He turned towards Des’s office, parked illegally and strode to the door with a resolute face.
‘Des is out with some buyers. I’m the senior negotiator, can I help you?’
She was a rounded, pleasant woman in her late thirties, wearing several Victorian rings on her left hand with a wide wedding band. He trusted her.
‘I’ve been on the market two weeks and haven’t had a single viewing. I’m getting married and I want to find a place for both of us. I was thinking perhaps the price was a problem.’
‘It’s a seller’s market at the moment.’ The senior negotiator frowned and went to the old-fashioned filing cabinet at the back of the office. He gave her his address. Finding nothing in the files, she went back to her desk.
‘I’ll have to search the database,’ she told him. ‘I’m sorry about this. It looks as though your details may have been mislaid.’ Hesitantly, she pecked at the keyboard with one finger. ‘Ah! Here you are! You’re under offer.’
‘No I’m not. I can’t be. Nobody’s been round. Des hasn’t spoken to me. It’s wrong. It’s a mistake.’
‘Well, then it must be,’ the woman agreed in a stricken voice. ‘I’m terribly sorry. Des has so much on his plate at the moment. You poor man, you must have been wondering what on earth was going on. The price looks fine to me. We had someone in this morning looking for two double beds and a balcony. Thank goodness you came in. Let me make some calls. Have we got your keys? Are you in this evening?’
‘I can be,’ Dillon assured her. He went back to his car like a new man.
At seven, he called the man, who sounded embarrassed.
‘You sure it was blue?’ He phrased the question so that it sounded as if Dillon was entirely responsible for his own disappointment. ‘There was only one blue coupé sold this year and that was to a leasing company. She married, this sculptor?’
‘Maybe she is, I don’t know.’
‘Well, if you really want to go there, the blue coupé belongs to Eon Leasing. Part of the Eon Group. They probably have a couple of thousand cars in London.’
The idea that Merita Halili might be married was troublesome. Dillon decided he wanted to go there, if only for peace of mind.
‘They wouldn’t tell me who had the car, would they?’ he hazarded.
‘If I was you, I’d give’em a call and say you’re Customer Services at Audi and you gotta do a product recall.’ The man had seen a way to deserve the balance of his five-hundred-pound fee. ‘It’s almost new, the blue one. Couple of months, that’s all. Say it’s the steering. That’ll be a safety issue. Ask if you can send a mechanic round to check it. They’ll probably give you the driver’s address.’
‘You think so?’ Dillon was not convinced. He had never been a good liar.
‘Yeah, no worries. Tell you what, I’ve got a contact at Audi. I’ll get you an ID.’
‘Really?’
‘A carpet’ll do it,’ the man proposed.
‘A carpet instead of half the monkey?’ said Dillon quickly, seeing an opportunity to be £50 ahead of the game.
‘Awright. It’s a deal.’ Since the man had been expecting him to renege on the half-monkey, he reckoned that this would put him up £200.
‘Brilliant. Cheers.’ Dillon’s heart suddenly soared. Then his doorbell rang and a shamefaced Des appeared with the first of a procession of potential buyers for his flat.
18. May 9
The Eon Group occupied the upper half of a steel-coloured tower that dominated the award-winning Caraway Spit development on the north bank of the Thames. The original Spit was a flat headland that stuck out into the river. Building was only just beginning on the remainder of its land mass so the Eon Tower stuck up like a single fang in a monstrous jaw.
The sky was a solid grey, reflected darkly from the tower’s colourless cladding. The river lapped inkily at its stone-built banks. A violent wind scoured the Spit, lashing the new trees planted in the concrete until it seemed inevitable that their trunks would snap.
Against the force of the blast, Dillon pushed the car door open and felt his hair whipped back from his forehead. The building’s car park was full. The streets were empty, waiting for the cars that would be driven by the people who would be working by next year in the towers that would have been raised from the surrounding clay. At that point, all that Dillon could see were cranes delving in the clay, a few trucks growling to and fro, and double red lines at the roadside that claimed that this was an important arterial route prioritised for buses and through traffic on which no decent citizen would even think of leaving a car.
