On the other side of the canteen Gerry saw his colleagues grinning and pretending not to listen. ‘Actually there’s no friend,’ she confessed. ‘I’m really just avoiding travelling back on the train with Brian Lincoln. I’m going to catch the following train, so I’ll have to be going now unless…’
‘Unless what?’ he asked.
She raised her eyebrows and smiled at him.
‘Oh! In that case… perhaps you could have dinner with me after all, before you go?’ he asked, blushing again.
‘That would be lovely, but I don’t have very much time so shall we go now?’
‘Great!’ He jumped to his feet and upset the remains of his coffee on to the table top. Gerry quickly pulled a handful of paper napkins from a dispenser and blotted up the mess, and then she stowed her computer in her bag, linked arms with him and smiled at his colleagues as the two of them left together.
Away from the pressure of work, Gerry found Phil a lively and interesting companion, with an excellent working knowledge of Arabic although lacking her familiarity of the vernacular and regional variations. She also found him entertaining on topics away from work and the evening passed quickly. While sipping their after dinner coffees she smiled and asked ‘So did you have a bet with your colleagues on asking me out, then?’
‘Oh… er… no actually, nothing quite that bad. They just said I wouldn’t have the courage to ask you. They told me you were out of my league and I’d find you too intimidating, they said. Sorry.’
She smiled at him. ‘No need to be: I am intimidating.’ The smile dropped from her face. ‘I spend my working life being intimidating. I’m known as… oh never mind.’
He saw her brooding expression and wondered what to say to restore her smile.
‘I think you’re lovely,’ he blurted out.
‘Now that’s just the booze talking,’ she replied.
He smiled down at his glass of diet coke. ‘No really. I’d ask you out again but we do live a long way apart.’
‘That needn’t stop you.’
‘Ok! Well when I’m next in London, perhaps we could do this again, if you’re around.’
‘That would be nice, and I’ll look forward to it. I’m away for the next ten days or so but then I should be back home.’ She pulled a notepad out of her bag, tore of a sheet and wrote. ‘Here’s my private e mail address and my home number; call me when you’re coming. In fact call me anyway.’
‘Thank you,’ he took it from her and gazed at it as if it was a winning lottery ticket. ‘Look the last fast train back to London leaves in about twenty minutes. I can give you a lift to the station.’
‘I think perhaps I’ll go back tomorrow,’ said Gerry. ‘I could go to a hotel tonight.’
‘It’s quite late; maybe you should check there’s one available.’
She stared into his eyes. ‘Go on Phil.’ She gave him her most winning smile. ‘Take a risk!’
He stared at her for a moment before looking around the restaurant and then whispered to her. ‘Or, or you could come back to my place… if you like.’
Phil proved to be a gentle and considerate lover and after four months of occasional liaisons driven by the irregular nature of their schedules Gerry began to rely on him more and more for her happiness. Then one day she came home from an operational screw-up with her front teeth broken and a heavily bruised face. Despite her reluctance to allow him to see her she was desperate for his company, and sent him an e mail as she was barely able to talk on the phone.
‘Before you come in, I look bloody awful,’ she mumbled through her slightly opened front door.
‘I can hardly believe that,’ he said, ‘you’ll always… oh shit!’ he finished as she opened the door wide.
‘No you can’t hug me,’ she said backing off and holding out a hand.
‘Why not?’
‘I’ve got a broken rib.’
‘What the hell happened, poor love,’ he asked as they sat down on her sofa.
‘I was in a car accident, I wasn’t wearing a seat belt,’ she began. Then she sighed. ‘Sod it! Why don’t I tell you the truth?’ She stopped and stared at her right hand and he realised that her knuckles were bruised and split. ‘I was in a fight; in Leipzig; I got beaten up.’
‘Oh hell Gerry, I didn’t realise you did the dangerous stuff.’
‘What? Because I’m a woman?’ she asked sharply.
‘No of course not, because you always seem such a… a calm person,’ he said.
‘Oh hah bloody hah! You really don’t know who I am, do you? Poor little Philip. Safe amongst your code breaking and translating and not realising that your girlfriend is a fucking killer. You want to know what happened to the guy who smashed my face? I broke his fucking neck. I beat him unconscious and then I knelt on his back, got hold of his head and twisted it. It makes a really weird noise you know when the neck breaks. That’s who you’ve been shagging for the last few months; someone who kills people and gets paid for it. So I wouldn’t blame you if you just walked out and went back to your nice quiet life in Cheltenham.’ She stopped, turned away from him, and began running her tongue over the remaining stumps of her front teeth.
‘Please don’t speak to me like that again,’ he said. ‘I’m going to take the week off and the next week off after that if you’re not better, and furthermore if you don’t behave I’ll never leave you in peace again. In fact I don’t think I’ll ever leave you Gerry unless you chuck me out. Now what do you need me to do for you?’ He smiled. ‘I’m actually pretty good at making soup you know.’
‘Ok, well the first thing you can do is give me a lift to the orthodontist, I’ve got an appointment in forty minutes, but I don’t like soup much. I think I need ice cream, chocolate and pistachio.’
‘What, together?’
‘No! Two separate flavours of course.’
Later on she was lying on her back in bed which was the only position which prevented her ribs from hurting, and describing the realities of her life to him in more detail. ‘So you’re not going to leave me then, are you?’ she finished up.
‘Of course not. Is there anywhere I can give you a kiss where it won’t hurt?’
‘On my face, you mean?’
‘Not necessarily’ he grinned at her.
She managed a small smile. ‘You’d better make it my forehead. I don’t think I’ll be ready for anything strenuous for a while.’
Then while he was sharing her flat he had applied for a job in the MI6 headquarters in London, and with his linguistic skills he was readily accepted. He had not suggested that they live together on a permanent basis; instead he had rented his own place until he had sold up in Cheltenham and bought a small terrace house in Twickenham. He was able to afford it because his parents had died when he was only twenty-four and left him a fair amount of capital. She had been a little put out that he had not even suggested that they live together but then there was his recent promise never to leave her and she realised she was content with their off and on cohabitation at each other’s homes. It wasn’t until she returned home pregnant after the Mulholland business that she realised that actually she really did love Philip. She had been looking forward with some trepidation to telling him that he was going to be a father, because she had absolutely no idea what his thoughts would be. The idea that she would become a parent had never seriously crossed her mind and so she had never discussed the possibility with him. She wondered if he had been similarly disinterested or whether she had just been extraordinarily selfish. But before they could resolve any of these issues together she had received that message from Richard Cornwall. The time had been 11:37.