James looked completely taken aback by the tirade. His gaunt face was a picture. Confusion, guilt, concern. Yes, normal concern. I knew he had had a bad time with his ex-wife and the children. And I did not know the full story, but perhaps one day he would tell me. Like, bonfire night?
I think it was time he did.
“This fire,” I said, knowing first I had to see if Jack was all right in hospital or wherever. “It’s under control? Yes? So soon you will be off your shift and we can meet? Say yes, James, or forever hold your tongue.”
It was an ultimatum with a bit of Shakespeare thrown in for ballast.
“How can I resist such a poignant invitation?” he said, his control shifting. He was thinking on several levels. Half of him wanted to meet me, the other half was ducking the issue.
“Right then,” I said briskly. “Eight p.m.? You pick me up, please, at my flat. If you phone, saying that something has cropped up, I won’t know if you are telling the truth, or ducking out.”
DI James was looking at me as if he had never seen date rage before. How many years had we known each other? His face was plains of disbelief. “You’re a hard woman, Jordan Lacey. Eight p.m.”
*
I had a lot to do. It was race around the clock time and I did not feel too well. Asthma is an odd ailment. It can catch you at unexpected times. Most days I ignore it, stupid breathing. That was the best thing to do with asthma. But the smoke had been lethal. It could have been me being carried out on a deckchair.
I tried to inhale normally. You know, in and out, without hurrying. But my airways were in spasm.
Help.
My inhaler was back at the flat. I don’t carry it on walks. The hospital would have some Salbulamol. But if I went to A and E. the hospital procedure would take hours, all those questions and doctors prodding and form filling. I hurried to the hospital, taking shortcuts along twittens, calming my breathing, and went in through the front entrance to the reception desk. Slight hiccup. I did not know Jack’s surname.
“You know the fire on the pier…” I began. “They’ve brought Jack in. He was rescued from the fire… I wondered if he’s all right, if he’s recovering. Could you please find out?”
“You mean Jack from the amusement arcade? He’s doing fine, wanting to go home already. Would you like to see him? Perhaps you could talk a little sense into him.”
“Is he… is he injured at all?”
“I believe it’s smoke inhalation. But they always keep them in overnight in such cases. Do you want to go up? He’s in Churchill Ward on the first floor.”
“Thank you.”
I took the lift, not wanting to arrive out of breath and panting. Churchill Ward was at the end of the top corridor. As a staunch Labour voter, he would be fretting at the choice of ward. I knew it well and the smell of disinfectant and dying flowers. It was an eight-bed ward and one bed had blue curtains drawn round it. I could tell from the indignant voice coming from behind the curtains who was in that bed.
“I’m not staying here, I’m telling you. I’m as right as rain and I’ve got my business to attend to. Those firemen could be wrecking everything with their hoses and their water. Some of those games machines are worth thousands. So I’ll have my clothes back now, if you don’t mind, miss.”
“Now be sensible, please. You are not in a fit state to go home. It would be very foolish to discharge yourself,” came a brisk, nursey voice. “I’ll get you a nice cup of tea.”
“If you weren’t a lady. I’d tell you what you can do with your nice cup of tea.”
I found the curtain opening and went in. “But I’d like a cup of tea, nurse,” I said. “If you’ve time to bring two cups. I’ll keep Jack company for a while.”
Jack had the oxygen mask under his chin instead of over his mouth. He was propped up in bed wearing one of those awful hospital gowns that tie at the back. No wonder he wanted his own clothes back. All dignity disappears with those hospital gowns.
He looked at me, aghast, as if I’d found him stark naked. He probably went to bed in his underclothes and only washed them when they were too stiff to move in. He pulled the candlewick coverlet up to his chin.
“Jordan, babe,” he said huskily.
The huskiness was the clue. He had inhaled smoke and the treatment was under his chin.
“Put that mask back on, Jack,” I said, slipping on to a chair near the bed. “Don’t be daft. You need a few puffs of oxygen.”
