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He began to leave, but Gustav’s next words stopped him in his tracks.
“You have time for Ben Rider though, don’t you?”
Aleksey was annoyed by this, for many reasons, but kept this emotion private, merely shrugging disinterest and continuing towards the door.
Rising from the bed, The Honourable sneered, “Oh, you can play the enigmatic nonchalance game,Nicky, but I saw your face when you were so studiously trying not to look at Pretty Boy. Do you think I’m stupid? You couldn’t have saidI love Ben Ridermore clearly than if you’d screamed it out to that entire room! You are utterlybesottedwith him.”
Aleksey closed the door through which he’d been about to leave and returned to this bewildering conversation. So true, and yet so missing the point at the same time. The man was stupid after all. Love. As if.
“You are entirely delusional. Who else have you told this little fantasy to? Have you been gossiping about me?”
Gustav backed into the light of the window, perhaps wanting to be seen from the street below. Ironic, Aleksey thought. His twin had done the same on a balcony once: glanced down to see if there was any support to be had from witnesses. Hadn’t helped him one bit.
“Why him, Nicky? Why that cold bloody fish? He'scommon. He's so...crass. Completely ignorant. Working class, for God’s sake. Does he like opera? The theatre? Can he even read? What’s his degree in—internalised homophobia? Who are his parents? He won’t give youanythingyou need. And I offered youeverythingyou could want. He’ll never love you as I did.Still do.”
Untangling this, attempting to keep up with the rapid-fire words, smirking a little to himself at the image of Ben at the opera or discussing erudite books he’d read, he eventually replied, “And I told you—everything is as nothing to me, and love is merely a word used by people who want to exert control.”
Gustav almost spat his fury. "Oh stop spouting that utter rubbish. I don't believe you any more.” He came a little closer. “I don't know exactly...but you're pretending somehow. All of this.” His arm swept the styled hair, the three-piece suit, the polished shoes. “I almost think I get it, like being at the theatre, I don’t know, you do something or say something and I sense it’s all just dialogue and stage directions...I don’t know! But I do know this isn't the real you, Nicky. It can't be. No one could be this cold and inhu—oh."
Aleksey stepped into the other man's personal space, a tactic he didn't bother to use all that often—when you were six foot four, you didn't need to occupy anyone else's anything—and held him in his tawny, merciless gaze. "Inhuman? Is that what you were going to say? If you were, then you are quite right. I can not be defined by the words that meanto be human. I have no fellow feeling, no sympathy, no empathy, no mercy to give, no understanding. The milk of human kindness soured in me in a place where milk was something we could barely remember the taste of. If I could, I would move this finger," he illustrated this nicely, he thought, by actually cocking his little finger as he'd seen his wife do whilst drinking tea out of fine bone china cups, a little touch of the dramatic that pleased him whilst he spun this bigger fiction, "and remove you from existence. From this room, this hotel, this city, this country, but most of all from my mind. You are nothing. Not, note, as nothing, but just nothing. Turn now and go away, Gustav. Do not come to Barton Combe again. Do not contact me in any way. I am bored of you. If you found me unpleasant before, when at least having you inexpertly suck my cock passed a mediocre few months of my life, you will not want to know me when I am bored. There were once many people in the world who regretted boring me." Ack, what was the point of knowing all these damn languages if you couldn't be a little verbose and theatrical in one when needed?
Aleksey was pleased to see that his words had, at last, taken effect. The other man had paled and flushed, an unpleasant combination of white forehead and pink cheeks with sweat under both eyes that repulsed him.
"Do you say this to Ben? Do you tell him he bores you? He's an ape loping around with pretty eyes!"
Aleksey repressed a grin. He was good at doing that as well. Many people had gone to their deaths in front of him not knowing he was chuckling inwardly at some quirky amusement to be had from their departure. Benjamin did many things to him, but boring him wasn't on the list. And he did indeed have pretty eyes. In fact, if put to hot pokers, he might admit that his main problem these days was not giving into the temptation to dive into the green pools of Benjamin Rider’s eyes, wholly and completely, and never come back up for air. But he was resisting still. It's what he did. As he'd said to this annoying little man, he was heartless. An overused word, yes, but he took its literal meaning and lived by that philosophy.
And although he had never let this thought cross his mind over the past few weeks, especially in the very darkest hours of the night when he lay awake at Barton Combe on his own, as profoundly alone in the bed as he was in the world, it had actually not passed him by that Benjamin Riderwascold. Aleksey Primakov wasn’t scared of anything of course, alive or dead, but even he didn’t relish diving into green pools only to find himself chilled to the bone—or to reach the bottom and discover the tempting water had been considerably shallower than he’d anticipated. Benjamin seemed more than willing to meet him, fuck him, and then leave to follow his own concerns, to live his own life.
He could still remember ripples in moonlight disappearing until there had been nothing left but smooth, cold, black water.
Indeed, he had only the other week discovered the provenance of Ben’s sudden, unexpected and unlikely interest in English house prices. Ben had apparently just bought his first property—a fuckingcottagein some remote uncivilised place—and had once or twice refused to meethimbecause he was there. In other words, Ben was not hanging around desperately waiting forhissummons, which he should be. Aleksey didn’t like Ben owning his own place. And he didn’t likenot likingit, because he suspected there was more to the not liking than just giving Ben a new focus that had nothing to do with him.
So, no, he wasn’t diving into anything anytime soon, green or otherwise. Major trauma could occur from reckless plunges into unknown water, after all.
He tested some words in his head, liked their import so said them. "Benjamin Rider means less to me than you, if that is possible."
Damn. Not so good out loud. Aleksey felt a momentary irritation for his own superb education and razor-sharp intellect. Why did he have to think about cocks crowing and betrayal now? It was very inconvenient. Well, he didn't believe in fate. Life was what you made it. He tested his philosophy a little by elaborating, "He not only means nothing, he is nothing as well." Ack, in for a penny, in for a pound. Another annoying expression he'd picked up since coming to live in this benighted little country with its silly language. "He could be killed tomorrow, and I would be glad to be free of the entanglement."
There. Three denials. When you committed to something, do it wholeheartedly with no thought for collateral damage. No lightning bolt struck him down. He’d have only bounced back if it had. It’s what he did.
Sure, some people might fear that such a moment, such betrayal of theactualtruth, would come back to haunt them later, but Aleksey didn't believe in later. He knew he was unlikely to live to see his fiftieth year. It was a miracle he was still alive now when you thought about it, considering he was dead. So, fuck it.
He was almost curious to see what this pathetic little man would say to counter such a superbly constructed deceit.
It almost even convinced him.
* * *
Chapter 30
Four Months Before April
He had not been stalking birds after all, this man with the large telephoto lens.
Had Ben not been preoccupied by happiness, and, he supposed, the permanent distraction of being with Nikolas Mikkelsen, he’d have realised that the guy might have beenpaparazzi. Stalkingthem.
Duh.
