by Roberta Kray
She glanced at Patrick. He was busy enchanting Sonia, gazing into her admiring eyes while he unleashed the full force of the Fielding charm. She realized, with a wry smile, that he had probably learned more about Sonia’s life in the last few hours than she had managed to acquire in the entire time that she’d known her. That was his skill, getting people to talk while he listened, routinely harvesting every tiny piece of information that came his way.
He caught her looking and grinned. ‘Everything okay, babe?’
She nodded. ‘Fine.’
Eve took another generous sip of her cocktail – so much for her resolution to stay sober – and turned her attention towards Henry. He had a vague bewildered expression on his face as if he had slipped so far out of his comfort zone that he was struggling to recall what normality was. Or perhaps she was just being over-protective. At sixty-two, he had probably forgotten more than she had ever seen.
‘It’s getting late,’ she reminded him. ‘You don’t have to stay. If you want to get off then—’
An explosion of laughter drowned out the end of her sentence. Next to them another foursome, two young men and their girlfriends, were drunkenly falling all over each other. A glass slipped off their table and smashed on the floor. After a brief silence, a second of surprise, they burst out laughing again.
Henry gave her a faint smile.
‘Perhaps we should call it a night,’ she said.
And he might have agreed if Patrick hadn’t suddenly leaned forward. He kept his voice low. ‘I thought you wanted to find Jimmy Reece.’
‘I did.’ She shrugged, reaching for her coat. ‘I do. But we can always try again.’
‘We don’t need to.’
It took her a moment to realize what he was saying. And when she did, she wasn’t best pleased. ‘Is he here? Where is he?’ She quickly scanned the room but couldn’t spot the face she was searching for. Frustrated she looked back at him. ‘Where is he?’
‘The same place he’s been since we came in.’ He gestured with a tilt of his head. ‘Don’t look now but . .. up near the bar, the small table to the right, the guy with the blonde.’
‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ she hissed.
His mouth slid into its silky hustler smile. ‘Because you might have stared.’
‘I never stare,’ she retorted. ‘When do I ever stare?’ She deliberately waited before she slid her gaze cautiously towards the bar. Despite the photograph, it was doubtful she’d have recognized him. He looked ordinary, slim, in his early forties, with dark straight hair that flopped a little over his forehead. His eyes, although she couldn’t see them clearly, were probably dark too. From a distance there was nothing much to distinguish him from any other man in the room. He was dressed in a suit that was expensive but crumpled. And he was drunk, very drunk if the expression on his companion’s face was anything to go by; she looked about as happy as a gold-digger who had just struck dirt.
‘Are you sure?’ Eve said.
‘Yeah, that’s him.’
Reece was lighting a cigarette for the blonde, touching her arm, whispering in her ear. The girl sat back and laughed, one of those false brittle laughs that floated through the air. Almost immediately her mouth closed again and tightened in a thin straight line.
‘So what’s the plan?’ Patrick said.
Eve frowned. She hadn’t got quite as far as a plan. Finding him had seemed a mission in itself and, now that they had, she wasn’t sure what to do next.
‘What do you need to know?’ he prompted.
‘Where he lives, what he’s doing, who he’s doing it with …’As she recited the list, she began to feel progressively more uneasy. What had Jimmy Reece ever done to her? And okay, she’d never been Miss Perfect but conning some gullible bloke out of a few quid was an entirely different proposition to what Cavelli might have in store for this particular victim.
Henry shifted beside her. ‘Perhaps we should give it some thought.’
Patrick’s lip curled a fraction. ‘What’s there to think about?’
‘The consequences?’
The consequences. The way he said it made them sound like a death sentence. A shiver ran through her. And perhaps he wasn’t far wrong. She could be making the biggest mistake of her life. What if—
‘Oh come on, we’re here now,’ Patrick snapped impatiently. ‘Let’s just do what we came to do and think about that later. We might not get another chance.’ He looked towards Sonia hoping to garner some support. ‘What do you reckon?’
