by Sandie Jones
He knew the lines from my favourite film! I think that might have been the moment I began to fall in love with him.
As the weeks passed, I began to feel more comfortable around Thomas and dared to be confident that we had something special going on. Walking hand in hand into the restaurant to meet his business associate seemed like the next big step, and I felt dizzy with excitement, conscious of other diners watching us as we followed the maître d’ to our table. A good-looking man with olive skin and dark smouldering eyes stood up as we approached.
‘Mr Rodriguez, good to see you. This is Miss Russo.’
Mr Rodriguez took my hand and brought it up to his lips. ‘Very pleased to meet with you.’
‘Likewise,’ I said, looking furtively around for his ‘better’ half.
‘Alas, my wife has been called away,’ he said. ‘So, I’m afraid it’s just me this evening.’
I didn’t know whether to be disappointed or not. There was a shred of relief that I didn’t have to make superficial small talk, but that then meant I would have to listen to their business dealings.
Thomas looked at me, as if to say sorry, and ordered a bottle of Laurent Perrier Rosé.
As it turned out, the conversation was actually very enlightening, and if nothing else, I felt my social standing had been elevated somewhat just because I now knew the difference between a Meursault and a Petit Mouton.
‘Who knew wine could sound even better than it tastes?’ I said, as we just made it onto the 23.50 from Waterloo. It was the last train from London to Guildford, so everyone was packed in like sardines, with Thomas and I pressed up against each other.
‘Yeah, sorry about that,’ he said, his face belying the fact that his hands were surreptitiously travelling up under my lace top, and into my bra. ‘I hope you weren’t too bored.’
I closed my eyes and a breath caught in my throat as his fingers deftly teased my nipples. If it wasn’t illegal I would have gladly let him take me there and then, regardless of who was watching.
‘N-no, I mean it,’ I managed. ‘I found it really interesting.’
He raised his eyebrows suggestively. ‘Which part? Was it the juicing of the luscious, ripe grapes, or the fact that you can make thousands of pounds from buying and selling wine? What turns you on the most?’
‘All of it,’ I said as his hand slid down into my trousers. His fingers just reached the lace top of my knickers before I grabbed his wrist and looked at him wide-eyed.
‘What?’ he said, all too innocently.
‘Patience is a virtue,’ I said, in between kissing him. ‘In one hour, all of your dreams will come true.’
Except they didn’t. Instead, we spent the first two hours after we got to my place searching for Tyson, who had, it seemed, let himself out of the back door.
‘But there’s no way I would have left it open,’ I said, verging on hysteria when we still hadn’t found him. ‘I’m sure I would have checked that it was locked before we went out. Don’t you remember seeing me do it?’
He ran a hand through his hair. ‘I can’t say that I did, but I wasn’t really paying attention.’
‘It’s the last thing I normally do before I go out,’ I cried. ‘How can I have been so stupid?’
‘Hey, don’t beat yourself up about it,’ he said gently. ‘We’ll find him – he won’t have gone far.’
As soon as the sun was up the next morning, we both headed out in different directions, our breaths billowing in the cold air as we shouted his name. ‘Tyson, Tyson! Come on, boy.’ I choked on the words, furious with myself for the stupid mistake I’d made and terrified of what might have happened to him. ‘Please Tyson,’ I begged. ‘Please come home.’
Thomas and I met again an hour later at the park where I usually took Tyson for his walks.
‘No sign?’ I stupidly asked, willing my dog to be at Thomas’s feet.
He looked at the ground, shaking his head glumly.
‘I need to go to work,’ I said. ‘We should go.’
‘I’ll stay, if it’s all right with you,’ he said. ‘I’ve got a meeting I can push back, so I’d like to carry on looking.’
‘Oh, yes, well, of course that would be amazing, if you really don’t mind.’
I’d not seen him looking quite so sombre. ‘I feel responsible too. If I’d not distracted you, perhaps this wouldn’t have happened.’
I thought back to the night before, when I’d asked Thomas to do my necklace up.
‘This is beautiful,’ he’d said as he admired the delicate diamond hanging from a silver chain.
