Evensong

She was standing in the middle of the room, waiting for him. Gaetano stood behind her and to one side. She was wearing a long velvet dress in her usual style, this one in dark blue. He took in the fitted bodice almost painted over her slender upper body, and the long voluminous skirt that he somehow found more arousing than a short tight one. The front of his trousers started to tent.

“This pantomime!” shes pat. “You’ve taken five days out of our summit preparations!You’ve openly cancelled my orders! In my Cathedral! And,” pointing behind her at Gaetano, “do you know what he did to me when I tried to get into that damn room?”

Anwar glanced at Gaetano, who remained expressionless.

“I don’t know. Or care.”

“Have you any idea what stories we’ve had to tell the media? And at the end of it all, you got us nothing. You had us check the Patel people, yet again, and we got nothing. You spent five days in the Signing Room while they tore it apart, and you got nothing. You gave us five days of disruption, five days of the media laughing at us and Zaitsev’s people screaming at us, and you haven’t got shit. I was right about you the first time, you’re a—”

“Don’t call me a fucking autistic retard. I didn’t like it the first time you said it. If you say it again, I might forget who I am.”

“When did you last remember who you are?”

He looked at her, long enough for her to look away. Then she gathered herself, stared back at him, and said, “Oh no, you do not do that to me. You do not stare me down reproachfully.”

“I remember who I am,” he said quietly. “I’m the thing you rented for your protection. I may not be enough, because you haven’t told me enough about who’s trying to kill you; but I’m all you’ve got.”

She didn’t reply, but neither did she look away; she wouldn’t be stared down.

“And I remember who you are,” he went on. “You stand for things I admire, but inside you’re ugly.” He looked her up and down. “A velvet bag of shit.”

He heard Gaetano stifle a gasp.

She continued to return his gaze, but addressed Gaetano. “The retard speaks out for itself. What’s happened to it? It seems to have changed.”

“And,” Anwar continued, as if she hadn’t spoken, “in the Signing Room I was...”

“Yes, yes, I get that. You were trying to find what they’re sending to kill me.”

“And I made sure...”

“Yes, I get that too. You made sure it isn’t there yet, and you can make sure it won’t be there before the summit. But you didn’t ask anyone. You camped out in the Signing Room while they ripped it to pieces and caused five days of fucking chaos and you didn’t ask anyone!”

“Would you have asked anyone?”

“Of course not.”

“Exactly. I did what you do every day: leave people running around in your wake, clearing up after you.”

Again, without leaving his eyes, she spoke to Gaetano. “Hear that? It identifies with me. With my methods. Just because for once it does something a bit decisive, it thinks it’s turning into me.”

He threw out a hand, spread into a Verb configuration, at her throat. It stopped maybe a tenth of an inch before touching her. He was frighteningly fast. If he’d wanted to, he could have completed the blow and left her headless before Gaetano had even started to move. Before she had even started to register the shock she was now registering.

Molecules had rearranged to harden his fingers into striking surfaces. He allowed himself to brush her throat lightly, then withdrew his hand. He’d put his hands all over her before, over parts much more private than her throat, but this touch was different. It caused something between them to shift.

“That’s how easy it would be for me to put an end to this mission, and this conversation, and you. And the people I’m supposed to be protecting you from have apparently got something that kills people like me. And still you won’t tell me the truth about them.”

She seemed to be having trouble breathing. He turned to Gaetano, shrugged an apology, and turned back to her.

“You see, I really don’t buy what you’ve told me. Not all of it. These people who threaten you, they’re serious enough for you to get Rafiq to give you a Consultant, but not serious enough for you to tell me everything about them. Who, where, and why. All I’ve got is conspiracy theories. A cell of mega-rich movers and shakers operating indirectly through the founders, passing you handwritten notes. The rest of it, you just hint at. Almost coyly, like it’s some second virginity you might let me have one day.”

He paused, glanced again at Gaetano, and continued. He still spoke quietly, but his voice took on an edge.

“And there’s something else you haven’t told me. Not world-picture stuff about the founders, but something quite specific.Afinaldetailwhichoverturnseverythingelse.Iknow it’s there. What is it?”

“I never said...” She stopped, caught her breath, and began again. “I never said anything about some final detail.”

“No, you didn’t. That was me.”

“Then you’re putting words in my mouth.”

“No. Of all the things I’d like to put in your mouth…”