Chapter Forty Nine

Jane was out that evening. Sorcha wasn’t sure if she had decided that she was out of danger or beyond hope, but she was intending to head back to Connecticut in a day or two, and had wanted to go and visit her godmother before she went.

Once she had calmed down after the phone call, and persuaded herself to go back home, Sorcha’s biggest concern was how Jane was going to react to the fact that she was planning to sell the flat rather than let it. Even a news flash which said that Stephen Warren had been found in a house in Oldham, but helpfully said nothing more, failed properly to distract her. Every way she tried to imagine starting the conversation it turned into a fight.

While she was still trying to think up an alternative way to broach the subject, there was a knock at the door. Not the buzzer, which at least meant that whoever it was had fifteen floors still to travel, but a knock. At any other time the most likely explanation was one of the neighbours, although that only happened once or twice a year at most. Now it could be anyone. If it was right that Stephen Warren had been found, it was possible that the press would be having another go. She tried to ignore it and went into the kitchen: she told herself that she was getting a glass of water, but it wasn’t an accident that it also took her further away from the front door. Whoever it was knocked again. She wondered if she should call down to the concierge. Then another knock, which sounded as if whoever it was wanted to hammer the door down. Sorcha picked up the phone, and was trying to choose between the concierge and the police when the person on the landing realised that just knocking wasn’t going to get them what they wanted. A voice shouted through the keyhole.

“Let us in love. I’m stuck all on my own out here, and I can hear your TV’s on.”

It was muffled, but the voice didn’t sound familiar. She hesitated, and pulled a large knife out of the block in the kitchen, before heading into the hallway.

“Please love. Pretty please. I tried next door, but they’re out you see. I’ll even get down on my knees and beg.” There was a scuffling sound the other side of the door, followed by a series of long and whining pleas. She looked through the spy-hole, but could see nothing at all – presumably because whoever it was had knelt down below the sight line. If she put the door on the catch to open it, she was going to have to do so holding the knife somewhere around her knees.

“Stand up.” She shouted, but wasn’t sure how loud it needed to be. There was more scuffling. When she looked at the spy-hole again she saw a nose, with what looked to be two fish-bowl eyes some way behind it. “Who are you?”

“You don’t need to know that love. I just need somewhere to hang out for a bit.”

She wasn’t sure whether to hang onto the knife for dear life, or drop it in exasperation.

“Tell me who you are, or I’m calling the police.”

“Shit, no.” It was hard to tell whether whoever it was was actually worried, “Don’t call the police. You don’t need to call the police. I live here, I just can’t get into my flat.”

He didn’t say anything else, and it didn’t sound as if he was moving around either. She looked through the spy-hole again, and although he was slightly further away than he had been before she still couldn’t see him properly. She could see that he was wearing a T-shirt, even though it was the wrong time of year, and it looked as if he had tattoos. She didn’t know anyone who had tattoos. She was afraid, and she had been too afraid too recently to be able to get a proper grip on herself.

“Step back from the door so that I can see you properly, and put your hands up.”

“Who the hell trained you? The CIA?” More scuffling, “What happened to ‘love your neighbour’, eh?”

She looked again, and he was standing in the middle of the landing area. As she watched, he switched from looking at her door head on, giving her first a left profile and then a right one. She wasn’t quite sure what she was seeing, and the distortion of the lens really didn’t help. She put the latch across, and opened the door a fraction. He moved forwards, just as she yelled at him to stay where he was. He sprang back to attention, and there was no longer any doubt about who she was dealing with. She opened the door as far as it would go with the chain still across.

“What the hell are you doing here? Last I heard they you were being driven around the States, drugged up in the back of a container lorry.”

When she had opened the door further Marty had taken a step forward again, only to see him spring back again when the knife came into view. He looked almost as afraid as she felt.

“Who the hell told you about the lorry? Nobody’s said anything about that. And why are you waving a fucking knife around. I just wanted somewhere to stay for an hour or two until someone comes to pick me up, but some nutter’s kicked my door in and then nailed it all up. Jesus.”

