by Faye Brann
‘Brilliant,’ Chris said. ‘Love it.’
‘Did you want to stick your coat upstairs in the guest room?’
Chris patted his chest. ‘Tom Baker never takes off his coat, Becks. You never know when you’ll have to leave in a hurry.’
‘Of course, Doctor, how silly of me.’
He disappeared off into the kitchen, leaving Becky, Laura and Vicky in the hallway.
‘Was this really your idea?’ Laura said.
‘I know it seems unlikely, but it really was.’
‘Well I think it’s genius.’ Becky gestured towards the living room. ‘Shall we?’
They moved into the lounge where about thirty slightly sorry-looking crime fighters were already in various states of drunkenness.
‘Vicky.’ Kate was busy waving her hands to the S Club beat. ‘Exterminate! Exterminate!’
Vicky grinned under her Dalek head. ‘Hey, Kate.’ Her friend was resplendent in a full-body black leather catsuit. She had been on an insane diet and workout combo since Becky sent out the invitations and Vicky had to give credit where it was due – she looked great.
‘Hello, gorgeous,’ she said. ‘Michelle Pfeiffer’s got competition, then.’
‘So has Dusty Bin,’ Kate replied, laughing.
‘Well we couldn’t all devote three weeks to protein shakes and CrossFit.’
‘Truth be told, I wouldn’t recommend it,’ Kate said. ‘I’m looking forward to a great big, fat burger tomorrow lunchtime.’
‘Well I reckon you’ve definitely won sexiest woman in the room,’ Vicky said, confident this would sate Kate’s need to win, and rather glad she’d taken herself out of the running.
‘Well, actually,’ Becky said, ‘I’m not sure Matisse didn’t pip her to the post for that particular award …’
Vicky scanned the room, trying to place Matisse. Ahead, near the dining table, she could see Sacha. He was dressed in black tie and held a martini glass in his hand. Bond. James Bond. But where was Matisse?
‘She’s getting a drink,’ Laura said, as if reading her mind. ‘Oh my God, Vicky, but wait until you see her. I didn’t think she’d have the balls, but, well, see for yourself—’
Laura nodded and Vicky turned around. Her jaw dropped and she silently thanked God that her face was hidden. Carrying a bottle of vodka and dressed in nothing but a white bikini and a hunting knife, Matisse looked incredible. Her hair was gelled to make it look wet and her make-up was done expertly. She looked more like Ursula Andress than Ursula Andress.
‘Bloody hell,’ Vicky said, before she could stop herself.
‘Told you,’ Becky said.
‘Hello, Victoria,’ Matisse said. ‘At least, I assume it is Victoria?’
‘You look … wow … well, I … amazing!’
‘Thank you.’
‘Aren’t you freezing cold though?’ Vicky still couldn’t quite believe what she was seeing. Did this woman have Dmitri by osmosis? Where were her stretch marks? What about her mum-tum? Vicky hadn’t seen a body this perfect since she was … well, truthfully, she didn’t think she’d ever seen a body this perfect.
‘Well, I guess she’s used to the cold,’ Kate said.
‘Don’t be daft, she’s French,’ Laura said.
‘Oui, but I have the Russian blood in me,’ Matisse said.
‘That’s not the only Russian she’ll have in her by the end of the night,’ Kate commented. Laura snorted.
‘It’s a little cold for cigarettes outside, but luckily Sacha and I brought our big Russian coats,’ Matisse said, ignoring Kate and pouring the neat vodka into a glass resting on the piano. She held up the bottle to everyone else, but they all shook their heads. ‘He’s in such a bad mood tonight; I am surprised he is even here.’
‘I can’t imagine he’d leave you alone to go out looking like that,’ Becky said. ‘He might be pissed off, but he can’t take his eyes off you.’
*
Becky wasn’t wrong. Sacha’s greedy eyes watched his wife wherever she went, and Vicky saw he wasn’t the only one. Matisse literally had the entire room’s attention. Surreptitious glances, and one or two blatant lustful gazes, were coming from every direction – men and women. Vicky did her best to ignore her own jealousy monster rearing up inside. So, her swimsuit requirements included significantly more underwiring and tummy control. So what? She’d spent a lifetime mastering the art of being invisible, and if there was one thing she was good at, it was being indistinguishable from everyone else. She was here to do a job, one that she was good at. She’d take that over pert buttocks any day.
