I automatically raised a palm back, but then I frowned. “Why?”
“Got myself a flat!” He was beaming.
Jo looked up too. “Where?”
“Pretty close to you two,” he reported. “Not cause I’m stalking you, mind, just because it’s the sensible place to be when we have to come back up here so often. Don’t want to spend half my life trying to get round town on the ring road…”
I smiled encouragingly. “Sounds good.”
“Bout time!” Jo threw at him.
“Yeah I know,” Pete agreed. “Now I’ve actually done it, I can’t understand what took me so long to make the move.”
“Are Mum and Dad pleased? They won’t know what’s hit them suddenly having the house to themselves for the first time for getting on for thirty years!”
“When you put it like that…” Pete agreed. “It does sound quite momentous.” He sat down on the bench near us. “Actually, I wasn’t quite sure about what Mum thought. Finally I ended up a bit snarky with her like. Ended up saying, ‘well maybe I might actually manage to get myself a long term partner now. It’s no wonder I end up dating girls that are so much younger than me! No girl my own age worth her salt would look twice at a bloke whose still living with his parents at the age of twenty eight. I must look like a complete loser!’”
I looked at him out of the corner of my eye and said nothing.
“And then I said, ‘no wonder Eve went off with Tyler, he had a bit more about him, didn’t he?’”
Jo seemed to be only half listening, but I was wondering what the significance of him saying all this aloud to us was. Was he telling me that he was looking for someone the same age as him to settle down with, or hinting to me that he was trying to make himself a better bet for myself if I wanted to reconsider him?
“When are you moving in?” Jo asked.
“After Venray,” he said.
“Ok, good, we’ll look forward to coming round then,” she said offhandedly, while frowning at the piece of metal in front of her.
The men were off to Holland this weekend for fixtures at Posterholt. There was no way I could afford that. Then it would be the World Championship semi-finals at Kings Lynn, and then they would be back to the Netherlands for the World Cup at Venray.
“Wouldn’t it be great if your Dad won the World Cup!” I exclaimed subversively to Jo.
“I don’t think Toon’ll be allowing that,” Jo said with a laugh. “The Dutch’ll do anything to stop their cup going to England.”
“As long as they don’t trash my car in the process,” I said protectively.
While the men were away in Posterholt, I had a World of Shale Qualifier at Mildenhall, and then I avoided the fixture at Hednesford because the big banked up 420 metre track is notorious for trashing F2 engines and I didn’t want to have to be doing major work on it before the semi-finals, and we took Cody instead on a minor local outing to Barford.
I chose to have her in the car with me so I could quiz her about Jessica, and find out how she’d got on with Quinn.
She didn’t know much more about Jessica. They’d disappeared and the house had suffered an arson attack. No it wasn’t burned down exactly, it was still standing. But it was a complete mess and if anyone had been sleeping in there that night they’d have probably not got out alive.
I felt a bit sick.
As for Quinn. He was obviously a big hit. She only blushed once when talking about him, so maybe she was getting over that crush. Or at least viewing him as a normal, if extremely attractive guy, rather than as a demi-god. But then she went and darted a little sideways look at me and said a bit breathlessly, “he’s absolutely gorgeous isn’t he? He’s even more handsome than I imagined he’d be when we used to see him on TV!”
Oh well, maybe not then. Didn’t bode well for Wentworth.
Ellie needed another outing. I went and sat her on that wall. Knee length skirt. Girlish cardie. It was a bit earlier than usual, about six o’clock. I didn’t know if he’d pass, but I didn’t want a late night tonight so I’d give it an hour and then go home.
He did come. He leaned right over and opened the passenger door. I got in. He smiled at me. I smiled back. There was no one else in the car. He drove me a short way and took me up to a flat. I looked quickly around. Completely empty. Rather nice. Sun streaming through the windows. Creams and oranges and deep reds. There was a thick soft sheepskin rug in front of the cream sofa with the orange cushions. I didn’t like to ask if this was where he lived, but it obviously was.
