by Tony Black
I wanted to make an entrance, thought about blowing the lock off the door. But it was only a fantasy. Likewise, I knew there’d be no Puerto Rican maid in the hall, a set of keys conveniently secreted about her person.
‘Calm, Gus, calm,’ I told myself. ‘Remember why you’re here.’
It was time to get with the programme.
52
I made a gentle knock on the door, the kind room service might use; stepped away from the spy hole.
No answer.
A light shone under the door. I heard movement. A bath running.
I knocked again. This time, an answer. Nadja kept the chain on the door.
She wore sunglasses, her hair tied back tightly.
‘Hello, Nadja,’ I said.
‘Why are you here? I have told you all I know.’
I said nothing. Tried to appear calm, I didn’t want to spook her before I got inside.
She moved to close the door, in a second I jammed in my boot, applied a shoulder. The chain snapped, spraying weak links on the floor.
‘What was that? “Come in.” Glad to.’
I walked into the middle of the room, turned to face her. She wore a short white bathrobe, the hotel’s initials stood out above her left breast.
‘I was preparing to bathe.’ The robe fell open to her waist, exposing an expanse of taupe skin.
‘I see that.’ I also saw she was changing tactics.
‘Let me turn off the water.’
As she walked away from me I noticed her legs. Long and shapely, what was once referred to as a finely turned ankle.
‘Help yourself to a drink, Mr Dury,’ she called out from the bathroom.
I didn’t need to be told a second time.
The whisky decanter was unmarked but before I even tasted a drop I had it pegged as Johnnie Walker, Black Label. Call it one of my many skills, I’ve a nose for these things.
When Nadja returned she’d taken the pins out of her hair; it hung wildly on her shoulders.
‘What’s with the shades?’ I asked.
‘I have a little bit of a migraine.’ She sat opposite me, crossed her legs. My eyes fell on a tranche of thigh.
‘Walking into a fist will do that.’
‘What? No, it is a migraine, that is all.’
I threw back my whisky, walked towards her.
‘Stand up,’ I said.
‘No — No, I will not.’
I put down my glass, jerked her by the arm and pulled her to her feet. We stood facing each other, I held her close enough to feel her heart beat.
I removed her glasses. ‘Who was it — Zalinskas?’
She nodded. Slumped into me. ‘He knows… he knows you were here.’
‘He does?’
‘Yes…’ She gripped me so tightly I felt her nails in my back. ‘You must protect me. I have no one else.’
‘Stop with the tears,’ I told her. ‘I’m not buying into the little-girl-lost act.’
Nadja composed herself, stared at me. I put my hand to her face, moved her eye towards the light. ‘I think you’ll live.’
As I let down my hand, her mouth opened. She threw back her head, showed me her neck. Her breasts slid from beneath her robe. Then the robe slid from her shoulders.
She turned, stood with her back to me, arms round my neck, grinding her rear into my crotch. I smelled expensive perfume on her wrists as she clawed at my head with her nails.
‘Nadja,’ I said.
‘No words.’
‘Nadja, stop this.’ I knew I had to pass it up. Every fibre of me yelled, ‘Stop now, Gus! Walk!’ But reason had left me the second her robe hit the floor.
‘Come… follow me.’ She lowered her arms, walked slowly away from me, her long legs crossing each other like she’d taken to a catwalk.
At the bedroom door, she turned, ran her hand up the jamb, and with the other summoned me to follow.
53
I tried to tell myself there wasn’t a man alive could have passed her up. But I was hurting now. I knew I’d jeopardised my position, relinquished the upper hand.
As Nadja ordered room service, I put the Glock out of sight, stuffed it between the mattress and the bed springs. I looked for a way the situation might work to my advantage, but found none. Women like her, in situations like this, hold the aces. Christ, Billy was proof of that.
She came back, said, ‘My, my, you are quite the cowboy.’
I had to laugh. ‘Cowboy?’
