by Robert White
“Susan! Get us two beers.”
Her look of mild displeasure turned to defiant anger. Her accent was European, German? Swiss? It didn’t matter. She was understood perfectly.
“Get them yourself, Joel; I have important things to do.”
Susan strode purposefully down the gravel path toward the house, turned briefly for what I considered maximum effect, and disappeared behind a green lion.
Joel was riled. His pride hurt. To a man like him, life was cheap, well fifteen grand actually. He curled his lip and pointed at me, an action I had no liking for.
“She knows exactly which side her bread is buttered.” He thumbed over his shoulder in her general direction. “Just a little Dutch temperament, that’s all, my friend. We’ll get our beer.”
Dutch, eh? Well I was close. So, this was the elusive wife of Joel Davies. You see it was unusual for me to actually meet my clients. Normally a middleman did the business. I had done several ‘contracts’ for Joel over the years. We now had an understanding. Both of us liked living so we adhered to the rules. This was only my second invitation to the home. I knew Joel had married some two years earlier. I also knew that his wife had got heavily involved in his international dealings. Exactly how involved I didn’t know, but I would make it my business to find out.
I heard the sound of Gucci on gravel and saw Susan walking toward us, two bottles of Heineken in hand. Her breasts jiggled under her T-shirt as she approached. Joel was right. She’d obviously had second thoughts. Davies beamed. His authority was restored.
I took the beer. “Thanks.”
No reply. She just stood with the second beer outstretched to Joel.
He took it. “You haven’t met Susan, have you?”
“No.”
“Well you have now.” He placed a hairy arm around her shoulders. He had to stretch to do so, he was a good three inches shorter than her. Susan tensed visibly. “Pretty, but petulant isn’t she?”
We made eye contact for the first time. I gestured toward the Mustang. “How long have you had the car?”
Her face softened slightly as she addressed me. She smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “It was a gift for my birthday, so, just three months.”
Joel squeezed her shoulder. This time Susan reciprocated with an arm around Joel’s waist but I got the impression it was just for show and she was really as tactile as I was.
“Classic car, eh? Cost me a packet,” bragged Davies.
His mobile bleeped in his breast pocket. He was still smiling as he answered it.
We’ve all witnessed it, now we have the mobile phone revolution; we get to see many more people receive bad news than we used to. Not only that, but we are often forced to hear personal conversations that are of no interest. Joel fitted both scenarios perfectly. His face quickly became a picture of seriousness. He screamed at the messenger, “You have to be fucking joking!” He quickly remembered his position, placed his hand over the mouthpiece and spat, “You two go back to the house. I’ll be with you in a minute.”
We dutifully obeyed and I walked behind Susan, who remained impassive at Joel’s barked command. We reached the massive patio where we were surrounded by the immobile green zoo. I sat on a huge cast-iron painted chair and took a sip of my beer. Susan seemed preoccupied with trying to overhear Joel’s telephone call.
I could hear him shouting from where I sat, so it wasn’t hard. It seemed something had gone seriously wrong with a boat purchase.
I checked my watch. I had things to do, places to go, and people to see, but I could cope with five minutes of small talk with someone as beautiful as Susan Davies.
“Did you design the garden?”
She broke off from eavesdropping for a moment and smiled knowingly.
“Unusual, isn’t it?”
“Not to my taste, I have to say.”
“Joel loves it, that’s all that matters.”
“Are you always so diplomatic?”
She folded herself in the next chair to me and crossed her legs. She looked at me intently, seemingly far more relaxed when not being fondled by Joel. She changed the subject.
“So how long have you worked for my husband?”
“I’m freelance,” I corrected.
She leaned forward and I could smell her perfume.
“I see. It’s strange we haven’t met before. I deal with many of his overseas affairs. Does he pay you well …erm…?” She fished for my name.
“Colletti, Stephen Colletti, and yes, I suppose he does.”
She seemed to mull over the information I had given her. “Are you of Italian descent, Mr Colletti?”
