Hugging herself against the increasingly frigid evening she was no longer even certain what he looked like. Very ordinary, maybe, with mousey curls. Clean shaven . . .
‘By the time I got here, I was convinced you wouldn’t show up.’
Honor jumped. Aaron was grinning before her, saved from ordinariness by wide-open blue eyes. And quite tall. She thought suddenly of Martyn Mayfair — no, that was tall. ‘I brought some friends along.’ He introduced two couples in a rapid-fire burst of names that she couldn’t possibly remember and they gathered around with friendly smiles and began to walk, chattering about America, holidays at Disneyland, cousins in Texas.
Honor was grateful to Aaron for providing safety in numbers. ‘Where are we going?’
‘A venue called Ali Spangles. You’ll love it,’ said a girl wearing a cute trilby hat.
‘It’s really cool,’ added the other.
It seemed a long walk before they entered the club up six steps and a black passageway sprinkled with star-like lights. She tried not to mind that her sandals kind of stuck to the floor. Electronic dance music blared. With a shout of, ‘Going to dance!’ the two girls straight away thrust themselves through the crowd towards the dance floor, their men in train.
Honor watched them go, wondering. Aaron bought her a drink but was just standing there, quiet. She made an attempt to re-establish the dialogue. ‘So — you like this club?’
His gaze quartered the room. ‘I come a lot.’
‘Do you dance?’
He glanced at her. ‘No, sorry.’
Honor began to revise her opinion of the manners of Englishmen.
His gaze continued its methodical path. Then his face lit up. ‘Come on, there’s the guy I want you to meet.’ He tugged her across the room as if he were a child and she his balloon bobbing behind, until he reached a squat, dark man with other men standing either side. ‘Jermaine! How’s it going, man?’
Jermaine nodded. He looked like the local gangster, cool as hell in his black shirt and jacket and his entourage taking a respectful step back because he’d entered a conversation. ‘Good. You got some business?’
Aaron’s hand tightened around Honor’s fingers as she began to think about freeing herself. ‘My friend here wants work waiting on tables.’
‘I could help with that,’ nodded Jermaine, looking at Honor.
‘She’s American and can’t get a bank account, so—’
‘I got one this afternoon,’ Honor put in.
A frown clanged down over Jermaine’s eyes. He turned to Aaron. ‘She got one this afternoon,’ he repeated, icily. The entourage stepped closer.
Aaron glared at Honor. ‘You never told me!’
‘You didn’t ask.’
He put his lips against her ear. ‘Listen, Jermaine owns three clubs and employs a lot of people. Know what I mean?’
‘I don’t think I want to know.’ Anxiety stiffened her voice.
Aaron’s anger faded and he snorted a laugh. ‘I don’t know what you’re imagining — but Jermaine has jobs for waitresses who would prefer to be paid incash.’
‘Ah.’ Honor finally got it. ‘Without troubling the tax authorities.’
He winked. ‘You didn’t hear that from me.’
‘No, notprecisely.’ She tweaked her hand free, smiling politely at Jermaine. ‘Goodnight.’ And turned to wriggle back through the throng.
Aaron caught up with her at the door. ‘What the hell is wrong with you? You made me look a bloody fool.’
‘I bloody guess I did.’ She knew she hadn’t popped the ‘bloody’ in the right place. Cursing in English took practice and she was upset. ‘But you offered toshowme around nothawkme around. You get a nice commission off that guy?’ This time, when she stalked away, Aaron didn’t follow. She paused outside, shivering, to drag on jeans and socks under her dress, her T-shirt over it, and change into tennis shoes.
Shoving her lovely gold gladiator sandals in her backpack, she set off to find a taxi rank, jogging gently beside the traffic along the sea front under the strings of lights, chanting under her breath, ‘Honor, you will not be so gullible. You will wise up. Just because they speak English doesn’t mean they’re not foreigners.’