‘With the gun in your pocket.’
I touched the rim of the bed, where I’d hidden the Glock.
‘Weren’t you about to have a bath?’
‘You are right. I will take a shower. Would you join me?’
‘Rain check. I’ll wait for the food.’
She climbed over me, lingered on a kiss, then slipped off to the shower.
Dressed, I poured another whisky. Got halfway through my second when room service arrived, closely followed by Nadja.
‘Ah, now we eat,’ she said.
‘Yeah…’
‘Come, sit by me.’
She’d ordered eggs Benedict, not my usual fare of choice.
‘You like it?’
‘It’s very… rich.’
‘That will be the hollandaise, dar-ling.’ She lingered on the dar-ling.
‘That’s not what I meant.’
She laughed. ‘We can have the concierge call out for McDonald’s if you prefer.’
I tried to get the conversation back on a business footing.
‘Nadja, I went to see Zalinskas.’
‘I know.’
‘You do?’
‘How do you think I got this?’ She waved a hand over her eye. ‘He knows about us.’
If Zalinskas thought there was an ‘us’ he was misinformed.
‘ Us?’
‘He… heard you were here.’
‘Yeah, you said.’
She put down her knife and fork. ‘I have lost all appetite.’
‘Nadja, it’s time you laid your cards on the table.’
She stood up, walked over to the window and picked up my cigarettes. ‘Can I take one of these?’
I nodded.
She looked out, blowing smoke onto the windowpane. ‘Benny found out about Billy’s plans.’
‘Plans?’
‘He had big plans, he was going to break away from Benny. He was tired of… how do you say? Playing the second fiddle. He knew he could make enough money to leave Benny for good and set himself up.’
‘What were the plans, Nadja?’
‘I do not know.’ She turned away. ‘I do not know anything.’
I walked over to the window, placed a hand on her shoulder and turned her around. ‘You can tell me. We’re on the same side, remember.’
She sat down. ‘I do not know everything, but I do know some. Billy, he had… knowledge. He had some… information.’
‘And…?’
‘It would pay him. He was going to make someone pay him.’
Things suddenly clicked into place.
‘This was a government minister, wasn’t it?’
‘I think so, yes.’
‘Who?’
Nadja stood up again, started to walk around. ‘That I do not know. I promise I do not.’
‘Then, Zalinskas… how did he sus this?’
‘Benny knows everything. He finds out by… he has many friends. Perhaps this person found out and went to him, like you say, out of the blue. For help perhaps. It happens all the time, all it takes is for Benny’s name to be put up and things happen or don’t happen.’
So, Billy had got greedy. Saw himself as the Big I Am. But he’d decided to put the make on the wrong man. No wonder Zalinskas was sore.
‘Billy was blackmailing this minister?’
Nadja nodded meekly.
Just what Billy had on the minister was anybody’s guess. The obvious old favourites sprang to mind, it mattered for one reason alone — to point me to Bi
lly’s killer. I needed to know who the minister was.
‘Does that work?’ I pointed at a laptop on Nadja’s desk.
‘Yes of course.’
‘Internet connection?’
‘Yes.’
‘Then log on.’
54
I knew my way round the government site from my reporting days. Found the Cabinet Ministers in no time; went to their mugshots.
The page threw up a list of past achievements, education and portfolios held. All I wanted was a clear picture Nadja could identify.
I took them one by one.
‘If you see someone… anyone you might have seen with Zalinskas, sing out.’
I put up the first picture.
‘No.’
The second.
‘No.’
Third, fourth, fifth and sixth.
‘No… I do not recognise any of these faces.’
‘What about Billy? Did he mention any of these names, or anything at all related to the government.’
‘No, never… Except… well, sometimes he would make a rant at the news, but I never heard him name anyone, or single anyone out.’
I continued to scroll down the screen.
‘No,’ said Nadja. ‘No. This is all so hopeless.’
‘Keep going.’
