Until Death (13 page)

She didn’t answer, jogging through the front entrance of St Pancras. She saw a cashpoint and jammed in the card, taking out her daily maximum amount of £1,000. Then she ran with her protesting children to the Underground.

‘Where are we going, Mum?’ Florence asked once they were on the train to Exeter, heading west.

‘Somewhere by the sea,’ she said.

‘Is it warm there?’

‘Not at this time of year. We’re going to see a friend of mine. An old friend.’

Two hours later the train pulled up at Tiverton Parkway and they got out, a blustery wind blowing down the platform. The few other passengers melted away and Kelly stood in the darkness, unsure what to do. She saw a figure in a denim jacket and a curl of cigarette smoke, heard the scrape of her high heels. ‘Lindsey.’

‘Hello, Kelly.’ Her voice was rasping and flat and she flicked the cigarette away and gave her a hug. ‘You sure you want to do this?’

Kelly nodded.

‘Let’s get a shift on then, it’s a long drive.’

N
early four and a half thousand miles away, and five hours behind Kelly, the Wolf was still in the bar in Belém he’d entered at eleven that evening. A girl was next to him on the bed in an upstairs room, but he wasn’t sure it was the girl he’d started out with. Her long dark hair fanned out across rumpled pillows and twisted sheets. He could hear Thomas Jefferson, nicknamed ‘President’, captain of the
Saracen
, talking and laughing behind the paper walls in the room next door to him. His hangover was beating percussion in his brain, and he had lain here quite long enough, the woman pushing him down whenever he tried to get up. But it was time to get to work. It was good to start a voyage with a bellyful. It brought good luck, the Wolf believed. It would help the fourteen-hour shift he was about to start in the heat pass quicker.

He tried to sit up and the woman moved to pull him back down again. ‘Enough, enough, I’ve got work to do.’ He stretched and scratched and glugged down some water.

‘President! All hail the President!’ he shouted and heard swearing and groaning in reply from the other side of the wall as he bent to pick up his T-shirt. He pulled it over his head and the sour odour of old sweat hit him. Most of his gear was still on the ship; this had been only a three-day stopover – he’d shower and change later.

The woman had her pants on now, had snapped back into business mode. ‘You owe me more. You’ve spent an hour extra.’ She had stepped towards the door to block his exit.

He held up his hands, smiled. She’d played a fast one but he wasn’t going to condemn her for that. A woman who had her eye on the money was someone straightforward, someone he respected. ‘Fair dues. You don’t miss a thing.’

‘No, I don’t. Where you going, anyway?’

‘London.’

She put her hands on her hips, swaying to one side. She had a mole on the corner of her lip which had attracted him last night. In the morning light it still looked cute. ‘One day I leave here and see the world.’

‘I’ll tell you something for nothing, the world’s all the same.’

‘I’ve got a passport, you know. I’m not staying here for ever.’

Young dreams that would fade and die. He gave her the extra money and banged on the wall to hurry the President along. He opened the door and half ran out, sliding down the banister to the ground floor. He didn’t bother to say goodbye.

The President half fell down the stairs after him. ‘You’re a bad, bad man, you know.’ The President wiggled his finger at the Wolf and shook his head as they stepped into the tropical heat outside. ‘God, that’s one hell of a hangover.’

‘That’s why you love me. Come on.’

They walked down a rubbish-strewn alley and out to the quayside. It was busy in the early morning, because the day would only get hotter. A mile-long stretch of docks and wharves, gantry cranes, thousands of men from all over the world, permanent or just passing through, moving the goods that oiled the world economy – and the other items that never turned up in a balance sheet: the guns, drugs, contraband cigarettes, women, children …

The
Saracen
was registered in Cyprus, flying an Argentinian flag, staffed by a crew from six nations and operated by Christos Malamatos, resident of London. It was taller than a twenty-storey building, as big as a small town, with giant smears of rust that ran down its huge sides to the water. The gantry cranes used to load the containers were so high off the ground you couldn’t see the operator. As a merchant seaman it was the Wolf’s floating home for a sixty-seven-day stint, and he was on the last leg now, seven days across the Atlantic to London with forty thousand tonnes of cargo on board – some more precious to the operator than others.