‘Well,’ she replied, hesitantly, glancing at each of them in turn. Clearly torn between her unwillingness to upset Eve, her desire to please Patrick and her complete indifference to Henry, she eventually came down on the side of compromise. ‘Well, I suppose, it’s like you said yesterday, love. You don’t have to pass on the information but at least this way, if we talk to him, you get to keep your options open.’
Eve nodded. She had a point. ‘Henry?’
But before Henry could make his contribution, the blonde girl suddenly stood up, grabbed her jacket and flounced past them towards the exit. A mixture of anger and sullen disappointment was etched across her face. In her wake she left a breeze of expensive scent. For a second it looked as though Reece was going to follow her. He rose unsteadily to his feet and peered between the tables.
‘Shit,’ Patrick murmured.
But then, as if the effort was too much for him, or he couldn’t quite recall why he had got up in the first place, his forehead scrunched into a frown and he sat heavily back down.
A small sigh of relief slipped from three pairs of lips.
Patrick used the opportunity to press home his argument. ‘Evie, make a decision and make it now. If we don’t do this tonight, it could take you weeks to find him again. He doesn’t always come here. If you change your mind, do you really want to be touring the bars of Soho for ever and a day?’
Put like that, she knew she had to make a choice. And fast. If Reece had left with the girl and jumped in a cab she could have lost her best, perhaps her only opportunity, to stick to her side of the deal. What she mustn’t forget, what she had to concentrate on, was that Terry needed her. She had to do this for him. ‘Okay,’ she agreed. ‘Let’s go for it.’
‘Right,’ Patrick said firmly. Before Henry had time to plant any more doubts in her mind, he quickly summoned a waitress. ‘Whatever the gentleman by the bar is drinking,’ he said, pointing him out. ‘And make it a double. With our compliments.’
Eve waited until the woman was walking away. ‘You’ve got an idea?’
He shrugged. ‘Not really. Let’s just play it by ear, see how chatty he is.’
They waited.
At first Reece, confused, tried to push the glass away. He glared at the waitress. They could see him shaking his head. He hadn’t ordered it. He wasn’t paying for it. It took her a while to explain that the drink was a gift. She turned and indicated towards their table.
Reece narrowed his eyes and squinted at them.
Patrick gave him a friendly wave.
Eventually he got to his feet again and this time managed to stumble the five long yards to their table. As if he was standing on the deck of a moving boat, he swayed a little as he stood in front of them. ‘Most kind,’ he said, patting the side of the glass with the palm of his hand.
‘Good to see you again,’ Patrick said. ‘Grab a seat. How are you?’
He frowned but slumped down obediently beside him. ‘Sorry, old chap, but … hope this doesn’t sound too ungrateful and all but … do I know you?’ Although he was clearly sloshed, his cut-glass accent held only the hint of a slur.
‘Patrick O’Connell,’ he said. ‘We met on the set of The Fall of Charlie Payne.’ Then he laughed. ‘But I guess that was a few years back.’
‘Ah,’ he said, as if the light had dawned. ‘So you’re … an actor …?’
‘God, no. Production, that’s more my line. I worked alongside Bill Morton on the movie. You remem
ber Bill, don’t you? Great guy. What a character. I was his right-hand man for longer than … But look, sorry, what am I thinking? Let me introduce you to everyone: this is my lovely wife Evie and our good friends Henry and Sonia.’
Eve shot him a sharp suspicious glance. What was with the lovely wife stuff? And so much for playing it by ear; unless Patrick had become an overnight expert on small-budget gangster films, he’d been doing his research on Jimmy Reece. And that was a worry. Was he really trying to help or was he working to a more personal agenda? He was hardly renowned for his acts of selflessness. But there wasn’t time to think about that now. Their mark had leaned across the table to take her hand.
‘Wonderful to meet you,’ he drawled.
She smiled sweetly back. ‘Hi. Nice to meet you too.’
He paused, his brown bleary pupils expanding a fraction as his gaze slowly focused on her face. ‘My pleasure entirely.’
