Curiosity getting the better of her, she popped her bare big toe onto the paper and dragged it out along the carpet into view.
A beautiful young woman’s fresh face stared up at her with sparkling cheeky eyes, high cheekbones, and soft, pale pink hair curling about her shoulders. Her head tilted to the side, giving the camera a bright trusting smile.
She didn’t recognise the girl. Maybe it’s the leg owner’s girlfriend?…sister?.
No time to delve further, she couldn’t risk having the leg wake at any moment; she slid the image back under the sideboard and made her way to the front door.
Heaving it open with a quick, final glance over her shoulder, she exited and pulled it gently shut behind her.
Relieved to have escaped unnoticed, she snuck across the opulent communal hallway to an awaiting elevator, choosing it over using the large circular stairway. She stepped inside and pressed the ground floor button. The doors closed with a gentle chime. A shiny gold panel indicated she occupied the fifth floor, the arrow pointing down.
With a sigh of relief, she turned and fell back against the doors. Her dishevelled image stared back at her from mirrored walls. Good God, I look rough!
Licking fingers, she rapidly wiped tell-tale mascara smudges from beneath her eyes and across her cheeks. She smoothed down her dress and finger-combed her hair. Rummaging through her bag, she found a lipstick tube and skilfully covered her red-wine-stained lips. Disgusting…I’ve got to stick to white.
The elevator hit the ground with a soft thump, depositing her in a lobby where she stepped into her shoes and strode into the lavish silk, marble, and granite concierge area, sauntering as nonchalantly and carefree as possible. She held her head high and blagged it, as if born to be there.
Taking it all in, she gawked at the building that reeked of money, but whom did she know lived here. Oh god, please don’t let it be a client…or Velma.
Her heart began to speed up again. Not again! Shut up and breathe.
Her heels clicked cheaply on the marble floor. The uniformed concierge looked up. She bet he’d grown accustomed to witnessing beautiful young women leaving the building in the early hours, his ready smile and slight nod confirming her suspicions.
She didn’t have time, or the balls, to stop and talk to him, to find out who the hell she’d been with last night. Would he even know? She scampered on, giving him a weak smile and a hasty wave of her hand.
As she reached the entrance doorway, four burly men wearing police uniforms barged past her.
“Excuse me, miss.” One of them turned to look over his shoulder, taking in the view of her long legs and tight-fitting dress.
She pulled her coat smartly around her body, hiding her thighs.
The officers hurried as their radios barked instructions and surrounded an alarmed concierge. The taller officer waved an official looking document at him.
Not waiting to see the fuss unfold, she pushed through the doors, skipped down the pillared entrance steps, skirted around the badly parked police cars with their flashing lights, and marched off into the London sunshine. Coffee...now!
Chapter Three
Brompton Court Train Station,
Knightsbridge, London, UK
He stood in the shadows, watching her fight her way through the barriers, one hand clutching the phone to her ear, the other balancing a tall iced latte and holding it aloft over commuters’ heads.
Amy shouted into her mobile, competing with the station’s hum.
“Urrgh! I’ve got the hangover from hell, Sal...sorry, what did you say?” She squinted her eyes from the pain, vowing never to drink again.
“What am I going to do, Ames? It’s that bitch Dartagnia. She’s been promoted, and she’s driving me crazy. I swear I’m going to kill her.” Sally’s voice whined through the phone. When she was pissed off, her inflections picked up a faster pace and higher pitch.
“Don’t let her get to you, hon. There’s a little shit-stirrer in every office. Just suck it up. Life’s too short. Leave it to karma.” Amy hugged the phone tight into her ear, took a slurp of much needed coffee, and continued.
“What you need is a little protective Labradorite tumble stone in your pocket. That’ll keep her at bay.”
“You and your crystals. What a load of baloney,” tutted Sally. “No, what I need is a little protective knuckle duster in my pocket and to chuck her into the bay. God help me, I’m gonna kill that woman.”
“Revenge only gets you in trouble, Sal, and comes back threefold. She’s not worth it.” Amy bit her lip and crossed her fingers, justifying her own revenge plan because it was different, he was an evil, murdering, child abuser.
