Like a Charm

by Karin Slaughter

  An old Presley song played for a moment at the back of Kiley's head. 'Your good luck charm,' he said.

  'If you like, yes. The first piece of luck I'd had in months, that's for sure. Years. I mean, I couldn't believe it. I just sat there, staring at it. I don't know, waiting for it to disappear, I suppose.'

  'And when it didn't?'

  Becker smiled. 'I tipped the pills into the toilet bowl, took a belt at the Scotch and then poured away the rest. The most I've had, that day to this, is a small glass of an evening, maybe two. I know you'll hear people say you can't kick it that way, all or nothing, has to be, but all I can say is it works for me.' He held out his hand, arm extended, no tremor, the fingers perfectly still. 'Well, you've heard me play.'

  Kiley nodded. 'And this?' he said.

  'The bracelet?'

  'Yes.'

  Forefinger and thumb, Becker took it from the palm of Kiley's hand.

  'Used it to get my horn out of hock, buy a half decent suit of clothes. When I was sober enough, I started phoning round, chasing work. Bar mitzvahs, weddings, anything, I didn't care. When I had enough I went back and redeemed it.' He rewrapped the bracelet and stowed it carefully away. 'Been with me ever since.' He winked. 'Like you say, my good luck charm, eh?'

  Kiley drained what little remained in his glass. 'Time I wasn't here.'

  Standing, Becker shook his hand. 'I owe you one, Jack.'

  'Just keep playing like tonight. OK?'

  The first few days went down without noticing, the way good days sometimes do. Adams' first set, opening night, was maybe just a little shaky, but after that everything gelled. The reviews were good, better than good, and by mid-week word of mouth had kicked in and the place was packed. Becker, Kiley thought, was playing out his skull, seizing his chance with both hands. Adams worked up a routine with him on 'Ghost of a Chance', just the two of them, voice and horn, winding around each other tighter and tighter as the song progressed. And, when they were through, Becker gazed at Dianne Adams with a mixture of gratitude and barely disguised desire.

  Costain didn't have to call in many favours to have Adams interviewed at length on Woman's Hour and more succinctly on Front Row, after less than three hours' sleep, she was smiling from behind her make-up on GMTV; Claire Martin pre-recorded a piece for her Friday jazz show and had Adams and Becker do their thing in the studio. Kate's profile in the Indy truthfully presented a woman with a genuine talent, a generous ego and a carapaced heart.

  All of this Kiley watched from a close distance, grateful for Costain's money without ever being sure why the agent had thought him necessary. Then, just shy of noon on the Thursday morning, he knew.

  Adams paged him and had him come up to her room.

  Pacing the floor in a hotel robe, sans paint and powder, she looked all of her age and then some. The photographs were spread out across the unmade bed. Dianne Adams on stage at Ronnie Scott's, opening night; walking through a mostly deserted Soho after the show, Kiley at her side; Adams passing through the hotel lobby, walking along the corridor from the lift, unlocking the door to her room. And then several slightly blurred and taken, Kiley guessed, from across the street with a telephoto lens: Adams undressing; sitting on her bed in her underwear talking on the telephone; crossing from the shower, nude save a towel wrapped round her head.

  'When did you get these?' Kiley asked.

  'Sometime this morning. An hour ago, maybe. Less. Someone pushed them under the door.'

  'No note? No message?'

  Adams shook her head.

  Kiley looked again at the pictures on the bed. 'This is not just an obsessive fan.'

  Adams lit a cigarette and drew the smoke deep into her lungs. 'No.'

  He looked at her then. 'You know who these are from.'

  Adams sighed and for a moment closed her eyes. 'When I was last in London, eighty-nine, I had this . . . this thing.' She shrugged. 'You're on tour, some strange city. It happens.' From the already decimated mini-bar she took the last miniature of vodka and tipped it into a glass. 'Whatever helps you through the night.'

  'He didn't see it that way.'

  'He?'

  'Whoever this was. The affair. The fling. It meant more to him.'

  'To her.'

  Kiley caught his breath. 'I see.'

