Cheaters

by JR Carroll

  Emerging in a fug at around six, Danny slid noiselessly from the sheets and tip-toed into the en suite shower to get himself functioning again. He was in there for a few moments with the water going full pelt when a blurred and naked shape appeared through the glass. The door opened and Mischa stepped into the confined space, arms by her sides, her face plaintive, not doing or saying anything except fixing him through the torrent of tepid water with her aquamarine eyes. Having shut the door she simply stood there, a silent offering, shoulders held slightly back and breasts upraised so that the nipples were almost, but not quite, touching his chest. Danny embraced her tenderly; she responded. One thing led to another, fingers felt and probed, their sleek bodies arched and slipped and twisted. Yet as much as he wanted her then and there – and despite having seen it done in movies – he could not contrive to penetrate her effectively in this severely restrictive environment, at least not without causing a mishap. He turned off the taps and they hastened back to the bed wringing wet and the moment she was on her back, Mischa grasped his swaying cock – pushing his own anxious hand out of the way – and guided it slickly between her opened thighs. As they fucked and squirmed and kissed she massaged his chest and shoulders, and water from his blue-black hair dripped freely onto her face.

  Danny’s heart was pounding as he struggled gamely but pointlessly against the surge of orgasm, and knowing this Mischa said, ‘Go for it, baby. Let it come.’

  ‘Oh, babe,’ he whimpered.

  ‘My babester. Shoot, lover. Hit me.’

  Danny gave her one deep, searching thrust, then another and on the third, a massive sob racked his body and he gasped sharply and spunked inside her with the fierceness of someone who has been deprived of sexual release for a long, long age.

  An hour later they were on the beach side of the main road, where a grassy parkland ran down to the sand. Children played on the slide and swings of an adjacent playground and a yapping terrier dog leapt and frolicked around its owner’s legs. Danny and Mischa sat on the grass, facing the sea. There were some marauding gulls, a handful of brave swimmers, surfers in wetsuits searching vainly for decent waves a little further out and, on the horizon, a tanker making imperceptible progress towards the heads. They stretched out on the cool grass, murmuring and watching the activity and the breakers crumbling onto the sand. Although it was well after eight, a velvety dusk was just starting to come down. There were two or three evening stars and a half-moon paley visible. There was an edge in the air with the sun gone. Danny was thinking: nothing is going to end. We’re going to be this happy forever. Waves tumble, stars shine, we love – and so it will go on.

  They decided to have dinner at Lome’s best-known restaurant, a seafood establishment of Greek origins in which the rich and famous lunched and dined in the season. Over a large bowl of delicious mussel soup, accompanied by a bottle of crisp chablis. Danny watched with undying pleasure the lights changing in Mischa’s eyes and hair. She had selected the poached scallop entree, served in a light tomato and leek puree with a hint of ginger.

  ‘Baby, I was thinking –’ Danny said.

  Cutting in, Mischa said, ‘What were you thinking. Tell me everything.’

  ‘As a matter of fact I was thinking about what I’m going to do with you later,’ he said.

  Tilting her face forward she said, ‘You do that so much you’re going to wear your thing out soon. And then what’ll you do.’

  Danny said, ‘I hear you can have an operation now, a transplant. I’ll get a new one. Bigger and better.’

  Mischa smiled. ‘I couldn’t handle it if it was any better.’

  ‘But really,’ he said, ‘as well as that, I was thinking about that missing girl. I think maybe I should definitely go to the cops. To the homicide squad, I mean.’

  ‘Yeah?’ She put her knife and fork down.

  ‘What do you think?’

  Mischa resumed eating. ‘So you’ve been stewing about his.’

  ‘Yeah. I have.’

  She shrugged. ‘It’s up to you. What would you tell them exactly?’

  ‘Just describe what I saw – the poor, terrified girl with Kenny, then Kenny in Chapel Street near her flat.’

  ‘So … You’re going to go to the homicide squad, tell them this, and give them Lewis Kenny’s name as a possible suspect.’

  ‘Do you think that’s a bit naive or something.’

  She shook her head, laughing through her nose. ‘It isn’t smart. I wouldn’t trust cops, that’s all. You know what they’re like.’

  ‘Well, I don’t, really. I haven’t had much to do with them.’

  ‘You don’t trust them an inch. Everyone knows that. You could end up in the shit for your trouble.’

  ‘I s’pose. But I should do something, Christ.’ He wanted very much to tell her about his sister, Milli, that he knew what it was to lose someone like that, but he had no wish to breathe that kind of tone into the evening, into their relationship. He did not want Mischa thinking he came from a damaged family, that he had major problems, that maybe he was not someone she should tie herself in with.

  ‘Mischa,’ he said. ‘I didn’t tell you this before, but when I walked past this girl she looked at me and asked me to help her. That’s what she said: “Help me.” But I didn’t help her, I kept on going.’ He lowered his eyes. ‘I was safe. But she wasn’t. I feel I let her down.’

  ‘But what could you do, Danny? You didn’t know then that something was gonna happen to her.’

  ‘I know, I know. But still, it has now, and I feel sort of … guilty. It’s stupid, isn’t it.’

