‘Whatever secrets she might have told him, they’re buried with him now.’
‘You say she left eight years ago. How long was she here?’
‘Six months. Maybe a little longer. She changed her name and worked here in the restaurant, which was when she must have written that card.’
‘To what? She changed her name to what?’
‘To Elena Toscano.’
‘Toscano?’
‘The postcard. Give it to me. Please.’
Señora Vaccaro said something to her companion, who then hurried forward to Frankie and placed the postcard in his hands. Turning it over, he read his mother’s words again:
YOU WERE THERE FOR HIM. JUST LIKE I ALWAYS KNEW YOU WOULD BE.
But he still couldn’t make any sense of them, because if Señor Vaccaro really was right about when this had been written, then that meant this wasn’t his mother thanking him for being there for Jack last year. Then thanking him for being there for what? He stared down at the smudged postmark. You couldn’t see the year, but the month looked like J – U – L something. Maybe Spanish for July was almost the same?
‘Did she . . . did she ever mention anything about my brother . . . about him nearly drowning?’ he asked. It was the only thing he could think of from back then. That time Jack had jumped off that bridge into the Regent’s Canal.
More hurried whispered translations. Señora Vaccaro nodded sharply in reply.
‘Yes.’
‘Then that might be what this is about,’ said Frankie. ‘Something that happened a long time ago.’ But, even then, he had no idea how she’d have known. ‘And what happened then?’ he asked. ‘Why did she leave here? And where is she now?’
‘You remember earlier I said that you might have reason to lie. And that you might have been sent here by someone?’
‘Yes.’
‘It was because we have reason to be wary.’
Wary. Now there was a euphemism if Frankie ever heard one. More like they’d nearly fed him to their dogs.
‘People came looking for her,’ Señor Vaccaro said. ‘Here, to Palma. People from London came to track her down.’
‘What people?’
‘Bad people, very bad people. I did not meet them as I was away at the time, but my father did.’ He pointed at a photo on the wall. A bunch of old boys, having a meal together in this exact same room.
‘That is my father. There at the head of the table. Do you see the scar on his face?’
A nasty one too. Right across his jawline. Whatever had done that must have hurt. ‘They did that to him? These people?’
‘Yes. Just to find out, as you wish to now, where she is.’
‘But he didn’t tell them.’
‘No.’ A look of fierce pride on his face. ‘And she got away that same day. She fled from here and she never came back. Though we do not know where and we have never heard from her since.’
Frankie felt like he was being crushed. Tears were welling up inside him and it was all he could do just to keep them inside. Because that’s what this was, a disaster. The second he’d found her, she’d gone.
‘Then I must thank you,’ he finally managed to say. ‘And your father. I must thank you all for everything that you’ve done.’
Señor Vaccaro stood and walked over to Frankie, and placed a hand on his shoulder. ‘Do not look so depressed,’ he said.
‘No?’ Frankie’s voice sounded suddenly tiny, like a child’s.
‘No, because even though we do not know where she went, we do know this. She had with her money. A lot of English money. Enough to get herself somewhere safe. Enough to survive.’
35
Frankie ate with the Vaccaros, his new relatives, that night. It had to be the strangest meal he’d ever had – not the food, mind. That was wonderful – caprese salad, mushroom risotto and brodetto – through which another mystery was solved. The smell of the food here had reminded Frankie of his childhood since the first time he’d come here. That was because the fish stew base, Señora Vaccaro explained, was an old family recipe that Frankie’s mum had learned as a child in Sicily and had added to the menu here, a part of her that still remained.
They quizzed him about his life in London, about the Ambassador, his father and Jack. They knew about them both and the Old Man being in prison and Jack nearly ending up the same last year – both stories had been big news in the English community over here, and Señor Vaccaro and Giovanni, being fluent speakers, had followed all the developments in the Daily Bulletin.
