CHANGING TIDES
※※※
Robin adjusted the hem of her black cocktail dress under her beige knee-long coat while her eyes roamed the area around her. She couldn't remember being so nervous for years, probably never if she was honest with herself. It was the good kind of nervous, though. She checked the watch on her wrist and exhaled loudly – she was eleven minutes early.
Get a grip, Ellacott; there's no danger lurking here.
She tried to compose herself, but it was of no use; the excitement and anticipation were too strong to keep them contained inside. Even when her ex-husband proposed to her over six years ago, she hadn't felt so elated and full of life. But then again, her ex-husband wasn't Cormoran Strike…
Her eyes wandered from the pair of swans on The Long Water on her left to the footpath on the right, trailing further into the Kensington Gardens. It was the golden hour, the time when the sun is still in force but already preparing to say goodbye to the day. Robin loved this time of the day, when the world seemed to have been covered by a golden veil, making every colour softer and warmer. Just when she was about to look at the famous statue of children, fairies and a boy with a pan flute just off the path, she spotted the familiar tall figure in a long dark coat walking toward her. Her heartbeat quickened and she couldn't stop herself from smiling.
Strike reached her only a moment later and she couldn't miss his admiring gaze. Just as well, for Robin couldn't take her eyes off him either, and it wasn't mainly due to his favourite, perfectly fitting Italian suit with a white shirt under his coat, and his freshly trimmed stubble. A feeling of déjà vue hit them both, thinking of more than a year back, a memory involving a balloon pony and Narciso perfume, which she was still using.
"Peter Pan?" Robin raised her eyebrows, smiling.
Strike chuckled. "Ted and Joan brought us here once on a trip to London because it was Lucy's favourite book. She loved the statue."
"And you?"
He grinned. "I was trying to figure out why does Wendy stare at Peter's arse."
Robin's laugh scared off a couple of pigeons. She had laughed a lot in the past twenty-four hours and loved Strike being the reason.
"I've always loved your wicked sense of humour, 'though it's really dark sometimes," she said then.
"Comes in handy, especially when your limb decides to take flight," he replied, adoring her flushed cheeks and the happy sparks in her eyes.
Robin, seeing the innocent expression in his eyes, lost it – and burst into laughter again. It felt almost cathartic. Without thinking, she hugged Strike, as if they parted a year ago and not only the previous evening. The subtle lavender scent of his Pour Un Homme did the trick again – she became pleasantly lightheaded. Unable to resist, she turned her head toward his face, her breath warming his neck when she placed a soft kiss on it. Hearing his soft moan and feeling his neck muscles flex, she smiled.
"So… where are we going?" she asked and pulled back to see his face.
Strike swallowed to regroup from the moment of sweet torture.
"First for a walk, then for dinner," he replied then and went silent, an enigmatic smile on his lips. "Guess I'm an old-fashioned bugger."
Robin liked the veil of secrecy about the exact location of their evening meal, on their first night out as a couple…The word had a strange ring to it, for Robin felt they were so much more than just best friends and a couple - they were true soul mates.
"I like old-fashioned," she purred with a low voice, making him swallow hard again. "Shall I expect another pony by the end of the day?" she smirked then as her arm sneaked under his as they started walking.
Strike grinned, enjoying the little play between them.
"No, but something tells me you won't be disappointed," he replied with a twinkle in his eyes.
Robin couldn't stop grinning as she leaned even closer against his bulk.
"I wouldn't dream of it."
※※※
Two coffees on the go and a long walk later - passing by Princess Diana Memorial Fountain, sitting down and watching the swans, ducks and geese on The Serpentine Lake in Hyde Park – they hailed a cab near Wellington Arch and drove down the Picadilly. Strike instructed the driver to stop at the Green Park underground station, leaving Robin puzzled, but intrigued.
