by Jessie Keane
‘Crystal wouldn’t like it,’ said Aggie with a set jaw, and that was the end of that.
15
On Saturday morning, Ruby was awoken by hammering and voices. Then a deafening screech of feedback from a microphone. For a moment she stared at the ceiling of her bedroom in her Victorian villa, unseeing, until it dawned on her what day it was. With a surge of real pleasure, she swung her legs to the floor, grabbed her robe and slipped it on, then went over to the window and pulled back the drapes.
Where two days ago the view had consisted of lawns, the blue oblong of the swimming pool and the flower borders, now there was also a big white marquee, with a red carpet leading to it from the house. People were scurrying about, carrying trays of glasses, lugging huge speakers, hefting boxes of plateware and cutlery. A dark-suited woman was threading cream roses, maidenhair fern and satin bows around the metal arch at the marquee’s entrance. Another was hurrying around with a clipboard, giving orders – the skinny, nervy little wedding planner.
Ruby looked up. The weather gods were smiling on them today. Blue sky and sunshine! She threw open the window and breathed in deeply. It did feel like spring, now. Then she turned back into the room and looked over at the hyacinth-coloured silk dress and coat hanging in its protective cellophane sheath on the wardrobe door. The Philip Somerville box containing the matching hat was on the mirrored dressing table. She couldn’t suppress a grin. Days like this didn’t come along that often, and they had to be treasured.
She glanced at the clock. Nine thirty, and the girl who was doing hair and make-up for her and Daisy was coming at ten thirty. Somewhere in the house she could hear Matthew and Luke, Daisy’s twins from her disastrous first marriage, starting another fight, and Jody the nanny loudly telling them to shut up.
Ruby couldn’t believe how blessed she was these days. Once, she had literally lived for nothing but her work. Having little else in her life, she had lost herself in statistics, turnover, profit and loss. But once she had been reunited with Kit and Daisy, her long-lost twins, everything had changed. Now she was a doting mother, an indulgent grandmother.
She hadn’t regretted letting the Darkes stores go. And now she supposed she was as happy as anyone had a right to be. Reviewing her life, she thought that she was a lucky woman. She was pretty minted. She had her kids and her gorgeous grandkids. She had good health.
And there had been men. That aristocratic bastard Cornelius Bray. What a mistake that had been – but she’d got Daisy and Kit from him, so out of bad, good could come. Then she’d fallen for golden-hearted crook Michael Ward. She would have married him, but it was not to be. And after Michael’s murder, Thomas Knox.
Ruby frowned. The question was, did she truly, completely believe his pleas of innocence over the warehouse job? Kit didn’t, and she wasn’t one hundred per cent sure herself. Knox was a real hardnosed gangster. Yes, they’d once had a hot affair. As a lover, he was second to none. But . . . did she trust him? Had she ever trusted him?
Suddenly the door to her bedroom was flung open. Daisy stood there wearing a white robe. Her corn-gold hair was loose to her waist and in wild disarray. Her skin was flushed and her blue eyes were glittering with happiness and a faint sliver of panic.
This was the best thing about her life, Ruby thought. Her kids. Big, beautiful, blonde Daisy and cool, dark Kit. Her twins. An accident of birth had seen them set off in very different directions in life – Daisy to live the high life with her father Cornelius and stepmother Vanessa, Kit to trawl the streets and somehow stay alive until Ruby managed to find him again. They looked nothing alike, Kit and Daisy. Coming from Ruby, who was half-caste, and Cornelius who was white, in a rare genetic fluke Daisy had been born pale-skinned like her father, and Kit had been born dark, exotic-looking, like his mother.
‘Christ!’ hollered Daisy in her cut-glass Home Counties accent. ‘Why didn’t you wake me? It’s nearly ten!’
Ruby opened her arms. Daisy, laughing, crossed the bedroom at a run and joined her mother at the window. Ruby hugged her as they looked out at all the hustle and bustle in the garden below.
‘Oh God,’ said Daisy.
‘What?’ Ruby looked at her beloved daughter with concern. ‘Nervous?’
Daisy bit her lip. Nodded. ‘A bit.’
‘Bad night?’
‘Missed Rob,’ she said.
