Eva did her best to sound more confident than she felt. More determined too. Dan scanned her face, and when he was done he sighed and sat up, leaning over his knees.
“It’s your call… But for both our sakes, don’t let her push you into anything more than you’ve said tonight. You only want to scare him. That’s all.”
“Dan. This is me we’re talking about. I’m all about self-control.”
“Good then. Because to me, that woman looks like a firework ready to explode. Be careful, okay,” Dan folded his laptop and slipped it to the floor.
“I’m done. I’m going to crash.”
“I’ll pacify Lauren and put her to bed. I’ll be right back.”
“Good luck with that one,” said Dan. He lifted the duvet and groaned as he slipped his aching body beneath the sheets. Eva watched him with envy, then slipped out.
“He’s texted me already. Twice,” said Lauren. She sat on the sofa with the television switched off. It seemed her sole focus was her mobile phone. “He demands to know where I am. Two minutes later, he texts again and he wants to know who I’m sleeping with this time.” Lauren held up her phone, but Eva didn’t even bother to look.
“Text him back,” said Eva. “Tell him you’re okay – tell him you’ll see him tomorrow. Then turn it off. Please.”
By the time Eva had reassured Lauren five times and fixed up a bed on the sofa, another hour had passed by. When Eva reached the bedroom, she was wired and more sober than she would have liked. Dan was snoring. Tonight there was no peace to be found. She got into bed in the darkness and felt very much alone.
Twenty-one
Dan awoke early. The sky was still dark outside, but nature called, telling him to rid his body of the beer from the night before. Eva was asleep. From the look on her face, her sleep didn’t look easy. Dan headed down the hallway in the darkness, forgetting all about their guest until he padded past the front room in his T-shirt and boxers. The faint glow of a mobile phone made him stop in the doorway. Lauren was awake on the sofa scanning her emails and texts. The woman looked back at him, nonchalant, almost as though she’d already moved in full time. Dan pulled his boxers into a seemlier order.
“Hey,” said Lauren, pretending not to notice.
“Morning,” said Dan, quietly, wishing she was gone. A sleepy coffee in front of the twenty-four-hour news channel now totally out of bounds. Dan walked away, shaking his head. He grabbed his running gear from the bedroom and padded downstairs to the cold office. Office coffee and a stiff chair provided him with all the motivation he needed. Twenty minutes later, he went out to pound the streets down to the seafront and back. Five miles at least, maybe six or seven. As he ran he felt all the aches and pains of the day before, with resentment at Lauren curdling in his veins. His mind replayed images and sequences featuring Alma and Blunt, Cripps and Robert Golding. Alma deserved better. They all did. But then none of it was in his hands. The merry-go- round of crime and drugs went on and on. It seemed whoever they beat, whichever lowlife ended up on the receiving end of the work, they still never made a dent in it. But Lauren was still in their hands. Still a case in motion. Maybe they had a chance of making this one come right. Making the woman safe, stopping the sicko boyfriend in his tracks, getting the Lauren nuisance out of their lives once and for all, and getting paid into the bargain. There was something in that. It wasn’t exactly noble. It wasn’t at all heroic. But in a life where fighting had become the norm, a moment’s peace was a goal worth having… wasn’t it? By the end of his run, a nagging feeling still remained. Dan walked into the office, checked the amateur rope job he’d done on the broken back door, drank a glass of water from the tap, and climbed the stairs. He walked straight to the bathroom, and found it locked. He heard the rush of the shower, and the humming of a strange female voice and shook his head as the stink of his own sweat filled his nostrils. Dan stomped to the bedroom. Eva slowly rolled over and her eyes blinked open.
“Dan…? You’ve been running?” she said with a yawn.
“Yeah.”
“Are you okay?” she said. Dan picked up his clothes, his phone, and grabbed a towel from the side. As he rolled the bundle together he saw an unopened message on his phone. He’d missed a phone call. That was all it said.
“Uh… look. I really need a shower but Lauren’s using it. I’ll have to head over to the gym. I’ll grab one there.”