It took a few seconds to gently extricate her fingers. He seemed determined to hold on to them. And even when she broke free he continued to look into her eyes. She forced herself to keep on smiling. Once this whole clichéd scene would have come to her as naturally as breathing but tonight she felt self-conscious, awkward, almost embarrassed. Perhaps it was because Henry was there. She wished he wasn’t. She wished she’d persuaded him to go home hours ago. Sliding back into the old seductive routine wasn’t quite so easy when the one person she respected, whose friendship she valued above everyone else’s, was sitting right next to her.
Thankfully, remembering his manners, Reece turned back towards the others.
It gave her the chance to scrutinize him. It was only up close that you could see the damage Cavelli had inflicted, the broken nose, the twisted mouth, the deep brutal scars that ran from his left cheek to his chin. So this was the man who had seduced his wife. This was the man he despised, who he’d hated so much he had beaten to a pulp. This was the man he was serving time for. She tried not to stare – although it was difficult not to. Reece had probably been quite handsome once but now his whole face was aslant, distinctly asymmetric, as though one side had been smashed into a hundred pieces and cleverly, although not altogether accurately, put back together again. What Cavelli had done could never be repaired.
She reached for her drink and finished it in one fast gulp.
Her glass was empty and so was Jimmy Reece’s.
‘You want another?’ Patrick asked him. ‘In fact, look, why don’t we get a bottle of champagne? Let’s celebrate. It’s not every day you run into old friends. What do you say – will you stay and have another drink with us?’
He took about as much persuasion as any drunk with a raging thirst.
Patrick caught the attention of a waitress again. He ordered the champagne but then, rummaging in his pocket, only came up with a tenner. He glanced towards Henry. ‘Er … I don’t suppose you could …’
As he reached for his wallet, Eve put her hand on his arm. ‘It’s okay, I’ll get it.’ She drew out her purse and threw her credit card on to the tray. It was bad enough that Henry had to witness this whole deception; she didn’t expect him to pay for the privilege too. She should never have dragged him into this. He’d been more than decent to her and if it all turned out as she feared then …
The bottle of champagne was swiftly delivered. Patrick poured the drinks, passed them around, and then made a toast. ‘To old friends!’ he announced.
‘And to new ones,’ Jimmy added, his eyes deliberately seeking out Eve’s, his right leg roaming dangerously close to hers under the table.
As his knee made contact for the second time she tried not to flinch, to pull away too quickly. It was too late now to change her mind. The game had begun. There was no going back.
‘To new friends,’ she repeated sweetly.
They all raised their glasses and smiled.
Micky had found a table in the darkest part of the bar, a corner where they could sit without being seen too clearly. He got out his phone and made a call. It was his third of the night. ‘Boss? Yeah, it’s me. We’re in Pearl’s. They’ve linked up with someone. Yeah. And guess who? It’s our old mate Jimmy Reece.’
He listened for a moment, nodding, before snapping shut the mobile and returning it to his pocket. He couldn’t tell if Joe had been surprised by the news or not; he always kept his cards close to his chest. Just stick with the girl was his only instruction. And Micky was no closer to understanding why.
He glanced over at the party again. It had seemed to him that the meeting hadn’t been prearranged, more accidental, a chance encounter, but he could be wrong. Maybe they’d just wanted it to look like that. Something was cooking but whether Jimmy was the victim or a player wasn’t clear yet. Originally, he’d thought the old guy might be the mark but now he wasn’t so sure. But if it was Jimmy instead, if they had some kind of scam planned, they’d be sorely disappointed. Since his movie career had hit the skids, he didn’t have a pot to piss in. Reece might have a title but he didn’t have the inheritance to go with it. He owed a fortune and he owed most of it to Joe.
‘What’s going on here?’ he asked Gruber.
He took a while to deliberate, the cogs turning slowly. ‘Reece needs some dough,’ he said eventually.
‘He always needs some dough. But do they look like a bunch of fucking money-lenders to you?’
‘Who says he’s borrowing? Maybe he’s trading. Maybe he’s got something they want.’
