The Fixer

by Claudia Carroll

  This book is warmly dedicated to Pat Moylan, with love and thanks. For everything.

  Contents

  MONDAY

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  TUESDAY

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  WEDNESDAY

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  THURSDAY

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  FRIDAY

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-One

  SATURDAY

  Chapter Forty-Two

  EPILOGUE

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  Copyright

  MONDAY

  Chapter One

  Meg

  I’m standing two behind her in the crowded coffee shop. It’s a grey, overcast morning, it’s only gone 7 a.m. and pretty much everyone in the queue is in shite form.

  No one is taking a blind bit of notice of me, which is just how I like it, so I shuffle up the queue, pretending to stare at my phone, while I do my thing.

  Age: she’s not much older than me, as it happens. Early thirties at a guess.

  Appearance: tall, tall, tall and whippety-thin. Attractive. Dressed in Victoria Beckham jeans, with a shirt tucked in at the waist that I’d swear is Stella McCartney – this season’s too. The hair is sun-streaked and light brown, worn long, loose and balayage-style. Expensive. High-maintenance. Nails are shellac, ruby red, and very recently done. One point of note; there’s a tiny bruise on the upper left quadrant of her forehead. A fresh Botox jab, I’m guessing.

  All of which point to one thing and one thing only; this is a woman who has absolutely no problem shelling out cash on herself. Clearly, she’s gone and forked out on a brand-new wardrobe, with no expense spared. So I ask myself, why would anyone do that?

  Because it’s what you do when you’re in a brand-new relationship. The heady early days when you do a major overhaul of your own look and when you can barely eat a cream cracker, on account of that intoxicating, infatuated, sick-to-the-stomach feeling you get when you think you’re in love.

  People are such idiots that way.

  She orders an Americano, so I take this as my cue and dive in.

  ‘Hey, it’s so good to bump into you!’ I beam brightly. ‘Are you losing weight? You look so much thinner!’

  Actually, she doesn’t at all – there’s no weight to lose. But this one’s been banging on on Instagram about her weight loss goals for so long now, I suppose it’s only polite to say something.

  ‘Wow, thank you,’ she beams back delightedly. She’s called Nicole, by the way, and she only looks delighted that a complete stranger is showering her with compliments, at seven o’clock on a drizzly Monday morning.

  ‘You’re gluten-free and vegan now, aren’t you?’ I smile my biggest, brightest, most sincere smile. Utterly fake, of course, but you’d never know. It’s a smile that says, Look at me, I’m just like you. Trust me, I know you. No, really. Honestly, we’ve already met before, like, loads of times. ‘Because it, like, really shows. Look at your skin . . . glowing!’

  #lifegoals #gettingthere #cleanliving.

  At least that’s what’s plastered all over your Twitter feed, you oversharing moron. Don’t you realise how easy you make it for people like me to get a handle on you?

  And there it is. That dazed, slightly confused look on Nicole’s face that might as well say, Help!!! Where do I know this one from? School? College? She seems to know so much about me – why can’t I place her?

  Nicole goes to pay for her order and when her back is turned, I surreptitiously tap at my phone. Bingo. Yet another photo on Instagram, that’s been posted all of about twenty minutes ago. God bless social media, I think, as I do several thousand times a day, for making my job such a doddle.

  Just for the laugh and to keep things interesting, I throw a little curveball into the conversation.

  ‘Tell me, how’s that new little puppy of yours getting on? Teddy, isn’t it? Is he still weeing all over your kitchen floor?’

  Because according to this photo, he is.

  ‘Teddy?’ Nicole says, looking baffled. ‘You know about Teddy?’

  ‘Isn’t puppy training just the worst?’ I chat away. ‘I had nightmares with my little bichon frise. The farting is something else, even in public – the amount of apologising I’ve had to do to complete strangers.’

  ‘Oh, right,’ Nicole says. ‘That must be where we know each other from – puppy-training class. So how is your . . . emm . . . Sorry, remind me what your dog is called again?’

  ‘Fantôme,’ I say, taking care not to let my fixed smile budge an inch. ‘It’s French.’

  French for phantom, actually. Appropriate, given that the little fecker doesn’t actually exist.

  ‘Of course! Fantôme. Great name . . . he’s a dote . . . that cute little face!’

  Oooh, you’re good. I’ll say that much for you. You’ll tell a barefaced lie, rather than admit you’ve never seen me before in the whole course of your life.

  But then, aren’t most people like that, I think, efficiently handing over my card to the barista and paying for my own decaf latte. Malleable, and easy to manipulate? You only have to bounce over, all friendly and bubbly, then flatter them about something – anything at all, really – because who on this earth doesn’t like a nice compliment? The more you butter them up and act like you’ve met before, the more the other person ends up feeling like they’re the idiot for not being able to remember you in the first place.

  And it’s usually plain sailing from there on in. Or so I’ve always found.

  ‘You know what else I find amazing about being a new dog owner?’ I toss in lightly, scooping up my latte as the two of us fall naturally into step and leave the coffee shop together. Coincidentally, I appear to be heading down the street in the exact same direction as Nicole. Funny, that.

