Strangers

by Paul Finch

  Seeing advantage in her mum’s absence, Lucy made herself some tea and toast, and then went back upstairs and rooted through the deeper recesses of her wardrobe, pulling out a succession of slinky garments: flared skirts, split skirts, mini-skirts, crop tops, sheer blouses, skinny leggings and a succession of ridiculously tall, strappy shoes. She hadn’t worn any of this gear in quite some time. Even so, she laid it out on her bed and stood there surveying it.

  ‘Going upmarket this week, are we?’ her mum asked from behind.

  Lucy glanced round, startled. ‘You seem to be in the habit of creeping around these days.’

  ‘Or is it just that you’re too preoccupied to notice I’m here? Preoccupied with trying to look like a porn star, that is.’

  Lucy struggled to conceal her irritation. ‘You know, you’re reacting to this as if I’m actually on the game.’

  Cora assessed the racy wear. ‘I think what you’re doing is more dangerous than being on the game.’

  ‘You don’t know what I’m doing. So if you can’t help out, at least stop interfering.’

  Cora sighed. ‘What help do you need?’

  ‘That stuff I wore before was bought from an adult website …’

  ‘God help us.’

  ‘This time I need something a bit classier … but not too classy, if you know what I mean.’

  ‘And what’ve you got?’

  Lucy indicated the tasteless array. ‘We all dressed to impress back in our clubbing days, didn’t we? Trouble is I was a teenager then. Even if I could get into this stuff, I don’t think the party girl image is really going to cut it.’

  ‘You need a touch of old-fashioned glam.’

  ‘Well … yeah.’

  ‘But something a woman would wear, rather than a kid?’

  Lucy looked round at her. ‘Exactly.’

  ‘Wait here,’ Cora said resignedly.

  She disappeared onto the landing and then into her bedroom, leaving Lucy bemused as she heard the sound of her mum rummaging around in her own wardrobe. When Cora returned, she was equipped with an item of clothing Lucy had never seen before: a black, backless pencil-dress with a knee-length skirt and gathered waist.

  ‘This might be a little tight on you, but that won’t hurt,’ Cora said. ‘Black stiletto court shoes and stockings should finish the outfit off, but it’ll be easy picking those up.’

  Lucy was amazed. ‘Where’d you get this?’

  ‘I wasn’t always a dowdy middle-aged woman, you know.’

  ‘No one would ever mistake you for dowdy, Mum … but this is going some.’

  ‘Felt like a princess in that frock.’

  ‘I’ll bet.’ Lucy held it up to check the size. ‘That bloody worthless bus driver got more than he deserved, that’s for sure.’

  Cora said nothing, a brief but distant expression on her face.

  Chapter 13

  Lucy was surprised when Tammy turned up on time that Monday morning. Even more so to see the girl looking presentable: clear of lippy and garish eyeshadow, hair tied in a sensible bun, and without a whiff of alcohol on her. She was wearing a tracksuit, white trainers and a battered old parka. In contrast, Lucy wore the smart, sexy pencil-dress under her beige raincoat, with, as her mum had suggested, a pair of black stockings and black patent stilettos to set it all off. Her make-up was subtle, her dark hair newly cut and styled in a neat, shoulder-length bob.

  ‘Look at you,’ Tammy said, scampering across Cross Street from the Royal Exchange to their agreed rendezvous point at the entrance to the Arndale Centre. ‘You scrub up special.’

  ‘You don’t look so bad yourself,’ Lucy replied.

  ‘You mean minus the slap?’ Tammy cackled. ‘In her moments of weakness, my mam used to say there was a real pretty girl underneath “all that slimy crap”. Probably why she smacked me in the face so often, she being an ugly bitch an’ all.’

  ‘Mam still around?’ Lucy asked as they walked.

  ‘Yeah, somewhere. Probably never die, that one.’

  ‘She know what you do?’

  ‘Who knows, who’s bothered? She wouldn’t give a shit. I was taken into care when I was five. Only seen her occasionally since. She rarely has a kind word. Anyway, let’s not talk about her. The lady you’re going to meet is a tad classier.’

  They boarded the Metrolink at Market Street, and rode north-east.

  ‘What’s her name?’ Lucy asked.

  Tammy grinned and nudged her with a bony elbow. ‘You’re in for a treat, I’ll tell you. This is the lady herself … Jayne McIvar.’