  Adams sat on the edge of the bed and lit a cigarette. 'Victoria Pride? I guess you know who she is?'

  Kiley nodded. 'I didn't know she was gay.'

  'She's not.' Tilting back her head, Adams blew smoke towards the ceiling. 'But then, neither am I. No more than most women, given the right situation.'

  'And that's what this was?'

  'So it seemed.'

  Kiley's mind was working overtime. Victoria Pride had made her name starring in a television soap in the eighties, brittle and sexy and no better than she should be. After that she did a West End play, posed nearly nude for a national daily and had a few well-publicized skirmishes with the law, public order offences, nothing serious. Her wedding to Keith Payne made the front page of both OK! and Hello! and their subsequent history of breaking up to make up was choreographed lovingly by the tabloid press. If Kiley remembered correctly, Victoria was set to play Maggie in a provincial tour of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.

  But he didn't think Victoria was the problem.

  'Payne knew about this?' Kiley said.

  Adams released smoke towards the ceiling. 'Let's say he found out.'

  One image of Keith Payne stuck in Kiley's memory. A newspaper photograph. A tall man, six-four or -five, Payne was being escorted across the tarmac from a plane, handcuffed to one of the two police officers walking alongside. Tanned, hair cut short, he was wearing a dark polo shirt outside dark chinos, what was obviously a Rolex on his wrist. Relaxed, confident, a smile on his handsome face.

  Kiley couldn't recall the exact details, save that Payne had been extradited from Portugal to face charges arising from a bullion robbery at Heathrow. The resulting court case had all but collapsed amidst crumbling evidence and accusations of police entrapment, and Payne had finally been sentenced to eight years for conspiracy to commit robbery. He would have been released, Kiley guessed, after serving no more than five. Whereas his former colleague, who had appeared as a witness for the prosecution and was handed down a lenient eighteen months, was the unfortunate victim of a hit and run incident less than two weeks after being released from prison. The vehicle was found abandoned half a mile away and the driver never traced.

  Payne, Kiley guessed, didn't take kindly to being crossed.

  'When he found out,' Kiley said, 'about you and Victoria, what did he do?'

  'Bought her flowers, a new dress, took her to the Caprice, knocked out two of her teeth. He came to the hotel where I was staying and trashed the room, smashed the mirror opposite the bed and held a piece of glass to my face. Told me that if he ever as much as saw me near Victoria again he'd carve me up.'

  'You believed him.'

  'I took the first flight out next morning.'

  'And you've not been back since.'

  'Till now.'

  'Costain knew this?'

  'I suppose.'

  Yes, Kiley thought, I bet he did.

  Adams drained her glass and swivelled towards the telephone. 'I'm calling room service for a drink.'

  'Go ahead.'

  'You want anything?'

  Kiley shook his head. 'So have you seen her?' he asked when she was through.

  'No. But she sent me this.' The card had a black and white photograph, artfully posed, of lilies in a slim white vase; the message inside read Knock 'em dead and was signed Victoria with a large red kiss. 'That and a bottle of champagne on opening night.'

  'And that's all?'

  'That's all.'

  Kiley thought it might be enough.

  Adams ran her fingers across the photographs beside her on the bed. 'It's him, isn't it?'

  'I imagine so.'

  'Why? Why these?'

  Some men, Kiley knew, got o
ff on the idea of their wives or girlfriends having affairs with other women, positively encouraged it, but it didn't seem Payne was one of those.

  'He's letting you know he knows where you are, knows your every move. If you see Victoria, he'll know.'

  Adams' eyes flicked towards the mirror on the hotel wall. 'And if I do, he'll carry out his threat.'

  'He'll try.'

  'You could stop him.'

  Kiley wasn't sure. 'Are you going to see her?' he asked.

  Adams shook her head. 'What if she tries to see me?'

  Kiley smiled; close to a smile, at least. 'We'll try and head her off at the pass.'

  That night, after the show, she asked Becker back to her hotel for a drink and, as he sat with his single Scotch and water, invited him to share her bed.

  'She's using you,' Kiley said next morning, Becker bleary-eyed over his coffee in Old Compton Street.

