‘Hello?’ I answered, breathless. ‘I mean, Gloss, Angela speaking.’
‘Angela.’ It wasn’t Cici. Not unless she’s gone through a very speedy sex change or possibly been punched in the throat. Oh God, what if Grace had punched her in the throat and run away? ‘It’s Jesse.’
Ohhh. Luckily for him, he was currently much farther down my shit list than he deserved to be.
‘Jesse, I don’t really have time to talk right now,’ I said, speedily tearing through the online address book for Cici’s mobile number. Which of course wasn’t there. ‘I’ll call you tomorrow.’
‘Tomorrow is Christmas Day,’ he pointed out. ‘And I’ll be quick … I wanted to apologise. For not coming in. And the other thing, I—’
‘Then I won’t speak to you tomorrow,’ I said, fingers flying as they frantically typed out an email to Delia, asking for her sister’s number. ‘I’ll see you on Thursday.’
‘I know it was stupid not to come in today,’ he carried on, completely ignoring the stress in my voice. ‘I panicked about Friday and I’m an asshole and I should have known you’d need me when the system was down but then that bitch-faced assistant of yours—’
‘Jesse, I’m not dicking about,’ I snapped. ‘I really don’t have time for this. We’re having to do all the approvals by hand, half the magazine is missing and so is said bitch-faced assistant. So I’ll see you on Thursday, yeah?’
‘Oh, that sounds rough,’ he replied, only not nearly as upset as I might like. ‘But yeah, Thursday.’
‘Hang on.’ I stood up sharply. ‘How did you know the system was down?’
‘Uh, Cici told me?’ he said, the line crackling as he spoke. ‘I’m on the bridge, I’m losing you.’
‘Why are you on the bridge? I thought you were sick?’ I was losing my tiny mind.
‘Obviously I’m not sick. I said I was sick because I felt weird about the whole scene in the cab,’ he explained, beginning to sound a little annoyed himself. Wanker. ‘I feel really bad. Should I come? Maybe I can fix Censhare?’
‘Can you?’ I asked, half hopeful and three-quarters incredibly suspicious. Which made more than a whole but maths was never my strong point.
‘I figure maybe?’
‘Jesse.’ I leaned over my desk, attempting to look intimidating, hoping that it would make me sound the same. ‘Did you fuck up the system on purpose?’
‘How could I do that?’ he laughed, sounding nervous. ‘I’m not even there. Sounds more like something Cici would do, doesn’t it?’
‘Are you in on this?’ I barked. ‘Are you in on this with her? Because I won’t fire you, I will destroy your fucking life. I will literally end you. Christmas or no Christmas.’
And as I said it, I meant it. And the tiny, effeminate whimper down the end of the line suggested he knew I was telling the truth. I knew reading half of the first chapter of Executive Toughness would pay off.
‘I didn’t, Angela, of course I didn’t.’ He sounded terrified. Good. ‘Do you want me to come in?’
‘Yes,’ I replied, my fingers rolling up the desk until my hands looked like little claws. At last I felt powerful but not in a good way. More in a ‘kneel before Zod’ way. And I’d seen all the Superman films – it never went well for Zod. ‘Get your arse in here and fucking fix it.’
As I hung up, Delia responded to my email with one word – ‘Problem?’ Instead of replying, I dialled Cici and prayed that she would pick up, hopefully while laughing at me as she walked out of the lift, holding Grace’s hand which still had all of its original fingers. But she didn’t pick up and the lift doors didn’t open and it was almost two o’clock which meant she’d been missing for fifteen minutes and Louisa would be back in two hours and the magazine had to be completely signed off in three.
Merry fucking Christmas.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
In my secret, quiet, keep-them-to-myself dreams, I had imagined that Monday might have gone quite well. I’d imagined the magazine going to press without any drama. I’d even fantasised about a bite of a sandwich or something, a little sit-down and three or four seconds to gaze upon my beautiful Christmas tree as a reward for a job well done. It was silly of me really.