  ‘Jayne McIvar?’ Lucy struggled not to show how much of a shock this was.

  ‘Why not? No point talking to someone who can’t actually help you.’

  ‘And just out of interest … why should she help me?’

  ‘Well … you’re a mate of mine, and she owes me.’

  ‘She owes you?’

  ‘Yeah.’ Tammy gave another of her trademark mischievous grins. ‘I know stuff.’

  Lucy glanced sidelong at her. ‘What’re you talking about?’

  ‘Well … I used to work at SugaBabes, didn’t I? I know stuff that goes on there … stuff they wouldn’t want me talking about.’

  ‘Tammy, you’re not telling me you’re going to try and blackmail these people?’

  ‘It’s not blackmail. It’s a kind of, well … you know, an understanding we have.’

  Lucy felt even more nervous. ‘You’re sure Jayne McIvar will share this understanding?’

  ‘It’s all about favours. Look … someone leaves the company, and that’s a security risk. So they like to keep us ex-employees happy. If we need a bit of help now and then, they’re the folk to go to.’

  ‘It may be a dumb question, but …’ There was no one sitting anywhere near them in the compartment, but Lucy lowered her voice anyway. ‘Wouldn’t it be easier for them if you were getting out of line to just … well, rub you out?’

  Tammy mused. ‘If I got out of line, they probably would. I mean Suzy McIvar! Fuck me … she’s not head of the firm’s security for nothing. She’s a right demoness, she is! But Jayne believes in carrot as well as stick. And like I say, she owes me. It’s not like I’m asking a lot.’

  Lucy nodded, but was far from happy with this glib explanation. Just how much potential danger was Tammy walking them into here?

  They disembarked from the tram at Queens Road and strolled half a mile north around the edge of Queens Park.

  ‘If Jayne takes you up there today,’ Tammy said, ‘to the club I mean … just be dead grateful. Brown-nose a bit. That never hurts. Oh, and don’t ask too many questions.’

  ‘Even if I get the job, it’s not going to start today, is it?’ Lucy replied. ‘Won’t she want to do some kind of diligence on me first?’

  ‘Dili-what?’

  ‘Check me out.’

  ‘Maybe,’ Tammy said. ‘But remember what I said about asking stuff.’

  ‘I’ll have to ask questions about the work conditions and that.’

  ‘Well, yeah … just so it shows you’re not a total numpty. But whatever you do, don’t ask about the Taxi Service.’

  At first Lucy thought she’d misheard. ‘The what?’

  ‘The SugaBabes Taxi Service,’ Tammy said. ‘I mean that’s not what it’s officially called, but it’s what I always used to call it.’

  ‘What’s the SugaBabes Taxi Service?’

  Tammy tut-tutted. ‘There you go. Failed your first test. I said don’t ask about it.’

  ‘I’m asking you.’

  ‘Don’t ask anyone!’ Tammy stressed this in all seriousness. ‘Pretend it’s not even happening. That’s what most staff at the club do. Those who know about it.’

  ‘Tammy, what’re you talk …?’

  ‘Ignorance is bliss, Hayley.’ Tammy tapped the side of her nose. ‘Trust me.’

  Lucy would have questioned her further on this – she didn’t like any kind of unexplained loose ends – but they were now a
pproaching a small coffee shop overlooking the edge of the Manchester General Cemetery, which on a drab, grey day in early November looked even more eerie and desolate than usual.

  ‘Almost home,’ Tammy said with a wink, though Lucy wasn’t sure whether she was referring to the proximity of her birthplace, Harpurhey, or some kind of spiritual commonality she felt with Greater Manchester’s most senior whorehouse madam. Oblivious to the increased worry she was causing her friend, Tammy now glanced at her mobile.

  ‘Eleven, bang on. Cool. Jayne always comes here for her mid-morning tea break.’

  Before they entered the coffee shop, Lucy noticed a white Audi R8 parked outside it, with a heavily built man slumped behind the wheel. He’d been poring over what looked like a Russian-language newspaper, but broke off briefly to give them the once-over, and then resumed reading. A bell jangled as Tammy pushed the door open. Only one customer was installed in the cosy interior, a woman, and she was seated at the counter on one of five bright blue, goblet-type stools. She had a pen in hand and a leather-bound ledger spread out in front of her. She glanced casually around. An awful lot had changed since the old custody mugshot was taken, but straightaway Lucy recognised Jayne McIvar.

