“So why...” “He doesn't understand you.” Jon looks directly at me. “He has no idea who you are.” “And you do, I suppose?” I retort, just as the lights come up and applause breaks out around the room. Instinctively I take a step away from Jon, and we both watch as Eric mounts the podium again, glowing with an aura of success and money and on-top-of-the-world-ness. “So, have you encountered Mont Blanc yet?” Jon says, clapping vigorously, his mood lighter.
“What's Mont Blanc?” I give him a suspicious glance. “You'll find out.” “Tell me.” “No, no.” He shakes his head, pressing his mouth together as though trying not to laugh. “I couldn't spoil the surprise.”
“Tell me!” “Jon! There you are. Emergency!” We both start in surprise as Ava appears behind us. She's dressed in a black trouser suit, holding a burlap sack, and appears flustered. “The ornamental rocks for the master bedroom fish tank have only just arrived from Italy. But I've got to see to the kitchen place-settingssome fucking idiot's been fiddling with themso can you do it?” She shoves the burlap sack into Jon's arms. “Just arrange the rocks in the tank. There should be time before the presentation finishes.” “No problem.” Jon hefts the sack in his arms, then looks at me, his eyes opaque and impenetrable. “Lexi, want to come with me and help?” My throat tightens up so hard, I can't breathe. This is an invitation. A challenge. No. I have to say no. “Um... yes.” I swallow. “Sure.” 256 I feel almost light-headed as I follow Jon through the crowd, up the stairs onto the mezzanine level, and into the bedroom. No one even notices us. All attention is on the presentation. We head into the main bedroom and Jon closes the door. “So,” he says. “Look.” My voice is sharp with nerves. “I can't carry on like this! All this whispering, creeping around, trying t o . . . to sabotage my marriage. I'm happy with Eric!” “No.” He shakes his head. “You won't be with him in a year.” He sounds so sure of himself, I'm nettled. “Yes, I will,” I shoot back. “I expect I'll be with him in fifty years!” “You'll try your best, you'll try to mold yourself... but your spirit's too free for him. At last you won't be able to stand it anymore.” He exhales, pressing his meshed hands outward. “I've watched it happen once. I don't want to see it again.” “Thanks for the warning,” I snap. “Well, when it does happen, I'll give you a call, how's that? We should do the rocks.” I jerk my head toward the sack, but Jon ignores me. He puts it down on the floor and comes toward me, his eyes intense and questioning. “You really, really don't remember anything?”
“No,” I say almost wearily. “For the millionth time, I don't remember anything.” He's only inches away from me now, studying my face, searching for something. “All the time we spent together, all the things we said There has to be something to trigger your memory.” He briefly rubs his brow, frowning. “Do sunflowers mean anything to you?”
In spite of myself I rack my brain. Sunflowers. Sunflowers. Didn't I once...
No, it's gone. “Nothing,” I say at last. “I mean, I like sunflowers, but...” “e.e. cummings? Mustard on fries?” “I don't know what you're talking about,” I say helplessly. “None of this means anything to me.” He's so close I can feel his gentle breath on my skin. His eyes haven't left mine. “Does this mean anything to you?” He's moved his hands up to my face, cradling my cheeks, rubbing my skin with his thumbs. “No.” I swallow. “This?” He leans down and brushes a kiss against my neck. “Stop it,” I say feebly, but I can barely get the words out. And besides, I don't mean them. My breathing is getting shorter and shorter. I've forgotten about everything else. I want to kiss him. I want to kiss him in a way I didn't want to kiss Eric. And then it's happeninghis mouth is on mine and my entire body's telling me this is the right thing to do. He smells right. He tastes right. He feels right. I can feel his arms wrapping themselves tightly around me; the roughness of his five-o'clock shadow. My eyes are closed, I'm losing myself, this is so right “Jon?” Ava's voice comes through the door and it's like someone electrocuted me. I fly away from Jon, tripping over my wobbly legs, cursing under my breath, “Fuck!” “Shh!” He looks thrown too. "Stay cool. Hi, Ava.
