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‘I’m sorry if you’ve been bothered, Mr. Lockhart,’ she said, with a flash of her green eyes which was a little bit more familiar than it needed to be. She looked disapprovingly at Fran, who was hastily re-knotting the belt on her kimono. ‘I can arrange to have security come and—’
Sam shook his dark head. ‘No, that’s fine,’ he smiled. ‘Miss Fisher and I will be sitting over there—’ He gestured with his head to where tables were grouped in the high-ceilinged foyer, where people had been drinking morning coffee and sliding scrumptious cakes onto bone china plates, but were now momentarily distracted by the sight of Fran. ‘Perhaps you could arrange to have a tray of tea sent over in a little while?’
‘Certainly, sir.’
Fran felt his hand firmly grip her elbow and propel her towards a vacant table. ‘Come and sit down,’ he murmured. ‘Or are you enjoying drawing this much attention to yourself?’
All her courage seemed to have suddenly deserted her. ‘I must look a sight,’ she muttered.
‘A fairly distracting sight,’ he agreed. ‘Come on. That table over in the corner is free, and it’s right out of the way.’
She was glad to sink down in a chair, away from all the curious faces. Then she forced herself to look into the dark-blue eyes, expecting to find bitterness and recrimination there, but was astonished to find none. Just that wry, questioning look.
‘You aren’t angry with me any more?’ she said.
‘Should I be?’ He settled back in the chair watchfully. ‘My anger is all spent, Fran. Interested is the word I would use to describe my reaction to seeing you here dressed in that extraordinary outfit. No, scrub that. Intrigued.’
She took a deep breath. This wasn’t going to be easy, and neither was she expecting it to be easy. So it was important that she expressed herself in a way which made it clear that there could be no misunderstanding.
‘I’m so sorry, Sam,’ she said simply. ‘Really, really sorry.’
If she had stood up and performed a slow and erotic striptease, Sam could not have been more surprised.
‘You’re sorry?’ His eyes narrowed. ‘Why?’
‘For allowing myself to be drawn into this whole stupid saga—this childish quest for revenge, without bothering to find out whether it was justified.’
He digested this for a moment. ‘And what’s brought all this on?’
‘Rosie rang me—’ she bit her lip.
‘And?’
‘And told me the truth about your encounter with her—’
‘The whole truth?’ he frowned.
‘Well, not all the gory details. She said she’d got you drunk.’ She looked at him with a question in her eyes.
Sam sighed. He had tried to do the decent thing by not telling her what had really happened that night, but suddenly he realised that his well-meaning courtesy had been badly misplaced. Half-truths bred like bacteria in the fertile breeding ground of the imagination and he needed to exorcise the knock-on effects of the whole sorry incident before it did any more harm.
‘She caught me at a vulnerable time,’ he said slowly. ‘It had been the second anniversary of Megan’s death, and I couldn’t face the thought of going home to an empty flat. Rosie was working at Gordon-Browne with me, always the listener, always attentive. But she wasn’t in-my-face, like the other four. She had become a friend. Or so I thought.’
‘Yes. She said.’
‘That night she insisted that I needed to get out more, said that she’d take me to a wine-bar she knew for a quick drink on the way home.’
Fran nodded.
‘The quick drink turned into a long drink. A very long drink. I was already quite smashed when we got into a cab and headed for my flat. I should have eaten something and crashed out and woken up with an almighty headache, but I allowed Rosie to persuade me to drink some whisky.’ His eyes were very blue and very troubled. ‘I have only vague recollections of what happened during the night, but my memory of the morning is much clearer. Rosie told me that we’d made love during the night, and that she had been a virgin.’ His mouth twisted with horror and pain.
‘I’m not trying to absolve myself of all the blame—obviously there must have been a part of me that wanted it to happen, otherwise, I presume I wouldn’t have been capable.’
‘Don’t!’ she whispered.
‘I have to, honey.’ He swallowed down the self-disgust he felt. ‘I tried to feel something for Rosie, but I simply couldn’t. Then when she let slip that she had been determined to have me, and had manoeuvred me into that position…well, I found that I didn’t even want to see her any more. From being a friend whom I relied on she became the symbol of a night when I felt I’d sunk so low, I wasn’t sure I’d ever be able to rise to the surface again.’
‘But you did,’ she said softly.