Ruby smiled at that. Daisy and Rob had been living together in one of the two plushly furnished and spacious apartments over the garage block for over a year now. The twins loved it there, with the pair of them. One night apart? That wasn’t so hard to endure, surely. She couldn’t be more pleased about this match. Tough, East End boy Rob and posh, big-hearted Daisy. They were made for each other.
‘After today you won’t have to miss him, ever again,’ said Ruby. She wasn’t upper-crust, like Daisy. Daisy had been raised so differently to her. Ruby was an East Ender, like Kit, like Rob. He was going to be so good for Daisy, Ruby just knew it.
‘Good.’ Daisy hugged her mother hard, and shivered in anticipation. ‘It’s really happening, isn’t it?’
‘It sure is,’ said Ruby, kissing her daughter’s flushed cheek, feeling so happy for her that she could burst. ‘Welcome to your wedding day, darlin’.’
16
When Romilly crawled home, exhausted after another hectic day, she found Hugh there, clomping down the stairs with two black bin bags clutched in one hand.
‘Oh!’ she said, startled. And pissed off. After a long day, if there was one thing she didn’t need it was Hugh in her face.
This warehouse heist was driving her insane. They had pulled everyone in, putting everything they had behind it, both her and the team, but they had drawn a blank. The six major crims they’d watched – including that slippery bastard Finlay and Tom Knox – had pretty much been cleared of any involvement. She was starting to feel that all avenues had been covered. She hated that. Something had to give on it. And soon. It was now a case of digging deeper and starting again, from the ground up. Every second lost on this was evidence lost, so they had to break the back of it soon.
‘Just picking up a few more things,’ he said.
He looked sheepish. Well, he ought to.
‘Not much to show for it, is it?’ Romilly indicated the two bags he carried. ‘Then again, I suppose most of your stuff is still back at that tip you call home. Smart move. Saved yourself some legwork there, Hugh, hanging on to that shithole.’
‘Don’t be bitter,’ said Hugh. He was doing his wounded-pup look.
‘Bitter? I’m not. Merely stating facts. Truth is, you always expected this marriage to crash and burn, didn’t you? So it’s no big surprise that it finally has.’
And damn, hadn’t she half-expected it, too? Everyone knew that cops were impossible to live with. Mum had moaned on about Dad often enough, and he’d never got beyond detective sergeant. She was a detective inspector, and the pressure was so much more intense. Lots of coppers married other coppers, because at least they understood the pressures of the job: the hideous shifts you had to work, the horrors you saw and couldn’t help but bring home with you.
She saw Hugh’s eyes go down to her left hand. ‘You’re not wearing your rings,’ he noted.
‘That’s right,’ said Romilly. ‘And you never wore a ring at all, did you? Bit of a clue there. Lack of commitment again. What, d’you want the engagement ring back? You going to give it to Sally? String her along for a few years?’
Angry colour flooded into his face. ‘That was a cheap trick, what you did. You didn’t have to humiliate her like that.’
Humiliate her?
Romilly opened the front door and stood there, stony-faced.
‘Get out, Hugh. And before you go – give me your bloody key.’
17
‘What the fuck did you let me drink last night?’ Rob asked.
He was sitting at the kitchen table at Kit’s house, where he’d spent the night. He was nursing a glass of Alka Seltzer an
d had thrown back a pint of water and a couple of painkillers. It was unlucky for the groom to see the bride the night before the wedding, so instead of being together in their cosy apartment over the garage at Ruby’s place, Daisy had gone off to Ruby’s and Rob had gone to Kit’s, which was a tall and fiendishly expensive Georgian house a stone’s throw from Belgravia. And Kit – his boss and today his best man – had got him and the rest of the small stag party, which included Rob’s two younger brothers Daniel and Leon, completely rat-arsed.
‘You were drinking Chivas Regal. And some vodka. Maybe a bit of port too,’ said Kit, pouring out coffee for them both and sitting down opposite his best mate. ‘Oh, and—’
‘No! Don’t tell me. I’ll feel worse than ever.’
Rob was slumped at the table. He had just staggered down from Kit’s spare room, having awoken to find that he hadn’t even undressed last night. He had fallen spark out across the bed in all his clothes. Now his head was pounding and Kit was finding all this very funny. Rob watched his boss moving around the kitchen. Kit Miller, feared gang boss, getting all domestic.
