by Mia Dolan
Michael’s face drained of colour as he half rose from the table. ‘What the hell . . .?’
Linda Bell was enjoying this and well into her stride. She’d always been a drama queen, and now she had her sights on an acting career. She was playing the part for all it was worth.
‘Don’t you give me that, Mickey bloody Jones. You was always coming on to me at the Red Devil. Said I turned you on and persisted even when I kept turning you down. Well, now look at me,’ she said, patting the faint rise in her belly where she’d had the foresight this time to tape a small cushion. ‘You’ll pay for this, Michael Jones. It’s your kid and you’re going to pay for it.’
Michael got to his feet. ‘You lying cow!’
‘So what’s this, bleedin’ Scotch mist?’ she yelled, pointing a painted fingernail at her stomach.
Michael grabbed her. ‘You lying bitch!’
‘Oh yeah! I was a lying cow just now and now I’m a lying bitch. That’s what they all say. Had yer fun and now you don’t want to know.’
She tried to wriggle free, but Michael was having none of it. He held her chin so she had to look up into his face.
‘I know who put you up to this, Linda. Tell Rafferty it isn’t going to work. Like you he’s nothing but a fucking amateur.’ He threw her away from him.
Linda Bell looked frightened. Few people ever saw Michael angry, but he was certainly angry now.
She rallied for a moment. ‘Well, just you wait until your wife finds out. We’ll see what she’s got to say about it Michael bloody Jones, you smug sod . . .’
Michael grabbed her again and dragged her to the door.
‘Get out! Get out and stay away from me and mine. And tell that Irish idiot, Rafferty, to do the same.’
‘Let go of me,’ she shouted, her arms flailing and her handbag socking him on the chin. ‘Let go of me, you vicious bastard. Wait till your wife hears about this. I’ll tell her. You bet that I’ll tell her!’
With one determined effort, Michael grabbed hold of her right wrist then her left. His eyes bored into hers. He was aware that Aldo and the other customers in the trattoria had fallen to silence and were watching him with spellbound anticipation but he couldn’t help himself.
‘Get this straight. If you dare go with your lying tales to my wife, I’ll kill you! I’ll fucking kill you!’
Chapter Ten
MARCIE BROOKS SAT numbly following Linda Bell’s visit. For all her bravado about facing Michael while that tart had been there, after Linda had left she hadn’t had the energy or the courage to make a move.
‘How do I play it?’ she asked Allegra.
Allegra was nibbling at her thumb. At the same time she was eyeing Marcie worriedly. ‘I don’t know what to say.’
‘I’m not asking you whether it’s true or not. All I’m asking is how do I play it? Do I face him out or do I ignore the whole thing? Is it worth getting into a row about something that might have happened or might not?’
Allegra stopped nibbling her thumb. She was surprised that Marcie could be so forgiving – if indeed there was anything to forgive.
‘I would say nothing. To err is human,’ said Allegra. ‘Michael is basically a good man and you two have a good marriage. Marriage may be a union sanctioned by God and His Holy Church, but that doesn’t make it perfect. And humans are not perfect.’
Marcie watched her children playing on the floor. Aran was so like his father. So was Joanna, if it came to that. She wondered briefly how marriage to Johnnie might have been. But the thought was fleeting and no longer caused her the pain it had once. Michael was her main concern. He was the man she loved.
She sighed. ‘It hurts, but I don’t want to split up over this.’
‘Then don’t mention it unless he does.’
‘You don’t think he might confess?’
‘He might, but to a priest not to you.’
Allegra’s words were surprisingly calming. Marcie decided not to mention anything to Sally who might be more belligerent about it. Sally had many lovers but no husband. All the same she took a dim view of men who cheated on their wives.
Marcie found the whole thing hard to accept. Why was it she couldn’t find it in her heart to hate her husband for what he’d allegedly done?
Because at heart you don’t believe it, she told herself. At heart you still believe that he’s the man you married, loyal and loving.
