Flank Street

by A. J. Sendall

  ‘Fixing up a few things at home that got broken. Packing and moving.’

  ‘You’re moving?’

  ‘Moved. That old place has memories I want to leave behind. I’ve moved to Dover Heights. You should come see it some time.’ She swirled her drink dreamily. ‘Why not come for dinner one night next week?’ She raised the glass and sipped delicately at the whiskey. ‘It’s the least I can do for the hero who saved me from the big bad lawyer.’

  From the corner of my eye, I could see Meagan watching us. It was natural we would associate after what happened. I knew Meagan was well aware from some of her comments, and lack of direct questions. Nothing much had changed between us. We still had smokes and vodka shots after close, and the light banter still flowed. I sometimes wondered how far in she was with Ray and Mitchell. Her relationship with Fish was perplexing. It seemed at odds with the trust put in her by Lenny. Something didn’t gel.

  ‘How about Tuesday? That used to be my night off until Lenny disappeared.’

  ‘Have you heard from him—or about him?’

  ‘No, and I haven’t asked. It’s none of my business. My business is running this bar. So, next Tuesday?’ I started to move away from her.

  She stood and pushed away her unfinished drink. ‘Call me.’

  I wasn’t the only man to watch her walk to the door.

  I called her on the Monday afternoon, arranged to see her the following night. Something was making me cautious. I couldn’t put my finger on exactly what. Perhaps it was just meeting in an unknown place where I could be ambushed. I still didn’t trust her.

  The Valiant was in the repair shop, so I took a cab to the corner of the address in Dover Heights Carol had given me. I was an hour early, but I wanted time to check the place out. It was a modest single-storey brick and tile house across the road from a reserve that overlooked the ocean. Fifty metres past the house, I crossed onto the reserve and walked to the edge where the cliffs fell vertically to the sea. There was little wind and the gentle rollers flopped benignly against the foot of the dirty white cliffs. It was tranquil and calming after the hustle of The Cross.

  There was an old bench set on the seaward side of a stand of windswept bushes. I sat and stared out to sea, considering where life was going. What this alliance with a murdering, blackmailing, lying, cheating escort would bring me. Trouble was a given, but what else? My initial concerns about walking into a trap evaporated as I sat and smoked, listening to the steady rhythm of the ocean’s breathing.

  When I looked at my watch again, I was surprised to see that half an hour had passed. My life needed more of these moments. I crushed the third cigarette under my heel and resolved to take time out every few days. Living the nightlife in The Cross fed one side of me, this calm and salty environment another.

  After walking past the house again, I decided it was okay. I entered through the low gate and rang the bell. The door opened almost immediately. She was dressed casually, had a wide smile as she welcomed me in.

  The room was full of the smell of cooking, spicy and aromatic. Buddy Guy’s mellow blues flowed from two large floor-standing speakers, adding to the relaxed feel of the room. It was nice: tastefully furnished without being crowded, comfortable without being ostentatious.

  We followed the smell of cooking to the kitchen: clean and functional. Pots hung from a wrought-iron rack suspended by chains from the ceiling. There was a huge range of spices in a teak rack on the wall beside the bench and a solid butcher’s block in the middle of the room.

  ‘Nice place.’

  ‘Do you like it?’

  ‘Really. I’m not much of a kitchen guy, but this looks classy and useable at the same time—and something smells great.’

  ‘It’s a workshop. It’s where I create.’ She dropped her eyes from my gaze almost shyly.

  ‘I never took you for the domestic type.’

  ‘I love eating—as you’d know by now.’ She smiled coyly as she removed a pot lid and stirred a thick, aromatic sauce. ‘So I learned to cook well so I can eat well without going out. Drink?’

  ‘Sure. Tell me where; I’ll get them.’

  ‘In the globe: ice is in the bottom of the freezer.’

  An antique globe drinks’ cabinet—the type I’d always admired and coveted—was in the corner of the lounge. I ran my fingers across the surface, feeling the countries and contours.

  ‘Nice, huh?’

  Her voice was soft, as mellow as the blues, yet her sudden presence startled me. ‘Beautiful,’ I said. ‘I’ve always wanted one of these.’

