Chapter 39

39

S ol got to the remains of the thirteenth-century palace that had served as the living quarters of the Bishops of Winchester five minutes before the agreed-upon time and relished in the fact that, for once, she was the first to arrive. Luke got there one minute later. His hair was perfectly disheveled, his clothes ruggedly dark and sexy, and he was smiling. He approached her but stopped himself before touching her as if realizing the etiquette around that greeting hadn't been negotiated.

"Can I kiss you?" she asked him, returning his smile.

"Yes," he pleaded more than assented, as if echoing her feelings from the previous night.

She went for his mouth, trailing his bottom lip and biting it before kissing him. She felt a bit lightheaded when he kissed her back. One of his hands was on her face, the other on her waist, and his smell all around her.

"Ciao," he said when she finally pulled back.

"Hola," she said in turn, realizing they were the object of intense observation from a group of around twenty four-to-six-year-old children on what could only be a school-organized outing. Were she and Luke making so much of a scene? "Since I'm sure you've seen the Winchester Palace many times, let's get moving, yes? Let's passeggiare." She grabbed his right arm and steered him in the direction of the river.

"Are you shy?" he asked as they made their rushed way out of the children's view. "The whole Mediterranean meeting was your idea, and I think we were acting in a completely appropriate fashion."

"For Southern Europe, yes," she agreed. "But let's behave more like proper Londoners if we're in a crowded public space."

"So you're shy." He laughed.

"Before we both forget again ," she told him to switch subjects and because she knew they truly would forget otherwise, "and then we can go back to all this playful banter you excel at, I don't recall another attendee in class the night of the theft. But I remembered something else."

"I was going to protest your shameless change of subject," he said. "But now I want to know. Also, are you guiding me on this tour of my hometown?"

"I'm not guiding, I'm merely following the river!" She signaled the Bankside promenade in front of The Anchor tavern with its brownish brick fa?ade and red-painted wood paneling. "We both know you're a North Londoner, so don't get so possessive about South London, please."

"So what else did you remember?" he asked as they both eased into a more relaxed walking cadence alongside the river.

"Look who's changing subjects now," Sol quipped.

"Sol," he said, once again lengthening the sound of the final letter of her name.

"Okay, I can't torture you when you say my name that way," she said. She took a deep breath to focus. "So, we established that the class must have ended at 6:40 on the day of the theft. When Josie dismissed us, I went to the locker area to grab my bag but realized that my compartment was unlocked."

"Unlocked?"

"I didn't have to input the four numbers of my combination because the door was already unlocked and ajar. At the time, I thanked the deities of tardiness for such a blessing because I assumed I had forgotten to lock the thing when I came in for class. I was a bit late. And it came in handy on my way out because, again, I was a bit late. And I hate?—"

"Being late." He laughed. "Yes, I've noticed."

Sol ignored him and continued.

"But thinking about it, perhaps the same person who opened Sara's locker to get the script also opened mine and maybe a few others on their search for the right compartment. It's not like we have an assigned one. You get to choose your locker for the class on a first-come basis. The first to arrive tend to choose the ones where you don't have to crouch to get your stuff in and out."

"But you're not completely sure that it wasn't you who left the locker open by mistake?"

"Not really. It wouldn't be the first time," she said. "Sometimes I get to class still distracted because I'm rewriting an article on my mind and make some notes on my cell phone and just forget about locking the whole thing. I've never thought much of it because, as I've told you repeatedly , I don't think any of Josie's members would steal anything. And you need to get buzzed into the building to get access to the studio. So it's not like someone from the outside could come mid-class and loot the lockers when we're all agonizing through the five series."

"So what else happened that day? You found the locker open, thought nothing of it…"

"Grabbed my bag and left quickly because I was in a rush to get home and from there dinner at this tapas place on Bermondsey."

"Bermondsey?" he said in an almost judgy tone, as if that wasn't one of the boroughs of London but a faraway land in the suburbs.

"Mare meva! You are such a North Bank snob! I go there often with my friend Laia because she lives in the area and for me it's a short taxi ride away. There's life south of the Thames, Luca."

"And you were meeting your friend when?" he said, ignoring her jest.

"Is this still for your case? You need a detailed log of my movements that evening or something?"

"It could come in handy to prove your lack of involvement when we finally draft that wretched report for Meshflixx. But I'm also just being nosey."