The moment she came across an empty telephone box, Linda Bell reported back to Paddy Rafferty as agreed. ‘That’s my girl,’ he said, sounding as though he were smiling at the phone.
Linda glowed with gratitude as though she were taking an encore on a West End stage not standing in a phone box which smelled of urine and cigarette ends and was littered with postcards advertising various services: ‘French Polishing – reasonable rates’; ‘School Mistress. Disciplined lessons.’
No more of that for me, thought Linda. She was on the up and nothing could stop her now.
‘How did Jones take it?’
She hesitated, thought about gilding the lily a bit by lying, then decided to tell the truth. Rafferty might be grateful for that.
‘He gave me a message. He said tell that bog Irish idiot Rafferty that I’ll kill him if he ever comes near me and mine.’
She could almost hear the rumble of his anger down the phone.
‘Did he now,’ Rafferty growled.
She imagined his face turning red, just like it did when he was putting it into her. He always got hot and red in the face when he was in bed with a girl or two.
‘He said he’d kill me too if I went to his wife and told her.’
‘Where did he say this?’
‘In a café. In front of everybody.’
‘So there were a lot of witnesses?’
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘There were.’ She frowned. The pips would go soon if she didn’t get to the point and she didn’t have any more pennies to put into the slot. There was only one question on her mind.
‘So! When do I get paid?’ she asked, as she slipped the cushion out from beneath her clothes and let it drop to the grubby floor.
Paddy’s response came surprisingly quickly. ‘Corner of Cobden Street, down by the gas works, tonight round about eleven. I’ll send Baxter along with it.’
Linda frowned. The time and location weren’t exactly to her liking. Besides the gas works, the only other places of note down there were a couple of scrapyards surrounded by a fence of corrugated tin. Populated it was not. Deserted in fact at that time of night. Meeting anyone there was unnerving. She decided to check that she’d heard right.
‘Cobden Street? It’s a bit late to be down there at that time of night.’
‘Well, we don’t want anyone knowing you were putting on a show, do we, girl? Don’t want any shady dealings affecting your prospects, do we?’
Linda had been fired from the last club she’d worked at for lifting the wallet of a drunken client. She hadn’t taken it seriously when the club manager, an elegant black guy named Leroy, had told her that things were run pretty straight as per the boss’s instructions. She’d disbelieved him and paid the price. Now she was getting her own back. Victor Camilleri had owned that club. As far as she was concerned, Michael Jones was his son and therefore as deserving of her revenge as his father was. Linda had a warped view of justice.
‘I suppose it’ll be all right,’ she said, while thinking of how she was going to spend the money. One hundred pounds! A shopping trip along Oxford Street was most definitely on the cards. She might even venture up west and go in Harrods. A hundred pounds could buy her something really classy.
Paddy put down the phone and gritted his teeth over the Churchill-size cigar he favoured, rolling it over his tongue to the corner of his mouth.
‘Stupid cow.’ He looked up at Baxter. ‘That bastard Jones threatened to kill me and then threatened to kill her. A bad mistake.’
‘How’s that, boss?’ said Baxter.
Rafferty grinned
like a snake about to swallow its dinner. ‘He said it in front of witnesses.’
Baxter didn’t need his boss to explain things further. He knew where this was going. Paddy Rafferty was only cool up to a point. Once somebody insulted, crossed him or turned him down on a deal – a deal that was in his favour – they were dead meat. Michael Jones had done all three. Paddy Rafferty was out for a sudden and very cruel revenge.
Their eyes met in mutual understanding. Baxter was as cold as Rafferty but like a bullet he had to be aimed at his target.
‘She’ll be there at eleven tonight. You know what to do?’
Baxter nodded. Of stocky build, Baxter had an inconspicuous air about him. He wasn’t handsome, he wasn’t huge and neither was he that imposing. In short he was the sort of bloke people didn’t really notice. In the past he had been a freelance contractor known to every high-flying criminal in London. If any of them had wanted to get rid of someone, he was the man they hired. Nobody knew for certain how many people he’d killed in his time, and no one was counting. He was a convenience who’d never been found out – not for murder anyway.