They got out of the cab, Strike taking her hand and leading her back to the Picadilly. It was once they turned left that Robin got a feeling she knew where they were going. Her instinct wasn't wrong when she spotted the famous white, over-a-century-old neo-classicistic building with familiar blue marquees. A knowing, wide smile appeared on her face when they stopped at the short staircase inviting them inside.
"I should have known," Robin said, still smiling, then turning her head to look at Strike, who observed her reaction with pleasure. "What exactly are we doing here?" she inquired, although deep inside, she knew the answer to her question.
His expression turned slightly more serious. "Making amends," he said quietly before a gentle smile returned to his face.
Robin squeezed his hand, mesmerised by the sincerity and care reflected in his eyes.
"Well then… Shall we?" she asked with a smile that told Strike more than any words could.
Hand in hand, feeling elated (and hungry), they walked into The Ritz.
※※※
"By the way, how on earth did you manage to get a free table here within a day?" Robin asked in awe while they were waiting for their dessert.
Strike grinned. "Let's just say Rockefeller owed me a favour," he said enigmatically, referring to one of their earlier cases – a wealthy financier who was being blackmailed over a few saucy photographs.
"I guess this job does come with a few perks, after all." Robin nodded, chuckling.
The waiter brought their desserts and Strike didn't even attempt to hide his enthusiasm in dumping the diet for one night, making Robin chuckle. He may have been looking after himself much more in the past year, but he was still Cormoran Strike – the man who loved his sweets even if they should kill him.
After Strike put the spoon to his mouth to devour the last delicious bite of his chocolate soufflé, he noticed Robin's mirth faded a bit; she looked absent-minded. He didn't need to be a detective to figure out why.
"How did he take it?" he asked the inevitable question that had been hanging in the air ever since his partner showed him that his feelings were indeed reciprocated. "You don't have to talk about it if you don't want to."
Robin sighed, then spoke with a sad smile. "It's fine. Better than expected, actually. It wasn't easy but… To be honest, I was having doubts for a while already, before you…" She looked at him, then shyly lowered her eyes, smiling. Strike's small smile encouraged her to keep going.
"Well, when we left the office, we only made it to the car park, a few minutes walk away," she started and returned to the decisive moment a day earlier…
※
DCI Murphy opened the car door on the passenger's side, to let his girlfriend get in. However, Robin was just staring ahead but not really looking at anything. All the way from the office, Murphy was talking about what they were going to do at their weekend break, excited at the prospect of being alone with her for three whole days.
He didn't even notice that Robin barely listened to him, walking in a state of trance, putting one foot ahead of the other as if on autopilot. The shock she had received only a few minutes before in the inner office sitting opposite her business partner and best friend numbed her and disabled her normal reactions. Her cheeks were flushed and her heart was thumping in her chest, unable to settle to its normal rhythm.
This is really it, she thought, suddenly painfully aware of what she was about to do.
"Robin, are you coming?" Murphy's voice made her blink and focus on the present.
Purely out of habit that she had adopted way back, still during her marriage to Matthew, she opened her mouth to apologise for drifting away in her mind. But the moment she wanted to do so, she stopped herself and spoke calmly.
"No."
The silence that fell on the space around them was filled with tension and on Murphy's part, with dread as well.
"What do you mean? Did you forget anything?" he asked, a hint of irritation in his voice. His hand was still gripping the handle on the opened car door, his knuckles suddenly white from the pressure he put on them.
Robin took a deep breath before exhaling, knowing there was no more point in pretending.
"I did," she replied quietly. "I forgot to listen to my heart."
Murphy released the handle, but not before pushing the door closed – with considerable force. He straightened himself up, lifting his head higher as if bracing himself for something he sensed was coming but stubbornly kept refusing to accept for months.
"How come it took you so long to figure that out?" His voice was surprisingly calm but detached as well.
"Because I was afraid," Robin replied, realisation suddenly hitting her. "I was so obsessed with making everything right, making others happy, especially my mother and you, that I totally forgot about how to make myself happy."
She sighed, briefly averting her eyes from him to think about her next words.
