“Was there something specific you wanted to say?” he asked, sounding bored now. “I do have an appointment.”
“Who with? Another reporter? The police?” I nodded to the bottle. “Or perhaps you just can’t wait to open that?”
For the first time, I saw a flash of anger, quickly veiled, followed by something else. Something darker. Pain? He took a breath and was calm again.
“You’ve clearly made up your own mind without any input from me,” he said. “But then, you always were a spoilt and willful child. Hardly surprising that you’ve made such a mess of your life.”
The gasp rose like a bubble. I only just managed to smother it before it could break the surface.
“‘A mess’?” I repeated, the outrage setting up harmonic vibrations that rattled at the heart of me.
He made an annoyed gesture with those long surgeon’s fingers of his, staring at me over the thin frames of his glasses. “Please don’t go blaming anyone else for your mistakes, Charlotte. We both know you’re over here solely because the people who have laughably employed you wanted the services of your semi-Neanderthal boyfriend enough to offer you some sinecure. And because he was too sentimental to leave you behind.”
“They offered me a job alongside him,” I managed. I was disappointed to note that gritting my teeth did nothing, it seemed, to prevent the slight tremor that had crept into my voice. “On my own merits.”
“Ah, yes of course.” He glanced upwards for a moment, as if seeking heavenly intervention. When he looked back at me, his face was mocking. “Face it, my dear, you’re little better than a cripple. A liability to those around you. You’ve already proved you can’t be trusted to do a job without injuring yourself and others. What possible use could they have for you?”
“For your information, I’ve just been passed fit,” I said, ignoring the fibrous tension burning up through the long muscles of my left thigh that made a lie of my words. I tried not to think of my abandoned fitness test, of what Nick was likely to put in his report. “I’ll be back on—”
“Credit me with some experience in these matters, Charlotte, if nothing else,” he interrupted, glacial now. “You may not approve of my ethics, but my surgical abilities are quite beyond question, and I’ve seen your records. You may be walking without that limp any longer, but your health will never be exactly what one might describe as robust again. A little light office work is about all you’re fit for. You know as well as I do that they’ll never quite trust you again.”
The shock wave of his words pummeled into me, sent me reeling back before I could brace myself. It took everything I had not to let him see me stagger.
“Oh, that’s right,” I said, soft in my bitterness. “Your daughter—the disgrace. All your self-righteous lectures about the shame I’ve brought on you, on Mother, and for what? For being a victim. And then when I stop being a victim, still you damn me.”
I paused. He said nothing and his silence only spurred me on. “You’ve never liked Sean—you’ve made that pretty bloody clear. But he’s stood by me better than my own parents have ever done. And now I find you’re nothing but a drunken butcher. How does that square with your sense of bloody superiority?”
“That’s. Enough.” It was almost a whisper. His face was bone white, his gaze everywhere but on me. When he put a hand up to his eyes I saw that it shook a little, and I was fiercely glad. But when he spoke again, his voice was neutral, almost dismissive. “I think you’d better leave, Charlotte. Throwing insults at each other is time- consuming and hardly productive, wouldn’t you say?”
I whirled back towards the door and found I’d barely made it three strides into the room. I grabbed the handle and twisted, but found I couldn’t leave it there.
“‘Surgical abilities beyond question.’ Is that right?” I threw at him. “Well, at least whenever I’ve had cause to stick a knife into somebody I’ve always been stone-cold sober.”
“You finally made it in, huh?” Bill Rendelson said. There was a row of clocks hanging on the glossy marble wall above the reception desk where he held court, and he pointedly twisted in his chair so he could check the one set to New York time. “The boss wants to see you—like, yesterday.”
I’d barely stepped out of the elevator before Bill had delivered his ominous message. He heaved his blocky frame upright and stalked across the lobby to knock on the door to Parker Armstrong’s office.
Bill could have buzzed through to let Parker know I was here, but he liked to rub it in. He’d been with the agency since the beginning, so the story went, and three years previously he’d lost his right arm at the shoulder in a parcel-bomb attack on the South African businessman he was protecting. His principal had survived unscathed, but Bill’s active service career was over.
When Sean and I had first started working for Parker, I’d assumed from his abrupt manner that Bill had taken against us for some reason, but it was soon clear that he didn’t like anyone very much. I often wondered if Parker’s keeping Bill on—in a job so close to the heart of things but without actually being able to get out there anymore— was an act of kindness or cruelty. Sometimes I thought perhaps Bill had his doubts about that, too.
Now, he pushed open the door in response to his boss’s summons, and jerked his head to me. I stiffened my spine and walked straight in without a pause, nodding to him as I went. He gave a kind of half sigh, half grunt by way of acknowledgment, and yanked the door shut behind me as though to prevent my premature escape.
Parker Armstrong’s office was understated and discreet, like the man. Modern, pale wood furniture and abstract original canvases. Not for him the usual gaudy rake of signed photos showing chummy handshakes with the rich and famous.
The office occupied a corner of the building and was high enough not to be easily overlooked—no mean feat in any city. Parker’s desk sat across the diagonal, so his chair was protected by the vee of the wall, his back to the windows, to allow potential clients to be slightly intimidated by the view.
He was on the phone when I walked in, and I expected to have to wait while he finished the call, but he wound up the conversation almost right away, stood and came round the desk to meet me.
Parker was a slim man, tall and serious. His hair had once been dark until hit by an early frost, and that made him difficult to put an age to. His face was handsome without being arresting, the kind that the eye would glance over, rather than rest on. Perfect for the line of work he’d chosen. And yet, if you looked closely enough, you saw something more in Parker, a depth, a strength, a watchfulness.
He was wearing a dark single-breasted suit with the jacket unbuttoned, and a narrow tie. I was glad I’d taken the time to put my business face on and change out of my scruffs. Wool trousers and a silk shirt in the obligatory New York black, the collar high enough to hide my more obvious scars.
“Charlie,” Parker said, steering me towards one of the leather armchairs near the desk. “Take a seat. You want coffee?”
A gentle accent, not immediately placeable, the U.S. equivalent of classless. I’d heard him add twang or blur to it, depending on the company he was keeping. A natural chameleon. There was a lot about him that reminded me of an older Sean. Perhaps that was why Parker had offered him a partnership in the first place.
I shook my head and he moved across to the filter machine he had permanently on the go in the corner. “You sure? It’s Jamaican Blue Mountain—just in.”
His taste in expensive coffee was practically his only vice—or the only one I’d found out about, at any rate. He had fresh-roasted beans delivered by the pound from McNulty’s aromatic old-fashioned store in Greenwich Village.
“So,” I said, wanting to take the offensive rather than wait for him to do so, “you’ve spoken to Nick.”
Lifting the coffee cup to his lips only partially obscured the quick grimace, his mouth twisting up at the corner.
“Yeah.” He arched an eyebrow. “He’s not a happy guy.”
“He should have kept his hands to himself,” I shot back.
“Maybe so,” he allowed, “but you coulda been a little more, ah, diplomatic in giving him the brush-off.”
I shrugged to cover the fact I’d already realized that. “Maybe.”
Parker sighed and put the cup down, regaining his seat like a judge about to pass sentence.
“Close protection is all about attitude, Charlie,” he said, sounding tired now. “Mind-set. You gotta see the big
