19. Adam

19

ADAM

I ’ve stayed away from Alchemy for almost a week, telling myself there’s no reason at all for me to go there—even if the team comped me a membership, which is decent of them. I’ve already looked around the place, sampled the wares, as it were, and set the ball rolling on the transfer of ownership from Wolff to Wright.

No other due diligence is needed. The bankers and lawyers can firm up the details once Wolff’s board signs off, which I’m sure they’ll do happily. The stake has been a bigger financial PR headache than its tiny presence on Wolff’s balance sheet warrants.

The real reason I’ve stayed away, though, is precisely the same reason I want to show up there so badly.

Natalie Bennett.

God knows, I couldn’t find a less suitable person to fixate on. There isn’t a woman on the planet who’d find the prospect of the slightest intimacy with me more morally repugnant.

My therapist may insist that I keep women at arm’s length because I still believe, deep down, that I’m unworthy of love. (Rather, he may have insisted once and hurriedly retracted when I threatened to fire him.) Lord knows what he’d say if he thought for a moment I had designs on a woman with whom my chances of making reparations for past unholy crimes are zero.

I know perfectly well what he’d say, in fact. He’d say I’m hoping to win her over because absolution from Stephen Bennett’s own sister would be the purest form of absolution I could hope for.

So yes, I steer clear of Alchemy. The irony of my investing in a sex club where I can have any woman I please except for the one I actually want is not lost on me. Seeing Natalie will serve no purpose, ergo reacquainting myself with her enchanting face and perfect body and vicious tongue is pointless.

She endured the hospitality I rammed down her throat with thinly-veiled hostility. She enjoyed my home, sure, but certainly not my company. She may as well have been a fairytale princess trapped in a brute’s dungeon for all the graciousness she exhibited. Persephone, even, condemned to Hades’ underworld.

Thank heaven she didn’t stir while I was stupid enough to fall asleep on her bed. I’m not sure which she would have found creepier—me passed out next to her with a huge boner or me, wakeful and watchful.

It genuinely pissed me off that she wouldn’t give me access to her data, that she let her pride and her dislike of me get in the way of having an extra pair of eyes monitoring her while she slept. I haven’t had any exposure to type 1 since Ellen died, and I wasn’t prepared for how incredibly upsetting it would be to witness Natalie’s attack, how powerless I’d feel as I struggled to get her glucose up and, later, as I lay there next to her with no way of monitoring her short of cracking open a lancet and puncturing the pale skin of the sleeping princess to draw her blood.

That said, the gratification I took from that hour or so of watching her sleep before I succumbed myself had a cause entirely separate from altruism. Not only did she look so peaceful, her beautiful face free from the horrific attack that had contorted it earlier, but all her hostility was gone, too. I was able to gaze down at her for as long as I liked while she slept the tranquil sleep of someone blithely unaware both that their mask had dropped and that their enemy was near.

She makes a fine sight when she’s not looking at you as if she’d like to douse you in petrol and throw a lit match at you.

Although, if I’m being honest, she makes a fine sight when she is, too.

I last six days, until Cal, one of the Alchemy founders, proposes drinks at the club, a chance for all of us to informally toast the passing of the baton from Wolff to Wright. Anton will be there, as will Max, Wolff’s current CEO, with his boyfriend, Dex, and his girlfriend, Darcy, who happens to be Gen’s sister.

This place is incestuous enough to put Ancient Egypt to shame.

I’m also expecting to see Cal’s partner, the charming broadcast journalist and documentarian Aida Russell, who’s interviewed me a couple of times in the past. It should be a good night. It’s the perfect chance to toast the changing of the guard and to catch up with friends, old and new.

It’s absolutely not about throwing myself in the path of any beguiling Alchemy hosts who hate my guts and haunt my dreams. It’s a shame the gestures that might make Natalie hate me slightly less—such as my impassioned cold call earlier this week to plead her brother’s case to a friend of a friend who founded OcuNova, an impressive ocular prosthetics company—can’t ever come to light.

Changing Stephen Bennett’s fortunes for the better isn’t about improving my reputation. It’s about making quiet, necessary reparations when the opportunities arise.