"I know this will sound hollow and like a bloody cliché, but it's true – you are a lovely person, Ryan, kind, generous, respectful, as Pat would probably say, an A+ boyfriend material." She couldn't suppress a sad chuckle." You gave me such a different life from the one I had in my marriage with Matthew, and you'll never understand how much I'll always be grateful for that."
"But A+ is obviously not enough," Murphy remarked coldly. His eyes were lifeless all at once.
"No! That's the thing," Robin interjected. "You're too good. Too good to be a…."
Suddenly she hesitated using the word she had on her mind, not wanting to make him feel humiliated.
"To be a what?" he demanded with a low voice.
Robin sighed. "To be a substitute."
Another moment of silence thickened the atmosphere between them even more. It was Murphy who spoke first then.
"Substitute for Strike, you wanted to say."
Robin was unable to reply. All she could do was look at him with compassion.
There was no point in denying it; Murphy was a detective too, and a very good one. In those months they had been together, he had seen Robin's interactions with Strike, and certain little things didn't go unnoticed by him - a gesture here, a look there, Robin being adamant about picking up her phone every time Strike texted or called, whatever she was doing…. And yet all the time, he believed that he could make Robin happy enough for her to want to be with him and not her best friend and business partner. He wanted to ask her if Strike felt the same about her but then thought the better of it. He would find out sooner or later anyway, so no point in adding salt to the gaping wound.
"I suppose that's it then," he remarked, his voice still low and cold, but Robin heard the sadness in it as well.
She didn't want to prolong it but thought it would be cold-hearted to just walk away without closure. She approached him and hugged him. With relief, she felt his arms returning the embrace, albeit in a cautious, reserved manner. When she pulled back, she noticed a tear escape Murphy's eye, although he kept a neutral expression on his face.
"You deserve better, Ryan," Robin said quietly, "I could never make you happy... but I hope you'll find the right one. I really do…"
He didn't react, or maybe thought there was no use in trying to persuade her to stay. He knew her well enough to know that once she made up her mind, nothing and no one could change it.
"I hope you'll be happy," Murphy said and let go of her. "You deserve it too."
She smiled, touched by the sincerity in his voice.
"Thank you," were the last words she said, and deep inside he knew she wasn't grateful only for not making a drama of the situation.
He watched her walk away, dragging the little suitcase behind her, heading toward a life she had chosen – a life without him.
※
"I never thought I would say it but I have to give that bloke credit; he's got some dignity," Strike said, after a moment of silence, in which he digested Robin's summary of her break-up with DCI Murphy.
Robin chuckled sadly. "He does, a lot of it, in fact… I didn't lie to him; everything I said was true, I'm just sorry I let it get so far. I should have broken it off a long time ago. It just seemed so… convenient." Suddenly she felt ashamed of using Murphy as a distraction from her true feelings.
"I was convinced he was about to propose to you on that weekend away," Strike admitted his greatest fear, lowering his eyes.
Robin regarded him with interest.
"Is that why you told me… you know, now?" she inquired.
Strike leaned back on his chair, with a heavy sigh.
"Partially," he replied. "I realised that I was running out of time. The thing I told Charlotte years ago about happiness requiring effort sometimes finally caught up with me. It was either that or losing you forever… I realised that my years of fear that it would damage our working relationship and our friendship was bullshit. If you really want something, you have to go for it. And I knew at that moment that it was all or nothing. And I told myself that I was done with pretence relationships or one-night stands with women. If you didn't feel the same as I do, I would have dedicated the rest of my life to work and that would have had to be enough."
His eyes were fixed on hers, letting her sink in his confession. It was strange how easy it suddenly felt for him to reveal to her thoughts he had always kept hidden from the outside world. It was like sitting in a therapy session when all things that had confused and screwed you up for so long suddenly become as clear as rain. Although this felt much better and more comfortable.