“I don’t care. I’d gratefully do time for that woman.”
“Just let karma do its stuff.”
“Stuff karma. Who’s got time to wait for blinking karma? I want her dead, now!” groaned Sally. “Do we know any hitmen?”
“No, I don’t know any hitmen,” Amy sighed.
Fellow commuters turned to look at her. She’d spoken a little too loudly. She gave them an apologetic shrug and turned away, whispering into her phone.
“Funny as it may seem, my contact list is fresh out of hitmen. You’ve got to calm down, hon. Maybe I should get you a Smithsonite stone. It’s really pretty. You’ll love it.”
“Fuck off with the blinking crystals, for god’s sake. What about some cyanide crystals, or ammunition? Can you get me some ammunition?” Sal had no time for the crystal hocus-pocus.
Amy sighed. “No, I can’t get any cyanide or ammunition.”
Her fellow commuters started to move away.
She carried on before Sal could continue.
“You need to calm down. Smithsonite is a stone of tranquillity. I know what you’re like. You get all ugly-obsessive-revengey. Your neck goes red and steam comes out your ears. It’s so not a good look, hon.” A surge of nausea hit Amy. “God I feel ill. I think I’m going to faint. I forgot my crystal last night. Should’ve known I’d get into trouble.”
As Amy squeezed through barriers, a wave of hurried, stressed commuters flowed in behind her. Well used to the rush hour chaos, she surfed the tide with ease. Tripping and bumping to the polite British murmur of ‘sorry…ooops,’ ‘sorry…so sorry.’
The heaving travellers made their way across the forecourt, down the steps, and onto the busy platform. She strained to hear her friend’s reply.
“You’re a useless drinker, two drinks and you keel over...wish Dartagnia would, do us all a favour. Give me the biggest fucking stone you’ve got. I’m gonna fucking throw it at her.”
“Now, that’s not helpful.”
“I’m gonna tie ten of them to her handcuffed body and throw her in the Thames.”
“Sal…”
“I know, I know…you see the effect she has on me. I hate the way she brings out the bitch…grrrrrr! I can’t help it. Nor can anyone else in the office. We all look forward to her days off or when she phones in sick. There’s such a nice energy in the place when she’s not there,” Sally sighed. “Miss High-and-Fucking-Mighty is always belittling us, always having the last word, charming to our faces but stabbing knives in our backs as soon as we leave the room. We call her the smiling assassin.”
Sally continued, barely coming up for air.
“She loves it when we fuck up, loves pointing it out and getting us in trouble, thinks she knows it all…and she generally does…grrrrrr! If we’ve done something, anything, you can bet she’s done it bigger and better. I bet if I say I’ve had a morning shit, she’s had two. She’s all about one-upmanship. Why are some women such annoying dicks? Surely, we’re all on the same side? Bitch, bitch…bitch, bitch…BITCH.”
“You don’t like her then.”
“No, I bloody don’t…and I’m gonna do something about it.”
Silence.
“Like what?”
“Murder.”
“Murder is not the answer, honey.” Fellow commuters glanced ov
er their shoulders. “God, I need some drugs.” Amy rubbed her forehead as the throbbing became unbearable. She turned to notice the stares. “Headache tablets…I NEED HEADACHE TABLETS,” she shouted, for their benefit.
“What?”
“Nothing. I’ve got a stinking headache.”
“If murder isn’t the answer, then what is?”
“Asking the Angels for help, then leaving it to karma…they’ll sort it for you, but you have to ask. Otherwise they can’t help.”
“Yeah, like they’ll listen to me. Fallen angels maybe, but I’m not sure they do hit requests. They’re not the Mafia, Ames.”
Silence. Amy could hear Sal’s heavy breathing.
“Are you picking at your cuticles? Hands down, now,” Amy barked, knowing exactly what her friend would be doing: sulking, slouching in a chair, cradling her phone against her neck, and pulling at the tags of skin around her fingernails.
Sally’s cuticles took the brunt of her stress. Next would be the scrunch-eyed, microscopic scrutiny of split ends (that only she could see) in her long, beautiful, well-conditioned hair, followed by tearing the ends apart.