They asked Frankie about what he was doing here in the Balearics and he spun them a half-truth, deciding this wasn’t the time to get into what he’d be flying back into later tonight, particularly as he still wasn’t even sure himself. He told them instead that he was here with some colleagues from London on a business weekend. But he wondered if they’d know Jeremy and his family? How could they not know the ten families who appeared to control so much of Ibiza’s nightlife, when they seemed to control a fair bit of the tourist industry over here?
But mainly what he kept thinking throughout the whole meal was that no sooner had he found out where his mother had gone than he’d lost her again. The name she’d taken when she’d lived here, that bothered him too. Elena Toscano. Was it a name his mum had travelled under after she’d fled Palma? Could she have? Señor Vaccaro had no idea whether she’d had new ID made or not. It was possible that his father might have arranged for that. Or possibly she’d moved on under a different name entirely. Because if she’d changed her name once to avoid detection, then surely she might well have done the same again?
*
It was Isabella, eventually, who took Frankie to the airport. Señor Vaccaro – who’d finally let slip his Christian name of Carlo, and had insisted on Frankie now addressing him as Uncle Carlo – had offered to drive Frankie himself. But Isabella had said that it was no problem and that she was going that way anyway.
Uncle Carlo did what he could to make Frankie’s journey as easy as possible, like giving him back his plane ticket, for one thing. Seemed like the pooches hadn’t gobbled it down after all, which wasn’t true of the rest of his cash. Apparently they’d torn that to shreds before the sweary twins had been able to stop them. But Uncle Carlo now more than made up for that too, by giving Frankie another thick wedge of pesetas to replace it. As well as some extra, to pick himself up some new clothes at the airport.
As Frankie bade Carlo and the rest of them farewell, he had to write their numbers down on a piece of paper, as his phone was still lying crushed back there on that driveway in Deià. He promised to call them and to visit again as soon as he could. When he looked back from Isabella’s little red Fiat as she drove them away from the restaurant, he knew he’d made some friends here for life. Señora Vaccaro was openly crying and being comforted by her son, and even the lads Frankie had traded blows with – including that smooth old bruiser Giovanni – waved him off, albeit some of them with broken-lipped smiles.
Isabella was non-stop chitter-chatter all the way to the airport, like what had just happened was something they’d both read in Hello! And, yeah, Frankie got it. Because he was feeling like his life was no longer his own, and everything he thought he’d known was wrong. Nothing would surprise him any more.
She helped pick him out some new clothes at the Lacoste boutique at Palma airport. A gabardine jacket, T-shirt and jeans, as well as a new pair of trainers that certainly helped put a spring back in his heels.
Isabella seemed to approve too from the way she looked him up and down. All appraising, like, but still with a bit of a glint in her eyes. Which was kind of mutual, of course. Because where he’d found her pretty hot yesterday, he was looking at her through entirely different eyes now. She’d stuck up for him and had probably saved his arse from a right old beating. He grabbed her hand and led her along, as they followed the signs through to customs.
Yeah, wouldn’t that be something? To be jetting off with her for real to som
e exotic destination? Instead of saying goodbye before more than likely heading back to Ibiza to get his head kicked in by a bunch of crazy Russian thugs.
‘So . . .’ she said.
Because here they now were . . . the cut-off point. People with tickets were heading through the gateway into the long snaking queue that led to customs control, while those without were heading home.
‘So . . .’ He smiled.
‘What?’
‘Just that . . . well, you know, we’ve been here before, haven’t we?’
‘Here?’ She looked around, confused.
‘No, not here here, actually here. I mean here . . . as in the idiom, as in the circumstances. I mean, what we’re doing now, saying goodbye . . . it feels kind of the same as outside the restaurant yesterday . . . you know . . . awkward?’
‘Meaning bad?’ she said, frowning.
‘No, not bad . . . more weird, me saying goodbye to you . . .’
‘Ah . . . me.’ She looked up at him. ‘And what is it, exactly, you think about me?’
‘That you’re . . .’
‘I’m . . . ?’
‘Nice.’
‘Nice?’
