‘Friends?Friends!Who the fuck do you think you are? You’re no friend of mine! You’ve always treated me like shit!’
‘I’m sorry you think that,’ began Luc, still calm, but Tom was advancing on us, marching across the salon pointing the gun.
‘Enough of this crap,’ he snarled, digging its barrel in Luc’s ribs. ‘Get in the kitchen, both of you.’
‘Look, wait,’ said Luc. ‘I will do whatever you say,but will you please let Alix go?’
What the fuck! Even at that appalling moment and in the full knowledge that he was only trying to protect me, I could not believe Luc had come out with that ‘women and children first’ outdated drivel. I’d have to have a word with him – if I lived to have another word.
We stumbled through the swing door into the kitchen, Tom poking and prodding the gun at random into any bits of us he fancied.
‘Put your phones on the table,’ he snapped. ‘And you, Mr Fine Gentleman,’ he indicated Luc, ‘unlock the cellar door.’
Taking the key from its hook on the door jamb, Luc obeyed, apparently meek, although I noticed that from under half-lowered lids, his eyes were actually fixed like gimlets on Tom, which made me pray he wouldn’t attempt any heroics. The cellar door creaked open, revealing the soot-black depths of its interior.
‘Right, Fancy-pants Cradock.’ Tom levelled the gun at me. ‘Get down those steps.’ He fashioned a silly little bow. ‘After all, ladies first, if you please.’
‘But I’m frightened of the dark!’ I squeaked. (It was worth a try.)
‘Very funny, Fanny.’ Seizing my upper arm in a painful grip, Tom pushed me roughly through the doorway, at which point I saw Luc start forward. But before I could do anything, Tom gave my back a hefty shove, which sent me flailing down the first few stone steps, desperately trying to grab the handrail to save myself from falling. Then I heard Tom’s evil little laugh again, and all of sudden Luc cannoned into me, propelling us both spinning helter-skelter to the bottom of the flight, where he ended up flat on his back with me on top of him.
The door above us slammed shut, the key turned in its lock, and there was silence: darkness and silence.
‘Are you all right?’
‘I’m not sure. It’s too dark to see.’
I felt rather than saw him smile. ‘An interesting hypothesis,’ he murmured, his breath on my cheek.
‘I’m working on it.’
‘Get your essay in by Friday, please.’
‘I might need an extension.’
He shifted slightly under me. ‘In which case, I’d better help you to move over. If I can stand up, I might just be able to find the light switch.’
With extreme delicacy, as if we were two pairs of gigantic knitting needles caught in a Gordian knot of wool, we untangled our limbs. As Luc rolled away from me, I sat up cautiously, rubbing sundry bits of my anatomy. In the darkness there came a scuffling noise, then an ‘Ouch!’ followed by an ‘Ow!’ and various muttered oaths, and then a click and the cellar flooded with light from an overhead naked bulb. I saw that we had landed on a thick sheepskin rug, matted and tufty with dirt and not a thing of beauty, but life-saving. With another groan, Luc bent to haul me to my feet. He seemed to be in one piece.
‘Are you injured?’ I asked.
‘Only my dignity. How about you?’
‘The same.’
We were avoiding each other’s eyes, the way you doon an overcrowded tube train after you’ve found yourself suddenly crushed up against a total stranger and have had to battle to get away from them. Except I realised I had not wanted to battle away from Luc. I had liked the feeling of his body beneath mine. Guiding me to an old plastic garden bench standing against one wall, he sat me down on it and cast his eyes about him.
‘Well, this is a pretty kettle of fish,’ he muttered.
‘I’ve always wanted to visit a real wine cellar.’
I looked about me expecting to see stone bins built into the roughly white-washed walls, with plaques from wooden wine cases tacked above them bearing poker-burnt legends such asGevrey Chambertin 1989.I would have thought there would be flagstones, a huge, scratched table bearing a leather-covered ledger recording every vintage since Adam and perhaps even a casual cask of cognac or two. Instead, it was all depressingly modern, like a cut-price wine warehouse in a retail park, with a concrete screed floor and the sort of Ikea flatpack bottle racks we mere mortals use.
‘Oh, the fucking idiot!’ Luc cursed suddenly. ‘Why do I feel sorry for the man?’
‘Tom? You feel sorry for Tom? Am I hearing this correctly? That crackpot has just pulled a gun on us, and you feelsorryfor him? Or have you totally lost it?’
Luc looked at me. ‘It was a fake,’ he said evenly.