‘I’m going to get a drink. Does anyone else want one?’ She glided away from her friends and into the kitchen. Chris beckoned her over to where he was standing with Simon, Steve and Jon and passed her a bottle of Peroni. Vicky removed the Dalek head with relief and put in on a chair in the corner.
‘I’m surprised you aren’t in the living room with all the other mid-life crises gazing at our resident Bond girl,’ she said to the four of them.
‘Ah, I got my fast car last year, Vicky. I’m done,’ Steve said.
‘I’m more of an evil-overlord-with-plumbing-parts kind of a guy,’ Chris said. ‘That whole gorgeous girl in a white bikini thing is so last year.’ He grabbed Vicky around the waist – or near enough her waist. To be fair to Chris, it was hard to tell where anything was in a Dalek outfit.
‘She does look incredible,’ Vicky said. ‘But I must say, he makes a bit of an odd-looking Bond.’
‘More like a Blofeld,’ Chris said.
‘Or that Jaws bloke,’ Steve bared his teeth and growled, and everyone laughed.
‘Yeah, he’s hardly the Secret Service type, is he?’ Jon said.
‘Neither is James Bond,’ Vicky said.
‘Of course he is. He’s the essence of a British spy,’ Chris said.
‘He really isn’t, Chris. I mean, think about it, he sticks out like a sore thumb and wherever he goes people know who he is—’
‘Argh! Get her away. She’s spoiling the fantasy.’ Simon put his hands over his ears in mock terror and Vicky grinned.
‘Next thing you’ll be telling me there’s no such thing as Batman,’ Steve said.
Vicky decided it was time to end the banter and put down her beer. She had work to do.
‘Excuse me, chaps,’ she said. ‘I need to go to the bathroom.’
‘Do you need any help?’ Chris said, only half joking.
‘No, I think I’ll be okay. Send in a search party if I’m gone too long.’
She made her way into the hallway and up the stairs. The chatter dimmed to a noisy hum and she made one last check to make sure the coast was clear, then let herself into the darkened spare room where all the coats lay on the small double bed. Closing the door and sealing it shut with the door wedge, she lifted off her costume, threw it on to the floor next to the bed and opened up her bag to get out her torch and the screwdriver. If anyone tried to come in she’d have a few extra seconds while they forced the door past the wedge, which was really all she needed.
Tucking the screwdriver into her waistband and holding the torch between her teeth, Vicky rifled through the coat pile until she found what she was looking for a few layers down: two big, thick fur coats. She pulled them both out and laid them on top of the pile. Humming lightly, she checked the pockets of each coat and prayed she’d find what she was looking for, knowing if she didn’t, that she had a much harder job on her hands. She struck gold as she searched the second pocket and her hand closed around Sacha’s Cartier lighter, stashed with a pack of Marlboros in the larger of the two coats.
‘Bingo.’
She pulled the light out and opened it up, getting a whiff of lighter fluid. Then, over the strains of Madonna striking a pose downstairs, she heard a voice. Someone was coming up the stairs. Vicky palmed the lighter, snatched up her handbag and turned off the torch. Her spare hand hovered over the screwdriver.
‘Where?’ a voice called. She couldn�
��t figure out who it was, and hordes of people shouting about Marlon Brando and Jimmy Dean to the strains of ‘Vogue’ were making it difficult to assess which direction they were headed.
‘Just up on the left-hand side.’ Becky sounded impatient. ‘Found it?’
Vicky waited a few long seconds.
‘Yes, thanks!’ came the voice, and the bathroom door closed and locked.
She breathed a sigh of relief. She switched the torch back on and eased the lighter out of its decorative gold casing. After unscrewing and removing the flint spring, she took the tiny tracking device from her bag and carefully slid it inside the spring. She put the lighter back together and got her phone out. Tapping something that looked a lot like the Google Maps app, she waited for the transmitter to connect. When the little red dot appeared on her screen, right above where Becky’s house was on the map, she tucked her phone away in her back pocket again and gave the lighter a quick rub with her top to get rid of her finger marks, before slipping it back inside Sacha’s coat.
