by JL Merrow
“What sort of place was that?” Phil interrupted.
“The Last Lick? Oh, it’s just a pub.” That was a relief. For one mind-boggling moment I thought it might have been some seedy sex club. Don’t get me wrong, if a girl wants to do that sort of thing for a living, it’s her business, but I didn’t like to think of someone as young and innocent as Marianne getting mixed up with all the slimy bastards you get hanging around those places.
Not that I’ve got any personal experience, of course. But I’ve read the Daily Mail.
“Anyway,” she went on, “Cas used to drink there regular, and we got talking one night. And she was lovely, and I saw her again when I wasn’t working, and we had loads of fun together. Like it was with Grant, back when I first met him?”
Right. Back when he’d been supposedly in mourning for his dead girlfriend. Lovely.
“And we was just friends, first off, and then, well, we weren’t, you know?” She looked up. “I never meant it to happen, it just did, see? So I told Grant I couldn’t see him no more.”
Phil huffed. “Flipped his shit, did he?”
“He just went really quiet. He didn’t get angry at me, just sort of sad. Said as how he didn’t know how he was going to go on without me. And I felt proper bad about it, so when he asked me to give ’im another chance, I did, see?” She picked up her mug with two hands. Neither of them was quite steady. “And he was so nice to me, after. Least for a bit. He asked me to move in with him, and I thought, well, if it makes him happy, see? So I did.” She took a sip from her mug. “It was later he started saying stuff. See, Cas was still coming into the pub with her friends, even though we weren’t together no more. So Grant said I ought to give up my job. But I didn’t want to. I like working in pubs. Talking to people, all that stuff. I wouldn’t know what to do with myself if I didn’t have a job to go to. But then he started saying this stuff, like, how a dyke bitch like her would probably love it in prison, and how it was just so easy for stuff to fall into someone’s bag.”
“Shit—did he do anything to her?”
“No. I never went out with her again, and I didn’t dare let him see me talking to her no more.” She took a sip from her mug, her eyes sad, and gave a little sniff. “She didn’t want to talk to me anyway. Not after that. But I didn’t give up my job,” she added defiantly.
Good for her.
“What about this bloke? Alan?” Phil must have scented blood. “Did he talk about planting stuff on him?”
“I should’ve gone to the police, shouldn’t I? But you don’t know what he’s like. He twists stuff. Makes it sound like you’re the one who’s lying, not him. And he never said nothing outright.”
Harry was nodding. “He’s a plausible little shit, all right. Almost had me convinced he was only looking out for Marianne when he came round.”
Phil nodded. “Right. Well, that’s something I can work with. Look into the case, see if there’s any evidence linking Carey with the drugs.”
He got Marianne to tell him everything she could remember, which pretty much boiled down to a name, Alan Mortimer, the name and rough location of the business he’d run before he’d gone on an enforced holiday at Her Majesty’s expense—something to do with importing electronic goods, which was what Marianne reckoned Carey’s business was all about, too, although she was hazy on the details—and a few dates.
She’d been sixteen when she’d started going out with Carey. Sixteen, and living on her own in some London dump, slaving away in a café to make ends meet. Christ.
The last thing she did before she left was hand over a few more photos of Carey. I didn’t get a good look until after Harry and Marianne had said their good-byes, shaken hands again—this time with me as well, except for Marianne, who gave me a cherry-ChapStick-scented kiss on the cheek—and gone. Then I sat down on the sofa with Phil to have a proper butcher’s.
Carey, like I said, was a slightly built bloke about my height. He had dark hair that was just starting to recede at the temples, devil-style, and the sort of big brown eyes a teenage girl would probably think were soulful. He looked a bit older on closer examination—at least my age. Which, by my reckoning, made him around a decade too old for Marianne—I mean, seriously, with her rocking the schoolgirl look, people must have wondered if he was her dad—but even though he wasn’t my type, I’d have to admit he was good-looking.
Phil probably wouldn’t kick him out of bed. I sent a sidelong glance at my so-called better half, who was studying the photos like he wanted to be able to remember them in private later.
