Page 92 of Reflex
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They arrived one after another, pouring into the hotel lounge area like they were marching into battle.Xane got too close.Rock Giant too.Ronnie danced around in her peripheral vision looking like he really wanted to say something, but wasn’t sure about cutting in.Alle held her tongue.She didn’t have to answer to any of them.
The only person who mattered was Spook.
He appeared last of all, like a shadow on the periphery of her vision.Jacket gone, he stood in shirt sleeves, the cuffs rolled up to the elbows, and his bowtie a crumpled knot trailing from his trouser pocket.As she watched, he freed his white blond hair from the band holding it tidy at the back of his neck, so that it spilled like frost over his broad shoulders.
Ignoring all the voices assaulting her with questions, Alle pushed through the wall of muscle to reach him.
“Spook.We can do this here if you prefer, or we could speak privately.”
He stared at her with his monsoon eyes.“Just explain why you left.Why you’re here.Why you were talking to a reporter forBang!”
“I didn’t know,” she said, leaping to her own defence.“He’s my brother.I didn’t know that he worked forBang!or that he was in Cannes.He saw me arrive with you all.”She shook her head.“I’m not sure why, but he thought I was with Xane, and didn’t seem keen to believe me when I said otherwise.He’s ambitious, Spook.I wish I could say he wouldn’t sell me out, but I’m not actually that sure.He’d probably do it and then tell me it was for my own good.Rock stars are bad news, apparently.I didn’t want to give him any ammunition or ideas, so it seemed best to leave.”
He listened unblinking to her garbled speech, then tugged her away from the group and out into the corridor.They stood beneath the whirring air con vent, the rain of cool air stealing some of the heat from their emotions.
“Unexpected family shit,” he said.“That’s the text you should have sent me.Succinct.Self-explanatory.You’re not responsible for your brother’s actions.”
She frowned at the doubt in his voice that seemed to contradict his words.“You’re right.I didn’t think.I was too flummoxed by him appearing and what he said.”She sighed into her hand, before covering her face.“Ah, Christ!I can’t believe he’s working for that outfit.I swear he’s not usually so sleazy.”Or maybe he was and she didn’t care to admit it.
“What was it that he said, Alle?”
What had he said?A lot, and also very little.Typical Marshall, all insinuation while he kept the details close to his chest.“That he couldn’t believe I was dumb enough to date a rocker, and didn’t I know that there are women in your past that wished they’d never met you.”
“My past?He said that about me, not Xane?”
She took a moment to run through the exchange she and Marshall had again.“Yes, about you.”
He paled.“Why warn you off me, if he thought you were with Xane?”
Genuinely, she wished she had answers for him.
“Why’d he think you were with Xane?”
“I don’t… I don’t know.”Had Marshall seen them arrive?“He’s an idiot.Maybe he can’t grasp the possibility that his sister would chase a man who’s ostensibly sworn off sex, even if he doesn’t believe that to be true.He’s called me a tart plenty of times in the past.”
“You mean he’s a chauvinistic bigot?”
Her shoulders sagged.“Maybe I do.He certainly seems to think nursing and caring roles are entirely my province.He was the first to declare himself too busy to deal with dad.He didn’t even show for the funeral.”
“What else did he say, Alle?”
“Only that Xane’s bad news, and you’re no saint either.”
A smile started in his eyes and soon tweaked the corners of his mouth upwards.“Is that what you believe?”
“I don’t know Xane well enough to comment.”
“About me?”
“It’s what you keep telling me.”
“But what do you think?”
“I think you’re a deeply layered mystery.Flawed in the same ways we all are.No worse or better than anyone else.Human,” she sighed.“Also, the man I’d like to be with.I’m sorry my family are such a fucking nightmare.”She reached out to him, then, touching his face.Spook leaned in and let her kiss him.
“Don’t disappear again like that.”
