A Dark Beginning: A China Dark Novel by Paula Hawkes Page A

putting herself in a situation where she would be sorely tempted to compromise herself. At least in public she knew she wouldn’t do anything stupid.
    Mark watched her with interest, and gave the slightest of tugs on her hand. “Come on. I’m sure you’ve not got that long and I’d like to start as soon as possible.”
    She finally relented, giving up her futile resistance to his insistent pulling on her hand, and let him lead her towards the pub she’d followed him to that first day. He opened a side door and she was instantly relieved that she didn’t have to walk through the crowded pub, holding hands with one of their barmen. It felt good to be holding his hand, the connection strange and intensely personal.
    The door led immediately onto some steep narrow stairs, carpeted in a sticky, red and awfully patterned floral material. At the top of the stairs they turned right and opened a door onto a very large and mostly bare room. In the room there was a bed against one wall, vintage iron and dressed in delicate white. On the opposite wall was a simple white dressing table and chair. Against the wall just to China’s right was a camera on a tripod. It was Mark’s Nikon, and a couple of large flashguns were perched beside it on top of lighting stands, one considerably higher than the other. A large window dressed in lacy net curtains faced out onto the main road and let a generous amount of soft, grey light into the room.
    There was a vague aroma of vanilla air-freshener in the room, with a background of beer and damp wood. Not particularly unpleasant, and with the muffled sounds from the pub below she felt comfortably cocooned away from the real world.
    China walked slowly into the centre of the room carefully studying the contents. She was surprised at how elegant the room looked, far more than she would expect from a room above a pub. It was quite classical and distinctly arty. She could see in her mind some tasteful black and white pictures being created here. At that thought her mind turned to the subtly erotic picture that hung on Mark’s wall in his flat, and she blushed, knowing perfectly well that the photograph had been taken right here, on this very bed. The thought filled her with a chilly excitement.
    “Who is she?”
    “Who’s who?”
    “The girl on your wall.”
    “Oh. That was Zilda. She used to model for me.” He suddenly looked very sad.
    “I’m sorry. Was she your girlfriend?”
    He laughed awkwardly, but his face was still sad. “No. Well, she was a friend, and she was a girl, but no, not in the way you mean.”
    “Oh.” China was puzzled about something but she wasn’t sure what. She continued to survey the room. “Where do you want me to sit?”
    “Wherever you’re most comfortable.”
    She sat primly down on the chair in front of the dressing table, hands in her lap, uncomfortable at being the subject of attention, knowing that she presented a very stiff and awkward vision.
    “Let’s move this shall we?” Mark said lifting and moving her bag over beside him next to the camera. Then he came back over to her and looked at her from different angles, assessing, squinting and adjusting his view, almost scientific in his studies. He nudged the mirror on the dressing table, watching her face as the reflected light changed, then leant down and adjusted her neck scarf slightly, pushing the material down here, up there, but never actually touching her flesh. Every time the silky material moved she felt the hairs rising on the back of her neck, despite the lack of full contact. In just a brief moment he had turned into a cool, calm professional photographer, but she was gradually melting.
    “Do you mind?” he asked softly as he gestured towards her hair.
    “Go ahead.”
    He carefully moved her hair into position, lightly touched her chin with a single finger that sent sparks through her, and lifted her face to just the right angle. He applied gentle pressure to one shoulder to get the