Ascension Day (25 page)

‘What? Some lawyer buddy who, unlike you, don’ mind playin’ dirty?’

‘No. It’s a lap-dancer I just met.’

Rodriguez beamed widely. ‘Now you’re talkin’. Slip a C-note into their G-strings and those girls will do just ‘bout anything. No, seriously. If you jus’ met her – d’yer think she’ll play ball on this?’

‘Only one way to find out.’

‘Yeah.’ Rodriguez nodded with wry smile. ‘But one word of advice, if I may. You’re meant to fuck ‘em before you let them too much into your private life. Otherwise you risk fallin’ into that awkward mid-territory of “just-friends”.’

Just friends
. Jac had immediately discounted Langfranc or his sister, too close, and while Alaysha would keep it at arm’s length from himself, and yes, it had been
her
suggestion – it was still a hell of a favour to ask of someone you’d just met.

Jac swallowed hard as he looked across the table at Alaysha. And the last impression he wanted to give now was that that favour was even close to the main purpose of the date – so he’d decided to wait before broaching the subject. Besides, from the way that at moments her eyes clouded and she’d look to one side, he got the feeling that she too had something on her mind. He decided to let her go first – but equally she was slow getting round to whatever was troubling her, as if it was awkward or she feared it was too sensitive for an early date.

‘It’s amazing we’ve lived next door to each other all this time without ever seeing each other,’ she commented.

‘Yeah.’ Jac shrugged. ‘I’ve had a hectic time the last year or so with fresh bar exams. And a lot of weekends I head out to see my mum and sister in
Hammond
.’

Alaysha nodded thoughtfully. ‘And is it your mom that’s originally French?’

‘Yes. My dad’s Scottish.’ Jac explained that his mother’s parents hailed from near
Bordeaux
, but because of their anti-Vichy stance they left
France
during the Second World War and settled in
Scotland
– which is where she had met Adam, Jac’s father. ‘That’s why when my father hankered after opening an artists’ retreat, he chose the
Bordeaux
area. It would be like a return to roots for my mum. And that’s where we lived from when I was eight years old up until just three years ago, when my father…’ Jac’s voice trailed off. Enough
death
hanging over him with Durrant.

Alaysha smiled tightly, as if in understanding, but the silence settled deeper as the seconds passed, a faint tension creeping into it.

‘How’s the Jambalaya?’ Alaysha asked, breaking it.

‘Just how I like it.’ He held up a forefinger and thumb pinched together in an O. ‘Even though I’ve only had it a couple of times before.’

‘Give you some grits and gumbos, and you’ll almost be a native.’ She smiled again, and Jac raised his wine glass in acknowledgment, returning her smile. 

The small talk was running thin – but still she looked briefly again to one side before making the final resolve to say something.

‘This “prisoner” you mentioned the problems with? Is it by any chance Lawrence Durrant?’

She held her gaze on him unflinchingly, and he had the same feeling as when he’d first met her. As if she could somehow see through to his very soul. And lying to her at this stage wouldn’t exactly help him when he got around to asking his favour.

‘Yes… yes it is,’ he said on the back of a resigned exhalation. ‘What made you suspicious – think that it might be him?’

‘Oh. Intuition. Clemency appeal and “wanting to die” all but narrowed it down to a possibility of one.’

‘Yeah, but how did you work it out from there?’ He ducked as she smiled and threw her balled-up paper napkin at him, his brow creasing as he straightened. ‘Really – was it that transparent?’

‘Pretty much. There hasn’t been an execution in
Louisiana
for over a year, and the only one I can see scheduled any time soon is that of Lawrence Durrant. At least from what I see in the news.’

‘I’ll have to be more careful in future not to mention death or clemency. Just saying “the prisoner” obviously isn’t enough to protect my client’s identity.’

‘Looks like it.’ She mirrored his thoughtfulness for a second before introducing a more upbeat tone. ‘But, hey, one hell of a case to land. You must be excited?’

It would have been so easy to play the big shot and score points by saying that he’d got the case because he was such a high-flyer at Payne, Beaton and Sawyer. But, as with everything else so far with her, he had the feeling she’d see straight through it. It wouldn’t get him anywhere.

‘Not really.’ Jac shrugged. ‘The firm only gave me the case rather than keeping it for one of the senior partners because it’s such a no-hoper. All the juicy stuff was apparently exhausted at appeal. All I’m left with is sweeping up the dust – but looks like I’ve broken my broom after the first couple of strokes. I’m striking out before I’ve hardly started.’

Alaysha’s eyebrows knitted. ‘But that suggestion I made the other day – I thought that was meant to have helped shift the deadlock?’

Jac nodded. ‘It would have, except that Durrant’s prison buddy, Rodriguez, can’t do it. Everything in and out of the communication room is strictly monitored – so there’d be no way of him getting away with it.’

‘Oh, I see.’

As Alaysha’s eyes settled back on him, Jac felt a stab of conscience. Still it felt wrong asking her to do it. Too early. ‘
You’re meant to fuck ‘em before you let them too much into your private life
.’ Maybe
that
was the trade-off: any chance of a relationship with Alaysha gone to save Larry Durrant’s life.