“What are you doing here?” he asked.
“I’ve come to see how you are, you idiot. I think you’re now classed a hero. You went into the nightclub to rescue someone, didn’t you?”
“I’d seen a girl… a woman, I mean, but I’d thought nothing of it. Their cleaners come and go at all times. Or perhaps she worked behind the bar.”
He started coughing and I had to insist, actually force him to put the mask back on over his mouth and nose. He was clearly distressed by my presence during what he regarded as a humiliating experience, a chip in his masculinity. So I retreated, giving him his privacy.
“I’ll go and see where that tea is,” I said. “That nurse must have gone to pick the leaves in India.”
I wandered about along the echoing corridor and found the nurses’ station. She was talking to another nurse, the two cups of tea cooling on a tray. I hate lukewarm tea.
“Shall I take the tea?” I offered brightly. “I can see you’re busy.”
“Thanks. I’ve just been called down to A and E. Another car accident. Latching seems to have an epidemic of cars crashing into each other. This is the third this week.”
“Is it serious?” I asked.
“I hope not,” she said.
I took the tray from her and went back to Jack’s cubicle. The curtains were still drawn. I did not open them, thinking Jack would prefer anonymity. He had cultivated his macho arcade image for years. Being in bed. wearing only an open-backed gown, was severely denting that image.
“The tea’s cold,” I said.
“I don’t drink tea,” he said, removing the mask. “I only drink coffee. My coffee.”
“If you promise to put that mask back on, I will try and find some coffee for you. Is that a promise?”
“You’re a star,” he said, closing his eyes.
I found a coffee machine on the floor below. It dispensed the kind of coffee Jack would like. It was so hot I could hardly hold the beaker. I wrapped a handkerchief round the beaker in case I was heading for the burns unit. Jack appeared grateful. I’d even remembered to lace it with double sugar.
“Brill, girl,” he said, the old light coming back into his eyes. “You know how to treat a man.”
That was the sad thing… I did not know how to treat him, because he was not right for me. Jack was a friend, a very good friend, and would never be anything more. He lived in hope that a meteor would enter the earth’s atmosphere, knock me senseless and into his arms. Some hope.
We talked fire, then small puppies for sale, then the world at large. Jack was more at ease now, drinking coffee, putting on the mask, forgetting his backless state. He was enjoying my undivided company. I had almost talked him into staying overnight.
“I’ll go lock up for you,” I said. “I can do that.”
“There’s a security code,” he said reluctantly.
“I know that,” I said. “It’s Fort Knox, Latching, on the pier. You can trust me with the code for tonight surely, then change it tomorrow if you want to. Trust me. No sweat. Jack, be sensible for once. You need to stay overnight so that they can check you out. What use will it be if you rush out and then collapse halfway to the pier?”
“You’ll do it properly?” he asked. “Like I would. All the codes and everything? Leave the money in the kiosk.”
“Don’t you trust me, Jack? Would I promise something that I wouldn’t do? Give me a break. I’m not an idiot.”
“I know that,” he said, whipping off the mask and grabbing my hand with the same movement
. It caught me by surprise. I could hardly snatch my hand away. After all, the man was a patient in a hospital bed.
His hand was rough, calloused, and his nails uncut. Bitten on some fingers. Imagine those hands on my soft skin. It was enough to send one to the nearest convent and start banging on the doors.
“So tell me the code and give me your keys,” I said, letting my hand rest in his, unfeeling. I was a martyr, an angel. St Peter, are you watching? Writing it down in your ledger?
“The keys are in me jeans. They’re in that locker. Then you’ll have to come close while I whisper the code. I don’t want nobody hearing it.”
Everybody, the entire Churchill ward, was dozing in bed or half comatose. They wouldn’t have cared if he was giving me the winning lottery numbers.
“Okay. Before I go, give me a whiff of your oxygen. Thanks.”
