‘Hope that he won’t kill me. Yeah. Fuck. You know the rumours about him getting people whacked, don’t you?’
‘Rumours,’ I said.
‘God,’ he cried, smacking his forehead so vigorously that a splash of his drink escaped from the glass in his other hand. ‘What possessed me? Why did I think it was a good idea to take you in there as my submissive? I must be suicidal without realising it.’
‘It’ll be OK,’ I said and I did feel inexplicably calm, perhaps as a reaction to his panic. ‘He won’t hurt you. He won’t touch you. I won’t let him.’
‘Oh, Lu.’ He put down his drink and gathered me closer, his chin on the top of my head. ‘Whatever I did to deserve you, I wish I could remember it. Did I save the planet and then have my memory cells wiped?’
‘You’re all right, Joss. We’ll be all right.’
I sat up and looked into his eyes, dark lamps of fear and love. I put my hand to his cheek.
‘If this is our last night alive …’ I whispered.
We came together in a grateful, hectic flurry of limbs and lips, clinging to each other for dear life, and it really felt like that. Dear life, a thing neither of us would take for granted tonight.
The leather and the rubber were too difficult to remove entirely, so we came to a bunched-up, tugged-down arrangement that left us bare in the essentials, if hotly, stickily clothed elsewhere. We squeaked and creaked together, desperate for the holy communion of skin on skin that our lips and tongues mimicked. Nobody ordered and nobody obeyed – this was a joint imperative. We had to have each other, then and there and without any barrier.
When I straddled him and got him inside me, it was enough and not enough. I had to have more of him, all of him, even more than he could ever possibly give.
I rode him into my soul.
Nothing less than his soul would be equal exchange. I think I had it. What I saw in his eyes when he came made me think I had it, and he must have known that he had mine. We had pounded and clawed at each other until we were messy pulp, merging into one flesh.
‘Whatever happens,’ I said, lying on his chest with my cheek on his shoulder, ‘this is more important than any of it. Us.’
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Milton put it best –’
But I cut the poetic sentiment off at its source, putting a finger to his lips. I looked down at his gleaming cheeks, his stunned eyes, his kissed-out mouth.
‘Never mind how Milton puts it. How do you put it?’
He took my finger away, kissed it, and said, ‘I love you.’
‘You put it best,’ I told him.
Chapter Eighteen
The DNA test results were, predictably, positive.
We were in Joss’s office, going through receipts, when Voronov called, in advance of the clinic.
‘Lethbridge, is my daughter there? Her mobile phone is switched off’ was how he chose to give the news.
‘As a matter of fact she is. I take it you’ve had the test results?’
‘Put Lucy on.’
He hit speakerphone and passed the receiver to me.
‘Why have you switched your phone off?’ A tender father-daughter moment. This seemed like the shape of things to come, I thought.
I could hardly tell him the real reason, which was that Joss and I had been shagging and I’d forgotten to switch it back on.
‘Battery’s flat,’ I lied. ‘You got the test results?’
‘Yes, positive. I am your father.’