A notice attached to a pole and anchored in a block of concrete had blown over. Lying on the pavement, it informed him that the patch of road on which he had stopped had been designated for the use of motor-cycle couriers only. Inappropriately parked vehicles would be clamped and ransomed only for a release fee of £90. Dillon refused to care. Rules were made to be broken. He saw no couriers. He saw no traffic wardens. He was on a mission.
As he struggled to the doors, leaning forwards into the wind, a train was gliding to a halt at the far side of the building. The Docklands Light Railway stopped at Caraway Spit only for the benefit of Eon Group employees. Several hundred of them stepped from the carriages and shuffled towards their workplace like a nation of the undead, ready to take over the mid-morning shifts.
‘I’d like to see someone in Eon Leasing,’ he informed the desk guard.
‘You don’t have an appointment,’ the guard deduced.
‘I’m from Audi,’ he responded, flashing his pirated ID card at a safe distance from the man’s bi-focals. ‘We’re doing an urgent product recall. It’s a safety issue.’
‘Give me a minute,’ the guard requested, picking up one of his telephones.
The Eon Tower was a small town on its own. Two floors of commercial units began at ground level, offering food, painkillers, print media, lavatory paper, cards, dry-cleaning, a nail bar and a flower shop – essentials only, no purchasing decisions tempting enough to distract the workers and waste their time. Above these was a floor of eating options – fast food, bistro, gourmet, coffee shop. Next came the clinic, the beauty spa and the fitness suite. The conference facility took floors six and seven. Above that, the offices began.
The air was soft and silent. The thrashing trees outside the glass walls looked absurd because they made no noise. The sky might have been cheap wallpaper. A pair of geese flew past as if they were part of a rudimentary early animation. The river was invisible, sunk below the concrete horizon.
From the rear doors the silent crowd of mid-morning shift workers entered and made towards the doors of the lifts, which hissed apart to swallow them. A single figure emerged from the last doors to open and battled upstream against the flood of bodies until she stood alone and dazed in the middle of the floor.
She looked a little like someone Dillon thought he knew. Afraid of staring, he turned away and checked her image on the security monitor above the desk. With a hurried stride, she marched off towards the shopping mall. No, nobody he knew.
Georgie fled to the back of the corner shop. From there she could peek around the news stand without looking too obvious. Yes, it was Dillon. What the hell was he doing here?
Looking for you, said her instinct.
As if, she retorted. No way.
Yes way, her instinct insisted.
Why? she asked, feeling the onset of panic. Since you know so much, what’s he looking for me for?
What do men usually go on mad quests for women for? It’s the mojo working. The old rock’n’roll. That old black magic. The same old voodoo.
Crap! Georgie had to put her hand to her mouth to stop herself speaking aloud.
I didn’t deserve that, her instinct argued. You started it. You and Flora. You women always start it. You let the genie out of the bottle. You open the box. You picked the bloody apple.
Get out, Georgie warned it. If you’re trying to lumber me with five thousan
d years of sexual guilt, you’ve picked the wrong girl.
All the same, her instinct said craftily, that’s what he’s here for.
No it isn’t. It’s business, it must be, pleaded Georgie. He’s come to see somebody else in the building on business.
And I’m the queen of Romania, suggested her instinct. As if you weren’t hoping he’d come after you.
I was not!
You were too. Ever since you changed your phone number. You can’t fool me, I’m your instinct. I know what goes on in that woman’s heart of yours.
I am not a woman, I am a person, Georgie informed her instinct sternly. My brain does the thinking. My heart is just a pump. And you are nothing but a disgusting bag of hormones and cultural conditioning, so don’t you tell me who I am and what I’m feeling.
It’s a tough job but somebody’s got to do it, her instinct sniggered.
