A Chance Encounter by Rae Shaw (best ereader for academics .TXT) 📕

She pushed him away and changed tack. ‘How is the world of men?’

‘Horrendous.’ He swept his hand across his brow. ‘I've not been laid in days.’

‘No bikers on the horizon?’

The walls of Nicky's bedsit were covered with posters of motorbikes. And men. Men on bikes to be precise. Men wearing leathers or tattooed from neck to ankle. He wasn't that interested in the bikes.

‘Oh, there are always bikers, honey. Always. I’ve just been working tedious extra shifts.’

More giggles. He chopped the apple into quarters and handed one back to her. ‘Eat. You look like a wraith.’

‘I'm fine. I've been running every day.’

‘Good for you. But remember to eat.’

Freddie lectured her too. Frequently. Thin girls aren't attractive. Men like boobs and bums.

Nicky didn't know about Freddie. Nobody knew about him. She liked keeping it a secret; a trait that must run in the family. One day Freddie would be obsolete and she would stop sending messages and he wouldn't need to know why. She fancied meeting him first and thanking him in person for propping her up when everyone else watched her fall down.

She ate the apple, not because she was hungry, but because Nicky had asked her to, and she needed friends. And she would meet Mark again because he was family. Real family. It was time to let him back in and have him prove to her that he was man enough to look after her. Freddie had competition.

  7

Julianna

The first time Julianna met Mark, she had gone away convinced he was hiding something, perhaps an obsession for Hettie, and that was the reason why Chris had dumped his file right in Julianna’s line of sight.

During their second meeting they fine-tuned their tactics for trapping the fleet car manager. Mark called her Mrs Baptiste. There never had been a Mrs Alex Woodfall, only Ms Julianna Baptiste; she had proudly kept her family name. It was unfortunate error, but not uncommon. She corrected him, including the pronunciation, perhaps too sharply, then found herself blurting out the reason; Alex's sordid affair with his secretary. Mark sympathised with a few appropriate questions. Was it long ago? Nearly eighteen months. Divorced? A quickie, neither of them wanted to go to court. She even admitted she had literally thrown Alex out of the front door.

‘Formidable. Black belt in something?’ Mark asked.

‘Yes. A few of them.’

She liked his honesty and directness, the way he spoke what was on his mind instead of sugar coating it. She also noted he stared at her when he shouldn't. She tried to act like an adult and not squirm in her seat.

Snapping shots of the carpool manager at the petrol station, she ruminated on the painting of the bower, which hung right in front of Mark’s desk; the abstract depiction of a lady’s chamber hidden amongst leaves and branches. An allegory alluding to a covert love affair? Or was he simply expressing an infatuation with his boss's wife, which wasn't exactly healthy either. Each time she thought of the bower, she played out possible scenes until they reached some unsavoury conclusion. At that point, stuck in a car conducting a rather tedious stakeout, she realised she was still jealous of Hettie. Mark might have a fondness for the boss’s wife, but she was beyond his reach and he wasn't a fantasist. All he had of hers was a painting on the wall. It struck Julianna as ludicrous, almost insulting, to think she wanted him for herself. Then, what the heck, why shouldn’t she have some fun in life. It wasn’t as if she planned to recreate the Paris weekend.

The next visit to his office, they went through the photographs she had taken.

She had an itch that needed scratching, the subliminal kind of curiosity that she often had before questioning a suspect. Alone with Mark in his office was a good opportunity to find out what he thought of Haynes.

‘So, Mr Haynes has really taken you under his wing. He’s invited you to the Opportunitas fundraiser. Most employees are way down the pecking order for an invitation.’

He had stopped writing when she mentioned the fundraiser. ‘How did you know about the invite?’

‘I’m on the security team, remember? I get to see the list of invitees. Your name was on it.’ Including a blank space for an extra person to accompany him. Julianna wasn’t on that particular list; she would be otherwise engaged that night. She needed the extra money.

He tapped his pen on the paper and shrugged. ‘It’s because I was Hettie’s accountant. I helped sort out a problem she was having with overseas payments. She has a gallery… but you know that.’

She picked up a photograph and pretended to look at it. ‘I thought you worked at Daneswan?’

‘I did. It’s no big deal, okay, he offered me the opportunity to help with Hettie’s accounts. She’s brilliant at art, but rubbish at numbers. She won’t let Jackson get involved. She likes her independence.’

The painting on the wall of Mark’s office was a reward; it made sense, more personal than a bonus payment. But why had Mark told her it was Haynes who was his friend? ‘You met Haynes, and he gave you—’

‘No.’ Mark retrieved the photograph from her. ‘It all started because I chatted up Hettie in a wine bar. I didn’t know who she was, I just bumped into her, and thought… well, I didn’t pay attention to the man keeping an eye on her. She took my business card with her.’

Julianna tried hard not to smile. Poor Mark, hoping that a business card might forge more than a working relationship. ‘She would have given it to Jackson, and he, obviously, knows Daneswan, since he owns it.’

‘I had an interview, and he gave me Hettie’s account. Officially, it was all through Daneswan. Nothing private