My hand had instantly gone to it, my fingers feeling its weight.
‘Thank you. It was a gift from my dad.’
‘Well, he obviously has very good taste.’
I didn’t tell him that he’d had very good taste. Instead, I batted away the tears that threatened to fall every time my dad was mentioned and closed my eyes as Thomas kissed my neck. The fifteen minutes we’d then spent having sex instead of getting ready meant that I’d been in a mad panic to get out of the door to catch our train. Perhaps I’d not had time to check that the back door hadn’t been left ajar. I could blame Thomas, but what was the point? It was a distraction that I had readily encouraged.
‘Thanks,’ I said, kissing him at the park gate, his lips cold.
‘I’ll call you with any news,’ he said. ‘If I find him, is there a cafe or something around here that I can wait in until you come back?’
Was there? I’d lived in the area for five years, but suddenly I couldn’t even recall the shop where I usually got a coffee on the way to work.
‘It’s okay,’ he said, sensing my difficulty. ‘I’ll find somewhere.’
‘No, no . . . of course, sorry, I’m not thinking straight. Here, take my key.’ I struggled to get my house key off the ring that carried a worn photo of me and Dad. I was prepared to give Thomas the key to everything I held dear, but not that.
‘Are you sure?’ he asked. ‘Is there an alarm or anything I need to worry about?’
‘No,’ I said quietly, paranoid that anyone might overhear how lax my security arrangements were.
‘Keep me posted, won’t you?’ I said as I reluctantly left him.
All morning my mind alternated between Tyson and a man I was fast falling for, and when I’d heard nothing by lunchtime, I could feel myself welling up.
‘I can cover for you if you want to go home,’ said Maria as she rubbed my back.
I shook my head. ‘I’m better off here. There’s nothing I can do at home, apart from wait.’
‘Honestly, I can do your classes this afternoon; you’re no use to the children when you’re like this.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes, go on, go,’ she said. ‘I’ll tell the head.’
As I walked from the station to my flat, my mood was lifted a little at the sight of ‘LOST’ posters on every other lamp post along the route. Anyone with information was being urged to call an unfamiliar phone number.
‘Do I assume I have you to thank for the posters?’ I asked Thomas when I got home. I didn’t dare call the number on my phone as I risked ‘Hot Guy’, the childish pseudonym I’d saved him under, appearing. I made a mental note to change it, even though it was still accurate.
‘Yes,’ he said sheepishly. ‘You don’t mind, do you?’
‘Of course not,’ I exclaimed. ‘That’s really sweet of you.’
‘No one’s called yet, but I’m hopeful. I didn’t know what else to do.’
‘Thank you,’ I said, kissing him.
‘Are you okay if I go to this meeting? I was able to put it off for a few hours, but I could really do with getting it done today, if you don’t mind.’
I was astonished he even felt the need to ask. ‘Of course, you should go.’
‘But I’ll be back tonight, if that’s all right, and I’ll leave you my phone, just in case anyone calls about Tyson.’
‘Don’t be silly,’ I said, shak
ing my head. ‘Take your phone with you.’
‘No,’ he said adamantly. ‘I won’t be able to answer the call if it comes in. We can’t take the risk of missing it.’
‘But—’
‘Take it,’ he said as he put his jacket on and handed me the phone. ‘I’ll be a couple of hours. Feel free to answer any call that comes in.’
It felt very odd to have someone else’s phone in my possession, especially one that belonged to a man I was seeing so casually, yet knew so intimately.
I held the phone in front of me as I walked around the park, calling for Tyson, and showing anybody I encountered a photo of him. I could almost feel my eyeballs burning the screen every time I looked at it, willing it to light up. When it did, just as I reached the gate, where another poster had been attached, I couldn’t answer it quickly enough.
‘Hello,’ I said gingerly.
‘Oh, hi,’ said a male voice. ‘I’m calling about the dog.’
My heart soared, making me feel as if it might lift me off the ground. Yet the very real possibility of being told that something had happened to him quickly followed. ‘Yes?’ I said, urging the man on, my chest a mangle of emotions.