‘No… no. Wait! Yes.’
‘This one?’
‘Yes.’
‘You know this one?’ I double-clicked on the picture, opened up a bigger shot. I definitely knew the face, it was Alisdair Cardownie, Minister for Immigration.
‘I think… but, wait, no. No, I cannot be sure. I think I may only have seen him on the television shows.’
My pulse had raced at the sight of him, to hear her change her mind like this put ice in my veins.
‘Are you kidding me?’
‘No, I am sorry. I do not think I have seen this man, other than on the television… he is on television a great deal, is he not?’
I nodded. ‘Oh, he is that.’
‘You know him?’
‘After a fashion.’
‘I do not understand, what does that mean?’
‘It means… let’s just say I’ve run into him on the odd occasion.’
‘There is the bad blood between you?’
‘He cost me my job.’
Nadja looked back at the screen. ‘This man? He doesn’t look capable.’
The sight of the smug arse-wipe turned my stomach, I closed down the laptop. This line of enquiry had got us nowhere. It was time to change tack, go to the root cause.
‘The fight between Billy and Zalinskas.’
‘What about it?’
‘That’s just it. What was it all about?’
Nadja shuffled in her seat, looked uncomfortable. ‘I do not know, entirely. Some security issue I think. I did not have any interest.’
‘Nadja, I know Benny ordered a sweep of the clubs after that row. It’s common knowledge.’
She took another one of my B amp;H, lit up. ‘I think some tapes had went missing. Benny is very particular about, how you say, running the tight ship.’
‘The tapes went missing on Billy’s watch?’
‘Yes, of course. Why else do you think they argued?’
‘Tapes of what?’
‘Just tapes. From the security cameras. Benny keeps them all in order, the tapes went missing and Billy had the hell to pay.’
‘Tapes from the casinos?’
Nadja squirmed. ‘And the houses.’
‘Houses?’
‘Where the girls work.’
‘Hah! You mean bawdy houses.’
I saw why losing some of the tapes from the knock shops wouldn’t be good for Zalinskas’ business.
I knew why the cameras were in place. They were Zalinskas’ insurance policy, or, maybe just for a rainy day. Billy had obviously got the same idea — only he’d decided to cash in Zalinskas’ chips a little bit early.
‘What else was Billy working on?’
‘Nothing.’
‘Come on — ambitious guy like Billy, he must have had umpteen irons in the fire.’
‘Nothing I tell you!’
I didn’t see Billy going too far down this track, he wasn’t building a second empire that’s for sure. But I knew if he thought of striking out on his own he’d need some kind of legit cover.
‘Motors… Billy liked his motors,’ I said, thinking out loud. ‘Did he have a workshop, garage somewhere?’
‘No. Never. He liked cars to drive, but he was not that kind of a man — you know, macho.’
‘What was he like?’
‘He liked the finer things in life.’
‘So, he liked his luxuries — clothes, scent?’
‘Yes.’
‘Did he ever bring in, say, a batch of designer gear from the Continent? Or anywhere else for that matter.’
‘Not that I know of.’
‘But say he did…’
‘He did not.’
‘Christ! Paintings then, Louis Vuitton handbags, mucky books? Where would he keep them? Where would he store them?’
‘I do not know. I really do not know. I tell you, he never had such business that I knew of.’
I was getting nowhere. I needed to know what Billy had been up to. Now, either Nadja was in the dark too, or she was holding out on me again. I wasn’t about to let her away with that for a second time.
I ran through to the bedroom, picked up the Glock. Stuffed it in my belt.
‘Right, on your feet,’ I said.
‘Why? Where are we going?’
‘Billy’s gaff. If he’s left a hint of what he’s been up to, we’ll find it.’
‘But Benny’s people have already been over it.’
‘I’m not Benny’s people.’
