Betrayed (23 page)

‘Yeah, but one of the victim’s pals could have visited him
in hospital and maybe he’s told them about getting electric shocks to his tackle.’ He paused. ‘In fact, the more I’m talking about this, the more I’m thinking I’ll make it a splash, Gilmour. Torture, kidnap, organised gangland beating. Yes. Let’s rattle it out as a splash. Fuck it.’

‘But, Mick. My cop contact …’ Rosie protested.

‘Fuck it. You’ll be able to get round him. Just tell him we got it from a hospital insider or a friend or sources close to the place where he worked. Come on, I know you can use your imagination. I’ve seen your bloody expenses.’ He chuckled.

‘Yeah, okay, Mick. Jesus! You’re going to get me in all sorts of shit.’ Rosie knew he wouldn’t back down. ‘Oh. And definitely don’t put my byline on the story.’

‘Fine. Now piss off and write me a splash. I might hold it for the second edition, but get it done so I can make up my mind. You have twenty minutes. No more. Any pictures of this guy, by the way?’

‘Christ, Mick. Hardly. I’ve only just heard about it.’

‘You’re slipping, Gilmour,’ he joked. ‘I need to go. Let’s get moving.’ He hung up.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Twenty minutes later Rosie hit a key on her laptop and sent her gritty story of the kidnap and torture of an innocent man on his way home from work. It would walk onto the splash in the
Post
, and she knew she was sailing close to the wind, giving the story plenty of topspin. She’d have to deal with the fallout from Don in the morning.

She looked at her watch and automatically scrolled down her mobile to find TJ’s number. It would be late afternoon, so usually he’d be in his apartment chilling out for a few hours until it was time to go to work. When she’d been out there with him, sometimes, by the time he was finished playing at the jazz bar until nearly four in the morning, they would catch some breakfast on the way to the apartment, before crashing out for the afternoon. The turning of night into day didn’t appeal to Rosie as a lifestyle, but it seemed to suit TJ who was more of a nighthawk. What she did love was watching Manhattan wake up to a new day; the
early morning bustle on the streets and the little dramas unfolding on every corner. She could have sat in a cafe for hours, watching the New Yorkers dive into their day with a kind of ratty edginess about them that reminded Rosie of Glaswegians, only more extreme. She punched in TJ’s number and let it ring a few times. No answer. Perhaps he was having a nap. She was about to hang up when a voice answered. But it wasn’t TJ, and Rosie felt a thump in her stomach. It was Kat.

‘Hello?’ Kat sounded sleepy, and her transatlantic drawl was even more pronounced than before.

Rosie froze somewhere between opening her mouth to speak and almost hanging up.

‘Hello? Who’s this?’ Kat said.

Silence. Just say who you are, for Christ’s sake, she told herself. But the words wouldn’t come. All she could see was the image of Kat dreamily answering the phone having been woken out of a deep sleep. Had she reached across TJ in the bed to answer it? Rosie’s paranoia went into overdrive. She saw him lying next to Kat breathing softly in a deep, contented sleep, the way he used to after they’d made love. Her chest felt tight. She took a breath and almost spoke, but the line went dead. Kat had hung up. She pictured her putting the phone back down on the bedside table and snuggling into TJ. Rosie sat down on the bed. Surely to Christ she was wrong. Especially after everything they’d said to each other while she was there and the promises they made. Her gut
burned with anger and disappointment, but worst of all some kind of sixth sense that she was losing him. Relationships across thousands of miles never worked, she’d told TJ, but he had insisted they could make it work. And she’d believed him because the way she felt about him left her with nowhere else to go. She stepped outside, gazing across the city shimmering in the myriad of lights and the silhouette of the Giralda on the skyline. A wave of loneliness shuddered through her. She took a deep breath. Get it into perspective, she told herself. There was probably a rational explanation. She should have told Kat it was her and asked for TJ – yet something had made her terrified of the answer. If Kat had said TJ was asleep, it would have been even worse. Stop getting all hung up, she whispered to herself. Perhaps they’d been working late and Kat had crashed out for a few hours. She didn’t like the image of that either, but there could be all sorts of reasons for Kat to be there. She’d give TJ a ring tomorrow and have a chat with him. If he didn’t mention Kat being at the apartment, then perhaps she’d have grounds for all this anxiety. She went back inside, picked up her bag and left the bedroom, then headed out of the hotel and back to the troops. She needed a drink.

