by Jessie Keane
The house was silent around her, waiting. No ghosts here, though, only memories. Not just bad memories, either. Leo might have been a cheating heel, and–all right–there hadn’t been much love lost between them; but he had cared for his family and treated them well, on the whole.
She went out into the hall and into Leo’s study. Looked around. There was a TV in the corner and an oldish computer on the desk. There were still big storage cabinets built into the far wall and she went to those. Leo’s love life might have been a mess, but in business and where cash was concerned, she knew he wouldn’t overlook the tiniest detail. She started throwing open doors, pulling out old encyclopedias and books and folders, none of which looked as though they’d been touched in years.
No good.
She went to the next set of cupboards beneath an impressively bulging bookcase (Leo had never read a book in his entire life) and she looked in there too.
Nothing.
Another set of cupboards, old golfing trophies in here, Leo had loved his golf. She dragged some of the silverware out onto the floor, tossed out some dusty old back-issues of Pro Golfer and found a VHS recorder sitting there with a Scart cable wound up on top of it.
‘Oh yes,’ she muttered, and pulled it out and went over to the TV in the corner and started fiddling with the connections. When she thought she had it right, she went up and fetched the tape and came back down again and switched on both TV and player. Then she started playing with the remotes. There was Sky on the thing; it was linked in to satellite. Everything had changed so much since she’d been put in the slammer.
She sat there and fiddled with the damned thing until she felt like shrieking and hurling all the remotes right across the room. Then she got it. Keyed in the aerial connection, bypassing the satellite dish. Pressed ‘play’ on the video, and it was playing.
First just white noise, a snowy screen.
But then the white noise stopped.
The screen cleared.
Suddenly, Leo King was in the room.
‘Hiya Lily girl,’ he said.
Lily’s legs turned to water. She flailed backwards and sat down hard on the captain’s chair at the desk.
‘Holy fuck,’ she moaned, feeling all the blood drain out of her face with the shock of it.
Leo was there, on the tape. Leo wearing a red open-necked Lacoste polo shirt, and she could see the thick gold chain around his brawny brown neck. His hair was cropped short, the way he always liked to wear it, his eyes were clear dark blue, brilliant against his tanned skin. It was the Leo she’d known, lived with, given children to, alive and well and sitting in–yes, he was sitting in the very same chair she was sitting in now, with the cabinets lined up behind him.
‘Oh Jesus,’ mumbled Lily, feeling the room spin around her, wondering if she was going to throw up or faint or both.
‘Well, Lily girl, if you’re playing this tape, I’m dead.’
She didn’t throw up. But the room went black, and then she was gone.
She came round with her face scrunched down into the Berber rug. It was scratchy and it was hurting her. She pulled her head off the rug, wondering what the hell happened, where she was, was she still inside?
But she could hear Leo’s voice–loud, booming, just like always. She must be going mad. Then she remembered the tape. She took a gulping breath and prised herself up from the floor, flopped back up onto the chair and looked at the screen again. Leo was still there but he had stopped speaking. She pressed the pause button with a shaking hand and sat there, looking at the frozen, flickering image of her dead husband. Tears slid down her face unheeded. All right, he’d been a bastard. But he was her bastard. And now he was gone forever.
Taking a gulping, teary breath she rewound the tape. Pressed ‘play’.
‘…if you’re playing this tape, I’m dead. Also, you’ve got hold of the emergency stash and the gun. That’s good. Take care of the girls, Lily.’
Take care of the girls. Not knowing that she wouldn’t be given a chance to do that. Not knowing that she’d be fitted up with his murder.
‘Oh, Leo,’ she groaned sadly.
‘The boys’ll look after you,’ he went on.
Christ, if only you knew, thought Lily. She put a hand over her mouth. Felt like she was going to hurl.
The phone was ringing. She glanced at it, then back at the screen. It kept ringing. She stopped the tape, switched off the TV. Snatched up the phone from the desk. Had to swallow several times just to get a word out. ‘Hello?’
‘You know Alice Blunt freaked out when you showed her that photo of Leo?’ said Jack Rackland’s light cockney voice.