“Why can’t blokes see her for who she is? See past the teeth, tits, short skirts, and promise of a cock suck?” Sally moaned. “Bet she’s lousy at it, she has one of those skinny, small, thin-lipped mouths that so doesn’t know how to enjoy a good meal…surely, blokes can stop thinking with their dicks once in a blue moon. Have you got a stone for dicks?”
“Well, there is one for impotence—Pink Beryl, I think it’s called…”
“Ames…shut up!”
“Sal, calm down and don’t even think about the hair. Drop it, now!” Amy barked before Sally could reach for her locks. “I’m so gonna get you a few stones to get rid of this negative energy. Maybe a nice bit of Smoky Quartz and a Sunstone. You can wear them in your bra.”
“I don’t need no bleedin’ stones. I need a drink—a double gin and tonic would just about do it right now.”
“It’s 8.30 a.m., hon.”
“Urrgh…so? It’s blinking five o’clock somewhere.”
Taking a leisurely drag of his cigar, he watched Amy’s blonde head weave along the jam-packed platform, looking for a place to stand. She found it near the outer edge halfway down the tunnelled station. He flicked the smouldering stub to the floor, covered it with the tip of his shiny black patent shoe, and twisted firmly, left to right, grinding the smoking leaf into the ground. He flicked ash from the cuff of his suit, stepped out of the shadows, and followed her. He loved the ‘click-click’ sound of his shoes as he walked. It made him feel important.
“This is ridiculous. They need to put on more trains. Heaven knows we pay enough for our tickets,” muttered Amy, squeezing into a gap between a little old lady and a suited city gent, ignoring the gent’s tutting glare and impatient shake of his newspaper as he tried to read it.
“What?” asked Sal, barely hearing her over the noise.
“Nothing, hon. I’m at the station…chaos as usual. Another joyous journey of sardine-packed, stinky arm-pit, breath-holding hell. I’m soooo done with London. I wanna live by the sea, get a cuddly Saint Bernard dog, tend a vegetable patch, have good WiFi, and work from a shed in the garden,” she said, taking a sip of coffee. “No rush hour, no dirt, noise, congestion charge or the expensive costs of a city. Dartagnia—what kind of name is that anyway?”
“Her mum has a thing for The Musketeers, apparently,” grumbled Sal.
“Ohhh…I love them in that TV show. Athos is delish, although Aramis is quite cute… and that theme tune always gets me tingly.”
“It means leader or something. I call her plain old Tanya to piss her off. She hates it. And do you know, she shags on my desk when we’re not in the office? I bleach my desk every morning and pick pubic hairs out of my keyboard. It’s disgusting.”
“Ewe…why don’t you tell your boss, if she’s so bad, hon?”
“Can’t. He’s the one she’s shagging.”
“What about his wife?”
“She’s shagging her, too.”
“What about her own husband?”
“He’s invited.”
“For god’s sake, is anyone doing any work in that office?”
“Swingers...I ask you, how the hell can I compete? Have you got a little tumble stone for that?” Sal said, grumbling sarcastically.
“Nope, I don’t think so, but Jasper may prolong sexual pleasure, and Rose Quartz is a great love stone.”
“Oh, for eff’s sake…shuuuuut uuup.”
“The next train on platform two is the Picadilly line, eastbound train for Cockfosters.” The tannoy screeched above commuter’s heads while the platform bustled with anticipation.
“Talking of sexual pleasure, I think I fucked up last night, Sal.”
“Good. Glad to hear it’s not always me. What kind of fuck-up?”
“Waking-up-in-a-stranger’s-bed kind of fuck-up...the walk-of-shame-from-an-address-I-don’t-recognise kind of fuck-up…the what-the-hell-happened, and with-who kind of fuck-up. I left my protection stone at home. Should’ve known.”
“Ooohh, who?” Sal said, cooing excitedly. “One of the guys from your internet dating site? The architect…the gardener…the scaffolder…the upholsterer? Oh my, not the priest?”
“No. Well I don’t think so. I’m still trying to work it out. I didn’t see who it was as I snuck out of the bedroom,” Amy admitted with a prolonged sigh. “It was the office party last night; I don’t even know if it was a guy. It could have been a client or Velma.”
