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As Good as Dead

Page 6

by Ben Westerham


  “Well, in that case, I’d say it’s just about time for an early night. What do you reckon?”

  Angela leaned in close and whispered, “Follow me upstairs in five minutes. I’ve got an extra special outfit for you tonight; something that will have your toes tingling.”

  *

  I shouldn’t have expected anything else, but I can confirm Angela was as good as her word; she did, indeed, have something special lined up for me. Mind you, I ought to point out that my experience in the kinky sex department isn’t exactly extensive. Of course, for some people what she was wearing might be considered your ordinary, run-of-the-mill bedtime outfit, but that certainly wasn’t the case for me.

  Angela spent the night satisfying her craven desires wearing nothing except a pair of thigh-length leather boots and one of those decorative face masks they wear in Venice when they have a big party. She made me wear one too. It had a big pointy nose and covered most of my face. I was still wearing it when she finally showed me some pity and allowed me to fall into a deep sleep.

  I was actually a bit disappointed to find the mask had gone when I woke up the next morning. I thought I might wear it to breakfast in the restaurant. It turned out Angela had put all the gear away as soon as she’d got up. I’d noticed the previous night how fussy she was about putting everything away before anyone else had a chance to see it. Probably didn’t want to get the sort of reputation that might attract the wrong type of guests; ones with peculiar tastes and odd habits of the sort she might recognise all too easily.

  The plan I’d agreed with Alex was for me to collect her from her room at nine, so the two of us could go down to breakfast together, where we’d decide how we were going to spend the day ahead. The trouble was, it was almost half-nine when I knocked on her door. There was no answer, not the first time or even the third time I knocked.

  I walked the few yards to my own door and let myself in, thinking I might as well get changed before heading down to the restaurant, where, most likely, I’d get a bit of a telling off for being late. Waiting for me on the floor inside the door was a folded piece of paper. It was a handwritten missive from Alex. Apparently, I was still in bed fast asleep, because it was twenty minutes past nine and she hadn’t been able to wake me. She was hungry, too hungry to wait any longer, so she’d decided to go looking for breakfast at a cafe. She wouldn’t go far, she promised, and if I put my detective skills to good use, I’d be sure to find her no more than a ten minute walk from the hotel. The cafe was one she’d noticed while we were out and about the previous day.

  I couldn’t believe she’d be so stupid as to leave the hotel on her own, especially after we’d most likely been followed the previous afternoon. If there was someone keeping an eye on her, what was to say he wouldn’t jump on a gilt-edged opportunity of the sort she’d just presented him with? Women, who’d have ’em, I grumbled to myself, then remembered I’d not told Alex my suspicions about being followed and her room having been searched. Sod it, I grumbled, realising I wouldn’t be able to point the finger of blame at her after all.

  Stopping only long enough to grab my jacket and keys, I slammed the door shut behind me and legged it down the corridor in search of my missing client, trying hard to picture any and all cafes we might have walked past on our way back to the hotel the previous afternoon. I couldn’t picture any. That was a good start.

  There are a lot of cafes in Brighton, even within a mere ten-minute walk of the Churchill, and I had to nip inside half-a-dozen in search of my missing client. I got some strange looks. One place looked completely empty from the outside, but I still had to go in, just in case Alex had decided to make things more fun by hiding under a table. Twenty-five minutes later, after running around like my backside was on fire and swearing I’d throttle her for doing something so stupid, I had found Alex. She was in Tony’s Italian Cafe, a small upmarket place on Duke Street, sitting at a table towards the middle of the room. More to the point, she wasn’t alone.

  Chapter Five

  Sitting opposite Alex was a bloke. Late forties, I reckoned. His neatly-parted short, dark, grey-flecked hair, drab dark blue suit and boringly plain blue tie suggested he had an office job, probably something like banking or insurance. If he’d been an estate agent or a car salesman, he’d have worn a more up-to-date suit and a tie with a bit of life in it. All the same, I didn’t recognise him and that I didn’t like.