She left the chain across, and hid as much of herself behind the door as she could. He looked absolutely nothing like any kidnap victim or hostage she’d ever seen. His hair had been cut, not cheaply, the stubble was just the right length and there was at least a suggestion of fake tan. The only sign of any luggage was a black leather holdall, on the floor over by the lift, which had a jacket of some sort thrown on top of it. It didn’t occur to her that her silence was likely to be freaking him out.

“That wasn’t you, bashed my door down, was it?” He started backing away, towards the lift. “Look, I don’t know what you’ve got going on, but you should get help.”

Sorcha shivered, and then felt silly. She shut the door to take the chain off, before opening it again as quickly as she could. He was still standing by the lift. She was still holding the knife.

“I’ve had a bad week.” It didn’t come close to doing justice to the situation, “Well, couple of weeks, at least. What are you here for, and why didn’t you want me to call the police? I’m guessing that they were the ones who knocked your door down, looking for either you or your charming friend.”

He was watching the knife intently as she spoke, in a way which didn’t leave much scope to pay attention to anything else.

“If we’re going to have a conversation, is there any chance you could get rid of the knife?” She shook her head, and kept on shaking it, “That’s a shame. Look, love, I’m actually a really nice guy if you just get to know me. Never had an unsatisfied customer, however much I’ve paid her.” She felt herself tensing more, and clasped the knife tightly in front of her, “OK, look, I’m here because I need to find a mate before he does anything stupid. A car is meant to be coming for me at eight. I just need somewhere to hang out until then.”

“If you mean Stephen Warren, you’re too late. The BBC gave out that he had been captured about an hour ago.”

“You’re shitting me, right?”

The knife blade was still pointing straight at him, but it was something in his reaction which made Sorcha feel calmer. He seemed to be worried, in a normal, human way.

“No, I’m not. I’m sorry. I have no idea who spirited you over here, or where they had been keeping you, but if I were you I’d get them to spirit you straight back again.”

She glanced across at the lift, which had just started moving, and as she did so he seemed to catch sight of something he hadn’t seen before. He put his head to one side and looked as if he was watching her.

“What?”

He grinned at her, slowly.

“You’re Jake’s girl, aren’t you? They showed me a couple of pictures. Bloody hell, you’re not like the meek little things he usually goes for.” He seemed to be holding some kind of celebration inside his head, “Shit. It’ll be weird being neighbours and everything. Maybe I’ll have to start spending some time here again. It’ll be like the old days, except I’m still a fuck of a lot richer than the rest of them. Whatever they say.”

He was still grinning. She was wishing that she didn’t keep having to say it, and didn’t properly listen to the rest of what he said.

“You’re not likely to see Jake around here, Pet. Rumour has it he doesn’t enjoy gunshot wounds much, and I’m selling up anyway. Estate agent’s coming round tomorrow morning to do the measurements.” She thought about what Jake would say if he could see her, standing there, having the conversation. “If your paths ever cross, you can tell Jake I threatened you with a ten inch cook’s knife: I doubt he’ll be surprised.”

She didn’t mean to, or even really notice, but tears started to trickle down her face. Marty seemed to hesitate before moving closer to her. She let him take the knife out of her hand because it seemed pointless to keep hold of it any more. There was a shelf unit just inside the front door, and he set it down on top of it.

“Come here love.” He held out his arms to her, “You have had a shit couple of weeks, haven’t you? Come and have a hug.”

She didn’t fight as much as should have: she wasn’t sure that she actually fought at all, although she definitely thought about it. He was a warm, solid presence, but he smelled strange. Like leather and mouthwash, with cigarettes and a hint of menthol or eucalyptus. Something like Vicks or Olbas Oil. They stayed like that for longer than they should have: long enough for Sorcha to get her act together, and wonder how the hell to get herself out of the situation she had somehow stumbled into. He didn’t seem to be inclined to loosen his hold on her, so she spoke at his chest and upper arm.

“You must have had a pretty shit few months yourself. What did they do to you?”

It worked: he didn’t quite let go, but he shifted so that she was far enough away to be a plausible audience. He didn’t look as subdued by the question as she had hoped he would, though.