Lily sighed, her mind still focused on Leo, looking so vital and alive when now he was dead, just bones lying in a cold grave. She rubbed at her eyes, pushed back her hair, tried to think straight. ‘Yeah,’ she said. She didn’t think she’d ever forget that little episode with Alice.
‘Well this one shouldn’t do too much freaking–she’s a tough nut. I’m free this evening, we can give her a visit.’
‘And what was this one’s name? Reba, was it?’ This one. One of many women that her husband had been shagging while she’d been raising his kids, tending his home.
‘That’s it, Reba Stuart.’
Lily stood there feeling sad and so alone. She wished Leo was here right now, if only because he was familiar to her, a fixed point of reference. Right now she had no one to turn to. And another four women to find after this: women who thought nothing of sleeping with someone else’s husband, who maybe thought nothing of killing someone else’s husband too, and letting someone else get stitched up for it.
‘Mrs King? Lily? You still there?’ asked Jack.
‘Yeah, I’m here.’
‘You want to do that? Tonight?’
‘Yeah,’ she said on a sigh. ‘Let’s do it.’
She put the phone down and pressed ‘play’, and listened once again to her dead husband talking to her. It was oddly comforting.
28
Tiger Wu was hanging upside down in a garage under the railway arches, on one of the meaner streets of Peckham. There was a winch in here for lifting car engines out; they were heavy as a bastard, so it had been no problem at all hoisting Tiger up with the chains–he was a feather by comparison. His ponytail was brushing the floor. His face was suffused with angry colour. His hands were tied behind his back. He was in serious trouble.
He knew he was in serious trouble because Nick O’Rourke was standing there with a few of his boys. It was like a solid wall of muscle in here.
‘You were following Lily King,’ said Nick.
‘No I wasn’t,’ gasped out Tiger.
One of the meat-headed seventeen-stoners standing around passed Nick a claw hammer.
‘Yes you were,’ said Nick, and his eyes were like cold black pebbles in his stony face.
‘All right!’ Tiger’s eyes were fixed in panic on the claw hammer. ‘All right, I was.’
‘Better,’ said Nick. ‘Now, Tiger. Perhaps you don’t know it, but Lily King’s my friend’s wife, and long ago–when we were just boys still wet behind the ears–you know what I promised him?’
Tiger shook his head hard.
‘I promised him I’d look after Lily.’ Nick went over to the workbench and laid the hammer on it. Tiger visibly relaxed. ‘And now, what do I hear? That a removal man’s on her trail. That’s you, Tiger. Following Lily King. And now I’ve got a really important question to ask you, and you’d better answer it straight.’
‘Ask me,’ panted Tiger, straining against the rope binding his wrist, twitching about there on the end of the winch chain like a fish on a hook. ‘Anything, just ask me.’
‘Okay. Here we go.’ Nick leaned in close to where Tiger was suspended. ‘Here’s your starter for ten, Tiger. How much?’
‘Mm?’ Tiger was sweating, droplets plopping onto the concrete beneath him.
‘How much, Tiger? How much to off Lily King. Don’t make me ask
again.’
‘Thirteen thou,’ said Tiger quickly. ‘Six and a half when I took the job, six and a half when it’s done.’
Nick nodded thoughtfully.
‘I wasn’t going to go through with it, though. I was just making it look good. I was gonna take off Saturday with the cash, leave it.’
‘But you were following her,’ said Nick.
‘To make it look good, I told you. Just for show, then I was gonna do a bunk.’
Nick was shaking his head now. ‘You’re a removals man, Tiger. That’s what you do. You got a reputation as a good solid worker. You ain’t–to my certain knowledge–ever shafted anyone on a deal. So do yourself a favour and don’t give me any bullshit.’
‘But it’s true!’
‘It ain’t true, Tiger. Don’t try my patience, for the love of God. What you think I am, some kind of tosser? Now, who paid you?’ Nick thought he knew the answer already, but he wanted to hear it from Tiger’s own lips. Tiger was a vicious and unscrupulous little tick: he’d off a baby and cheerfully do his own grandma for the price of a bottle of Jack Daniel’s. No way would he pull back from completing a contract.