*
I took a taxi back to my bedsits. I was that desperate. It was nearing eight p.m. and I had a date. A date with my soulmate, heart to heart time, but now I had an errand to do and James would have to come with me.
I stood under the shower for two minutes to rid my body of the smoke smell, hospital smell, dried briskly for another minute, dressed in one minute. Clean jeans and underwear, black shirt, black fleece sweater, newest trainers and a silky scarf. I looked like a candidate for a Mafia recruitment parade. The last remaining minute I spent on my face and hair. Mascara and gray eyeshadow. My hair bunched up with a velvet scrunchie. Do I hold the record for fast changes?
“You look very nice,” said James at the door. “Your hair is wet.”
“It was a quick make-over,” I said. “I’ll tell you on the way to the pier.”
“We have a date on the pier?” He looked bemused.
“I promised Jack I would lock up for him. He’s given me his keys and his code. Major trust in return for staying overnight in hospital.”
“Then lock up the arcade we must,” said James, leading me to his car. “Major trust is one of the most important aspects of life. Drinking copious red wine can wait.”
It is during these brief, sweet moments that I love him to distraction. There are not many of them and they have to be savored. Sometimes, he knows exactly the right thing to say.
The drive to the pier was minimal, but I was glad not to be walking. The firemen were clearing up, the blaze now out, charred timbers still steaming and the stench of fire everywhere. It looked as if the fire had been contained to one corner of the nightclub. The crowds had dispersed. All the fun over.
“You realize that you would not even be allowed on the pier without my authority,” said James, opening the passenger door for me. “The pier is off-limits until it’s been checked for safety.”
“If you say so,” I said demurely.
“Let’s go lock up.”
The decking had been checked and declared sound, so it was safe to walk to the amusement arcade. The premises were not damaged but they smelled of smoke and the floor was wet.
Jack had said nothing about counting or removing the money in his cubicle, so I made sure the door was fast and left the bags of change hidden behind the bullet-proof glass. We locked the back entrance doors, keyed in the security code and then left by the front entrance, keying in a different code. It was a smooth operation.
“If you ever decide to leave the force, I could offer you a job,” I said facetiously. “The pay is not good but the perks are brilliant.”
“I may take you up on that, Jordan. You see, I am being offered a transfer to Yorkshire and I may not like it there.” He was looking straight ahead, concentrating on the jam of traffic leaving Latching. He always drove well. It was one of the things that I liked about him. No road rage, no fuss, always competent, professional driving.
I did not remember much of the leafy journey to the Gun at Findon. Yorkshire? That was somewhere up north with wild and wet moors. I would never see him again. It was hundreds of miles away. The news was shattering. I did not know how to talk normally.
“That’s great for you,” I began, babbling. “Promotion, of course?” He nodded. “Congratulations. A few more steps to chief superintendent. You are going to take it, aren’t you?”
“There’s nothing to keep me down here,” he said.
Knife in the ribs.
The rest of the evening was a blur. I was nothing to keep him down here. I don’t remember what I said or how many glasses of wine I drank. It was a good wine, fruity and rich. James was not drinking. He looked at me curiously.
“What did you want to talk to me about?” he asked.
“I think it’s too late now and anyway I’ve forgotten,” I said. “You’re leaving. We probably won’t meet again.”
“It’s never too late,” he said.
“I wanted to know about your wife,” I went on, not caring anymore whether it sounded callous or blunt. “I want to know what happened, what has made you so bitter, so against women. It must have been something awful.”
His face went gray. I was sorry that I had spoken.
“It was something I want to forget,” he said slowly. “Awful is not the right word.”
“Then let’s forget it,” I said, gulping down more wine. “It’s none of my business. Another juice? It’s my round.” I pulled out a fiver, knowing I would never forget this moment. It was even a clean note.