‘Is there a reward?’ he asked, stopping me in my tracks.
‘Er, I . . . I don’t know,’ I stuttered.
‘Well, is there or not?’
‘Does it matter?’ I said, suddenly indignant. ‘Have you any information or not?’
‘Well, it all depends on how much the reward is.’
I took the phone away from my ear and stared at it aghast, horrified that the safe return of my beloved dog was reliant on how much I paid. Wasn’t this akin to kidnapping and demanding a ransom?
My head wrestled in vain to win the tug of war with my heart. It was a poorly fought battle.
‘A thousand pounds,’ I said, suddenly aware of how much I wanted Tyson back. The ache was so profound that I would pay five times more. I wonder if he heard it in my voice.
‘Whoa,’ the voice said. ‘You really like this dog, huh?’ I stayed silent whilst he conducted a muffled conversation at his end. ‘We’ll think about it and let you know tomorrow.’
The call abruptly ended as I cried, ‘I’ll give you five thousand!’ into the dead air.
17
My sleep was interspersed with vivid sightings of Tyson. He was around every corner, running through every meadow. I could hear myself laughing as he bounded towards me, my arms outstretched ready to embrace him, but as he leapt up into them, a car came from nowhere and mowed him down. My own screaming woke me up.
‘Ssh, it’s okay, it’s just a bad dream,’ whispered Thomas as he wrapped his strong arms around me. My heart was racing, and my breathing came in short sharp pants as I struggled to get myself back around the right way.
‘It’s okay,’ he repeated over and over, and for a few moments I believed him, but then came the sudden rush of reality as the harsh facts presented themselves.
‘But it’s not,’ I cried. ‘It’s not okay.’
‘I’ll deal with it tomorrow,’ he said. ‘If that man’s got Tyson, I promise we’ll get him back.’
‘And if he hasn’t?’
‘I’ll get him back,’ is the last thing I remember him saying, before I dozed off again.
He was gone by the time I woke up, my hand instinctively reaching down to the floor beside the bed, giving Tyson the sign that it was okay to jump up. I waited momentarily for my face to be licked or the unmistakable swish of an excitable tail going from side to side. It felt like I’d been punched when I remembered he wasn’t there. My body ached with yearning and I thought, as I so often do, about the passage of time. How so much can happen in twenty-four hours – in one hour – one minute. That’s all it takes for your whole world to turn on its axis. In just a moment, everything can change, and your life will never be the same again.
That’s how it had felt when my dad died suddenly. He’d uncharacteristically taken the day before off work, and we’d gone out on the boat – just the two of us. It was the most perfect day; the sun scorched in a bright blue sky and the light breeze worked in our favour as we sailed my namesake out onto the Solent. We had anchored off the coast of the Isle of Wight and called a tender to take us to one of Dad’s restaurants.
‘How are you, my friend?’ asked the head chef, Antonio, as he kissed Dad on both cheeks.
‘Very good,’ Dad had replied, his accent so much more Italian whenever he spoke to a fellow countryman. ‘I couldn’t be better.’
‘And my, how you’ve grown,’ Antonio said to me. ‘I remember you when you were down here.’ I’d smiled as he’d held a hand out a few inches from the floor. ‘What are you now? Fifteen, Sixteen?’
‘Thirteen,’ I’d giggled, secretly pleased that he thought I looked older.
‘Bellisima!’ he said. ‘And Mrs Russo? Is she not with you?’
‘No, it’s just me and this one today,’ Dad had said, ruffling my head as if I was three. I flattened my hair self-consciously. ‘Father and daughter time.’
If I had been cross with him for treating me like a child, it didn’t last long, as he poured the tiniest amount of white wine into one of the glasses set on the table.
‘Don’t tell your mother,’ he’d said, winking.
I remember the sun shining and Dad offering to swap seats because he had sunglasses and I didn’t. I remember the starched white tablecloths and the smell of olive oil and garlic as bowls of seafood spaghetti wafted past us on their way to other diners. If it hadn’t been the last meal we shared, I doubt I’d be able to recall what we had, but because it was, I can see all too clearly my carbonara and Dad’s arrabbiata being set down before us.
