See Naples and Die (8 page)

The Mafia negotiator looked first at her
breasts, then raised his eyes and said, “Okay. Where and when?”

Chrissie was familiar with Central
London, and thought quickly. “There’s a bar called El Dorado’s on Old Compton
Street in Soho. We will meet you there at two o’clock tomorrow afternoon.”

Then she motioned for the others to
follow and they set off back to Bayswater Road, with the bemused Italians
watching them go. After a few steps Chrissie turned and spoke directly to
Armando. “And there will be no exchange unless we speak, in person, to Roberto
Vialli.” She didn’t wait for an answer, and strode defiantly away.

Once they had put a little distance
between themselves and the two men they took a separate path towards
Kensington. They were staying in a hotel in Earls Court, and thought the walk
back would clear their heads and encourage some positive thinking. On the way
down Kensington High Street Chrissie spotted a pub sign down a side street, and
suggested sharing a bottle of wine. It was a typical West London pub – scruffy,
with absolutely no atmosphere – but with an extensive wine list. They sat
around a funny-shaped table and poured the wine. Even Bruno was drinking so the
bottle only managed one glass each, but that was enough for now.

This wasn’t the time to go over their
situation again, so they drank and talked about this and that. They listened to
some more of Chrissie’s tales of the unexpected and Megan’s time in East
London. Bruno was more or less back to his old self, and told some surprisingly
good anecdotes about life as a novice priest. Another bottle of Pinot Grigio
made the conversation even more light-hearted, and when they stepped back out
into daylight it was as if they hadn’t a care in the world.

They ambled towards Earls Court like
lost tourists, with London surrounding them for miles on every side, and
Chrissie finally understood Brenda’s illogical remark when they first arrived.
She had said that London is so big it makes you feel claustrophobic.

They arrived at the hotel and walked
through the lobby. It was only a small hotel and the reception area was
unmanned, with a bell to ring for assistance. Their room was only on the first
floor, but they still took the lift. The walk and the wine had sapped their
strength, and their feet hurt.

There were only eight bedrooms on each
floor, and they had taken two of them. Halfway down the corridor they saw the
shape of a man coming towards them. Brenda thought it strange that she hadn’t
noticed him before, but they were so weary.

Then everything seemed to happen at
once. They heard footsteps behind them and turned to see, only a few feet away,
a man with a raised gun. There was a small thud as the gun was fired, and they
scattered to either side of the corridor. A moment ago their legs couldn’t walk
another ten yards, but now they ran like the wind. As they rushed past the man
with the gun Megan was, for a brief second, face to face with him. She saw his
dark eyes, and the scar that ran in a jagged line from temple to chin.

They reached the end of the corridor,
and crashed into each other like skittles in a bowling alley. Then they all
tried to fit through the door to the stairs at the same time and almost became
jammed. It was farcical – but panic does that, and they were panicking. They
ran down the stairs, across the lobby, and into the street. This was the second
time they’d done this in the past two days, and they were learning. This time
they didn’t stop outside. They just kept running. They ran on to Earls Court
Road and into the Tube station. They had daily travel tickets they’d used
earlier to go to the meeting with Roberto’s men, so they went straight down to
the platforms. Destination didn’t matter: it was whichever train came first. It
was the District line to Wimbledon, and they leapt on.

The train was busy and they had to stand
in the door area, but they huddled together and felt stronger as a group.

“Where shall we get off?” asked Megan.

“The end of the line,” proposed Brenda.

Chrissie laughed. “Bad choice of words,
Bren.”

Brenda and Megan smiled too. Whether it
was nervous tension, adrenalin, or dead brain cells it was a side of their
character that set them apart. Bruno didn’t smile. Whatever it was he just
didn’t have it.

Eventually the train arrived at
Wimbledon, and they got off with the rest of the passengers. They were looking
everywhere for possible assassins – but paid killers don’t have signs around
their necks, so what’s the point? There is no point, but you do it anyway.

Outside the station exit was a coffee
shop, and it was as good a place as any to assess the precarious position they
were in – and their dwindling options of not just getting out of it, but even
surviving the next few days.