"I realised later that the way I worded it could have sounded unclear," Strike continued, seeing Robin hanging on his every word, her eyes glistening, sparkling in the fancy restaurant lights. "I know you're damn bright but how did you know that I didn't mean… the past?"
Robin's smile reflected a calm certainty as her hand reached for his. "Because I realised that Cormoran Strike would never give a woman a pony balloon and take her to Ritz for a birthday dinner if he thought they were just best friends…"
He lowered his eyes, smiling.
"But above all," Robin continued, meeting his gaze again. "I've only seen you really sad because of a woman once - after you broke up with Charlotte. None of the others seemed to have had any effect on you when it was over; they came and… went. But the pain I saw in your eyes when you told me… " She paused, remembering the decisive moment only the day before. "And when you didn't say anything to deny it… I just knew."
Strike couldn't be happier, and yet a trace of melancholy cast a faint shadow over his grey-blue eyes.
"That night at the Ritz…" he started.
"I know," Robin interrupted him gently. "We should have talked about it… "
"There were times throughout the years when I already struggled with it, but this was the hardest one to resist, until then at least - I wanted to kiss you so badly…" He shook his head.
"Why didn't you? I've been wondering ever since then…" Robin asked, her old doubts resurfacing for a second.
He sighed even louder, his eyes wandering about for a moment, then settling on her again.
"Just when I was about to, I saw the fear in your eyes… I thought you felt… offended, thinking I'd make a pass on you when you were drunk and you'd hate me afterwards. I thought you realised that you are worth more than ending up with a fat and ugly old ape."
Robin put her hand over her mouth, shocked. Then unexpectedly, she laughed at the absurdity of it all, and Strike looked puzzled.
"Sorry, it's just…" she apologised, smiling with relief. "I was afraid, but not because of what you said. I was afraid that if we kissed and… Well, I thought that you would regret it the next morning, regret what we did because we were drunk. And I couldn't stand it if you did…" She paused for a moment, her facial expression changing from soft to something bordering on anger. "And I never thought you were a fat and ugly old ape. Different, yes, but never that." She sounded almost offended.
The misjudgement of the situation on both of their parts made him groan. At the same time, he was touched by her comment about his looks. He couldn't believe they lost so much time just because of a misunderstanding. He couldn't help it and laughed.
"Well, fuck me," he stated, shaking his head again.
"Later," Robin blurted, and her eyes grew wider immediately after, realising she had said aloud what she thought. Strike's eyebrows went up.
"Shit, sorry, I…" Robin wished she was on the other side of the world at that moment.
How romantic was that? she thought, embarrassed, and buried her head in her hands.
She was still looking for the right words, blushing heavily, when Strike suddenly snorted and couldn't stop laughing. All at once, he felt as light as a feather floating in the air on a warm, sunny day.
"Now we're definitely going to be banned from coming here again," Robin remarked quietly, still mildly embarrassed, when she glanced at the barman at the counter nearby, whose lips twitched from amusement.
Strike took her hand again and kissed it.
"I don't care. I'm so fucking relieved," he said, chuckling, his face glowing from happiness. "And for the record," he added, raising his eyebrows, and his eyes twinkled, "I'm not entirely opposed to the proposed offer."
They both laughed and Robin finally relaxed again. She couldn't believe that only within not even forty hours, they went from being best friends and colleagues, occasionally having a curry in the office together, to suddenly sitting on a date and talking about the most intimate things as if they had been doing that forever. It felt damned good.
As opposed to their infamous "date" in the Ritz before, they drank only two cocktails each after dinner, both deciding they would rather stay sober to enjoy (and remember) the experience the best they could. It was approaching 11 p.m. when Robin yawned.
"Am I boring you already?" Strike quipped, with a smile.
"No chance," Robin chuckled. "I think I just need some fresh air."
They picked up their coats and walked out of the bar into the crisp night air on the street. Strike's arm rested comfortably around Robin's waist when he suddenly stopped them on the pathway under the stairs leading out from the hotel.