"We were having dinner at 7:30, I guess—it's our regular dinner time," Sol said. "When I left the studio, I needed to get home to leave my things and get changed, but since it was late I took the Tube at Charing Cross. I normally just walk home."

"For some reason, I can't picture one of Josie's disciples doing something as mundane—and plebeian—as taking the Tube," he said.

"Please!" she protested. "I do it all the time! I wasn't even the only ‘disciple,'" she said, air quoting that last word. "When I got to the platform to wait for my train, I ran into Sara."

"Sara Daniels?"

"Uh-huh."

"Hadn't she left class like ten minutes before you?"

"Don't underestimate my ability to move fast when I'm in a hurry," Sol explained. "Also, apparently there were delays on the Northern line and she'd been at the platform for a while. I think she said she needed to be home to finish something for work."

"Did you ask her what she needed to do?"

"I would never. There's nothing that causes more paranoia than a journalist asking unnecessary questions. She was purposely vague on whatever she needed to do and then she complimented my bag, which is indeed gorgeous. Oh and then Phyllis got there too, actually."

"Phyllis?" Luke asked, confused.

"Philippa! I always mix up her name. You know, the influencer who's at Josie's on a permanent basis?"

"I know who Philippa Majors is," Luke said. "But I can't picture her taking the Tube."

"I would have never said you were so prejudiced," she told him, amused. They stopped for a moment to take in the views across the Thames in front of Shakespeare's Globe Theater.

"I'm not prejudiced!" He imitated Sol in her admiration of the city's skyline. "But I assumed she'd have a chauffeured car taking her everywhere."

"She probably does have a driver," Sol conceded. "But she normally walks to Josie's from her place in Grosvenor Street. The woman lives by her daily steps quota as much as I do."

"So what was she doing there then?"

"I don't know! The train arrived then. I said bye to both of them and made my way inside one of the crowded cars. I was in a hurry, remember?"

"Yes, in a hurry to trek to Bermondsey," Luke said, and Sol laughed. "Don't tell me there are no neighborhoods in Barcelona that you consider far away and where you never set foot?"

"Oh, many of them! Most of them probably," she admitted. "Now that you make me think about it, I tend to limit myself to a walkable and historical part of the city and never venture too far from it. It's funny to meet my London equivalent in a way."

"Why did you move out?" he asked.

"What do you mean?" Sol wasn't prepared for the abruptness of his question.

"You seem so much in love with Barcelona," he replied.

"Oh I am. I guess I needed to leave the place to realize how much I miss it. Don't you ever take London for granted?"

"I try not to," he said, but lately he'd been more aware of how inadvertently that could happen.

"Of course, you don't." He thought he saw not only sympathy in her eyes but also some friendly enviousness.

"But there was also the matter of work," she continued. "Not many prospects for me in Barcelona even with a network of friends and university colleagues working in media. It's such a small market. There are just no jobs."

"California welcomed you with open arms?"

"It's not that." Sometime during the conversation, her manner had changed. She was no longer teasing him. "It was tough. I was homesick. It's so far away. It's so different from Europe and everything I knew. The visa was a nightmare. But there was a sense of things working in a way where I'd be able to find a job based on merits. No need to be personal friends or the sister-in-law of the hiring manager."

"Was it hard moving here after that?" he asked, slightly afraid of her answer.

"Moving is always hard. No matter how many times you do it." She had donned a pair of round wayfarer Ray-Ban glasses at some point during the walk, so he couldn't see her eyes but her voice sounded melancholic. "You have to make new friends, open new bank accounts, get a new cell phone plan, a new internet provider and, what's worse, find a new place to live and a new hairdresser. Plus, I moved here on the eve of fucking Brexit." There it was, the word Luke had been anticipating and dreading since he met her. "I did it on time to be able to sort my immigration status. But, in a way, I felt I was moving to a country that didn't necessarily want me. I'll always feel like an outsider. It's not like I wasn't feeling like an outsider before. I guess it comes with being an immigrant."

"My mom talks about feeling that way as well, and she's been living in London since the nineties. She says the accent doesn't help." He wanted Sol to know that he understood. "I think that's why I don't speak Italian outside of their house and I've always tried to disguise that side of myself." He was surprised by his openness. The only other people he'd ever talked about that with were his sisters.

"You speak Italian with me," she said, smiling again.

"That's only because I noticed how much that side of me attracts you."