Perfect Match

by D. B. Thorne

  PERFECT MATCH

  D. B. Thorne is a digital entrepreneur and founding member of a highly successful tech start-up in the UK. Thorne has long been fascinated by the intersection between the digital and real worlds, inspiring him to write the acclaimed thriller Troll and the brilliant follow-up, Perfect Match.

  Also by D. B. Thorne

  East of Innocence

  Nothing Sacred

  Promises of Blood

  Troll

  PERFECT MATCH

  D. B. THORNE

  Published in trade paperback and e-book in Great Britain in 2018 by Corvus, an imprint of Atlantic Books Ltd

  Copyright © D. B. Thorne, 2018

  The moral right of D. B. Thorne to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

  This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities, is entirely coincidental.

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  Trade paperback ISBN: 978 1 78239 597 3

  E-book ISBN: 978 1 78239 598 0

  Printed in Great Britain.

  Corvus

  An imprint of Atlantic Books Ltd

  Ormond House

  26–27 Boswell Street

  London

  WC1N 3JZ

  www.corvus-books.co.uk

  PERFECT MATCH

  one

  ROBBIE, THOUGHT TIFFANY, WALKING ALONG HACKNEY ROAD past shops that had once sold wholesale leather goods but now hawked artisan coffee at prices just the wrong side of crazy, could go screw himself. She was going on a date. If the date went well, anything might happen. She was ruling nothing out. And if Robbie parked outside her flat one more night, she’d call the police. No, scratch that, she’d go one better and call her brother, and there was only one way that was going to end.

  The evening was warm and every other car seemed to have its roof down, each one pumping out different music, samba then rap then something African, diversity filling the rich city air around her. Somewhere up ahead was Shoreditch and her date, a guy who was unknown beyond a brief message exchange. And a photo, which she’d admit hadn’t exactly blown her away, but he had the right amount of eyes and noses, and she liked blonds, so that was a start. Anyway, pretty much anything beat Robbie White.

  As she walked, she knew people were looking at her, men mostly, but she didn’t care. Hell, it was her job to have men look at her, so it wasn’t like it was anything new. Fact was, she looked amazing, and the long walk in preposterous heels wouldn’t do her calves any harm either. No, she felt good, as good as she’d felt for a long time, and if tonight wasn’t a success, it wouldn’t be for lack of trying.

  ‘Hey, darling, you want a ride?’ A car slowed next to her, a Golf with some kind of exhaust upgrade on it that made it sound, well, ridiculous, she thought. Exactly the kind of thing Robbie went for. She’d bet this guy had a decal on the rear bumper. What was it Robbie had had, until she’d made him take it off? Louder than your girlfriend last night. Sad didn’t begin to cover it.

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘Thanks.’

  ‘Where you going?’ the driver asked, his urban patois betrayed by his skinny white face.

  ‘I’ve got a date,’ she said, almost sang, and did a small pirouette on the pavement in celebration. The driver, barely more than a boy, tried to think of a comeback but instead just laughed, said, ‘You have a good one, my darling,’ and drove off with a throaty snarl of his ill-judged exhaust. Yes, thought Tiffany, tonight’s going to be a good, good night.

  She’d never been to Convent before, didn’t really do trendy bars, or at least the Shoreditch hipster brand of trendy. She didn’t like men with beards, which kind of ruled out eighty per cent of the available talent, she figured. She turned off Curtain Road down a side street, but before she got to the lit sign, red neon spelling out Convent in cursive, a voice called to her.

  ‘Tiffany?’

  She turned to see a man, blond hair, cross the street to catch her up. ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Tobes. Hi. Sorry. I didn’t book and the bar’s full. Since when was it all hen parties around here?’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘I recognized you from your picture. You’re …’ He paused. ‘You’re really pretty.’

  Tiffany giggled and pretended to fan her face with a flat hand. ‘Whatever. Where are we going?’

  ‘I’ve called an Uber. You know the Rooftop?’