  Becker found the energy to wink. 'And how,' he said.

  Kiley told him about Payne and all Becker did was shrug.

  'He's dangerous, Derek.'

  'He's just a two-bit gangster, right?'

  'You mean like Coltrane was a two-bit sax player?'

  'Jack,' Becker said, grasping Kiley by the arm, 'you worry too much, you know that?'

  The following afternoon Adams and the band were rehearsing at Ronnie's, Dianne wanting to work up some new numbers for the weekend. Kiley thought it was unlikely Payne would show his hand in such a public place, but rang Costain and asked him to be around in case.

  'I thought that was what I was paying you for,' Costain said.

  'If he breaks your arm,' Kiley said, 'take it out of my salary.'

  Kiley had been checking out The Stage. Cat on a Hot Tin Roof was already on the road, this week Leicester, next week Richmond. Close enough to make a trip into the centre of London for its star a distinct possibility. He sat in the Haymarket bar and waited for the matinee performance to finish. Thirty minutes after the curtain came down, Victoria Pride was sitting in her robe in her dressing room, most of the make-up removed from her face, a cigarette between her lips. Close up, she didn't look young anymore, but she still looked good.

  'You're from the Mail,' she said, crossing her legs.

  Kiley leaned back against the door as it closed behind him. 'I lied.'

  She studied him then, taking him in. 'Should I call the management? Have you thrown out?' Her voice was still smeared with the southern accent she'd used in the play.

  'Probably not.'

  'You're not some crazy fan?'

  Kiley shook his head.

  'No, I suppose you're not.' She took one last drag at her cigarette. 'Just as long as you're here, there's a bottle of wine in that excuse for a fridge. Why don't you grab a couple of those glasses, pour us both a drink? Then you can tell me what you really want.'

  The wine was a little sweet for Kiley's taste and not quite cold enough.

  'Are you planning to see Dianne Adams while she's in town?' Kiley said.

  'Oh, shit!' A little of the wine spilled on Victoria's robe. 'Did Keith send you?'

  'I think I'm batting for the other side.'

  'You think?'

  'He threatened her before.'

  'That's just his way.'

  'His way sometimes extends to hit and run.'

  'That's bullshit!'

  'Is it?'

  Victoria swung her legs around and faced the mirror; dabbed cream on to some cotton wool and wiped the residue of make-up from around her eyes.

  'Keith,' Kiley said. 'You let him know about the card and the champagne.'

  'Maybe.'

  'Just like you let him know about you and Dianne.'

  Victoria laughed, low and loud. 'It keeps him on his toes.'

  'Then shall we say it's served its purpose this time? You'll keep away? Unless you want her to get hurt, that is?'

  She looked at him in the mirror. 'No,' she said. 'I don't want that.'

  His phone rang almost as soon as he stepped through the door. Costain.

  'Why don't you get yourself a mobile for fucksake? I've been trying to get hold of you for the best part of an hour.'

  'What happened?'

  'Keith Payne came to the club, walked right in off the street in the middle of rehearsals. Couple of his minders with him. One of the staff tried to stop them and got thumped for his trouble. Wanted to talk to Dianne, that's what he said. Talk to her on her own.'

  Kiley waited, fearing the worst.

  'Your pal, Becker, all of a sudden he's got the balls of a brass monkey. Told Payne to come back that evening, pay his money along with all the other punters. Miss Adams was an artiste and right now she was working.' Costain couldn't quite disguise his admiration. 'I doubt anyone's spoken to Keith Payne like that in twenty years. Not and lived to tell the tale.'

  'He didn't do anything?'

  'Someone from the club had called the police. Payne obviously didn't think it was worth the hassle. Turned around and left. But you should have seen the expression on his face.'

  Kiley thought he could hazard a guess.

  Later that evening he phoned Victoria Pride at the theatre. 'Your husband, I need to see him.'

  The house was forty minutes north of London, nestled in the Hertfordshire countryside, the day warm enough for Payne to be on a lounger near the pool. A gofer brought them both a cold beer.

  'Hear that,' Payne said. 'Fuckin' bird song. Amazing.'

