“But I am in love with you, Adrienne. That has to count for something. Okay, not very much if you’re not in love with me anymore.”
“Of course I am!” The words came out almost as a gasp, and she looked hurt and emotional that he could have even doubted her love. He thought again of the tears Jonas had told him about, wishing he could undo them.
He moved closer, putting his hand up to her cheek, her skin soft and hot to the touch.
“You’re hot—are you okay?”
She smiled. “I’m fine. But thank you for saying I’m hot.”
He smiled, too, and said, “Oh, I don’t even need to say that you’re hot.”
He let his hand slip down across her shoulder, then traced his fingers across her breast. Her body seemed to respond to his touch, but almost instantly she reached up, grabbing his hand and holding it firm over her heart.
“No more secrets.”
“No more secrets,” he said.
“Then tell me what’s going on. Why are they watching you? What’s on the USB stick?” He looked surprised. “Yes, she told me about that too, so you don’t fool me—it’s why you have Mathieu’s laptop.”
He looked at her, earnest as he said, “I can’t tell you.” She pulled his hand away from her and let it drop. “Not yet, because I’m not even sure myself what it’s about. I left under a cloud six years ago, but I thought it was done, finished with.”
“And it isn’t?”
“Maybe not.” She looked frustrated again, and he said, “I’m not being evasive, Adrienne, I just don’t know what’s going on. They appear to be raking over the past, but I don’t know why. I don’t even know if I need to do anything about it.”
“How can you do nothing? People are spying on you. I can’t come back to an apartment like that.”
“So you might be coming back?”
Almost involuntarily, she shook her head. “I don’t know. I don’t know if I can believe you anymore. I don’t know how much of the person I’ve known is a lie.”
“Most of it.” She looked shocked, as if she might have misheard. “I only thought about it the other day . . . I don’t know how you stayed with me for so long. I’m cold, distant, I keep secrets—and I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to not keep secrets. I know it must seem like I’m not even there most of the time.”
“You’re too hard on yourself.” Then she thought about it and said, “But all those things are true, most of the time, and I’ve loved you in spite of them. I’ve loved you in spite of them but I can’t anymore. It’s not even about secrets, although if I were to come back there could be no more—it’s about living, about the way we never discuss . . . getting married, having a family.”
“Is that what you want?”
She laughed, perhaps at the hopelessness of it all, and after a moment she said, “You know, there’s a quote from Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, about love not being a matter of staring into each other’s eyes, but both staring out together in the same direction. With you, it feels like we’re both looking in different directions.”
She stood up abruptly. He tried to reach out for her again, desperate for her not to go. Even being admonished by her, in ways and for things he did not fully comprehend, he still wanted just to be with her. But she moved away too quickly, and how could he explain that, despite his continuing need for secrecy, he would be different, that something about this last week had changed him.
“Adrienne—” She stopped and put a finger to her lips. Quieter, he said, “Will you be back?”
“I don’t know. Will you?” He smiled, acknowledging the point, finally reduced to its most concentrated form. She hesitated then, near the door, and said, “Do you remember the last time we spoke, when you called from Béziers?”
“Of course.”
“Do you remember what I said to you?”
“No. No, I don’t.”
She smiled—a smile tinged with sadness—as she said, “Because I said almost nothing at all. I had things I wanted to talk to you about, but you didn’t ask me anything, just told me about your research and your hotel and the journey and the hire car. It was the final thing, to make me decide, so I came here, where people would want to talk with me about the things I wanted to talk about.”
“We could talk about them now.”
“But I don’t want to, not anymore. Goodnight, Finn.”
He watched her glide away, then turned and looked at the laptop. He took the memory stick out of his pocket, but decided against looking at the material again tonight, doubting there was anything more he could learn, not even wanting to think about it.