‘Will it take long?’ I asked.
Linda, the PA, looked at me blankly. ‘Could be ages,’ she said. ‘Anything I can do?’
‘I’ll wait, if that’s okay,’ I said. I couldn’t face going back downstairs; the thought of having to see Dunkerley again, or even explaining any of this to Lucy and Gavin, was almost too much.
I watched the clock above Linda’s head creep slowly round. Was I really going to do this? Surely this wasn’t me – I’d never given up on anything in my whole life. Was I going to let that horrible man get the better of me? I should be fighting this. And yet, the thought of having to carry on…
Ten minutes.
The lift doors opened and Lucy emerged. I thought to myself, You took the lift? She looked at me and handed over some reports to Linda.
I don’t know if it was Lucy’s presence that made me move, or simply that I couldn’t stand being here for a minute longer. I got up and went to the office door, opened it wide. Simon Lewis, the CEO, was sitting at his conference table with three other people, one of whom was a client I’d worked with on a major project last year. The conversation stopped abruptly and they all turned to look at me. I strode over to them and put the folded letter on the table in front of Simon.
‘Genevieve? What’s going on?’ he said, and despite my dramatic and unannounced visit his voice was so kind I almost regretted it, almost took the letter back and apologised for the intrusion.
‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘I’ve got to go.’
I shut the door behind me and walked straight past Lucy, who was standing by Linda’s desk with her mouth open. I took the stairs – not the lift – and by the time I got to the ground floor I was almost running. I went out of the building through Reception and, despite my heart thudding with the enormity of it all, the relief that I was never going to go back there was sudden, and immense.
The cab took me straight home. I had a hot bath and, after lying awake for a while thinking about everything that had happened in the last two days, I finally managed to sleep. When I woke up in the afternoon, I put on a skirt and sandals with a denim jacket and headed out with my sunglasses to catch the bus to Victoria Station.
It was busy, packed with commuters making their way home. I took the escalators to Victoria Place, and then up again to the part of the mall where various food and drink outlets circled a central, open-plan eating area.
I looked around but there was no sign of Arnold, or anyone else I recognised. Not sitting anywhere obvious, anyway. I bought a coffee from the burger place and sat down on a hard plastic seat bolted on to the table, where I could see the escalators and anyone coming up them. I was still early.
A few seconds later, someone tapped me on the shoulder and I looked around, startled.
To my surprise and relief, it was Dylan. I barely recognised him; he was wearing jeans and boots, a shirt unbuttoned with a dark grey T-shirt underneath. I’d never seen him in anything other than a suit.
‘Come with me,’ he said.
I took my coffee and my bag and followed him around the other side of the complex to a few tables and chairs that were tucked away behind a coffee kiosk.
‘This is a nice surprise,’ I said, sliding down into a seat opposite him.
He nodded. ‘Yeah. Never seen you in daylight before.’
‘And?’
‘You could do with getting out in the sun.’
‘Cheers. And you look like you could do with laying off the vodka for a while.’
It was true, he looked rough, his skin lined and his eyes red and tired. He hadn’t shaved and there was a rasp of stubble over his face as well as over his head, showing the shape of where his hairline would have been, if he’d ever let it grow.
‘What can I say? It was a late night.’
I couldn’t get over how different he looked, how – normal. He was like any other bloke out having a coffee on a Monday afternoon.
‘How do you feel?’ he asked.
‘I’ve felt better,’ I answered. ‘I’ve had such a crappy few days.’ There were no bruises visible from where Arnold had grabbed me, even though the skin around my mouth felt tender. My arms were sore too, where he’d held me down, but nothing you could see.
‘How’s the boat-buying going?’
‘I went to look at some last week,’ I said, ‘thank you for asking.’
‘So you’ve got enough money, then?’
‘No. I’ve got just about enough to buy the boat, but not enough to renovate it properly and take time off, which is all part of it. I can’t do one without the other. So I need to do a bit more saving. I’ll have to ask Norland if he’ll increase my hours. Or maybe Fitz will ask me to do another one of his parties.’