55
Billy kept a yuppie apartment down on the waterfront. I’d read an article by Irvine Welsh where he’d queried what it was with yuppies and water. I’d never found the answer to that myself. The water down here, looking out to a sea black to the horizon, is far from calming. Byron Bay it ain’t.
Whoever came up with the saying ‘worse things happen at sea’ had the Scottish coast in mind at the time. There’s a spot in the north called Cape Wrath. Says it all. A name like that, you don’t need to see the pictures. Safe to say, it hasn’t made any holiday brochures.
Robert Louis Stevenson’s family fortune came from building lighthouses to warn against the harshness of the Scottish coast, he had the right idea nicking off to Samoa. As a teenager on a trip up north, he’d described the coastal town of Wick as ‘one of the meanest of man’s towns, and situated certainly on the baldest of God’s bays’.
As I looked out of Billy’s floor-to-ceiling windows I couldn’t find one word of praise for the view, said, ‘What were you thinking, Billy?’
‘What, what did you say?’
‘Nothing. Just admiring the view.’
Nadja looked at me as though I’d fallen into apoplexy.
‘Are you serious? It is like the end of the world.’
What do you say to that? I said nothing.
‘Can you hurry, please,’ said Nadja. ‘I don’t like it here.’
‘Why? Bad memories?’
‘I’ve never liked it here.’
She stood in the centre of the floor, arms folded. Her eyes darted from me to the door and back again. She looked cold. I expected to see her shiver, but then it dawned on me — it was a deeper cold, a visceral chill. She’d carry this cold with her wherever she went.
Coming back here I’d expected tears from her. At least, some stirring of emotion. Maybe pick up one of the pictures dotted about the place. Pictures of her and Billy in what looked to be happier times. But she seemed unmoved by the return visit. Worse than that, the place unsettled her.
I asked, ‘Why?’
‘Why what?’
‘Why did you never like it here?’
She gave out a loud huff, moved away from me, propped h
erself on a bar stool.
‘Can you please get what you came for? I want to leave.’
The place had been turned over by Zalinskas’ goons, but I guessed it was a week since anyone had been there. A layer of silver dust covered the dining table and a stack of unopened mail sat on the mat.
‘Cleaning lady on holiday?’ I joked.
Saw a set of drawers turned out onto the floor, packs of cards, TV Times and Sainsbury’s coupons everywhere.
‘Billy clipped coupons?’ I said.
‘Ohh… that man!’
The DVD player lay smashed to bits on the floor. A set of size tens stomping on the casing will do that. A stack of empty shelves, left untouched, confused me. ‘Why are these shelves empty?’
Nadja shrugged her shoulders.
I got behind the DVD player, poked about on the floor, found an empty CD case and another empty CD rack.
‘They’ve taken all the disks.’
‘Yes, so what? Can we go now?’
I tramped through the debris to the kitchen, placed a hand on Nadja’s thigh. ‘You’ll have my full attention soon enough. Why don’t you make yourself a coffee?’
She rose, threw up her hands. ‘I am going to wait outside.’
‘No, I don’t think you are.’ I lowered my eyes and she went back to her seat.
‘Can you hurry — please.’
‘All in good time.’ I handed her the pile of unopened mail. ‘Here, look through that.’
In the bedroom, Billy’s clothes covered the floor. He had some expensive gear, but no taste. Ties that the guy off Channel 4 news wouldn’t give the nod to.
Inside his wardrobe more shelves had been removed, I say removed, torn out more like. But his shoes seemed untouched, lined up on the floor in two neat rows. Had a brainstorm to tip them out. Instantly, glad I did. A key for a mortise lock fell out of a Reebok runner.
I picked up the key. ‘Hello, what’s this?’
It seemed like an old key, rusted over. Certainly not well used. I called out to Nadja, ‘Hey, come in here, would you?’
No answer.
I stood up, went back through to the lounge.
‘Nadja,’ I called out. Then again, louder, ‘Nadja… Nadja.’
The place was empty. She’d run out on me.
