The door inched further open and a figure started to appear round the leading edge.
“Now!” Marc yelled.
I hit the door with my shoulder, slamming it shut. Marc went straight for the man who'd entered, body-slamming him low, taking him down hard and fast. I had a moment to admire the precise economy of his movements, then all three of us were on the floor.
The man didn't even get a chance to lash out. We had him face down in a flash, rearranging his nose into the pile of the carpet. Marc rammed the bloke's arm up behind his back so forcibly his joints cracked. I'm amazed he didn't fracture the bone.
As I got shakily to my feet, the adrenaline still pumping, one overwhelming realisation hit me.
It wasn't Angelo.
For a start, he had far too much hair. And the build was wrong. He was much too slight. Marc must have come to the same conclusion because he let go of his arm lock and punted the man over onto his back so we could get a better look at him.
“Bloody hell,” I swore. “Gary?”
Marc's face closed in with an anger that was more frightening because of its apparent calm. He hauled his hapless bar manager to his feet and almost threw him onto the hard sofa. Gary cringed away from the pair of us, cradling his arm as though it didn't work any more. His colour was high and he looked close to tears.
“I don't suppose you'd care to tell us exactly what you were up to?” Marc enquired silkily.
“Nothing!” Gary protested, his voice high and whingey. “I haven't done anything!”
Marc didn't bother with threats. He crossed the distance between them with deceptive speed and hit Gary with a considered and quite clinical blow to the face. I tried not to wince at the squelchy tear of cartilage.
Gary squawked and clamped his hands to his nose. Blood immediately started dripping out between his fingers. He automatically leaned forwards so it didn't ruin his evening suit.
I went into the bathroom and brought out a roll of toilet tissue. Gary didn't acknowledge me when I handed it over, just ripped off a dozen sheets and held them to his face. He was rocking slightly backwards and forwards, distressed and shocky.
Marc was sitting on the edge of the desk, watching him like a Rottweiler eyeing up a baby. He took advantage of Gary's distraction to wink at me, but I was too shocked to return the gesture, even though I tried not to show it. Marc had slipped so easily into the role of interrogator. Too easily for comfort, perhaps?
“Cut the crap, Gary,” he said coldly now. “You're not entitled to keys for this office, and you know it. So what were you doing sneaking in here?”
For a heartbeat Gary gave thought to another lie. Marc only had to shift his weight towards getting off the desk for the other man's nerve to fail him. The menace he projected in that room was oppressive.
“OK, OK!” he cried, voice nasal and muffled. “I came for the damned tapes! From the bloody security cameras.”
The words sent a chill washing down over me. I hadn't even considered Gary as a player in all this.
“And why would you want those?” Marc demanded softly.
“I, well, I—” He glanced from one of us to the other, but obviously didn't see a way out written in either of our faces. He swallowed convulsively, grimacing like someone trying to take a pill without water. The bleeding seemed to have slowed and he pulled the makeshift handkerchief away from his nose, heedless of the bits of fluffy tissue left adhered to the light stubble of his chin.
Marc sighed. “Don't make me hurt you again,” he warned, sounding tired.
Suddenly, I remembered about all those not-quite-empty bottles Gary removed from the club bars, his uneasiness, and I put it all together.
“Why don't I help you out, Gary?” I suggested. “Why don't I tell your boss about your little scam?”
His eyes widened, flickering apprehensively to Marc, then back to me. “S-scam?” he tried. “What scam?”
Marc's second blow landed deep into his solar plexus. Gary spent a couple of minutes doubled up on the chair, gasping and moaning. I twitched with the memory of the smoker's fist landing on my own body and scowled at Marc over Gary's wheezing head, but he just met my gaze levelly.
He didn't enjoy this sort of thing, I realised, not in the way Angelo would have done. It didn't please or excite him. It was just a job to be done, ruthlessly, efficiently, and he had no qualms about doing it.
And it worked. When Gary could speak again he didn't bother with any further denials. He launched straight into a full confession.
“All right, all right, I'll tell you all about it,” he said sullenly. “When I've been bottling up the bars I've b-been—” his voice wavered, but he swallowed again, less awkwardly this time, and went on, “I've been changing the bottles in the optics a bit early.” The last piece came out in a rush, as though saying it quickly would make it easier.
“A bit early,” Marc repeated. Something in his voice made me turn towards him. “Every bottle, in every optic, on every change, throughout the club?” he queried.
After a moment's hesitation, Gary nodded. When Marc put it like that it started to sound like a major fraud. I had no idea about the price of spirits. With the exception of the occasional whisky, I was more of a beer drinker myself. I liked the odd glass of wine, but hated the pretension that went with it.
I suddenly remembered the price of drinks in the club, when I'd been that first time with Clare. It wasn't so much that Gary was robbing Marc of vast amounts, but he must surely have been curtailing his profits by quite a chunk.
Marc slid off the desk, dismissing with a contemptuous glance the way Gary shrank back away from him. He moved over to the coffee machine, pouring two cups and handing one to me. When he spoke again his voice was deadly quiet.
“And did you really believe, with computerised tills which record every drink, that I wouldn't notice?” he asked. “That I wouldn't begin to wonder why the bar costs were higher here at the New Adelphi than at any other club I own? Why, miraculously, you didn't seem to be able to squeeze the standard twenty-eight shots out of a bottle that they manage everywhere else.”
The dismay flared in Gary's eyes. He had that trapped look, that look of someone who's slipped and slithered their way into deep trouble, rather than taking a calculated gamble. He knew that he was in way over his head, but there was still something that might drag him out of the slime again.
“He made me give him an alibi,” he said quickly. “Angelo, I mean. The night that girl was killed – Susie. Angelo knew what I was up to and he said if I didn't cover for him, he'd drop me in the shit.”
He looked from one of our faces to the other, opened his mouth to speak, then wisely realised that anything he said would probably make things worse. He shut it again.
Marc sat down in his leather chair behind the desk. With his dark colouring and clothing he looked like a Mafia don. “Just get out,” he said grimly. It sounded like as soon as Gary turned his back Marc was going to shoot him in it.
Gary got painfully to his feet. “A-am I sacked?”
Marc tilted his head on one side and considered him, like something he'd picked up on his shoe. “I don't think so,” he said, surprising both of us. “Not this time.” He stood abruptly. “But if you ever try stealing from me again, I'll finish you,” he said, his voice chillingly pleasant. “You won't work again.”
He could have just meant “in the licensing trade”, but the way he said it made it sound like Gary's lack of employment would be caused by his sudden inability to eat solid food.