‘We match,’ she remarked in greeting, smiling back.
‘So we do,’ he responded lightly, looking as if he had almost said something else in answer to that.
Like we always have matched, Jo thought to herself.
Afterwards she could not remember the details of their conversation through the meal. They talked about O’Donnell, of course, and Shifter Brown, because that was always there between them, but they both knew that was not what their meeting was about. Not this time.
Joanna had no plan, she had made no decisions before the lunch. What happened at the end took her half by surprise even though she was the instigator.
They both turned down dessert. Then he asked her if she would like more wine or coffee. They had drunk much less this time, just one bottle between them. Still enough at lunchtime to shock the new puritans rigid, she thought obliquely.
She suddenly heard herself say: ‘No, thank you. Life’s too short, don’t you think, and for all too many people turns out to be a lot shorter than they might reasonably expect.’
She sensed the change in him at once.
He became very still, his gaze steady and serious. She knew he would be determined not to make a fool of himself again. Not twice. Not Mike Fielding. He was a picture of restraint. ‘That’s true enough,’ he murmured eventually in a non-committal way. But she knew he was already on her wavelength.
‘Well, you said it yourself last time, we never used to waste too much time over lunch.’
His eyes widened. He had been fiddling with his wineglass, turning it round and round on the white linen tablecloth. He took his hand away and sat back in his chair. ‘Are you suggesting what I think you may be suggesting or are you playing games with me?’ he asked. This time he sounded almost stern.
Typical Fielding, she thought, he would never let someone else be in charge for long. ‘Now would I play games with you?’ she enquired, in a bantering sort of way.
His eyes narrowed.
She’d make him angry if she carried on like this. Maybe neither of them was quite as good as they thought they were. Not any more, anyway. ‘No games,’ she said, absolutely serious now. ‘Have you got a hotel or do we need to find one?’
His eyes softened at once. For a second or two she thought she could see tears welling in them. She had seen that before, in the days when most people would have said Fielding did not have an emotional cell in his body. God, the man was a curious mix all right.
But that moment was over almost as it began. He said nothing. Just stood up, reached into his pocket, half threw a handful of notes on to the table, gestured for her to rise too, put a hand on her arm and steered her quite firmly out of the restaurant, almost as if he feared she might change her mind.
She had intended to pay the bill this time. But it somehow did not seem an appropriate moment to start fishing out her credit cards. Instead, she let him be masterful.
It was not the best of hotels. One of those slightly sleazy ones in Southampton Row. Joanna could have afforded something much better, but he would have hated that. She had no idea, however, that he had paid for the room himself, just assuming that it was on expenses, as in the past. Fielding had always been good at fixing things to fit in with his personal life. If you were married and had also been embroiled in as many affairs as she knew he had, then it wasn’t surprising. But she really did not want to think about that. Not now.
They had taken a black cab to the hotel, even though it was really quite close, each sitting at opposite ends of the bench seat, as if they were afraid their bodies might touch by accident. They barely spoke. The room had only a single bed, she noticed, which was a nuisance, but at least it indicated that he had not been taking her for granted. She was unaware, of course, that he had quite deliberately decided to book a single, not to save money – although God knew he could not afford to pay out for too many London hotel rooms – but to create exactly the impression she had indeed gained.
She felt awkward in that bare, impersonal room with its cheap furniture and nasty net curtains. It was hardly romantic. But then, afternoon sex in downmarket hotel rooms was not about romance and she’d known that well enough before re-embarking on it after so many years, she told herself.
He seemed awkward, too. He took off his jacket and tie, and stood looking at her. She had not even removed her jacket. The only furniture in the room apart from the narrow bed and a small fitted wardrobe was a single hard wooden chair. She too was standing, over by the window, half pretending to be looking out at the street below through its grubby metal-framed panes.
He crossed the room to her, turned her towards him, wrapped his arms round her and kissed her. A proper kiss. Full on the lips. She felt their bodies melt together, just as they had always done – without either of them appearing to move, really. He was a good kisser. One of the few men she had known who actually enjoyed kissing and for protracted periods of time. The years seemed to disappear. The magic had not gone. It was as if it were only yesterday that they had last been together like this.
He drew away from her. ‘Undress for me,’ he said, smiling.
The same words he had used the very first time so long ago, the same command. The same husky voice. She knew he had done it quite deliberately, but she was moved nonetheless. At least he had remembered. But then, would either of them ever forget? She supposed that was what this was all about.
So she did what she was told, just as before. Slipping her clothes off, no game playing, no stripper antics, just slowly removing her jacket, her trousers, her silk T-shirt and her underwear, until she stood naked before him. She wasn’t self-conscious any more. Strange, that. But from the moment he had come to her and kissed her it had all felt so natural again.
He gazed at her appreciatively. ‘God, but you’re still beautiful,’ he whispered.
She knew that her body looked good, thanks to those workouts at the gym, but she loved hearing the words from him.
