‘It’s the family business,’ he said, looking faintly embarrassed.
‘So you followed in Daddy’s footsteps,’ I said. I felt disappointed. I couldn’t put my finger on why, exactly. Maybe I expected him to live up to that profile with a suitably buccaneering past.
‘Eventually,’ he said. ‘I read Arabic at university, then I worked for the BBC World Service for a while. But the money was dire and there were no prospects. My father had the sense to see that sales had never interested me, but he persuaded me to take a shot at working in claims.’ Michael raised his shoulders and held out his hands in an expressive shrug. ‘What can I say? I really enjoy it.’
All of a sudden, I remembered one of the key reasons I like being with Richard. He lives an interesting life: music journalist, football fan and Sunday morning player, part-time father. I was sure if I hung around with Michael Haroun, I’d learn a lot of invaluable stuff. But not even the most brilliant raconteur can make insurance interesting for ever. With Richard, no two days are the same. With Michael, I suspected variety might not be the spice of life.
Now I’d established that I didn’t want to spend the rest of my life with the man, I felt a sense of release. I could take what I needed from the encounter, and that would be that. My life wasn’t about to be turned on its head because I’d fallen in love with a profile when I was fourteen.
With that comforting thought in the front of my mind, I had no hesitation about inviting him back for more coffee. The fact that I’d forgotten to mention Richard to him somehow didn’t seem too important at the time.
Richard’s car wasn’t home when we got there. I wasn’t sure whether to be pleased or not. On the one hand, I wanted him to see me with Michael Haroun. If it took a bit of the green-eyed monster to make Richard start thinking about where our relationship was headed, so be it. On the other hand, the last thing I wanted was for him to throw a jealous wobbler in front of someone who was potentially a useful source, if not a prospective client.
‘You live alone, then?’ Michael asked casually as we walked up the path.
‘Yes and no,’ I said. ‘I have a relationship with the man next door, but we don’t actually live together.’ I unlocked the door, switched off the burglar alarm and led him through the living room into the conservatory that links both houses. ‘This is the common ground,’ I said. ‘We each reserve the right to lock the door into the conservatory.’ I wasn’t sure why I was telling Michael all this. Maybe there was still a smidgen of lust running through my hormones.
Michael followed me back into the living room, closing the patio doors behind him. ‘Coffee?’ I asked. ‘Or would you prefer a drink?’
He smiled mischievously. ‘That depends.’
‘Oh, you’ll be driving,’ I told him. Even if I’d been young, free and single, he’d have been driving, I told myself firmly.
He pulled a rueful face and said, ‘It had better be coffee then.’
I’d just finished grinding the beans when I heard the clattering of Richard’s engine. I glanced out of the window and watched the hot pink, customized Volkswagen Beetle convertible nose into the space between Michael’s car and my Leo Gemini turbo super coupé, a trophy from the case which had put our relationship on the line in the first place. I kept meaning to trade it in for something more suited to surveillance work, the coupé being about as unobtrusive as Chatsworth on a council estate. But it was such a pleasure to drive, I hadn’t got round to it yet.
Back in the living room, Michael clearly wasn’t brooding on his rebuff. He was absorbed in the computer games reviews again. ‘Coffee won’t be long,’ I said.
He closed the magazine and replaced it in the rack. Either he had very good manners, or he was as obsessively tidy as I was. Richard calls it anal retentive, but I don’t see why you have to live in a tip just to prove you’re laid back. Before we could get back into computer games, I heard the patio doors on the far side of the conservatory open. Richard’s yell of greeting penetrated even my closed doors. ‘Brannigan, I’m home,’ he called.
Seconds later, he appeared at my doors, brandishing the unmistakable carrier bag of a Chinese take away. He pulled the door back, took in Michael and grinned. ‘Hi,’ he said expansively. I estimated three joints. ‘You two still working?’
‘We finished ages ago,’ I said. ‘Michael came back for coffee.’
‘Right,’ said Richard, oblivious to the implication I was thrusting under his nose. ‘You won’t mind if I join you then?’
Without waiting for an answer, he plonked himself down on the sofa opposite Michael and unpacked his takeaway. ‘I’m Richard Barclay, by the way,’ he said, extending a hand across the table to Michael. ‘You wait for Brannigan to remember her manners, you could be dead.’
‘Michael Haroun,’ he said, shaking Richard’s hand. ‘Pleased to meet you.’ Yes, an insurance man born and bred. Only an estate agent could have lied more convincingly.
Richard jumped to his feet and headed for the door. ‘Chopsticks and bowls for three?’ he asked. ‘Sorry, Mike, I wasn’t expecting company, but there’s probably enough to go around.’
‘We’ve just had dinner, Richard,’ I said. ‘I did leave you a message.’
‘Yeah, I know,’ he grinned. ‘But I’ve never known you refuse a salt and pepper rib, Brannigan.’
‘Sorry about that,’ I said as he left.
Michael winked. ‘Gives me a chance to suss out the competition.’
I didn’t like the idea that I was some kind of prize, even if it was gratifying to know that he was interested in more than recovering Henry Naismith’s Monet. And he didn’t even have the excuse of a previous encounter in the British Museum. ‘What makes you think there’s a competition?’ I asked sweetly.
Michael leaned back against the sofa and stretched his legs out. ‘I thought you were the detective? Kate, if you two were as happy as pigs, you’d have left me sitting in the car wondering where exactly I’d made the wrong move.’
Before I could reply, Richard was back. ‘I’ll get the coffee,’ I said, annoyed with myself for my transparency. By the time I got back, Richard and Michael were getting to know each other. And they say women are bitches.
‘So, what do you do when you’re not chipping a oner off people’s car theft claims because your assessor spoke to the next-door neighbour who revealed that the ashtray was full?’ Richard asked through a mouthful of shiu mai.
As I sat down next to him, Michael smiled at me and said, ‘I play computer games. Like Kate.’
I poured the coffee in silence and let the boys play. ‘All a bit sedentary,’ Richard remarked, loading his bowl with fried rice and what looked like a chicken hoi nam.
‘Oh, I work out down the gym,’ Michael said. I believed him. I could feel the hard muscles in the arm pressed against mine.
Richard nodded, as if confirming a guess. ‘Thought as much,’ he said. ‘Bit too pointless for me, all that humping metal around. I prefer something a bit more social for keeping in shape. But then, I suppose it can’t be easy finding people who want to play with you when you’re an insurance claims manager,’ he added, almost as an afterthought. ‘Bit like being a VAT man.’
‘I’ve never had any problems finding people to play with,’ Michael drawled. I had no trouble believing that. ‘What exactly is it that you do to keep fit, Richard? Squash? Real tennis? Polo? Or do you prefer raves?’
Richard almost choked on his food. Neither of us rushed to perform the Heimlich manoeuvre. Recovering, he swallowed hard and