  ‘Having a dog,’ I chat away, as we weave in and out of other early-morning pedestrians, ‘really is the most fabulous way to meet guys. The number of cuties I’ve had approach me when I’m out walking Fantôme . . . amazing!’

  ‘Well . . . I’ll have to take your word for that,’ says Nicole, tight-lipped.

  Oh will you now? I’ll take that as neither a confirmation nor a denial of your relationship status. Which means this Nicole one is cautious and private. Useful to file away for future reference.

  ‘You work just here, at Colchester Private, don’t you?’ I say, as we approach a dominating glass building, with imposing steps leading up to it and a lot of cool, architecty-looking chrome going on.

  ‘Ehh . . . yeah, yeah I do,’ says Nicole, looking puzzle
d as we get ready to go our separate ways. ‘Wow, you must have an amazing memory. Because for the life of me, I don’t remember telling you that.’

  ‘It is easy to remember. I’m just across the road from you, as it happens,’ I lie, nodding vaguely in the direction of a social media company’s glitzy HQ, directly opposite.

  ‘Wow! We certainly seem to have loads in common,’ says Nicole, still looking politely confused, as swarms of her co-workers busily barge past her up the steps.

  ‘Yeah – don’t we just?’ You’d think that, wouldn’t you?

  ‘It’s just driving me nuts that I can’t remember meeting you before,’ she adds, shaking her head, completely baffled. ‘Sorry . . . what did you say your name was again?’

  I didn’t.

  ‘Meg. It’s Meg.’

  ‘Well, nice chatting to you, Meg, see you again soon!’

  Oh, you have absolutely no idea, babes.

  *

  As Nicole sweeps off, Americano in hand, I stride briskly onwards, efficiently tapping notes into my phone as I walk.

  Find out where I can hire a puppy. Or volunteer to walk a stranger’s dog for about an hour a day – that’s all I need.

  Then, ever professional, I send a quick text update to my client.

  Initial contact has been made.

  So far, so good.

  The response comes back instantly, but then this particular client isn’t one to hang around.

  6 weeks. That’s all the time I’m prepared to pay for. I expect results by then, or you can consider our arrangement over.

  Six weeks? I think, hailing a taxi to whisk me off to my next meeting. Puh-lease. Gimme a decent challenge, would you?

  Chapter Two

  Meg

  ‘Now I don’t want you to think that I’m, like, bitching or anything . . .’

  ‘That was the furthest thing from my mind,’ I purr down the phone, filching keys from the bottom of my handbag and letting myself in through the hall door of the penthouse apartment where, believe it or not, I happen to live.

  Long story.

  ‘. . . But he is really giving me a major pain in my hole,’ says my client, who’s called Denys, by the way, and who genuinely sounds like he’s about to do time for someone. ‘I mean . . . not that I’m being judgy or anything.’

  ‘Of course you’re not,’ I say soothingly. But then two full years at this game have taught me that ruffled feathers need to be smoothed down and that the client is always, always right. No matter what the circumstances.

  ‘Much more of this messing though, and I really will fucking kill him.’

  ‘You’re human,’ I reply. ‘And that’s a perfectly natural reaction.’

  ‘He was a good forty minutes late into work again this morning,’ Denys grouses on. ‘Eighth time this month – I shit you not. I mean, it’s like this tosser thinks there’s one rule for him and another rule for the rest of us.’

  I’m just about to dump my bag and keys down on the hall table, but on hearing that, I stop dead in my tracks.

  ‘So why not just fire this guy yourself?’ I ask him, straight out. ‘It certainly sounds like you have ample grounds to.’

  ‘Ehh . . . don’t you remember the name of the company I work for?’ he sighs.

  Course I remember, I remember everything.

  ‘Cambridge Holdings,’ I say.

  ‘Correct. And this guy’s full name is James Cambridge. That should tell you a lot.’

  ‘Ahh.’ OK, so now I’m beginning to see the full picture. ‘You’re a family-run business, then.’

  ‘We certainly are. And just because this idiot’s mother and his uncles and aunts founded the place and all have jammy seats on the board, he thinks he can just drift in and out as and when he pleases. Entitled little shit – pardon my language, but I’m really at the end of my rope here.’

  ‘In that case, why don’t you leave?’ I ask, kicking off the trainers I’ve had on since early morning, heading for my bedroom and opening double doors that lead into a walk-in wardrobe.

  ‘Because,’ Denys says wearily, ‘I actually like my job. In fact, I love it. I care about the work we do here and I know our company is helping to make the world a better place. I did a master’s degree years ago, specifically so I could bring the right skill set to this organisation, and it’s just beginning to pay dividends for me. So how do you think it feels that I have to shoulder this deadbeat, who doesn’t care about his job and who’s only there because he’s got the right last name?’

  ‘I take your point. It’s certainly a delicate situation.’