What's up?“ Rocks. Yes. That's what we're supposed to be doing. I grab the sack and start pulling rocks out, chucking them into the fish tank as fast as I can with a series of splashes. 258 The poor fish are swimming about like lunatics, but I don't have any choice. ”Everything okay?“ Ava puts her head around the door. ”I'm about to lead a party of guests up here for the tour...“ ”No problem,“ Jon says reassuringly. ”Nearly done.“ As soon as Ava disappears, he kicks the door shut and comes back to me. ”Lexi.“ He grasps my face as though he wants to devour me, or hug me, or maybe both. ”If you only knew, this has been torture...“ ”Stop it!“ I draw away, my mind spinning like a kaleidoscope. ”I'm married! We can't You can't just“ I gasp and clap a hand to my mouth. ”Oh shit. Shit!“ I'm not looking at Jon anymore. I'm looking at the fish tank. ”What?“ Jon stares, uncomprehending, then follows my gaze. ”Oh. Oops.“ The tank has quieted down. All the tropical fish are swimming peacefully among the marble rocks. Except one blue stripy one, which is floating on top. ”I've killed a fish!“ I let out a horrified giggle. ”I've brained it with one of the rocks.“ ”So you have,“ Jon says, going over to survey the tank. ”Nice aim.“ ”But it cost three hundred pounds! What am I going to do? The guests will be in here any moment!“ ”That's pretty bad feng shui.“ Jon grins. ”Okay, I'll go and delay Ava. You flush it away." He reaches for my hand and holds it a moment. “We haven't finished.” He kisses the tips of my fingersthen heads out of the room, leaving me alone with the tank. Wincing, I reach into the warm water and pick up the fish by the very edge of its fin. “I'm really sorry,” I say in a tiny voice. Trying to catch the dripping water with my other hand, I hurry into the high-tech bathroom. I drop the fish in the gleaming white loo and look for the flush. There isn't one. This must be an intelligent loo. “Flush,” I say aloud, waving my arms to set off the sensors. “Flush!” Nothing happens. “Flush!” I say, with more desperation. “Go on, flush!” But the loo is totally dead. The fish is floating around, looking even more lurid blue against the white porcelain. This cannot be happening. If anything is going to put a customer off a high-end luxury apartment, it's a dead fish in the loo. I pull out my phone from my pocket and scroll down my contacts until I find J. That must be him. I press speed-dial, and a moment later he answers. “Jon here.” “The fish is in the loo!” I hiss. “But I can't flush it!” “The sensors should set it off automatically.” “I know! But they're not setting anything off! There's a dead blue fish staring up at me! What am I going to do?” “It's fine. Go to the panel next to the bed. You can override it and flush it from there. Hey, Eric! How are you doing?” The phone abruptly cuts off. I hurry over to the bed and locate a flip-down panel set into the wall. A scary digital display blinks back at me and I can't help a small moan. How can anyone live in a house that's more complicated than NASA? Why does a house have to be intelligent, anyway? Why can't it be nice and stupid? My fingers fumbling, I press Menu, then Override, then Options. I scan down the list. Temperature... Lighting... Where's Bathroom? Where's Flush Loo? Do I even have the right panel? Suddenly I notice another flip-up panel on the other side 260 of the bed. Maybe that's it. I rush to it, wrench it open, and start jabbing at random. In a minute I'm going to have to scoop the stupid fish out of the water with my bare hands A sound draws me up short. It's a wail. A kind of distant siren. What on earth... I stop jabbing and look more carefully at the panel I've been hitting. It's flashing words at me in red. Panic Alert Secure Space. A sudden movement from the window attracts my attention and I look up to see a metal grille descending steadily over the glass. What the Frantically I jab again at the panel, but it flashes back at me Unauthorized, then returns to Panic AlertSecure Space. Oh... my God. What have I done? I dart to the door of the bedroom and look down to the space below. I don't believe it. It's mayhem. The siren is even louder out here. Metal grilles are descending everywhere, over the windows, the paintings, the waterfall. All the rich guests are clinging to each other in the middle of the space like hostages, apart from one portly man who's trapped next to the waterfall. “Is it a robbery? Do they have guns?” a woman in a white trouser suit is exclaiming hysterically, wrenching at her hands. “George, swallow my rings!” “That's a helicopter!” A gray-haired man is cocking his ear. “Listen! They're on the roof! We're sitting targets!” I'm staring at the scene, my heart hammering, frozen with panic. “It's coming from the master bedroom!” shouts one of Eric's staff, who has been consulting a panel by the fire 261 place. “Someone's set off the panic alarm. The police are on their way.” I've ruined the party. Eric will kill me, he'll kill me... And then, with no warning, the noise stops. The sudden quiet is like the sun coming out. “Ladies and gentlemen.” A voice comes from the stairs and my head whips around. It's Jon. He's holding a remote control, and he glances briefly up at me before addressing the crowd. “We hope you enjoyed our security demonstration. Rest assured, we are not under attack from robbers.”