The Carbon Trail by Catriona King Page A

and that was something she couldn’t afford.
    She closed her eyes for a moment and pictured the first day that they’d met; Richie standing in his crisp white shirt and pressed trousers, with her dressed exactly the same, wishing she was in a pretty dress the moment he’d glanced her way. Each time she’d turned round Richie had been smiling at her, and she’d involuntarily smiled back. After that they always seemed to end up near each other; in lectures and the canteen, training and in the car-park. Meaning to go straight home to their other halves, but never quite making it beyond the gate, without ‘just a quick drink at Mac’s?’ emerging from one of their mouths.
    Pereira shook her head hard, trying to wipe out the images and with them the feelings that she still had. It didn’t work. She could still remember the fullness of Richie’s lips on hers and his strong hands stroking her, unexpectedly gentle. Richie had held her as if she was delicate and could break. He’d been right. She could break and she had, into a million tiny shards of love and loss.
    A single tear escaped from her eyes and slid in slow motion down her cheek, its heat burning a path. Pereira let it fall, watching it slowly in her mind and feeling it cool as it reached her neck. It fell alone. She’d already cried millions of others since the day she’d made her choice. A choice she’d known every day for the past two years that she shouldn’t have made.
    Richie had been so much braver than her, so much truer. He’d always known what they had together and that even if she wouldn’t leave Joey he had to leave his wife. To stay with Dina any longer would have betrayed all three of them.
    Richie was brave in every way. But she wasn’t and she’d betrayed them both. Staying in the half-life of fondness and safety her marriage offered, instead of seizing the real love that she felt for him. She’d regretted it every day, as life heaped on yet more things to tighten her chains. Each time she saw Richie she lied to him, and to herself. Full of banter and sarcasm, pushing him away with her words. Pretending that she’d chosen well, and yet every minute praying that he’d see the truth and pull her into his arms. Pull her out of her cowardice into the life that she was supposed to have with him.
    Pereira dreamed for a moment longer and then dashed away the tear, half-dried now against her skin. Then she sat forward, the professional again, and scanned the street ahead. There was still nothing happening, so she sat back again to wait.
    ***
    4.30 p.m.
     
    Mitchell pressed randomly on the keys of his laptop and glanced at the clock. Four-thirty. Soon he’d have the weekend to cope with. He braced himself for the conversations ahead, where he’d hold back, delaying one beat to search for clues in Karen’s words. At least he could relax with Emmie. She knew even less about their life together than he did.
    He turned his chair towards the window and scanned the street. The Goldman Sachs Tower stood opposite, casting its wealthy shadow on everything around. Thousands of glass towers shone across New York, their mesh of windows forming a rainbow. It joined a real one, caught by the falling afternoon sun. Mitchell squinted up at the clouds, searching for faces in them like a child. Images half-formed and faded as he watched. Whose face was he searching for? He barely knew his own, so how could he find someone’s that he didn’t know?
    Frustration overwhelmed him suddenly and Mitchell slammed his fist down on the desk. Why couldn’t he remember things and why did he have this constant bloody headache? Why didn’t he know the people in his life, when they so obviously all knew him? And what internal homing device had led him to that café the day before, where the old woman had greeted him so warmly? A warmth that he’d felt too, even before she’d told him her name.
    A brisk rap on the door jerked Mitchell back to earth and he fixed on a