‘You’d make someone a bloody fantastic wife,’ he said.
‘Fuck off,’ said Kit with a grin. ‘What you need,’ he said, going over to the fridge and pulling out eggs and bacon, ‘is a fry-up. Line your stomach.’
‘Ain’t that supposed to happen before you start drinking?’
‘Ah yeah. Spotted the deliberate mistake there.’ Kit was hauling out the frying pan, slapping it on the stove, switching on the gas. ‘Some people swear by prairie oysters.’
‘I’m not eating – or drinking – raw eggs.’
‘In that case, it’s bacon and fried eggs,’ said Kit.
‘All right.’
Kit eyed his old pal with amusement as he put the bacon in the pan and heard it sizzle. Rob was the best, Kit depended on him absolutely. He’d provided solid back-up for Kit for so long that they almost moved together as one unit, neither having to explain a thing. But when it came to drinking, Rob was a lightweight. Kit, on the other hand, could put it away for England and barely feel the effects. Not a good thing, that. And there had been times – tough times – in his life when drink had threatened to rule him. But it didn’t. And it wouldn’t.
Kit Miller was tough and he was proud of that. He’d had a hard early life but it had made him resilient. Hard enough to take the knocks and stay standing. Knocks like life in the orphanages. And losing his old boss and mentor, Michael Ward, and Gilda, the woman he’d loved, both of them murdered. And then, five years back, Bianca Danieri had walked out of his life, saying she had to go search for her long-lost family, she needed time alone, and she hoped he understood.
He’d understood all right. It was a brush-off. He’d loved that mare, but she’d had a different agenda. He busied himself with the breakfast and thought Well, fuck her. Cocky as hell in his youth, full of swagger, Kit had grown up big style and he now had a cool, watchful presence. He had an athlete’s inborn energy, good height, broad shoulders, curly black hair and café-au-lait skin. His face was arresting – his eyes, in particular, were startling, given his skin colour. They were a sharp, clear blue – the same blue as Daisy’s – and radiated quick intelligence. His nose was straight, the nostrils widely flaring. His mouth was sensual. Such looks guaranteed that there were always women hanging around him, but mostly he took little interest in them.
Once, he’d had beautiful, golden Gilda.
Then, Bianca, white as the snow of her Nordic homeland.
For now, he was off women. As the bacon crisped up he broke the eggs into the hot fat and thought that women either let you down, screwed you over, or broke your heart. So who needed it?
He got the bread out, put it on the table with butter and orange juice from the fridge. Got out the cutlery and glasses. By that time the eggs were done. He went back to the stove, dished up, put breakfast on the table. Rob eyed it dubiously before picking up his fork and starting to eat.
Kit watched him. Rob was built like a ten-ton truck and had been his right-hand man for just about forever. He was handsome, burly, dependable as daylight. All the breakers and enforcers on Kit’s payroll answered to Rob. Sure, Rob was – technically – Kit’s employee. But he was also his best pal in all the world. He was like a brother.
‘Better?’ Kit asked.
‘Hmph,’ said Rob. He put down his knife and fork, sank his head into his shovel-like hands, scrubbed them across his face. Upstairs, it sounded like Daniel and Leon were starting to get up. Rob glanced up at the ceiling, frowning. Then he looked at Kit. ‘Christ, am I really doing this?’
There was something in Rob’s face that made Kit’s attention sharpen. ‘What, you got cold feet?’
‘Nah.’ Rob heaved a sigh and picked up his cutlery again. ‘It’s not that. Just this fucking hangover. And business stuff. Listen – we got to have a talk soon. A serious talk.’
Kit looked at Rob in surprise. ‘OK. You sure it’ll keep?’
There was heavy footfall on the stairs. Daniel and Leon burst into the kitchen.
‘Yeah,’ said Rob. ‘It’ll have to.’
‘What, no brekkie for us?’ said Leon, nicking a slice of bacon from Rob’s plate. Rob slapped the youngster’s hand away, his face like thunder.
‘Show some fucking respect,’ he growled.