Matt got up from the table and strode towards Rosie as she crossed the square where she’d left them earlier.

‘Hey, Rosie.’ His grin was from ear to ear. ‘You’ll never guess what’s happened.’

‘Something good, by the look on your face.’ Rosie stopped in her tracks. ‘You’ve got me all excited now.’ Matt’s enthusiasm pushed her anxiety over TJ away.

‘You know the bar across the square from us where all the bears are singing and partying?’

‘Yeah.’ Rosie glanced across and could hear the chants. ‘I see they’re still at it.’

‘I know. It’s just livening up. But about half an hour ago, we’re all sitting having a drink, and who do I see strolling over to the bar but big McGregor and his two sidekicks – Mitch and that Jimmy geezer.’

‘Yeah? And?’

‘Next thing is that bent cop joined him. What’s his name? Thomson? The guy I snatched.’

‘You’re kidding! Did you get a snap of them together?’

‘You bet I did. And more than that.’

‘What?’

‘They all went inside at one point and there’s this big sing-song going on. All the ’Gers fans belting out “The Sash” and “No Surrender”. So Javier slipped in and stood at the bar. Next thing is the cop joins the sing-song with McGregor and the rest of the mob. Javier stuck the video in his camera, and bingo! They’re all on it. You need to see it. It’s a belter. Fists pumping and chanting at all the right bits! Even if we never got another line of the drug story, we’ve got footage of a police inspector singing sectarian songs with Rangers
fans. Even if we can’t prove he’s UVF, him just being there is a story in itself.’

‘Not half,’ Rosie said, delighted.

‘Brilliant. Couldn’t risk doing the video myself in case anyone got suspicious, but your man there just looked like one of the locals capturing the party atmosphere.’

They walked towards the table and sat down.

‘Top stuff, Javier,’ Rosie said. ‘I would throw my arms around you, but I don’t want to attract any attention.’ She smiled. ‘Consider yourself hugged.’

Javier grinned.

‘Of course you must understand the video is extra – not part of my daily rate.’

‘Yeah, yeah. I’m sure your expenses will reflect the amount of drink you had to buy to get the film.’ Rosie signalled for the waiter. ‘Let’s have a celebratory drink.’

It was nearly two hours and two bars later by the time Rosie was making her way back to the hotel, accompanied by Adrian. They’d left the others still drinking in a dingy little flamenco bar that Garcia had told them was the oldest bar in Seville. Considering she’d been drinking for several hours, Rosie felt more sober than she was entitled. Must be the Mediterranean way. They spend hours over dinner, eating slowly and drinking copious amounts of wine, but you never see Spanish, Italian or French people falling about drunk. The secret is clearly about pacing yourself – unlike
the stereotypical Brit abroad. She would find out when she woke up in the morning if she’d managed to master the continental drinking habits, or if she was just another hung-over Brit craving a full cooked English breakfast. Away from the buzz around the cathedral square, there was a calmness about the city and it was pleasant to stroll now that the night had lost its energy-sapping heat.

‘Would you like to have a coffee with me, Rosie?’ Adrian said as he stopped at the American cafe next to their hotel.

Rosie stood looking at the deserted tables inside, the walls adorned with black and white prints of Hollywood in the fifties. The decor somehow looked out of place in the midst of the ancient architectural splendour of Seville. Suddenly she was captivated by a song drifting out from the speakers and into the stillness of the night. The mellow tones of Nat King Cole and an old classic, ‘Embraceable You’, filled the air and transported her back to another life. It was years since she’d heard that song. She felt a catch in her throat, and blinked away the image of her mother and father dancing in their living room one Christmas Eve a lifetime ago.

‘We sit?’ Adrian pulled out a chair at the small iron table on the pavement.

Rosie studied his pale face. Long before she had known about Adrian’s tragic past, she’d sensed that behind the hooded eyes and flat expression there was pain and loneliness. Being the shadowy figure he was, Adrian didn’t invite
questions, so she had never asked, but two months ago he’d allowed her to share his darkness. She looked at him for a long moment, remembering the morning he stood at the Bosnian cemetery on the hillside, his shoulders slumped as she and Matt waited nearby. Then he’d beckoned them close to a graveside and confided in them that the headstone marked the place where his eight months pregnant fiancée lay buried with their son, torn from her womb by rampaging Serbian butchers. She had seen for the first time who he really was, and though he seemed to have dulled himself to the pain of loneliness, perhaps there were times, Rosie thought, when he just needed someone around a little longer.