Charlie Baxter had been working for Paddy since coming out from his last term in the ‘Scrubs’. Paddy had been the only bloke to give him a chance even though he knew what he’d gone in for. Baxter hung about in lavatories waiting for willing men. Something about that turned the stomachs of some, but Paddy had given him a chance, providing he kept on the straight and narrow, went along to the counselling sessions and took the tablets – bromide mostly – same as Paddy himself had taken in his National Service days. He sometimes thought it was the best thing he’d ever got from the army. The rest of it was all bullshit as far as he was concerned. He still had contacts there; handy if he ever wanted a gun, which sometimes – just sometimes – he did.
The smell of grilled steak with all the trimmings filled Marcie’s kitchen. She loved cooking for Michael when it was just the two of them. He’d even brought home a bottle of wine.
Together they’d put the kids to bed. Marcie loved that too. It wasn’t often they got to do it what with him working some nights making sure the club staff were doing their jobs properly.
Friday night was usually a busy night so it had come as a complete surprise that he’d rang earlier and said he fancied a quiet night in.
‘It’s Friday. You’re not usually home on a Friday.’
‘I felt like a change. I fancy spending some time with my missus. Is that OK?’
His tone was a little sharp, but she didn’t react. There was no point in looking for trouble or indeed a gift horse in the mouth. She’d love to have him home. If he was here he wasn’t seeing the Linda Bells of this world was he?
The feeling that she’d been stabbed in the heart was still there, but she’d determined the subject would not be mentioned. Like a lot of bad things in her life, it would be brushed from her memory – at least she hoped it would.
Allegra’s serenity had helped her come to terms with the shock. It was early days but she was sure she would get over it. She had to get over it for her children’s sake.
She smiled at him brightly when he came into the room after reading a bedtime story to Joanna and taking a look in on Aran.
‘Is she asleep?’ she asked as she stirred the boiling peas – as if they needed any stirring.
‘Both of them are dead to the world up there,’ he said with a smile, moving in to give her a hug. Lifting her hair to one side, he kissed the nape of her neck as he’d done a hundred times before. This time it almost hurt. Had he done the same to Linda Bell?
Stop it! Stop it now!
The small voice in her head took her by surprise. It seemed a long time since she’d last heard it. But the voice – she liked to think it was Johnnie’s – had always been right. She forced herself to fight back the feeling of betrayal.
She managed a light laugh into the steam from the peas. ‘I wish you wouldn’t do that,’ she said to him.
‘Why?’ He continued to nuzzle her neck.
‘Because if you carry on like it I won’t want to eat steak – I’ll want to eat you.’
She turned round to face him entwining her arms around his neck. He smelled good and looked even better. Little creases appeared at the corners of his eyes when he smiled. She closed her eyes when he kissed her, tried to forget their recent troubles and focus on how lucky they were to have each other.
Even so, the confrontation with Linda Bell was still at the back of her mind. And there it is staying, she thought to herself. The girl was a liar. She felt it somehow. Michael was the best thing that had ever happened to her and she wasn’t going to let a vindictive ex-employee get to her. Besides, she’d run away once Marcie had offered that they go together to see her husband and have it out. Surely that meant something?
She must have tensed while her thoughts ran riot, because Michael noticed.
‘Is something wrong?’ he asked.
She shook her head. At the same time she pressed her hands against the nape of his neck so he could kiss her again.
‘I’m going to die in your arms,’ she said suddenly.
The comment came unbidden and without warning. She’d surprised herself by saying it. Michael looked surprised too.
‘Where did that come from?’ he asked her as she leaned against his hands, which were supporting the small of her back.
She shrugged. ‘I don’t know. I just felt I had to say it. I just felt it mattered.’