18
The killer got into position bright and early to check that all was OK. He settled down. Got comfy. Took the pieces out of the carrying bag, looked it over. All fine. Slowly, carefully, he assembled the rifle. It was a nice day; no wind, that was good. A bright spring day in England, what could be better? Well, some things could, he thought. A beach paradise break, for instance. Couple of weeks in Barbados at a five-star hotel. But this would pay for that.
He had the first twenty grand tucked away safely. After today, there would be another twenty. Soon as he’d collected the cash, he’d select one of the fake passports he kept to hand – you could buy the things for a song on the black market, they were ten a penny – and take off somewhere.
He’d scouted out this area, gone in the local pub, kept his head down and his ear to the ground. People chatted, and he listened. He’d discovered that the owners of the apartment he now sat in were already living the Caribbean dream. They were in Antigua, and would be out there for another month. It was perfect. The place wasn’t alarmed. He had a set of skeleton keys, and easily found one that fitted the lock on the front door. Once he was in, he stayed there, quiet and watchful; no one was any the wiser.
Inside, the apartment was a mediocre little place with dodgy plumbing, set in an outwardly grand and picturesque Georgian block cloaked in thick green creeper that would turn scarlet in autumn. The place was near the shops, but he hadn’t been into any of them and now that he’d gained entry to the apartment he didn’t go to the pub any more, either. He got his groceries at a distance, and didn’t bother with booze or newspapers. Oh, he glanced at the headlines sometimes, but the outside world didn’t bother him much. He saw silly pictures of Henry Cooper and Kevin Keegan arsing around in a fake boxing ring, promoting Brut aftershave, and shots of the Humber Bridge under construction. Nothing of any interest to him.
No one knew he was here, he was sure of that. He’d been wearing disposable surgeon’s gloves the whole time he was in here, and already this morning he’d given the entire place a thorough clean. Granted, his dabs weren’t on any police file, but why take a chance? Why give the filth anything to work with?
You could see the river from here. It was pretty. Swans glided, ducks squabbled. Light danced off the surface as canal boats chugged past. A nice place to live, this picturesque village near Marlow on the Thames. And the most important thing he could see from this vantage point?
The church.
Quaint old place, it was. Norman, he reckoned, judging by the squared-off tower. He knew a bit about things like that. Aisles and naves and flying buttresses and stuff. He liked churches. Felt a deep sense
of calm wash over him whenever he stepped inside one. Which wasn’t very often, granted, but he liked them anyway. Not all the God stuff, but the architecture, the detail. Brilliant.
He picked up the gun again, rubbed it down almost lovingly with the cloth, hauled up the sash window and leaned the barrel out a little so that the tip rested on the stone sill. He hooked his finger into the trigger, fastened his eye to the sight. Adjusted the crosshairs until everything looked perfect. The big arched oak door of the church was so sharp and clear he could see the knots in the ancient wood, could pick out the black metal studs embedded in its gnarled surface.
His finger tightened on the trigger.
Boom, he whispered.
He sat back, replaced the rifle on the floor, pleased. All fine. He glanced at his watch. Ten o’clock. He’d grab some breakfast and then all he had to do was wait until it started. Or ended. He liked endings. They were neat.
19
‘Right. Let’s have a look at you,’ said Ruby, grasping Daisy’s shoulders and directing her gaze toward the full-length cheval mirror.
‘Wow,’ said the wedding planner, standing off to one side, still clutching her clipboard.
‘You look wonderful. Both of you,’ said the girl who’d styled their hair and done their make-up. She was packing her kit away now in a square silver case, but even she paused at this moment and stared.
Ruby, in her hyacinth-blue silk coat and dress with a matching hat, looked the picture of elegance, but all eyes were drawn to Daisy, who had wanted something simple for today, something rustic. So her corn-gold hair was loose, the waves cascading, gleaming and lustrous, on her bare shoulders. Her gown was in the milkmaid style, scooped low at the neck, fastened with pearl buttons at the back, the bodice tightly fitted, the skirts flowing out loosely to the floor, covering her white sandals.
Daisy carried a messy, casual bouquet of lush, cream roses and fronds of baby’s breath. On her head was a circlet of the same flowers, holding the plain, simple veil she had dithered over and finally selected as the one. Her face glowed with happiness.