  She handed me two crystal tumblers filled with ice. ‘It’s melting. Better get that whiskey out when you’ve finished massaging East Asia.’

  I poured. We clinked and sat in armchairs. It was a nice home.

  ‘What smells so good?’

  ‘Lamb tagine; I hope you like Moroccan food. It’s one of my favourites, and what I like to cook for special people.’

  ‘Have you been there, to Morocco?’

  ‘Sure have. Three times now: once to Fez, once to Agadir, and the other time to Casablanca. I still have to see Marrakech and the High Atlas.’

  ‘Keep the High Atlas in mind in case Brookes ever finds out the truth.’

  She slapped my arm playfully, went through to the kitchen and checked the food.

  ‘How are you enjoying living at the bar?’ she asked as she returned to the lounge and sat beside me.

  The point of the hook pushed against my skin. ‘It’s fine. The price is right and there’s no commute.’

  ‘Doesn’t it get tiring, being always at work?’

  ‘It never feels like real work. It’s more like some of my friends drop in at night, have a drink, and leave a bucket of cash behind.’

  She laughed. ‘Well, if you ever feel like a break, you can always come here. It’s no trouble.’ She waited for a response. When it didn’t come, she continued. ‘And when we have to discuss business, this place is ideal.’

  ‘Do you own it, or is it a rental?’

  ‘It’s mine. I had it rented out for a while, but the tenants were gobshites with no respect, so I threw them out. I always liked this area, so once it was empty I had it done up.’

  ‘And Turnbuckle?’

  ‘Been renting it for several years; gave them notice a few days ago.’ A timer rang. She got up again and went to the kitchen. I walked over and leaned against the opening, watching her deftly stir, taste, sniff, and throw in more spice.

  ‘Ras-el-hanout,’ she said, stirring some more. ‘It means—.’

  ‘Top of the shop.’

  She turned and examined me, obviously surprised I knew what it was.

  ‘I haven’t always been a thief.’

  She raised an eyebrow. ‘You’re full of surprises, Micky DeWitt.’

  The food was delicious. We ate enthusiastically and chatted continuously. Nothing to do with The Cross, Hedges, or Brookes, just normal getting-to-know-you stuff. Movies, books, travel, and of course, Carol’s favourite—food. It would be fair to say we were both surprised by the depth of the other. She was very well read; I’m not talking Mills and Boon, but many of the classics, as well as a broad selection of contemporary novels. More than that, she had informed opinions on, and a deep understanding of literature.

  Despite knowing she was a master tactician, and dangerous as a taipan, that night she seemed normal. She was articulate, educated, and funny. I found my guard slipping further as the evening passed.

  After clearing away the dishes, she led me into a side room off the hallway. When she turned on the subdued lighting, I got another surprise. Inside was a mini-library on one side and a tiny home theatre on the other. ‘This is my chill room,’ she said, brushing lightly past me as she stepped inside the room. ‘It’s where I recharge.’

  I looked along one of the many loaded bookshelves, sorted by genre and then alphabetically: Dickens, Hardy, LeCarre, King, and almost any other I could name were there.

  ‘You’r
e quite a surprise yourself, Carol Todd. I would never have guessed.’ I moved to the other side and ran my eye along the hundreds of movies, recognising a few of my favourites amongst them. She had one of the latest rear-projection screens with quad sound system. I was impressed, envious as well.

  She made coffee, served it in the chill room with a brandy chaser. The coffee, like the food, was superb. She surprised me again by producing a box of small, fine cigars, lighting one for each of us. She was being the perfect hostess, and it was making me nervous.

  My opinion of her was slowly changing. As much as I tried to deny it, I had to admit we were quite similar in some ways—quite a few ways. Part of me wanted to leave, to go home. The other side of me wasn’t having any of that.

  She ran a finger along a shelf of movies as she searched for something. ‘La Femme Nikita or Bird on a Wire?’

  ‘I haven’t seen either, so you choose.’ She weighed the choice for a few seconds. ‘Nikita.’ She opened the box, pushed the video into the player, and joined me on a sofa.

  ‘What’s it about?’ I asked. I rolled the ash from the end of the cigar.

  She tucked her legs up and leaned her shoulder against me. ‘A female assassin.’

