by Anna Smith
He nodded.
She turned around, put the key into the lock with trembling fingers, then opened the door and went inside. Josef followed her in, and they climbed the two storeys to her door.
Tanya put the kettle on, watching from the corner of her eye as Josef glanced around him.
‘Is a good place here, Tanya.’ He licked his lips. ‘Better than where we were.’ He looked at her. ‘I am still there, but not for long. Is too much money.’
‘Then you should find yourself a job, Josef. That’s what everyone else does.’
He sat down quietly, and Tanya could sense him watching her as she made coffee. She crossed from the small kitchen area and handed him a cup, sitting on the chair opposite him and lighting a cigarette. He reached over and took one from her packet without asking her.
‘You have a good job these days, Tanya.’ His expression was blank.
‘If you’ve been following me, then you know.’ She drew on her cigarette and inhaled deeply, shooting him a defiant look.
Her stomach was in knots. She’d made a mistake inviting him in. At least he was calm so far, but she knew he could flip at any minute. She desperately wanted to pour herself a vodka to settle her nerves, but she didn’t dare because she couldn’t risk giving him any more alcohol.
‘I know you are working again. I saw you go into the hotel tonight and come out later.’ He looked at the floor, then at Tanya. ‘You are with the escort agency again?’
She nodded, saying nothing. They sat in silence, the air heavy with tension.
‘You should go now, Josef,’ Tanya said. ‘I’m tired. I want to go to bed. I have to work in the office in the morning at eight.’
Josef said nothing, but he didn’t move. She got up and went into the kitchen.
‘Please, Josef. I think you should go. We have nothing to talk about. I want to be alone.’ She turned to face him.
Josef didn’t speak, but Tanya could see in his eyes the rising anger. Her legs felt weak. She leaned against the worktop for support. He got up and came towards her.
‘Tanya,’ he looked at the floor hesitantly, then at her. ‘I need some money. I have nothing. You can see that. Can you give me some money?’
Tanya shook her head. She saw his fists clench at his side.
‘Josef. I need my money.’ She lifted her bag, and rummaged inside it. ‘I can give you twenty pounds. But that is all. Then you must go.’ She brought out a twenty-pound note and held it out to him.
He looked at it and smirked.
‘Twenty pounds? You were in the hotel for over an hour. It must have been more than a blow job!’ He snorted.
‘Take it.’ She thrust the money at him. ‘Take it and go.’
In a flash, he grabbed her handbag. A menacing sneer broke over his face as Tanya reached for the bag, tried to wrest it from him. He jerked his hand back.
‘Give me my bag.’
‘Shut up!’ he said, his eyes blazing. He stuck his hand into the bag.
He pulled out a wad of notes and made a soft whistling noise.
‘You have been a busy little whore. Haven’t you.’
He caught hold of Tanya’s wrist and twisted it as she reached out and tried to snatch the money.
‘Stop it. You’re hurting me.’
Josef pushed her back against the sink, squeezing her wrist.
‘You’re going to break it, Josef. Let it go.’ Tanya pleaded.
He pushed the money into his pocket, and slapped her face hard. Tanya felt dizzy and her legs buckled a little. She leaned on the worktop for support as he slapped her again.
‘You tell me to go find a job. You think what you do is a job? Slut!’
Tanya felt her face burn and blood trickle from her mouth. She blinked, looking at the red rage in Josef’s eyes, and as she did so, her hand slid along the worktop to where she kept the knives. As he came towards her, ranting, she grabbed the knife and stabbed him on the shoulder.
‘Bitch!’ He caught her hand and twisted her arm until the knife dropped. He touched his shoulder where the knife had nicked him. Then he punched her hard on the face. She saw the room sway as she slumped to the floor.
*
Tanya didn’t know how long she’d been out, but when she came to she slowly lifted her head from the floor and saw that it was getting light outside. She rubbed her eyes as she began to focus, and saw that all the drawers in the kitchen units were opened and their contents emptied on the floor. She crawled along the floor, her head pounding, her wrists stiff and swollen. Slowly she got to her feet and went to the sink, splashing water onto her face. She ran her mouth under the tap and spat out blood. She staggered to the living room and saw that all the cupboards were open. He must have ransacked everything looking for her money.
