I read it again, but just the ‘I love you’s’ this time, and closed everything down with a loud sigh of relief. It took me a while to stop shaking and breathe normally. I’d stopped fake crying when my head had started to ache from the effort.
When Noel came back through with the coffee I wasn’t that interested in seeing the charade through. I was too angry with him to pretend to be hurt.
He put a cup of coffee down next to my hand and I ignored it.
‘Are you even happy?’ I asked. ‘Really? I mean, I can’t help but think that in a few months you’ll ring me up and everything will just start all over again, except every time you’ll sound a little bit less happy and a little bit more unhappy.’
That part wasn’t insincere. I decided that part I actually meant.
‘You’re probably right,’ he said, sitting down, unrepentant.
I snorted. ‘I’m probably right, huh?’
‘Yeah, I... Seven, I respect you too much to lie and say nothing is going to happen again. We have history, you know. That means something, right? But I promise, I truly fucking promise it’ll never affect your job.’
My job. Christ.
I almost couldn’t believe that he had the gall to say that to me, and then he had the audacity to reach across the tabletop and take my hand. The gesture didn’t help the level of fury that was building in my stomach every second I was looking at his stupid faux-earnest face.
What did he want, a fucking gold star for being honest? When I first met him I’d thought that his overly frank and unapologetic manner was admirable, but I was starting to believe that maybe he was just a raging dickhead who couldn’t be bothered to spare a thought for how to conduct himself around people who weren’t sycophants.
I picked up the coffee, looked at the white carpet beneath our feet and poured the entire boiling cup over his lap and on to the spotless floor.
‘What the fuck?’ He flew up, knocking his chair backwards. ‘Fuck, Seven, what the fuck was that for? That fucking... Jesus, ow, fucking hell!’
I put the cup back down on the table and sneered at him swiping at his crotch as I skirted around him in the direction of the door.
‘Wow, I hope that doesn’t... Looks like it’s going to stain. Asshole.’
I lit a cigarette on my way out of the flat and I heard him call after me once. But it was just the once and he didn’t follow me.
11
An old man stared at me for my entire tube journey. Every time I caught his eyes he licked his lips and at one point I was certain he was masturbating across the near-empty carriage. Feeling unwashed and revolted I got off two stops early, even though it happened so often I should have been used to it.
All I wanted to do was curl up on the sofa and go to sleep, or maybe fantasize about punching Noel in the face for a bit. But it was as if I could sense an atmosphere before I reached my street and the front doors of my building.
At first I wasn’t sure if it was he, but a few more steps and Alexei’s face and build came into focus. I walked more slowly for a moment, eyeing him and his brother standing either side of the entrance like a pair of scrawny black crows.
I sighed. ‘Well, hi.’
‘Thank you for planting the recorder for us,’ Alexei said, with a nod. ‘You did well.’
After his attitude the night before I wasn’t prepared to take anything else he said at face value.
I shrugged. ‘Thank you.’
‘Come with us.’
Alexei indicated behind me at the road, where a car with blacked-out windows was waiting half on and half off the kerb. Every nerve in my body screamed against it. I would almost certainly die in that car if I allowed them to coerce me inside. But aside from running, I didn’t see that I had another choice.
‘How the hell do you know where I live?’ I asked, folding my arms and taking a step back.
‘We followed you.’ Isaak stared at me, still and matter-of-fact, as if he hadn’t spoken.
‘And why would you do that?’
‘What’s to stop you from backing out of our agreement if we don’t keep track of you?’
‘Keep track of me? I didn’t sign a contract here, I said I could maybe help you and—’
‘Maybe, maybe, maybe. You twist your words.’ He inclined his head. ‘Who exactly did you think you were talking to? A couple of amateur thieves?’
When Isaak did speak he was calm and to the point. Too calm. Horrifying.
I looked back and forth between the vehicle and Alexei’s ill-practised smile, and decided to do as they had asked. I walked to the car and got into the back. After a minute or so Isaak joined me. In the front, next to Alexei, there was a driver whose face I couldn’t see owing to a pair of large reflective sunglasses.
We started to drive.
I started to talk.
‘Anyway, I just had a look at Noel’s computer and there’s not much on there. I mean, nothing you guys would find interesting. But him and Ronnie were swapping emails about a guy called Issa Taggart. He might be one of their dealers. I don’t know, I don’t think they’d talk openly about drugs by email. Anyway, I think that’s the name you should go on. There wasn’t any mention of an address... No reason, I suppose.’
I clutched my bag against my lap, struggling to sound confident, trying to remember if there was anything in there I could use as a weapon.
‘Issa Taggart,’ Alexei parroted, exchanging a look in the overhead mirror with Isaak. ‘Issa Taggart?’
‘You recognize the name?’
‘Yes, we do. He is one of a list of names we have from... surveillance, but obviously we cannot search all of their houses. An address, we can find.’
‘How long have you been watching him?’
‘... A long time.’
I cleared my throat. ‘Why are we driving?’
‘To talk,‘ Alexei said, turned away from me.