“What would you like to drink?” He asked, indicating a collection of bottles on a low carved table in the corner.
I looked back at him. “Tea,” I said.
He laughed. “Ok, then, tea it is.”
He went into the kitchen and put the kettle on. I followed him through. The kitchen was ultra modern, all sleek dark surfaces with a slight underlying sparkle. He still hadn’t said anything to me. He stretched and yawned as he waited for the kettle, then put a fancy looking teabag into a white china teapot, waited a minute or so, then poured out some pale green liquid into two clear glass cups.
He handed one to me and answered my querying look with “Green tea and jasmine.”
I followed him back out sniffing deeply at the steaming liquid. It did smell beautifully fragrant.
He threw himself down on the sofa with a sigh, and patted the seat beside him. I sat down and carefully put the hot full cup down on another low carved table with glass coasters on it.
He gave me a sidelong look and laughed. “You really love those shoes, don’t you? You wear them whatever else you’re wearing whether they go with it or not! And then when I take them off – like this-” He slipped them both off my feet. “You watch them anxiously all the time like you think someone’s going to steal them.”
“Do I?” I said innocently. His hands started working on one of my feet. I relaxed and leant back in the sofa. He smiled at me. If the situation were anything other than it was, this would be bliss. I stretched my other foot out for the same attention and closed my eyes. When I opened them again, he too was looking relaxed. He reached for his cup of jasmine tea and sipped it. I tried mine. Bit too hot still. Unusual tasting. Bit bitter, but you could definitely taste the flowers in it.
“After last time, I got my friend to teach me how to do a foot massage,” I said. “Do you want me to try one on you?”
He smiled again, seemingly amused.
“You’ll have to lie down on the rug though,” I suggested.
He lay down on the soft sheepskin and I knelt down and took his shoes and socks off. “Tell me if it tickles or hurts at all. I’ll try not to let that happen though.” I started to work on his feet. They were soft and smooth and his soles were lighter than the top. He was stretched out, completely relaxed, seemingly in heaven.
“You have lovely feet,” I said.
He opened his eyes briefly and smiled.
“What now?” I asked. Then wished I hadn’t in case he asked for something sexual.
He didn’t open his eyes. “You can do my forehead.” He said magnanimously.
I moved to the other end and took his head into my lap. I began to massage his forehead, and then his scalp like hairdressers do when they wash your hair, and then I worked my way all round his face. He sighed with pleasure. Then he suddenly opened his eyes and said, “Give me a kiss.”
I was taken by surprise and didn’t feel I could say no. I leant forward and gave him a brief kiss on the lips. They were warm and soft and dry. He didn’t try and snog me or anything, just let me kiss him like the Prince does Sleeping Beauty, and then he sat up and leaned back against the sofa, while still sitting on the rug, and sort of caught me into him with a laugh. He held me in his arms and looked down at me.
“What do you want?” He asked.
“What do you mean?” I responded cautiously.
“As a present,” he said.
“Nothing,” I said.
“You must want something,” he insisted, looking at me quizzically.
“I’d like to drive your car,” I said truthfully. It just blurted out.
He looked startled, then he laughed at me. “Don’t be silly, of course you can’t!”
“Want to bet?” I challenged him, unable to help myself.
He laughed again, as though I was joking.
“Well at least let me take a look under the bonnet then,” I bargained.
He started to get up. “Ok then, let’s go out there. I’ve got to go on some business in a few minutes, so maybe you could drive around with me for a bit…”
Outside he lifted the bonnet and we both peered inside. He suddenly became quite loquacious and started pointing out the special features of the model and explaining the basic workings of the internal combustion engine to me. Now, I like a man who is enthusiastic about a car and knows his way around his own engine. Don’t ask any intelligent questions, I reminded myself, keep schtum. And don’t point out to him the engine fault that is glaring out at you.
“Ok, hop in,” he said.
As he got into the coveted driver’s seat he said, “I know what I’ll buy you – how about a mobile phone, so we can ring each other up, a private one just for me and you to use?”