Jac swallowed, shook his head. ‘I can’t do it, either… it breaks every possible rule of lawyer-client trust.’ Jac repeated much the same he had to Rodriguez about being struck off the bar in a heartbeat if he was found out. ‘The only possibility I hit upon while with Rodriguez was that someone else do it. Someone not directly linked with Durrant…’

Jac was watching Alaysha’s expression closely throughout, but it took her a second to realize that he was asking her if she could do it. The faint jolt to her body and clouding in her eyes was late in registering. She looked down fleetingly before looking back at him directly.

‘That’s a pretty big favour to ask?’

‘I know. And I’d understand if you felt you couldn’t help.’

‘No… I didn’t mean it like that. Okay, yeah, it was my idea – but asking me to be hands-on and actually do it. That’s another level entirely. It means that… that you must trust me.’

In turn, it took Jac a second to realize that she felt strangely flattered rather than outraged. He smiled tightly and cast his eyes down, as if in coy acceptance. He didn’t want to dilute the sentiment by saying he couldn’t think of anyone else because in his few years in New Orleans he hadn’t made that many close friends; or, as Roddy had put it, ‘crooked lawyer buddies’.

‘And is this your last hope of getting Durrant to want to live, as you see it?’ she asked.

‘Pretty much. If this doesn’t work, I’d have to admit to being stuck for what next to do.’

She looked down briefly again, as if searching for invisible inspiration in her Jambalaya.

‘Okay,
okay
. I’ll do it,’ she said finally, exhaling as if she was easing a weight off her chest.

Jac eyed her cautiously. ‘Are you sure you’re okay with this?’

   ‘Yes, I’m sure.’ Her initially hesitant smile became fuller, more confident. ‘In fact I’m glad to be able to help.’

Jac nodded gently as he saw Alaysha’s last reservations slip away. He wondered whether to tell her about his mystery e-mailer – reciprocation for helping out with something so momentous, showing her even more trust – but in the end decided against it. There probably wasn’t much advice she could offer and, besides, he’d already over-stretched client confidentiality.

They were silent for a moment, only the clinking of their cutlery and a Clara Moreno album playing softly in the background.

Jac saw something in Alaysha’s eyes then, a warmth and soulfulness that went deeper, hit another level he hadn’t been aware of before, as if she’d purposely shielded it from him till that moment. Though he had no idea what it meant until almost an hour later, as she was clearing away and leant in towards him and started kissing him.

They were tentative at first, as if she was testing the water before diving fully in. But after that, it was almost two minutes before she pulled back for air again, looking at him thoughtfully as she traced the moistness she’d left on his top lip with one fingertip.

‘Now that I’ve agreed to do a big favour for you… well, looks like I might need one in return. It involves my boyfriend...’

Jac was quick to give his agreement to what she asked, probably far quicker than he’d have been without the heat of her closeness firing him on – because much of what she was suggesting helped close the door on the chapter with her boyfriend and left the way clear for himself.

And as he nodded and their bond of clandestine mutual favours was sealed with more rapid, fervent kisses and Alaysha started unbuttoning his shirt before leaning back to slide her own top over her head – that look returned again to her eyes, and Jac knew then what it was.

It signalled the moment that she’d first decided she was going to sleep with him, straight after she’d agreed to help him with his last-ditch duplicitous bid to try and save Larry Durrant’s life.

Their lovemaking felt like a dream, happening so quickly, fervently, breathlessly, that the images were little different when they replayed in Jac’s dream later that same night; tinged with the same hazy glow of the streetlight filtering into Alaysha’s bedroom.

Her coffee-cream skin, bathed in orange light, her hazel-brown eyes drawing him in like a welcoming blanket of autumn leaves, the beads of sweat massing on her top lip and, when he looked down, spread across her entire body like fine raindrops; and her breath, hot and urgent in his ear, urging him on.

‘Oh, fuck me… fuck me, Jac.
Fuck me
!’

But beyond her body heat and him frantically keeping rhythm with her, he started to hear the bed banging – though he could never remember that at the time. And he realized it was someone knocking at her apartment door, her boyfriend’s voice.

‘Who have you got with you? What are you doing in there?’

Then suddenly there was the banging of a door behind him, then another – the same banging he’d heard on that first night through the apartment wall – successive doors slamming like pistol shots as her boyfriend moved inexorably towards them.

But as the bedroom door burst open it was Larry Durrant standing there, gun in hand, as in his previous dream; yet this time, as the bullet hit and suddenly it was Jessica Roche beneath him, he didn’t pull back, repulsed, but clung on, eyes searching for clues he might have missed last time… something…
something
… her blood hot and clammy against his skin, mingling with his sweat.

‘No, no, no….
No
!

Larry shouting from the doorway was little more than a silhouette, the stark light behind that of the corridor at
Libreville
, his desperate cries echoing through its cavernous grey depths. His face, fearful and beaded with sweat, became suddenly quizzical, pleading.

‘Don’t tell anyone what just happened here…
please
, Mr McElroy. Perhaps we can hide the body somewhere so that nobody will know. Maybe then I’ll get to hear from my little boy again… I haven’t heard from him in a while…’

   Jac awoke with a jolt as the thunder crashed only a second after the lightning flash. His heart was beating wildly and his body was bathed in sweat, as if he
had
only seconds ago been making love to Alaysha.