I balanced my half empty bottle of lager on the matching cast-iron table, which was the size of a small country.
“You ask a lot of questions, Mrs Davies. I find, in my line of work, anonymity is the best policy. And, if you’ll excuse me, now I must be going.”
Susan stood. “Of course, you must be a very busy man. Joel speaks very highly of your skills.”
I nodded, but thought it a lie. Joel was as secretive as I.
“Thanks for the beer. Please tell Joel I have a pressing engagement.”
Susan collected my discarded bottle.
“Have a nice day, Mr Colletti.”
“I will. Take care of the Mustang, Mrs Davies.”
As I walked down Joel’s pale pink gravel drive I mused over what I’d seen of Susan Davies, and if I’d known why she was so keen to collect my empties, I could have saved a lot of people a great deal of grief.
Not many men are keen on shopping with anyone else. That does not mean that men don’t enjoy some retail therapy just like our female counterparts. Partners, wives and girlfriends tend to slow down the process, that’s all. I feared my obsessive behaviour was slowly isolating me from normal society, although I didn’t feel sufficiently in control to stop the process. Although I had become somewhat reclusive, shopping remained one of life’s normal pleasures that remained. These days, my idea of a good time is shopping alone, and with someone else’s money.
There I was driving along the road with fifteen grand in used twenties and Susan’s perfume still in my nostrils.
I hadn’t had any sort of serious relationship with a woman for over ten years. Past events had seen to that. Susan Davies didn’t make me want to rush into another one either. Beautiful as she was, I got the impression she was a cold fish.
There was also a nagging doubt about her that I couldn’t quite fathom.
I put it to the back of my mind. Nothing was going to spoil my fun today.
I was really going to enjoy spending Joel’s money.
Another of my newfound obsessions was cars, as you have probably gathered by now, they were very important to me. Cars, clothes, risk and making money were all I craved; that and my own personal space. I liked to be a little different but I wasn’t into flash for the sake of it.
I was in my daytime car. A near new Range Rover Sport. It was the supercharged 4.2litre V8 Jaguar powered model, nearly 400bhp of grunt. The latest computer-controlled anti-roll system made the car more suitable for on-road. Brembo four-piston front discs stopped it on a sixpence and I liked it. Good sounds inside too. I’d had a six-speaker Bose system fitted that I could connect an iPod to. Snow Patrol played as I drove. The motor was just under fifty-five grand. The bullet-proofing was another eight. You have to be careful in my job.
I pulled up at Thomas Cook’s, where I bought ten grand of U.S. dollars in draft form. The girl in the exchange posed the usual twenty questions and asked for two sets of ID. I had no problem with the new money-laundering legislation. I smiled and filled in the form. I used D.H.L. to post Mr. Colletti’s banker’s draft for $19,800 to a numbered account in the Cayman Islands. I could then move that by mobile phone later and it would be virtually untraceable.
Now, that left me five grand to play with. Where do you start when you have that kind of money to blow on whatever you want?
After all the ye
ars of wearing uniform, I had developed a liking for expensive clothes, so, first to Ralph Lauren. I spotted a nice navy two-piece suit for a meagre nine hundred and fifty quid. When you’re six foot tall you need a good tailor, and it fitted like the proverbial glove so I took it. A pair of formal plain toe Oxford shoes by Oliver Sweeney came next a snip at two nine five.
Shirts, I love shirts. As I skipped around town I found classic white cotton by Ermenegildo Zegna at a hundred and twenty quid. A blue gingham check by Alfred Dunhill, eighty-five, a couple of casual shirts at Duck and Cover for under a ton and four ties at Thomas Pink for just two hundred dabs.
That’s under two grand! I needed to look at boys toys.
Now I nearly lost my fine mood in the first store. I wanted a new mobile. The little shit in the shop was so full of bollocks about, ‘you need this, sir, and you need that, sir, you get more free minutes with this model, sir…” I could gleefully have cut his fuckin’ ears off and posted them to his unlucky parents. Did I look like I needed free bloody minutes?