“First things first,” said Chrissie. “We
didn’t even get back to the room, so all we have are the clothes we are
standing in and whatever money we’ve got on us … How much have we got?”

Megan and Brenda had dropped their bags
when fleeing from the hotel and Chrissie wasn’t carrying one to begin with, so
they emptied their pockets out on to the table. Chrissie counted the bits and
pieces. “Forty-five pounds,” she said.

This was bad. Chrissie’s face was a
picture of despair. “How much have you got, Bruno?” she whispered, her words
tumbling out like a line of weary coal miners ending their shift.

Bruno always wore a man satchel, which
he lifted over his head and placed on the table. He unzipped it and showed the
contents. It was crammed full of bundles of £20 notes.

“Bloody hell, Bruno,” said Chrissie.
“Zip it up, quick.” Surprises like this can instantly lift a person’s spirits,
and now they all felt as if they had been plucked from the abyss and placed on
top of the world.

This time Bruno did smile. “I wasn’t
leaving this for some chambermaid to find,” and then his smile withered. “If
only we still had the data stick.”

“Ah, but we have,” said Brenda, and she put
one hand inside her bra, gave a slight tug, and produced the magic red USB data
stick.

“That’s brilliant,” shouted Chrissie.
“Then we aren’t in any worse position than before. We can book into another
hotel, we can buy whatever we need, and we can still do the meeting with
Roberto tomorrow.”

They got up to leave, and as they walked
across the room Chrissie mumbled to herself, “I didn’t like that hotel in Earls
Court, anyway.”

On a one-mile gradual incline near the
Surrey/Hampshire border a single-track road wound its way through the wooded
slopes. With only a handful of passing places it was inhospitable to any form
of motorised transport, but then very few people ever came this way. It wasn’t
a short cut to anywhere, and only three houses were spaced along its entire
length. The last property was the most secluded, and couldn’t even be seen from
the road. Only a shabby green-painted ranch-style gate gave any indication that
something may lie beyond.

After the gate a gravel path disappeared
around a wide curve of huge rhododendron bushes and then widened out into a
courtyard, with a converted barn dwelling to the right and a stunning
six-bedroomed art deco property to the left. With flat roof and white-painted
facade the house looked decidedly out of place in rural Surrey. It should have
been a stone-built, ivy-covered, Victorian masterpiece with large chimneys, but
was in fact built circa 1944 to the specifications of a well-known English
actor of the time.

The actor had co-starred in several
Hollywood movies and, although never destined to be a leading man, had carved a
niche for his charming English characters. But then, with the growing unrest in
Europe and the imminent threat of war, he felt it only right to return home and
do his bit for king and country. So he bade a fond farewell to Tinseltown and
flew back to the rolling hills of the South Downs where he had this house built
in a style that reminded him of Los Angeles, and for the rest of the war he
spent his working hours at a South London film studio playing various military
parts in low-budget war films. Now that’s patriotism for you.

For the past eight years the house had
been owned by Walter Monreal, a Conservative member of parliament. Walter was a
humourless individual who seemed to take pleasure in berating defenceless
waiters in restaurants or other unfortunates who crossed his path, and he had
one of those mouths that had a permanent upside-down smile. He was smug and
crass with an overinflated ego matched only by his ruthless ambition, and he
stepped over people without remorse or regret. He was a human being who truly
believed he was the centre of the universe with the rest of the population in
his orbit and at his beck and call.

As an MP he had moved up the greasy pole
of politics with ease. Walter was an expert at choosing the right alliances,
and even better at gaining sensitive information on individuals who he could
then control. The FBI would be proud to have produced such dossiers. It had
taken only a short time for Walter to manoeuvre himself into a permanent role
at the department of business development, which was as far as he wanted to go.
He had no desire to become a senior cabinet minister. Those positions came with
a mountain of responsibility and offered little in return … and Walter was in
it for the money.

His grand project was the development of
a large area on the outskirts of Manchester. The government was making lots of
noise about plans to relocate some of its departments out to the provinces, and
was putting pressure on the financial institutions to do the same. This was
never going to happen, of course – the capital would always be the centre of
commerce – but the prime minister had given instructions to make a gesture, and
Manchester had been chosen as the Canary Wharf of the north.