Micky looked at him, surprised. Gruber might not say much but all that time in the boxing ring clearly hadn’t mashed his brains completely. He could be on to something. But what could Reece possibly have that Eve Weston wanted? And what did it have to do with Joe Silk?
He stared at the group, wondering if it was safe to move closer, to try and listen in on their conversation, but decided against it. No unnecessary risks. No mistakes. Not with the mood the boss was in.
He studied the blond guy, the hustler, again. His first thought had been that he was her boyfriend – there was an intimacy between the two of them, a closeness. But Jimmy Reece was all over her like a rash. If she was his girl he’d have punched the bastard’s fucking lights out. So why was he just sitting there and taking it?
They had to be working some kind of con.
As Eve walked back from the Ladies, she glanced around and saw the two men sitting in the corner. She felt a nervous flicker of recognition. The light wasn’t good but she could have sworn she’d seen them before, earlier in the evening, in one of the other bars. They were both big guys, solid, distinctive – the type it was smarter to never pick a fight with.
Was it possible that she’d got her shadow back? Could the older one be the man from the alley? She peered through the dimness. Her heart skipped a couple of beats. Christ, she hoped not. She let her gaze linger for a couple of seconds longer but neither of them looked up or paid her any attention. Perhaps she was overreacting. After all, it was Friday night. Lots of people moved from bar to bar. It was inevitable that a few familiar faces would crop up.
But as she took her seat, she automatically glanced over her shoulder again. Now the younger guy, the one with the square jaw and close-cropped hair, was leaning across to chat to a giggly brunette at the next table. She relaxed. No, they were just a couple of blokes out on the pull, two mates out for a good time.
Which was a long way adrift from the type of time she was having. The attentions of Jimmy Reece were beginning to wear thin. What had Nadine ever seen in him? But then she’d married Cavelli. There was no accounting for taste. However, she had caught an occasional glimpse of what some women might find attractive: a lazy arrogant charm, a public schoolboy confidence, the sporadic emergence of a sharp but cruel wit. It didn’t do anything for Eve but then she’d had too much experience of rich, spoiled boys to ever be beguiled by them.
Hopefully, they could leave soon. She’d had enough and Reece was too drunk to get anything more out of him. All he was interested in now was the fastest route
up her thigh. As his hand slid under the table again, she swiftly shifted away.
Sonia, coming to her rescue, picked up the bottle and refreshed his glass. ‘That Charlie … er, whatsit film,’ she said, ‘I just loved that. It’s one of my favourites. Brilliant. You’re such a great actor, really great.’
And while Jimmy lit another cigarette and basked in the glory, Eve looked down at her watch. Twenty past one. She shot a glance at Patrick, a conspiratorial glance from the old days. Get me out of here was what it was supposed to convey but he simply grinned back, picked up his glass, and joined in the conversation.
‘Yeah, you should make more movies.’
While the rest of them talked, she made a rapid review of the information they’d managed to acquire so far. They hadn’t done too badly. Not only had they established that Reece had moved from Notting Hill to Chelsea and found out his address, they’d also learned that he was married, trying to revive his acting career, and desperate for anyone who could help him back on to the silver screen. Fame was what he missed – and what he craved.
Most of this, surprisingly, had been down to Henry. He had spent the first half-hour in virtual silence but, as if woken from a trance, had abruptly come awake and embarked on a crossexamination so subtle and skilful that the Old Bailey would have been proud of him. It had happened shortly after Patrick had asked about the girl Jimmy had been with earlier.
‘I couldn’t help noticing but … I hope you don’t mind me asking … was that your wife?’
He had laughed into his champagne. ‘Hell, no. She may be somebody’s wife but she certainly isn’t mine.’
It might have been that ugly dismissive comment, his general arrogance, or his increasingly blatant advances towards her which had finally spurred Henry into action. Or maybe he had just wanted to get the whole damn thing over and done with as quickly as possible. Whatever the reason, he’d done an excellent job, prising one small piece of information after another from Jimmy’s drunk and careless mouth.