He wanted to see what was inside it but felt powerless to ask because of how absorbed she was, because of the air of total privacy that surrounded her. And in truth it had nothing to do with him anyway, and better to keep out of other people’s business.
Finally she left, still without looking at him or at the man behind her on the bed. She looked content, or perhaps more, like she was trying to conceal her elation at having found the package. And despite the bewitching surface calm he could see now that her nerves were only just holding it together, that perhaps she did know how it was and wasn’t convinced yet of making it out of there alive.
As she walked past him he drew in the stirred air, catching the smell of her perfume and a deeper musk that made him turn and stare after the last glimpse of her as she closed the door. The spell was broken then, leaving him alone with his work and a question mark over what could have been so important, what threat or promise had made her so determined that she would have that package.
Intrigued by association, he did a quick sweep on who Bostridge was, something he often did anyway if he had the time, for his own benefit, keeping ahead of the game. There wasn’t much among the business cards and receipts though. His wallet contained a picture of him with his wife and two kids, an attractive family, part of the illusion.
Finally JJ came back to the man himself. What had he been doing there? JJ was guessing the package was art or religious plunder, so either he was a trader who did agency work on the side or he was an agency guy playing the black market. Either way, he’d somehow managed to take a hit from both lines of work in the same evening, JJ and the girl both sent there to do a job, both pulling it off smoothly.
Probably for a while there Bostridge had thought he was somebody; maybe that had been his problem, the way it was for a lot of Westerners doing business in Russia. And now he’d been reduced back to brutal truth, all pretense done with, transactions over, a flabby American with thinning hair, wearing only a yellow condom and a torn veil of blood across his face and chest.
When JJ left he found her sitting on one of the chairs facing the elevators, dressing slowly as though she’d been hit by fatigue, the package on the floor under the seat. She still looked beautiful in the harsher light out there, her skin flawless. He looked at her, hoping she’d glance up, but her eyes remained downcast as she worked through the thought-free movements of dressing.
He even turned to face her in the elevator before pressing to go down, staring at her again. She was buttoning her blouse, simple and white, expensive; not the kind of girl who got picked up on the street or in any old bar. Maybe Bostridge had been a family man after all, but whoever had sent this girl had chosen a bait he wouldn’t have been able to resist.
She reached the top button as the doors began to close and for the first time she looked up, gray eyes fixing him with a gaze too expressive to read, of youth and premature wisdom and a plaintive yearning, something out of reach. Without thinking about it, his hand lifted and pressed the control panel, the doors stopping in their tracks and opening again.
They held each other’s gaze for thirty seconds more. He wanted to speak to her, to say something, anything, but what was there to say? She was a teenage girl who’d just seen him kill a man, a girl he should have killed too but who’d captivated him because of the way she’d behaved and because he’d seen her naked and she was beautiful. There was no other bond between them, no other unspoken territories to explore. He let the doors close the second time, let her disappear, her eyes on him till the last.
He couldn’t get her out of his thoughts though. In the cab on the way back to his own hotel he stared out of the window, a heavy sleet falling, lights and shadows from the passing traffic, and he kept seeing her face and the way she’d looked at him. And in the back of his mind he was telling the driver to turn around and calculating whether it was too late to catch her before she disappeared into the city darkness.
He knew he’d regret not doing it. There’d been something about her, something different, a secret locked away and communicated to him in code with that one acknowledgment of his presence. He knew if he didn’t go back he’d be haunted by her. Even now he was regretting that he hadn’t spoken, hadn’t asked her name or where she lived, hadn’t asked what was in the package, what could be so precious that she’d been willing to risk her life for it.
Whether or not, he remained silent, the driver continued on his way, the girl on hers. He wanted to go back, but it was easier not to. He closed his eyes, listening to the background hum of the engine, the rhythmic squeaking of the wipers, the surface water hissing under the tires. He switched off and let himself be lulled and thought of nothing. It was one of his weaknesses; sometimes he thought too much.