Right. That’s enough. I’m way too busy to waste time arguing with you. I’m going over there and I’m going to ask him what he’s doing here. That’ll sort this out.
You’re right there.
It was maddening the way her instinct always thought it knew everything. It was as bad as Felix sometimes.
That wasn’t me! I didn’t say anything! Her instinct was laughing.
As she approached the reception desk the guard put down his telephone and said to Dillon, ‘Can you take a seat, sir? Someone’s coming down to see you but they’re tied up for a few more minutes.’
Taking a deep breath, Georgie stepped in front of Dillon as he turned away towards the black leather couches by the glass wall. ‘Are you looking for me?’ she asked simply. It didn’t seem too political to smile. In fact, it was impossible not to smile. She could almost have danced as well.
‘Uh?’ He was looking puzzled. ‘I’m sorry, I … oh. Oh! Oh, my goodness! Is that you? Merita Halili?’
‘Yes.’ Georgie found that her mouth would not behave. ‘Yes and no,’ she managed eventually.
‘I was looking for you,’ Dillon told her.
You see? Was I right or was I right? demanded Georgie’s instinct.
‘This is great!’ he continued.
You see! You see! Georgie decided that it was time to be brave and deal with both of them.
‘No it isn’t. Not really,’ she announced. ‘Look, we should talk.’
‘Oh, yes,’ Dillon agreed. If anything, she looked even more exciting in this smoothed-down disguise. He found that he was clasping one of his hands with the other to stop himself ruffling her hair.
‘It’s complicated,’ she promised him. ‘Maybe we should sit down.’
‘OK.’ They moved to the benches and sat. The way it worked out, they were sitting so close that their knees nearly touched. Georgie thought of moving back but did not want to seem rejecting. Dillon thought of moving back but did not want to acknowledge that there was any reason why they should not have been sitting close together in the first place. So they stayed put.
Georgie took a deep breath and began. ‘Your fiancée …’
‘Yes. Yes. Flora.’ For a moment there, while he was stopping himself noticing the way the deep breath caused movement under her silk blouse, Flora’s name had slipped away like a frightened fish. Very strange.
‘Flora. She’s got a friend, hasn’t she? Called Georgina?’
‘Why, yes she has. How do you know that?’
‘Because I’m Georgina.’ OK, this was it. Time to get real, finally. ‘And we were … we had … it was … it was a sort of a game.’
‘You mean you’re not Merita Halili?’
‘No. She’s a real person, a real sculptor …’
‘I know, I saw her things. In that exhibition in that gallery.’
‘Flora and I went there. I had the invitation in my bag. My other bag. And when I ran my car into yours I kind of lost it and her name was there so I used it.’
Dillon’s mind was reluctant to scale the necessary height of fantasy. ‘So she really doesn’t want to make another blue glass thing?’
‘I don’t know what she wants. I don’t know her. She’s not part of this.’
‘Oh.’
‘Flora and I had a bet.’ A bet was a recognisable concept. He’d be able to get his mind around that, surely? ‘With Donna. You know Donna?’
‘Oh yes. She introduced us. I used to work for her. Donna the prima donna.’ Dillon felt a shiver of foreboding. If Donna was mixed up in this, it was probably bad.
‘You used to work for her?’ It was off-topic, but Georgie had to know.
‘I got fired last week.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘I’m not. Go on, you and Flora had a bet with Donna?’
‘When she found out we were getting married … because, I was engaged too, you see.’
‘You were engaged?’ Really bad. He was never wrong where Donna was concerned.
‘I am engaged, what am I saying? Flora and I are both engaged, you see …’
Badder than bad. Dillon found himself suddenly up to his neck in gloom. While Georgie expounded the basics of the Heartswap adventure, putting much emphasis on Flora’s belief that he was a loving and faithful partner, he heard her as if from the next room.
