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Nevertheless, she slid off obediently, whispered something in Radulf's ear and came over to Ben, holding up her arms, and he swung her onto his shoulders, where she dug her fingers into his scalp and then clung hard, pulling on his hair. “Ow.”
“It’s my reins. Faster horsey.”
Sarah had risen and was hovering. She offered him a treat from the bag, and Ben realised they were homemade flapjacks and he was starving, so took one. He debated explaining that the dogs shouldn’t have any, but suspected he was outvoted and wasting his time. They all began to walk together back towards the house, and Ben asked Sarah conversationally, “How are you getting on with the new guys?”
Employing Sarah to be Molly’s full-time nanny had been one of his better decisions—even Nikolas now admitted. He knew Nik had been highly skeptical at first, considering Sarah an unsuitable companion for their daughter. But Nikolas had only recently confided to him, one night when he was attempting, unsuccessfully, to get Ben to share his cigarette, that Sarah was possibly the only completely normal person Molly met, and was therefore to be highly prized. She was always calm and always happy. And, of course, she still bore the scars of her ordeal attempting to save Molly’s life that spring. That, Ben knew, counted for more with Nikolas than her undoubted normality. True loyalty and courage—they both knew you couldn’t buy those qualities in people, they were ones only freely given.
Sarah was anxiously watching Molly pull Ben’s hair as she replied, “Oh, good. I think. They’re not around very often, are they, Mol-Mol?”
Ben smiled to himself. Hannibal was lurking even then, merely a shadow in the woods off to one side. He wondered what Sarah had assumed the dogs were doing when they appeared to be wagging their tails enthusiastically at empty bushes.
Molly was now kicking him with her heels, presumably attempting to get him to break into a run, which he might have done without the nanny’s presence. Instead, he swung her off and held her upside down for a minute by her ankles, which usually left her hysterically over-excited and exhausted with gleeful screaming, which at least gave him a break from her constant attentions.
Unfortunately, they were intercepted by Babushka, who was coming out seeking Sarah. Babushka immediately flew to Ben’s side, chastising him in quick, angry Russian, which he didn’t understand a word of but didn’t need to. She righted the child and hugged her. Molly took advantage of the situation and additional attention by bursting into tears, which then saw Ben, Radulf and PB looking on disbelievingly as the two females enveloped her and tried by bribes and promises to calm her.
Ben wrinkled his nose, glanced at Radulf and agreed with him that it was time for a holiday.
The idea cemented itself so firmly that when he arrived back at the house, fortunately free of all encumbrances, he went straight to one of the computers and woke it up.
He Googledholidays.
Addedno childrento the search.
Then tagged oncouples only.
Then he deleted all of this and typedmen only holiday.
The results made him smirk: most of the suggestions appeared to be clothing optional—not what he was looking for at all.
He wasn’t deterred. His morning had made him…determined.
* * *
Chapter 9
Fourteen Years Ago
Smoking in bed was something Aleksey had forbidden himself to do. After all, when you were a complete impostor, it often wasn’t one grand misstep that got you caught, it was the little details that added up: one of Philipa’s guests mentioning that he appeared to have switched to Russian when swearing at her husband; not knowing anything at all about Danish politics when he was supposed to have a degree in the subject, and a housekeeper claiming she smelt cigarettes in his bedroom when Sir Nikolas Mikkelsen purportedly didn’t smoke. But on the other hand, he was aware that psychopaths often gave themselves away by being too good at lying. Smoking in bed, therefore, proved he wasn’t one.
And it was his best thinking time.
Had he been a truly introspective person, he might have been feeling a bit sorry for Benjamin Rider. Ben was due tomorrow. Aleksey wondered if the young man was brushing up on his grade D GCSE in metalwork for a possible topic of conversation. What would he pack? If the suit he’d worn to the interview was anything to go by, Ben Rider didn’t value or understand clothes. Or his body come to that.
He supposed Ben would arrive on his motorbike, not think to take a train and then call casually from the station fully expecting his host to pick him up, as Philipa’s friends did—in other words, arriving like acivilisedperson.
Aleksey knew a great deal about Ben Rider now, so none of this was really idle speculation.
What he did not know, however, was Ben’s preference in bed. That, he had not been able to discover. True, it did not appear that he had a girlfriend. Now, or in the past. Although he had known a few men like that, ascetics who denied themselves sexual pleasure for the promise of something beyond this life, he did not see Ben in that guise. Although such oddities did often gravitate towards institutions such as the army. Or the church, obviously. Anything with rigour and a higher calling. Or there was the very real possibility that Ben Rider was in fact autosexual. This too, Aleksey had come across during his long and varied history with sexual attraction in many forms. Aleksey found himself laughing out loud when the thought crossed his mind that if he were Ben Rider, he’d fancy himself too.
All of this formed part of a very pleasant Thursday night, anticipating an intriguing weekend ahead.
The most important question Aleksey had not answered to his own satisfaction, therefore, was whether Ben Rider would fuck another man. Or, more to the point, him.
Even his third cigarette had not given him the answer to this. There had been something between them, but he wasn’t too sure that this hadn’t just been male dick-measuring.
He hadn’t made any specific plans for the weekend other than throwing Benjamin Rider in at the deep end and watching to see how fast he’d sink. Maybe he’d rescue him, maybe he wouldn’t.
He idly wondered if Ben was thinking about him.