Robin, who was slightly leaning with her back against Strike's chest, turned her head and looked up at him, intending to ask why they had stopped walking. However, the moment she met his gaze, she was brought back to that night… The difference was that this time, she was not afraid of anything. Seeing the longing in Strike's darkened eyes, she was not going to make the same mistake again.
Her upturned face invited him to do what he wanted to do back then. They hadn't kissed since the previous night when they parted at their office on Denmark Street. Strike called Robin a cab to drive her home to her apartment, deciding to stick to his resolution and do things the right way. Robin loved him even more for it, and the anticipation building up in both of them all day was bliss and torture at the same time.
The expression in her eyes that greeted Strike now was screaming at him to do what his heart desired. He smiled, slowly dipped his head closer to her, feeling her warm, sweet breath on his face, and found her lips. The moment their mouths made contact, the hunger took over and Robin turned her body to his, wrapping her arms around his neck and pulling him even closer.
Strike got mildly dizzy, inhaling the Narciso perfume lingering on her skin; some unidentified force made him completely erase the world around them again, and he felt himself drifting into a state of frenzy. It felt like being pulled into the eye of the storm, and he was unwilling to stop it. Not that Robin would let him…
When they finally broke the kiss to get some air, Robin was shaking.
"Are you all right?" Strike asked immediately, mildly alarmed.
"Never better," she chuckled, her beaming smile chasing away his fear. "It was all that I ever dreamed of; it was… perfect."
Strike's face relaxed and he allowed himself to savour the feel of their "correction" kiss.
Suddenly, he found himself at a loss for words. He pulled her close, wrapping her in his coat, his cheek resting against the top of her head. Over six years ago, after his break-up with Charlotte, he didn't think he would be capable of loving someone again. He felt damaged beyond reason, unable and unwilling to let himself be led on the same path again. Love as he knew it hurt too much and cut too deep to plunge into its abyss again.
And then Robin stepped into his office… Only then did he understand that his image of love had been a wrong, distorted one. Although they had not been a couple until now, she taught him the meaning of real love - unconditional, selfless and giving, rather than taking. Not the wild, reckless and unsettling emotion, but rather the soothing, healing and reassuring one. As he placed a kiss into Robin's crown and savoured yet again the scent of her hair, he felt grateful and humbled, thanking whoever or whatever ruled the universe that they allowed him to hold her and call her his Robin.
Joan, she is finally my Robin… I wish you could have met her, too…
The tears, prickling in his eyes, surprised him; he thought he was done with crying for some time again. However, the thought of his late aunt caused a lump in his throat. His recent re-evaluation of his personal life made him more prone to physically expressing his emotions. He might have been a soldier once, but as opposed to the familiar saying, he knew now that boys do cry, without having to be ashamed of it.
"Are you all right?" Robin's quiet voice returned him to the moment. Only a few seconds later he registered the fact, that she must have felt his inner turmoil without even looking at him because she was still wrapped safely in his arms. So that's what soul mates are…
"Yeah, never better," Strike replied, smiling again, stroking her hair. "It's getting chilly. We should get out of here." He raised his hand to hail a cab.
There was no question where they would go - to the one place which held special memories for both of them, not only work-related. The place which was theirs. A black cab stopped on the curb. Strike opened the door for Robin and followed her inside. She reached for his hand, entwining her fingers with his as if making sure she wasn't just imagining it all.
It was an evening full of flashbacks; this time Strike was brought back to the night after he rescued her from the farm, remembering lying in bed next to her, desperately wanting to hold her close but keeping his distance, only for her to reach for his hand and hold it for a long while. Back then, he had little hope that she would ever do it again, and especially not on a date they would go on together…
The stocky, middle-aged cab driver with a cheerful face looked into the mirror and asked the expected question: "Where to, turtledoves?"
Strike barely opened his mouth when Robin answered for him with a beaming smile.
"Denmark Street, please."
※※※※※