When I enter the lobby and Natalie spots me, it’s not outright hostility I detect, but rather wariness. Conflict, even. She’s recovered her poise by the time I get to the lectern.

‘Hi,’ I say softly, taking her in. Her hair is tied back in a long, sleek ponytail. It’s a little like the one she sported the other morning, but more glamorous, somehow. Or perhaps it’s the heavy eye makeup that provides the glamour. She even has an arc of tiny, immaculately applied crystals above each eyelid. All I know is that she’s a vision.

The strapless, boned corset of her top—or dress, I can’t tell from here—is crafted from black satin and moulds perfectly to her body, its rhinestone trim sparkling prettily under the chandelier and its cut showcasing the delicate architecture of her collarbones, the toned musculature of her upper arms. The cups are the only parts not done in satin. Rather, they’re pleated chiffon, the edges of the fabric frayed, feathering against her skin like the impossibly pretty edge of a parrot tulip.

I’d put money on it being one of her creations. Still, it’s skimpy and it’s bloody November, after all. The faintest goosebumps are visible on her skin, and I make a mental note to tell Gen to turn the heating up in the lobby.

Far worse, in the split-second that I take her in, my brain serves up to me the morsel that her nipples are very clearly also feeling the cold.

Not fucking helpful.

I wonder what proportion of the clientele hits on her before they’ve even made it through to the bar. A decent one, I imagine. The thought irritates me.

‘Good evening, Mr Wright,’ she says smoothly, and I raise an eyebrow. Mr Wright? Seriously?

‘I’d like to think we’ve graduated to first name terms by now, wouldn’t you?’

‘Of course. Whatever you prefer.’

She doesn’t react. Neither does she say my name. Her impassivity is armour indeed.

‘How are you doing?’ I ask her. ‘It’s a general question,’ I add hurriedly, in case she takes it as a circuitous enquiry about her glucose levels.

‘I’m fine. Thank you for sending the bag over last week. And for the book. You didn’t need to do that.’

‘It was my pleasure.’

‘I’m sure Nigel had better things to do than come back into town on my account.’

‘He really didn’t.’ I lean in confidingly. ‘In fact, one of Nige’s absolute favourite burger joints is on Brewer Street. So I imagine a lunchtime trip to Soho worked out very well indeed for him.’

That gets me a little smile. ‘Well, it was kind, thank you.’

We appraise each other for a minute. She’s inscrutable when she’s in host mode, and find I don’t like it. I’d far rather she was screaming at me, or being exceptionally rude, or giving me side-eye. I don’t like that she’s behaving as though I’m some random punter who can only expect small talk and barely-interested civilities.

I don’t like it at all .

Still, I find myself lingering, hesitant to go on through and bring my brief moment with her to a close.

‘Do you know if any of the guys are in there yet? I’m meeting your bosses and a couple of others—Max Hunter and his partners.’

An expression I can’t quite read flits over her delicate features—the wispiest of clouds across a clear sky. Disappointment? Disapproval? ‘Max just arrived with Dex and Darcy—they’ve gone on through. And the rest of them are in the bar, too, except for Rafe.’

Rafe already sent his apologies that he wouldn’t make it tonight. I know his wife is close to popping.

‘Excellent.’

There’s a draught of cold air when the doorman lets another member in behind me, but I pause.

She chews her lip, as if she’s waiting for me to clear off.

And I bite the bullet. ‘Will I—do you ever…’ I clear my throat and gesture behind her. ‘You know, go next door when your shift is done?’

We stare at each other, and I swear her clear brown eyes widen a little, as though she’s caught my unasked questions.

Will I see you in there later?

Do you ever slip through those doors and let any of those hungry, entitled arseholes fuck you?

Would you ever, in some inconceivable parallel universe, let me fuck you? Let me make you feel as good as I know I could, if only you’d let yourself judge me on the man who stands before you today and not the sins I was capable of committing half a lifetime ago?

There’s a second where we hold each other’s gaze, and I swear our souls speak to each other, before she shuts me down .

‘I never fraternise.’

Okay, then.

Time to drag myself away and preserve what little is left of my dignity.