‘So tell me.’
He sighs again, checks around to make sure nobody can hear and then lowers his voice so that I can barely catch the words. ‘It was all on email,’ he says.
‘How did someone get your email? I thought it was done through a website?’
‘It is… well, it usually is. I’ve got two mobiles – one for work, one for me. I’ve also got a few email addresses. Sometimes I give my actual number or email to a client.’
‘The person who contacted you is a former client?’
He bites his lip and shakes his head: ‘I’ve been doing this for years. At first it was just the odd woman but then I started telling people they could pass it onto their friends. I probably get half a dozen emails a week from people I’ve never met. My details have been passed on so many times over that it’s not really a secret any longer.’
‘What does that mean?’
Stephen presses back and runs a hand through his hair. He glances across to the waiter, who is perched on a stool at the bar, pretending not to watch us. He’s well out of earshot.
‘It means I often meet women who’ve not gone through the agency,’ Stephen says. ‘They say they got my email or phone number from a friend and I take it at that.’
‘You make more money if you arrange things yourself…?’
‘Obviously.’
I don’t know enough about the industry to know how things work but it sounds genuine enough. I have another sip of water, taking a couple of seconds to think it over.
‘Who emailed you asking you to meet me in the hotel?’
‘I don’t remember.’
‘I don’t believe you.’
He’s unrolling his sleeves now: ‘It’s the truth.’
‘How much were you paid?’
‘Doesn’t matter.’
‘How were you paid?’
‘PayPal.’
‘Is DBA Enterprises something to do with you?’
He looks at me blankly and pouts a lip. ‘Should it be?’
I try to look for any sort of tic to say he might be lying – but there’s nothing. I’m not convinced I know when someone’s telling the truth anyway. I couldn’t spot the truth from my own husband a few hours ago. Just because Stephen doesn’t know DBA Enterprises, it doesn’t mean the thousand pounds that left Dan’s credit card wasn’t funnelled through some other account before being sent via PayPal to him. That’s low on my priorities for now.
‘What happened in the hotel?’ I ask.
Stephen bites his lip and frowns. He seems confused. ‘We ate, we talked and we drank.’
‘Then what?’
‘We didn’t sleep together.’
I was almost certain of that anyway but breathe out in relief. I might tamper with evidence but I’m not an adulterer. Bully for me. ‘You were still in my room, though…?’ I say. ‘You helped me into bed.’
‘I made sure you were safe.’
The word stings. I start to say something and then stop myself. ‘Safe from what?’
His eye twitches as he realises he’s said too much.
‘What did you do?’ I ask.
He rubs his forehead and squeezes his eyes closed tight. As I watch him, an ominous creeping sensation starts to ripple through me. The dawning realisation of something I should have figured out before.
‘I only had three drinks,’ I say. ‘You spiked me, didn’t you?’
Stephen doesn’t reply, instead screwing up his lips and chewing on them. His allure has long gone and he looks like a man whose life is crumbling in front of him.
‘What was it?’ I ask.
‘I don’t know.’
‘Come off it.’
‘I really don’t.’
‘So how did you get it? Why did you do it? Were you going to rob me?’
He shakes his head. ‘It was all in the email,’ he replies.
It takes me a moment to understand what he’s said.
‘Someone emailed you asking to spike my drink?’
It’s barely there but he nods. He glances to the waiter again but nobody has moved. No one can hear us. ‘They wanted me to befriend you and then slip something into your drink. They said it would be funny – that you’d find it hilarious.’
‘Hilarious? Are you joking?’
‘I wish…’
He can’t look at me – but the same is true of me. I can’t stand the sight of him. It feels like I’ve been invaded.
‘I thought you didn’t know the person who paid you?’ I say.
‘I don’t.’
‘So how did you get the pill or whatever it was you put in my drink? Do you have that sort of thing lying around?’
Stephen is barely moving. His head is in his hands and he’s staring at the tablecloth. ‘I got it in the post,’ he says. ‘They said they’d send it and it arrived a day later. They said it would dissolve in a drink and it did.’
‘What was it?’
‘I don’t know. Probably Rohypnol, something like that.’
‘You put Rohypnol in my drink and thought that was fine…?!’
I’m on the verge of shouting but also on the brink of not caring. He shushes me and I’ve never been closer to hitting someone in the face. I’ve never been violent, never had those urges and yet my fists are clenched. The whole of my upper body is coiled. I’m not sure how but I manage not to shout or lash out.
Stephen must see the fury in me because he leans in again, his voice low and pleading. ‘They said it was a joke. That you’d think it was funny. They said you prank each other all the time. I wasn’t going to do it, but…’
‘But what?’
He shrugs, not needing to say he did it for the money. He’s either an idiot, dangerous, or both. Someone sent him a pill in the post which could have been anything. It could have poisoned me but he slipped it into my drink anyway because of the pay-off. I can barely comprehend it – but, if I’m honest, when it comes to money, people have done far worse things for what would likely be far less. Junkies have mugged and killed for pound coins. Pensioners have had their houses burgled while they sleep for the contents of their purses and wallets.
‘Why’d you need the money so badly?’ I ask.
‘Do you care?’
‘Perhaps.’
With all sense of decorum gone, he wipes his nose the back of his hand and cleans it on his trousers. ‘Online poker,’ he says. ‘I spent over a hundred grand last year. I’m constantly moving money between three credit cards just to pay rent.’
He’s right that I don’t care – but at least I have a degree of understanding.
As if reading my mind, he glances to the envelope on the table but doesn’t reach for it.
‘Is there anything you won’t do for money?’ I ask.
He’s past caring as well. ‘Not much.’
‘How much were you paid for me?’
There’s no delaying this time. He answers straight away: ‘A grand.’
I wish I could be surprised but I’m not. I wonder how Dan got hold of Stephen’s details, or how he knew about Stephen’s financial problems. It could have been luck, or perhaps Dan cruised a host of websites and tried multiple people before stumbling across Stephen. Perhaps someone turned his request down but gave him Stephen’s email address and said to try him instead. I’m not sure it matters. It’s the here and now that counts.
‘What did you do after taking me to my room?’ I ask.
‘Put you to bed.’
‘And…?’
‘And I left you. The email said to put the door on the latch so they could walk in. It said they were going to surprise you.’
There’s something terrifyingly creepy about the way he says it. He must have known how vulnerable I’d be. I was left on a bed, barely conscious, with the door unlocked. Anyone could have walked in.
It’s hard to contain my emotion. I’m scared of what might have been and I’m so furious that I have to grip the arms of my chair to stop myself shaking. I can barely get the words out.
‘What was the name on the email?’ I hiss.
He shakes his head. ‘I don’t remember.’
‘I still don’t believe you.’
He looks around, hoping the waiter will save him. Either that or a meteor.
No such luck.
‘You’ve still got the email, haven’t you?’
He swallows and rolls his eyes. I know I’m right. Without me having to ask, he digs into his pocket and pulls out a phone. He shields the screen with one hand, scrolling with the other and then re-pocketing it.