‘Well, we’re finished, right?’ I spread my hands with an animated smile, daring to think for a second that it might be over now that I’d done what they wanted. I was finished now. I was ready to jump ship and never try and be smart about anything ever again. ‘Good luck with the whole... robbing thing. Don’t mention it was me. Um... can you stop the car?’
Isaak made a strange little twitch next to me.
‘No, we’ll need more,’ Alexei said. ‘We’ll need you to continue finding us these locations when the drugs and money start moving. This is an ongoing project, not a fucking... what do you call it?’
‘Shoplift,’ Isaak offered.
‘Yes, shoplift. Did you not understand what I told you?’
‘I understood,’ I hissed back. ‘But that’s not what you asked. You just asked me to come up with something and I have and... you know, I don’t even care about the flight or the profits any more. I’m done, I’m out.’
‘No, you are not.’
‘Well, sorry,’ I said, raising my eyebrows. ‘I’m not your little dog with a bell on it waiting for commands like this guy over here.’
I gestured at Isaak, who smiled at his brother.
It was way too cramped in the back of this car. If I were killed no one would know. He could strangle me and even if someone looked straight at the windows they wouldn’t be able to see.
We drove in silence, turned a few corners.
Alexei’s voice came from the front.
‘Well, if the girl will not honour her agreement... Kill her then.’
I punched Isaak in the ear and he elbowed me in the chest, pinning me against the window. Air left my lungs. There was a knife in his hand with a long serrated edge.
Fuck, it hurt; it hurt so bad I thought my collarbone had cracked.
‘No!’ I screamed, scratching at the arm that was holding me down. ‘No wait! Wait! I can help you! I CAN HELP YOU!’
Alexei raised a hand without looking back.
No words, and Isaak let me go, taking his arm from across my chest. He sat back in his seat in the middle of the ca
r, aloof and ready. The knife was lying across his knee. I couldn’t take my eyes off it.
‘What have you got to say now?’ Alexei asked slowly.
‘I can give you something... better.’
‘Like what?’
I didn’t have a fucking clue. I’d only said it to stop Isaak from disembowelling me.
The car halted.
I was shaking.
The driver cut the engine and Alexei turned to look at me. ‘What? What have you got to say? You talk far too much. You are one of those sluts who do nothing but talk. But you have one last chance to open your mouth, which should be wrapped around my dick, and say something that might save your fucking life. Do you understand me now? You fucking Asian cunt.’
Breathing was difficult.
‘I’ll... I can get you everything.’ I was almost paralysed with fear, my throat clamming up. ‘Everything, the drugs, the money... Every stash, I can find out where it is. I... I know Noel, OK, he’d tell me anything, anything!’
It was becoming unbearably claustrophobic, as if I was already pleading for my life within my own coffin.
‘Anything,’ I repeated, meeting Isaak’s eyes too. I didn’t think he would be more reasonable, but he might be able to see the long-term benefits in what I was offering. ‘Think about it. Noel Braben... Ronnie O’Connell... You’ll get a free shot through me. You’ll get loads of free shots. No one would suspect me, least of all them! You’d barely have to be involved; they’d never be able to find you.’
Some thought for Noel’s welfare should have crossed my mind, but it didn’t. Either I died, or I did this. It was an obvious choice. I would have offered them anything in exchange for my life. Everything was expendable in comparison.
Alexei stared at me. I didn’t know how to interpret the smile on his face. I just prayed that he cared more about the money than he did about his dislike of me.
‘You think this is... how do you say it...? Leverage?’ the driver said suddenly, impassive behind his sunglasses. He had the same accent. He raised his face to the overhead mirror to address me from behind the lenses. ‘Take away your face and your body, your smart mouth and that hole between your legs and what power do you have over anybody, really?’
I was desperate for Alexei and Isaak to miss the fact that he had a point.
Forcing myself to remain calm, I glared at him past a sweep of my hair and said shakily, ‘I have more power to get the things you want than you do.’
My breathing was audible.
The driver’s eyes were front again, completely indifferent to my false bravado.
A siren passed us in the distance.
I realized I was sprawled against the corner of the car and I made a more conscious effort to sit up straight, even with Isaak encroaching into my space.
The decision was with Alexei, but I felt that if I said anything else I would most likely talk him into killing me just to shut me up. These guys weren’t exactly feminists. A woman talking back at them was probably more offensive an idea than gutting me in the back of a parked car.
I noticed Alexei had been chewing gum when he took the small white ball out of his mouth and stuck it in the drinks holder.
‘OK,’ he said. ‘OK, Miss Ishida. You have our attention. You may explain. You have one minute.’
I began talking for my life. ‘I can get into the houses for you, where they keep their money. I’m a girl. Some of the dealers even know me. There’s no way a gang of you will be able to get in and out without leaving traces of a struggle. All I would have to do is ask... or make up some story, and most people would let me in.’
I deliberately avoided looking at the knife. If I did I’d start to fall over my words.
‘Think about it,’ I said, trying to appeal to their logic rather than non-existent reason or emotions. ‘I could get in, find whatever I need to find and get out without any sign of forced entry. If I was disguised I wouldn’t draw any attention to myself. What were you lot going to do? Wear balaclavas to the front door? Imagine, I could get in and out and you wouldn’t even have to leave a fingerprint. No one could ever connect you to it.’
