The Love Detective: Next Level by Angela Dyson

Author:Angela Dyson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Troubador Publishing Ltd
Published: 2019-09-02T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twenty-Three

We didn’t go back for the car. Stumbling along the towpath, we rounded the corner and spotted a black cab trundling along with its yellow light on. I flagged it down and, within half an hour, when Flan, fresh from her bath and in her robe and slippers was rummaging around in the fridge looking for something for us to eat, I had stripped off my clothes in her guest bathroom and levered myself down into the foaming water. My body felt stiff and aching. At some point during the night’s doings, I’d managed to cut my arm. Blood encrusted a long, thin line that went from inside the elbow joint all the way down to my wrist. Closing my eyes and breathing in the steam and the scent of rose from the bath essence, I ignored the question of exactly when it was that I’d had my last tetanus shot and instead offered a silent prayer to whomever or whatever had been watching over us that night. We’d been incredibly fortunate. It could all have gone so terribly wrong.

“Clarry,” called Flan, “I’ve left one of my nighties and a dressing gown out for you.”

When I joined her in the kitchen, Flan was uncorking a bottle of Champagne.

“It’s good for shock,” she said, pouring some into a flute glass and offering it to me.

“I thought that was brandy,” I said, accepting it.

“That too,” she said, filling her own glass. “But Champagne, in my opinion, not only calms the nerves but instantly cheers the spirits.”

“It certainly does,” I agreed as the cold liquid fizzed down my throat and we clinked glasses.

“Do you know?” I said, sinking down on a chair, “I don’t think I’ve ever tasted anything quite as good as this in all my life.”

“We’re celebrating being alive, darling,” said Flan solemnly, before taking her first sip. “That’s really what you’re tasting.”

*

I was awoken the next morning in Flan’s guest room by sunshine streaming in through the white voile curtains. It was seven o’clock. The Champagne must have worked its magic because, untroubled by bad dreams, I had slept soundly. Perhaps we are only plagued by visions of pursuit along ghostly passages or down endless flights of steps when, in the real world, there is little or no chance of those things taking place. My nightmares had invaded my waking world. I’d lived them. And that, it seemed, was enough for even my unconscious mind to get a handle on.

I had no alternative but to pull on my filthy clothes of the night before and so, looking like a tramp that had spent the night in a ditch, I padded into the kitchen. Flan was still in bed, but on the table, I found a message written on one of the notelets she’d bought at The Nook, which was a nice, if ironic, touch.

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