Free Strangers by Carla Banks Page B

hands lightly on his shoulders. Her eyes were almost level with his. He could smell her perfume, and see the way the delicate flush on her face was deepening as they looked at each other.
    As he kissed her, he could feel the anger flowing through him and knew she could feel it as well. Suddenly, she was urgent, her nails digging into him as she pulled his shirt free. He could feel her fingers unbuckling his belt. He lifted her up and sat her on the edge of the table that stood by the wall, pushing up her skirt and impatiently pulling her clothes aside.
    ‘Damien…’ she said, then as he touched her, her breath caught and she stopped speaking as the shadows of the evening gathered around them.
    By the time Joe got back, Roisin had finished unpacking the last case and had taken another shower to get rid of the sticky dust that seemed to settle over everything.
    There was a bottle of wine in the fridge, some homebrew that a neighbour had given her. It was to have accompanied the chicken that was now cold and congealing in the pan. As the hands on the clock dragged from nine to ten, she got the bottle out and poured herself a glass.
    She was lying on the settee, trying to concentrate on her book, when she heard his key in the door. It was almost twenty past ten, the latest he’dever been. She sat up wearily and put her glass on the table.
    He looked tired. He’d loosened his tie and his shirt collar was open. His face was pale under his tan and he had shadows of fatigue under his eyes. ‘Roisin.’
    ‘You look exhausted.’ She kept her voice neutral. ‘Have you eaten?’
    ‘What? No. No, I didn’t have time. I’m not hungry anyway.’
    ‘You’ve got to have something.’ She stood up. ‘Joe, where have you been?’
    He frowned slightly, studying her face. ‘I’ve been working.’
    ‘Mike phoned. He wanted you to call back.’
    ‘When? I haven’t seen him. I’ve been in the library.’
    ‘The library?’
    He shook his head. ‘I know. I’m sorry. I should have come home like I said, but I’m getting behind with my own work. If I don’t keep up with that, I’m not going to get a decent job when we leave.’
    And he hadn’t felt able to tell her.
You hardly know him, Rosie
. And he hardly knew her. ‘You should have said.’
    He was looking at her with half-amused doubt. ‘What did you think? That I was out hitting the fleshpots of Riyadh? Because there aren’t any.’
    ‘Of course not. I just thought we’d agreed to spend this evening together.’ She saw his face startto set in the cold, distant look. ‘Mike said you’d left, and I was worried.’
    He seemed to pull himself back from somewhere. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘You’ve been on your own. I should have thought.’ He put his arms round her. ‘We could start the evening now. I didn’t mean to make you worry. You look beautiful.’ His smile was deliberately hangdog.
    She knew what he was doing, but she couldn’t resist smiling back. ‘And you look shattered. Go and have a shower, and I’ll get us something to eat. Here—’ She gave him the glass of wine she’d barely touched.
    He leaned forward and kissed her lightly.
    He came downstairs in jeans and a T-shirt, looking more relaxed. She made a quick salad using some of the cold chicken. She poured them each a large glass of the homebrew and they sat on the settee and ate with fingers rather than forks.
    When they’d finished, he lay down with his head in her lap. ‘I thought today would never end. But it kept the best bit to the end.’
    She played with his hair. ‘Listen, next weekend it will be the end of my first week at work. Let’s go into the desert again.’
    ‘If I can.’ He looked at her. ‘I don’t want to promise something and let you down again.’
    She nodded, not completely happy. ‘I unpacked that last case of stuff that was in the study.’
    ‘You shouldn’t have done that. I would have…’
    ‘When? I nearly broke my leg on it twice