‘So you see,’ she concluded, ‘it was a game. I was pretending to be Merita Halili. I’m really just a fund manager. You did everything absolutely right. You were great, really. And it’s over now, we called it off.’
‘That’s awful,’ he said in a mild voice. His face was white and his eyes were black.
‘That’s what we thought. So we decided to stop.’
‘Well,’ he got up without warning, wavering a little as if his knees were weak. ‘Thanks for putting me straight.’
‘I’m sorry,’ she told him. ‘I really am sorry.’ At that instant, there was no one in the world she would have wanted to hurt less.
‘Yes. Well. I’d better go.’
He stumbled as he turned, then got control of his legs and walked to the revolving door. Georgie thought he was about to be sick.
Outside the building, a pair of overweight, shaggy-haired men in jeans were fixing a wheel clamp to the Saab. When he saw them, Dillon instantly lost the desire to throw up. His yell was loud enough to be heard over the wind and through the thick glazing of the hallway. The revolving door spun violently as he jumped out to save his car. Behind the desk, the reception guard looked up and watched the ensuing argument with one hand poised over the alarm button.
Faced with the force of Dillon’s rage, the clampers soon decided that they were not paid enough to be heroes and drove away in an old white van. The door whirred again and ejected Dillon in the hallway. His face was now white with rage.
‘Let me get this straight,’ he said to Georgie, who had been sitting on the bench without moving, paralysed by self-inflicted shock. ‘You and Flora decided to run some kind of fidelity test on me? Because that’s the most disgusting, the most cynical …’
I told you, Georgie’s instinct reminded her. I told you someone was going to get hurt. I told you, but you never listen.
‘They pick the grapes by night, so that they’re cool, and then let them ferment at a really low temperature to keep that almost-scented taste. The vineyards are in a region that is also famous for its almond orchards. I always think there’s a hint of the almond blossom in there.’ Felix gazed at his glass, then at Flora, implying that she was as exquisite as all the almond orchards of Catalonia.
Rain was spotting the windows of ‘their’restaurant, just a few steps away from the flat where the linen sheets were smooth and fresh and waiting for them.
‘You are involved, aren’t you?’ Flora asked him, pulling in her hands and feet before he could make contact with any of them.
‘Not really,’ he replied.
‘Felix,’ she said sternly, ‘I know you are involved.’
‘You’re an intelligent woman,’ he told her. ‘You must have noticed that someone had left her things in my flat. I notice
d you didn’t leave anything. Anything tangible, at least.’
‘The Epilady in the shower was a bit of a giveaway,’ she assured him with an impish grin. ‘And I couldn’t really see you painting your nails Kensington Rose every weekend. Chelsea Red is more your colour. But the fact is, Felix, I’ve always known what your situation is.’
‘I’m intrigued,’ he admitted, deciding that since she did not seem to be taking a judgmental tone he was already home and dry, and this part of the conversation was therefore just a formality. Some women liked to invent a little emotional complexity just to add spice. He appreciated that. ‘How do you know what you say you know?’
‘Your fiancée. Georgie.’
‘Georgina,’ he corrected her. It was no part of the strategy to go into a new relationship with a carry-over of gender issues from the old one.
‘I call her Georgie. We’re friends. Been friends for ages.’ And she zipped through the edited highlights of the Heartswap affair, glossing over the unladylike question of a wager and implying that it had been all one to Georgie whether Felix cheated on her or not. She chose to leave the question of her real-life occupation for later. When he was in deeper. Just in case he was not comfortable with a woman who ran her own business.
‘Clever,’ he said when he had the picture. He did not seem deeply moved, only amused. ‘And whose idea was it? This other friend? Donna?’
‘Georgie, mostly,’ Flora asserted. ‘Do you ever think she has a kind of obsession about fidelity? It seems like it’s a really big issue for her. We decided it was some kind of revenge trip. Did she ever talk to you about her history with men?’
‘Not really,’ he said sadly. ‘She was always withholding, it seemed to me.’
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