‘Come on, Tiger, I’m getting pissed off with this now,’ said Nick as Tiger seemed to hesitate. ‘Give me the name.’
Tiger let go then. ‘That bastard Freddy King. He’s a nutter. I only took the fucking job because I was afraid if I said no he’d do me because I was in the know. I don’t go in for offing women, Nick.’
Liar, thought Nick. Tiger had only confirmed what he had suspected. Si was too shrewd to get anyone else involved at this early stage, but Freddy was a loose cannon. Freddy wanted Lily dead, and he was getting itchy to see it done. While Lily, of course, was swanning about the town like Paris Hilton, spending like a man with no arms—or rather sponging off Oli’s allowance, no way could an ex-con lay hands on enough money for the posh shops she was doing—and making a good clear target of herself.
The silly cow.
He didn’t know who was winding him up more—Freddy King, Tiger Wu or Lily herself. All three were treading pretty close to the edge with him right now.
‘Tiger,’ he said at last, ‘I appreciate your honesty. I really do. But I hope you understand the reasons why my boys here are going to give you a smacking.’
Tiger Wu thrashed on the end of the chain like a fresh-caught salmon. ‘Jesus—wait! Listen…’ he cried out.
‘I’m done listening,’ said Nick, and turned away and left.
The boys closed in and soon Tiger Wu’s shrieks echoed around the building, scattering the pigeons out in the wet, windblown street.
29
‘Good Christ,’ said Jack Rackland when they stepped inside Reba Stuart’s place that evening. ‘Talk about shagarama.’
Reba Stuart had a place in Soho, not just a place but apparently the place. The best not-so-little massage parlour in the whole town. There were eight or ten girls in the front room when Lily and Jack were shown in there, and they all looked like film stars.
‘One hundred and fifty an hour,’ said Reba proudly to Jack. ‘And by God they’re worth it.’
A gorgeous green-eyed brunette sauntered past Jack, giving him an enticing smile.
‘Yeah, but sadly I’m not a punter,’ said Jack, his eyes out on stalks. To Lily he added: ‘Monica would have my balls for breakfast if I hooked up with any of this.’
‘I thought you and Monica were history.’
‘Hey, tell her that. She rants down the phone at me morning and night, like it’s my fault she went and did the dirty on me.’
‘Maybe it was. A bit.’
‘Oh don’t start. Jesus, the mouth on that woman, and she’s barely five feet high.’
To Lily it sounded as if Jack still loved Monica, but she had her own worries right now—like Reba Stuart.
Reba looked like everyone’s idea of a brassy barmaid. Big hourglass figure with cleavage prominently on display above a red glittery top, which was pulled in tight at the waist above a plain black pencil skirt. Too much make-up, fag-smoker’s lines around the overpainted mouth. Shrewd blue eyes, and white-blonde hair, dyed to a crisp and swept up on top of her head, instant facelift. Despite that, Reba looked a decade older than her forty years. Her face was hard and businesslike; all fake smiles and cold calculation.
Leo liked blondes, thought Lily, feeling faintly sick.
‘You said you wanted to talk about Leo King?’ said Reba, leading the way through the totty-packed room and out into another, smaller, less lushly furnished. There was a table and chairs. She sat down, gestured for Jack and Lily to do the same. The harsh overhead light showed her lines up. She stared across at Lily. ‘And who’s this? Your assistant?’
‘Yeah,’ said Jack.
Lily glanced at him. He was good. Start calling it like it was too early and Reba might just clam shut on them.
‘I knew Leo years ago,’ said Reba, fishing out a packet of Dunhill’s and a gold lighter. ‘You don’t mind if I…?’
They both shook their heads.
Reba lit up and inhaled deeply, exhaling plumes of smoke through her nose. She coughed once, sharply. The wrinkles in her face deepened. Lily felt glad she had never cultivated the nicotine habit, not even to while away the hours in prison. But by God she could have used a drink right now. To think of Leo in bed with this…and then coming home to her. It made her feel sick to her stomach.
Maybe Becks was right. Maybe fidelity really was too much to expect from the type of man she’d married. She should have learned the rules and played the game. She’d taken it all too seriously, felt he was holding her up to ridicule among their circle of friends. But after all, he’d only hurt her pride—he hadn’t broken her heart.