He was watching me steadily, evaluating.
‘What?’ I said at last, feeling worried about the intense expression on his face.
‘I could help you,’ he said, his voice low.
‘Help me with what?’
‘Help you with the money side of it.’
I ran through the possibilities. Whatever we were doing here, it wasn’t something he wanted to discuss in front of Fitz. Which meant he was taking a huge risk.
‘What do you mean?’
‘How much would you need to be able to leave London by, say, the end of this month?’
Two weeks away. In other words, how much money did I need now?
‘At least fifty grand,’ I said, after a moment, feeling my cheeks flush.
‘I can do that,’ he said, without hesitation.
I wondered what I’d got myself into. If it hadn’t been for Dunkerley, I would have probably said no. ‘So…?’
‘I need you to look after something for me.’
‘What?’
‘It’s a parcel. Not very big. I need someone to hide it for a couple of months. Maybe not even that long. You’re the best person I know.’
‘That’s it?’
‘Just hide it and don’t let anyone get it. That’s it.’
‘And for that I get fifty grand? Like, to keep?’
‘Yours to keep.’
‘What’s the catch?’
‘The catch is, it’s not something you want to be caught in possession of. And after you leave, you won’t be able to come back. You’ll have to walk away from the club for good. You get me?’
I paused, drank the last of my coffee while I considered his offer. He watched me without blinking. He wasn’t nervous at all, which made me wonder what was at stake here.
‘Where are you going to keep your boat, anyway?’
I shrugged. ‘Depends where it is when I buy it, I guess. The boats I saw on Thursday were in Kent. There was one I liked.’
He nodded, ‘Kent. That’d be alright.’
‘Does that make a difference?’
‘Far enough away for it to be safe, near enough for me to come and collect it from you.’
‘When will you collect it?’
‘I don’t know. I’ll give you a phone. When I’m ready to come and get it, I’ll ring you to arrange a meeting. Is it a yes, then?’
It had been a yes from the moment he’d agreed to fifty grand.
‘I guess it is, Dylan.’
He smiled his best Dylan smile and offered me his huge meaty hand to shake. ‘Deal.’
I felt a curious sense of release, as though I’d been holding on to a thread somewhere that had finally snapped. I could go. I could afford to buy a boat, and I had enough money to take a year off, maybe even more than a year.
Twenty-nine
I was back to planning my fantasy bathroom on the table in the dinette when I heard steps on the pontoon followed by steps on the deck and a woman’s voice that called out, ‘Genevieve Shipley? Hello? Can you come up, please?’
I went up to the wheelhouse.
On my deck were two people, a man and a woman, both of them wearing suits. The woman showed me her card. ‘I am DS Beverley Davies; this is my colleague DC Jamie Newman. I wonder if you ha
ve a few moments to talk to us.’ She spoke fast, as if she was in a tearing hurry and had no time for dissent or explanation.
I felt afraid, as though I had been caught in the act of doing something I shouldn’t.
‘What’s it about?’
‘It would be good if you could come with us, Genevieve. We need to have a talk.’
‘What – now?’
‘Yes, right now.’
‘Where did you say you were from?’
‘We’re from the Metropolitan Police Serious Crime Directorate.’
‘But – Jim Carling –’
‘DC Carling knows we are here. He told us where to find you. He did say you wouldn’t mind helping us out with a few questions, Genevieve. It won’t take long.’
I guessed she was trying her hardest to be encouraging, but all I could think of was how I could persuade her to fuck off and leave me alone.
It wouldn’t work, though. Maybe if I went along with her and answered her stupid questions they would go away and not come back.
‘I’ll just get my shoes,’ I said.
‘Mind if I come with you?’ Jamie Newman asked me. ‘I’d like to see your boat.’
‘Sure,’ I said, and went down the steps into the cabin, leaving the door open for him to follow me.