He took her hand in his and drew her to the bed, made her sit down and kneeled before her. Still fully clothed, he buried his head in her. Something else she began to remember was how good this had been with him, just how good it had all been. And how much it had always made her want more, and more.
Eventually he stood up and began to take off his shirt and trousers. Standing right above her looking down at her, there was great longing in his eyes.
‘I’m not sure how able I am going to be,’ he began. She liked to think of him being just a little uncertain. He had always been so sure of himself before.
As he was climbing out of his trousers she reached out and touched him. ‘I don’t think we’ll have any problems,’ she said.
And they didn’t. He wasn’t the super stud he had been twenty years earlier. However, she hadn’t expected him to be. They were both slower and more lingering in their approach to their lovemaking. She had wondered, even as they rode in the taxi from the restaurant, whether it might be a let-down after so many years. Perhaps even half wished that it would be – after all, that would probably at least ensure that their renewed relationship would not become a problem. But it wasn’t a let-down at all.
They soon found the narrow bed too confining. They half rolled on to the floor using the duvet cover as a kind of mattress and the pillows to help them find more imaginative positions. She was a bit surprised they still had the athleticism, but they also spent quite lot of time just lying very still in each other’s arms. And that was sweet too. She felt the sense of belonging she had always felt with him and tried very hard to dismiss it, because it really could not be. She could never belong to Fielding. Not now. Maybe the truth was that she never could have done.
Because of the growing strain between her and Paul it was weeks since she’d had sex at all, let alone sex as good as this. It was just so mind-bogglingly good still – which was disconcerting as well as wonderful.
Perhaps it was because they were older, perhaps because they had both wanted it so much, perhaps bec
ause of the almost subconscious desires we all get from time to time to slip back into our own pasts – whatever the reason, to her it seemed better than ever.
She left the room first. He hadn’t told her that he was going home to Exeter that night. That would have given the game away, made her realise that he had booked the hotel specifically for the purpose for which they had used it.
He had wanted her so much, yet, like her, had thought that maybe he wouldn’t mind too much if the sex hadn’t been that good. He really didn’t need any further complications in his life right now and Joanna Bartlett had always been a complication for him. But the sex had been sensational. Like it always used to be. The best he had enjoyed in years. The best since the last time with her, if he were honest. It had always been what had drawn them together. He might have considered himself a bit of a stud in the old days and certainly his enthusiasm had been limitless, but with her it always seemed that sex reached a unique level of excitement and fulfilment. It was them, together, that did it. Something special. Something indefinable. Something undeniable. And it hadn’t changed. It was still there.
He liked the look of her, the feel of her and, by God, he adored the taste of her. He wondered if he were still in love with her – indeed, if he had ever stopped being in love with her. He knew that he wanted to see her again, but just like the first time he was afraid of seeing too much of her.
He comforted himself that geography and both their other commitments, particularly hers, would probably look after that for them. It was unlikely that they would be able to meet very often, even if they both wanted to. He knew that this time it would not be like before. That at best it would be no more than occasional snatched meetings. Never again would they dream of being properly together. That, at least, was over.
*
In July 2001 Shifter Brown stood trial at Exeter Crown Court. He didn’t stand a chance of leniency. Not under the most intense police pressure, nor in court, would he say who paid him to kill Jimbo O’Donnell. He was sentenced to the mandatory life for murder and the judge recommended that he serve a minimum of twenty-two years. It was even worse than Shifter had expected, perhaps, but he had resolutely refused the one piece of information that could have helped. There was no jury, because Shifter pleaded guilty, and the hearing lasted only two days. Joanna went to Exeter to cover it, arriving the day before the proceedings began and leaving the day after.
Until then, she and Fielding had been together just three times during the four months which had passed since their afternoon in the Southampton Row hotel room. Geography had indeed taken care of it. That and fear.
Joanna had a very practical side to her. She did not want to wreck her marriage or her life. In her mind she had tried to think of Fielding as a failed policeman, a bit of a sad case. But there was nothing failed or sad about Mike when they were making love. She had been forced to admit that regardless of his failings and what she knew he regarded as the failure he had made of almost everything except, most perversely, perhaps his marriage, he remained the love of her life. That frightened her. Perhaps it had been partly curiosity that had led her to that Southampton Row hotel room. She wasn’t sure. Partly anger at her husband, of course, no doubt about that. But she hadn’t really expected the old feelings to be quite as intact and it had been something of a shock.
She couldn’t stop herself sleeping with Fielding whenever the opportunity presented itself, although she was not prepared to take any silly risks. It seemed he felt the same. So they had to settle for very occasional torrid afternoons.
The trial, however, gave them, albeit for such a short time, almost unlimited opportunity.
God knows, she thought, what Fielding told his wife, but he more or less took up residence in her Exeter hotel room for the three nights she was there, slipping in and out via the fire escape, which she opened for him at agreed times, so that he would hopefully not be seen by anyone who might recognise him.