Anyway, a few deep breaths and a quick squeeze of the little fella’s arm were enough to return me to my pleasant self. I think the manager was close to calling the cops, until I bought the new BlackBerry phone by Motorola at three hundred quid. I liked it. It didn’t spoil the line of my suit.
I knew I had a couple of jobs on the horizon that needed a small video camera so I picked up the new Panasonic DS 33 digital camcorder, incidentally the smallest in the world, from a little camera place just off St Peter’s Square.
With just over a grand left to spend, I stopped for coffee in Nero’s on Oxford Road and pondered dinner arrangements.
I prefer Nero’s to Starbucks, even though they allowed smoking at the rear of the shop. The coffee is better, and it feels like a coffee shop rather than McDonalds.
I was served my skinny latte by an overly camp lad with green hair. He almost hissed like snake when he pronounced his S’s delivering the company spiel of, “Any cakes or pastries, sir?”
I gave a, “No thank you.”
He added a cheeky, “Sweet enough?” as I handed over my money, which I politely ignored.
I found a comfy, if slightly worn leather armchair by the front window and sat to sip my coffee and read the paper. It was a lovely early summer day, and Nero’s windows were folded open. I people watched for a few moments. The mixture of human beings wending their way along Oxford Road on a sunny afternoon was enough to keep most people entertained.
I was jolted back to earth by a well-known voice.
“Stephen? Stephen Colletti?”
I turned to see a thirty-something, rather rotund and balding Greek guy, dressed in a dirty green polo shirt, cheap black trousers and Asda training shoes. He reminded me of Jack Nicholson. He had gas flame blue eyes that sparkled when he spoke. I would wager he was popular with the ladies, despite his lack of hair and growing pot belly.
It wasn’t as if Spiros Makris couldn’t afford the best, I knew full well he could, he was just a tight bastard.
He didn’t wait to be invited to sit opposite me, but simply flopped into the chair. He held out his hand and I took it but quickly returned it to my coffee cup.
“Hello, Spiros.”
He looked me up and down.
“You look like a bloody tourist,” he said and laughed. As he did so his shoulders heaved up and down in the most comical fashion.
“And you look like a cheapskate forger,” I retorted, quiet enough for secrecy.
The reason Mr. Makris knew me by name was he invented it, together with my passport, driving licence, National Insurance and medical card. I even had a medical history and a work record. It was one of four separate identities he had formulated for me over the last eight years or so. I also knew he was relatively wealthy as the four ID’s cost me ten grand each and I was not Spiros’s only customer by any means.
He had a double espresso in front of him and he grimaced as he took a sip.
“Why do you bother drinking in these bloody Italian shops? Greek coffee is so much better.”
He put down the tiny cup and patted me on the knee. I sat back slightly so I’d be out of reach should he try it again. He didn’t notice.
“I saw your picture in the paper, Stephen. You need to be more careful, my friend.”
I nodded. I had amassed a small fortune over the last few years. Spiros was right; the time was fast approaching for another visit to my Greek forger and a change of scenery.
“Nosey reporters, Spiros, it only made the Manchester paper, nothing to worry about.”
I could see he wasn’t convinced.
“I saw it. Those Irish bastards have long memories, Stephen, and you know they are still active. They might have changed their name. What? They add ‘Real’ to the front. They are still bloody IRA, my friend.”
Spiros’s father had fought in the British Army in WWII. He was decorated with the George Cross for bravery in 1944. He saved the lives of three British sailors off the coast of Corfu after their boat was torpedoed. He entered the water three times under machine gun fire to pull them to safety. He had a wife and four sons, and brought them to England in the early sixties. Spiros opened a small Greek restaurant in Manchester. One son, Kostas, still ran the family business, the other two brothers’ imported olive oil. Well, it said ‘Olive Oil’ on the tin. Of course Spiros had his little side-line in identity theft and manufacture.
I drained my latte and stood.
