The lull was disturbed by a group of women, out on a hen night, moving along the street. Behind them, a man followed close by, his boots dragging in the slush. Some of the women looked over their shoulders at him — a look that suggested that if they’d been on their own, somewhere less populated, they might have been worried. He dropped back a little as they passed the front of Angel’s, his face disappearing into his coat, but then, when he was past the entrance, he speeded up once more. Some of the girls at the back of the group flicked a look at him again; one of them — fired up with alcohol — turned and asked, ‘What’s your fuckin’ problem?’ But the argument fizzled out when she saw his attention was no longer focused on them or where they were headed. He was looking across the street.
Right at me.
Our eyes locked for a split second and he seemed to hesitate. But then he tagged on to the group again, breaking into a jog and eventually passing them. When he was clear, he looked up ahead to where the road split.
Something stirred in me. A memory.
By the time he started disappearing west, parallel to Chinatown, it had come to me: the guy who broke into my car at the cemetery.
He looked back, saw I was still watching him, and quickened his pace. I tossed the coffee aside and followed. He turned right at the end of the street, then started moving through the crowds working their way down towards Shaftesbury Avenue. It was packed. Shops were still open. Restaurants were luring people in. A queue from a theatre curved out and along the pavement towards me.
He glanced back again, bumped into someone and then upped his pace, disappearing into a crowd of tourists. I headed after him, to where the group — gathering around a tour guide — were blocking the pavement. He emerged the other side and crossed the street.
Then he broke into a run.
Forcing my way through the crowd, I could see him barging through another group of tourists further down. One of them stumbled as he pushed past. Her husband called after him. But when he looked back, it wasn’t to apologize. It was to see how close I was.
I tried to move faster, put my head down for a second, and lost him. He’d gone behind a theatre queue. I crossed the street. There was a back alley close to the queue, black and narrow. Steam hissed out of a vent high up on one of the walls. As I got closer, he burst out from a knot of people about halfway down, glanced at me once, then disappeared into the alley.
The darkness sucked him up.
When I got to the mouth of the alley, I could only hear the echo of footsteps at first. Then he emerged from the shadows, partially lit by a window above. I started down the alley after him. He was a long way ahead of me, almost on to the next street. He stopped when he got there. Looked back. And then disappeared out of sight.
By the time I’d got to the end, he was gone. I stood for a moment, looking both ways. There were crowds on both sides of the street, and cars passing along it. And there were shadows everywhere, doorways to disappear in, tiny vessels of lanes and alleys. Slices of night that would hide him for as long as he needed.
I looked at my watch. Ten minutes past seven.
A thought hit me. Maybe this was the point: they were luring me away from Angel’s so I couldn’t get at Jade. Tricking me. Manipulating me. Maybe the barman had glimpsed me in the shadows out front after all, and gone in and raised the alarm.
But then I stopped dead.
About a quarter of a mile down on my left, Jade was crossing the road. She looked both ways, a cigarette glowing between her fingers, and moved off in the opposite direction. I hesitated, suddenly unsure it was her.
But it was.
It was Jade.
I followed her, keeping to the other side of the street, moving in and out of the pools of light cast by the street lamps. When I drew level with the alley she’d emerged from, I looked along it and saw a big green door, partially open. Above it were a pair of neon angel’s wings. She’d left through the rear entrance — which meant they knew I was waiting.
So why lead me back to where Jade would come out of?
Because it’s a trap.
I hesitated.
What if it was? What if the first guy had led me here and now Jade had been told to lead me somewhere else? What if that phone call outside Eagle Heights had been my one chance to walk away? The one chance I hadn’t taken.
She disappeared from sight at the end of the road.
I stood there, frozen to the spot, uncertainty pumping through my veins. Something flooded my chest, a sense that I’d been here before, in the first few weeks after Derryn’s death: standing on the edge of a precipice, watching the ground crumble beneath my feet.
But then I saw my reflection in a nearby shop window and realized how much direction this case had brought to my life, the energy it had returned to me. And I understood that if I wanted to carry on moving forward, this was something I had to do. A step I had to take.
So, I went after her.
When I got to the end of the road, I saw Jade about forty yards along a street to the right. She was crossing the road and heading for a thin sliver of back street, partially lit. There was a restaurant on the corner, its front decorated in tinsel and Christmas trees. Otherwise it was another London back alley full of exit doors and second-floor windows.
I caught up quickly, and then slowed as I got closer to her.
‘Jade?’
She stopped and turned. She couldn’t see me to start with, then I moved out of the dark and under the light of a Christmas tree.
Her face dropped. She sunk her hands into the pockets of her fur coat: a reflex action. She felt threatened by me. Maybe she hadn’t actually been leading me anywhere.
I held up a hand. ‘I’m not going to hurt you.’
She didn’t reply. Her eyes darted left and right.
‘I just want to talk to you.’
She nodded, slowly.
‘Were you leading me somewhere?’
Her face creased a little. A frown. ‘I was tryin’ to get away from you.’
‘Why?’
‘’Cos you’re trouble.’
‘You knew I was coming?’
She nodded. ‘One of the guys saw you out front.’
The barman. I’d been right.
‘What was the point of the decoy?’
She frowned again.
‘The scruffy guy,’ I said.
Her expression didn’t change.
‘The guy who led me to you. What was the point of that?’
She shrugged and looked away. But when she turned back, her expression had changed to a kind of relief, as if she’d just reached the biggest decision of her life.
‘What d’you want with me?’
‘I just want to talk.’
She shrugged again, and nodded. ‘Then we talk.’
Her eyes got darker as we walked; harder to read. I tried to figure out whether she was scared, or confident, or both, but I gave up as we got to the car. Men were probably drawn to her suddenly and easily — but left just as quickly when they realized she’d never let them in.
‘Is this what you drive?’ she asked, looking at the BMW.
‘This is it.’
‘I thought you’d have something better.’
‘I’m not really Magnum, Jade.’
She glanced inside, then back at me, as if anticipating the question to come.
‘So, what’s going on?’ I said.
‘Can’t we go somewhere?’
‘Where do you want to go?’
‘I’m hungry.’
‘Okay.’
We got into the car, and I started it up.
‘What’s on the menu?’
‘Cheeseburgers.’
‘Where?’
She smiled. ‘If you’re paying, there’s a place I know.’