‘Think that is your minute gone,’ Isaak said, eyes on his brother.
I clenched my fists. ‘You know it makes sense. Let me live and I can do the legwork for you. What have you got to gain by killing me anyway? You wouldn’t even have tried. You wouldn’t even know what you could be gaining. All you’d be doing is leaving evidence around for people to find later.’
Isaak snorted. ‘This is ridiculous.’
‘No, it’s not,’ the driver said.
‘You’re going to listen to a stupid girl?’
‘Shut up!’ Alexei snapped. ‘You’re being a stupid girl! Do you not hear what she is saying?’
‘And you trust her?’
‘What’s the worst that can go wrong?’ I cut in. ‘I fail, I get killed? Just a longer way around to the same ending... except if I don’t fail you reap the benefits.’
Alexei turned to the driver and they conversed in Russian.
Isaak shouted something but was reprimanded.
I shut both eyes, desperate to speak again but not wanting to push my luck any more.
Alexei mixed his Russian and English for a moment, and then addressed me.
‘You know, if you are lying, we will kill you, and it will not be as quick as the death we were going to afford you now.’
I nodded. ‘What does it matter if it’s between you or someone else? What reason would I have to lie? To give myself, what, an extra week? An extra month?’
It was lucky, I realized, that they all thought I was dim-witted because of my gender. They probably didn’t think I had the mental capacity to lie at this point, and I would just be begging for my life like a typical weak female in movies.
‘Alex, you don’t believe this bullshit?’ Isaak spat.
‘Isaak,’ Alexei gestured at me, ‘what can she do? Are you really that scared of her?’
Isaak fell silent, but glared at me.
I tried not to look too smug, but I hoped my expression was pissing him off.
‘We will be watching you,’ Alexei said. ‘In the meantime, you will wait for our instructions.’
Isaak rolled his eyes but said nothing further.
‘Now, get out.’
I had to regain control of the situation somehow. If I let them leave it like this they’d never listen to anything I had to say again, so I didn’t get out right away. Instead I looked at Alexei and said, ‘I want a passport’.
‘You what?’ Isaak looked at me as if I’d said I’d wanted to publicly defecate.
‘Well, I assume if I’m still holding up my end of the agreement you’re both going to uphold yours?’ I raised my eyebrows. ‘I can’t get to Japan without a fake passport, can I? Noel will just have me followed. You think I’m stupid?’
‘You f—’
‘All right.’ If I wasn’t mistaken, I thought I saw Alexei wink as he said this. ‘That is fair.’
‘I’m going to want to see proof of it.’
Isaak drew back a fist. ‘Get the fuck out now, before we change our minds!’
I put my hands in the air and retreated back into the corner. ‘Fine! Fine, I’m going.’
The driver unlocked the doors and Isaak pushed me out so hard that I fell to my knees in the road outside, scraping my hands. I got up, shaking, as the car pulled away.
Across the street a woman was walking her dog but all she had done was quicken her pace.
I looked over my shoulder for the vehicle but it was too far away to read the number plate.
12
I lay awake for most of the night in the living room with the light on, trying not to count, trying to meditate instead, meditate myself to sleep.
Everything I’d said in the car had been from panic and now I couldn’t see a way out. It was only going to afford me an extension at best. I was certain they’d kill me when I was no longer useful to them, but
I’d have to deal with that when it came to it. Until then, all I could do was plan ahead as much as I could and be prepared.
I began to think of other times in my life when I’d had to convince people to do things for me. It had never been difficult. Getting into a drug dealer’s house wasn’t going to be the hard part, but what the fuck was I going to do once I was in there?
I’d need a gun: it was the only weapon you could defend yourself against other guns with.
It was still and clammy and silent outside. I kept sweating.
Every so often I’d think back to reading Noel’s emails and feel like shit, even though our perverted sex triangle was the least of my problems. The last time I was feeling this down Noel took the day off work and took me to an art gallery.
It had been a novelty to be taken anywhere in public. Not that I’d minded...
I sat up, sick of my thoughts and wondering if I had any sleeping pills.
My phone rang.
It was five past three and the Caller ID said ‘Mark’.
‘Aren’t you concerned about waking me?’ I answered.
‘Well, if you were asleep you wouldn’t answer. You don’t sound very tired.’
I shrugged. ‘No, no I’m not tired. What are you calling about?’
‘Are you free for a prison visit at some point?’
‘What?’
‘Can you come with me to a prison sometime?’
‘Um... Well, yeah, I work evenings. Wha—?’
‘Nothing’s set in stone yet but I’m waiting on the name of the kid that shot the Williams boy. Even if his death is unconnected I thought it wouldn’t hurt to double-check, and I thought you might want to come if you want to stay informed about everything?’
I couldn’t help smiling. ‘And the perfect time to call and ask about this is three in the morning?’
‘I just got home, I don’t keep regular hours like you working girls.’
‘OK.’
He paused. ‘You sound sad.’
‘Well, my... family were killed in this machete incident. You might have heard about it?’
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