Suddenly her stomach dropped: the letter. She went back into the living room and quickly opened her bag. The money was gone. So was the suicide note to Frank Paton she’d taken from Tony Murphy’s desk.
‘Oh God, no!’ Tanya went into her bedroom and flopped onto the bed. She wept until she drifted off to sleep.
Later in the morning, she got stiffly out of bed and made her way to the kitchen. Her mobile phone was in her jacket pocket. She punched in the number and waited for the answer.
‘Rosie. It’s Tanya. Please, can you come here? I need to talk to you.’
*
Across the city Frank Paton was just walking into his office when the phone rang on his desk. He put down his briefcase and lifted the receiver, then walked around his desk and sat down.
‘Mr Frank Paton? Can I speak with Mr Frank Paton?’
The foreign accent had to be a refugee. Frank was irritated at having to take the call without knowing who it was and having their file in front of him. He looked at his watch. He was early. The temp secretary wasn’t due in for another ten minutes. He would have to deal with it, whoever it was.
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Frank Paton speaking. Who is this please?’
‘It is Josef. The husband of Tanya.’
Frank was surprised. Perhaps he was phoning to tell him Tanya was ill or something and wouldn’t be in. He hadn’t even noticed when he arrived if she was already upstairs in another area.
‘Oh, hello Josef. I don’t think Tanya’s in yet, if that’s who you’re looking for.’
‘No,’ Josef said. ‘I want talk with you, Mr Paton.’
‘Me? Okay. What’s the problem?’ There was no answer, though Frank could hear Josef breathing. Bewildered, he said, ‘Hello? Josef?’
‘I must see you,’ answered Josef now. ‘I have information. I have something you will want.’
‘What?’ Frank’s mind was thrown into confusion. ‘What do you mean Josef?’
Silence again, but for Josef’s heavy breathing, which made Frank uneasy. Then Josef spoke. ‘I have the letter. To you, from Murphy, the dead man. Your partner.’
The words exploded in Frank’s head and he jumped to his feet.
‘What are you talking about, Josef?’ Frank felt sick.
‘You know what I mean. He wrote letter to you before he kill himself. You want I read?’
Frank sat back down, his legs weak. Jesus Christ! He couldn’t speak. Josef broke the silence.
‘I read letter to you.’
Frank sat with his hand over his mouth as Josef read the letter in his fractured English, stumbling over some of the words. But the content was loud and clear.
‘Stop.’ Frank said. ‘Where did you get this letter?’
‘Where do you think?’ Josef was sarcastic.
‘Listen, you cunt. If you have something that has been stolen from this office you are in big trouble. I make one phone call and you’ll be in jail by lunch time.’ Frank’s face burned.
‘So you will call the cops? I don’t think so.’
The sneer in Josef’s voice put Frank into a blind rage and he gasped for breath. Slow down, he said to himself. Think clearly. He had to get this letter. Fucking Tony and his fucking guilty conscience.
‘What do you want?’ Frank’s tone was measured.
‘I want five thousand pounds.’
‘What?’
‘You hear me.’ Josef said. ‘Cash money. Tomorrow.’
‘You’re fucking joking.’
‘You pay the money, or I give letter to police.’
‘If you give the letter to the police, you will get arrested for stealing it.’ Frank hoped his voice didn’t sound as desperate as he felt.
‘I didn’t steal it.’
‘So who did?’ Frank knew the answer before he even said it.
‘That is for police to prove,’ Josef said. ‘But they going to ask you questions first. You want them to ask you questions? I think you are a crook, Mr Paton. You and Mr Murphy. Both crooks. You want police to ask questions?’
Bastard, Frank murmured to himself. The words in the letter rung in his ears – I told you we should have stopped. See you in hell … Tony. The cops would be all over him like a rash if they got hold of that. Christ! Twenty years at the top of his game and he was being done up like a kipper by some fucking Russian thicko who could hardly write his name. That fucking Tanya. He never trusted her from the start. It was Tony who wanted to give her the job, keys to the office, the lot. He trusted her too much. Now it was all coming into sharp focus in Frank’s mind. Tony must have been having an affair with her. He’d even asked him once, when he found the two of them having a laugh together in the office. But Tony always denied it. Tanya must have taken the letters. The bitch.
