“Can I?” said Alex after a moment.
“Of course.” Bernice seemed to be working herself up into a fever pitch of excitement now. “Tim and Harriet! They’re an item! Can you believe it? I couldn’t at first, I thought Sam was pulling my leg when she told me.”
Alex could now almost remember who Sam was, but as she kept listening, her attention was diverted again to Aiden’s car. Daisy was now standing next to the driver’s side door, waving her arms, evidently involved in some kind of conversation with him.
“So anyway,” continued Bernice, “the reason I’m phoning, is first of all to say ‘Hi!’ of course, but also to ask if you want to come to this party.”
“Party?” said Alex.
“Yes,” said Bernice, now very animated, “try and keep up, Alex! I’m having a party, which is wonderful in itself, obviously, but Tim wants to propose to Harriet, right there, at this party, and thank God I know she’s going to say yes, so there won’t be any embarrassment, oh it’s going to be so romantic, but don’t tell anyone because this proposal thing is a huge secret!”
“If I can come I will be there,” said Alex. “I’m sure it will be a massive blast!”
“Of course you’ll be there,” said Bernice. “Oh, and while I remember, isn’t your brother some kind of singer now? Isn’t he in a band?”
“Well yes,” said Alex, “he is, they’re called Joel’s Garden, have you heard of them?”
Conner, who was sitting at one of the other desks, still poring over his receipts, sat up when he realized Alex was talking about him.
“Who is that?” he whispered to Alex.
“Yes, we’ll both come to the party,” said Alex into the phone.
“Wonderful,” said Bernice, “and maybe we could get your brother and his band to play?”
“I’m sure they’d love to play at this event,” said Alex.
“Who is that on the phone?” hissed Conner, a bit louder this time.
“Hang on a moment Bernice,” said Alex, and turned to her brother. “Conner, I am on the phone talking to one of my friends about a very important social engagement, and she might want you and the boys to play at an event.”
She brought the phone back up to her ear, and as she did so she glanced outside and saw that Daisy and Aiden were still talking to each other.
“Wow,” said Conner, “tell her yes we’ll play at it!”
“Was that Conner you just spoke to?” said Bernice. “Is he interested in playing at our event? Can I have a quick chat with him?”
“Please do,” said Alex. She glanced out of the window again, just as Daisy was turning away from Aiden’s car; he looked as if he was about to leave.
She passed the phone to Conner and headed towards the door. When she got down to the car park she could only watch as Aiden’s Saab pulled away, and Daisy had gone. She walked back to the office, frustrated at the opportunity missed.
Back in the office, Conner and Bernice were exchanging numbers, and then Alex took the phone back from him. She promised to stay in touch with Bernice, said her goodbyes, and then put the phone down. Alex was pleased that she’d been able to reconnect with her friend, but she was really thinking about what Aiden and Daisy might have said to each other.
“Hey, Alex, I’ve got two gigs today,” said Conner with undiminished enthusiasm, “and this one is going to be five hundred!” He waved a piece of paper in front of her.
“Good for you,” she said impatiently. “Now I need to get on with some work so go off and do whatever it is that you do.”
“Sure, I’ll see you later.” He was surprised by her abrupt manner. “You know you are my favourite sister, don’t you?” he said, coming over and putting an arm around her shoulder.
“Not now please, I’m not in the mood, okay?”
“Okay sure.” He was confused but he decided to back off. “Well, I’m off to practice with the guys, I’ll see you later.”
When the door shut, Alex let out a long, heavy sigh. Now both Conner and Aiden were upset with her.
The office door opened and she turned, not wanting to see either of them, or Daisy right now.
But it was Lewis, and she found herself relieved to see him.
“You okay?” he asked as he slumped into a chair next to her.
“Yes, it’s just that…well you would know, it’s not easy running a business, is it?”
He laughed. “Heavy lies the head that wears the crown, Alex. That’s how it is. If you want to achieve something it nearly always costs. Part of your problem is that you’ve got some of your family and friends working for you. Mixing business with pleasure or family is always trouble. I found that out.”
“Have I done the right thing?” she asked him, surprising herself with the question.
“Well, I’m not connected to the divine network like you lot.” He smiled. “I can only offer my opinion.”
“I want your opinion,” she said. “I value what you think, since you’ve been in the chair.”
“Okay,” he said, “if you mean the whole business, then of course you’ve done the right thing. You’ve got your dreams and you need to pursue them, what else are you going to do? But if you mean about taking on this girl Poppy, well I don’t know. I think maybe you have done the right thing, if Daisy and her can get these designs sorted, prototypes done, and a manufacturing deal delivered in the next three months, then maybe you’ve done the right thing, but it’s a big ask.”
“Thank you,” said Alex.
“It could all go wrong,” said Lewis, “but, hey, go for it!”
She nodded.
“Of course,” he continued, “I can afford to say that, it isn’t my money, it’s yours.”
She stared at her desk and tapped a pencil onto the wood. Her diary was open at the date where she had written in details of the party Bernice was organizing.