The peas chose that moment to boil over and curtail further kisses and the possibility that they might forego dinner altogether and make for the bedroom.
‘Oh no! What a bloody mess!’
She turned the gas off immediately and dished out the steak, the chips, the salad and the peas as Michael poured the wine and lit a candle.
‘Here’s to my lovely wife,’ he said in the softly seductive voice he’d used on their wedding night.
‘And on a Friday night,’ said Marcie. ‘And it’s not even our wedding anniversary. Do you have any other reason for doing this?’
A look she had trouble reading flashed into his eyes and then was swiftly gone. His smile was wide and reassuring.
‘One year, six months and twenty-three days, six hours and forty-three minutes?’ He closed one eye as though he really had calculated it to the very day, the very hour and the very second.
Marcie laughed. One year, six months maybe, but she’d need to put her thinking cap on with the rest of it. ‘And don’t think for one moment that I believe you’ve worked it out that precisely,’ she said, still laughing, still entering into the spirit of his behaviour. ‘How come?’
‘How come?’ He looked taken aback, pretending to be found out and not wanting to admit to anything.
Marcie flipped a finger at his nose. ‘What brought on this sudden calculation of how long we’ve been together – and the fact that you’re home on a Friday night?’
His expression changed in an instant. ‘Does there have to be a reason?’
She didn’t want his mood to change and instantly regretted what she’d said. ‘No. Of course not. It’s lovely having you here. The kids loved it too.’
She realised she was gushing, but if that’s what it took to see him smile again, that’s what she would do.
‘I’m glad,’ he said.
Just as he reached across the table to take her hand and kiss her wrist, the phone rang.
‘Saved by the bell,’ said Marcie.
Michael got up from the table. ‘I’ll be right back. And then I’m going to take it off the hook and ignore it. Tonight is for us!’
She laughed and this time felt happy.
The phone was on a half-moon table with wrought-iron legs out in the hallway. Marcie sat with her hands folded beneath her chin listening to Michael’s murmuring voice and knowing – absolutely knowing – what he was going to come in and say.
‘That was one of the waiters from Aldo’s Trattoria phoning to tell me there’s been tro
uble at the club. The poor bloke sounded so hysterical I could barely hear him.’
He moved smartly, grabbing his coat and his car keys, pausing only to peck at her cheek. Like a hurricane he whizzed down the hallway. At the door he stopped to call out that he would be back as soon as he could. ‘And phone your dad. Tell him to get round there ASAP. OK?’
Marcie phoned her father as ordered. Knowing her father well, she phoned him at his favourite pub, the Black Dog in Lambeth. There was much raucous noise on the other end. Above it all she heard the barman shout for her father. When he came to the phone he sounded drunk.
‘It’s my night off and I’m here with friends.’
‘Well, it isn’t now. Michael said he needs you there.’
Her father wasn’t happy about leaving the pub and grunted something about being ordered around like a dog before putting the phone down.
Not entirely convinced he’d do as requested, she sat down and finished her glass of wine before starting on the dishes.
‘Well, that’s that,’ she said to herself.
If things had gone according to plan – that is dinner then bed – she wondered whether she would have had the courage to mention Linda Bell to Michael. She couldn’t make up her mind about that one. There was no doubting that the girls at the club fancied Michael; nobody in their right mind wouldn’t fancy him. When she’d first met him she’d never really noticed how attractive he was. He’d been overshadowed by his more obviously handsome half-brother. Michael’s good looks were more subtle. She never doubted that she’d ended up with the better man, but discovering women found him very attractive had surprised her and she counted herself lucky that he was her husband.
The corners of her mouth turned down as her thoughts darkened. Linda Bell. What was she to Michael? And what was Michael to her? Perhaps they had meant something to each other in the past. Perhaps she was purely out for revenge. Was she really pregnant? And if so, was it Michael’s?
She shivered. It wouldn’t do any good to go there. The girl had been lying. That’s all there was to it.