‘Listen,’ Frank said. ‘I’ll meet you somewhere. I need to see the letter.’ He wrote down the mobile number that was on his consul.
‘You call me when you have the money and we meet. The letter is not a trick, you know that for sure. You meet me, give me five thousand and I give you the letter. Then we say no more. You do this tomorrow, or I go to cops.’
‘Wait!’ Frank said. But the line was already dead.
CHAPTER 18
It had been two hours since Tanya had called, and Rosie knew by the sound of her voice she was in trouble. She’d wanted to go to her straight away, but she was stuck in her flat wondering what to do with Emir, who was still sound asleep. She finally woke him up and told him to stay in the flat until she got back, when she would call McGuire and talk about bringing in the cops. Emir was very grateful and said he wouldn’t leave until she returned.
As she sat in the Argyle Street traffic jam, Rosie’s stress levels were picking up the pace. She tapped the steering wheel nervously and glanced at her watch, reflecting on last night’s row with TJ. She knew how he would react when she told him she had Emir at her flat, and she considered not telling him at all when he’d called her, suggesting they go for dinner. She decided to be honest and he was predictably furious. He couldn’t believe she was being this reckless when she knew the kind of guys who were already after Emir.
‘You’re asking for trouble,’ TJ had said. Then, before he hung up, he added, ‘Actually no, Rosie. You’re going out of your way to make sure you get trouble. I don’t know what to do with you.’
His words had stung Rosie for the rest of the evening while she tried to clean up Emir’s wound, make him a meal and give him her spare room for the night. She had much more on her plate right now than a row with TJ, but she was about to phone him when her mobile lit up and vibrated on the passenger seat.
‘Gilmour. Where the hell are you?’ It was McGuire.
‘Oh. Hi Mick. Er, I’m just heading out to see Tanya. Got a call from her this morning, and I think she’s in some sort of trouble.’
‘Really? Well watch what you’re doing. By the way I didn’t hear from you all day yesterday. And why the fuck don’t you keep in touch? Am I going to have to start tagging you?’
‘Sorry, Mick. It all got a bit crazy last night.’
‘What did?’
‘I’ll tell you in a bit. I’ve got a lot to tell you.’
‘So tell me.’
She confessed that she and Matt had driven to Manchester behind a truck loaded with containers from the slaughterhouse. Once he stopped ranting and berating her for going without asking him, she told him about the PD Pharmaceuticals and the checks she’d made on them from library cuttings.
‘So, you’re not telling me they’re involved in the illegal trade of body tissue? Come on, Rosie. Don’t tell me you’re even thinking about us taking on a bloody multinational. Do you want to give the lawyers a stroke?’
‘We’re a long way away from that, Mick. But all I’m saying is the stuff they took from the slaughterhouse – whatever it was – they dropped off down at this plant, in an area kind of hidden away from the mainstream operation of the place. I’m told it’s the section where they test their drugs on animals. I spoke to a security guard and he said nobody ever gets inside that place and it’s all top secret. Maybe it’s just possible there is something dodgy going on and it’s top secret not for the reasons people think, but because of what they’re really doing. Or what they’re also doing … if you get my drift. Maybe they’ve got some rogue workers who are involved in the tissue trade and nobody else knows anything about it. It’s anybody’s guess.’
‘You’re beginning to sound plausible, Gilmour. But I won’t be going anywhere with this until we’re totally all over it.’
‘Of course.’
‘So what’s going on with this Tanya bird?’
‘Don’t know. That’s where I’m headed.’
‘And what happened last night? You said it all went a bit crazy.’
Rosie hesitated. But she knew she wouldn’t get away with it.
‘Well?’
‘Tell you later, Mick. When I come in.’
‘You will, and your arse. What the fuck have you done?’
‘Mick …’ She hesitated again. ‘Look. Can it not wait for a couple of hours?’