  ‘No. Listen, I don’t want to be driving …’

  ‘It’s close.’ He paused. He wasn’t young, was older than she’d expected, but there was something immature about his face, and Tiffany felt sorry for him. Maybe he was out of his depth. Maybe he just needed a bit of mothering. ‘Look, I know, I feel stupid because it was my idea …’

  ‘It’s no problem,’ said Tiffany. ‘Though I’m gagging for a drink.’

  ‘Hold on,’ he said. He held out a hand. A car stopped, and the driver said through his open window, ‘Sam?’

  ‘We’re in.’ He opened the passenger door and held it for Tiffany, who slid in showing as little thigh as possible. He got in next to her and said to the driver, ‘Got the address?’

  The driver turned and nodded, said, ‘Verona Street?’

  ‘That’s it.’

  Tiffany relaxed into her seat and decided to let things go, to just enjoy the night, see where it took her. It looked like her date had it under control. She looked across at him and he wriggled out a hip flask, said, ‘You were saying?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘About gagging for a drink?’

  He unscrewed the top and handed the flask to her, and she took it and drank, then he took it and put it to his mouth and handed it back to her, and this happened again and again, and as the taxi drove them through the busy, alive streets of east London, the night closed in around her like a warm blanket and she no longer cared where they were going, or why, or what was carrying her there, because she’d rarely felt so good in her life and things were going to be wonderful, just wonderful, of that she had no doubt, though actually, no, no, stop, why was it that the taxi driver had called her date Sam? Wasn’t he called Tobes? Wasn’t he?

  two

  HIS SISTER HAD BEEN VENTILATED BY A TUBE DOWN HER throat, and a cardiac monitor blipped her steady heart rate in green waves across a black screen above her head. Solomon kept an eye on her blood pressure, which looked reasonable, the systolic number on top holding fairly stable at around 101, the diastolic below maintaining a steady 63. Not bad, both a little on the low side, but what did he expect? She was in a coma, and both numbers were within the acceptable range, or at least the range that scientists had decided. Who knew?

  He looked down at her sleeping face, her closed eyes and delicately arched nose, which also looked normal. Directly past her and in his line of sight was his brother, whose nose fell well outside any range that could be termed normal, bent and misshapen and broken he couldn’t guess how many times. The ventilator hissed and sucked and the cardiac monitor blipped quietly and it could almost have been peaceful, here in this room, if it hadn’t been for his brother. Solomon had never seen his brother calm, but right now he was a lean, shaven-headed vessel of barely controlled rage.

  ‘So tell me this, since you know everything
,’ his brother said, as passive-aggressive an opening as Solomon could imagine. ‘If it was an accident, how come she’s missing teeth and her arm’s broken? Tell me that.’

  Solomon didn’t answer, instead he turned and looked out of the window onto the hospital’s car park. An old man was helping an unsteady woman – Solomon assumed it was his wife – into the passenger side of an old-model something-or-other, it was hard to tell from up here. Maybe a Nissan. Yes, it was a Nissan. Good.

  ‘One hypothesis would be that it happened when she fell,’ he said, without turning around. This was the first time he had left his apartment in twenty-two months. Twenty-two months, one week and three days, to be exact.

  He watched the old man start the car and navigate his way out of the car park, as carefully as if he was piloting a tanker through a crowded harbour. In his mind, Solomon idly transformed the car park into a geometric framework, planes and axes and angles, placing every car in theoretical motion and modelling a possible future in which each and every one was simultaneously attempting to find the exit. He played out alternative pathways and trajectories and velocities, a complex yet elegant piece of mathematical choreography.

  ‘That,’ his brother said behind him, ‘I’m not buying. What, she goes out for a drink, nearly drowns, ends up in a coma and it’s an accident? Please, Solly. Do me a favour. You know who did this, don’t you?’

