The Convenience of Lies Read Online Free Page B

am but it’ll be my last. I know it.’
    Lexie looked at him as if her mercurial mind has made a decision. She took his cup and put it on the floor by hers, drew him close, her fingers in his twisting gypsy curls. She kissed his lips - kissed him because this is what she wanted and time was short. Her lipstick tasted vaguely sweet and her perfume carried the scent of pleasures unknown.
    Then her hands ran the contours of his gaunt, drum-tight body which craved only hers. Lexie backed him through a rail of Victorian dresses left over from some past production.
    They lay in the musky, dusty darkness beyond and she unzipped him and took him for herself. There was an elemental remoteness about her, almost animal, disconnected from the then and there. McCall held to her, drawn by such a force of nature he’d never encountered before.
    And when at last she was done, when she opened her eyes and was satisfied, then came that coded smile between initiates who now shared a secret. He hadn’t language equal to the moment or to calm his trembling elation.
    ‘Oh God, Lexie…’
    ‘Oh God, what?’
    ‘I’ve never… you know, I’ve never - ’
    But they heard footsteps approaching. Lexie quickly led him through another subterranean passage and into the light of a day for which he was born and could never forget.
    ‘Listen, I have to see you again.’
    ‘Sure, but I’m late for work now.’
    ‘I know, but when can we meet?’
    ‘There’s a big party here tonight. Come to that.’
    ‘Can I? But what about Mr Gannex?’
    ‘Evan? He doesn’t like parties.’
    ‘But he’s your fiancé, isn’t he?’
    ‘How wonderfully archaic that sounds.’
    ‘Yes, but he is, isn’t he? You’re going to marry him.’
    ‘Who knows? Who cares?’
    ‘Me - I care. Please don’t, Lexie.’
    ‘Listen, you really have to go now or I’ll be fired.’
    ‘Don’t do it, Lexie. Don’t marry him. Please, I mean it.’
    ‘Go on, funny man. See you tonight.’
    So the cruel drama of their affair began. McCall was to be tortured by infatuation and jealousy, the ache of separation, of being alone while knowing she was with him.
    In that moment outside the Arts Theatre where all was make-believe and pretence, he could only shiver at what he feared and had yet to understand.
    But slowly, very slowly, McCall would begin to learn the convenience of lies.

 
    Five
     
    Lexie folded herself into one of the wing back chairs either side of Garth’s wide brick inglenook. The wind sent spatters of rain bouncing down the black void of the chimney to hiss against the burning logs. She wore a red check shirt with the top buttons missing so the soft white slopes of her breasts were just visible.
    McCall had been persuaded in bed that there could be a story in the disappearance of Lexie’s ten-year-old niece, Ruby. Lexie was never to be denied.
    ‘She’s an unusual child,’ she said. ‘Quite brilliant in one way but so, so vulnerable.’
    A photograph taken at Manor Hill primary school in north London showed a querulous-looking child, small for her age, with wild curly hair, a floral pinafore dress and sandals. Police had rung Lexie’s apartment in Bristol to check if Ruby was there.
    ‘I told them she’s so unworldly that she barely understands the concept of money or buying tickets for a train or coach,’ Lexie said. ‘She gets bullied a lot so escapes into her own fantasy world of fairy castles and unicorns.’
    Other children said Ruby had been taken over by demons. She’d hit one and made his nose bleed and been excluded from school last term.
    McCall poured Lexie a glass of Italian liqueur made from almonds and set it down on the hearth by her side, glowing gold in the firelight.
    ‘So there’s something wrong with Ruby… psychologically?’
    ‘It’s called Asperger’s syndrome,’ Lexie said. ‘It means she can’t read other people’s feelings, hasn’t got a clue about the effect of what she says or does has on anyone.’
    ‘It