As much as Jack knew that this was wrong, that Nancy was drunk, he couldn’t resist her. Fuck, he didn’t expect many men could. Nancy was beautiful. Way too young for him though, but she certainly knew what she was doing.
Unbuttoning his shirt, hers too. Jack felt himself getting swept away in the moment of it all. The excitement. He hadn’t realised until now how much he wanted Nancy.
Kissing her back, he could smell the heady scent of her perfume mixed with the strong smell of Scotch on her breath. She was drunk, he reminded himself, doing the decent thing and breaking away from her.
But Nancy had other ideas.
Pulling him towards her, down on top of her on the kitchen table. Tugging at his unbuttoned shirt. Lifting her own top over her head.
It all happened so quickly, so passionately.
Seconds later, they were merely two bodies writhing as one. Entwined together.
Jack could feel Nancy’s nails digging into his back, tearing down his skin as she moved beneath him.
An arch of her back, and then a long, trembling shudder.
Jack came then too, before collapsing on top of her.
The room silent now. Just the sound of their laboured breathing. The pounding of their hearts inside their chests.
‘Shit. We shouldn’t have done that,’ Nancy said, getting up from where they’d lain, and getting dressed. Immediately regretting her actions. She felt embarrassed then. For initiating it all. For being so forceful, so self-gratifying.
‘It was my fault. I should have stopped it.’ Jack closed his eyes.
What had he been thinking?
Jack was almost forty. Nancy was twenty years younger than him.
She was drunk, too, and vulnerable. He should have known better. Only, his ego had taken over. Convinced not many men would have been able to resist Nancy Byrne, but he should have.
Nancy wouldn’t hear of Jack apologising though. The man had done nothing but be nice to her, to look out for her. She’d done this, not him.
Though now she felt as if she should at least explain.
‘I just wanted someone. For a few minutes. Someone of my own. To make me feel protected,’ Nancy said then, before laughing. Scolding herself as she did so, for sounding so pitiful. Still shaken from the attack a few nights ago, she’d needed to feel safe. To feel a pair of warm, strong arms around her. To feel as if she really wasn’t alone. ‘God, how pathetic am I, huh? Sleeping with one of my dad’s best friends. What a walking, talking cliché!’
Jack shook his head.
‘It’s not like that, Nancy. I care about you. You know that, and I’m here for you no matter what,’ he said, hoping to reassure the girl. ‘You’re not on your own. You’ve got me. As friends, or whatever. I’m here for you. I just want to make sure that you’re okay. That you’re safe.’
It was Nancy’s turn to close her eyes then, as the realisation suddenly hit her.
‘That’s why you came here tonight, isn’t it? You’re keeping tabs on me, aren’t you?’ Of course he was. Why else would he just show up here at stupid o’clock in the morning? ‘Is that what you’re doing? Checking up on me? Poor defenceless Nancy! Is that what you think?’ Her voice cold once more, back on the defensive. ‘You think I can’t do this, don’t you? That’s why you’re here. Why you’re following me around and watching my every move.’
‘It’s not like that, Nancy! I just want you to be okay, to be careful.’
Nancy laughed then. Both amused and insulted at Jack’s patronising comment.
‘To be careful? Why? Because I’m a woman?’ She smarted. ‘Would you be skulking around the place if I was a man?’ She guessed, rightly, that Jack doubted her capabilities to step into her father’s shoes and take over from where the man had left off. ‘Thanks for having faith in me. I can do this, Jack. I may be a woman, but that’s not a handicap. I’m more than capable. Though I guess if I was a man, you wouldn’t have just had the added bonus of being able to fuck me!’
Even Nancy winced at that low blow.
‘Shit. I’m sorry.’
Jack held his hands up then, calling a truce. He’d forgotten how fiery Nancy could be when pushed, but he also knew she didn’t mean what she’d just said.
There was something between them. They both knew it deep down.