Walter had been instrumental at deciding
on the exact location. Land was cheap in the north, and through a maze of
companies he had been buying up great chunks of the area. But, as with any
commodity, buying and selling are two entirely different animals. He had bought
low but would sell high, and the government wouldn’t question the price because
it was his decision. He would be signing his own cheque. The development would
go ahead and he would continue to profit from leases on the buildings, where he
held well-hidden percentages. The construction company, the architects, the
financiers: they were all under his thumb – well, most of them.

There was a potential problem. A square
peg was trying to force itself into a round hole. A Mafia family was involved.
This had happened in the early stages … just to get it moving. He had made that
quite clear. They were never a long-term proposition, but now they wanted to
change the goalposts. Well, he wasn’t having it. Nobody, not even the Mafia,
told Walter Monreal what to do. He had returned their initial investment plus
interest, and that was the end of it. And as additional insurance he had done a
deal with a new consortium, which included London gangsters – who had promised
muscle, whenever and wherever necessary. He felt utterly protected and safe. In
any case, no one is going to get rough with a member of the British government.
It would cause too much of an uproar, and create pressure even the Mafia could
do without. Walter grinned inwardly, making his face contort into a vicious
sneer and his eyes glare with an insane intensity – then he heard the sound of
a drink being poured in the kitchen, and his mind once more was on the matter
of the moment.

Walter had a wife, two sons, and a long-term
boyfriend. The wife and family were a necessity for public life, and the
boyfriend was reality. It had all been agreed years before … a marriage of
convenience, where the lady in question would live an envious lifestyle and – as
long as they remained a secret – could even take lovers to satisfy her needs.
In return she would provide a family and stability but, from day one, they were
to lead separate lives.

And then – to his annoyance – his second
son, Nigel, had knocked on his door and asked to stay for the evening. The boy
hadn’t seen his father for over a year and, at the age of seventeen, was going
through a difficult time in understanding this family arrangement. He wanted a
heart-to-heart with his father. He needed to know if there were any genuine
feelings – perhaps even love – between father and son. Like any child, he
needed it.

Walter watched his son approaching with
a feeling of deep regret. Times had certainly changed from the days when he’d
first entered public office. Then he had no choice but to hide his sexuality in
a web of lies – but now no one gave a damn. Being openly gay isn’t an obstacle,
and in the hands of a decent PR company can even be an advantage … so here was
a son he didn’t need, and it was a source of constant irritation to him.

Nigel handed a drink over and sat in the
armchair facing his father. The boy had poured himself a dark rum and Coke,
thinking it would appear alcohol-free. But it didn’t matter: his father
couldn’t care less.

“Well, Father,” said Nigel. “This is
pleasant, isn’t it?”

“Mmm,” grunted Walter. “What do you want
…? Is it money?”

The boy closed his eyes. Never once in his
life had his father ever shown affection for him, and he craved so much for an
arm around his shoulder or just a sign of interest in his well-being. But he
simply replied, “No, Father. I only wanted to spend some time with you.”

Now it was Walter’s turn to reflect. If
the boy only wanted money, that would be fine. But time … That was something he
didn’t want to give – and this evening was supposed to have been quality time
spent with his partner, Roman Vasalknis.

Over the past five years Roman had become
much more than just a lover: he had become a confidante in Walter’s scheming.
They attended talks together, and it had been Roman who had suggested severing
the links with the Mafia. Walter recalled a particular meeting with their
representative, Angelo Tardelli, when Roman had been vociferous in his
condemnation of the Italians. Angelo hadn’t liked it one little bit. His eyes had
seethed, but he had done nothing. Roman had said as much: these so-called
gangsters rely totally on their reputation. Stand up to them and they are
nothing … and Roman had been proved right. He felt his blood flow faster and
his cheeks flush at the thought of his lover. Then his thoughts were broken by
the sound of his son’s embarrassed cough.

“For God’s sake, at least appear to be
listening,” said the boy.