“You could wait. It’d be nice to see you over breakfast.”
“Um, I’d rather get clean now,” said Dan, thinking of Lauren.
“Dan…”
“I’ll be back soon as I can. Fifteen minutes, tops. Remember. Don’t let her wind you up. I can see what she’s like.”
“You will come back?” said Eva.
Dan offered a half-hearted nod and turned for the door. He jogged down Hamstel Road to the prefab style edifice of the old boys’ club gym, his boxing gym, and unlocked the door with a rarely used key. The gym was an ice-cold concrete box. It still stank of sweat even in the freezing morning. He flicked on the lights and turned the showers onto full blast, but the best they could do was run luke warm even after a solid two minutes. Dan got in and got clean. He dried quickly and remembered the message on his phone.
Was it Joanne, after more advice? Or Mark, maybe, probably leaving an excuse for a no-show at work, or needing a man-to-man chat… He dialled the voicemail number and put the phone to his ear.
Beep. “Hello, Mr Bradley,” said an older man’s voice. “You won’t know me, but my name is George Crickley. I am the new chair of trustees for the Renton Trust, a charity set up by Carl Renton to manage the two community houses he left behind. Last month you helped solve poor Carl’s tragic murder – for which we’re all extremely grateful. Unfortunately, as you will know, Carl was proven right about the terrible effects of drugs on our town, especially this awful Uber craze in particular. Seeing as you were so instrumental in solving his case, we’d like to talk to you about the possibility of working with you again.”
“Hmmmm,” Dan muttered, thinking out loud, “What kind of work?”
The voicemail went on.
“You and your partner brought two Uber villains to justice. We’d like to explore the possibilities of you carrying on what you started to stop this menace. We have a meeting booked for tomorrow morning at Chestnut House, Baxter Avenue. It would be excellent if you could attend.”
The voicemail stopped there, cutting off the end of the long rambling message.
Dan narrowed his eyes and stared at the screen. He didn’t have a room number for the meeting, or an appointment time. These old-aged charity types always seemed a little sketchy… but that didn’t matter. Renton, Pink and Grace had a tally of three down, in a list of possible Uber criminals probably numbering in their hundreds, if not thousands. And now it seemed there was the merest possibility that he had a chance to do more. To change the big picture. And Dan had always been a big picture man. And the Renton Trust didn’t even know about his latest scrape with Ubers. What if this was a chance to bring the whole house down?
Maybe he was onto something. Serendipity. But he wouldn’t know until he went and heard them out. Decision made. Dan dried himself quickly and walked back via the café at the crossroads. He ordered a sausage sandwich and a large filter coffee and ate them inside as he pondered the possibilities. Then he called The Renton Trust. It was only eight am, but a prim sounding receptionist lady answered and told him the Trust Planning meeting was booked for nine.
Nine am, halfway across town… Dan finished the last of his coffee, polished off his sandwich crusts and got out of there. He hurried back to the office and packed his laptop. Eva was busy with Lauren, so he knew he was going to have to do this alone. And if Eva wasn’t going to be there to balance the presentation with her innate professionalism, then he at least had to look the part. He hoped the prop of a laptop would do the job. And the very last thing he needed in his face before an important business meeting was a woman like Laur
en. Whatever she was going through, the meeting mattered more.
Dan’s heart was thudding at the prospect. He grabbed his stuff, and almost as an afterthought, he typed out a quick-fire text to Eva… Eva who was upstairs in the bedroom getting dressed for work and dreading the day ahead.
Eva. Carl Renton’s people called. The Renton Trust. They want to see me – it’s urgent. Could be big. They want us to tackle the Uber problem. Big job! Meeting at 9. I’ll have to catch you later… don’t let Lauren wind you up. Stick to YOUR plan x
Soon as the text was done, Dan rushed out of the office door.
