Winner Takes It All (24 page)

After a refreshing
shower, Alex dressed and went down to the kitchen for breakfast.
Robin had prepared a full English for her; there was a rose in a
vase and an envelope with her name on propped against
it.

‘
Oh you
shouldn’t have,’ she struggled to smile.

‘
Nonsense. Sit
down and enjoy your food.’

The bacon and eggs stuck
in Alex’s throat as she tried to eat. She had no appetite at all;
her misery had made her unable to face food and she’d lost half a
stone in recent weeks. Deciding she couldn’t eat any more, she put
down her knife and fork and picked up the envelope, thinking it was
a birthday card. She was rather shocked when she tore it open and
discovered it was a British Airways wallet. Why on earth had Robin
booked a holiday? He knew she hardly had time to breathe, let alone
go away somewhere.

Opening the wallet, she
saw it contained two tickets to the Maldives. They were to fly out
on November 18
^th
.

‘
I don’t know
what to say. It’s almost a Christmas present.’

‘
I was rather
hoping we could make it our honeymoon.’

Alex’s blood ran so cold
it practically turned to ice and froze in her veins. She’d been
expecting a marriage proposal at some point in the future but
they’d only been back together for a month.

‘
It’s a bit
soon,’ was all she could say.

She cringed even more
when he got down onto one knee before her and from his jeans pocket
took out a red velvet ring box.

‘
This is your
proper birthday present,’ he said, opening the box up to reveal a
beautiful white diamond set upon what she presumed to be a platinum
band. ‘Alex will you marry me?’

Before Alex could speak,
her mobile began to ring and she saw it was Nicola, the head of PR.
She had no idea why she was ringing her on a Saturday morning - it
may even have just been to say Happy Birthday, Alex didn’t care, at
least it was a diversion from Robin and his proposal.

‘
Nicola,’ she
practically snapped.

‘
Alex, you
need to come to HQ now; a crisis is about to erupt.’

‘
What sort of
crisis?’

‘
A story is
going to be in the Sunday Telegraph tomorrow about how Sheridans
helped fund the IRA in the Seventies and Eighties.’

‘
What?!’

‘
Just come in
Alex. This is terrible.’

‘
I’m on my
way.’

Alex ended the call and
while she was terrified about this horrible revelation and the
implications it could have, at the same time she was grateful for
the distraction from Robin’s proposal.

‘
What is it?’
he asked.

She stood up.

‘
Someone’s
accusing Sheridans of funding the IRA,’ she replied. ‘I’ve got to
go to HQ. Look, you go on down to Layton House. I’ll get there as
soon as I can.’

‘
Well do you
want me to come to HQ with you?’

‘
No. Just go
down to Abbott’s Leigh Robin. I can cope on my own. I’m not
helpless you know.’

Alex drove at speed
across London, wondering what the hell she was going to face. She’d
been a child when all this was going on, but she’d never known her
father to express any sympathies with the IRA. Just because they
were of Irish descent and Catholic, it didn’t make them terrorists.
She kept thinking of Jack’s words of warning - that someone was
conspiring against Sheridans. As much as she hated the thought of
it, she couldn’t help but wonder if he was right.

She so wanted to call
Jack; he was so good in a crisis and would know what to say. But
since that night when they’d kissed in the hotel room in Hove,
things had become awkward between them. Jack had remained mostly in
Liverpool, overseeing the development of the hotel. All the fire
damage had now been repaired and although police were still seeking
the arsonist, at least the building was back in Alex’s hands.
Similarly in Ibiza, Mr Alonso’s building firm were making great
strides with the development and Mel spent at least three days a
week over there making sure things were going smoothly.

Alex knew Jack was in
London today because he was meeting with the interior designer who
would be overseeing the development of The Exchange – the building
they’d bought in Earls Court. Through their visit to Hove, they’d
found out that Harvey’s, the company in Bristol that bought the
bankrupt stock etc, also worked with a designer called Greg Dale,
who they’d now employed to work with the renovation of both The
Exchange and Sheridans Liverpool. Because Alex thought she would be
in Abbott’s Leigh, she’d asked Jack to meet him. She wanted to see
him so much it hurt and she marvelled at her self control when she
reached Sheridans HQ and didn’t call him.

Passing the main
entrance, she saw the press gathered around like a pack of vultures
and so she opted to go into the underground car park. It was
patrolled by a security guard who would stop any rogue journalists
coming in and Alex knew she was safe. She took the lift up to what
used to be her office, to find Nicola holding the landline phone in
one hand, her mobile in the other. She looked at Alex, rolling her
eyes to the ceiling and spoke into the landline.

‘
No, we have
no comment,’ she said. ‘The allegations are untrue and we will be
issuing a statement.’

She put down the phone,
gestured to Alex to sit down and returned to her mobile.

‘
I’m fine
thanks Christian,’ she said and Alex realised her father was on the
other end of the phone. She worried about him. He was just on the
mend and didn’t need this sort of stress to set him back. ‘She’s
here, would you like to speak to her?’

She offered her mobile to
Alex and she took it.

‘
Hello
daddy.’

‘
Happy
Birthday Pumpkin,’ he said, his voice still slightly slurred. ‘What
the hell is going on?’

‘
I don’t know.
Things keep happening daddy. Jack thinks someone’s out to get
us.’

‘
He could be
right. Come down to Abbott’s Leigh as soon as you can.’

‘
I will. But
don’t you worry about any of it, I can look after
things.’

‘
Alright. I
love you.’

‘
I love you
too.’

She ended the call and
passed the phone back to Nicola.

‘
So what
happened exactly?’

‘
Did you know
a man called Colm Kennedy?’

‘
Yes, he was a
friend of my father’s, he used to be on the Board of Directors but
he died a few years ago.’