Not that I was, you know, feeling insecure or anything.
Most of the pics were just of Carey on his lonesome, with him looking straight at the camera and smiling like he didn’t have a care in the world. They were a bit less obviously posed than a lot of people’s snaps tend to be, with him all friendly and relaxed looking. You wouldn’t have believed this bloke would get up to the sort of stuff Marianne had told us about, if you hadn’t heard her firsthand.
Maybe it was just all that practice he’d had at getting people to let their guard down around him. But there was one with Marianne in it too, and that one was a bit more revealing. Carey hadn’t been expecting it, I reckoned. There was a cold gleam in those eyes of his, and his arm around Marianne’s shoulders looked just a bit tighter than could have been comfortable.
I don’t like bullies. Never have. “Course, maybe it’s not his fault,” I mused. “Maybe he had a bad childhood. I mean, who calls their kid Grant Carey?”
“Forties film fans?” Phil suggested without looking up.
“S’pose. Hey, he was one of our lot, wasn’t he? Queer, I mean. Cary Grant.”
“No. Cary Grant was straight. You’re thinking of Archie Leach.”
I frowned at Phil, but the tiny smirk on his face decided me against asking who the bloody hell Archie Leach was, and what he had to do with the price of fish. “So what do you think about Carey?” I asked instead.
Phil hmm’ed. “I think I’ve seen him around, somewhere. Which is interesting. For a bloke with a business to run in London, he seems to be spending a lot of time around here.”
“Maybe he’s expanding his operations. Taking advantage of the lucrative Hertfordshire market for knockoff iPods.”
Phil shrugged. “Even dodgy businessmen take holidays now and again.”
“In Hertfordshire? Costa del Sol all booked up, was it?”
“I didn’t say it was his main holiday. Anyway, not everyone likes baking their brains on a beach.” Phil gave me a pointed look. We were in the middle of a bit of a debate about where we’d be heading off to, once the gay wedding of the year was all done and dusted. I came down firmly on the side of sun, sea and sand, but Phil was holding out for a bit of culture, which, as far as I could tell, meant trekking miles around dusty old ruins.
If I’d wanted to spend my time off doing that sort of thing, I could just go and visit Mum and Dad.
“Maybe it’s one of those activity holidays some people go on,” I suggested, hoping we weren’t about to rehash the whole bloody argument. “You know. Cooking holidays. Painting retreats. Countryside stalking escapes. Take a break in idyllic rural surroundings and indulge your creepy obsession at the same time.”
Phil looked thoughtful. “There’s an idea. You ever think of doing something like that?”
Bugger. So much for keeping this about Carey. “What, stalking my exes?”
“Activity holidays, as if you didn’t know.” He gave me a grumpy glare, which was the Morrison equivalent of an eye-roll.
“See, this is where we have the problem. If you ask me—”
“Which I didn’t.”
“—activity holidays are a whatsit. Contradiction in terms.”
“Oxymoron.”
I flipped him a finger. “Same to you with knobs on. Nah, the whole point of a holi
day is that you don’t have to bloody well do anything. That’s why they call it a holiday and not, you know, work.”
Phil huffed. “I’m not asking you to go on a bloody plumbing holiday. Ever thought it might be fun, trying something a bit different? Doesn’t have to be sodding intellectual.”
I shifted uneasily in my seat. “So what’s it going to be, then? Pottery in the Cotswolds? Circumnavigating the country on a bloody canal boat?”
“What are you, seventy? We could have a go at rock climbing, maybe. Or, if you’re so desperate to get sand up your crack, we could go somewhere that does water sports.”
“My mum wouldn’t like it if I got up to any kinky stuff,” I said primly.
My turn to get the finger. But at least he didn’t come back at me with Your mum hasn’t got a leg to stand on. Which was fair enough, really. I mean, a bit of adultery is hardly on a par with becoming an enthusiastic member of your local fetish club.