“It wasn’t actually that bad. Stupid bugger doing it this time didn’t really want to cause any bother. The first couple of weeks were shit, but he didn’t actually like giving me the drugs and stuff. I reckon he was also a bit lonely. Ended up with us just driving round a bit, and me hiding when there were other people around.”

“You let him drive you around for four months?”

The question wasn’t particularly friendly, but he didn’t seem to notice.

“Mad, innit? We were even going to get matching tattoos, but we couldn’t agree a design. Then the silly bugger just ran away, and left me in a parking lot. Left me all on my ownsome, somewhere in the middle of fucking Kentucky.” He did what had probably once been an approximation of puppy eyes, but puppies didn’t have age spots and wrinkles. “That definitely deserves another hug.”

He grabbed Sorcha close to him again, catching her completely unawares as he did so. She gasped in surprise, and he pushed the door closed behind them with his foot. He kept hold of her as he carried on talking.

“Especially as I’ve come all this way, with a little help from half the fucking unofficial universe, to find that it’s all too late.” He thrust his groin hard up against her, and she yelped in surprise. It didn’t mean what he thought it meant, and he had no idea how lucky he was that she could no longer reach the knife, “That deserves at least another hug, I reckon.”

Before Sorcha had a chance to use either cunning or force to extricate herself, she found his face bearing down on her face, and his tongue shoved unceremoniously in her mouth. She’d had no idea that it was open, but had no time to think about it as one of his hands slid down inside the waistband of her jeans. She stamped hard on one of his feet, and spat his tongue back at him as best she could, making a bid for freedom.

It didn’t quite work, because his hand was still inside her jeans.

“What the fuck was that for? We’ve both had a shit time of it, and we’ve got an hour or so now when we could have a bit of fun.” He was attempting an expression which had probably once been impish, “It’s not often you get a chance to shag a bona fide rock star. You’ll be telling your mates about this for years.”

She was twisting, trying to extricate his hand, which he seemed to want to leave where it was.

“Get your hands off me, and get out of this flat this minute, or I’m definitely calling the police. They’ll want to talk to you about the blackmail if nothing else.”

As she said it, she realised that she shouldn’t have. She felt the usual cold, hollow, falling feeling from screwing up again. The worst of it was that it had happened so often in such a short period of time that she was almost used to it, although it still made the relief when he held his hands up in the air, in carefully faked surprise, quite a lot less comfortable than it should have been. She suddenly, stupidly remembered that she had intended to try to get him to agree to her having gone into his flat, but standing there looking at him it was quite clear that none of it had been worth it, just as none of it could ever be undone.

“Calm down love. I didn’t mean no harm.”

He was trying the puppy eyes again, which was just ridiculous.

“Get. Out.”

An air of wounded astonishment set in as he finally got the message that she didn’t want him around and was unlikely to change her mind.

“It’s OK.” His hands were back in the air. She opened the door for him, so that he could keep them there, “I’m going. And they’ll never get me on that blackmail shit. I told Stevo it was all a load of bollocks from the beginning.”

He winked at her, and then picked up his bag and turned and walked down the stairs. Sorcha was angry with him, more because of what he was than because of anything he had done. More than ever it confirmed her need to get away, and her fury was such that Jane gave up even trying to challenge it. She knew that Sorcha’s reaction to Marty was mostly anger with herself, but could see no way of breaking through it.

It seemed right when the flat sold almost as soon as it went on the market. There were two asking price offers within the first few days, both from cash buyers, and it ended up going on sealed envelope bids. Sorcha never even met the buyer, and decided that she was happier that way. The fewer chances there were for anyone to ask for an explanation, the better. She kept her work handovers as short as possible for the same reason, and ended up packing her life away with the TV playing in the background, with the news bulletins generally on mute as Keith was found shortly after Stephen Warren was arrested, Marty gave more press conferences than he needed to, and speculation about what exactly had happened continued to rumble on. She hated herself for wishing she knew more about it all, but it soon became apparent that less than what she already knew was going to be made public before Keith McDonald and Stephen Warren were brought to trial. That was likely to take at least six months, and she had no intention of waiting around for it to happen.