‘
Well a man
called Finn Healy has gone to the Sunday Telegraph claiming that
throughout the Seventies and Eighties, Kennedy used to supply him
with money in exchange for protection for Sheridans pubs in
Northern Ireland.’

‘
What? I am
completely confused. Who is Finn Healy?’

‘
He’s a former
IRA member who spent ten years in The Maze Prison. He reckons that
Sheridans used him as an enforcer to make sure there was no trouble
in their pubs. I’ve a transcript of the article, would you like to
see it?’

‘
Yes
please.’

Nicola printed out a copy
of the article and passed it to Alex. She took it up to her office
and made herself a cup of coffee, her hands shaking through fear of
what was happening around her. She then settled at her desk and
started to read.

Finn Healy is
a diminutive man and as we sit in an Irish pub in Kilburn, it’s
hard to believe that for twenty years he was somewhat of a secret
weapon of the IRA’s. Born in the early 1950s to an impoverished
Catholic family, he was raised to hate everything British and it
was a natural progression he would join the Republican cause. An
IRA member at fifteen, by twenty he had murdered at least ten men
and would go on to be a chief enforcer in his area in Coleraine. In
1988 he was convicted of the murder of Private John Hobbs, a
British Solider and sentenced to life in The Maze Prison. Whilst in
this notorious institution, Healy saw the error of his ways,
turning his anger into creativity and becoming a poet. He was
released in 2000 as part of the Good Friday Agreement, and has not
offended since.

Now reaching his late fifties, Healy
feels the need to confess and clear his conscience before he enters
the final stage of his life. When Sheridans, the huge Irish brewer
and leisure group based in the UK came under fire recently for
serving underage drinkers, it sparked a memory in Healy and he felt
he could not keep it to himself any longer.

‘
It makes
me angry how lads like myself took all the crap for our crimes,’ he
laments in his still strong Ulster accent. ‘But like everything it
was big business that was funding us. When I see them poor Muslim
lads in
Guantanamo
Bay being tortured and
questioned, it makes me a bit angry cos we know it was big business
that spent money on the countries where they’ve come from, just cos
at the time they were fighting a joint enemy. They brought them
guns; they taught them how to fight, now they’re washing their
hands of them. You’d be surprised at how many big companies gave
money to the Cause. On both sides of course. In Coleraine, most of
the pubs were owned by Sheridans and they were worried about
trouble happening. Before the present family took over, it was run
by a protestant family and Catholics weren’t allowed in the pubs.
When the new owner took over, they allowed Catholics in but
wouldn’t keep proddies out. So I came to an arrangement which meant
there would be no trouble.’

Sheridans has
a very colourful history. Founded in the mid nineteenth century,
the Sheridan family were proudly protestant until one of their
sons, Eugene, married a Catholic girl. Disowned and banished, he
retreated to Southern Ireland, converted to Catholicism and raised
his family in poverty. In the late nineteenth century, the family
moved their base to Summerset in Sussex where the company has
remained ever since. In a remarkable turn of events, in 1973, the
company was brought out by the writer Louisa O’Connell who was the
great grand-daughter of Eugene Sheridan and her son Christian
Cusack has run it ever since. Louisa’s father Mick was a Fenian,
fighting against the British in the Easter Rising of 1916 before
relocating to England. The O’Connell family were proudly republican
and this changed the dynamics of Sheridans forever.

‘
I used to
meet regularly with Colm Kennedy,’ Healy explains. ‘He was on the
board of directors of Sheridans. We had an agreement whereby they
would supply the IRA with enough money to buy all the weapons and
explosives we needed if we ensured no trouble would kick off from
the Catholic patrons. To me, that family have blood on their hands.
I served my time and paid the price for my crimes. They’re getting
away Scott free and it isn’t fair.’

This
revelation will come as yet another shock to the mighty Sheridans
clan. Firstly, in May, Leicestershire mother Tracey Higgins
complained that her fifteen year old son was served regularly in a
pub owned by Sheridans. In the light of the recent rise in teenage
violence fuelled by alcohol, the issue was raised in the House of
Commons. Later that month, Christian Cusack suffered a stroke,
leaving him incapable of running the company, forcing him to hand
temporary control to his inexperienced daughter Alexandra. Lastly,
in June a hotel in Liverpool which has been bought by Sheridans was
subject to an arson attack. At the time of press, Alexandra Cusack
was unavailable for comment.

Alex put down the piece
of paper and buried her head in her hands wondering what the hell
she was going to do. She had no idea if this was true or not and
even if it was, did it really matter? The IRA ceasefire had been
going strong for years now and everyone had turned their attentions
to the Islamic world. But she knew she was being over-optimistic.
There were thousands of people in both the UK and Ireland whose
lives had been ruined by the IRA, who would bear no forgiveness for
them or anyone who funded them. This could be the end of Sheridans
if it wasn’t handled properly.

Composing herself, Alex
took the article and went back down to Nicola’s office. As before,
she was on the phone and Alex waited for her to finish.

‘
This is all
ludicrous,’ she said once she could speak. ‘I want you to issue a
statement denying everything. I’m going to speak to my father and
see what he can tell me.’

She left the office and
went down to her car, grateful no journalists had managed to sneak
into the car park. She went to call Christian, then a thought came
to her. It might have been a long shot, but it was worth a go. She
called Jack’s mobile, too fired up and scared to even feel any of
the awkwardness that had gone between them since the kiss. He
answered almost immediately.

‘
Hi Alex,’ he
chirped.

‘
I need to see
you,’ she said. ‘Where are you?’

‘
I’m at the
Mandarin. What’s wrong?’

‘
I think
you’re right Jack. I think someone’s out to get us and they’re
spreading the most terrible lies about my dad.’

‘
Come on over.
I’ll be waiting for you.’