The Persistence of Memory

Chapter Fourteen

"I know you said this wasn't a date, but you could still invite me up for coffee. Or Irish coffee?" She says. There's a suggestive glint in her eye that I'd have to be blind not to get.

The taxi was dropping her first and it hadn't escaped my notice that since we got in she'd been sliding across the leather seat, getting fractionally closer to me every time we took a left turn. She's going to reach out and take my hand in a minute.

Hopefully as a deterrent, I clasp them together and place them between my thighs over my crotch.

"You wouldn't like my Irish coffee. They're bitter," I say. Her smile fades and she nods, dropping her eyes to her lap.

"Ah. I get it. I've served my purpose."

"What?"

She lifts her head and purses her lips, hesitant. She wants to say something more but is afraid of my reaction. "I saw the way you were looking at her," she says quietly.

I stiffen. "Looking at who?"

Another pause. "Eloise Alford," she says. I frown harder, trying to cover up the embarrassment spreading over me. It's ridiculously over the top and feels weird on my face.

"She's a beautiful woman," I shrug. "I look at all beautiful women the same way."

"Oh really?" She raises an eyebrow.

"Yes, really."

When her expression turns accusatory the urge to talk comes over me and as always when that urge comes over me, I do the opposite of what I should. Talk.

"Look, Sasha, I'm not going to explain myself to you. I don't think we're quite there, sweetheart." My voice is harsh and a little patronising and I immediately feel guilty about it. My next words I choose more carefully. "I had a nice time with you tonight. You're a great girl; beautiful, smart, the lot. I'm just not looking for anything." From you.

Surprisingly, her face softens, seemingly appeased.

"I get it, Aidan," she says. "I know what this wasn't. But I wasn't proposing marriage or anything, just so you know."

Her intent isn't lost on me. She's offering to come home with me, to horizontally enjoy my company, and then leave quietly in the morning with no strings attached. And looking at her, I'm thinking I should be given a fucking medal for turning it down. She really is a beautiful girl. Not my kind of beautiful — as far as I was aware I only had one kind of beautiful and it had left half an hour before me with her husband — but seriously beautiful. Except, instead of imagining her naked, all I can see is Oliver Alford peeling Eloise out of that grey dress and doing to her what Sasha is inviting me to do to. I close my eyes and pinch the bridge of my nose. No. I'm not fucking doing this. Not tonight.

"I know. I just don't want to lead you on. That's not what I wanted, regardless of what you might think." I mutter, guiltily.

"No, but you did want a reaction from Eloise Alford. Which is why you invited me tonight."

When I turn to her she doesn't appear to be waiting on any kind of confirmation, she's just watching me with a sad, remorseful kind of look.

"Pathetic, huh?" I sigh.

She shrugs, noncommittally. "If you'd told me before we went in there I might have been able to help, at least."

"You helped," I say.

I find that hard to believe considering you've looked more than interested in looking at Sasha for the last three hours.

She'd done her duties well this evening. The little hints of jealousy displayed by Eloise at the presence of Sasha had lit me up like tiny flickering beacons of hope. She's silent a few moments and then laughs softly, it's a relieved kind of laugh, one that settles some of the tension of me being a dick.