  I was about to rush up to them and whisk Alex away when something about the way the two were behaving made me stop and wait for a moment, just inside the doorway. Then it dawned on me what it was about them that had caught my attention. Alex wasn’t behaving like someone who didn’t want to be there and nor did she look worried or upset. In fact, the more I watched them, the more obvious it became that they were relaxed and happy.

  Chatting away, all smiles and, on her part, hand gestures galore, they looked like they’d known each other for years. Perhaps they had or, there again, maybe they’d only just met and he was busy trying to chat her up; Some blokes are like that, believe it or not. Then he must have told Alex something funny, because her head rocked back and even standing where I was I could hear her laugh; a sort of nasal number that didn’t do her any favours.

  Deciding I’d watched for long enough, I strolled across to their table and pulled up a chair.

  “Well, well, here you are then,” I said to Alex, trying to sound like a disgruntled boyfriend who was wondering what his bird was doing having breakfast with another fella.

  “Oh, David, you managed to find me. I was starting to think you either hadn’t bothered to come looking or had given up.”

  She sounded happy, but a bit of colour seemed to evaporate from the bloke’s cheeks and he began to fidget. The one thing he didn’t seem to want to do was make eye contact with me.

  “Wouldn’t be much of a detective if I couldn’t manage to find you here, would I, now? Tell you one thing, though, I’d never noticed there are so many cafes in this part of Brighton. There’s bloody dozen of ’em.”

  I glanced at Alex, but I quickly shifted my attention to her friend, who was now scratching the back of his neck and studying a framed print of Rome on the nearest wall.

  “Oh dear, I hope you haven’t been looking for ages and ages. I noticed this place yesterday afternoon and was going to suggest we came here this morning before going off to bed last night, but I forgot. They do wonderful coffee. Strong and aromatic.”

  “Terrific. Friend of yours?” I asked, jabbing a finger in the direction of the bloke.

  “Oh, yes. This is Andrew Longmeadow, an old friend I haven’t seen in ages.” She sounded full of beans. “I couldn’t believe it when he walked in. It turns out Andrew is staying in Brighton for a few days on business. How lucky is that?”

  Well, at least she knew the bloke, which immediately put to bed any thoughts I had of kidnappers or axe murders, although I still wanted to know something about him before I could fully relax.

  “Nice to meet you, Andrew. David Good, private investigator and part-time babysitter.”

  I shoved a hand in his direction. He half got to his feet and took my hand.

  “Pleasure to meet you, David.” He glanced briefly into my mince pies.

  “Andrew’s an accountant and he’s in Brighton on a very exciting mission,” jumped in Alex, breaking up my budding love-in with her friend. I put that down to jealousy; she wanted him all to herself.

  “And what’s that?” I asked, my eyes still fixed on her friend.

  “Go on, tell him, Andrew,” prompted Alex.

  “I work for a wholesalers. It’s mostly garden and house-hold goods. We’re planning on buying twenty-five thousand pairs of garden secateurs from a supplier we haven’t used before and it’s my job to check their books; make sure they’re not in any immediate danger of going out of business. It wouldn’t go down very well with our owners if we were to hand over a considerable amount of money to a supplier who went to the wall before completing our
order. Creditors tend not to do very well in such situations.”

  All of a sudden, he was Mr Chatty.

  “That’s a lot of secateurs. Got green fingers yourself, Andrew?”

  He almost laughed but must have thought better of it, because he stopped himself just as the corners of his mouth began to turn upwards.

  “No, I’ve never been much of a gardener. I leave that to my wife. She enjoys growing things.”

  Everything seemed innocent enough, but I couldn’t get rid of a nagging feeling things weren’t quite as straightforward as I was being led to believe. It felt like it does when you walk into a room where a couple are mid-argument or just about to kiss for the first time. They know you know and they don’t really want you to, while you know they know that you know and all you want to do is turn right round and bugger off, pretending you were never there in the first place. But Alex looked and sounded happy enough, so I decided to leave them to it and loiter nearby, just in case.

