The Innocents (33 page)

She stroked her grandmother’s cheek. Ziva exhaled heavily and nodded but did not open her eyes. She wore an expression of defeat.

They did not speak in the car. For twenty minutes they drove in silence. They did not speak as Adam parked near Ziva’s, nor as they walked down the shade-dappled path to the house. They did not speak as Ellie fumbled for the keys in the pocket of her leather jacket, opened the door and stepped inside to calm the high, threatening shriek of the alarm. And they said nothing as they came together in the dark hallway, finally, drawn into each other’s arms with angry desperation, grappling and clawing like adversaries, stumbling together through the drift of denim and cotton and leather discarded at their feet and finally, finally, enfolding each other like mingled flames. There were bright spots on his vision though his eyes were closed and Adam felt himself for the first time wholly consumed, soul and blood and flesh, swallowed in the heat of her until he was only this, only now, lost forever to everything that had been before her skin. They did not speak until they lay together, wet with sweat and Ellie’s silent tears, and even then, the only word he ever spoke aloud was her name, over and over with the rhythm of her breath as again and again he bent to kiss the tiny tattooed Hebrew letter
samech
hidden beneath her left hip bone, a secret mark that he had never known was there.

28

“Rachel? Rachel?”

It was still early when Adam got home and he was certain that Rachel would be back at the hospital delivering the brownies. He hoped so, desperately. In that moment he could not imagine ever being alone at home with her again. There was no answer and he breathed with relief. He wanted to lie down somewhere—he had an urge to be connected to the ground, to lie on grass or in a field; but if it could not be then he wanted instead to collapse on his back on the floor of the sitting room and stretch and unfurl like a starfish. Alone, he did not feel in turmoil.

The Tupperware container of brownies was still on the table in the kitchen however, and when he went into the sitting room he saw that Rachel was asleep on the sofa. When he came near her she blinked and smiled. She yawned loudly.

“Hi, Ads. Why are you being all formal all of a sudden?”

She sat up sleepily and began to rearrange herself, pulling down the T-shirt that had ridden up over her stomach and swirling her tousled hair into a bun.

“What do you mean?”

“Calling me Rachel.”

Adam felt suddenly, urgently ashamed. “I—I don’t know. I hadn’t even thought about it.”

She lay back down again, her knees pulled up to her chest, and her hair fell across her cheek. She pushed it away. “Mmm. I’m so tired. How’s work?”

“I’ve not done much today since I spoke to you earlier. I’m waiting to hear from your dad. And Ziva’s doing well.”

She smiled. “She’s soooo much better. She’s going to be able to go home really soon, they think. She had a good sleep after you left this afternoon, apparently, and then the physio tried her walking with a Zimmer frame and she could do it. Only for a minute before she got tired, but still.”

“That’s such great news, Pumpkin.”

“I know, she sounded like herself again, all strong and determined all of a sudden.”

“Who was at the hospital just now?”

“Just
Ima
and me, and Ellie called and said she was on her way back and nearly there so I—Just when I was leaving.” She rubbed her eyes. “And I forgot to take the brownies back! I made them and then walked out without them—I’m so knackered. We should probably take them later.”

“Pumpkin you’ve had so much on, if you’re this tired, let’s have supper at home and you can take them in first thing instead. Jaffa’s there, and your cousin.” Even her name was sacred now; he would not hex himself by speaking it aloud to Rachel. He could not go back to the hospital, obviously, nor could he allow Rachel to go. But he was surprised when she nodded.

“That’s a good idea, and I think it gets a bit much for Granny anyway, when we’re all in there at once. I can’t be bothered to cook, do you mind? Shall we curl up here and get a pizza?”

Rachel tipped her face up and held her arms out to him, like a toddler asking to be carried. In recent months he had begun to notice how many of these tics and mannerisms she had; had seen how a lifetime of her parents’ infantilizing worship had meant that her default posture was to be cute. Once he had noticed it had been difficult to stop. His irritation had only increased, compounded by embarrassment, when he realized that her dependence and innocence had been traits that he’d once found appealing. They were deeply, intractably ingrained, but how could he have known it? When they’d met they had both been childish because they were children. More than once since they’d married he’d had to stop himself from snapping at her to talk in a normal voice, to act her age. But today he felt pity, and the same lurching vertigo he had felt when he’d left her to go to Paris. Poor, sweet Rachel. She loved him with such loyalty and such simplicity. She was so unprepared for the havoc that his betrayal could wreak in her perfect, simple life. He went to her and held her as she asked him, burying his face in her shoulder. She stroked his back.

“Poor little Ads,” she whispered. He lowered himself to sit beside her, his arms still locked around her, his face still hidden. “Poor Ads. You’ve been working so hard. What a mess this all is.”

The claim was not going well. Lawrence had been philosophical since the hearing and did not hold out hope that they would receive very much, if anything, he told Adam as they ate bagels together in the small office kitchen. Although he remained committed to pursuing the case, Adam could see that most of his energies were diverted, in private, to finding another solution. Justice done to Ethan Goodman concerned him less than seeking justice—and reimbursement—for his own staff.