She had just stuffed the torch and screwdriver into her bag and thrown the Dalek costume over her head when she heard voices on the landing again.
‘I need a word.’ Sacha’s voice was unmistakable. Vicky used the seconds of time the door wedge had bought her to stuff the coats back in the pile. She dived on to the floor on the far side of the bed and, as Sacha forced the door open, pulled a coat from the bed over her head. She tucked her feet and arms inside her Dalek costume and lay stock still, her heart pounding.
‘Here? What’s the matter, old chap?’
William? Why had Becky invited that idiot? More to the point, what the hell was William doing with Sacha?
Sacha spoke in low tones and Vicky could hear the stress in his voice.
‘The deal is not going to plan. I might need to extend my credit line again while I divert the shipment and find a new buyer.’
‘It’s a big sum of money, Sacha. We’ve talked about this before. As your accountant, I’m not sure I can recommend doing that—’
William was Sacha’s accountant? Did he know what a dangerous crook he was dealing with? William had four kids; he wouldn’t put his family at risk like that. Would he?
‘I know it’s a lot of money,’ Sacha snapped. ‘It’s that dick of a middleman, trying to screw me over, telling me the paperwork for the land transfer isn’t ready yet.’
‘You’ve still got a few weeks to go. I don’t think there’s much reason to panic.’
‘What the fuck would you know about it? This isn’t some small-time deal I’ve put together, William. I’m telling you, I can smell a trap.’ She couldn’t see a thing, but, by the sound of his voice, she could tell Sacha had made his way further into the room, towards her side of the bed. Vicky’s heart lurched and she eased her hand down to try and find the screwdriver from inside her bag. Although what use a screwdriver would be if that great hulking lump of a man trod on her was anyone’s guess.
‘I’ve greased the palms of a lot of people to make this deal happen,’ Sacha continued. ‘But I didn’t get where I am today by being a fool, and something isn’t right about this jumped-up zhopa. I know other people who are like him. He wants this deal for himself and he’s happy to let me take the fall in order to get it.’
‘Are you sure, Sacha?’
‘No one is going to screw this up for me. So, do what I pay you for and prepare to extend the credit line. If it comes to it, the goods will stay in Chinese waters until I can shift them elsewhere.’
‘Your client won’t be happy.’
‘If that arsehole tries to fuck me over and my client is sitting waiting for a shipment that never arrives, they’ll find him and pull his fingernails out one at a time until they get some answers. And if they don’t, I will,’ Sacha snarled.
‘Steady on, old chap.’ William sounded nervous and Vicky felt a flicker of sympathy for him. He was Sacha’s accountant, and obviously complicit, but he’d got himself involved way over his head. She was starting to feel the same way.
‘Just make the necessary arrangements, William.’
The bedroom door opened and closed. Both men were gone. Vicky waited a few minutes for her heart to stop pounding and then threw the coat off her head and lifted herself gently off the floor. She listened, then opened the door a crack to check the coast was clear. She’d just left the bedroom when Matisse came up the stairs.
‘So, you managed to negotiate the bathroom with your costume then?’ she said to Vicky, as they passed in the hallway.
Vicky glanced at the bathroom door, which was mercifully open to her left. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘It’s all yours.’
‘Oh, I’m coming to get our coats to have a cigarette in the garden,’ Matisse said, working her way past Vicky.
‘Well good luck out there – don’t catch a cold,’ Vicky said, and shuffled her way down the stairs as quickly as she could. She would have to report the conversation she’d overheard when she got home.
‘Where’ve you been?’ Chris said, turning around and shimmying his long scarf around her. ‘Come and dance!’
‘It was trickier than I thought, getting that costume on and off,’ she said.
‘I thought it might be.’ Ricky Martin’s horn section started up and the room began to shake to the beat of ‘Livin’ La Vida Loca’. Chris shimmied towards her like a giraffe with no bones and Vicky tried her best to join in, but she’d broken a sweat and was feeling thirsty.