Well that’s standard, I thought disgustedly. They always buy them a mobile phone so they can keep tabs on them and have them at their beck and call. That suggestion wasn’t exactly spontaneous.
We drove off. “What do you do as a job?” I asked curiously. “And please don’t tell me you’re a chiropodist – that would be too disappointing!”
He glanced sharply sideways at me, and I got the giggles. He allowed himself to smile slightly. “No not a chiropodist,” he reassured me. “This and that I guess…”
Hmm, not about to tell me anything. The car was hot as it had been sitting in the sun, so I took my cardie off and rested it over my lap.
“How did you get that scar?” He asked, looking sideways again.
“A freak cheesewire accident,” I joked. No chance I was telling him it was a knife wound or he would assume my background was rougher than he had previously imagined and may think it was ok to go rougher on me and at a quicker pace than he was at the moment.
He looked really sharply at me, to see if I was taking the piss. I got the giggles again. “Sorry,” I apologised. “I fell into some rusty barbed wire as a kid and it really caused a mess…”
“It’s such a shame,” he said regretfully. “You’d be perfect otherwise.” He pulled the car over, opened the window on his side and lit up a cigarette. “I don’t mind that you don’t have blue eyes. Your grey ones are quite unusual. They make you look more intelligent.”
Ta a bundle, I thought.
He took a long drag in on the fag so that the end lit up red and glowing. Then before I had any suspicions about what he was doing, he leant across, took a very firm hold of my left wrist, straightened my arm out and jabbed the cigarette end down on my inner elbow by the other scar.
I was so shocked that I didn’t even yelp. I just burst into tears like I really was just a fourteen year old. He flicked the cigarette out of the window and whirred the glass closed.
“Hey now,” he said kindly, stroking my face. “It’s not that bad is it? It’s a small price to pay to be mine instead of Kaz’s isn’t it? Shall I kiss it better?”
He took my arm again and kissed my wrist, and then the burn which made me jump away in pain, and then my neck and then my lips. He kissed the tears away, and then wiped my cheeks dry with his thumbs. “Stop crying now,” he said with a sudden steely note in his voice.
Pull yourself together girl, I thought crossly. And I hauled back on the tears. Bad Cop, Good Cop, I thought. Then the threat of Bad Cop again.
He leant into my neck again and breathed in. “That’s a very expensive perfume you’re wearing,” he said, his tone oddly accusing.
In an impulsive moment, I’d put a quick spray of Tyler’s perfume on before I’d left the house. Not a great idea probably, as I should have realised it might get associated in my mind with the abuse. “Is it?” I said blankly. I’d never thought about how much he might have spent on it.
“At least fifty-five pounds,” he said sharply. “How can you afford that? Did Kaz give it to you?” His tone was threatening. Definitely Bad Cop again, I thought.
“No!” I defended swiftly. Quick! I needed to think up a convincing story… “I’m afraid I sneaked into my foster mother’s bedroom and nicked a tiny squirt. It never occurred to me that it might be so expensive! I better not let her catch me with it on…” I tried to look penitent.
Suddenly he was nice as pie again. “Maybe I should get you some of your own then,” he suggested. Bad Cop, Good Cop. He glanced at me to gauge the reaction.
I smiled obediently and looked wide eyed at him. Please don’t, I thought. Because then you’ll make me wear it every time I see you and every time I smell anything like it, it will bring you back to mind.
“Or another pair of shoes?” His lips twitched as though he was still amused by my attachment to these shoes.
Please don’t, I thought, or you’ll expect me to wear them every time I see you and I’ll have to call Simon up and ask him to put another locator in them.
“Or maybe you could give those earrings a rest if I got you some nicer ones?”
I glanced sharply at him. He was really taking the piss now. He was laughing at me. His dark eyes caught mine for a second and they were both mocking and seemingly affectionate at the same time. God, and come to think of it, he was a man with some good taste. Porshe, lovely clothes, perfectly pedicured feet, strikingly spotless and beautifully decorated flat like something out of a magazine, and he was even able to recognise that my earrings were truly dreadful.