  Solomon was spared from answering this question by the sound of the hospital-room door opening. He still didn’t turn around, instead let his brother deal with whoever had come in. The room was well lit and the day was bright outside, which meant, Solomon knew, that light was refracting efficiently through the window. Which meant there was very little reflection, something Solomon was perfectly happy with.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ a woman’s voice said, ‘but we’re going to need you to leave.’

  ‘How come?’ Solomon’s brother said.

  ‘Hospital rules,’ the voice said. ‘And we need to change your sister’s dressings.’

  ‘Don’t need to leave for that. We’ll stay.’

  ‘Luke,’ said Solomon, still facing the window. ‘You must allow the lady to do her job.’ He raised his voice slightly and said, ‘Don’t worry. We’re going.’

  ‘I’ll give you a couple of minutes,’ said the voice, and Solomon waited until he heard the door close behind her before turning.

  ‘Please, Luke, don’t be difficult,’ he said. ‘They’re only following the rules.’

  ‘Not being difficult,’ said Luke. ‘Just saying.’

  ‘We’ll be coming back, remember that. Upsetting the hospital staff won’t make it easier for us to see Tiffany.’

  Luke thought for a second, then smiled. ‘Point. Best to keep the wardens sweet, isn’t it?’

  Something like that, thought Solomon, although probably not the analogy he would have deployed. But then, he wasn’t Luke, was he? Not even close. Taxonomically close but a metaphorical species apart. He put his hood on, took his Ray-Bans out of the pocket of his running top and put them on. ‘Are you ready?’

  Luke stood up and leant over their sister’s sleeping face, giving her nose a quick kiss, careful of her broken arm in its plaster cast. ‘Later, Tiff.’ He paused, bent above her, and Solomon could sense his internal struggle, his unwillingness to leave her here, alone, in this room. But eventually he stood, picked his jacket up from the back of the chair and headed for the door. Whatever his brother’s faults, Solomon thought, he loved his sister. But then, with Tiffany, what wasn’t there to love?

  It had been Solomon who’d got the call from the police, the land-line of his apartment ringing for what might have been the first time ever. Not that he didn’t get calls, people did call him, now and then. Occasionally. But on his mobile. He only had the landline because the phone networks ran an inelegant but efficient scam in which you needed a landline in order to get online. Probably a way of future-proofing their business, Solomon imagined, since landlines were as doomed as the Neanderthals, but it hardly mattered. Solomon lived his life in the virtual space. As far as he was concerned, the rise of the online community was the only thing that made his existence bearable, and he’d willingly hand over a kidney for an internet connection, never mind thirty pounds a month.

  ‘Hello?’ he’d said.

  ‘Solomon Mullan?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘We have you down as the next of kin of … Tiffany Mullan.’

  ‘My sister,’ he said, an unexpected wobble in his voice he tried to control by swallowing.

  ‘I’m afraid she’s at Royal London Hospital,’ the voice said, a man’s. By the detachment in his voice, this wasn’t the first time he’d made this kind of call. ‘In intensive care.’

  ‘Can you tell me what happened?’

  ‘She nearly drowned,’ the man said. ‘She’s in a coma, that’s all I can tell you.’

  ‘Drowned? How?’

  ‘Sorry, I don’t have that information.’

  ‘Well, is she stable? Has she been ventilated?’

  ‘I …’ The man on the other end didn’t seem used to this level of informed questioning. ‘I really couldn’t say. She was found in a canal, that’s all I can tell you. You’ll need to come in.’

  ‘I’ll be there,’ said Solomon. ‘As soon as I can.’ He hung up and stood for some time with his back against the wall of his hallway, trying to process what he’d just heard. His sister, Tiffany, in a coma. He’d need to go to her, need to go outside. How did that work? Shoes, he’d need shoes. Where were they? He hadn’t worn shoes in well over a year, had had no need to. And a coat. Did he need one? What month was he in? He felt anxiety flood his chest, anxiety for his sister but also for himself. He’d have to go out of the front door and into the world, where people were, where they talked and laughed and looked, always looked. God. Money. Did he have any? People still used it, right, out there? Of course they did. He rubbed his face and tried to think calmly. It would be okay. People did it all the time. Went out there, got things done, functioned as social animals. He could do it too.