  ‘Why didn’t I know?’

  She jabbed her finger in my ribs, smiling widely.

  At some point during the movie, her legs ended up across my lap, her hand in mine. You know how it went from there. We had another brandy and cigar, watched Kim Basinger in 9½ Weeks, and woke up tangled in the sheets at dawn.

  Revenge

  Since taking over Frankie’s from Lenny, I’d given Mandy a set of keys so she could come in and clean at whatever time suited her. Next morning I didn’t need to rush back there and open, and Stella would be there before eleven to get the bar sorted.

  After a leisurely cooked breakfast, we walked across the reserve and looked out at the ocean from the same seat I’d sat on the previous day. There was still no wind: barely a ripple disturbed the slowly lifting and falling blue/grey surface.

  The previous night had been nice, better than nice, and it had broken down a few barriers we’d both erected from survival instincts and distrust of the other. I still didn’t fully trust her, probably never would. The memory of her rushing the stairs and shooting Hedges through the back of the neck was still fresh. She probably distrusted me after I tracked her and threatened to kill her parents, but there was a comfortable and unspoken status-quo that allowed us to enjoy these moments.

  ‘Have you heard from Lenny?’ she asked, breaking the shared silence.

  ‘No, and I don’t expect to. My guess is Mitchell gave him the option of leaving Sydney or the big adios. Lenny’s a survivor, a grifter; he’ll find some other place to hang out and cheat people.’

  ‘Did he really tell you he was skimming off Brookes?’

  ‘I don’t think even Lenny’s that stupid.’

  ‘So it was just a ploy?’

  ‘Not entirely. I knew there was some coin going west. He was paying a couple of suppliers with cash, the rest I pieced together. They probably just slapped him around and told him to piss off and don’t come back.’

  ‘Doesn’t matter anyway.’ She turned to face me. ‘What matters now is you and I making the right moves and staying tight.’

  ‘Do you have anything in the pipeline?’

  ‘Not yet, but when I do, I’ll tell you. It might be a while before anything turns up, but when it does, we have to be committed and ready to rock.’ She looked out to sea again. ‘In the past I’ve heard things, seen things that I could’ve benefitted from if I’d known someone like you. I fit in around some of the clubs and bars. I’ve been there a long time, so people figure I’m part of the place, part of the Brookes’ empire.’

  ‘Are you?’

  ‘He just told you to kill me, remember? I’ve worked around that area and hung out for years. Anyway, like I said, I sometimes hear things.’

  ‘Example.’

  ‘Okay.’ She thought for a moment. ‘There’s this guy I was drinking with one night, Luis Two-step—comes from his funky walk. He’d had a few shots, as well as some nose candy, and he gets this phone call. I could make out what was going on from hearing his side of the conversation; he was fencing some stolen gems. Anyway, he ends the call and starts telling me about it, about how much he’ll make just by collecting later that night and delivering the next day to this bent jeweller he knows. If I could have called you—’

  ‘I could have rolled him. Then what?’

  ‘Then we split it sixty-forty.’

  ‘Cute. Fifty-fifty, but I don’t know anything about gems, or fencing them.’

  ‘That’s why I get the big bucks.’

  We walked back to the house and I called a cab. It was time to go, time to clear my head and think about where this could lead.

  Running the bar was keeping me busy most days. I was making a few changes, putting a row of booths along the wall facing the bar, cleaning the place up, and doing some light redecorating. I had carte-blanche from Mitchell as long as they got their kickback each Friday, and I was looking after the place. No sign of or word from Lenny. I’d half expected him to come back at me for dobbing him in, but I guess he now saw me as being under the protection of Brookes, Mitchell, and Ray. It didn’t feel like that, but I accepted it, and that it was the reason Kurt Reed or Fish hadn’t come for me either. I still had the Beretta, but left it hidden. It was my rainy day leverage over Carol, if I ever needed it.

  Ray, or more often Sonny, would be in each Friday night to collect. Ray was the strong, silent type who controlled people the way an eye dog controls sheep. Sonny was starting to open up and seemed like a decent guy. He’d recently become a father, and was keen to show anyone who was interested, or not, pictures of his baby son. He was from the Cook Islands, a group of islands I’d visited on the way to Aussie. I didn’t mention it to him. My past was mine alone. I hadn’t seen Mitchell since the night Carol and I faced him with the lies about Hedges.