The Wolf stopped walking and stared up at the ship. ‘You carry on, I forgot something.’ He left the President and headed back to the bar. The best plans were simple. He took the stairs two at a time and opened the girl’s door without knocking. She was efficient, already stripping the bed, and had tidied up the bottles. She looked surprised, was still young enough to find life a shock. In a few years that too would be gone.

‘What’s your name?’

‘What do you want it to be?’

He laughed. ‘It’s in your passport, unless you’re a lot cleverer than I thought.’

She smiled back, a broad mouth and black eyes bright with calculation. ‘Luciana.’

‘That’s a pretty name.’

‘It is, isn’t it?’

‘Fancy seeing the world?’

K
elly woke in a small room, shafts of sunlight piercing the gap between the flowery curtains. She could hear kids playing outside, their voices rising and falling on the wind. The window pane rattled in its warped frame. She pulled on her clothes and opened the bedroom door, heard the clattering of plates in the kitchen, the tinny tones of a radio.

‘You slept late. You must have been shattered.’ Lindsey was in faded pyjamas and a big wraparound sweater, her dirty blonde bed hair poking up at odd angles. She poured water into a giant mug that said ‘Sports Direct’ and handed her a tea. ‘Strong, milk, no sugar. Don’t worry, Steve’s gone to work. There’s no one to answer to.’

Kelly came over and gave her a hug, staring over her shoulder at the kitchen door that gave on to the garden. A broken swing was swaying in the wind, a kid’s tractor and some old farm implements were stacked in the corner of the weedy lawn. ‘It’s perfect.’

Lindsey picked up her cigarette packet and opened the door and they went out. Yannis and Florence were pushing one of Lindsey’s kids on an old tricycle. The lawn gave way to a field and then another and then some low farm buildings and in the distance the Atlantic.

‘Damn wind, can’t light my fag.’ Lindsey had her back turned, hunched over with a clicking lighter. Kelly felt a fresh wind, straight off the ocean, pushing back her hair. They walked to the edge of the garden where the potholed drive wound away and two old cars sat rusting by a garage. ‘I swapped the bright lights for this. You’re lucky it’s not raining. It’s always raining here.’

‘This is a lovely place, Linds. I can see why you moved back.’

‘You’re having a laugh.’ She inhaled, regarding her old friend. ‘You look even thinner, you old cow. You must have been pretty desperate to come all the way to deepest Devon to get away.’

‘More than you know.’ Kelly turned her face to the sun again. ‘Oh, to have the wind in my face, to breathe, you have no idea.’

‘It went that wrong, eh?’

‘As wrong as it can.’

Lindsey sighed. ‘He use his fists?’ She took a deep drag on her cigarette when Kelly didn’t answer. ‘I told you at the time he was too good to be true. Didn’t I tell you?’

Kelly started to nod. ‘But tell me how a woman in my situation was supposed to refuse.’

Lindsey let out a half laugh. ‘You weren’t, that’s the point. He could have who he wanted. He could have had any of us in there. Still thinks he can, by the sounds of it. He wants all the choice and none of the responsibility. We all dreamed of escape, Kel, you actually did it.’ She inhaled again. ‘Remember when he laid out that map of that ship on the table? My God, he saw you coming.’

‘Oh stop, Linds.’ She almost laughed. They had both been working that day when Christos came in to buy a coffee. He used to tip well, they had all noticed. Then he had laid out a plan of a ship, and the siren call of the sea, of her old life, had brought her over.

You like ships?
She had seen his dimples then as he smiled.

More than you can know.

Come closer, let me show you the biggest ship you’ve ever seen.
She had glanced back at Lindsey, saw her bulging eyes behind the counter urging her on, the look that said,
Live our dreams for us
. And she had discovered, serving him coffee that day, that she still had the capacity to flirt, to put her looks and her charm to work once again. She still wanted fun and adventure, to believe that all the heartbreak and loss had not ended her life, but thrown it in a new direction. How she had loved him then. And how, only five years later, she hated his guts.

‘The kids look good,’ Lindsey said. ‘Happy.’ The kids began rolling around on the grass before running into the house.

Tears pricked at Kelly’s eyes. ‘They are all I’ve got.’ They both sighed at the small pieces of good fortune each had been handed.

A cat came alongside and jumped on a low wall, its bushy tail wafting through Kelly’s fingers. ‘How many of these have you got now?’ Kelly asked.