He stood there watching me while I pulled on my boots and did up the laces. He wasn’t interested in the boat at all, for other than a cursory glance around the cabin he hadn’t taken his eyes off me.
They knew about the package, I thought. Or at least, they knew I had something on here to hide. Carling had told them. Newman was here to make sure I didn’t move or destroy whatever it was.
I gave him a tight smile, grabbed my keys and the two mobile phones from the dinette table and went back up to the wheelhouse.
‘Two phones?’ he asked, while I locked the door.
‘One of them’s got a crap signal on the boat; the other one’s got a crap signal everywhere else,’ I said, as if that explained everything.
‘Where are we going?’ I asked from the back seat of their Volvo. I’d never been inside a police car before, marked or unmarked.
‘Medway police station,’ Newman said. ‘They’ve kindly offered to let us use one of their interview rooms. Saves us a trip back to town with you.’
‘Oh,’ I said. ‘Couldn’t we just have had a chat on the boat?’
They didn’t answer. I wondered if they’d got other people on there now, searching it.
I watched the streets of Rochester as they passed, thinking of the boat and the package and what it could possibly be. Something I didn’t want to be caught in possession of, he’d said. Which meant drugs, several kilos of them, hidden on my boat and waiting to be found.
The following weekend at the Barclay was my last.
It wasn’t even a proper weekend, just the Saturday night, and even that was cut dramatically short.
All week I’d been working up to going back there, telling myself that Arnold wouldn’t be there, that I’d be careful about private dances from now on, I’d check that someone was in the CCTV room when I was dancing, I’d ask who it was who had booked me – all of that crap. In reality I was going to hand in my notice. I was working up to that, too.
The club was quieter, as it often was towards the middle of the month. Some of my regulars were in, men for whom payday was a bit irrelevant, and I knew I’d be getting some private bookings later on. Would I be able to dance for them without freaking out? Dylan had said he would keep an eye on me, but I hadn’t seen him. What if he wasn’t even here? Who would watch out for me then?
When I had a spare moment between my dances I went to the bar to find Helena. They were short-staffed and Helena was doing a bit of waitressing. If that was what you called it – there was an awful lot of socialising and chatting up going on at the same time.
‘Is Fitz in tonight?’ I asked.
She shrugged. ‘Not seen him. Go upstairs and ask Nicksy; he’s in the office, I think.’
I was halfway up the stairs when Nicks appeared at the top. Someone was watching that CCTV camera, at least, I thought with irony, looking at the camera that covered the staircase.
‘What’s up?’ he asked, folding his arms across his chest.
‘I’d like to see Fitz,’ I said.
‘He doesn’t want to see you.’
The answer came back so quickly, I was shocked. He didn’t want to see me? Why the hell not? Had Arnold said something to him? Had someone seen me meeting Dylan at Victoria Station?
My heart started thumping with alarm. ‘Why doesn’t he want to see me?’
Nicks shrugged and didn’t answer.
‘Could you go and ask him? I only want a minute.’
The wall of muscle didn’t move. I looked behind him, down the corridor. All the office doors were shut. If I tried to get past him, he would stop me. There was no way I’d be able to get down there, not now.
Nicks gave me a look that invited me to try. I wondered if I would end up being thrown back down the stairs if I did.
I turned around, but instead of heading for the dressing rooms I went into the main part of the club, scanning the VIP booths for Fitz, in case he was down here after all. No sign of him. Then to my relief Dylan came upstairs from the public bar. He was dressed smartly again, freshly shaved, immaculate.
He saw me and hesitated, as though he was unsure whether he should talk to me or not. I gave him a smile I hoped was encouraging. He smiled back and his eyes travelled upwards very briefly to the CCTV camera above our heads.
The meaning was clear. We were being watched.
I walked over to him and said sweetly, ‘I’d like to see Fitz, but Nicks won’t let me in. Would you ask him for me, when you get a minute?’