And, ye gods, I was giving myself mental images I really didn’t need. I sighed. “Look, we’re getting off track here.”
“Noticed, did you?”
“Shut it. So where do you reckon Carey’s hanging out? Reckon he’s got a mate around here he’s dossing with? Or just taking a lot of day trips?”
“Either’s possible, but my money’s on him getting a hotel room. Be a pain if he was out stalking and missed the last train home. And Marianne wouldn’t run away somewhere she knew he had connections, would she?”
“Well, I’d hope not. She’s not that dizzy. Hang about, though, she never said she’d run away from him.”
“No. Harry did, when we spoke on the phone. She was too scared to tell the bloke it was all over—again—so she just packed her bags and did a runner while he was out doing one of his dodgy business deals.”
“Yeah? If I was her, I’d have run a bloody sight further than Hertfordshire. Gets tired easy, does she? Or was it some kind of reverse psychology thing—he’ll never look for me only twenty-five miles away, that sort of thing?”
“Had to have somewhere to run to, didn’t she?” Phil huffed a laugh. “Seems Harry’s got a bit of a reputation for taking in waifs and strays. That so-called bloody harem of hers?” He was referring to the parade of pretty girls who worked at the Dyke for a bit and then moved on to pastures new, local wisdom being that Harry’s relationships never lasted long. “It’s a load of bollocks. It’s just a bunch of girls who need a safe place to stay for a bit. LGBT organisations put ’em in touch.”
“Huh. I always knew Harry was all right.” I scowled down at the table. “Makes me mad, that bastard threatening her.”
“Oi, no coming over all chivalrous. Harry’ll have your bollocks if she catches you.”
“Miss ’em, would you?”
“Too right.” Phil gave me a gentle squeeze in a relevant area, and the discussion sort of degenerated after that.
Not that I was complaining, mind.
Monday was another scorcher of a day, despite it being a bank holiday and therefore legally required to be wet and miserable. If we’d known it was going to be like that, we might have bothered with planning something—maybe hop on a train down to Brighton, something like that.
Then again, maybe not. Being stuck on a baking-hot train full of kiddies all hyper from the half-term holidays for the best part of two hours was probably even less fun than it sounded. At any rate, by the time the heat had forced us out of bed, it was too late to bother, so we just had a lazy day at home. Well, I had a lazy day at home. Phil got out his laptop to do a few of the preliminaries on Marianne’s case. Luckily for me, he did it with his shirt off so I had something to look at too.
Arthur came padding into the room while Phil was stalking Carey’s Facebook page (status: in a relationship with Marianne Drinkwater. Seriously? Drinkwater? And her a barmaid?). He—Arthur, that was—eyed my lap speculatively.
“Not a chance, sunshine,” I told him. “Last thing I want in this weather is your furry arse parked on top of me.”
Phil looked up from his computer, which was one of those posh silver ones that are so thin you could get paper cuts from the edges, unlike my trusty old laptop that needed a six-inch-thick case to fit all the cogs in. “I hope it’s the cat you’re talking to.”
“I would say you can park your arse on top of me any time, but right now I’d be lying. Jesus, when did England move to the tropics?” I fanned myself weakly with the culture section of yesterday’s Sunday paper—well, I had to get my money’s worth out of it somehow.
“I blame gay marriage,” Phil said absentmindedly, still tapping away at his keyboard. Then he shut the lid with a sigh. “God, I need some fresh air.”
“You’re in the wrong county for that. Try Sussex, or Norfolk, or pretty much any other bloody county. Somewhere with a sea coast.”
“What is it with you and beaches? Reckon you’re going to find one with buried treasure one day?”
“I dunno, do I?” I leaned back in the sofa and closed my eyes, wondering if a cool drink would be worth the effort of actually moving. “Maybe it’s genetic. I could come from a long line of seafaring folk, couldn’t I? What?” I added, miffed.
Phil was giving me a smug look. “I knew you hadn’t forgotten about your dad.”
“Course I haven’t bloody forgotten. Not exactly the sort of thing that just slips your mind, is it?”