***
Eva heard the front door clatter below. She skipped from her wardrobe doors, stepping over Dan’s discarded clothes to peer out through the slats of the blind. She saw Dan bounding away around the corner towards his car. Ten seconds later, his car growled into life. Eva felt almost as tired as she had the night before. Her hair was still damp from the shower, and now Eva threw her blouse on in a grim hurry. Before she started the first button, Dan’s text came through. She picked up the phone and read the message, and for some stupid reason her eyes misted over at the thought of not having a moment with Dan before the chaos started. Just one moment before the day from hell. But the ridiculous moment soon passed and Eva suppressed every hint of weakness she could find. She looked at the woman in the mirror and was almost convinced.
Eva allowed herself one final sigh before she left the peace of her bedroom and walked into the hallway. She heard the TV on, but found the lounge was empty. The guest duvet had been folded in a neat pile beside the spare pillow and left on the sofa. There was a coffee cup and a plate with toast crumbs on the coffee table. Eva picked up the crockery and dumped it in the kitchen sink.
“Lauren?” she called. There was no answer, and the bathroom door was wide open, the room empty. Eva frowned and walked downstairs. She opened the door into the office, expecting the woman had left to go and do something drastic. Maybe something which would take the whole case suddenly and irrevocably out of her hands. But that was only wishful thinking. She found Lauren seated at Mark’s desk. She turned around and her lustrous, fresh-washed, wavy hair tumbled down her back. Lauren looked rested and well and ready to go. She smiled at Eva but the smile faltered when she saw the fraught expression on Eva’s face.
“I’m putting you under too much pressure, aren’t I?” she said with a hint of pity.
“Forget it,” said Eva, noting Lauren looked like she already had. The night away had apparently done Lauren the power of good. But Eva? Not so much.
“Here, Eva. Let me make you a coffee…” Lauren stood up and collected an empty mug from Dan’s desk and walked into the kitchen as if she was already familiar with the place. “Bit draughty down here, isn’t it?” she called from the kitchen. “Probably something to do with this broken door…”
“Hmmm?” Eva walked to the kitchen and saw where the door had been busted in. The frame looked damaged, but mostly around the latch and lock. Since whatever had happened, someone had tied a short piece of rope between the back-door handle and the window latch to keep it shut.
As the coffee machine started to gurgle, Lauren turned her back to the counter, leaned back and folded her arms.
“You were right, Eva,” she said. “I did need a break. And time to think.”
Eva nodded.
“But the truth is, I still don’t see any way around it. He sent even more texts. They’re interminable. Full of disgusting threats.”
Eva frowned. “I’ll take a look, shall I?”
Lauren shook her head. “Being here finally gave me a clear head. I deleted them. I needed him out of my head so I deleted every single one.”
“Lauren, I could have used those.”
“That’s not the way to handle Jamie. You know he won’t back down from any kind of legal threat. The only way to deal with him, I’m sorry to say, is the same one we’ve discussed all along.”
“Sorry, Lauren. But we haven’t actually discussed anything.”
Lauren nodded. “Yes, we have. You’d promised to do whatever was necessary, and staying out last night can have only made him bring his plans forward..”
Eva pursed her lips and looked at the broken door. “That could be one consequence…”
“Eva, this is the only way.”
Lauren scanned Eva’s eyes and Eva saw there was no room for debate or argument. Eva nodded, her eyes glazing, while her mind worked on an inner mantra. Do what’s necessary, and no more…
“I said I’d help you. That’s what you hired me for.”
Lauren smiled, her eyes sparkling. “Yes, I did. And I’ve not regretted it yet.”
The woman turned away to finish making the coffee. When she was done, she thrust a mug into Eva’s hand. Eva took it and Lauren chinked her own coffee cup against it.
“Cheers. To our enduring friendship,” said Lauren. “The future starts here.”
Eva nodded and quietly sipped her steaming coffee.
Unsurprisingly, the coffee tasted bitter, but at least it was strong.