‘Hey, I didn’t say you weren’t capable, okay. Shit, Nancy. If anyone can sort this mess out, it’s you. I’m just saying be careful. Whoever it was that attacked you the other night might come back. That’s all I’m saying… You need to keep your wits about you. There’s been a lot of fucked-up things happening around here lately. People being attacked, or worse, murdered. People aren’t always what they seem.’
Nancy couldn’t argue with that. People really weren’t what they seemed.
Wasn’t that the truth?
‘Look, I was vulnerable the other night and whoever it was that attacked me had known that. In fact, they’d depended on it.’ Nancy shook her head, the disbelief of how easily she’d played into her attacker’s hands. ‘They caught me off guard, but let me tell you, Jack, they won’t do it again. I’ll be ready next time and if they think they can get the better of me, then they will have deeply underestimated me. No one’s stepping in here and taking from me what my father has built. They’ll have to kill me first.’
Jack winced, knowing without a doubt that Nancy meant every word she spoke.
‘That’s exactly what I’ve been worrying about.’
Nancy shook her head. Annoyed with herself for letting her guard down tonight too. With Jack.
‘And tonight. Tonight was a mistake. We shouldn’t have done that, but it was my fault. I was the one who initiated it. I wasn’t thinking straight.’
Glad when the loud shrill of a mobile phone rang out in the room, interrupting them.
It was Jack’s. Only he didn’t move, didn’t speak.
Instead Nancy nodded at him, as if to give him permission. ‘You better get that, it might be important.’ She half hoped that it was too. Some crisis at work that would mean Jack would be called away. She just wanted him to leave now. She wanted to be on her own. To drink herself into a complete stupor. To wallow in self-pity.
Nancy got dressed, listening in to Jack as he answered the phone, his tone short and curt.
Suddenly he was pacing the room. An urgency to his voice that Nancy recognised to mean that something was up.
‘I’ll be right there,’ he said as he ended the call.
‘Trouble?’ she said, as he placed his phone back inside his pocket. Seemed her wish for him to leave had suddenly come true.
‘You could say that.’ Jack’s expression now was deadly serious. ‘That was Gem down at The Karma Club. Someone’s taken an overdose. They’re saying it’s a young girl and that she’s in a really bad way.’
‘Shit,’ Nancy said, praying to God that the drugs hadn’t come through their suppliers. ‘You don’t think that this girl got her gear from one of our guys, do you?’
‘I don’t know…’ Unsure of what the fuck was happening down at The Karma Club, the best thing for him to do now was get his arse down there, and find out for certain.
Nancy sensed his hesitation.
‘What, Jack? Tell me?’
‘Look, this is the last thing you’re going to want to hear right now, but fuck it. You’ll find out sooner or later anyway. Daniel. He’s changed the supplier at the club. He said that you didn’t want any part in the club anyway. Not in the drug side of it all. So he’s stepped it up.’
‘What do you mean “he’s stepped it up”?’
‘I mean that he’s distributing MDMA – Ecstasy. There’s a massive demand for it in the clubs at the moment. If the girl did take something from one of ours then we’ve got ourselves a huge fucking problem—’
Nancy shook her head. Unable to fathom what she was hearing.
‘What? You knew that Daniel had taken it upon himself to start making changes like that and you never thought to
mention it to me?’ Interrupting Jack, incensed that he’d kept this from her after all his spiel about being able to trust him. Clearly she couldn’t if he wasn’t telling her shit that he’d been hearing about her own business.
‘Nancy. You’ve got enough on your bloody plate, and you’re already gunning for him. I thought it was best to keep out of it. I was keeping an eye on him and when I got the opportunity I was going to try and talk him out of all this bullshit. I warned him to steer clear of all of this.’ Jack sighed, annoyed that he hadn’t done that in the first place. Fuck knows what Daniel had led them all into now. Maybe Nancy was right, after all. Daniel was a liability. He’d been intent on cutting Alex and Nancy out of that deal and taking this deal all for himself. Jack had warned him not to get involved in anything to do with drugs, but it seemed Daniel had gone and done the deal anyway.
The idiot.