  There had been little news in the papers about the late Barry Hedges and no talk of it around the bar. I hoped it would stay that way. Carol and I hadn’t spoken of it, other than one or two passing jibes. She seemed unaffected by it and was always happy and good company when I was with her. It made me wonder if he had been abusive towards her at some point. Either way, she seemed glad he was gone. I still had regrets about burning the XJ12, but that was all.

  I’d put on another barhop, a girlfriend of Meagan’s named Janet. They worked well together and it allowed me to take the occasional night off. Sunday nights had become the regular visit to Carol’s place at Dover Heights. She always cooked, was always a good host and an even better lay. I didn’t ask about her work life. I assumed she was still escorting and she didn’t volunteer anything.

  I wouldn’t go as far as saying I was growing fond of Carol, although I was enjoying seeing her once or twice a week, looking forward to it as I worked the long days and late nights. We were getting to know and understand one another; trust seemed to be growing as well, but affection wasn’t part of it. However, when I let myself into her house one Sunday afternoon at the beginning of May, I did feel protective of her.

  I held her chin and looked at the split lip and blue-yellow bruising around her right eye.

  ‘Who did it?’

  ‘It looks worse than it feels, Micky. I’ll be fine.’

  She’d been drinking. There was a change in her that could have stemmed from anger or fear. I’d brought wine with me, went through to the kitchen to put it in the fridge. There was no smell of cooking. The kitchen was a mess. No use drilling her for information on what had happened and who’d hit her, or why. I returned to the lounge, sat beside her, cradled her head in my left hand, and pulled her towards me.

  I wasn’t ready for what happened next. She cried, softly at first, and then sobbed. I just held her, rocking her slightly and making soothing noises as I’d seen parents do with a hurt child. She stayed th
at way for several minutes until the sobs slowed and stopped. She wiped her eyes and nose on my shirt, sat up and looked at me.

  She sniffed. ‘It was this nasty little fucker called McCutchen.’

  ‘Who is he?’

  ‘Some kind of fag errand boy for Loretto Reed, I think.’ She sniffed again, rubbing distractedly at the wet patch on my shirt. ‘I was in Les Girls on Thursday night, just having a drink with a friend. When I turned from the bar carrying two drinks, I bumped into him. One of the drinks ended up on his suit. It was just a G & T, not a Bloody Mary. He looked at me, sort of incredulous, you know, as if I’d done it on purpose. Before I could say anything, he backhanded me across the mouth and then punched me in the face.’

  She looked down and blinked away emerging tears. ‘There was nothing I could do. He’s not big or tough, but he’s backed by those arsehole Reeds.’ She pulled at my T-shirt and wiped her nose on it. ‘I could probably have fucking decked him, but the payback would have been a bitch. My friend saw it happen and bundled me outside and into a cab, telling me all the time to forget it, let it go, that any revenge would backfire on me. I know she’s right, but right now I could fucking kill him.’

  ‘You want to?’

  ‘Want to, yes, but it would be bad for my friend.’

  I tipped her head towards me and looked again at the wounds. I hated men that thought they could beat women. They were always cowards. Most would turn and run from a fight with a man.

  ‘I don’t know why it upsets me so much, Micky. I’m so sick of being around those sort of people. Small things seem bigger than they really are, like a sore that’s constantly rubbed raw.’

  Something changed in our relationship that afternoon. I didn’t notice it straight away, but there was a shift in dynamics, a tighter bond, and for me, a better understanding of Carol.

  Being vulnerable to someone takes trust. That afternoon I felt genuine vulnerability from her, not skylarking or banter, just honest sadness flowing from an unhappy heart.

  It touched me; it lit a protective flame which, as I thought about the actions of the coward McCutchen, grew into a roaring bushfire. I marked him. He’d pay for his actions before he’d lived many more days. I had a name, and one of the places he hung. I knew who he hung with and I knew a barmaid that knew where they hung out. It was only a matter of time, and fitting the pieces together.