‘Of course,’ Rosie said. ‘I’ll have a coffee.’

She didn’t feel like going to bed anyway. She knew as soon as her head hit the pillow she would lie in the darkness picking away at the phone call, conjuring up all sorts of pictures of TJ and Kat, or TJ and some other random woman in a dimly lit New York bar. She knew her troubled dreams would be a confusing mix of terror somewhere between Manhattan, Kosovo and the childhood trauma that never seemed to be far away when she slept. She thought of TJ as she sat down, and there was a sudden rush of clarity. It couldn’t go on, she told herself. Perhaps the phone call was a trigger for what she felt right now, but the fact was that in the last ten days she and TJ had only spoken once. Mostly, she realised, because she was busy and hadn’t had a chance to
phone him. But she hadn’t heard much from him either in emails or texts. Perhaps they
were
drifting apart. Having TJ in her life as a friend before they’d become so involved had been much easier to manage. The falling in love part hadn’t been on her agenda, but when it happened, it unleashed in her explosive, passionate emotions she’d never felt about anyone before. But it also made her vulnerable, afraid she would lose him; it weakened her. Too often, she’d told herself she should have walked away after the first night they’d spent together, putting it down to a drunken error of judgement. But by the time she’d left his house that morning she knew it was already too late. And now, an even greater problem niggled away at her, no matter how much she pushed it away. Since Bosnia, she’d found herself thinking about Adrian. Amid the ruins of his life there, she’d seen him in a different light. Christ almighty! Why did she always have to complicate her life like this? The waiter brought them coffee – a decaff for her and espresso for Adrian. He looked like sleep was something he had given up years ago. He offered her a cigarette and lit them both.

‘Are you okay, Rosie?’ he said, his rich Slavic tones almost a whisper.

‘Yes,’ she replied quickly, surprised at the question, avoiding his eyes.

‘You are sure?’ Pale grey eyes scrutinised her face.

Rosie felt a little unnerved and said nothing, drawing on her cigarette.

‘I was thinking that you look maybe a little sad. Your eyes. You seem sad for a while now.’ Adrian still didn’t take his eyes off her.

‘Sad?’ she said, trying to brighten. ‘How do you mean … for a while?’

‘No. Sorry,’ he said. ‘Maybe I shouldn’t say. I mean tonight. You went away to the hotel, and then came back, and you look different.’

Jesus, Rosie thought. How can he see that? How can he see the angst behind my eyes? I hardly know him. When she’d come back from sending her story to the paper, they’d been laughing and joking about Javier’s video and then moved to the other bar, where they drank more and listened to Javier and Garcia tell stories of their old days together. She thought she’d been in good form, given that her insides were in turmoil.

She let out a tired sigh, feeling she had to say something. ‘Oh, you know how things are, Adrian. I’m always a bit jaded. Lot of travelling and working. Sometimes it catches up with me and I start to puff a little bit.’ She gave him the most reassuring smile she could muster. ‘But I’m fine. Thanks for asking.’

She reached across and patted the back of his hand in a friendly way, and to her surprise he slipped his hand in hers. He held it for a moment and looked at her.

‘Okay, Rosie, if you are all right. You are my friend. Probably the best friend I have in the world – next of course to
my comrade Risto.’ His eyes smiled at the mention of his friend that he had fought alongside in the Bosnian war. He opened his mouth to speak and hesitated for a second, seeming to struggle to find the words. ‘You … you mean a lot to me, Rosie. I am upset if you are unhappy. I care for you very much.’

Rosie allowed him to hold her hand, feeling the softness and warmth in hers, and the instinct to squeeze it or reach across and touch him was almost overpowering. But she knew she couldn’t. This was Adrian, her friend, her minder, the man who had saved her life not once but twice. She looked away and then at him, his eyes still engrossed in her face.

‘Thank you.’ She lightly took her hand out of his and pushed her hair back a little self-consciously.

They drank their coffee in an edgy silence. Rosie wondered if she should say something, gently stress that they were good friends and could never be anything else. But what if she’d read it wrong? Perhaps Adrian was just trying to be caring. She caught herself looking at the soft underside of his muscular, suntanned forearms and again had the urge to touch him.