“And what am I about to hear?” asked his
father. “You obviously want something … so go on. Spit it out.”

Nigel tilted his head backward in
exasperation. “Mother has always made it clear regarding the arrangements, and
who you really are. Joseph and I know we are supposed to keep away … but I
can’t. I don’t know why – and I must be an idiot – but you are my father, and I
love you.”

Walter pondered on this for a moment and
then, reverting to type, said in words of ice,

“Well, I don’t love you.”

Casually his son put down his drink, and
from his jacket pocket produced a small revolver. “I wanted you to open up. I
hoped Mother was wrong, and that somewhere you could produce an ounce of
decency. If you had said the right words I would have embraced you … but now I
have to end it.”

Nigel pointed the gun at his father, but
his hand was shaking and he felt fragile. Walter was a master at picking up on
weakness and he walked towards the boy, smacked the gun from his grip, and then
swiped him across the face with the back of his hand. “You are no son of mine,”
he said. “Now run back to your mother.”

The boy was defeated, and tears burnt
his cheeks. He moved towards the door and was about to leave when he heard his
father call to him. He turned, even now half expecting a change of heart, but
Walter simply threw the gun to him. “Take that with you,” he said. “When you
get older you can always try again.”

Nigel Monreal caught the gun and walked
out of the house and out of his father’s life, at least knowing for sure what
the man was truly like.

Walter heard the sound of his son’s car
against the gravel path and then the hum of the engine fading into the distance,
and he laughed. He picked up his phone and rang Roman, and in a delighted voice
told him to drive immediately down to the house. They could spend the weekend
together after all. He went into the kitchen and opened a bottle of Chianti. Then
– taking the bottle and a glass with him – he went and sat back in his
armchair, ready to sip wine and bask in his immortality.

An hour passed, and the bottle of wine
was emptied, when he was suddenly startled by the sound of the phone ringing.
It was Roman. There had been a disaster en route. Walter’s heart skipped a beat,
but he let Roman explain. The car had lost power on the A3 near Guildford and
he’d had to call the rescue service. The mechanic had confirmed earlier
suspicions: it was the cam belt. The car was useless: it required a complete
engine overhaul. There was no other option: it had to be loaded on to a
recovery vehicle and, along with the sobbing Roman, would be taken back to
London. The crestfallen lover would have to hire a car in the morning and
travel down then. Walter didn’t like to be let down, not for any reason, and
without any words of comfort he hung up.

He glared at the floor, and then strode
into the kitchen for a second bottle of Chianti. When he came back to the
living room, full glass of red in hand, he felt much calmer. He sat and gulped
the wine, almost wishing his son would return – and then he could humiliate him
some more. A picture appeared in his mind of the poor boy giving it one more go,
and then being ruthlessly ripped to shreds by his barbed replies. Then he heard
footsteps coming up the hall, and he smiled. The boy was actually here. He put
a hand to his forehead and felt the power he commanded. He only had to
visualise whatever he wanted and it would come to pass. He was indeed a supreme
being. He felt strong and untouchable. The alcohol and the prospect of inflicting
further pain on his son had topped up his ego and testosterone levels, and he
was king of the world. No one could harm him now.

The footsteps stopped by the door, and
he could imagine his son shaking. His eyes fixed on the entrance in
anticipation … and then the stranger strode towards him. He had no time to
register shock or surprise before a cold, steel object was pressed against his
temple.

He looked up at the intruder’s eyes, and
they terrified him. Unaware that he was even doing it, he dropped the wine
glass and gripped the side of his chair. He was about to speak when the
stranger beat him to it.

“Don’t say a word.”

Walter closed his mouth quickly.

“It’s very disappointing that your lover
boy can’t make it. I had a good ending planned for both of you. And it wasn’t much
fun waiting in the hall closet for the past two hours listening to you torment
the boy, but at least that showed me what kind of man you are and that I am
going to enjoy this night. You know, at one point I thought the boy was going to
do it for me … but I’m glad he didn’t.”

Walter knew what was coming, and forced
himself to scowl into the face of his assailant. Tigran Sadorian scowled back,
and then pulled the trigger.