  “So, all’s good with you? I asked Alex. “I’m alright to retire to a safe distance?”

  “I’m absolutely fine, thank you, David. You have nothing to worry about where Andrew is concerned. Remember, he’s an accountant. An extra sugar in his coffee is enough excitement for him for one day.”

  She gave her friend the wide-eyed treatment and he smiled, awkwardly.

  “I’ll leave you to it, then. Get myself some breakfast and peruse one of the cafe’s newspapers while you chat about secateurs and roses. Seeing how it’s sunny, I think I’ll sit outside until you’re done.”

  I could hear Alex laughing again before I’d reached the door and as I sat down at a little table on the pavement, with a copy of the Express in one hand, I wondered whether I ought to be more worried about bumping into my ex than I had been up until then. I was as confident as a man could be that any meeting with Christine would be a long, long way from the happy get together I’d seen with Alex and Andrew; in fact, there was a good chance it would result in a right old slanging match, seeing as I had years of pent up frustration looking for an opportunity to burst out.

  But ten minutes later all that evaporated from my mind, as I settled down to demolish a very tasty-looking plate of bacon, eggs and what have you.

  *

  Someone once told me seaside romances are a mug’s game. You’re in love or lust for one week, hands, tongues and everything all over each other like the world is about to end, then you pack your bags and head off home. Then, after exchanging one round of letters with the girl you thought you’d never be able to live without, you decide that Cardiff, Lancaster or Dundee is too bloody far away from home to even think about making a visit. Thereafter, you carelessly forget to reply to her next letter and move on to chatting up some sexy little number you met down the local boozer.

  That lesson in life had been playing on my mind as I sat outside the cafe, drinking my coffee and watching the world go by. Was I going to be Angela’s latest holiday romance, another innocent abroad tied to her bed-post then heartlessly abandoned once I’d dragged my weary body back home, to be replaced a fresh-faced young thing only just in full-length trousers? Surely not, I told myself. I’d already done things for her that I wasn’t altogether sure were legal; there couldn’t be that many other blokes around as open-minded as me. No, she’d be on the phone the day after I got home, begging me to pay another visit to the coast.

  Fortunately, before I’d reached the likely conclusion that I was being heartlessly used, Alex and her friend appeared by my table, him to say a fond farewell and her to say she was ready to head back to the hotel. I couldn’t be sure, but as Andrew waltzed off up the road, I reckon Alex was paying his backside a little bit more attention than she ought to have been, considering he was a married man. I made a mental note for future reference and said nothing about it.

  I heard more about long lost friend Andrew on the way back to the Churchill. You could say I heard more than anyone needed to about him and I was happy to drop Alex off at her room, before walking down to mine, where I waited for her to get herself ready to go back out. Apparently, women have to make special preparations for each and every trip out, otherwise they run the risk of dying from embarrassment if they’re seen with a hair out of place, smudged lipstick or wearing the wrong shoes.

  Alex had decided she wanted to head off to Brighton Pavilion, which is a popular port of call for anyone visiting the town, seeing how it’s mad as a spoon and there’s nowhere else like it in the whole country. It’s a bunch of pointy-topped white onions from the outside and a maniac decorator’s paradise on the inside. I’m sure someone told me it was only a bloody seaside beach hut for the Prince Regent, who had the place thrown up in the early 1800s.

  She nearly laughed her head off, did Alex, when she saw the place, which I suppose is a fair enough reaction. Anyway, she must have enjoyed herself because we spent over two hours there, checking out every nook and cranny; even visiting some parts twice, she was so gobsmacked at what she saw.

  Lunch was a sandwich and coffee in a cafe looking out across the beach and the Channel. The wind was blowing in off the sea, stronger than it had been for days, bringing with it the smell of salty water and rotten seaweed.

  “Bowie or Bolan?” She asked me out of the blue, after we’d been quiet for a bit.

  “What?”

  “David Bowie or Marc Bolan? Which one’s your favourite?”

  “What about Elton John?”