  ‘Now you see why I’m reaching out to you,’ Denys says, as I do a lightning-quick scan through my wardrobe, where racks and racks of clothes, shoes and bags are neatly laid out. All colour-coded, naturally.

  My job demands uniforms – lots of them. And no one, absolutely no one, barring the cleaning lady, is ever allowed in here – ever. Well, otherwise I’d have to fend off a list of annoying questions along the lines of, ‘but how can a twenty-nine-year-old possibly afford all this?’

  There’s no way to explain it, really. Not without telling people what I do, which is out of the question. My own mother thinks I’m just flat-sitting for a colleague at work, and that’s how I came to be living in such unheard-of, breathtaking luxury.

  ‘Just don’t get used to it,’ Mum sniffed on the one and only occasion I let her inside the place. Big mistake, as it turned out. ‘This wraparound balcony lark, and views over the docklands, and a spare bedroom? When I was your age, I was living in a bedsit with the one payphone in a hallway and a two-bar electric heater with lumps of plastic coal on it. Whoever this owner is, they must be coming down with money.’

  If my mother finds out the flat belongs to me, she’ll think I’m out on the streets dealing drugs. Far better just to smile and keep my mouth shut. My situation is far too complicated to explain anyway – and particularly not to family. The fewer who know, the better.

  Anyway, with AirPods efficiently clipped in my ears, I wriggle out of the jeans and jumper I’ve had on since early morning; my outfit for casually ‘bumping into’ my newest project, Nicole, in the coffee shop. Clothes that said, ‘hey, I work in the tech industry, too – I could come to work in PJs and no one would give a shite’. That look might have been all very well and good for a 7 a.m. in Café Sol, but not for the lunchtime meeting that’s ahead – not by a very long shot.

  Carefully, I select a neatly tailored pencil skirt with a crisp white shirt and shimmy into the new outfit, while Denys keeps rabbiting into my ear.

  ‘Anyway, you came very highly recommended,’ he’s saying. ‘From a friend of a friend, if you’re with me.’

  ‘I understand,’ I say, knowing precisely who this mutual connection is. My benefactress, the woman who set me up. But, of course, I’m far too discreet to let on. Discretion is the better part of valour, etcetera.

  ‘And I know you’re probably used to dealing with relationships of a far more . . . intimate nature than this,’ Denys says.

  At that, I allow myself a wry little smile. Over the past few years, I’ve earned the nickname The Fixer, because that’s pretty much what I do. I fix your people problems – all of them. I’m pretty much entirely self-invented and, quite frankly, consider what I do for a living to be a kind of public service.

  You’ve got someone in your life driving you nuts? I’ll get rid of them for you. Gently and subtly, of course, using the time-honoured art of persuasion. Maybe you’ve got a partner who’s cheating on you behind your back and you need this ‘third party’ to be airbrushed completely from the picture. Or an ex who won’t leave you alone, or else a clingy former friend who won’t take the hint that you’re trying to shake off. So what to do? Send for The Fixer, of course. Hell, I’ve even dealt with a meddling mother-in-law who wouldn’t back off a newly married couple, and if I can do that, I can do anything.

  Two years now. That’s how long I’ve been doing thi
s. Two years of giving calm, dispassionate, discretional service. Two years of never getting it wrong, two years of completely smashing it. When hired, I immediately knuckle down to brass tacks, get on with the job in hand and get results, quickly and with an astonishing lack of fuss. Job done, game over.

  You want to know the secret to my success?

  When my work is done, everyone actually ends up far better off in the long run. Inconvenient ‘third parties’, whether professional or personal, are gently moved aside, so imperceptibly they barely even realise it’s happening. Without fully grasping how, they often find themselves sidelined to different jobs in different companies, sometimes even in different countries, which, more often than not, work out far better for them. And the pure magic of it is, I always manage to convince them that it was entirely their own idea.

  Not only that, but I’ll always aim to guide them on to newer and far more suitable partners – critically, ones who are single and available this time. Ergo, my clients get what they paid for, cheating spouses are given their just deserts, and as I always make crystal clear – whether a client subsequently chooses to stick with or turf out an errant partner is entirely up to them.

  True, when I first started out, I was merely doing a favour for a client of the company I worked for at the time, a lady whose husband was doing the dirt on her and who I just felt sorry for.

  Back in the early days, as things started to take off for me, spouses were generally my stock-in-trade; men mostly. I’d get rid of mistresses, then deal with married, lying, scumbag cheaters as I saw fit.

  But the trouble is, it turned out, I had such a talent for it that now I’ve evolved into something of an equal opportunities freelancer. Word about me seems to have spread like wildfire, and these days I’m as likely to be called in for a case just like this one, where a disgruntled employee needs to get rid of a deadbeat co-worker, as I am a romantic triangle – hence my wry smile.

  ‘You see, I heard you were a woman who was good at fixing . . . undesirable situations, shall we say,’ Denys adds.

  Fixing undesirable situations. A delicate way of putting it, I think, phone in one hand as I touch up my lipstick with the other. An almost invisible nude shade – discreet. Unshowy. Perfect.