Thoughts of Becks reminded Lily that she hadn’t heard from her in a little while. Maybe Becks still felt bad about having to turn Lily out in the cold. She decided she’d find the time to call her, patch things up. Maybe arrange to meet up with all the girls for lunch, just like they used to back in the good old days. She missed those times so much. But then…what girls? What friends did she really have left?
There was Becks. There would always be Becks. And Hairy Mary; yes, she could still be called a friend, Lily was sure of that. But Maeve was her enemy now—and, as for Adrienne, who she had once believed to be a pal, well, why on earth would she want to sit at a table with that back-stabbing cow grinning across at her?
‘First time I saw Leo King was…let me think…’ Another thoughtful puff of the ciggy. ‘Nineteen eighty-six. Late July. We were all sitting around watching Fergie get hitched to Prince Andrew at Westminster. Leo called right in the middle of it all, and some of the girls moaned on a bit. Like watching a fairy tale, that was. Then he calls and in they come, all the boys, and the romance of the day was sort of ruined, know what I mean?’ Reba winked. ‘They’d just come back straight from Amsterdam and they were loaded.’ Reba was staring at Lily, hard enough to make her feel uncomfortable. ‘I think we all know what Amsterdam and large amounts of money adds up to, don’t we?’
Drug money, thought Lily. Yeah, she knew. Turned a blind eye to all that, but she knew. She even thought she remembered him making the trip. And instead of coming straight home to her—yeah, and she’d been watching the wedding too, who hadn’t?—he’d concluded his business with the Dutch and come here instead to treat the boys, and, of course, himself.
Just boys letting off steam.
High-octane danger could do that with men. Do a moody deal, you half expect to get shipped back in a body bag. And if you didn’t, if some bastard didn’t off you or rob you or double-cross you before you made it home, there was a sense of release, a sense of needing to celebrate your success, to celebrate life. Because you still—against all expectations—had it.
So Leo had come to a knocking-shop instead of to her. They’d been engaged then, her and Leo—not even married. The first flush of lust should have been on them, but she had still been pining over Nick, still trying to
come to terms with losing him, and Leo had preferred to bed a tart. That just about said it all.
‘’Course, they got it easy out there in clog land,’ said Reba. ‘Legalized prostitution. Must be heaven on earth. Not like here, with the Bill always sniffing around. Oh yeah, I remember Leo King. He was great in bed.’
Lily was glad she wasn’t smoking—she’d have choked at that point. Jack sent her a quick look, but twelve years inside had taught her to keep her face straight and her head down.
‘I didn’t run the gaff then, I was one of the workers,’ Reba elaborated. ‘We had a big selection of girls then, just like now. Asians, Swedes, blacks, all beautiful. The men could pick and choose, double up, whatever. Leo picked me, he liked blondes.’
Lily felt bile rise into her throat. She swallowed it. Willed her face to stay blank.
‘And Jesus could that man perform. He kept on coming back for more…’ Reba blew out smoke, her eyes suddenly dreamy…‘I remember the last time he came here. Another Amsterdam trip. Our last night. His last night. I saw it in the papers later that week. He was dead. The most alive man I ever met, and he was stone-dead. Only it wasn’t another gang killed him, as you might expect. It was his ever-loving wife.’
Reba was staring at Lily again. Now she started nodding. ‘I know who you are. You’re not his assistant. You’re Lily King,’ she said. ‘You’re the bitch who did poor Leo.’
Lily felt her blood run cold.
‘What?’ Lily sat there, open-mouthed, startled.
Reba was still nodding her bleached-blonde head. ‘Yeah. You’re Lily King. Saw you in the papers and on the telly when the trial started.’ She took a contemplative drag on her ciggie then said: ‘Girl, you ain’t aged a bit.’
Well, you’ve aged about a hundred years, thought Lily.
‘Was it just business then?’ Lily asked slowly. ‘You and Leo?’
‘What, you gonna blow my brains to fuck too?’ Reba gave a snort and angrily stubbed out her cigarette in a glass ashtray. ‘I can’t believe they let you out already. You should have died inside.’
