‘I know … you won’t believe me, but please … I want you to go back to your mother. I want you to go home.’ He sighed. ‘I want to go home too.’
All around were too many people making too much noise. Screaming and braying. Worse even than the worst nights in prison. At least then he was on his own, just listening to the noise. Here he was right among it. In the thick of it. He didn’t know what to do, couldn’t think.
So he just stood there, holding the gun. Hating himself. Josephina wouldn’t even look at him. That really hurt. Knowing he had let her down, betrayed her trust. And he had done it by being weak. Making the wrong decisions, the wrong choices.
And that made him angry with himself.
He looked again at the gun. At the child. At Amy next to him, talking on the phone.
At the gun. Again.
Yes. He was hurt. Yes. He was angry.
It was time to do something about it.
80
‘You bitch … ’ Marina started to move through the crowd.
‘I’ve told you already. Stay where you are.’
Marina knew this wasn’t the time to antagonise the woman, so she did as she was told and stopped moving. She kept the phone clamped to her ear.
‘That’s better,’ said the woman. ‘I just wanted you to see that she’s still alive, that she’s unhurt. That I haven’t been lying to you.’
‘I need to see her,’ said Marina.
‘You can see her from where you are. She’s fine.’
Marina knew she should react as a psychologist would, but she couldn’t help herself. ‘Bitch … ’
‘Whatever. You get her back when you’ve completed your part of the deal. Not before. Do that and everything will be fine.’
Marina wanted to look round but didn’t dare. Was Franks nearby? Could he see her or Josephina? Could he see the gun? It was hidden from most of the crowd, so she doubted it. But she hoped he was watching her and could read her reactions. She had to play for time, so she reined her emotions in. Tried to keep calm, focus. ‘Right. I’m here. You want me to give a report on your patient. Shall we do this now?’
‘I had hoped we could. But this venue isn’t particularly conducive to conversation, is it?’
‘Well, we could … ’ A wall of sound sprang up around Marina as she spoke. The fight was over. Most people were cheering, some booing, shouting out threats. Marina, her back to the ring, ignored it. She also missed seeing Sandro appear and stand at the ringside. He didn’t see her either. He was focused, in the place he needed to be to fight.
Marina gave another surreptitious look round. Still no sign of Franks. ‘We could go somewhere else,’ she said.
‘We could. In fact we have to, since we can’t do anything here.’
‘Where is he?’ asked Marina. ‘Stuart Sloane, where are you keeping him?’
‘He’s right here.’
Marina looked around. ‘Right where?’
‘Right in front of you.’
Marina realised who she meant. Her heart skipped a beat. ‘That’s him? The one holding a gun on my daughter?’
‘Your new client. Don’t sound so surprised. I’d ask him to wave, but he’s busy.’
Marina felt her legs begin to tremble. ‘And you want me to declare him sane.’
‘Oh yes. He’s sane, all right.’
Marina fought the urge to scream. ‘Then why is he holding a gun on my daughter?’
‘Because I told him to. He’s protecting my investment, Dr Esposito. So don’t do anything stupid, or it’ll get very messy.’
The trembling in Marina’s legs spread to her whole body. She wanted to rush over and grab her daughter, call the woman’s bluff, take whatever came her way and run. She looked round once more, desperate for Franks’s intervention.
‘Who you looking for?’
‘What?’ Marina had been too blatant. ‘I’m not … not looking for anyone.’
‘You looked round like you were waiting for a bus.’
‘I was just … No … ’ And then she saw him. Off to her left, trying to walk through the crowd as unobtrusively as possible. He had spotted her, was coming closer.
She had to signal, tell him to keep back. She caught his eye, shook her head.
‘Who’s that? What are you doing?’
‘I’m … Nothing.’ Franks picked up the signal. Stopped moving.
‘Liar. You were … ’ There was a pause on the line, followed by a sharp intake of breath. ‘Bitch.’
‘Sorry?’
‘You’ve set me up.’
Marina felt her stomach churn. ‘No I haven’t, I—’
‘Don’t lie to me. You’ve set me up, haven’t you? That’s why you wanted to meet here. Who is it? Who were you signalling to? Bitch … ’
Marina was going to argue but couldn’t think of anything to say that wouldn’t incriminate her further. The woman would be able to tell that she was lying.
The woman gave a sigh that was almost a growl. She spoke quickly. ‘Why couldn’t you just have done what you were told, eh? Why? Why did you have to … ’ Another sigh, another growl. ‘You’ve done it now, bitch. ‘I’m not responsible for what happens next.’
The phone died in Marina’s hand.
81
Mickey was relieved that he and Anni hadn’t had sex in the office.
They had both been seriously tempted, but common sense had eventually prevailed. They had kept working on the task before them, just giving occasional suggestive hints, quick, surreptitious strokes of arms and thighs, tantalising little promises of what they could expect from each other later.
They had focused, gone to work. Pulled out everything they could find about Michael and Dee Sloane, their company and their lives.
‘Right,’ said Mickey, leaning back from the screen and rubbing his eyes, putting together what they had found out so far. ‘Graham Watts … ’
‘The dead guy from the house in Jaywick,’ said Anni, sitting on the edge of the desk, swinging her legs back and forth and eating a packet of vending machine crisps. ‘First on the scene to find the bodies that Stuart Sloane was supposed to have killed.’
‘Yep. Now. Jeffrey Hibbert.’
‘The victim in the murder case Calamity Jane’s working on.’
‘Very funny. Hibbert and Watts used to work together. For the Sloanes.’
Anni kept listening. Mickey checked the screen, his notes on the desk. ‘They were both high up,’ he said. ‘Started as workers, went on to be gangmasters on the farms, did their own recruitment, hiring and firing, all that.’
‘Farms,’ said Anni through a mouthful of crisps.
‘What?’
‘You said farms. Plural.’
Mickey leaned forward, helped himself to a crisp.
‘Oi!’
‘Thanks.’ He continued. ‘Salt and vinegar. Not my favourite.’
‘I’ll remember that in future. Always get them. Stop you from nicking them.’
‘Anyway, yes. Farms plural. After the death of their parents, the Sloane siblings diversified the portfolio, you might say. It was like they were just waiting for their father’s death to take over the family business and get it going. They started speculating. Bought up shares in the industrial farms that were emerging in Europe at the time. Worked those shares up to controlling interests in most cases.’
‘Industrial farming? Lovely.’
Mickey nodded. ‘Saw a documentary on it once. Horrible. Almost put me off eating meat.’
‘Almost. Carry on.’
‘Right. The Sloanes diversified. Import — export, taking control of the supply chain. The works. Eventually they sold their farm, set up an umbrella company, Sloane Holdings.’
‘So where do Hibbert and Watts come into this?’ asked Anni.