‘Well, why do it?’ He looked genuinely puzzled. ‘I mean, a girl like you could have…’
‘Who’s this, Chris?’ Another voice came from behind me, cutting across him. I turned to see who’d spoken, and was confronted by another Aussie. This one was slightly taller than the first, and had rough dark hair, and stubble. The blond guy bridled, and put his hand on the pillar above me, as if staking his claim.
‘This is…’ He looked at me, questioningly.
‘Grace,’ I said, looking from one to the other, before taking another slug of beer.
‘G’day, Grace,’ said the dark guy. ‘Stef. Can I get you a drink?’
I looked down at my glass. It was almost empty again. I went to speak, when Chris cut in. ‘Hey, mate. I’ll get it. This one’s mine. Go and find your own.’
‘I offered first.’ Stef took a step forward, the planes of his chest standing out against his tee-shirt. ‘D’you want one, babe?’
‘I…’
‘I’ll get you one,’ Chris told me firmly, then to Stef; ‘Fuck off, mate.’
They squared up to each other, chest to chest, and I shrank back against the pillar. I watched them argue and, suddenly, it occurred to me why I’d despised Gav’s weakness so much. I was weak. I’d been letting people push me around ever since this whole Leo business had begun. First Max, then Leo. Even Kitty and Liv had argued over me, as if I wasn’t there, and now it was happening again. Jeez, I wasn’t even interested in these guys…not really.
It was time I took charge. ‘Look, you can both get me one,’ I said. ‘You can both have me.’
It didn’t come out quite how I meant it to, but it seemed to mollify them. They flashed each other a grin, then headed off to the bar, nudging each other as they went. Almost as soon as they’d gone, the band started up and I forgot all about them.
Eighteen
‘After you.’ I showed Rick into my office, which was on the upper floor of the castle, well away from the parts he was more used to patrolling. He’d been a good security guard over the years, and I was grieved that it had come to this, but he’d picked his path and there was nothing either of us could do now.
He stood in front of my desk. He didn’t say anything. He thought he knew what this was about, I could tell, and it was about that in a way, but it was about so much else, too. It was essential I caught him off-guard.
‘You’ve always had a thing for prostitutes,’ I said. I had my back to him, and I was staring out the window at the avenue of lime trees. ‘I’ve never understood it myself.’
‘You either get it or you don’t,’ Rick said. ‘Sir. It’s the thrill of it.’
‘And yet you have a wife.’
‘Yes sir.’
‘And you claim to love her?’ I turned to him. He was standing at my desk, practically to attention.
‘You know I do, Sir.’
‘So how does that work, exactly?’
He didn’t speak at once. He was shuffling from foot to foot, clearly uncomfortable with how the interview was progressing. I didn’t push him. In fact, I ignored him for a few moments, while I took the things out of my pocket I’d brought with me for safe keeping. The tape of Fliss for the vaults…the letters. I was going to go through them after this, see what information I could glean.
I looked up. ‘Well? How does your wife like the fact that you pay for sex?’
Rick obviously thought he’d risk a joke. ‘Well, if I paid her Sir, she’d probably do it more often.’
I didn’t crack a smile. ‘But it’s not her you pay.’
‘No.’
He was squirming, and I pinned him with a look, wondering how I could get through to him. He was such a contradiction. I didn’t understand him at all. The irony was that he really did love his wife. More than most men I’d known. He adored her, and yet still he screwed around behind her back.
‘Look,’ he said, finally. ‘She doesn’t know, you know that. She’d leave me. Sir.’
It was practically an appeal. I only stared back at him, unmoved. ‘So she doesn’t know about Charlotte, then?’
As the implications of the question sunk in, Rick paled visibly. By the time he attempted a reply, he was ashen, and he could barely get the words out. ‘N…now, Sir. I didn’t know anything about that. I…I thought she was just another call-girl.’
‘But you passed her for security clearance?’
‘Yes, Sir.’
‘For both Dominion and the Castle itself?’
‘Y…yes, Sir.’ His eyes were downcast, but then he looked up, desperation in his eyes. ‘She said she’d tell Sandy,’ he said. ‘I couldn’t have that.’
I shrugged. ‘You let it continue…let us all get sucked in,’ I said. ‘And you’ve still been using whores, knowing you could catch something and pass it on. What use are medical exams, if you go fucking around straight afterwards? Don’t you think about anything except your cock? You’ve put us all at risk and, last night, you disobeyed a direct order.’
‘I…’ He was wilting in front of me. He could see where this was going by now, and the fight had gone out of him. ‘I did it to get you off the hook,’ he said, but it was a lame excuse, and I could tell he knew it.
‘You know I’m going to have to let you go, don’t you?’ I said, turning again to stare out the window. I didn’t want to look at him. I hated this kind of thing, but he’d brought it on himself.
‘Oh, no, Sir.’ He spoke quickly now, the words tumbling out on top of each other. ‘Please, Sir. Where am I going to find another job like this? With pay like this?’
‘It’s not my concern.’ I shrugged and turned to him, trying to suppress my anger. ‘My only concern at the moment is protecting the people you’ve put at risk. Look,’ I relented slightly. ‘I’ll give you some cash to tide you over. After that, it’s up to you.’
I went into the room next door. I always had a decent amount of cash in the safe, for emergencies. It took a few minutes to get the combination lined up correctly. It was an old safe – it had been my father’s – but it was solid and dependable enough for the amount I kept in it.
Finally, I got it open, and counted out enough cash to give him a few months’ breathing space. I shut the safe quickly, and went back into my office.
Rick was gone. As I looked out the window, I saw his car hurtling away up the driveway, past the avenue of lime trees and out on the darkening roads of Berkshire. I wondered why he hadn’t waited…why he was leaving empty-handed and in such a hurry.
It was only when I turned back to my desk to sort out the rest of my business, that I found the answer. Rick hadn’t left empty-handed at all. He’d taken the tape, and the letters, with him.
Nineteen
As the first strains of music crept out across the audience, people were still laughing and shouting, but as soon as Liv began to sing, the room fell silent. Her voice, though low, was rich and melodic, and it stopped the audience in its tracks.
I recognised the song straight away. It was one Leo and I had danced to when we’d first met, and the memory brought back the hurt all over again. We’d been happy then. He’d been a youth team player, and I was at college. He’d come to our student prom with a friend and we’d fallen in love almost at once. He was awkward and shy, and it had taken him the whole evening to get up the courage to ask me out. From the moment he had, we’d been inseparable.
The song brought it all flooding back but, after the initial shock of hearing it, the pain began to dwindle. I was too interested in the way Liv sang it. For such a dainty creature, she could sure kick out a tune. She’d put her own twist on it, taken a light love song to another plane entirely…dragged it kicking and screaming into a power ballad. She’d destroyed the original for me forever, and I was glad. There was a gothic edge to this version, too, which gave it a haunting quality. The audience loved it and, as she sobbed out the final notes, they yelled and cheered for more.