“Have you called his wife?” said Patrick. “She’s the one who needs to put a stop to all this.”
“I’ve left two messages,” said Ellen. “I don’t think she could help now anyway. He’s got me in his sights.”
She paused. “Did I just say, ‘He’s got me in his sights’? I can’t believe I said that.”
Patrick didn’t answer. He was lying back on his pillow looking at his BlackBerry. He was addicted to it. It made Ellen laugh when he complained about Jack spending too much time on his Nintendo.
“Jesus,” said Patrick. He sat up.
“What?” said Ellen, thinking, Saskia.
“The bastard wants to take me to court.”
“What bastard?”
Patrick was still looking incredulously at the tiny screen. “That client who is refusing to pay his bill.” He tapped furiously with his thumbs. “I got my solicitor to send over a Letter of Demand today. And now this guy is not only refusing to pay, but he reckons he’s going to sue us because we took too long to complete the work. What a joke.”
“It’s probably just a, what do you call it, a countermove,” said Ellen.
“God almighty! The injustice of it.” Patrick’s whole body had become almost rigid with rage. “He wanted this job fast-tracked. We worked overtime for him. I missed Jack’s soccer game because of this prick, and then he has the audacity to say we took too long?”
“Your solicitor will know what to do,” said Ellen.
His rage made her feel nervous. She’d always found male anger intimidating. It was so physical.
She said, “You can call him first thing in the morning.”
“Yes,” said Patrick. He turned off his BlackBerry, took a deep breath and glanced at her. “We’re not having a great day, are we?”
Ellen pointed at her stomach. “Shhhh. It was a great day, remember?”
Patrick put his hand briefly on Ellen’s stomach. “Of course it was.”
He put the BlackBerry down on his bedside table and folded the quilt back so that it was covering Ellen but not him.
They snapped off their bedside lamps at the same time, lay down and turned away from each other, their backs pressed together.
“Flat pillow,” said Patrick suddenly, sitting back up and pulling his pillow out from behind his head.
“Oops,” said Ellen. They swapped pillows and lay back down again.
Patrick tapped her leg with his heel to say good night; she tapped back with her heel.
They’d been in a relationship for less than a year, and already they had so many routines, customs and procedures. It was like each new couple created a new kingdom together.
Saskia couldn’t let her kingdom go.
She closed her eyes and Ian Roman’s face immediately loomed in front of her, as if he’d been waiting behind a curtain, ready to jump out the moment she tried to fall asleep.
I’m putting you out of business.
He couldn’t really put her out of business, could he? Even if the article did imply terrible things about her, she wouldn’t lose all her clients, would she? All the goodwill she’d built up over the years couldn’t vanish overnight, could it?
From just one article?
And for heaven’s sake, how bad could that one article be? She wasn’t some sort of evil con artist. She hadn’t done anything wrong.
They couldn’t just make things up, could they?
Well, of course they could. She thought about all those celebrity articles announcing that Jennifer Aniston and Brad Pitt were getting back together, when they clearly weren’t. But she wasn’t a celebrity. Nobody actually cared about her life, whereas everybody wanted Brad and Jennifer to get back together; that’s why they wrote those articles, because that’s what people wanted to hear.
(She herself was quite keen for Brad and Jennifer to get back together.)
Surely this Lisa Hamilton would have enough journalistic integrity to talk to clients other than Luisa. Or did she have no choice? Had Ian Roman called her up and said, “I want this woman’s reputation trashed or it’s your job”?
Maybe the poor journalist had an abusive husband and three small children, one of them requiring some sort of expensive transplant, and she had to keep her job at all costs, so Ellen would have to be sacrificed.
“Can you sleep?” said Patrick, his voice suddenly loud in the quiet room.
“No.”
“Me neither.”
He switched his light back on. “Should I get us some milk or something? Tea?”
“No thanks,” yawned Ellen. She sat up.
He said, without any real enthusiasm, “Should we have sex, do you think?”
Ellen laughed. “I’m not feeling especially amorous.”
“No,” agreed Patrick. He sat up. “I think I’ll go write an abusive e-mail to that client. Or punch something. Or run around the block.”
“Let me do you a relaxation,” said Ellen. She would be glad of the distraction.
“You’ve got enough on your mind,” said Patrick.
“It’s fine,” said Ellen. “I go into a trance too.”
“Oh, God, thank you, I didn’t want to ask.” Patrick lay down next to her. “I can’t believe how hooked I’ve got on this.”
Ten minutes later he was in a medium trance, and Ellen herself was in that lovely liquid state she seemed to reach whenever she hypnotized Patrick.
“I want you to go back to a time when you felt completely relaxed. A time long before the stresses of running your own business. Think of a time when you felt completely relaxed and happy. Are you there yet?”
He nodded.
“Where are you?”
“Honeymoon,” said Patrick. His voice had that stupid drugged quality.
Ellen went very still.
Stop right there, said Flynn’s voice in her head. She paused, considering, listening to Patrick’s deep, even breaths.
Ask him, said Danny. Ask him what you want to know.
“What are you doing?” she said to Patrick. There was nothing wrong with that.
In the soft lamplight Patrick looked ten years younger. The lines between his eyes had smoothed out and his cheeks looked plumper.
“We’re snorkeling,” he said.
“You and Colleen,” checked Ellen.
Who else? Julia snorted in her head. Oh, what a load of rubbish, said her mother. He’s just describing a memory to you. This isn’t time travel.