  He walked through to his bedroom and found his mobile. He looked through his recent calls, found his brother’s number. It was about the only one in there, the only person he spoke to, him and Tiffany. Before he thumbed the call button, he looked at the time: 3.15 a.m. He listened to the ringtone, wondering at the same time what exactly his brother would be up to at this time of the morning.

  Outside the room the hospital corridors smelt clean, and that reassured Solomon slightly about his fear, which he acknowledged as irrational, of MRSA, the tabloid spectre of entering hospital for one ailment and rapidly dying of another.

  ‘You want a lift home, Solly?’ said Luke, walking slightly ahead of him. It made it easier not to make eye contact, Solomon suspected.

  ‘You drove here?’

  ‘Yeah. Why?’

  Given the smell of booze on his brother’s breath when he’d arrived at the hospital at just gone five, he shouldn’t have been anywhere near a car. He probably shouldn’t even have been standing. But with Luke, the normal rules had never applied.

  ‘No,’ said Solomon, though he did want a lift, he really did, in fact he would have endured however many hours of his brother’s angry company if it meant avoiding public transport. Avoiding the public in general. But he had somewhere to go and he didn’t want Luke to know anything about it, so he’d just have to suck it up and face the world.

  ‘Sure?’ said Luke.

  ‘I’m sure.’

  ‘Suit yourself,’ said Luke. ‘I’ll call you, yeah? We need to get this sorted.’

  Get what sorted? Solomon almost said, but stopped himself. He wasn’t ready to hear about his brother’s plans for revenge, whoever they were aimed at. Instead he gave a non-committal ‘Yes,’ and watched his brother walk away, or aggressively swagger to be more accurate, before he turned a corner and disappeared. His brother, a promising career criminal. His sister, a comatose stripper, sorry, burlesq
ue dancer. And Solomon, whatever he was. The white sheep? As far as family dysfunction went, the Mullans were running away from the competition. He sighed, pulled his hood lower over his forehead and headed for the hospital exit, counting the black and white tiles beneath his feet as he walked.

  three

  ‘WHAT HAPPENED?’ ASKED INSPECTOR FOX, KEEPING HER EYES on Solomon Mullan. She hoped that she came across as concerned, rather than intimidated by what she saw.

  ‘What matters is what happened to my sister,’ Solomon said quietly, his head bowed. ‘That’s what I’m here for. I’d appreciate it if we could talk about that.’

  Fox would rather have talked about Solomon Mullan’s brother, Luke. He was the family member of interest as far as she was concerned. As far as the department was concerned. Not the sister. But there you were, and here Solomon Mullan was. And she had a job to do.

  ‘Fair enough,’ she said, and looked down at the notes she’d made about the case. They didn’t amount to a whole lot. ‘So Tiffany Eloise Mullan is your sister,’ she said.

  ‘You know she is.’

  Fox looked up sharply at Solomon, who still had his head bowed. She didn’t need this attitude, was accustomed to dutiful respect from juniors and civilians. She was an inspector, after all. A young one, but as far as she was concerned that only meant she had more talent and ambition than the rest. She tried for her most condescending manner. ‘Are you in a fit state to do this?’ she asked.

  ‘Yes,’ said Solomon. ‘Why do you ask?’

  But she didn’t bother answering, just went back to her notes. After a moment she said, not looking up, ‘She was a stripper.’

  ‘Was?’

  ‘Is.’

  ‘Yes, she is.’

  ‘How is that?’ Fox said. ‘For her?’

  ‘I believe it’s a living.’

  Fox looked up again. She had very blue eyes and had developed a direct gaze that she knew people found hard to meet. But Solomon Mullan seemed equally practised at looking anywhere but at her, his face always averted. ‘Are you going to continue to be abrasive?’ she said. ‘I am here to help your sister.’