Twenty-two
As meeting rooms went the committee room on the top floor of Chestnut House was hardly state of the art. It was stuffy, and full of furniture which looked at least twenty years old. But the aged look suited most of the faces Dan could see around the table. They were middle aged and older; forty-somethings, ranging all the way up to white hairs in their late sixties and seventies. They seemed affable enough and most of them seemed to be enjoying the small plastic packets of biscuits one of the admin types had placed in front of them with their coffee. It was a scene a little like morning tea at the old people’s home. But as the members of the Renton committee chatted among themselves, they forgot to accord the same basic hospitality to Dan. They waved at him and let him stand just inside the meeting room door. After a moment, Dan decided he wasn’t prepared to be treated like an unwelcome intruder. After all, he really wasn’t selling them anything. They’d invited him. So he walked across to the meeting table and dumped his laptop in front of an empty seat before depositing himself in the chair. A few of the members looked at him and stopped talking. Then Dan recognised one of the people at the other end. Barry, the guy out of his depth at the drug rehab house – the house where Joanne had almost been dragged upstairs. Barry nodded at him before carrying on his little conflab with the curly haired woman beside him. After another few awkward minutes of nodding and meeting the glances from curious eyes, a man with a thicket of white hair called the meeting to order. He ran through a few preliminaries which Dan didn’t bother to listen to. Formalities. Not long after he pointed a thick finger at Dan.
“Should you be wondering about our mystery guest in the leather jacket, let me put you out of your misery. This here is Mr Daniel Bradley, one half of the private investigation agency which worked so tirelessly to uncover the identities of the men who were bringing those awful Uber narcotics into our town by cover of night. Much as Carl suspected, they were using the Marine Centre jetty. Depending on your view of such things, it was either fortuitous that Mr Bradley was able to complete Carl’s work and bring those villains to justice, or it was Divine Providence. Mr Bradley and his partner also managed to identify the culprit behind Carl’s murder. You may have read his name in The Record, but now here is the man in the flesh. And in all of this, we never had to pay anyone a penny. Mr Bradley’s work coincided with our interests and he did a grand job.”
“Kind words, thank you,” said Dan. “And the name is Dan, not Daniel.”
The white-haired man nodded but quickly moved on.
“Carl was convinced the Uber drugs were a quite different threat to those already prevalent in our town. They are designer drugs, but affordable. They stimulate a so-called high which is reputed to be like no other, and yet they kill a very substantial number of those who dare to take these drugs. Without the science to give us the cause, the youths taking these things often blame the deaths on the individual victims,
such as bad usage methods, and other such nonsense, so they can go on abusing them. Carl knew all this, but in the end he was unable to do anything about it. And he tried, we all know that. This mission cost him his life. We cannot let his death go by without considering how the charity that bears his name should proceed. We’ve had the funeral, and in terms of his legacy, it’s certainly true that the recovery work will go on. But Carl had a bigger vision, we all know that. He wanted this epidemic stopped, starting with Ubers.” Having finished his speech, the man turned to Dan. “Mr Bradley. What is your viewpoint on this?”
“On which part?”
“On how the Uber dealers can be stopped.”
Dan coughed into his fist and looked around the table and found that most of those present had their attention fully locked on him.
“Actually, it’s funny that you mention it. Because as of yesterday, I had another brush with Ubers… and it’s given me an insight into how their business ticks. And if you know how something ticks, I think there’s always a reasonable chance you might be able to take it apart.”
The man with the thicket of white hair nodded eagerly. His eyes shone at Dan.
“Go on, Mr Bradley. Do tell…”
***
Dan walked out of the brown-brick box of Chestnut House. It was eleven ten. He felt spent, but in a good way. And in all that time, he hadn’t thought of Eva, Joanne or Mark once. He’d had too much on his mind, too much to say, most of his ideas coming out of his mouth as soon as they came to mind. But now he was free, Dan took a moment to lean on the low front wall overlooking a bland corporate garden. There was a job in this, he was sure of it. They’d listened to him, and he’d shown he was the expert. The gig was coming. For a moment, Dan was so up in his head he didn’t register the sound of shoes clacking across the street towards him. He only noticed when the accompanying female voice spoke up and broke his spell.
“Well, you’re looking pleased with yourself.”
Cuts Both Ways Page 29