Tony had brought the bagels, having decided on the way to work that his team needed cheering sustenance. But they were from the supermarket rather than Carmelli’s and there was something not quite right about them, too similar in texture to bread rolls—too light and airy, with an outside that needed very little jaw strength to penetrate. A real bagel should have a touch of India rubber about it, Lawrence had said sagely, holding up one of the impostors, and should be heavy enough to induce a soothing catatonia. Despite the chaos, Lawrence and Tony found time to argue this point for some five minutes before going back to their own offices. Adam was relieved to be at work. He was grateful to give himself over to it.

A nuzzling, cooing Rachel had climbed on top of him early that morning and, already half-roused by vivid waking dreams of Ellie, he had been too weak-willed to push her off. He had spent a long time in the shower after that and had sat morose on the Tube, feeling more disgusted with himself for sleeping with his wife than he had felt the day before after sleeping with her cousin. Aware that this was staggering hypocrisy, he nonetheless resented Rachel for having sullied something. She had interposed herself, and now when he called up those private, precious moments with Ellie it was as if there were fingerprints smearing what had been inviolable.

Yesterday’s dizzy elation had given way to a queasy hangover, although beneath it he felt an instinctive certainty that all between him and Ellie was as it should be. Everything else, however, was a mess.

The return date was looming. Matthew Findlay had also been put on the case and now worked quietly and steadily across from Adam, clicking the top of his pen. Until deep into the afternoon the two men read together in near silence.

A text message arrived. Adam had been completely absorbed; Ellie’s name took him by surprise. All it said was

What now?

Kristine popped her head round the door. “Call’s been moved forward. Lawrence wants you all before the barrister rings.”

“Coming.”

He tapped quickly, “
I don’t know, but we’ll work it out. I know you have to stay near me
,” and then went to join the others in the conference room.

When the meeting ended Adam went back to his desk and was checking for the tenth time whether Ellie had answered him when Lawrence came in.

“Ziva’s being discharged today, she’s able to go home in about an hour.”

“That’s brilliant news. Do you want me to go and pick her up or anything?”

“No, that’s fine, stay here. Jaffa and Rachel will take her back.”

“Is she going to be okay at home?”

Lawrence did not look convinced. “Well, Ellie is staying with her for a bit.”

“That’s a great idea!” Adam’s voice sounded high and false to his own ears. “I mean, how brilliant for both of them that they can sort of, take care of each other. Ziva’s going to need lots of hands-on help by the sounds of things and she can make sure that Ellie doesn’t go off the rails again, I suppose. It might be good for her to be living with Ziva and good for Ziva to be living with Ellie. Nowhere near Marshall Bruce or his wife. So good for everyone,” he finished. He wanted to fall through the floor. For the first time in twenty-four hours he could no longer feel Ellie’s skin, could not summon the shivers of pleasure that had buoyed him all day at the slightest thought of her yielding body. All he could feel was his father-in-law’s comforting, familiar presence before him and the vacuum that would open between them if Lawrence ever found out the truth. Until now, his intermittent shame had taken Rachel’s form. Suddenly Adam felt with equal force how profoundly he had betrayed a man who loved him.

“Is it?” Lawrence asked. When he looked at Adam, Adam felt the urge to look away. Lawrence held his eye. “I’m not so certain that it’s good for everyone.”

29

She was staying for him. He knew that she was staying for him. He knew it even before her text message arrived that morning—the one that stopped his heart with the single sentence:
“Now I’ll be near you.”
What now? He didn’t care. Whatever it was would be difficult and yet he felt sure that there was a way. A way now to see her whenever he could; maybe one day a way that he could be with her and her alone, somewhere else and always. He was walking home from the tube station. The Jewish New Year, Rosh Hashanah, began once again that evening and she would surely be in synagogue with her family and he could sit in the men’s gallery and look across at her and start the new year knowing that, however fucked up it all might be, the woman he loved loved him too. In the meantime, walking home to Primrose Hill past the bright graffiti and high, copper-green girders of the Chalk Farm footbridge, he felt sick with lust and manic with possibilities. Maybe Rachel would fall in love with someone else and leave him. He almost laughed aloud at the possibility. But—wouldn’t it be incredible! It would all be so easy. She could marry Dan Kirsch—no, not that
schlemiel
, someone he didn’t know and couldn’t picture but who nonetheless made her happy—and he could be blissfully and openly with Ellie, life would begin afresh, and when he and Ellie came to visit London from their loft in Tribeca then the four of them would have dinner in Notting Hill in an easy bohemian way while Hampstead Garden Suburb marveled at their amicable divorce. Stranger things have happened.

And then he thought, No, actually, they haven’t. That was the most improbable scenario, maybe ever, maybe in the world. It would happen when pigs, or any other earthbound, unkosher creatures, could fly. So, what? He didn’t need dinner in Notting Hill. There would be a way and they would find it and right now he felt recklessly, boundlessly joyful.

Rachel was out when he got home, which surprised him. It was already six and they had to be at synagogue at seven thirty for the
erev
Rosh Hashanah service; usually she would have been at home for hours checking her outfit, blow-drying her hair, trying different angles for her married-lady hat—this year a neat charcoal cashmere beret from Jigsaw in Brent Cross—and generally preparing herself to appear before the community.

Half an hour later he heard the key turn in the lock.