All these months that Jimmy and Alex had been distributing their coke in the club, and they’d not had a single problem. Tonight was the first night that Daniel had executed his plan to start shifting pills and already the bloke was neck high in shit.
‘Oh, you did, did you? Well, now look what’s happened. Fat lot of good that did us all, eh?’
‘They’ve just summoned Alfie Harris down there and from what I’ve just been told the man’s like the fucking Antichrist.’
‘Yeah, I bet.’ Nancy nodded once more. ‘He’s never been keen on drugs being distributed in his venue. This will be the last thing he needs, all that negative press—’
‘I think the last thing that Alfie Harris is worrying about right now is that poxy nightclub,’ Jack said, his expression as deadly serious as his tone as he stared Nancy dead in the eye.
‘Sorry, that was insensitive of me,’ Nancy said, wondering herself when she had become so cold-hearted. ‘The kid. Do you think she’ll be okay?”
‘I hope so, I really do,’ Jack said. ‘Fuck, Nancy. They think it’s Megan. Megan Harris – Alfie Harris’s daughter! She’s only sixteen.’
‘What?’ Nancy said hoping to God that she’d misheard him.
But Jack didn’t bother repeating himself. They both knew what he’d said.
‘I’m going to go down there and see if there’s anything I can do to keep the heat off. See what the rest of my lot have managed to dig up and have a word with the superintendent. See what they’ve found so far.’
Nancy nodded, unable to find any words now.
‘This isn’t good. If this comes back on Daniel, the Old Bill will throw the book at him.’
Again Nancy nodded. Watching as Jack Taylor stormed out of the office.
Then taking a seat in the chair behind her, she rested her head in her hands, the drama of the night too much for her to deal with.
Alfie Harris’s daughter had been caught in the crossfire tonight. Some poor, defenceless sixteen-year-old kid.
Nancy felt sick then. The Scotch leaving a bad taste in her mouth as she leant over and threw up in to the wastepaper bin. Wiping her mouth with the back of her hand, she thought about Jack’s last words.
How Jack had been concerned that the Old Bill would lock Daniel up for this. That was the least of Daniel’s worries, Nancy thought. Alfie Harris adored his daughter. The girl had been the sole reason he had wanted out of the criminal way of life. It was one of the reasons why he despised the drugs side of the club. He’d always made no secret of any of that.
It would only be a matter of time now until Alfie Harris went on the warpath for this tonight. Daniel would be praying that he was locked up, as far away from Alfie Harris as possible.
They all would.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
‘Take as long as you need.’ Guiding Alfie Harris into the private room on the Intensive Care ward, Critical Care Nurse Denton stood back and let the man have a few moments, allowing him to identify whether or not the girl in the hospital bed was his daughter.
So far, they had little information on who this patient actually was.
A young girl, aged fifteen to sixteen they’d guessed. The only ID she had in the bag that the paramedics brought in with them had turned out to be a fake. Fake name, fake date of birth. The police had been about to start making their time-consuming enquiries to try and find out the girl’s real identity, but Mr Harris’s arrival at St George’s Hospital could provide the vital pieces of information on the patient that they so desperately needed.
‘Megs?’ Alfie Harris said then. His voice high-pitched, his throat constricting. Standing at the foot of the hospital bed, he felt his legs go from beneath him at the sight of his precious daughter, lying there so helpless looking. Stupidly believing that calling out to her would somehow allow her to miraculously answer him back. Gripping on to the metal bedpost to steady himself, he fought to gain his composure.
He felt Jennifer’s hand on his shoulder then. For a second Alfie had forgotten she was even in the room with him. He hadn’t been too sure about the idea of Jennifer rocking up at the hospital with him at first, but now, seeing his baby girl in the state that she was in, he was glad she had been so insistent on coming with him.
She was right in thinking that he’d need her support. He didn’t think that he could do this without her.
‘It’s her. It’s my daughter,’ Alfie said then, his voice barely a whisper.