Of course I wasn’t going to get any of those things. Of course I was going to be running around Times Square without my coat on because I was too much of a twat to grab it on my way out the office, searching for a psycho blonde who had gone AWOL with my goddaughter and was presumably also holding the fashion pages of my magazine hostage. The magazine pages were replaceable. Megan had already got a fresh set to Chloe, who had only sulked and moaned a little bit, before I’d even run out the door. Replacing Louisa’s daughter, however, was likely to be a little bit more difficult. Yes, there were a lot of blonde children running around Times Square but I felt a bit weird about picking one up off the street and legging it. Presumably because I wasn’t Cici.
I’d left everyone in the office on red alert to call me if the two of them showed up but I’d been running around Times Square in the snow like a headless turkey for nearly twenty minutes and nothing. I’d been to Starbucks but no one had seen them. They weren’t in Toys R Us when I pelted around there at top speed, checking everywhere from the Ferris wheel to Barbie’s Dream House and quietly congratulating myself for all the recon work I’d done in there in the past, even if I hadn’t known it was recon at the time. After that, I found myself stood outside M&Ms World, ready to slap myself. Of course they wouldn’t be in there – that’s where I would go, not where Cici would go. As if she would spend a second inside an establishment that did nothing but celebrate tiny chocolate nuggets of joy. She was an utterly joyless human being. I couldn’t shake the idea that she and Jesse were somehow in on this together, that they had been plotting this all along – to fuck up the magazine and get me fired and then nick off with Grace just to scare me and Lou. There were no lengths that Cici wouldn’t go to once she’d developed a plan – she’d proven that more than once before – and I couldn’t imagine involving a pre-verbal toddler in her schemes would give her that much pause for thought.
With no better idea, I began to head east, towards Radio City Music Hall. The streets were packed, limiting me to an angry hop, sprinting every fifty metres or so before coming to halt behind some old dears in furs, rattling on about kids today. What should have taken me five minutes took almost fifteen and by the time I arrived at the box office I was freezing my arse off and very, very close to tears.
‘Hello,’ I beamed at the attendant on the door, adopting my very best ‘please trust me, I’m British’ accent. ‘My friends are inside and I very much need to speak to them urgently. Would it be possible for me to pop in and grab them?’
I clutched my phone tightly, willing it to ring with good news before I had to do this. The man in the white shirt and red waistcoat regarded me with nothing short of utter contempt before clearing his throat, stepping in front of the door and laughing.
‘No,’ he announced. ‘It would not be possible.’
‘It really is an emergency,’ I replied, pressing my hand into my side to ward off a stitch. Sweet Jesus, I was unfit.
‘No way,’ he answered.
‘I’m not trying to sneak in to see the show,’ I explained, attempting to peer over his shoulder and find another, more sympathetic usher. Possibly someone with a couple of ovaries and a heart. ‘I was looking after my friend’s little girl and she’s gone missing and I really need to talk to her.’
He at least had the decency to look distressed, but clearly more at the thought that I would be allowed to look after anyone’s child rather than the current predicament before he gave his next pronouncement.
‘Sounds to me like that’s a matter for the police,’ he said, not budging. ‘Why don’t you call them?’
‘Because I’m hoping not to need to,’ I said with as polite a smile as I could muster. It wasn’t very polite. ‘And I really, really have to tell my friend.’
‘Wh
y haven’t you called your friend?’ the man asked.
‘Because she’s a decent human being and turns her phone onto silent in the bloody theatre,’ I shouted. ‘Will you please just let me in? It’s an emergency.’
It seemed that shouting was not the way to this man’s heart. Rather than smile, soften and let me by, his face hardened and he stepped a little closer towards me. Aah, so that was what intimidating looked like. He really was wasted on Radio City. I was sure that there was some poncey club downtown that was desperate for a bouncer like him.
‘You’re not going in,’ he bristled. ‘Maybe I should call the police for you.’
‘Oh, that would be brilliant actually,’ I replied, waiting for him to step a little closer and then seizing my moment.
