‘But I can change.’
He’d said it so deadpan it had taken her a few seconds before she got it, then she laughed because she couldn’t believe he would make such a lame joke.
So then it had become a kind of thing that they tried to find the lamest jokes to tell each other: Snorting Coke… when Becca’s drink went up her nose, Baggers can’t be choosers… when she was struggling to get a sack of rubbish out of the door. ‘Why doesn’t that dosser do a bit of work?’ he’d said once, looking across at the barman, Toby, who spent as much time as he could get away with playing on the games machines.
Toby became Dosser after that.
Andy took the piss out of the punters, giving them daft names as well. There was the tall, thin woman who hung out with the bikers, and who always wore a hat tipped forward, shadowing her face, and sometimes sunglasses as well, like she was some kind of celebrity. ‘Or gangbanger,’ Andy said when Becca commented on the glasses. After that, he started referring to her dismissively as Sal Capone. And there was the fit guy – and didn’t he know it? – with long dark hair who looked like some kind of gypsy or pirate or something. Becca once admitted she thought he looked like Johnny Depp. Andy had dismissed this at once. ‘Him? You mean Johnny Dip?’ That one had made her laugh.
The pirate guy had been Johnny Dip ever since.
But Andy was more than just a punter. As they got to know each other, he admitted he was there for a reason. He worked for an investigation agency specialising in fraud, he’d told her. Carl Lavery, the landlord, was on the fiddle, or they thought he was, and it was Andy’s job to collect the evidence.
‘Yeah, right,’ she’d said. Private detective? He was having her on. Carl, in his old mac, looked more like a private detective than Andy did. Andy called Carl ‘Flasher’ on account of the mac.
‘You’re kidding, though? Private detective?’ That had made her uneasy. It was a bit like him being a copper, and you couldn’t trust coppers. All her life, from her policeman stepfather to the police who wouldn’t listen and who had locked her up last year, she’d learned you could never trust them. They might talk nicely, they might pretend they were on your side, but if you fell for it, even for a second, you soon found out how wrong you were.
If you trusted them, then you got what you deserved.
They’d raided the pub a few weeks ago – she hadn’t been working, but when she’d heard, it had made her feel sick, the thought that they could come in at any time and turn the place over.
So she didn’t like the detective thing at all.
‘No, it’s true.’ He’d handed her a card with his name on: Andrew Yeatson, Financial Enquiries. ‘I’m a real private eye,’ he’d added. Then, looking more closely at her face, ‘Hey, are you OK?’
‘Yeah.’ She’d managed a smile. ‘Yeah, I’m fine.’ It didn’t matter, she told herself, if the coppers came here. She wasn’t doing anything wrong. Since when did that make any difference, loser? a voice jeered in her head.
For a while after that, she’d kept out of his way, but it was like he didn’t notice. He’d gone on being friendly, he’d given a couple of the punters a hard time when they’d said things, and before long, they were mates again.
He was nice, easy to talk to, and without really realising it, she’d started helping him – telling him what she knew about the people who came into the bar, telling him if the till roll balanced properly, telling him about deliveries. He was interested in those.
A couple of weeks ago, she told him about that odd time she’d been in the cellar, collecting more crisps, and Carl had come down the stairs, staggering under the weight of two holdalls he was carrying.
When he saw her, he’d dumped them on the floor and she’d edged round him so she could get up the steps quickly if she needed to, but he wasn’t planning on being grabby, not this time. ‘What are you doing down here, Becca? It’s busy. The bar’s your job.’
‘Yeah, only we were out of—’
‘Look, if it isn’t behind the bar, we don’t have it. You don’t come down here without my say-so. Got it?’ He’d aimed a pat at her bum as she went back up the steps but she’d been ready for him and moved too fast for him to connect.
Creep.
Later, after closing, he’d sent her down to bring up some soft drinks for the next day. Curious, she’d looked round for the holdalls, but there was no sign of them.
She’d told Andy about it. ‘He was really pissed off I was down there.’
‘Twat.’ That made her feel good, to know he was on her side.
Then she’d told him about the groping, and it had made him really angry. ‘You shouldn’t have to put up with that sort of shit. Do you want me to…?’
She’d shaken her head. She could look after herself, but it was – yeah, it was nice that he was bothered. He’d asked a few questions about the holdalls – not that she’d been able to give him any answers.
‘Why do you want to know?’ she’d asked.
‘Got my boss on my back,’ he’d said. And then, to her surprise. ‘Do you want to go out, after? There’s a new club opened in Hull.’
‘Hull?’
He’d grinned. ‘You know any cool clubs in Brid?’
She’d smiled back. ‘Yeah. OK.’
She hadn’t been clubbing since she’d left Leeds, about two years earlier. A long time. And it had been great. They’d danced until three in the morning, and she could have gone on dancing until daylight. He’d driven her back to Brid, driving fast on the empty roads, getting them back to her flat in just over forty minutes. Then he’d kissed
