“Why?”
“You might get your hair pulled.”
“So might you.”
“It’s my battle.”
“And mine, if I’m really thinking of making this relationship permanent. Anyway, you need me. I’m the one with the Tampax.”
“They won’t work.”
Roz chuckled at the expression on Geof’s face.
“They will.
Trust me.”
Hal tipped a finger at Wyatt.
“Now you know why I brought 7 her.”
“You’re both bloody mad.” Geof dropped his cigarette butt on to the pavement and ground it out beneath his heel.
“So what do you want me for? By rights I should be arresting you.” He eyed Roz curiously.
“I suppose he’s told you everything.”
“I shouldn’t think so,” she said cheerfully, walking round the back of the car.
“I only learnt half an hour ago that his ex wife’s name was Sally and you married her. So, on that basis, there must be an awful lot more still to come.”
“I was referring,” he said sourly, ‘to the numerous prosecutions he’s about to face when this little farce is over and I take him down the nick.”
“Oh, them.” She gave a dismissive wave.
“Bits of paper, that’s all they are.”
Geoff not altogether happy with his new marital arrangements, watched her amused exchange of glances with Hal and wondered why other people, infinitely less deserving than he, had all the luck.
He listened to Hal’s instructions for him with a hand pressed to his queasy stomach.
Roz had expected something seedy and run-down like the Wells-Fargo office: instead they walked into a clean, brightly painted reception with an efficient-looking receptionist behind an efficient looking desk. Someone, she thought, had spent a great deal of money on STC Secwity. But who?
And where had it come from?
Hal favoured the receptionist with his most charming smile.
“Hal Hawksley. Mr. Hayes is expecting me.”
“Oh, yes.” She smiled in return.
“He said to show you straight in.” She leaned forward and pointed down the corridor.
“Third door on the left.
Perhaps your friends would like to take a seat Out here?” She indicated some chairs in the corner.
“Thank you, miss,” said Geon.
“Don’t mind if I do.” He hefted one as he passed and took it with him down the corridor.
“No,” she called, “I didn’t mean take one away.”
He beamed back at her as Hal and Roz disappeared through the third door without knocking and he stationed himself on the chair in the middle of the closed doorway.
“Very comfortable, I must say.” He lit a cigarette and watched, with some amusement, as she picked up the phone and put through a flustered call.
On the other side of the door, Stewart Hayes replaced the receiver.
“I gather from Lisa that you have a minder, Mr. Hawksley. Would he be a policeman by any chance?”
“He would.”
“Ah.” He clasped his hands on his desk, apparently unconcerned.
“Sit down, please.” He smiled at Roz and gestured towards a chair.
Fascinated by him, she took it. This was not the man who had tried to strangle her. He was younger, better looking, bluff and friendly like his voice. The brother, she thought, recalling the photographs on the sideboard. He had his father’s smile, with all its sincerity, his father’s old-world charm, and under different circumstances she would have found him easy to like.
Only his eyes, pale and carefully guarded, implied he had something to hide. Hal remained standing.
The smile embraced them both.
“OK, now perhaps you’d like to explain what you said over the telephone. I’ll be honest with you’ his tone suggested he was about to be the exact opposite “I don’t understand why I’ve been given half an hour to buy a restaurant from someone I’ve never met, someone I’ve never heard of, and all because a self-confessed murderess
