in the window as the train jolted and the lights dipped, yellow and sulphurous, so that Delaney's brown eyes smouldered in the low light like a hunting wolf's.
He came to a decision and reached into his pocket as the train clattered to a standstill.
Kate walked out of the Tube station scowling as the wind came howling up Hampstead High Street sweeping the rain into her face. She stepped back into the entrance and waited for the weather to abate. She looked at her watch, still not relishing the idea of going back to her empty house, but she had a film on DVD to watch and three-quarters of a bottle of Cloudy Bay chilling in her fridge. Damn Delaney, she thought for the hundredth time that day, wishing again, also for the hundredth time, that she'd never gone to the funeral. She tried to persuade herself that she'd gone for the old man, not on the off chance of seeing that ungrateful Irish bastard. She'd nearly put her life on the line to save his miserable skin, not to mention that of his daughter's, and what thanks did she get? Used and discarded. He made her feel like the cheap kind of whore he obviously felt comfortable with. She strode angrily out into the rain, sod the man, her life had been on hold for long enough. Time to push the play button, and not on the DVD machine. She hurried up the street towards the Holly Bush. Physician, heal thyself, that's what they said, didn't they? Well, she was going to write out a large prescription in her own name: vodka-based, repeat as required.
She crossed the street and, as she did, she felt that familiar tingle in her spine again, but, as she blinked the rainwater from her eyes and looked back, she couldn't see anyone following her. She hurried on up the slight hill, keeping her face down and angled away from the rain. Within minutes she was pulling the old, heavy door behind her, closing out the wind and the weather, the rainwater dripping from her black overcoat on to the rough wooden floor of the pub as she shook her hair and wiped a hand across her eyes, hoping her waterproof mascara was holding up and hearing the sweet, soulful tones of Madeleine Peyroux cutting across the chatter in the room. They didn't always have music playing; the manager said that the hubbub of conversation was the real music of the place and she agreed with him. It was just part of what made the pub special. Tonight though she was grateful for the music, it shielded her from other people's thoughts.
As she knew it would be, even this early, the pub was busy. She walked up to the right-hand bar where luckily there was a vacant stool. She pulled it forward, sat on it and smiled briefly at the young, Australian barman behind the counter. 'Large one please, Stuart.'
The barman nodded back at her, lifted up a jug of ready-made Bloody Mary and poured Kate a glass. Kate took a long pull, the sharp kick of vodka mingling with the bite of the pepper and the tang of the celery salt. She took another sip and sighed. Time to heal.
Janet Barnes had never had to work hard at soliciting admiring glances from men; her ex-boyfriend, a failed stand-up comic, said that she had the kind of body that pouted if it didn't get attention. Usually she enjoyed that attention, but tonight there was one man in particular who was looking at her from across half the length of the train carriage, and her skin crawled. She pulled her raincoat tight around her, but if anything it just accentuated her lush, curvy figure. She looked out of the window, the featureless rush of Victorian brick wall flickering past scant inches away. There was talk of London flooding in the news again. Steps being made to improve the Thames Barrier. She remembered the flooding of last year. Whole areas, families, homes, lives ruined in the North of England. She couldn't help wondering what would happen here if the Thames were to ever break its banks. The Underground system would be flooded. Thousands of tonnes of water would pour into the network. Would the passengers all be drowned or electrocuted? All those electric rails running everywhere. Another problem for that Eton-educated, class clown Boris Johnson to sort out. Not a problem for her, mind. Any luck and she'd be out of the miserable city long before that happened, if it ever did. Just a few more quid saved up, a few more months, get the winter over with and she'd be out of the capital, out of the country and over the mountains she'd fly to sunny bloody Spain. Put this miserable, sodding, rain-drenched country behind her once and for bloody good. Just because she dressed