“Do you want to get a coffee somewhere?” she said eventually, “I still want to talk to you about the marketing for Conner’s band.”
“Sure,” he said, “I’ll get the coffees, you can bring the spreadsheets.”
Conner Adams curled into a corner seat in the back row of the night bus heading home. The vibration of the engine beneath his feet had a soporific effect; floating his mind from the comfortable maleness of the boys in the band and out into the intriguing, unknown territory of Poppy Martinez. Whatever else was on his mind, whatever else he was doing, his thoughts always came back to her, the colour of her eyes, the scent of her, the feel of her against him when she hugged him at the café. He leant back his head and let out a heavy sigh.
This girl had severely messed with his head, and at the moment he was not at all sorry that she had done so. All that time and effort he had put in to building some emotional defences, knowing he needed to be a bit careful with girls, patrolling his boundaries, priding himself on how good he was at this sort of thing, and along came Poppy Martinez, a girl who seemed to be able to find her way under his radar with unnerving ease. He’d resisted the temptation to make a fool of himself with Daisy and in the process they’d developed a wonderful sibling relationship. He’d been especially proud of how resisting some initial stirrings had helped them find the right way to relate to each other, even if it did mean she teased him mercilessly. But with Poppy things were different. It amused him to think that he had resisted one flower, only to fall for another.
His thoughts were interrupted by a vibration from his phone. He tried to pull the mobile out of his pocket and in the end he had to stand up to do so, and by then the ringing had stopped. He put the phone back in his pocket and the rumble of the wheels lulled him into sleep.
When a jolt over a pothole woke him, he found he’d missed his stop. He pressed the bell and when the bus again pulled up he stumbled off, pulling up the collar of his jacket against the cold.
He remembered the call he had received and dug out his mobile. There was a voice message, just three seconds. He watched his breath steam out into the night
as he raised the phone to his ear and listened:
“You are Cain.”
He looked at his phone as if he expected it to explain itself. As he stared, it buzzed again into life and he almost dropped it. He answered the call.
“Hello?”
There was no answer.
“Hello?”
Again, silence
“Who is this?”
He fancied he could hear breathing at the end of the line. It was probably one of the guys from the band, Mark or Baz, having a laugh.
“Okay, sunshine,” he said loudly, “you’ve had your fun, goodnight.”
He was about to switch off the phone when a voice, clear and precise, spoke into his ear: “You are Cain, and your offering is unacceptable.”
Then the line went dead.
He frowned at the phone, expecting it to do something else, but there was only a passive silence; whoever had called him had withheld their number, so he couldn’t call back.
He walked on for a couple of minutes and then he listened to the voice message again.
“You are Cain.”
It didn’t sound like anyone from the band; it wasn’t even a voice he knew. If it had been one of his mates they would have done something stupid like phone him and pretend to be Poppy, pledging him undying love.
But this wasn’t a joke; this unnerved him, it felt more like an attack. This was from someone who sounded serious, and intent on harming him in some way.
As he put the phone in his pocket it hummed the arrival of a text message:
“You are Cain, and your offering is unacceptable.”
He thought back to Sunday school classes he’d gone to, to Cain and Abel, and the first recorded murder. But which one was Cain? Was he the one who murdered his brother? He would never murder anyone; that didn’t feel right, that idea had no power over him, so that wasn’t the sting in this attack, so what was it?
“You are Cain, and your offering is unacceptable.”
Wasn’t Cain the one whose sacrifice had been rejected by God?
Conner stopped and looked at the stars. Was that it? But that didn’t make any sense. How could his offering not be acceptable to God? He tried to make himself walk on, continue home but the stars above him drew his attention. Was there something wrong in what he was doing? Was it this thing with Poppy?
He continued to search the skies for an answer, for some reassurance. His offering was his music, was that what this was about? Was there something wrong with his music? Surely that made no sense, did it?
And yet there was something in that, and he knew it; there was something wrong with his music, or his performances of his music.
Conner felt a sickening feeling growing in his stomach as he thought about the songs he had written and played over the years.
Above him through the crisp clear air he saw the white pinpoints of the stars, some randomly scattered, others appearing in patterns or lines, their precision seemed to judge him, and he called out to the one who had put them there.
“Isn’t my offer acceptable to you?” he whispered. He continued to look up and listen, but then the stars began to blur and swim around in the inky blackness, and he found there were tears in his eyes.
9
Lewis Ashbury sat at his desk and sucked on a cigar. When he had been a young man, and thought he knew everything, this activity would give him a superficial sense of calm, and confirm him in the illusion that he was in control of his life.
But now that he was older and perhaps a bit wiser, he knew enough to be aware of his ignorance. He knew enough to know that he was not in control. Gradually, everything in life and love and business had slipped from his grasp, so that now, helping out this misfit set of Holy Joes led by his former Personal Assistant had become the defining purpose in the life. And even that could not disguise the creep of fathomless grief that still came upon him more frequently these days.
He looked down at the desk, at the two photos of the only woman he was sure he’d ever loved.