  She took his hand. ‘Not stupid, no. There’d probably be something wrong if you didn’t feel that way. But fuck me, you see people in trouble all the time, every day in the street. It’s just the way things are, and always will be. It’s life.’

  ‘I know. But I was there.’

  ‘You’ve got a very active conscience, Danny Goldfingers. I thought you were just a money-making machine.’

  He gave her a smile, and placed his hand around hers.

  ‘I love you heaps, Danny. Have I said that in the last ten minutes?’

  ‘Yeah. I love you too, Mischa. I’ll always love you.’

  ‘Always?’

  ‘Yep. Do you believe me?’

  She seemed to think about it for a second, turning her mouth down and staring at the ceiling, then said, ‘Yeah. I think we’re pretty lucky to have run into each other. What would be the odds on that, I wonder.’

  ‘You couldn’t calculate them. You’d have more chance of winning Tattslotto. Just be thankful.’

  ‘I am. Every single minute of every single day.’

  ‘And the best is yet to come.’

  ‘Is it.’

  ‘You bet.’

  He didn’t elaborate, so she let it go. Let go of his hand, too, and resumed eating. Danny was shucking the green-lipped mussels and making a pile of empty shells on a plate. He had almost told her of his scheme, what was in store for her, but resisted by concentrating on the mussel-eating instead. Much better to bide his time until everything was in place.

  After a bit she said, ‘You could always just make an anonymous phone call to CrimeStoppers.’

  ‘Yeah,’ he said, not looking up from the mussel he was about to devour. Then he did. ‘But it’s a bit pathetic, isn’t it. And they probably wouldn’t take any notice. They must get thousands of calls like that, most of them hoaxers and nut cases.’

  ‘I s’pose.’

  She was remembering Mike Buckland’s dubious view of the matter when she had raised it with him, Mike saying there wasn’t much to go on, when Danny cut into her thoughts and said, surprising her, ‘You don’t know any friendly cops, do you?’

  ‘Me? Shit, no. I told you – I don’t like cops. I steer clear of them.’

  ‘They’ve got a bad rep, haven’t they.’

  ‘Sure have. You don’t want ’em getting their teeth into you.’

  ‘Guess not. So – I
’ll forget it, will I?’

  But Mischa could see this was not what he wanted to do, and said, rather lamely, ‘Why don’t you let it go for a day or so. See what happens. She might turn up.’

  ‘She’ll turn up – dead,’ Danny said with more force than he had intended, and then finished his soup and shucked the remaining mussels.

  Mischa’s scallops had long gone. She refreshed their wine glasses and said, ‘You’re a nice boy, aren’t you, Danny Goldfingers. And a total spunk. An absolute fucking Baldwin.’

  ‘Which Baldwin is that?’

  ‘Any of them. They’re all spunks, like you.’

  Danny could feel her knees brushing against his under the table. ‘Men aren’t spunks,’ he said. ‘They’re hunks. Women are spunks.’

  ‘So you’re a hunk.’

  ‘And you’re just the spunk of spunks. The queen of spunks.’

  ‘Hunk and spunk,’ she said, using the words because she liked the sound of them.

  For a main course they both had the grilled swordfish, which they agreed was unmatched by any seafood they had ever eaten. With it they had more chablis, so that by the time they returned to their suite they were on their merry way again, for the second time in a day. That night they made a mess of the Horny Devils and the Gila Monsters. When they woke up in the morning there was the strong smell of wet rubber between the sheets and silver paper and used prophylactics littered the floor. Mischa said that as far as she remembered, the devils had it all over the monsters because of the two prongs, but they tested them both again before breakfast just to make sure.

  15

  Michelle parked her Virago in a dead-end alleyway off Flinders Lane and secured it behind a stack of flattened removalist’s cartons. It was still dark, but the first crack of dawn was just visible: the coolest hour, but Michelle was snug in her leather jacket. Leaning on a wall near the entrance to the lane, where early birds – mainly delivery vans – were already getting the day’s business under way, she waited. Inside three minutes the door of Cricklewood Close opened and Sigmund Barry came out, wearing a dark blue and white Nike tracksuit. He shut the door behind him, automatically locking it, then set off in an easterly direction, away from Michelle, at a steady jogging pace.

  When he was out of sight Michelle moved swiftly. First she opened the door, behaving nonchalantly, as if she lived there, then she climbed the blondwood stairs to Sigmund’s apartment at the top of the second landing. Then, holding her breath a little in case someone else was in there, she unlocked that door and let herself in. Instantly she knew the apartment was empty. She pocketed the keys, which she’d had copied after sneakily making impressions of Sigmund’s set in modelling clay, made for the office area adjoining the studio, and set to work. There was no urgency since she knew Sigmund would be away for at least an hour. She even knew the route he would take: right at Degraves Street, left at Flinders, over the bridge, across St Kilda Road, down Alexandra Avenue, then a lap of the tan track before returning the same way. Or, if he was feeling particularly energetic, he might run all the way to Albert Park Lake and back. This information she had extracted simply by asking, by pretending to be interested in his running. Having tested him early in the piece with one or two questions about his life, she found Sigmund only too happy to talk about himself. In fact he was a tireless self-promoter. Of course, he was a businessman, a financial entrepreneur, who relied on his ability to convince clients to put their hard-earned in his care.

