Alexei And Grace

04 | It will Scar

ALEX SAT OPPOSITE ME, BACK straight, hands linked on the table, looking like some sort of Adonis as I struggled to think of a question. I had thousands, of course, but me being me my brain had already classified many of them as invasive and stored them away.

          "So, um, what do you do?" I finally settled on the most basic question, unable to meet his eyes with embarrassment.

          He let out an amused breath that might have almost been a laugh. "You find me in a hospital room guarded by police, I've only a destroyed Armani suit to my name, you help me escape for god knows what reason? And you're asking me what I do?"

          "Are you going to answer?" I snapped, growing tired of him mocking me.

          "I'm a banker."

          "Oh." I tried to keep the disappointment out of my voice. What had I expected, after all? A spy injured on a secret mission? Something exciting and secretive? I was living in a fantasy world. This is reality, where people do normal jobs and live normal lives.

          "That too boring for you?" His voice was light but I could feel his dark eyes studying me intensely, searching for truth.

          "No," I lied.

          "I work for my father's company. We deal with stocks and shares," he elaborated, staring out of the window. I got the impression he was a little bored with our conversation, and I felt my heart sinking. In his left hand, he had picked up his knife and begun spinning it between his fingers deftly. It was the sort of thing someone might have done absently with a pen - except this wasn't a pen.

          "Are you left handed?" I blurted.

          Alex's eyes snapped on to mine and he smiled a shit-eating-grin. His face had the ability to pull off the most cockily self-assured expression I'd ever seen. He deftly moved the knife between his left and right hands, using them equally to do things with a knife that should have been near impossible.

          "You're ambidextrous." I smiled. "Impressive."

          He shrugged and went back to looking out of the window. "My father taught me a lot of useful things."

          I couldn't imagine a world where anyone needed to use both hands equally, especially someone who was a banker, but then I supposed I knew very little about the financial world.

          "So you said you wanted to escape the hospital to find your father." I tried to change the conversation topic to peak his interest.

          "Yes."

          "Do you want to use my phone? Make some calls?"

          "No."

          The knife spinning got faster as I waited for a response, but after a while it became clear that I wasn't going to get one. "Why not?"

          "I'm trying not to think about him," Alex said evasively. "And what it might mean if he was dead."

          "What would it mean if he was dead?"

          "Ask me something else."

          For a moment I was affronted - stunned by the cool tone of his voice. For someone who wanted to avoid a topic, he was remarkably relaxed. He never lost his composure - not even for a second. He just kept spinning the knife.

          "Is there something interesting out of that window?" I demanded, growing irritated.

          "No, Grace. There isn't."