As the usher came towards me, he left a tiny gap between himself and the door. A gap that I was now desperate enough to throw myself through and leg it up the stairs, into the main lobby. The usher was just startled enough to give me a head start and, once inside, it seemed like no one gave two shits as to whether or not I had a ticket. I barrelled straight into the main auditorium, just in time to see dozens of dancers dressed like soldiers lined up on the stage. Ooh, the Rockettes! This was one of my favourite bits! But I didn’t have time to be distracted by perfect formation dancing, as impressive as it was, as the usher from the front door appeared to have recovered himself and was right behind me. I bolted down the aisle, apologising to everyone under my breath as I went, half hunched over, trying to be as quick and as quiet as possible. Sadly, I was not a church mouse and I was not doing well. Really, I should not have spent all morning eating biscuits. The three-block dash over here should not have left me in such a state.
I saw Jenny and Louisa right away. Jenny, the heathen, was fast asleep, her eyes closed and her head lolling on her left-hand neighbour. Her right-hand neighbour, Louisa, was transfixed. I really, really wished I wasn’t about to ruin her afternoon.
‘Louisa,’ I hissed from the aisle, bobbing down to stay out of sight of the usher. ‘Lou.’
A few disgruntled parents turned to look at me while the rest of the front row hardened their faces and stared straight ahead, pretending I wasn’t there. I assumed they were English.
‘I’m sorry,’ I stage-whispered. ‘I really need to talk to my friend. LOU.’
But my best friend was completely transfixed by the dancers and couldn’t possibly hear me. There was no way I could get to her without actually crawling along the front row to avoid getting in the way of the stage. I sighed, blew a piece of hair out from in front of my face and got down on my hands and knees. Thank God I’d worn shorts and not a skirt. This still wasn’t going to be a pretty situation but at least no one was going to have to see my knickers.
I got as far as the fifth person in, just three more pairs of snowy shoes from Louisa, before I felt the very-upset-by-now usher grab hold of my ankle and pull. The floor was slippery and, quite frankly, gross, so I wasn’t too happy when he gave me a good yank and my hands slipped out from underneath me.
‘Bollocks,’ I grunted as my face hit the cold, wet floor and my body began to slide backwards.
As I tried to scramble back upright, one foot held high in the air, face still level with a lovely pair of Manolos on the second person in from the right, I couldn’t see an awful lot of point in being coy. I’d already effectively ruined, or made, everyone’s afternoon, depending on how you looked at it.
‘LOUISA!’ I yelled as I felt a second pair of hands wrap around my other ankle. ‘LOU!’
Once I had been dragged out to the aisle, the hands let go of my ankles and wrapped themselves around my arms, pulling me roughly to my feet. Really, I’d seen people thrown out of clubs with more delicacy.
‘We’ve called the police,’ the usher from outside said in a quiet but firm voice. ‘I hope you’re looking forward to spending Christmas in a cell.’
‘Oh, whatever,’ I replied, shaking my hair out of my eyes and trying to see whether or not Lou had noticed the commotion. For fuck’s sake … she was still staring straight ahead. Stupid British refusal to acknowledge anything even slightly dodgy. ‘LOUISA SMITH! TURN AROUND!’
To her credit, she did actually look up but not before the usher bent my arm up behind my back and started to half drag, half carry me out of the theatre.
‘Oh shit,’ I heard her say as she got to her feet. ‘Angela?’
‘LOU!’ I shouted back, still fighting with the man who had clearly failed the police force entry exam several times over. ‘I LOST GRACE.’
She stopped clamouring for her bags and went a very funny colour. Beside her, Jenny snorted, jumped in her seat and opened her eyes, looking around in confusion.
‘What do you mean, you’ve lost my baby?’
The music up at the front really was quite loud. I was surprised the Rockettes weren’t deaf, let alone that they could hear well enough for Louisa to distract them. And really, I would have expected more professionalism. Surely someone had stood up in the front of a matinee performance and screamed about a missing baby before today without half of them falling over? Surely?
Every single person in Radio City Music Hall gasped at exactly the same time. The racket on stage as thirty-six dancers all collapsed into each other at the same time was much, much louder than I had imagined it could be. There was no way a single one of them weighed more than a hundred pounds, how could they possibly cause all that noise? The crowd’s gasp turned into a ripple of murmurs, finally evolving into assorted tuts, sighs and general displeasure. The people down the front did seem to have the decency to be a bit worried about the baby but the people at the back, who didn’t really know what was going on, seemed altogether more excited.
