David parked his car around the corner from the Club Sorrento, a dance bar loved by the rich and famous deep in the heart of Soho. Black wooden panelling, low-key signs, steps downwards. The sight of the club made his stomach roll. It was all of his bad memories.
He thought about Emma. She didn’t know everything about him. This was his reminder of what she didn’t know. Three seasons of powder-fuelled late nights and in the palm of the London gangster set. He’d got away, but the help he wanted was back there, with people who wouldn’t talk to the authorities.
He paused for a moment, wondering whether he was doing the right thing. But then he thought of what he stood to lose if he chose the alternative.
He walked quickly into the club, hiding away behind sunglasses and a baseball cap. Although the club wasn’t open, he knew the door would be. The owner did his best business when the club was closed. The club was a cellar bar of red velvet alcoves around a raised dance floor, the ceiling a tangle of lights and speakers. It was nothing special, but all those who wanted to be on the up could meet people who were already there. For those at the top, it was a place to flaunt fame in front of the hungry. When he went in through the doors, familiar faces from his past turned around, all sitting by the bar, and when they recognised him, they grinned.
‘Hey, look who it is. Gold Dust Watts.’
It was the barman, a fat Londoner, all slicked hair and gold, an open-necked white shirt and bulging forearms marking him out as more than a student treading time. The rest of the people at the bar laughed along. In their world, they were kings. David was just a jester.
David nodded, gritting out a smile. ‘Is Marky in?’
The barman laughed aloud. ‘What’s wrong, superstar? The new leaf turned back over?’
David didn’t respond, knowing from bitter experience that these people weren’t the laugh-along types. ‘I’m looking for Marky? Is he here?’
The barman looked around. They were the only people in there. ‘I don’t see him,’ he said, shaking his head with fake regret.
Four big faces laughed among themselves, cackling like a pack of fat hyenas.
‘Cut the crap,’ David snapped. ‘Is Marky in or not?’
The barman put his hand on the shoulder of one of the apes by the bar. He had started to get off his stool, a gap-toothed hulk, his shirt too tight for his neck. ‘Cool it, superstar. Why do you want him?’
‘That’s between me and Marky.’
The barman shook his head. ‘Wrong. You’re the big man around town, but in here you’re shit, so you either state your business or you get out.’ He nodded towards the four people by the bar, all watching with quiet interest. ‘You can have an escort, if you want, but maybe you won’t get to play on Saturday.’
David stared back at him and considered the odds. His fame was an irrelevance. Marky arranged the supply of high-grade cocaine to some of the top movers and shakers in town, and David was just another happy customer. No, he was less than that. He was an ex-customer, unlikely to return.
‘I want to find someone,’ said David, ‘and I thought Marky might be able to help me.’
The barman stepped closer until David could smell the warmth of his breath.
‘You think Marky is in the missing person game now?’
David shook his head, defiant. ‘I really need to find this person, and I reckon Marky might know someone.’ Then a pause. ‘So get him.’
The apes by the bar shrieked and covered their mouths, acting up like they were frightened, and then burst into laughter. The barman nodded, stroked his chin, and held his hand up to quieten the others in the bar. He looked David in the eye and saw that he was serious. ‘Wait there.’
David was left in the bar, looking at the scuffs on the toes of his three-hundred-pound moccasins, and wondering how long he would be there. He could hear the men talking by the bar, back to small-talk to let David know that they no longer cared about him. David looked up when he heard a door open on the other side of the bar. It wasn’t Marky. It was the barman, and he was holding a small cellophane wrap of white powder.
David looked confused. He didn’t do coke any more. Not since before Emma. That was an old life, not the one he had now.
‘Marky sees you as a lost opportunity,’ the barman said. ‘He wants you to be sociable when you meet.’
David looked at the bag, knowing what it contained. ‘What if I say no?’ he asked, already knowing the answer.
The barman grinned. ‘Then so does Marky.’
David’s heart dipped. He had hoped past custom might have counted for more. He heard someone making chicken noises by the bar.