“She took my children and gassed them in the car,” he said, looking at a wall across the room. “And then she gassed herself. The exhaust method, you know. Pipe through the window. It wasn’t necessary. I would have let them go to her, willingly, to let them live, but she was possessed by some demon. She did not want me to have them or see them. My children, my two young sons. They were in their pyjamas. She carried them out to the car. I would have done anything to save them, given her anything. But she did not even give me the choice. She took them with her, without telling anyone. And she took away all that I have ever really loved.”
His face was without expression, stony, a gray sphere.
I was stunned, shocked. It explained everything. I did not know what to say, went cold. I could not even touch him. He was in a world of misery that I could not enter. James… James.
“I know that sometimes I have been less than kind to you,” he went on, turning his glass. “Sometimes it must have seemed cruel, a pointless cruelty. I’m sorry. Jordan. You are always so bright and bubbly and it was more than I could stand. You had no right to be so happy and content with your life. I wanted to make you suffer in some way. Sorry.”
“I didn’t know,” I said, my voice subdued. “If you had told me earlier, I would have understood.”
“How could I tell anyone? I wanted to lake it out on someone.”
“Well, thanks buster,” I said, trying to normalize the level of conversation. “It worked. You did upset me, often. And I’ve always wanted to know why. But it’s okay now. I don’t mind anymore. You can have a go at me anytime you like.” I made an offer. “I’ll try to be less bubbly.”
A shadow of a smile touched his mouth, that curved mouth. “Don’t you dare, Jordan. You stay the same sweet, zany person. Many times you’ve saved me from the depths of hell.”
“Me?”
“By doing or trying out something so idiotic that I have had to laugh. It works every time. Even rescuing you from disasters is therapeutic. Carry on bubbling.”
“Bumbling?”
“Both. Can you still say bumbling? I don’t know if I should buy you another wine. I think you’ve had enough. I doubt if you can stand. You’re swaying sitting down.”
“That’s not fair…” I began, but James stopped me with a hand on my arm. His eyes said don’t move.
“Don’t look now, but a couple have just come in. They are both wearing neck braces. The woman is leaning heavily on a walking stick.”
“Is there a young girl with them? A daughter perhaps?” I tried to swivel my eyes without craning my neck.
“No. no daughter. But there’s another man w
ith them who sells dubious second-hand cars and faked guarantees. He’s well known for it in Sussex. We’ve had tabs on him for months.”
“Is it the famous car-crashing couple, Mr and Mrs Derek Brook? Victims of yet another appalling roundabout accident?” I asked, wishing I could see.
“Can you identify any of them without too much obvious staring?” said James.
“Of course, I don’t stare obviously,” I said. I took a mirror out of my bag and touched up my straggling hair, looking at the reflection behind me. I saw Derek Brook and his female partner or wife, then I froze. The shock was from seeing an old terror emerge in reflection.
I controlled the panic. I was with James. Nothing could happen. It was the person with them, the dubious car dealer. He was the man from the Sow’s Head. The man with a knife. The thug who swore to cut me up.
Sixteen
“I know that man,” I said, without taking my eyes away from the mirror. A shiver went through me, slicing nerve ends. “Derek Brook?”
“Yes him, but particularly the other one. The man you said has a dodgy second-hand car business. He also has a very nasty temper, as I know only too well.”
“Is he the one who attacked you with a knife and cut your hand? You were supposed to be meeting someone about a puppy at the Sow’s Head when he appeared?” James had a knack of being able to watch without turning his head. The pub only saw a man enjoying a drink with a woman friend. But I could sense the alertness, not missing a trick.
I nodded, putting away the mirror, apparently satisfied with my appearance.
“Are you sure?”
“I’d know that face anywhere.”
“You couldn’t describe him very well right after the incident. Yet now you say that you’d know that face anywhere.”
“It’s the whole of him,” I insisted. “Not only his face. The feeling of malevolence. The whole evil thing.”
Ring and Die (Jordan Lacey Mysteries Book 6) Page 15
