Before We Met(89)

‘Even if you’re risking your life?’

He said nothing.

‘And mine?’

He closed his eyes. ‘I’m sorry. You’re right – of course you’re right.’

‘We can stay in London, I can deal with that, but just not here. I can’t stand it – with him out there, knowing exactly where to find us.’

‘The police car will be outside.’

‘But that just makes it worse, doesn’t it? I feel like we’re . . . bait.’



Mark took a last look around then stepped outside and pulled the front door shut. The deadlock made a final-sounding clunk. Hannah watched as he closed the gate behind them and put the latch down as if it would make all the difference to the security of the house while they were gone.

They loaded the bags into his Mercedes and Hannah jumped as he slammed the boot shut. She kept her eyes down to stop herself looking for the surveillance car but as she made her way round to the passenger door, she caught a glimpse through the window of the house opposite and saw the little boy who lived there hurl a stuffed rabbit from the tray of his high chair. The sound of his gleeful laughter was just audible and she watched as his mother, the woman she’d seen in yoga kit on Tuesday, picked the rabbit up, gave it to him then laughed herself as he tossed it straight back down again. The sight caused a sudden inexplicable ache in Hannah’s chest.

‘Han?’ Mark was watching her. She shook her head, snapping out of it.

The car’s new-leather smell enveloped her as she pulled her door shut. Mark did up his seatbelt then reached for her hand. ‘You’re sure you’re okay?’

She nodded then shrugged.

‘It’ll be over soon,’ he said.

He started the car and pulled out. At the top of the street they turned on to New King’s Road and, as they passed the delicatessen, she remembered how Nick had looked as he stood spot-lit under the awning, his face as he turned her way. She closed her eyes, as if that would block out the image.

When they reached the lights at Fulham Road and neither of them had spoken, Mark put the radio on to break the silence. While she’d been showering, he’d called and booked a room for two nights at K West in Shepherd’s Bush. ‘We’ll see where we are after that,’ he told her when she came back down, towelling her hair. ‘With luck . . .’

‘Is that far enough?’ she said, stopping. ‘Shepherd’s Bush. It’s only – what? Three miles away? Four?’

‘Something like that. But I think you’re right: the important thing is not being here, sitting targets. It’s four-star so there’ll be someone on reception twenty-four hours a day, people around all the time. You’ll never be on your own, and when I’m out this afternoon . . .’

‘You’re going out?’

‘I have to.’

‘God, Mark . . .’

‘I’ll feel so much happier if I know you’ve got other people around.’

‘But what about you?’

‘There’ll be a car at the office, too, remember? Anyway, you’re my priority here – I want you to feel safe.’ He picked up the detective’s card from the counter. ‘I’m going to call the police and tell them what we’re doing.’



The hotel was a hyper-modern box of glass and concrete on a street otherwise lined with Victorian mansion blocks and terraced villas. It was almost as quiet as Quarrendon Street, the only real noise the muffled sound of traffic on the four-lane roundabout beyond the road’s dead end. Inside, the incongruity continued: the lobby was over-designed, all sleek marble surfaces, outsize lampshades and walls of backlit curtaining. Hannah hated it.

‘It’s like a tornado went spinning through Miami, picked up a hotel and dropped it in suburban west London,’ she said, closing the door after the porter. She wandered around the room, touching the dark-wood desktop and the cold surface of the dresser, switching on one of the ugly bedside lights then switching it off again. The street was hidden from view by a great expanse of net curtain.

‘Is it all right?’

‘It’s . . . luxurious,’ she said, feeling ungrateful. ‘It’s just weird, that’s all.’

‘Like we’re hiding in a nightclub?’

She looked at him and grinned. ‘Exactly.’

They ate a room-service lunch before Mark went. ‘I won’t be late,’ he said at the door. ‘Do something relaxing this afternoon: watch a film or have a massage – there’s a spa downstairs.’

She shook her head. She found spas uncomfortable at the best of times, and if there was ever a day when she didn’t want a stranger’s hands on her, this was it.