She couldn’t believe the sexual energy they managed to maintain.
‘Not bad for two middle-aged folk,’ she said one night after their lovemaking had been particularly extravagant.
‘I forget what a tired, worn-out old bugger I am when I’m with you,’ he told her. And his eyes went all crinkly as he smiled and reached out for her yet again.
When the trial ended she had not wanted to return to London, even though she did feel guilty whenever she thought about Paul and Emily. Particularly Emily, whom she had found herself phoning much more often from Devon this time than she usually did when she was away.
She realised she was going to miss her lover dreadfully. And yet she knew that something else had not changed with the years: she and Mike Fielding were not going anywhere. Not ever.
Two weeks after his sentencing, Shifter Brown phoned Joanna from jail and asked her if she would visit him. He had something to tell her, he said, something he was sure she would want to know. And he was planning to tell her exclusively. ‘I’ll get a visiting order sent to you, personal, like. You can be my cousin. I wouldn’t want them to know who you really were.’
It would take a bit of getting used to, being Shifter Brown’s cousin, but Joanna was consumed with curiosity.
‘I’ve got a story for you, Joey,’ he said. As ever, it made her want to giggle when he called her that. ‘It’s a corker,’ he went on. But he would give her no clue as to the subject matter.
She could not resist, of course. She accepted his offer with alacrity. Shifter was in the Devon county prison at Exeter, where he had been held on remand before his sentencing and then returned for assessment. It would be another couple of months before he would be despatched to serve out the rest of his term at a maximum-security jail like Parkhurst or Long Lartin.
On the appointed day, less than a fortnight later, Jo set off down the M4 heading west. She was so focused on what she was doing that she did not even arrange to see Fielding, although she was going into his patch. ‘Maybe I’ll call him after I’ve seen Shifter,’ she had thought to herself as she swung off the M5 at the Exeter exit. But her mind was intent on the task at hand. Maybe this was the big exclusive she had been chasing. Certainly any sort of interview with Shifter inside jail had to be a story, whatever he eventually told her. She was hoping, naturally, that he was going to tell her who had hired him, although she couldn’t think what would have changed his mind about that. Shifter didn’t grass, after all.
He was convicted now, though, so sub judice no longer came into it. Shifter would be well aware of that. He was a pro. She wondered about his motive, as well as his intentions.
She was quite preoccupied with the prospect of talking to him, but had decided not to tell anybody else about it. Not even her husband and editor. In fact, particularly not him. She had made sure that her visit to Exeter prison had been arranged on one of the days when she was not expected in the office, and had deliberately delayed leaving home until her husband had already departed for Canary Wharf and Emily was safely despatched to school.
At the grim old county jail on the hill opposite Exeter Castle she was searched and her VO pass inspected before being led to the visiting room. She had been seated first at one of the small wooden tables and then Shifter was led out to her. He was wearing prison denims, which stretched over his huge shoulders. The clothes did not seem quite big enough for him. She thought that would probably offend a man who wore the kind of beautifully tailored suits she had last seen him in. He walked just as he had in the restaurant, however. As he always did, she suspected, with his huge hands hanging like weapons waiting to be loaded and put into action. He did not show the great strain he must surely be under. She had to remember that to the Shifter Browns of this world doing a stretch in prison was just a part of life, he was of the breed who prided themselves on being able to survive it. But twenty-two years! That was some sentence and surely must have shaken even him. If he served the full time recommended by the judge Shifter would be well into his sixties before he got out, even with
full remission. She studied him closely as he walked towards her. She had noticed in court that he looked even fitter than when she had lunched with him. His waist was slightly narrower, stomach flatter, jaw a little more squared. He would be spending his days working out she supposed, that was what the old lags did. They believed that if you kept the body in top condition, the mind would stay that way too. The one thing they all feared was losing their minds. Stir crazy, they had called it once.
Shifter loped across the room towards her and beamed a greeting as he sat down. ‘All right, Joey doll?’
‘I’m fine, Shifter. How about you?’
‘Been better, doll, but I can handle it.’ There was something about his expression which made her realise then what an effort he was making, not just with her for this visit, but probably every day of his life inside, determined not to go under, not to let himself be beaten.
‘You copped the big one, didn’t you?’
He nodded sagely. There was not a hint of self-pity in him. ‘Yeah, well, it wasn’t any more than I expected.’
‘You could have done yourself a favour, told them who put out the contract on Jimbo.’
‘But I don’t grass, do I?’ He smiled again.
‘So what have you brought me here today for, then? What is this corker you have for me exactly?’
‘I want to tell you the truth behind Jimbo’s murder, of course. All of it. The works, Joey. It’s yours, doll.’ He paused. ‘At a price, naturally.’
‘Ah,’ she said. So that was it. He was after money. She made no further comment.
A Kind Of Wild Justice Page 27