Consumed with shock and fear, Alfie had never felt so scared in his entire life. It was definitely Megan, one hundred per cent, though it had taken him a few moments to process the fact as he’d taken in the sight of her: skin, tinged with blue; the streaks of black make-up smudged all down her face; her lips, cracked and dried, parted by a large plastic tube that was hooked up to a large machine next to her; the IV drip that the nurse was placing in her arm; the loud chorus of beeping machinery echoing around the clinical room.
He barely recognised her, if the truth be told. In this state. But it was her all right. His little Megs. His beautiful princess.
‘Can you confirm your daughter’s full name, please?’ Nurse Denton said, not wanting to bombard the man for information but she wanted to at least get the girl’s name. Now they had her name they could obtain her full medical history.
Alfie nodded. His eyes not leaving his daughter.
‘It’s Megan Harris.’
He hadn’t been prepared for this. After ringing Amber’s home phone constantly, and getting no answer, he had raced to the hospital in record-breaking time, hoping to rule out what Sherrie had said. That it wasn’t his Megan here.
But his worst nightmare had come true. It was Megan.
‘What’s happened to her? Is she going to be okay?’ The tremor in his voice sounded almost alien. As if it belonged to someone else, far away. This couldn’t really be happening. Not to him and certainly not to his beautiful Megan. His precious daughter, lying there helplessly, attached to a mass of tubes and wires.
‘Has she taken any form of drugs before?’
‘No. Never,’ Alfie said with certainty. Though he could see from the nurse’s neutral look that she was trained not to comment what she really thought: that a lot of parents didn’t have a clue what their kids were really up to once they were left to their own devices. But this nurse didn’t know his Megan.
She was a good kid.
She didn’t do drugs.
‘Is that what you think this is then? Drugs? Megan wouldn’t touch anything like that.’
The nurse nodded. She’d heard that sentence too many times to even count.
‘The paramedics that brought her in were told that she’d possibly taken MDMA – methylenedioxymethamphetamine – to give it its full chemical name. Or Ecstasy as it’s more commonly known. Kids get up to all sorts these days, Mr Harris; even the most trustworthy ones are capable of making the odd bad decision.’
‘Not my Megan. She’s too smart for that. There must be some mistake.’
‘Well, we’ll know for certain when we get the toxicology report back. Until then we can’t confirm exactly w
hat she’s taken nor can we verify how much of the drug she has in her system. But her body’s showing all the symptoms of an MDMA overdose, so that’s what we’re treating her for.’ Pausing, Nurse Denton let the patient’s father have a few seconds to digest what he was being told. It was a lot to take in for anyone, especially someone who was so visibly upset.
‘Your daughter has also consumed a large amount of alcohol, Mr Harris. She’s suffered multiple seizures and the paramedics had to stop her from choking on her vomit on numerous occasions when they brought her in, so we decided to pump her stomach.’ Nurse Denton moved around the bed, making sure that Mr Harris was given all the information he needed, and that the man was taking in the severity of his daughter’s situation. ‘We’ve administered an activated charcoal directly into your daughter’s stomach now through a nasogastric tube and while we wait for that to work in flushing out any further toxins, our priority is to reduce her temperature. It’s been rising rapidly. Currently at 41.5.’
Alfie nodded, dumbly. Unable to take his eyes off his daughter lying there, looking so vulnerable in the hospital bed. Unable to focus, his brain was whirring as he tried to take in everything the nurse was telling him.
Nurse Denton could see that too. It was understandable. Seeing a child in this state was a shock to anyone’s system, let alone a parent.
And Megan Harris really was in a bad way.
Though she was saddened at the realisation that she was starting to become immune to the sight now. As harrowing as a child in this state looked, Nurse Denton had seen so many patients in similar conditions a hundred times over. That was the grim reality of her job. She spent so much of her precious time dealing with youngsters that had selfishly dabbled with class A drugs, these days. The Critical Care Unit was inundated with overdoses and drug abuse patients. Completely overrun in fact. They had patients being brought in on a daily basis, in such increasing numbers that Nurse Denton was almost numb to it now. Almost.
The Broken_A gripping thriller that will have you on the edge of your seat Page 19