He grabbed at the powder and walked to the bar. He barged into the middle of the apes and made a space on the bar top. He poured a couple of lines, used a drinks stirrer to tidy them up, glanced into the eyes watching him, and then rolled a ten-pound note into a straw. He gave a silent prayer, then lowered the note to the powder and snorted the lines hard, one for each nostril. He put his head up and back, sniffing hard, trying to get the full sensation out of his nose, the insides of his nostrils hot.
The cocaine kicked in quickly. The leers and laughs of the voices around him receded to an echo as he felt his own inner fires take over, like a steady roar, a hot wind driving him forward. He turned to the barman. ‘My turn now. Take me to Marky.’
The barman laughed and turned away. ‘Follow me, arsehole. Oh yeah, before we go,’ and he pointed towards a blinking red light just above the row of spirits, ‘if you fuck us about, the News of the World gets the tape.’
David said nothing. He just felt his grip loosen on events as the laughs of the apes by the bar faded to nothing. He walked towards Marky’s office, a room at the back of the club. He felt a hand stuff a bag of white powder into his pocket. Maybe later.
David had been told to wait at a bar in Covent Garden.
It was a balcony bar, overlooking the cobbled piazza between the old market hall and St Paul’s Church. He was inside, sitting at a table behind panelled French windows, watching the stairs for whoever he was to meet. He’d had to sign a couple of autographs, pose for a photograph on someone’s phone. He had bought an apartment at Chelsea Bridge so that he could be in the city. As he sat there, just a face in the crowd, he wondered whether he lived in the city at all. Didn’t he just shut himself away, to avoid the waves and smiles and autographs and handshakes?
He sat back, twitchy and edgy, his adrenalin making him flick looks around the bar. He couldn’t see anyone likely to be Marky’s contact. He rubbed his eyes and then his nose. He felt tired. He sniffed and exhaled loudly. He couldn’t meet anyone like this. He had to be clear and focused, and right then he was anything but that.
Then he saw him.
David knew he was the contact as soon as he saw him. It was the poise, the menace, like contained fury.
And his clothes made him stand out. Black shirt, black denim, black cowboy boots. David almost laughed. Marco had sent him John Wayne. His head was gleaming pink, shaved to a shine, with a dark moustache and silver rings on his fingers.
David caught his eye, but the man kept on walking. As he passed the table, he said, ‘Outside.’
David got up to follow him, and ended up on the balcony, overlooking the piazza. The balcony was busy, a good place to rest and have a drink and watch the tourists go by. A street entertainer was plying his trade, a man in red dungarees juggling chainsaws, surrounded by a circle of onlookers under the Roman portico of St Paul’s Church.
The contact was in a corner, by the metal struts of the market roof, a couple of scruffy pigeons behind him, just resting, heads twitching.
As David reached him, he said, ‘Tell me what you want.’
David leant against the stone balcony rail and considered the man in front of him. He noticed the American accent but couldn’t place its origins. His gaze was impenetrable, tough and fierce.
David began to talk. The man’s expression never changed, whereas David’s face was animated, and his hands flailed around as he told the story he had told to his agent. When David told him about the phone call and the links with the football shootings, the man smiled.
‘And you want me to find this person?’
David nodded, looking nervous.
‘Do you want her bringing to you?’
David’s cheek twitched. His reply was whispered, nervous and twitchy. ‘If she’s the shooter, I just want her to stop shooting.’
‘You’re no salesman, are you, Mr Watts.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘You just doubled the price.’
‘How come?’
‘How come, Mr Watts, is because I know how much you want her. I could go to the police and tell them what you just told me. I could sell this story and make a six-figure sum with no risk.’
David went to walk away. ‘I’ve had enough of this. I’m going.’
The man smiled and took a cigarette packet out of his shirt pocket. He lit a cigarette, the smoke clouding his face.
‘You’ve no choice now, Mr Watts. If you get someone else to do it, hell, I’ll go to the police and tell them you offered it to me, and then they’ll be on your doorstep.’
‘You wouldn’t go to the police. That’s not what people like you do.’