Not stopping to worry about the people in the neighbouring seats, and really, who could blame her, Louisa grabbed her coat and her Jenny Lopez and ran into the aisle while three dozen dancers dragged each other to their feet and attempted to regain formation on the stage.
‘Where is she?’ Louisa looked terrified and I felt horrible. More horrible than I had ever, ever felt before. ‘What? I mean, how?’
‘Cici took her out of the office because she was running around,’ I tried to explain as quickly as possible but it was difficult when my left arm was about to be broken and I was still being pulled backwards by a man three times taller than I was. ‘And then I went out to get her and she wasn’t there.’
It was more or less entirely what had happened. I didn’t see any point in leaving in the toilet break.
‘Cici has my baby?’ Louisa bellowed. Jenny rubbed her eyes, slowly waking up and processing what was happening. ‘That psycho has my baby girl? Oh my God, Angela, she’s probably sold her by now. She’s probably on a plane to Guam.’
‘Where is Guam?’ Jenny asked, blinking. ‘I’ve always wondered.’
‘That isn’t important,’ Lou shouted, punching her delicate fist into my captor’s shoulder. ‘Will you bloody let her go. My child is missing!’
He glared at Louisa and then looked at the other usher who had assisted in my capture before letting go of my arm. I twisted it back in front of me, rubbing my wrist and nursing it close to my chest. The relief lasted for approximately four seconds before Louisa began raining a torrent of tiny blows onto my arm.
‘I cannot believe you lost my baby,’ she said, punctuating each syllable with another slap. ‘I cannot believe you lost my baby.’
‘The police will still want to talk to you,’ he grunted. ‘We called in a public disturbance.’
‘Good.’ Lou marched out into the lobby, too angry to even cry. Jenny took my hand and squeezed. I was not too angry to cry. I was sobbing my eyes out. ‘I’m about to create a really fucking big one if we don’t find my baby immediately.’
Two uniformed officers stood in the doorway as we approached the front door. They looked incredibly bored. I was immediately both thankful for their presence and terrified of how they were going to deal with Louisa.
/> ‘We got a report of—’ one of them began.
‘MY BABY IS MISSING,’ she shrieked, throwing herself on the woman officer. ‘CICI SPENCER STOLE MY BABY!’
‘OK, we were called to a public disturbance?’ the male officer said, looking to me and Jenny for answers as he peeled Louisa off his colleague. ‘There’s a missing baby?’
‘Well, there’s both,’ I said. ‘Sort of.’
I tried to work out how I could explain without implicating myself in either potential crime while the police officers stared at me, clearly confused. It didn’t take me long to realise it would probably be quite hard, given that I was guilty in both cases. Oh God, I was going to spend Christmas in prison. I’d be someone’s bitch by morning. And while I was braiding my prison wife’s hair, Cici would be reprogramming Grace to become a complete sociopath on a yacht in the south of France. It probably wouldn’t take long, I had a feeling she was already predisposed.
‘There’s no disturbance.’ Jenny woke up just in time to be useful. Both Louisa and I seemed to be suffering complete psychotic breakdowns. ‘My friend was babysitting for us in her office and her assistant has absconded with the baby. We need to find the assistant.’
In times of crisis, everyone needed a Jenny Lopez. Who else would think to use the word absconded other than someone who had spent three hours a day for the last six years watching police procedural dramas and dated three different detectives? She was my hero.
The police waited to get confirmation that the theatre staff were happy to drop the disturbance charges but they had clearly already lost interest in me and my Christmas Spectacular crashing antics. Angry usher seemed mostly interested in Jenny and his accomplice looked as though he was only interested in getting the police out before his boss appeared.
‘Ma’am, we need to know exactly what happened,’ the woman officer said, still supporting a sobbing Louisa with one arm. ‘When did you last see the child?’
‘It was about one fifteen?’ I said as my phone buzzed against my bum in my back pocket. I pulled it out to see Delia’s name glowing on the screen. ‘Is it OK if I take this? It might be about Grace?’