We drew up outside a set of buildings and he switched the engine off. “Wait here will you?” He took the keys out of the ignition and got out. Hmmm, not so sure that I wouldn’t still be nursing that ambition to drive it? I stared hard at the buildings. With a jolt, I suddenly realised that we were round the back of the Civic buildings complex. I used to have to come here to the Children’s Services department when I was fulfilling my supervision order. The Youth Courts were just round the corner. I stared across to see if I could spot who he was talking to, and film it. He was too far away for anything to be clearly seen through the slightly tinted windows. I tried the button to wind the window down, but he’d removed the key from the ignition and it wouldn’t respond. I tried to undo the door, but he’d activated the central locking and I couldn’t get out. My heart started to thump hard. I looked around for some other button to press to release the doors. Couldn’t see one.
Within five minutes though, he was back. He used the electronic fob to unlock the doors and he opened my door. “I’m sorry, you’re going to have to go home now, and I can’t take you. Here-” He pulled a note out and handed it to me. “Get a taxi.”
I got out and looked down at the money. It was a twenty pound note. “This is too much,” I protested.
“Just take it,” he said, turning away. Then he turned back. His dark eyes suddenly gripped mine. “And don’t ever use Crescent Cars, do you hear me?”
I nodded.
“You promise?”
I nodded. Hmm, that was really interesting. He must jolly well know what those taxi drivers were getting up to, and he wasn’t having any of his own girls giving out freebies.
He smiled at me again. “I like the fact you don’t wear make-up,” he said. He glanced me up and down. “And no short skirts, you hear me? Nothing higher than just above the knee. What you’ve got on is just right.”
I nodded.
He leant over and kissed me on the lips. “I’ll get you that phone,” he promised and walked away.
I went the other way, glanced back, but he was gone. But before I’d got out of the car I’d managed to slip the pen down the side of the passenger seat switched to voice activation mode. The
only thing was, it meant that I’d have to take Ellie back at least one more time to retrieve the thing. It was a bit of a long shot, but it was worth a try.
Rather than get a taxi, I wandered into the centre of town and went into a pizza place and sat on my own in a corner and slowly picked a pizza apart while going over and over everything in my mind. Afterwards I called a Blue Star taxi, and asked it to take me to Chetsi’s. At least I didn’t have to be tense calling a taxi any more, I knew now which ones to avoid.
She answered the door and stared at me. “So this is Ellie?” She surmised. “She’s less tarty than I expected. And no wonder you’re being so successful at this, you do look ridiculously young and vulnerable and gauche…”
“What’s gauche mean?” I asked as I stepped inside.
“Oh, sort of awkward. You only really hear it applied to teenagers when they’re at that sweet but shy and awkward age. Come in – I guess you’ve got something to tell me?”
“Yes,” I confirmed. I glanced around for Taib.
“He’s not here,” Chetsi said.
I felt a bit exposed that she immediately knew what I was looking around for. She made me a coffee and we sat at the table. I switched off my own devices and watched as she switched on hers. Then she looked at me. “Go ahead.”
I was silent for a moment. I didn’t know what I wanted to say. So instead I started to explain systematically what had just taken place.
She listened quietly, just nodding occasionally. When I got to the cigarette bit, she looked a bit shocked. “Let’s see,” she said, holding out her hand.
I shook my head. “It’s blistering up now and it’ll pop if I try to pull the cardigan sleeve off it.”
“So how do you feel about that?” Chetsi asked.
My eyes filled with tears and I brushed them away. “Really shocked and angry and I feel betrayed because he just did it without asking permission. It feels like a rape, but it’s so minor in comparison to a rape it sounds terrible to even say that aloud!”
Chetsi looked sympathetic. “No, I understand. That’s what a rape is, taking something without permission. Why do you feel betrayed?”
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