‘Ed said you were lovers. Described the purple birth mark on your groin.’
Sarah shivered, then exhaled. ‘I didn’t tell you the whole thing. It was too . . . ’ She wanted to say upsetting but that wasn’t the right word. ‘Degrading.’
‘It’s your business, not mine.’
Behind her, somebody sounded their horn. Sarah was forced to drive on. ‘I’m just going to pull over for a minute.’
They were on the edge of some playing fields, half of which had been replaced with ugly, new Housing Association builds.
‘He ripped my knickers off, Nick. He had my dress up round my waist. The room was brightly lit, so he got a good look, yeah. Then I kneed him in the groin. How could you think that I’d give myself to a neanderthal like him?’
Although she’d stopped driving, Nick still stared ahead. ‘You knocked yourself out to get him out of prison.’
‘Because I thought he was innocent!’
Her mobile rang. Sarah snapped a ‘hello’, then recognised her party leader’s voice. Taken aback, she stumbled out an apology for her abruptness. Tony pooh-poohed this in his most earnest, blokey manner. He told her how much he appreciated the work Sarah had done over the last two years. ‘I admire you sticking with your seat. It was the right thing to do, but I know you were given . . . options. If things work out for us tonight and they don’t work out for you, I want you to know this: we’ll find you a role. A good one.’
She didn’t need to tell Nick who she’d been talking to. When the call ended, he sounded impressed.
‘Call you often, does he?’
Sarah shook her head. ‘First time ever. Do you believe me about Ed?’
She turned to face him and they looked each other straight in the eye, only a few inches apart. ‘How can I not believe you?’ he said.
This was not the moment to kiss him, though Sarah wanted to. But it was their most intimate moment since they stopped being lovers.
‘Suppose I’d better drive you back,’ she said.
Nick only spoke again when she was almost at the cab firm.
‘Something I haven’t told you. Something important.’
‘Wait a mo.’ She didn’t want to end the conversation but the road outside Cane Cars was double yellowed and busy. Sarah turned into the cab firm car park, where there was one space, which she took. At least they couldn’t be seen here. Words tumbled out of Nick.
‘The woman I was seeing until recently . . . it wasn’t serious, but you know her. I picked her up in the cab from one of your surgeries.’
Sarah could feel it coming, knew at once who her rival was.
‘It was entirely physical. You can’t imagine what it’s like, not having any for five years. Anyway, it was Polly. Polly Bolton.’
‘You were screwing that?’ Sarah shook her head in disbelief.
‘That’s not all of it. I went round to see her the other day. I wanted to warn her that Ed’s driving a taxi for my brother. Only, she already knew. Thing is, and this is hard to believe, she’s seeing Ed.’
‘Polly’s got back with Ed? That’s beyond bizarre.’
‘You knew that they were together before?’
‘I only just found out. How close are they, have you any idea?’
‘They’re living together, as far as I can tell. She’s a hard case, Polly. I told her what you’d told me about Ed. She didn’t give a shit. She says he didn’t do it. She says he told her who did.’
‘If he knew that,’ Sarah said, ‘he’d have told me. Or at the very least he’d have told his solicitor.’
‘I’d better go,’ Nick said, awkwardly leaning over and putting an arm around her. ‘Do you want me to ring you later?’
‘Please. I ought to be at the count by ten. Until then, whatever I do is displacement activity.’
He kissed her on the cheek, then got out of the car. Sarah began to back out of her space, distracted. What could a man like Nick see in a woman like Polly? Had prison coarsened Nick so much? No wonder he’d believed it when he heard that Sarah had been with Ed Clark.
A cab was waiting in the narrow driveway. Sarah held up her hand to indicate that she was on her way out and pulled down the sun visor to keep off the glare. The cab pulled alongside Sarah and she manoeuvred carefully around it to make her way out, not once looking at the driver.
‘What was Sarah Bone doing in the car park?’ Ed Clark asked.
‘No idea,’ Nas said, as Nick put down the paper, which was predicting a comfortable Labour win.
‘Thought you’d stopped working here, duck,’ Ed said to Nick.
‘I’m not working,’ Nick said, and Nas didn’t contradict him.
‘You and Sarah. Back together again, are you?’
‘She gave me a lift, that’s all.’
‘I’d have thought she had better things to do on a day like today,’ Ed said. ‘But she has strong needs, Sarah, dun’t she?’
Nick couldn’t stop himself. He hit Ed in the face, hard, sideswiping his nose. The other driver didn’t go down. Without waiting to recover, he lunged at Nick. Before Ed had time to get in a good punch, Nick kneed him in the groin, hard.
‘From what I hear,’ he said, as Ed keeled over, ‘you’re used to being hit there.’
Nas threw Nick the keys to Stuart’s cab. ‘Get out of here before he can stand up.’
29
Best to be straight with her. Sarah couldn’t pretend to be at Polly’s house by accident. Suppose Ed was there? His taxi wasn’t outside but maybe, like Nick, he shared one. Meeting Ed was a risk she would have to take. Sarah knocked on the door, then took deep breaths, inflating the anger she needed before she was able to tackle Polly.
‘You again.’
‘We need to talk. Now. Away from the kids.’
Sarah’s demeanour was stern enough for Polly to step aside and let her in. She yelled into the front room.
‘I’ve got a visitor, so watch the telly quietly. No interruptions.’
She ushered Sarah into the back room, which was messier than on Sarah’s last visit. There was a leather jacket hanging from the cellar door. It was the one Ed had been wearing on the night of his release. Sarah pointed at it.
‘How could you, Polly? You were so convinced he killed your brother, your sister-in-law.’
‘Nick told you, did he? Ed said you used to know him but I found that hard to credit. The MP and the jailbird. We’re not so different, are we? Both go for blokes who’ve been inside.’
‘Nick’s crime was a lot less serious than Ed’s.’
‘Except for one thing,’ Polly said, looking at the stairway. ‘Ed didn’t do it.’
‘You’ve changed your tune. I don’t get it, Polly. How could you let that . . .’ – she was going to say ‘sociopath’ but doubted Polly would know what the word meant – ‘that creep near enough to you to convince you he’s innocent, never mind let him into your bed?’
‘Ed gets what he wants,’ Polly sneered. ‘But then, you’d know that, wouldn’t you?’
‘If you’re saying . . . ’
‘It bothers you, dunnit, that I’ve had the same men you’ve had. Nick, he’s the one who likes it rough. Did he learn to be like that from you? Ed, he’s a gent compared to Nick. Don’t look at me that way. You’re not going to pretend Ed forced you, are you? I know what you told Nick. But I know what you’re like.’
‘You know nothing,’ Sarah said. ‘Ed Clark tried to attack me and if I hadn’t hurt him, he would have raped me. I went out with Nick fourteen years ago and how he could have stooped to sleep with the likes of you, I can’t fathom.’
‘Stoop? Sleep? Fathom? Listen to her. Your Nick never slept here. He came to fuck me when he felt like it and didn’t give a shit if the kids heard a thing or not. Ed sleeps here. He’s good to those kids. And if he offered you a jump and you turned him down, you missed out.’