“Poor choice of words. I mean, you’ve been thinking about it all bloody day, haven’t you?”
“Well, not all day. I seem to remember someone taking my mind off it pretty well this morning. But yeah, I guess. Um. You mind not coming round tomorrow evening? Thought I might give Cherry a bell and invite her over. You know, to talk about stuff.”
He nodded. “About time. And I meant what I said before. I’ll have a dig around, see what I can come up with, all right?”
Chapter Three
Tuesday was a mare of a day. I blamed the weather—tempers rising with the mercury, that sort of thing. And, all right, maybe I was a bit on edge about the coming evening. Not that I’d spoken to Cherry yet about popping round, but, well. I’d made the decision—finally. It was going to happen.
At any rate, I had a particularly bolshie lot of customers, and by the time four o’clock rolled round I was hot, bothered and ready to call it a day.
Mr. H over in Fallow’s Wood—the posh bit near Brock’s Hollow—was the worst. A retired director of something-or-other important, he insisted on breathing down my neck the entire time I was installing his new Regency bath taps. It was like he was worried I was going to chip off some of the gold plating and run off with it.
“I hope you’re taking good care of those. They cost a lot more than I’m paying you to put them in,” he said, and then gave a little laugh so I’d think he was joking. Which I didn’t, because I’m not daft.
“Don’t worry, mate. I’ll handle ’em like they’re my own.” I didn’t tell him my own what.
“Hmph.” He was quiet for a blessed thirty seconds or so, but the hairs on the back of my neck were still prickling, so I managed not to jump when he spoke again. “You sound very British. Second-generation immigrants?”
“Nah,” I said, freeing the old taps carefully. They were still in perfect nick—just apparently not flashy enough. Well, if he didn’t want ’em, I could probably find someone else who would. “It’s just a name. We’re not Polish. Not even a little bit.”
“Names have to come from somewhere,” he said snippily. “You must have at least one Polish forebear.”
“Yeah, well. Long story. Right, best not talk during this bit, all right? Wouldn’t want to damage the taps, would we?”
He finally backed off, thank God. Only to rally when I gave him the bill and argue till he was blue in the face—well, bluer; he had a sort of permanent purple tinge going on—that every tradesman he knew gave a twenty percent d
iscount for cash in hand. Then he got his knickers in a twist when I told him I wasn’t up for defrauding the government, so I’d like the full amount, please.
All in all, it was a gift from the gods when I got to the last job in Southdown and realised I wasn’t going to be able to do it today. I’d have to order a new pump in, seeing as the one I had in the van turned out to be faulty.
Mrs. L was pretty understanding about it, in the circs. Like she said, who needs hot water this weather?
I swung by the supermarket on the way home, then had a shower. Lukewarm to show solidarity with Mrs. L, not that she’d know anything about it. It was still a bit early to ring Cherry—she might be in a meeting or something—so I grabbed a bottle of beer from the fridge and switched the telly on, but the sofa just wasn’t comfy this evening. Too hot, or something. I put my beer down on the coffee table, got up and stretched my legs a bit, then wandered into the kitchen. I stared out of the window (waste of time; the view hadn’t got any more interesting since the last time I’d looked), gazed blankly at the calendar on the wall (the Chippendales; a present from Gary; Mr. May was rocking the oiled pecs and leopard-skin posing pouch look) and tapped my fingers on the kitchen counter. Merlin pricked up his furry little ears at the sound, but Arthur carried on ignoring me in favour of scarfing down his dinner like there was no tomorrow.
Speaking of dinner… It’d been slim pickings in the fresh produce aisle, so my and Cherry’s tea was going to be quiche garnished with the few limp lettuce leaves I’d managed to forage for in the supermarket. I could rustle up a pretty good selection of pickles, but it still wasn’t anything I was particularly proud of as a spread.
I could make a pasta salad. Yeah, that’d pad things out a bit. Make it look like I’d made a bit of an effort. I nodded to myself and put the water on to boil.