The Make

CCTV footage out in the road. Sorry, Gracie. It looks like the fire was started deliberately.’

Gracie was silent.

‘And there’s more,’ said Brynn. ‘The police were quizzing me about your finances; they were thinking maybe you’d started it.’

‘Me?’ Gracie blurted. ‘They were asking if you had money troubles.’

‘They asked me the same thing. Fuck me,’ said Gracie angrily.

‘Gracie – you haven’t, have you?’

‘I don’t know how you can even ask me that,’ said Gracie in exasperation. ‘You’ve seen the books. You know we’re well in the black.’

‘Yeah, but personal stuff,’ said Brynn, sounding uncomfortable. ‘You know, personal debts . . .?’

Gracie stared hard at the phone. Brynn was asking about her expensive apartment, her car, her high-end holidays.

‘For fuck’s sake, Brynn, you know the wage I draw from the business. You know I have a budget. You know I’m not careless with money. I take money off the punters. I don’t gamble myself.’

‘I know that . . .’

‘Look, I’m not in financial trouble, Brynn. I pay all my bills on time; I clear my credit cards at the end of every month.’

‘Hey, don’t shoot the messenger, Gracie. I’m trying to prepare you, that’s all. For sure they’ll want to speak to you in the New Year, and these are the things they’ll be asking you about.’

Oh terrific.

This was just getting better and better.

George and Harry

NOVEMBER

Chapter 23

It was another black-tie do. Harry arrived slightly early at Jackie Sullivan – aka ‘the cougar’s’ – gaff in Notting Hill. She opened the door to him, wearing a different halter-necked maxi-length dress – white this time, not the old funereal black – and she still looked endearingly awkward and over-dressed. Her pale eyes were nervous as she smiled up at him.

‘Goodness, don’t you look gorgeous,’ she said.

‘So do you,’ said Harry.

‘And you’re such a marvellous liar,’ she smiled.

‘I’m not lying,’ said Harry, and he wasn’t. She had the sweetest face and he was pleased to be here with her again. ‘Do you think we’ll make it this time?’ he asked, stepping into the big lemon-yellow hallway with its myriad prints and antiques.

‘Oh, to the . . .’ Jackie paused, blushing – remembering, Harry knew, what had happened on their last date. The tears, the outpouring of grief over her husband; and then the night, the hugs and kisses and the surprisingly satisfactory sex.

‘Sorry,’ said Harry, seeing that he’d embarrassed her.

Jackie bit her lip. ‘No, I’m sorry,’ she said quickly. ‘I’m so sorry that I as good as ignored you when we bumped into each other in Covent Garden. I felt awful about that afterwards, but I was with a client, and I was just so surprised to see you – all I could think to say was that you were a friend of Emma’s.’

‘Well, I’m a friend of yours, so I think I can stretch to Emma too – even if I didn’t meet her at uni.’ Harry hadn’t been to university. He hadn’t been anywhere. He’d left a pretty useless school at 16 without any qualifications, got a couple of dead-end jobs and wound up on the dole. Being an escort and actually earning well was the pinnacle of his achievements so far.

‘My mind just went blank,’ said Jackie.

‘It’s okay. Not a problem. You ready to go?’

Jackie paused. Checked she had her wrap, her tiny sequinned evening bag. Glanced back at the photos on the console table. Her husband; her daughter. Harry wondered if she was going to start crying again. But Jackie turned to him with a smile.

‘Yes, I’m ready,’ she said.

Chapter 24

‘So how’s it going, Lefty?’ asked Deano.

Lefty was in the back room behind the fetish club, summoned there by Deano Drax. This room was all business – desk, filing cabinets, cold steel and big mirrors – in complete contrast to the hot reds and golds and dim lighting out in the club itself. The pounding beat of the club’s sound system was thrumming through the walls and into the body of the office, keeping pace with Lefty’s rapidly accelerating heartbeat.

There was a boy who looked about fourteen years old sitting on Deano’s desk. Deano’s hand was resting on the boy’s denim-clad thigh, smoothing over it caressingly. The boy was slim, dark-haired and blank-eyed. There was a dusting of white powder under his nose. He was sipping from a bottle of Bud.

Underage drinking popped into Lefty’s addled brain. And that sure wasn’t talcum powder on the kid’s upper lip, now was it? But Lefty thought that both those things were the least of this kid’s worries, if he was in Deano’s hands. Lefty had the horrible queasy feeling that Deano’s dick had been out of his trousers just a second before he came in the room.

Lefty’s mouth seemed to have dried of all spit. He swallowed hard, came up empty.

‘Only,’ Deano went on, ‘you been days looking for my boy Alfie now, and I said I’d give you some time. But there’s a limit. You do remember I said that, don’t you?’

‘I remember, Deano,’ said Lefty, gulping hard. ‘And I’ll find him. Don’t you worry about that.’

‘Oh, I ain’t worried, Lefty. I got every faith in you. But time’s moving on.’

Lefty saw Deano’s hand wandering ever further up the boy’s thigh. Oh shit. He had to look away. One thing turned his stomach, it was noncing.

‘Only so far you ain’t been doing too good, Lefty,’ went on Deano. ‘You been letting me down. Way you’ve been going on, if I asked you to post me a pair of bollocks, I’d end up with a set of tits, that’s my feeling.’

The boy smiled vaguely at Deano’s piercing wit. Lefty raised a wilted, trembling smile.

‘I’m gonna find him, Deano. I swear to you on my mother’s life.’

‘Yeah?’ Deano smiled too. The boy leaned over and tenderly held the bottle to Deano’s lips. Deano sipped the ice-cold beer and the boy smiled. Then Deano looked straight at Lefty. ‘I’m gonna hold you to that, Lefty. Your mother’s life. Or yours. I don’t care which. Okay?’

Lefty nodded. He couldn’t speak; he was so frightened he was afraid he was going to piss himself. His mother, his sweet dear mother, lived over in Brixton, and he wondered if Deano knew that. He thought that Deano probably did. Deano knew everything.

‘Now fuck off,’ said Deano.

Lefty hurried from the room.

The boy leaned in close to Deano, who looked at him assessingly. He was a pretty thing, but he wasn’t little-blond-angel Alfie. It was Alfie Deano craved – for now, anyway. It was Alfie he wanted, Alfie he loved, Alfie he was completely obsessed with. He missed him so much; he had to get him back