Exotic Affairs(46)

Watching him lift a hand to his inside pocket, Evie felt the muscles in her shoulders tighten just a little bit more. What she thought he was going to withdraw from that pocket she wasn’t quite sure, but what she didn’t expect to see him holding out towards her was a slender slip of paper.

Wary, confused, instinctively suspicious of what was taking place here, Evie stepped forward so she could take the piece of paper, then stepped quickly back before letting her eyes drop from Jamal Al Kareem’s expressionless face to check out what she was holding. And felt a sense of chilling horror slide slowly through her blood.

It was a cheque made out to the World Aid Foundation for two million pounds.

‘The Crown Prince is aware of the good work you do for this particular charity,’ the messenger explained while Evie just stared unblinkingly down at the cheque. ‘He begs you will accept this small donation as a—gesture of atonement. And in the light of events,’ Jamal Al Kareem smoothly continued, ‘he feels sure you will understand the sad necessity for him to also offer you—this…’

Evie blinked, glancing up rather dazedly to find yet another offering was being held out to her. It was a business card; she could see that even before she stepped forward to take it.

But it was only as she lowered her eyes and found herself staring at the famous logo of a very exclusive private clinic right here in London that the full horror of what was really being relayed to her here finally hit her.

‘The Crown Prince is, of course, confident of your continued discretion during this—delicate time,’ Jamal Al Kareem silkily concluded. ‘In anticipation of your understanding, he remains your most humble servant, and hopes this will put an end to the matter…’

An end to the matter—an end to the matter. Those few terrible words went round and round in Evie’s head as she stared at that wretched business card while her two visitors made their bows and left her to it.

She didn’t move, didn’t breathe, didn’t do anything at all as far as she was aware. She felt strange, separated from herself almost. As if she were now standing where Jamal Al Kareem had been standing and was observing from a distance someone who looked like her, staring down at the cheque and the business card she was holding in her hands with absolutely no reaction at all.

Her face was very white, her lips cold and bloodless. Her eyes were lowered so she couldn’t tell what they were doing, but her chest wasn’t moving, as if her heart and lungs had simply stopped functioning, effectively cutting the oxygen off from her brain so that it couldn’t even attempt to think.

Because thinking meant pain—the worst kind of pain. The pain of knowing that this truly was the—end of the matter.

No hope left. No more waiting. No chance that Raschid was going to walk through that door at any moment now and tell her that everything had been sorted in their favour.

For Raschid was in Abadilah, with Aisha.

And Evie should not be standing here in his apartment.

From that very cold, distant place she seemed to have retreated into, she watched her other self open her fingers and let both the cheque and the card drop to the floor. Then that person simply turned and walked away—out into the hallway, out of the apartment and into the waiting lift. It took her downwards. She didn’t even stop when the concierge called out to her sharply.

Outside, the good weather was still holding. London was baking beneath a heatwave that had most people walking around in shirt-sleeves. So she didn’t look out of place in her pale blue knitted top and casual white cotton trousers as she joined the lunchtime rush taking place on the pavements.

A car followed her for a while, though she didn’t know that, its two occupants pacing her progress along the embankment until she turned onto a paved walkway where a car could not go.

An hour later—maybe two—and she was still walking. It must have been instinct that eventually made her aware of where she was, because she suddenly found herself standing outside her mother’s apartment.

She rang the bell, and her mother’s disembodied voice sounded in the communication box.

‘It’s Evie,’ she heard herself say. ‘Can I come in?’

There was a moment’s surprised silence, then the buzzer sounded to tell Evie she could open the front door now. Her mother’s apartment was on the first floor. She was already standing at the flat door when Evie got there. Lucinda took one look at her daughter and went as white as a sheet.

‘Oh, my God, Evie,’ she gasped in shaken dismay. ‘You’re bleeding!’

Evie barely heard her; she was too busy fainting at her mother’s feet.