  “You’re an Elton John fan?” She looked as I felt, confused.

  “No, not really. Just didn’t feel right leaving him out of the equation.”

  “Oh, I see,” she said, wagging a teaspoon at me. “So, which one, Bowie or Bolan?”

  “Which one do you think I’ll go for?”

  “I’ve got you down for a Bolan man.”

  “You’ve been thinking about that for a while, haven’t you?”

  “I have,” she said, narrowing her eyes. “I’d say his dress sense is more your sort of thing. Bowie would be too extrovert. Same goes for Elton John, for that matter.”

  “Bit a ladies’ man, so they say, was Bolan.”

  I left the words hanging in the air, all suggestive like.

  “And would that be the same with you?”

  She kept a straight face, meaning I had no way of knowing if she was taking the piss or not. She hadn’t cottoned on to me and Angela already, had she? It’s not like I have a queue of women waiting to get their hands on me; it’s just the desperate ones and those with, erm, unusual tastes, who seem to take an interest. I’ve always supposed it’s something to do with my innocent looking face and naive willingness to think women take an interest in me for my giant brain. That and the millions in my Swiss bank account, plus the Ferrari that’s always parked outside my flat.

  “It’s only the desperate ones that cop off with me. I seem to attract them like moths to a flame or crap footballers to Arsenal. They seem to be able to tell that I’m so desperate, they’ve got a good chance of dragging me into bed; not that some of them bother with making it all the way to the bedroom. I once had sex with a divorcee in Dartford on her sideboard. By the time we’d finished, two of the legs were broken and half the crockery inside had been smashed. She said afterwards she’d never liked the bloody thing anyway, because her former mother-in-law had bought it as a wedding present.”

  “Oh, I never knew people really did things like that. I’m so wet behind the ears sometimes, it’s embarrassing.”

  She made a face, then laughed so much she had to put her coffee down. Again, I couldn’t work out if she was being serious or winding me up. It was starting to feel as though Alex had a dozen different versions of herself and was busily working her way through them. Whether that was for my benefit or just her normal way of things, I didn’t have a clue and didn’t fancy asking, in case she took offence.

  “I didn’t either, not until I started working as a private investigator. Now, I’m not sure there’s anything I would be prop
erly surprised to see people getting up to.”

  The waitress arrived and cleared away our empty plates, putting a temporary halt to our conversation. When she’d gone, Alex took the conversation in a completely different direction.

  “I spoke to my uncle last night,” she said, her voice quieter than before.

  “The one with the money?”

  “Mm. He thinks things will be all sorted out by tomorrow or possibly the day after. Apparently, there’s not much of a gap now between what’s being demanded and what my uncle is prepared to pay, though he won’t tell me how much that is.”

  She looked sheepish, guilty even. Wasn’t much point in that, of course, because there was nothing she could do about it. There are scumbags everywhere, eyeing us all up for a chance to make some easy money. Me, I’d pay this blackmailer, then arrange for him to have a little accident, of the sort that looks entirely genuine and nothing like a carefully set up hit. He could end up getting mauled to death by a pack of hungry corgis or drowned in a giant vat of golden syrup.

  “You don’t want to go feeling all guilty about it,” I said. “You’re not the one doing the blackmailing; you’re the victim.”

  “I know,” she said, not sounding for a second like she believed it. “But I do feel guilty, all the same. If I’d been more careful in the first place, then Uncle Robert wouldn’t have to pay this little shit anything at all. I was such an idiot.”

  “If you ask me, you’d be best off putting all this behind you, then getting on with your life. You don’t want to go letting this screw things up from now until your dying day. Do that and he wins twice over.”

  From somewhere nearby came the blare of a car horn, followed by the screech of tyres on asphalt; the only thing missing was a loud scrunching sound as metal smashed into metal. Seemed someone had enjoyed a lucky break. I half turned, towards the window, to see if I could get a glimpse of the near miss. Nothing. When I turned back, Alex’s seat was empty. I looked all around; she was at the counter, purse out, paying for our lunch.

 

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