‘Just the two.’

‘You’re destined to end up a cat woman.’

‘With just two? They hardly keep the boredom at bay. She had kittens recently, so sweet they were, racing all over the house and up the curtains. We gave them away – see how good I am? But she still looks for them.’

‘Looks for them?’

‘Yeah. She wanders round the house mewing, calling for them. She searches everywhere, but her children aren’t there.’ Lindsey took a final drag on the cigarette, then flicked it away and glanced back at Kelly. A second later it dawned on her what she had said. ‘Oh God, Kelly, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to upset you. I didn’t mean – oh Kel, I’m sorry …’

‘It’s OK, I know you didn’t mean anything by it.’

Lindsey looked stricken. ‘I’m so sorry. Jesus, I’m a stupid insensitive cow sometimes …’

Kelly hugged her friend. ‘No, you’re not. Not at all.’ She saw Lindsey wipe away a tear. ‘I won’t be here long, Linds, just today while I get my money out. I didn’t dare to keep it in the flat in case he found it. You’ve got a lot on your plate and not much space.’

‘Where are you going to go?’

‘It’s better if you don’t know. Really, it’s better. I need to get to a bank, is there one nearby?’

‘I can drive you to the village, there’s a post office. Will that do?’ She looked at her watch. ‘You slept late. It’s shut at lunch, but opens afternoons.’

‘We’ll leave this afternoon if you can drive us to the station.’

‘If that’s what you want.’ Lindsey gave Kelly the look she used to give her when they had a difficult customer in the bar. ‘Men,’ she spat. ‘What fuckers they are.’

Kelly smiled. It was good to see her old friend, to hang out. ‘So what do you do when you’ve got a few hours to spare and a beach nearby?’

Lindsey urged Kelly to go and stretch her legs. ‘Take the path at the far end of the garden and it’ll take you down to the beach. I’ll feed the kids. I used to deal with twenty covers at a time at the restaurant, remember?’

Kelly said goodbye to Florence and Yannis and followed the path as it wound through dripping woodland and then cut down a cliff to a pebbly beach where the breakers pulverised the sand. The wind was stronger here; the high tide line held a broken plastic bucket and part of a wetsuit. A dog walker came past, smiling. Kelly began to walk away from the path into the wind, feeling freer and lighter with every step. She walked further than she meant to, and it took her longer than she had imagined it would to get back to the path. She speeded up; she didn’t want to leave her children for too long.

When she got back Lindsey was in the corner of the garden furthest from the house, trying to get an old lawnmower started. ‘If I don’t mow it I get no end of grief from Steve. You’d think he’d lift a finger.’ They fiddled with it together for a while, swearing and laughing, enjoying the autumn sun on their faces as the kids played in and out of the back door, running round the side of the house. This is how life should be, thought Kelly. Normal interactions, an ebb and flow to relationships, a give and take …

She saw Lindsey turn towards the house; something had caught her attention. Kelly looked up. The faint thrum of an engine. A car. Two black Audis came fast up the drive and pulled to a stop by the broken-down hatchbacks. The children ran towards the cars, intrigued and excited.

She saw Christos get out of one, Medea the other.

Kelly sprinted across the garden, the wind whipping away her cries. Christos was hugging Florence. Medea had picked up Yannis and was folding him into the first car.

She was halfway across the garden now, rounding the broken swing, hollering and shouting. Florence turned to look at her mother as she sat down on the back seat next to Yannis, half in and half out.

‘Let go of the kids.’

Kelly slammed at full pelt into the side of the car by Florence and began pulling on her daughter’s arm. Medea came round and stood in front of her.

‘We’re going home, this is ridiculous.’

‘No, we’re not.’

Yannis put his hands over his ears, trying to block it all out. Medea pushed Florence’s legs into the car and tried to shut the door as Kelly fought with her.

‘Get in the car, Kelly.’ Christos was right by her, holding her arm.

She let out a sob and at that moment Medea slammed the door and walked around to the driver’s seat. ‘No.’

Lindsey ran towards them, her own kids ordered into the house. She was pulling her big sweater round her for protection. ‘Leave her alone or I’m calling the police.’

Christos dragged Kelly to the second car, her feet scoring deep marks in the gravel as she fought him. She saw Christos’s driver at the wheel.