  Coupled with that he had an ego, and an ego craved audience. So Michelle had learned about his turbulent love life, his corporate ups and downs and even his time in prison. After a few Riccadonnas there wasn’t much he wouldn’t tell her about that. If he was to be believed, he had used his charm to win over the rougher elements, and even managed their financial affairs from inside. Being Hungarian, he claimed, gave him a big advantage over these simple-minded souls. They were like children once he gained their confidence – no match for centuries of cunning and culture, in the broad sense. Michelle had told him at that point about her White Russian origins and about the countess in the family and Sigmund had been greatly impressed. Russians he had no time for, but the white variety from the Ukraine were all right. Hungarians, Poles and White Russians, he told her, all Latvians, Lithuanians and Ukrainians were united in their abiding hatred of Russians. Russians he called ‘fucking cunts’, and when he said the words it was with a relish and viciousness that surprised her: Mischa, these people are nothing but fucking cunts. ‘Fucking cunts’ came out as if he were hawking phlegm from the back of his throat. He was charming, there was no doubt about that, but it was the kind of charm that concealed a multitude of deep-set prejudices, motives – and sins. Not a man to cross.

  Consequently Michelle did not like to linger in the apartment for any more than twenty minutes. Her heart shook and the adrenalin pumped fast just from being a trespasser, and what if Sigmund should come back early for some reason? What if he changed his routine just this once? Their common bond would not help her then. As far as she knew he had not done time for violence, but that did not mean he was not capable of it. The .32 automatic in her pocket gave her comfort, but she did not know if she had it in her to use it, and what if Sigmund managed to take it off her? Michelle had no wish to test any of this. Dismissing such fears she switched on the main computer and the attached printer, quickly got into Netscape Navigator and checked for mail. There was plenty and she set about printing it all off. While that was in train she shuffled through his regular mail, copying anything that wasn’t junk. There was always a lot of correspondence, much of it from overseas. Any yellow memo tabs stuck to the computer or his desk were also copied, as were his diary and notebooks, scrapbooks and so on. Virtually everything she could lay her hands on was copied. When she was finished she made sure all the equipment was switched off and everything was back where she had found it, even the little yellow tabs. The office area might be a total shambles in her eyes, but that didn’t mean Sigmund wouldn’t notice if something was slightly out of place.

  Michelle put everything into a large envelope, which she stuffed inside her Gearsack. There was so much material that she’d been there over half an hour this time. Her heart was racing. One last look around, then she was out the door and down the stairs. She always felt anxious at this stage, that when she opened the door onto the street, Sigmund would be standing there with his key in his hand. Shit. Not this morning, though. She slipped around the corner to her bike, then stopped, frozen. She’d left her fucking helmet and gloves inside. Christ. No need to panic; still plenty of time. She rushed back, more people out and about now, let herself in, ran up the stairs two at a time, dropped the keys trying to open the apartment, told herself to calm down, got inside, grabbed the helmet with the gloves in it. Again the moment of panic as she opened the door downstairs. With a fluttering stomach and a dry mouth she clipped the helmet on, fired up the bike and was out of there.

  Michelle rode home on a high, wearing a smug grin under her visor. Oh, I’m so fucking clever, she told herself. It was a clear morning but still chilly, and the newly risen sun was hitting her in the face. Soon enough her thoughts turned to Danny, warm and snug back home in bed. To cover herself she had made up a story about having an early morning shoot, using exterior locations, and he seemed to buy that. She didn’t like lying to him, but what else could she do? It was going to be quite a juggling act to keep him in the dark, a challenge even for her. Michelle didn’t want him knowing the truth about her, not yet. She would tell him later.

  Constable Michelle Anne Fleming was rising twenty-seven, but she had the unblemished facial skin and features and the youthful, perfectly formed body of an eighteen or twenty-year-old. Quite often in clubs and bars she was asked to produce ID as proof of age. People rarely knew what to make of Michelle, or how to deal with her at the professional or personal level. Although physically she looked as if she had just emerged from adolescence and was extremely attractive – especially wi
th those aquamarine contact lenses – no-one messed with her. Michelle had a talent for placing distance between herself and those she didn’t like and a person didn’t have to do much to be disliked by her. No cop, not even the vain and lecherous Mike Buckland, would dare to make a move on Michelle. Men discussed her freely in canteens and pubs and the discussion was always a spirited one: was she a dyke, a slut, frigid – or what? Rumour had it she had a shaved pussy – what did that mean? One thing for sure – they all wanted to fuck her and find out. But Michelle was too cool, and could be an ice queen, as if she were some kind of emotionless replicant. There was another story, that she stabbed a guy who grabbed her tits once, and walked. No-one was sure if it was true or not, but it fitted. She carried her beauty with a shield and sword that were symbolised by the leather and the Virago bike. Sexy – yes. Available – no.