There were two images of Bridget, each displaying different facets of her character: on the one hand there was Bridget his business partner, with all of the courage, intelligence and determination she brought to the company, and on the other there was Bridget the lover, full of charisma and passion.
He didn’t have to be a master of self-awareness to know what was gnawing at his gut. He’d buried the truth quite thoroughly and it had stayed buried for months, but now it was rising to the surface, digging itself out of the grave he’d put it in, coming back to him to collect its due.
That truth was as simple as it was devastating. He’d loved Bridget. He’d always loved her, when they were lovers he loved her, when they were just business partners he’d still loved her, even when he’d pretended he hated her, he loved her.
But now Bridget was gone, and her death had affected him more profoundly than he expected, and he could not rationalize or deny this fact any longer.
She’d been murdered, possibly by the shadowy forces that his colleague Martin had got himself mixed up with, possibly even by the maniac who had caused a scene in the café Alex owned.
Whoever it was, he could feel the grief rising in him, mixed with a hunger for vengeance. He didn’t want to admit his feelings because he hated the idea of having the weight of the past hanging around his neck, dragging him down. All his working life had been spent looking forward, pointing forward, away from the mistakes and consequences of the past, and on towards new beginnings, fresh opportunities. His desire to stay ahead of the past had always driven him on to find the next new thing. He believed in re-launching his life on a regular basis, like a new marketing campaign for a well-established brand; reinventing and redefining himself, and pushing on so that he didn’t so much solve the problems in his life as simply leave them behind. That was why, after Bridget’s death he was happy to pass what was left of SLaM over to Alex, another woman he loved, albeit in a completely different way.
But now, for the first time in his life it wasn’t working. He couldn’t rebrand himself and move on from his feelings for Bridget. She was dead and he had loved her and he still loved her, and he had not grieved her loss because he had not dared to. He had not wanted to admit to himself how he felt, and so he suppressed his emotions, held them down, believing that in time, they would simply go away.
But they had not gone away.
Instead they’d come back to haunt him, and not just a sorrow at her passing, he was also taken with a fierce desire for revenge, a desire with much more potency and hunger than anything he’d felt at the time of her death.
He sucked hard on the cigar and looked at the pictures, and felt nausea churn inside him, and at last he confessed to himself all the feelings: anger, sadness, remorse, love, revenge. He indulged himself in the free flow of memory. He recalled the times they had been together, the challenges they had faced together. The smoke made his eyes sting, as it curled up towards the anglepoise lamp, and he bowed his head. He wanted to pray, but there was nothing there to pray to.
All of the feelings were still there, boiling and curdling inside him, especially the anger. Anger because someone had crushed the life out of her with a spray of bullets, anger at the nagging suspicion that this hadn’t just been a burglary gone wrong, that she had been targeted, or worst still, killed by accident.
As he thought about these things, a new resolve bubbled to the surface within him. He stubbed out the cigar and reached for his address book. He would visit a former employee, and return something he had been looking after since the fall of SLaM. That, of course, would be the pretext for the start of a journey towards something else: the truth, justice, and maybe the vengeance he thought he wanted.
Grabbing his car keys he walked briskly out of his apartment and into the cold evening. In his left hand he carried a briefcase, locked and unopened since the day he received it.
Martin Massey, former head of music at SLaM, had done rather well for himself in the last
twelve months.
After the SLaM debacle he’d left the country with some haste, and at short notice, he accepted an invitation from his brother to go out to Greece to work on an olive farm. His brother’s track record in business had convinced him that the whole scheme would end in failure, and would inevitably cost him money at some point, but he had to leave quickly and he didn’t have a lot of other offers, and so he had scurried to the airport, and flown out to Athens.
When he arrived at the farm, he was amazed to discover that the work was light, the investment was sound, and his brother was not the impractical dreamer he’d once been. Martin provided the capital for his brother to buy land from a neighbour to expand the business, and he returned months later with a suntan and a quarter share in a busy and productive olive farm. These had been happy times, a golden period after the chaos of working at SLaM and associating with Lench and his cronies. He’d secured some consultancy work via a media contact, and paid off most of the mortgage on his apartment, and, quite unexpectedly, life was good.
Like his old boss Lewis Ashbury, Martin was well versed in the art of only looking forward, and the SEEKA project, with all the mess it created, was now a distant memory.
Life in the sun had helped Martin to regain some of his old confidence. He had lost his fear of evening callers, and registered only mild curiosity when the intercom system buzzed at around nine thirty one cold evening at the end of February. He’d been casually watching a programme on true crimes, but now he flicked the TV off, walked into the hallway and stabbed at the intercom.
“Who is it?” he mumbled.
“Martin, it’s Lewis. Lewis Ashbury, I’ve got something of yours.”
Martin frowned at the sound of the voice.
He wondered whether he could simply ignore this ghost from his past, cower by the intercom and wait for him to leave. But Lewis did have something of his, something he had forgotten about, and knew he wanted to get back, and these days cowering was not his style.
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