  Kiley could hear birds sometimes, above the noise of traffic from the Holloway Road. He kept it to himself.

  'Vicki says you went to see her.'

  'Dianne Adams, I wanted to make sure there wouldn't be any trouble.'

  'If that dyke comes sniffin' round.'

  'She won't.'

  'That business with her and Vicki, a soddin' aberration. All it was. Over and done. And then Vicki, all of a sudden she's sending fuckin' champagne and fuck knows what.'

  'You want to know what I think?' Kiley said.

  A flicker of Payne's pale blue eyes gave permission.

  'I think she does it to put a hair up your arse.'

  Payne gave it a moment's thought and laughed. 'You could be right.'

  And Becker, he was just sounding off. Trying to look big.'

  'People don't talk to me like that. Nobody talks to me like that. Especially a tosser like him.'

  'Sticks and stones. Besides, like you say, who is he? Becker? He's nothing.'

  Swift to his feet for a big man, Payne held out his hand. 'You're right.'

  'You won't hold a grudge?'

  Payne's grip was firm. 'You've got my word.'

  The remainder of Dianne Adams' engagement passed off without incident. Victoria Pride stayed away. By the final weekend it was standing room only and, spurred on by the crowd and the band, Adams' voice seemed to find new dynamics, new depth.

  Of course, Becker told her about the bracelet during one of those languorous times when they lay in her hotel bed, feeling the lust slowly ebb away. He even offered it to her as a present, half hoping she would refuse, which she did. 'It's beautiful,' she said. 'And it's a beautiful thought. But it's your good luck charm. You don't want to lose it now.'

  On the last night at Ronnie's, she thanked him profusely on stage for his playing and presented him with a charm in the shape of a saxophone. A little something to remember me by.'

  'You know,' she said, outside on the pavement later, 'next month we've got this tour, Italy, Switzerland. You should come with us.'

  'I'd like that,' Becker said.

  'I'll call you,' she said, and kissed him on the mouth. She never did.

  Costain thanked Kiley for a job well done and with part of his fee Kiley acquired an expensive mobile phone and waited for that also to ring.

  Three weeks later, as Derek Becker was walking through Soho after a gig in Dean Street, gone one a.m., a car pulled up alongside him and three men got out. Quiet and quick. They grabbed Becker and dragged him into an alley and beat him w
ith gloved hands and booted feet. Then they threw him back against the wall and two of them held out his arms at the wrist, fingers spread, while the third drew a pair of pliers from the pocket of his combat pants. One of them stuffed a strip of towelling into his mouth to stifle the screams.

  Becker's instrument case had already fallen open to the ground, and as they left, one of the men trod almost nonchalantly on the bell of the saxophone before booting it hard away. A second man picked up the case and hurled it into the darkness at the alley's end, the bracelet, complete with its newly attached charm, sailing unseen into the deepest corner, carrying with it all of Becker's new-found luck.

  It was several days before Kiley heard what had happened and went to see Becker in his flat in Walthamstow, bringing a couple of paperbacks and a bottle of single malt.

  'Gonna have to turn the pages for me, Jack. Read them as well.'

  His hands were still bandaged and his left eye still swollen closed.

  'I'm sorry,' Kiley said and opened the Scotch.

  'You know what, Jack?' Becker said, after the first sip. 'Next time, don't do me no favours, right?'

  PLAN B

  Kelley Armstrong

  Monday, August 10

  Deanna lifted the charm bracelet and shifted closer to the bedside lamp for a better look.

  'Oh, God,' she said. 'Reminds me of the bracelet my dad bought me when I turned thirteen. I asked for the new Guns N' Roses tape, and he gave me one of these. Bastard.'

  Gregory double-checked his tie in the mirror. 'Think Abby will like it?'

  'Shit, yeah. If any grown woman was made for charm bracelets, it's Abby.' Deanna rolled on to her back and draped the bracelet round her breast. 'Looks better on me, though, don't you think?'

  Gregory chuckled, but continued adjusting his tie. Deanna slid the bracelet down her stomach, spread her legs and dangled it there.