He tried again. ‘Great.’
‘And this great, it is better than nice?’ She took his hands and he flinched. ‘Or maybe worse?’
‘No, definitely better.’
He saw she was smiling. ‘OK . . .’ She stepped in closer. ‘In fact, good. Because I think you are very nice . . . as well as maybe a little great also too . . .’
‘Just a little?’
‘Maybe even a lot.’
‘The only problem is . . .’ he said.
‘What?’
‘I’ve been acting like a bit of a dick, lately.’
‘A dick?’
‘Yeah. That’s, um, kind of a word for someone who keeps making bad decisions . . . who keeps getting things wrong.’ And, boy, had he been doing plenty of that of late. Sharon . . . Sky . . . ending up out here on Tommy Riley’s pay . . .
‘You do not seem like a bad person to me.’
‘No. And I don’t want to be but there’s stuff I need to sort out . . . before . . .’ He looked down at their hands. ‘. . . this.’
He saw the rejection in her eyes.
‘It’s not like that,’ he said, gripping her hands tightly in his. ‘I really do like you. It’s just . . .’
‘Timing.’
‘Yes. That’s exactly it. All my problems . . . what’s been going on, what I’m heading into now . . . I need it all sorted, so I can get back to being who I really want to be.’
‘The real Frankie James?’
‘That’s right. The very man.’ He looked down at their hands, at their fingers intertwined. ‘But I promise you this – I will come back.’ As soon as he said it, he knew it was true.
‘When?’
‘The end of the summer?’
‘To here?’
‘Yes.’
She stared into his eyes for a moment, then nodded, as though coming to a decision. ‘Then maybe that is what we should do,’ she said. ‘Agree to meet again. Or perhaps for the first time. To meet the real Frankie James.’
‘Yes,’ he said, ‘I’d like that, I’d like that a lot.’
‘But first I think I should give you something to remember me by.’
‘Oh, yeah, and what’s th—’
But he didn’t get to finish his sentence and didn’t need to. Because, as she rose up onto tiptoe and kissed him softly, briefly, on the lips, it was already obvious what she meant.
*
Back in his room in the Mandalay hotel in Ibiza Old Town, Frankie flopped down onto his bed and stared up at the ceiling, watching the fan go round and round. He couldn’t sleep. What had happened to his mother?
Had someone on Mallorca grassed her up? But who? He just couldn’t believe it had been one of the Vaccaros. They’d loved her – still did. Meaning maybe it had been someone back in London that she’d kept in touch with?
Because that was another thing that was bothering him. Who’d told her about Jack nearly drowning? Someone must have, or how else would she have known to write what she had on that card?
The Old Man? He doubted that. The two of them had hardly been on speaking terms when she’d still been living there herself. It had to be someone else then. Someone who knew both her and Frankie well enough to know what he’d been up to. Someone at the club? Or affiliated to it? Kind Regards? Or even Slim? But why would they have sent anyone after her when they cared for her too?
Someone bad, then. Because that’s what Uncle Carlo had said. Bad people. Bad people had come for her. But what kind of bad people? The kind ruthless enough to cut up that old man. Had he meant a gangster? Like a Hamilton or a Riley? Or even a cop? Some bastard like Snaresby? Someone who’d spent the last year hunting for her.
Frankie was now remembering something else too about what his mum had said to him that day she’d disappeared, when she’d made him promise to look after Jack. No matter what happens, she’d said. To me or your dad, or to anyone else. Like even then she’d known – that someone was coming for her . . . and maybe even the Old Man too?
But coming for what? Because that was the other question Frankie just couldn’t shake. Whoever these bad people were, they’d gone to all the effort of tracking and hunting her down. Meaning she’d either done something to them, or knew something about them, or had something they wanted.
Which left Frankie with the issue of the money. Where the hell would she have got that kind of money from? And where was she spending it now?
36
The call came at 5 a.m. It was Grew telling Frankie he needed to be outside in ten minutes. A quick shower later and on with the new clothes – because, sod it, if he was heading into hell, he might as well at least go dressed to kill.
