“And your wife?” It was said casually, too casually. “We couldn’t hack it together. We’d been married about seven months and she was constantly bitching about my working nights as a policeman; she took off with a boyfriend… sent me divorce papers from Mexico. She wiped herself out about ten years ago in an automobile accident in Germany.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. Not for me. Or for her! She went out the way she would have wanted to go… taking an internationally famous movie star with her. It made headlines throughout Europe. They’d been living together while she was trying to get her fifth divorce.”

Sylvia listened to him talk. Odd, she thought, I’ve been married to Bruce for ten years and I never understood or felt one damned thing about him. Yet, here I am sitting with almost a stranger, and I’ve gotten more insight into this man’s character in fifteen minutes than I’ll ever have about Bruce… even if we were married for another ten years. She found herself in empathy with the detective. When he had been talking about the newspaper delivery episode she’d actually found herself reaching impulsively for his hand to show him she understood. Fortunately he hadn’t noticed her abortive movement.

Over lunch they chatted about inconsequential things. When they both fell silent at the same time, it was a warm, companionable silence, with neither feeling any need of conversation. Someone had once told Sylvia that when lovers are silent and not speaking, their bodies are talking to each other. While it had seemed nonsense at the time, she could almost believe it now. She was all too aware of his body next to her. She imagined she could feel the heat of his thighs radiating against her own. And although she fought against the remembrances, she found herself recalling her reactions to him when he had been taking the photographs. It had taken her hours of soul searching that night before admitting that she had, for the very first time in her life, truly enjoyed sex. She didn’t know if it was the result of some mental quirk on her part… of having “paid” for a sex servant who did her bidding… or whether the man’s body and her body were that compatible. One way or the other, she thought, I’ll find out for sure before this thing is over.