“I know where you are, Spiros. If the shit hits the fan, I’ll come and see you.”
“Okay, Stephen, but you be careful, eh?”
I shook his hand briefly. “I will, I will.”
I lived on the Docklands in the city of Salford by choice. It was a strange place, full of business types with the odd celeb and a television studio smack in the middle. Yet on its surrounding edges was a Manchester gangland hell-hole. The oldest reported gangland battles were reported in Salford. They started knocking hell out of each other before the Mafia or the Triads were even thought of. Bet you didn’t know that one, eh?
Still, I liked it because I got good secure parking for my night-time car, and a gymnasium on the top floor meant I didn’t have to pay to sweat with a mixture of steroid-popping bouncers and bimbos with a full face of make-up in some local country club.
My apartment was sparsely furnished. I have always disliked clutter of any kind, but in more recent times it had become just another element of my obsessions. The minimalist look therefore suited my taste. I was lucky enough to obtain my floorboards from a two-hundred-year-old mill that had been demolished to make way for further development. I’d had them professionally sanded and laid throughout the apartment.
Once finished with clear varnish, they were a beautiful honey colour and gave the otherwise characterless rooms a feeling of warmth and history. All the furniture, pictures and electrical appliances were provided by Selfridges’ in-house interior designer. It worked for me. So it should, not including a Persian panel rug imported from Turkey for close on eight grand, or two La-Z-Boy armchairs I wanted for my den at a grand each, the interior decoration and furnishings cost me sixty thousand pounds.
There were three bedrooms. One I slept in, one was an office-cum-den for my business (the money had to appear to come from somewhere!) and the last I used as one large walk-in wardrobe. I removed all my purchases from their packaging, folded it all neatly and threw it in the compactor before any traces of paper plastic or pins could fall on the floor and force me to vacuum the whole apartment. I then ironed the shirts and ties, polished the shoes and put them all in the correct place.
After a long shower and a shave, it was time to dress for dinner. I had a date with the rest of that five grand. I sipped my second glass of Chablis. It was refreshing and suited my mood as I wandered around my wardrobe.
When people buy something new most like to wear it that day, I was no different. Therefore, I laid out the Ralf Lauren suit I had bought that afternoon.
I stuck my old SIM card in my new Motorola and I was ready.
On the stroke of eight my security phone buzzed. I drained the last of my wine and killed off the Libertines from the stereo. As I lifted the receiver, a small black and white image appeared on a screen on the phone. I pressed the button to allow my guest entry. She strode straight to the underground parking area, without coming to the flat. I took the lift and arrived to find her leaning against the white paintwork of my prized night car. I’ll tell you all about the Aston when we have more time.
Her seemingly endless legs protruded from the briefest red mini dress. I hadn’t seen it before but to me it looked like a DKNY. Her black skin shone with the Tisserand oils she always applied. Her shoes were as red as the dress, delicate straps and a four-inch spike, definitely Jimmy Choo. Terribly uncomfortable, but she knew I loved them. She dressed the whole thing up with a very chic charcoal wrap from Giorgio Armani I had bought her for her birthday last year.
“Hello, Tanya.” I took her hand. She gently pulled me toward her and kissed me briefly on the mouth.
Without a word, she pulled me closer still and kissed me harder. There seemed urgency to her actions and I had the feeling that, should she want sex there and then, I may not have a choice in the matter.
When it came to Tanya, I was all for going with the flow. After all, she was one of the few people on the planet that I could allow to touch me without feeling physically sick. Fuck the new suit, or the risk of scratching the classic motor. If Tanya wanted to romp over the bonnet, there and then, it was going to happen, and bollocks to the security cameras.
Tanya had other ideas and drew away quickly, teasing me. She was of Jamaican origin. Very tall and slender with fantastic muscle definition. She worked hard at her body. It showed. Her voice was deep, with the thick ‘Yardie’ street accent when she pleased. “Slow, man, you too eager. It be a long night, you take it easy, baby.”