“Who’s Velma?”
“You know—the one with yellow teeth and personal space issues who always stands too close when she’s talking to you. Our receptionist.”
“Oh yes, oh no. But she’s not…and you’re not…are you?”
“No, no. But she does get a little creepy, needy, in your face, especially when drunk. I’m sure I didn’t go home with her. I think it was a man. Even paralytic, I would know the difference, surely.” She shook her head, trying to get rid of the image of Velma’s yellow teeth going in for a kiss. “It didn’t smell like a woman.”
“Ewe…”
“You know what I mean. It was a macho pad. A woman would’ve had nice perfumed smellies around the place. Oh, I don’t know.”
“You’re such an old tart, Amy Fox,” Sal giggled. “Never a dull moment.”
Amy cringed. She could hear Sally’s snorting laughter.
“Stop laughing. I’ve got to go straight into the orifice this morning, stinking of Beaujolais and vodka shots.” She slurped her coffee. “If I see Velma later and she gives me a loving look, at least I’ll know it was her last night and not a client. I can’t ever walk through Reception again, I’ll have to use the back door.”
Sally’s laughter got louder.
“Stop laughing,” Amy shouted into the phone.
The stuffy newspaper gent gave Amy a raised eyebrow with a disdainful glint. She gave him a full-on, fake smile and shrugged. Miserable twat, you need to get laid, mate.
“She may be too mortified to turn up today.” Sally’s laughed.
“Will you stop laughing?”
“Sorry, Ames.” Sally took a deep breath to calm herself. “At least you’ve put an end to your dry patch, hon. It’s been a while.”
“I’m not sure if I did…and if I did, it would be nice to be able to remember the moment, for god’s sake.” Amy sighed. A thought came to her.
“You don’t think I was drugged, do you? My drink spiked? I’m never drinking again.”
“I’ll see you in the bar after work then.”
“What if it’s a client, Sal?”
“I hope not. You know what happened the last time. What did he…sorry she…sorry…it do when you left—” Sally’s voice was drowned out as the tannoy screeched.
“Mind the gap.”
Amy cupped her phone closer, unable to hear.
“Hang on a minute, Sal. I can’t hear you. I�
��ll plug my headphones in. Hold on.”
Placing her coffee cup safely on the ground between her feet, she fished around in her handbag for her headset. Something caught her attention.
She pulled out an old black and white photograph, torn and yellow with age. She turned it backwards and forwards in her hands, trying to understand where it had come from. She looked to the old lady and the grumpy gent, wondering if one of them had lost a treasured photo, but they ignored her, too busy preparing for the almighty charge to secure a place on the train.
The image portrayed a young boy and girl, no more than four or five years old, standing together and smiling for the camera. The blonde girl cupped a football in her short arms and the curly brown-headed boy cradled a toy machine gun. She couldn’t make out their faces, the image too worn and blurry. She turned the photograph over and read the words ‘I’m sorry’ scrawled in black ink across the back.
“Mind the gap.”
Could the photo have found its way into her bag during her one-night-stand? She couldn’t think now, her mind throbbing with hangover fog. She’d work it out later. She stuffed the photograph back into her bag and picked up her coffee. The distant train rumbled and churned in rolling rhythm, its vibration rocking the platform.
“Sal…” she shouted into her phone. No answer.
Leaning forward, she peered down the tracks into the black tunnel. Train headlights came screaming towards her while its thundering noise shook the air. Warm, soot-ridden wind sucked at her ankles, swirled around her body and lifted soft blonde hair from her shoulders. She scrunched her eyes tight from the percolating grime.
“Mind the gap.”
A grinding screech signalled the train’s declining speed.
“Sal, I’ve gotta go. Speak later, OK…OK?” Amy shouted above the noise.
As the train neared, a breathy wisp of air blew across her body, unlike the train’s stirring wind or an exhausted traveller gasping for air. Commuters jockeyed for position along the platform, knocking into each other, but this cool sensation delivered an eeriness she couldn’t explain.
She shivered, glancing over her shoulder but saw nothing more than anxious people shoving their way to avoid being late for work.
The Deal (The Fallen Angel Series Book 1) Page 3