‘Sure,’ he said in reply, and then he was gone, into the crowds of suits, heading for the bar. If they’d watched that little exchange they wouldn’t have found anything unusual in it. I hoped not, anyway.
After that I felt odd, panicky. I sat by myself at the end of the bar, ostensibly scanning for customers but at the same time trying to avoid them all. Across the club in one of the booths, I could see Stephen Penrose. He was a company director, the owner of a chain of estate agents: I only knew this because I recognised him from an interview he’d done with the Financial Times a few months ago. Here I knew him as Steve, and I would never have let on that I knew exactly who he was. He was staring at me, smiling.
I was on the list for the pole but for some reason I wasn’t called, or, if I was, I didn’t hear it. It wasn’t the thought of Dylan’s money, that sudden pile of cash that made everything here seem so much harder; since Arnold’s assault, being here wasn’t fun any more. The few people here I recognised, even the ones I liked, the ones I had a laugh with week after week – they all looked different tonight, sinister, strong, threatening. I can’t do this any more, I thought. I don’t want to be here.
Stephen Penrose, a man who wouldn’t hurt a fly, who paid me double for our private dances in the Blue Room and always sat there rigid, his hand over his crotch like a small boy who needed a wee, was staring at me, his smile of encouragement fading each time I cast a glance in his direction. In normal circumstances he would not have had to wait; I would have been by his side the moment I’d seen he was here. He probably thought I was waiting for someone, waiting for a better prospect than him.
He was safe, surely? Why wasn’t I over there, talking to him, easing him out of his working-week shell, making him feel wanted and happy and attractive?
When he stood up and crossed the club towards me, weaving his way through groups of people, I got up off my bar stool and made for the door, walking with purpose and almost breaking into a run. If he called my name, I didn’t hear it. I went straight to the stairs, and this time there was no Nicks standing guard at the top. Maybe I’d taken them by surprise; maybe they hadn’t considered I would have the audacity to do this; or perhaps they’d all gone out somewhere and I’d fin
d the doors locked.
I was almost expecting this to be the case, so when I reached Fitz’s office door I didn’t even knock, just tried the door and to my surprise it opened easily, propelling me into the room.
They were all in there. Fitz, Dylan, Nicks, Gray, even Norland, who looked skinny and pathetic next to this group of tough men. I had a second to take this in – Norland, Nicks and Gray sitting on the sofas, cash on the desk in bundles, a holdall on the floor, Fitz perched on the edge of the desk, Dylan standing as though he was about to leave.
Nicks stood up abruptly and took a step towards me.
‘Oh,’ I said.
‘Viva,’ Fitz said, holding up a hand which stopped Nicks in his tracks. ‘Might be nice if you could think about knocking next time?’
‘I’m sorry,’ I said, not looking at the others, deliberately not making eye contact with Dylan. ‘I just need to have a word with you. It’s important.’
Fitz was watching me steadily. I stared him out, feigning a confidence I did not feel. My heart was thumping with panic, the need to get this over and done with so I could get out of here.
‘Alright,’ he said. ‘What is it?’
‘In private,’ I said.
He laughed, a single laugh of disbelief at my cheek, but even so he looked at the others and said ‘Gentlemen, would you give us a minute?’
They all left. Dylan was the last to go. He hesitated in the doorway, and for a moment I had the terrible thought that he was going to say something, do something. Fitz gave him a nod, and then he went.
I took a deep breath. ‘Did you know Leon Arnold was here last weekend?’
He shrugged. ‘No. And?’
‘He attacked me. He booked a private dance and then got his two heavies – Markus and the other one – to wait outside while he jumped me.’
At last Fitz looked up and met my eyes. And he laughed. ‘Did he really? Sly old git.’
So it was true, then. I’d seriously pissed him off somehow.
Surely my disagreement with Caddy wouldn’t have done it? I racked my brains to think what it could be. Maybe Dylan had been followed at Victoria Station? He was too careful for that.