Night of the Seventh Darkness [antikvár]

CHAPTER ONE Fort Greene, Brooklyn Friday, 18 September 199-Late afternoon The apartment smelled fusty. Angelina wrinkled her nose as she stepped into the hallway. Fusty. Or maybe something else. They'd only been away three months, and most of that time Filius had been there, Filius and maybe some friends of his. A girl maybe. Filius had said he didn't have a woman, but she found that hard to believe. He was good-looking, street-wise, and from the looks she sometimes found him giving her, Angelina didn't think he was gay. 'Home,' intoned Richard as he came in behind her, putting down two suitcases. The word was flat, almost meaningless: a narrow word in a narrow doorway. Angelina stood stock-still, letting it sink in. They were home, whatever that meant. Their next trip abroad wouldn't be for. . . how long? No telling. But what was that smell? 'You smell anything?' she asked, not turning round. Richard put his hands on her shoulders, pressing down a little. She disliked the pressure, the feel of his hands, hard, proprietorial. 'No.' He bent his face to her neck and sniffed. 'New perfume,' he whispered. 'Am I right?' She'd bought the bottle of Fendi in Geneva on the flight back from Kinshasa. In the cab coming in from JFK, she'd applied a few dabs to strategic places, a little surreptitiously. For the three months they'd been in Zaire she had studiously avoided perfumes. The heat turned them rancid on her skin. Or perhaps it had been her skin itself that made them grow sour. 'I don't mean that,' she said. Now she turned to face him. 'Don't 13