then crept across the landing into her bedroom. Slipping out of her clothes, she left them where they fell, then pulled on her nightdress and eased herself into bed. Nestled beneath the soft, warm duvet, she ran over the evening in her head, scene by scene, reliving every detail from that first glimpse of Mark, to the journey in the car, and the restaurant. She could picture the way he had looked at her across the table, attentive and interested in what she had to say. She could hear the little compliments he had slipped in at every opportunity. She could see his face, his clear blue eyes and neatly clipped fair almost blond hair. She caught the faintest breath of his aftershave, and as her eyes finally closed, heavy with sleep, she felt the light touch of his lips on her cheek, a feeling so intense she shivered with desire. ‘Until Monday,’ she whispered.
Chapter Seven
‘Isn’t he exactly as I said?’ Belinda enthused when she phoned at nine fifty on Monday morning. ‘Absolutely charming! You’ve made a real impression. He’s asked me to find out.’
‘Find out what?’ Aisha asked, not best pleased by Belinda’s early call. ‘I’m sorry, I haven’t got much time this morning.’
‘Yes, I apologize. I know it’s not your lunch hour, but Mark needs to know if you feel the same. He telephoned me first thing this morning, like a dog with two tails. He’s besotted with you, Aisha, but he doesn’t want to make a fool of himself. I always give my clients feedback if they ask for it, and he’s worried he might have scared you off. I told him I didn’t think he had.’
Aisha pressed the phone closer to her ear and watched the door to her PA’s office. ‘I like Mark,’ she said. ‘But we have only just met.’
‘And what’s wrong with love at first sight?’ Belinda intoned, her voice rising. ‘You can tell a lot by first impressions, and I’ve got a sixth sense for this one. It feels right, so very right. I’m excited for you both. I’ll tell Mark you feel the same then and—’
‘Belinda,’ Aisha interrupted, ‘will you please tell Mark that I enjoyed Friday evening very much, and I am looking forward to him phoning.’
‘OK, playing it cool is fine by me, but be careful you don’t lose him.’
Aisha’s Monday morning at the bank passed with the usual fallout from new Saturday opening plus analysing the sales figures from the previous week, readjusting the staffing rota for the week ahead allowing for absences, and a meeting with the area manager. Then the ATM broke and it was two hours before the replacement arrived, and another hour before it was fitted and fully functioning, which put an additional strain on the already depleted staff of cashiers, all of which Aisha had to oversee because her deputy was on leave.
At one forty-five she was at her desk, surrounded by piles of papers and folders, with the outside line switched through while Grace took her lunch. Aisha’s sandwiches lay in their box beside the phone, and her computer was on, but she did nothing with either. She sat watching the movement of the hands on the wall clock, as they gradually inched towards two o’clock. Mark hadn’t phoned and he said he would. I’m like an adolescent schoolgirl, she thought, unable to settle to anything, waiting for him to call. She chided herself for having been so cool with him, as Belinda had put it, and for not giving her the encouragement she had wanted to take back to Mark. Perhaps I should phone Belinda, Aisha thought, and apologize for not being more forthcoming; explain that it’s just my nature, that I’m naturally reserved, that I really do want to see Mark again, and am as besotted with him as he is with me. Then she wondered if ‘besotted’ was his word or Belinda’s exaggeration.
At five past two, when Aisha had almost given up hope, the phone rang and she snatched it up. ‘Aisha Hussein,’ she said.
‘Aisha, it’s Mark.’ Thank goodness, she thought. His voice was exactly as she remembered it – as she had continuously recalled it since Friday. ‘I’m sorry I’ve left it so late,’ he said. ‘I got held up. Is it still OK to talk?’
‘Yes, but I might get interrupted.’
‘Me too. Sorry,’ he said again. ‘We’ll have to have a code word to alert each other when we’re not alone. Something we wouldn’t normally use like “sausages” or “wellington boot”.’
Aisha laughed. ‘Wellington boot. We could have done with them on Friday.’
‘Too right,’ he said, then paused and lowered his voice in intimacy. ‘It was a lovely evening, Aisha. I’ve thought about nothing else all weekend. I hope you didn’t mind Belinda calling?’
‘Not at all. The go-between.’
‘Yes. But it’s no longer necessary now, I hope. I just needed the reassurance, after everything I’ve been through. You do understand, don’t you?’
‘Of course.’
‘I was beginning to think I was having an early mid-life crisis,’ Mark said. ‘I took work home and brought it back again, untouched, I couldn’t concentrate on anything. Aisha, it really was a lovely evening. Damn,’ he said and stopped. She heard a noise at his end that sounded like a door opening and closing. ‘Wellington boot coming soon,’ he laughed. ‘Let’s arrange to meet quickly before I get interrupted again. Are you free tomorrow?’
‘Yes, I am.’
‘Great. I could pick up some tickets for the theatre. We could eat first, if you’re coming straight from work.’
‘That would be lovely.’ She paused as Grace knocked on the door; then poked her head round, signalling her two o’clock appointment had arrived. ‘I have a wellington boot here too,’ she said.
He laughed. ‘It must be very muddy out there. Look, I’ll collect you from work at six. Is that all right with you?’
‘Yes, fine. I’ll wait outside the office.’
‘Until tomorrow then. Take care. You’re already very special, Aisha. I can’t believe how lucky I am – an old geezer like me.’
And so it began, his courtship, her romance. Whirlwind, yes, but given their ages and circumstances that wasn’t so very strange. For, as Mark said and Aisha agreed, they had both lost too much time already in going down the wrong path, and had a lot of catching up to do. Mark always managed to say and do the right thing; he was always the perfect gentleman, and wholly attentive to her needs.
In the six months that followed, they spent every available minute together and Aisha felt that all her dreams had come true. She and Mark talked endlessly about anything and everything – the myriad of little incidents that shape us and make us who we are. Mark met her parents and, although he still wasn’t close to them, she met his. He introduced her to his work colleagues and friends, of which there were many, for with his sympathetic ear and ready wit Mark attracted people like bees around a honeypot. By the time Aisha told her parents that Mark was divorced, carefully explaining the circumstances – how he had worked hard and had been badly deceived – they were so impressed with him, and he had become so much a part of their family that other than a couple of questions from her father about his children, it wasn’t an issue.
* * *
‘So did I miss something?’ she asked herself later, when she sat night after night, alone in her armchair, answering the inspector’s questions, trying to get it right in her mind. ‘Did I miss something in the headiness of it all, when Mark literally swept me off my feet?