He smiled back at David. ‘No, because people like me are uncaring bastards, who will squash anyone for a small price. And, Mr Watts, I could squash you.’ He raised his eyebrows. ‘Easy money.’
‘Fuck off. Look where we are. Everyone in here knows me, and if I get arrested for anything, you’re in the same shit.’
The American pointed his cigarette at him. ‘Maybe that’s why I picked it. Because I’m going to do what you ask, and then when I’m done, I’ll get my money. And if the police catch me, you go down with me. I’ll shout conspiracy, and everyone will remember you and me enjoying a drink.’ He sat back. ‘And I accept the job. Whether I do it or not, the price is the same.’
‘So what’s the price?’
The American smiled. ‘You got it now.’ He drew on his cigarette, eyeing David carefully. ‘One million pounds.’
David laughed aloud. He carried on laughing for a few moments, the absurdity of it all coming crashing in on him.
‘One million pounds,’ he laughed. ‘Are you fucking daft?’
The man shook his head, and then leant forward. David felt the point of a blade just above his kneecap. He swallowed.
‘If you fuck me about,’ the man continued, ‘I will put this knife so far into your kneecap that you’ll never straighten your leg again.’
David felt his mouth go dry.
‘You promise me one million pounds and your problem is solved, every angle gone forever.’ He smiled in David’s face and stared hard into his eyes. ‘If you don’t, you won’t stop her and you’ll never play again.’
The American then sat back and drew on his cigarette.
David went pale. He could think of nothing to say. The afternoon had drifted away from him, he knew that.
‘And what if I say no?’
The American smiled. ‘Look at the crowd down there,’ and he pointed at the crowd of people around the juggler.
David looked. ‘Yeah, what is it?’
Then David carried on looking as the American smiled. And then he saw the barman from the club. He was in the crowd, but his camera wasn’t pointed at the juggler. It was pointing up at the balcony bar, clicking away as he took pictures of them both talking, stopping just to give a smile and a wave at David.
David whirled round in fury. ‘You bastard.’
The American nodded. ‘You got it. So add those pictures to the video from the club, and we’ve got a half-million-pound story. You double it to a full million and I’ll do the job. Say no, and I sell the story.’ He raised his eyebrows. ‘Your choice, Mr Watts.’
David Watts said nothing. He just stood there, his jaw clenched, his face pale with emotion.
The American smiled. ‘Good. I’ve enjoyed it, Mr Watts. Have a good day.’
He held out his hand to shake. When David snapped ‘Fuck you’ at him, he put his hand in his pocket and pulled out a small mobile phone, still wrapped in cellophane. ‘Take the phone, Mr Watts, and give me back the wrapper.’
David did as he was told.
‘I’ll contact you on this. Pay-as-you-go, with plenty of credit. My number is keyed into it. I’ll call you on this phone, and this phone alone. You need this doing quickly, so I’ll go pack now. I’ll be in Turners Fold this evening. I’ll keep you updated. If you get any more calls that give you clues as to where she might be, call me straight away.’
David nodded, staring at the phone. He began to wonder what he had started. He could have gone to the police and handed over the answer machine. This would be harder if it went wrong. He had a sick feeling in his stomach; the surge of confidence brought on by the coke was slipping. He couldn’t afford to lose that.
He looked up when he heard the man get to his feet. He was turning to walk away, so David asked him, ‘If you do this, how do I get the money to you?’
The man stopped, his cowboy boots scuffing on the wooden floor. He turned around. ‘You’ve given me your word. When the job is done, I’ll come and collect.’ There was a glint in his eye. ‘And I will collect.’
David felt a flicker of panic. ‘What do I call you?’
The man thought for a moment. ‘Mr Christ,’ he said eventually, ‘Mr Jesus Christ.’ He smiled. ‘I’m your saviour,’ he said, then laughed to himself and walked away.
When he was gone, David felt alone. As he looked around the bar it seemed like everyone had stopped talking and was turning to look at him, pointing, eyes wide.
David got up quickly and ran out of the bar.