He checked himself out in the mirror, remembering how he’d caught Isabella eyeing him up in the Lacoste boutique the day before. He remembered her kissing him too. Kissing this, his mashed-up, bruised face. The thought made him smile, because if she liked him how he’d been yesterday – all hungover and knackered and bloodied and torn – then she really must like him, right?
Three cars stood waiting in line outside the hotel. Mercs, well pukka with tinted windows and shiny chrome hubs – the works. They were exactly the kind of convoy you’d expect any copper worth his salt to take an interest in. Only Frankie reckoned the filth around here had already been bought off.
The back door of the last car in line swung silently open as Frankie walked down the hotel steps. Jesús peered out, smiling up. Just like Frankie’s, his face was looking well battered, this sunny morn. He stuck out his hand and him and Frankie shook. Grew had a point, the two of them might not exactly have hit it off to begin with, but after what they’d gone through at Indigo Blue, they were certainly now brothers-in-arms.
Jesús shuffled up to make room, dressed sharp in a suit too. Grew was on the other side of him, scowling, in jeans and a Paul Smith T-shirt.
‘Late again, but at least I suppose you’ve sobered up,’ he said, as Frankie climbed in.
I could say the same for you too, Frankie nearly said, but thought better of it. Grew didn’t look in a bantering kind of a mood. He’d clearly had his three Shredded Wheat. Or a Colombian version, at least.
‘So how far’s this villa?’ Frankie asked instead.
‘You’ll find out soon enough. And what the hell’s happened to your face?’
‘Nothing. Just the fight at the club. Or don’t tell me, you forgot?’
‘I don’t forget anything,’ Grew said. ‘Right, let’s fucking go.’
This last to the driver. Some local lad in Ray-Bans, who now flickered the headlights at the car in front, signalling the convoy to move off.
‘Gummi Bear?’ Jesús asked, offering Frankie the packet.
‘Yeah, why fucking not?’ Frankie somehow figured Grew hadn’t thought to bring croissants.
‘But
not the yellow ones,’ Jesús warned. ‘Those are mine.’
‘Fair enough.’ Frankie took a green one instead and sucked it as they drove on in silence.
Somewhere along the line, he must have nodded off. Because the next thing he knew, the Merc was pulling up behind the others in a small tourist lay-by on a quiet, drywalled country road. Down in the valley below, he could just about make out the tiled rooftops of a building among the trees.
Grew lit a smoke.
‘Your job’s the girl,’ he told Frankie. ‘Just get a hold of her and bring her back here to the car.’
The same, then, as what Tommy Riley had told Frankie back in London, when he’d first called in the favour, but everything had changed since then. Then he’d been told to persuade the girl to come back. But now? Shit. This sounded like something else entirely.
‘Get a hold of her?’ he mimicked. ‘You’re joking, right?’
‘Do I look like Jimmy fucking Tarbuck?’
No, fair point. He did not. ‘I’m not getting hold of anyone,’ Frankie said. ‘Not unless someone tries to get a hold of me first and I’m especially not getting hold of any girl.’
‘You’re working for Tommy, which means you’re working for me. You’ll do what you’re bloody well told.’
‘Just because I owe him a favour doesn’t mean he can click his fingers and turn me into a kidnapper.’
‘Actually, for the record, that’s exactly what it means. But if it will ease your conscience, my young friend, then what I’m actually asking you to do isn’t fucking kidnapping at all.’
‘And how exactly is grabbing someone and bundling them into a car against their will – and, trust me, I’ve met this girl, and this will be against her will – not kidnapping?’
‘It’s called protecting them. Because if you don’t do it, there’s a very good chance she might end up very badly hurt, or worse.’
Frankie just stared at him then. Worse? He meant dead.
‘But I thought the whole point of this, the whole point of coming here, was to just persuade her to come back home and for you to find Duke. Which I’m guessing you now have.’
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