  Though she had aged, she had aged well. She had smooth, copper-coloured skin, firm, full lips and bright green eyes somehow enhanced by her tortoiseshell glasses. Her hair was a lively orange-red Afro, currently backcombed and braided in neat parallel rows. She wore a fluffy white jacket, tight white jeans and white cowboy boots. But that was where the pleasant picture ended. This coolly attractive lady might well owe Tammy, as the girl had so brightly and confidently put it, but by the look on her face now, the feeling wasn’t totally mutual.

  ‘And what can I do for you, Tamara?’ she asked, clearly not even considering the possibility that this meeting might be accidental.

  Lucy felt a fleeting surge of panic. So not only had Tammy got no real plan here, she hadn’t even prearranged things; in fact she was winging it.

  ‘You remembered who I am!’ Tammy exclaimed, delighted. ‘How wicked is that?’

  ‘How could I not?’ Jayne McIvar replied. ‘The one girl of my acquaintance born with a genuinely lovely name, and yet who still insisted on curtailing it so that it made her sound like a scrubber.’

  On the subject of how things sounded, Lucy noted, Jayne McIvar did not speak as if she came from inner Manchester. Her accent was noticeably northern, but at the same time refined, its harsh edges sanded off – as if she actually hailed from somewhere in leafy Cheshire. Elocution lessons, most likely. Always the sign of a villain who intended to go places.

  ‘That was the punters,’ Tammy protested cheerfully. ‘And wasn’t it you who taught me the customer’s always right?’

  Jayne still didn’t smile. ‘I said what can I do for you?’

  ‘Nothing.’ Rather impertinently, Tammy pulled up the next stool along and perched on it. ‘Just thought I’d pop in to say “hi.”’

  ‘With a friend?’

  ‘This is Hayley,’ Tammy said.

  ‘Ladies?’ asked the young, Italian-looking guy behind the counter.

  ‘Cappuccino for me, please?’ Tammy replied.

  ‘Latte,’ Lucy said.

  He nodded and moved away.

  ‘And you both just happened to be in Smedley?’ Jayne asked.

  ‘Not really,’ Tammy admitted.

  ‘You surprise me.’

  ‘But I wanted a quick chat.’

  Jayne laid her pen down. ‘Go on.’

  ‘You remember you said to me a bit ago …’

  ‘It must have been years ago, Tamara.’

  ‘Yeah … sure.’ Tammy shrugged as if this was unimportant. ‘You said that if I ever wanted out of the game, you could fix me up with a barmaid job. At the club, I mean.’

  The madam peered long and hard at her. ‘You can’t be a barmaid and a wino, love. That would be something of a problem.’

  ‘It’s not for me.’ Tammy nudged Lucy. ‘It’s for Hayley here.’

  Thus far, Jayne had given Lucy no more than a cursory glance. Even on hearing this, she remained focused on her former employee. And now, for the first time, she looked annoyed. ‘I’m sorry … who’s Hayley? You don’t just walk in here and bring us people we don’t know, Tamara! You ought to realise that.’

  ‘We do know her,’ Tammy insisted.

  The counter guy returned with their coffees. Carefully, he pushed them over. Tammy nodded and smiled. Jayne nodded at him too, in her case without a smile. Cooperatively, he departed back into the kitchen.

  ‘We do know her,’ Tammy said again, quietly. ‘She’s been working with me down on the East Lancs.’

  ‘Oh … great.’ Jayne sat back on her stool. ‘Another piss-artist. That’s all we need. Or is she a crackhead? Sorry, sometimes it’s difficult to tell the difference.’

  ‘Hey, Miss McIvar,’ Lucy interrupted, tired of being spoken about as if she wasn’t there. She unfastened the strap of her raincoat and let it fall open on the pencil-dress. ‘Do I look like a druggie or pisshead to you?’

  The madam appraised her for the first time, eyeing her top to bottom.

  ‘Sorry,’ she said, not sounding sorry at all. ‘No offence intended, Hayley … if that’s your actual name. But I don’t know you. So how can I form a judgement?’

  ‘I want a job,’ Lucy said. ‘That’s all I’m asking.’

  Jayne sized her up again; a tad more attentively this time.