‘Jesus, this thing is warm. I might need to go and get another drink in a minute to cool down.’
‘Why don’t you just take it off?’ Chris said.
Sacha and Matisse came back into the room, and Matisse peeled off her coat before beginning to gyrate her body across the dance floor. Vicky watched as Sacha snarled and headed back out again, presumably to put their coats back upstairs.
‘Maybe later,’ she said, feeling suddenly light and adrenaline-fuelled. Despite the close shave, she’d completed another successful covert operation and the night was hers to enjoy. ‘After all, I never told you what was underneath …’
Chapter Fourteen
Vicky approached a bench in the park, flopped down onto it, and put her head between her knees. She’d decided to go on a post-Dalek, pre-Christmas health kick and was on week one, day three of the Couch to 5k app on her phone. She wanted to thank whoever invented it for highlighting the tragic state she’d got herself into and to point out to them that a minute and a half of walking time wasn’t nearly enough to recover from sixty seconds of running. The lady shouting, ‘You’re halfway through!’ just as she thought she was going to throw up was a dead woman if she ever got her hands on her.
In the app’s defence, November wasn’t the ideal time to kickstart a running career. It was freezing cold and damp, and Vicky was pretty sure she’d hate the process slightly less if she didn’t continually worry about frostbite making all her toes fall off. Chris and the kids had fallen about laughing the first time she went out, wrapped up in every old piece of ski thermal she could find.
‘You’ll boil,’ Chris said.
‘I won’t,’ she said.
‘When you’re working up a sweat after ten minutes, you’ll wish you’d worn less.’
‘When I’m working up a sweat after ten minutes I’ll be halfway across Putney Bridge and thinking about jumping in,’ she said.
‘Up to you, Vics, but, trust me, you’ll be too warm.’
Chris maybe had a point. She caught her breath and felt sweat running down the smooshed-up cleavage formed by her sports bra. Her heart was thudding in her ears and her legs felt like burning lumps of ice, if that was even possible. And her hips – what the hell was that about? – they hadn’t ached this much since her third trimester with James. She was a hot mess, and not in a good way. Still, at least she’d arrived at the meeting point early. Jonathan wouldn’t be here for fifteen minutes or so, and she should have recovered her dignity by then, if not her breath.
In that m
oment, she heard a second set of panting and the face of a dog loomed into hers. She looked up and saw that Jonathan was squinting at her with his head cocked to one side, in a sort of amused disgust.
‘Are you all right? Your face is purple.’
‘Hi … yes … fine … decided to … get fit …’ she squeezed out the words, and they sat in an awkward silence for several minutes while her face stopped pulsating. She took a few gulps of icy cold water that sent her into a coughing fit and, finally, when that was over, she could speak normally.
‘What’s the update?’
‘We successfully bugged Sacha’s office while they were at the party and we have tabs on him at all times thanks to the transmitter you planted. I also received your report on the conversation at the party and we’re busy confirming the information and monitoring the accountant. Good job.’
‘Thank you. So, what’s next?’
‘Surveillance are taking care of the rest and we’ll action the rest of the plan once the deal’s done.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘We don’t need you to do anything else.’
‘But what about—’
‘We agreed no unnecessary danger, Victoria. You’ve done what we needed you to do, and you were lucky you didn’t get caught, so let me take care of things now.’
‘So, I’m off the case?’
‘You can stand down.’
‘Jonathan—’
‘You’ve been a tremendous help in getting us access to Sacha, and uncovering valuable information, but the deeper we go into this, the more likely it is we will endanger you or your cover. It’s better to keep you out of the next bit. You’re too close to it all.’
‘It’s not my cover – it’s my life, Jonathan.’
‘Exactly. Better not to have any needless risk-taking, don’t you agree? Or any nasty conflicts of interest at the crucial moment. We’ve been there before, remember.’
Vicky clamped her teeth together and took a deep breath to stop herself throwing a punch at her boss.
‘I don’t think you needed to remind me of that again, sir. And I think in the past few months I’ve proved I’m still more than capable in a high-risk situation.’