Singapore Sling Shot - Andrew Grant [20]
“I’m just asking because, if it is, I’ll need to organise my sitter for my children.”
“Would you like it to be on the agenda?” I asked. My throat was dry despite having just bathed it in Mr Carlsberg’s best lager.
“Very much indeed. I don’t have a boyfriend and casual sex is not my thing, even if the opportunity arises. We have people in common, so that makes us definitely not casual, and anyway, it appears we are man and wife.” Simone held up her left hand. On her ring finger was a gold band. I hadn’t noticed it before. When she played a role, she certainly played it for real.
“So we are,” I replied. All of my earlier thoughts about being Mr Virtuous went right out the window. Hell, I was helping a lady in distress, or something.
The waitress arrived as Simone flipped open her cellphone to call her sitter. I forewent another beer and called for the bill. I paid for our drinks and we went in search of a taxi.
7
Being the imperfect gentleman I am, all I will say about the night I spent with the beautiful Simone DeLue is that it was spectacular. She admitted at some stage that she hadn’t had sex for more than a year. It showed. Her enthusiasm bordered on the psychotic. Eventually things calmed down and moved on from her lonely, animal lust to another place. Later still, mutually exhausted, we ended up in the huge spa bathtub.
Room service delivered a bottle of Moet and glasses. Yes, Simone drank some of it. Not much to be sure, but lying there amongst the bubbles she let the yeasty golden velvet of the champagne tickle her senses.
Simone DeLue left my room very, very, late. Or was that very early? The phraseology always confuses me. Whatever, it was 03:30 when we said goodnight.
“Will I see you again?”
“I hope so, but no promises.”
“I hope so too. Take care, Mr Spy!”
With that she was gone without a backward look. I closed the door and locked it. How different this night had been from my escapades of the past few months. Sex for sex’s sake, especially when you’re an addict like I am, is a totally empty experience, beyond the physical at least. This had been good sex. It had meaning of sorts. We had connected throughout the day. Dare I say it? We’d had genuine fun as we’d play-acted our roles as Mr and Mrs Ed from Perth. Big kids, I guess, but it had been fun none the less, and fun is something I haven’t experienced much over the years. It was another day when I didn’t have to kill anyone, and that can’t be bad.
But as for the sex Simone and I had just shared, that had been quite wonderful. The thing is that, since quitting Thailand, sex for me had been bar, pick-up, home and bed. Several girls had been on a repeat loop but after a couple of weeks I moved on. Variety is supposedly the spice of life. How about we replace that cliché with another claim. How about “Variety is the flat grey sludge of boring repetition”?
On her way home by cab, Simone DeLue was smiling to herself. She was exhausted, sore and happy. She’d had no intention of inviting Daniel to seduce her. That had never been in her plans. She’d imagined a day out play-acting. She’d anticipated some nice food and a few laughs and that would have been that. A pleasant day away from her normal routine.
In fact, she admitted to herself at one point during the day that she hadn’t really been sure she even liked the man she was with. However, somewhere along the way her perception of him had changed.
In her book, physically Daniel Swann was every woman’s dream, or at least he was very close. He was good looking in a rugged sort of way. He had a great body and he knew how to use it. However it was the little things that made her really connect with him.
Throughout the day she’d had glimpses beyond that hard, almost callous exterior he presented and she knew there was a lot more to Daniel Swann than he was prepared to show the world.
She had seen immediately that he was smart and humorous, but she had felt that there was a very real sense of vulnerability about him. She had gone in search of it and