  ‘She’s looking for indoor work, Jayne,’ Tammy added.

  ‘Is she indeed?’

  ‘Yeah, but I’m not bringing her to you as Talent.’

  Jayne glanced at Tammy, puzzled. ‘In that case why are we having this conversation?’

  ‘I already told you … the barmaid job.’

  Jayne looked back at Lucy. ‘You want to work for us … as a barmaid?’

  Lucy shrugged. ‘Why not?’

  ‘There must be a dozen pubs and bars in central Manchester that are advertising for staff as we speak. Why not just apply there?’

  Lucy shifted her feet awkwardly. ‘I’ve got a criminal record.’

  ‘I know plenty pubs where that wouldn’t be a problem.’

  ‘And she’s got a maniac boyfriend who’s always on the warpath,’ Tammy chipped in. ‘She needs somewhere to lie low.’

  ‘Plus, I’m in the life already,’ Lucy added. ‘You know what I’m saying … what if I was serving someone in a regular pub, and it turned out to be an old customer?’

  All the way through this faltering explanation, Jayne continued to size Lucy up, eyes lingering on her legs, on her bust.

  ‘If we were to take you on,’ Jayne said, interrupting Lucy mid-flow, ‘you’d make more money on the Talent Team. I mean, you’ve already been doing that down on the A580.’

  ‘I’ve told her that, but she won’t listen,’ Tammy said.

  ‘Why do you want to change now?’ Jayne asked.

  Lucy shrugged again, awkwardly. ‘It’s just not for me.’

  ‘There’d be no scallies where we’d put you. We only entertain quality clients.’

  ‘I don’t want it anymore, whatever the clients are like.’

  Jayne tapped a long, carefully manicured fingernail against her white front teeth. ‘Well … I’m not saying you wouldn’t look good behind our bar. But there’s a problem. No vacancies.’

  ‘Ohhh, Jayne!’ Tammy protested. ‘There’s always …’

  ‘But we might be short on the coat-check desk.’ Jayne watched Lucy with interest. ‘Reckon you could do that?’

  ‘Yeah, sure,’ Lucy said.

  ‘Pay isn’t up to much. Nine quid an hour tops, and you only get to keep half your tips. But then you won’t be giving us much in return … will you?’

  This seemed like a rhetorical question, so Lucy made no response.

  ‘The hours are six nights a week, seven p.m. until five a.m.’

  Lucy nodded bravely as if this was just abou
t acceptable, though in truth it wasn’t even as long a shift as she was currently working.

  ‘You told me you had a criminal record,’ Jayne said. ‘What’ve you been up to?’

  This could be the make-or-break moment, of course. Especially if Lucy was now looking to work as a coat-check girl. Despite that, honesty was always the best policy.

  ‘Thieving,’ she said.

  ‘Got caught with her hand in the till,’ Tammy explained.

  ‘So it’s not just thieving,’ Jayne said, ‘it’s thieving from your employers?’

  Lucy inclined her head.

  ‘I don’t need to tell you what’ll happen if that occurs when you’re on our payroll.’ Jayne’s green eyes now bored into Lucy like laser beams. ‘I must stress this, Hayley. A lot of the people who work for us have a shady past … and in some cases a shady present. It goes with the territory, and we are hugely understanding in that regard. But we’d take a very dim view indeed if that generosity of spirit was not repaid in full.’

  ‘I understand that, Miss McIvar.’

  ‘Let’s just say this, love. It wouldn’t be me you’d be answering to.’

  Lucy nodded again; it wasn’t difficult looking suitably unnerved.

  Jayne closed her ledger and slotted it into a large handbag. ‘Not that you’ll be stricken with temptation. There’s a security camera on the coat-check area. But that’ll work in your favour too. Someone claims his wallet’s suddenly lighter than it should be … we can soon find out whether you’ve been up to your old tricks again or he’s just a lying bastard. When can you start?’

  ‘Tomorrow night?’ Lucy suggested.

  ‘Okay. Do you know where we are?’

  ‘No.’ This wasn’t untrue. Lucy had familiarised herself with the area where SugaBabes was located but had learned that, as an establishment with no legal status, it was concealed among ordinary, nondescript buildings. It wouldn’t be easy pinpointing it on a map.

  ‘That’s okay,’ Jayne said. ‘I’ll meet you right here. Three o’clock sharp.’