‘This is the life,’ he’d said, as we tucked in. And it was. I couldn’t imagine having a better time.
‘One day this will all be yours,’ he’d continued, sweeping his arm over the packed veranda we were sat on. You couldn’t squeeze another table in if you tried. All of his restaurants, the one on the Isle of Wight and the four others on the mainland, were always fully booked, more often than not for months in advance.
‘But I can’t cook,’ I’d said, worrying that I wouldn’t be up to the job.
Dad laughed heartily. ‘When did you last see me in a kitchen?’
‘You’re always in it at home,’ I’d replied, confused.
‘But I don’t go to work and cook, do I?’
I’d shrugged my shoulders.
‘You just need to run the operation,’ he’d said. ‘As long as the chefs can follow Grandma’s recipes, you’ll be fine.’
As always, Antonio had joined us for a drink after our meal and, as always, I’d spent their mostly Italian conversation fixated on watching the smoke rings he created.
I was fluent in Italian, but it was still an effort to keep up, and anyway, they were just talking shop, so I zoned out. Now, of course, I wished I’d concentrated on every word Dad spoke, no matter how boring I thought it was, because ever since, his is the only voice I yearn to hear.
The next morning, back home, he had woken up, made Mum a cup of tea and collapsed on the kitchen floor with the teaspoon still in his hand. She’d tried to revive him, and the ambulance was quick to come, but it was already too late. He’d had a brain haemorrhage at just forty-nine.
The house had been full of people, even before I’d woken up, and I’d walked out onto the landing to cries and panic from the floor below. I knew something had happened, but it didn’t occur to me that it had anything to do with Dad. How could it? We’d just spent the best day together. He’d been perfectly normal, and he’d let me have some wine. It was our little secret. How could he no longer be there to share it?
My hand was still dangling down the side of the bed, ever hopeful of feeling Tyson, when my phone rang, making me jump. Hot Guy lit up the screen. I really had to change that.
‘Hi,’ he said tightly.
‘What’s up?’ I asked, immediately aware of his clipped
tone.
‘That man’s called again,’ he said grimly. ‘I’ve got a good mind to call the police . . .’
‘And say what? People offer rewards for their pets’ safe return all the time. It’s not a crime to take it.’
‘But we didn’t offer a reward,’ he said.
‘No, but I would have done, if I’d thought about it. This guy’s obviously chancing his arm, but if he’s got Tyson, then I’ll happily pay whatever it takes to get him back.’
‘He says he’s got him and wants two thousand pounds,’ said Thomas.
‘Do you believe him?’ I asked.
‘I think we should take him seriously, in the absence of anything else. I’ve got his address.’
‘So, what should I do?’ I asked, my voice wobbling. ‘What’s the next step? Should I get hold of the cash?’
‘God no. I don’t want you turning up at some strange guy’s house with that kind of money on you.’
I gulped. ‘Me? You want me to go?’
‘Well, no . . .’ he faltered. ‘Not if you don’t feel comfortable.’
‘Look, I know I’m asking a lot of you,’ I said, ‘especially after everything you’ve done already, but would you mind going? You know Tyson – you’ll know if it’s him. I’ll give you the money and as soon as you’re happy, you can hand it over.’
It dawned on me how ridiculous it all sounded. ‘God, listen to us,’ I went on. ‘It sounds like something out of a film!’
I still felt uneasy when we met outside the bank and I surreptitiously handed Thomas a brown envelope stuffed with a hundred twenty pound notes. ‘I feel like I’m in the middle of a drugs bust,’ I said, laughing nervously. But Thomas was rubbing at his chin, deep in thought.
‘You sure you’re okay to do this?’ I asked.
‘Nothing will give me greater pleasure,’ he said.
I saw a flicker of something cross his features, a tightening of his jawline, a blackness momentarily descend over his eyes. I’d not seen that look on him before.
‘You won’t do anything silly, will you?’ I said, feeling unsettled.
‘Of course not,’ he replied, a little too quickly.