‘Just give me a heads-up, Rosie. Don’t fuck about. If you’ve done something stupid I want to know now. Come on. Out with it.’
Rosie took a deep breath, then exhaled as she turned into the street where Tanya lived. She drove along, trying to find a parking space.
‘Okay. Just briefly, Mick, because I’m about to go into Tanya’s flat.’ She stopped the car at the kerb. ‘Listen. The refugee, Emir? Remember?’
‘Of course I remember. I’m the fucking editor.’
Rosie stifled a laugh. McGuire was on his high horse.
‘Well, he called me yesterday. When I was on my way back up from Manchester.’
‘Great. At least he’s not chopped liver.’ McGuire chuckled at his own wit. ‘Yes. He told me the most amazing story about what happened. He’s been on the run for a few days. They kidnapped him. Took him to the slaughterhouse. I think he was next in line to be … er … chopped liver.’
‘Fucking hell,’ McGuire said. ‘So where is he now?’
‘He’s in my flat.’
‘What?’
‘Yeah. I let him stay there last night.’
‘Christ almighty, Rosie! Why didn’t you call me last night about this?’
‘It was just a spur of the moment thing. Sorry, Mick. I knew you’d go nuts, and I felt sorry for the guy. He was terrified, and he’d been stabbed on the arm. What was I supposed to do? He had nowhere to go.’
‘Rosie. When you get through with Tanya, give me a call. Then go back and make sure Emir hasn’t been murdered in your flat.’ He paused. ‘You know Rosie, this is just wrong what you’ve done. I’ll talk to you when you get in.’ He hung up.
*
When Tanya opened the door, Rosie gasped at the state of her face.
‘Shit, Tanya,’ she said, heading down the hallway. ‘What happened?’ She followed Tanya into the tiny living room, her mind flipping to junkie prostitute Mags Gillick the day she’d told her she’d got a dig from the bent cop who was using her.
Tanya sat down, lit a cigarette and inhaled deeply, the cigarette trembling in her fingers. She looked up at Rosie and sniffed. One eye
was black and swollen and her mouth was puffed up and bloodied.
‘Can I get you something, Tanya?’ Rosie said, not really knowing what to say. ‘Tea or something? Water?’
‘Coffee, please.’ Tanya jerked her head in the direction of the kitchen area behind her.
Rosie put the kettle on, searching in cupboards for the coffee and cups. She came back out and sat opposite Tanya.
‘What happened, Tanya?’
‘It was Josef.’ She wiped a tear from her eye. ‘He followed me last night from the hotel.’
‘The hotel?’ Rosie asked.
There was an awkward pause, and before Tanya took her eyes off the floor and looked up at her, Rosie knew what she was going to say.
‘I am working as escort.’ Her expression was flat, resigned.
‘Oh,’ Rosie said. ‘I didn’t know.’ But she wasn’t surprised.
‘Only in the past few weeks. I needed to get some more money. I did it before. A couple of years ago, and at first when I come to England.’ She blew out smoke and shrugged. ‘What the hell. It is easy money.’
Rosie watched her as she dissolved into tears. It wasn’t easy money. Never was. Not on any level. It was no easier for Tanya than it had been for Mags Gillick, or any of the women down the generations who had reduced themselves to hocking their bodies, whether it was for drugs, drink or any other reason.
Rosie got up, made two mugs of coffee and came back, handing one to Tanya before she sat down.
‘So Josef followed you,’ Rosie said, putting down her mug.
Through tears, Tanya told her about the beating, about how she had only let him in because she felt sorry for him, because there had been a time when he meant the world to her.
Rosie listened, saying nothing. Then Tanya stopped.
‘He stole from me.’
‘Your money?’ Rosie assumed.
‘Yes,’ Tanya, said, swallowing. ‘But that is not all.’
Rosie looked at her enquiringly.
‘Do you mean the piece of paper you showed me, with the names of the refugees?’
Tanya shook her head.
‘No. I have that in a safer place.’
‘What then?’
Tanya swallowed. ‘I stole two letters, Rosie. Suicide notes. From Tony Murphy, that day. I took them from his desk. One for his wife, and the second one was for Frank Paton.’