Bitter Remedy (17 page)

Half an hour later, Nadia was sitting in the back seat of a Range Rover, Alina’s head in her lap while their sweaty saviour, if that’s what he was, drove at excessive speed down the road leading out of Bari. About every 100 metres stood prostitutes, usually in pairs. She expected him to stop at any moment and tell her to stand at the side of the road like all the others, but he kept driving. As he drove, she felt her eyes beginning to close from tiredness. The man would not stop talking, even though she understood nothing he was saying. After a while, he shut up and put on the radio, and she fell asleep.

‘The talkative man with the money in the sports bag was Niki?’ asked Blume.

‘The man who took us away with him, yes.’

‘What was that money for?’ asked Blume. ‘Cocaine? Niki deals, doesn’t he?’

Nadia shrugged. ‘He has a nightclub that is frequented by rich kids and politicians. They expect things. I told you I saw him give those men money. I never said he took anything from them. Except us.’

‘That’s illegal, too.’

‘If you ask were we trafficked, we will say no.’

‘Why?’

‘Because we were rescued, not trafficked, by Niki. I have no idea what the money was about. If you force me to testify, I might forget all about it.’

‘Why risk telling me all this?’

‘For Alina.’

‘He rescued you, but you still work for him in his nightclub?’

‘I can leave whenever I want.’

‘And Alina, she could leave too, whenever?’

‘Yes.’

‘So maybe that’s what she did,’ said Blume. ‘See, there is a bit missing from your story. Running at a group of armed criminals with a knife, even a blunt one, is an act of desperation. She held it to her own throat, too, and threatened to kill herself. It sounds to me like she was
very
keen not to go back to Turkey, am I right?’

Nadia called over the bar boy and ordered a glass of white wine for herself and looked inquisitively at Blume.

‘I’ll have another beer,’ he said. ‘What happened in Turkey?’

Nadia said nothing.

‘Is it the sort of thing that if you told me, I, as a public official, might be forced to report it?’

Nadia closed her eyes, and raised her face towards the sun.

‘What I am thinking,’ Blume spoke to her upturned profile, ‘is that whatever happened in Turkey might have finally caught up with her here. Maybe Alina had to run again. Maybe she is destined to spend her life running.’

‘It’s an intelligent theory,’ said Nadia. ‘But I don’t think that’s it.’

‘Well, I can’t tell unless I know what happened in Turkey.’

‘And I would prefer not to say.’

‘Which is why I can do nothing to help.’

‘If it had anything to do with Turkey, I would have heard about it.’

‘Were you involved in whatever it was?’ asked Blume.

‘No, but they – the people in Turkey – don’t know that.’

‘Has it ever occurred to you that Niki might have sold you out? Or just Alina?’

The bar boy came over with their drinks, except instead of a glass of wine, he carried a whole bottle and two glasses, as well as the beer ordered by Blume, on a tray. With a flourish, he placed a steel bowl of salted nuts on the table between them. ‘It’s all been taken care of. The beers, too. The man said to give you a full bottle.’

‘Who was this?’

‘The ones in the tracksuits,’ said the boy.

Blume looked up just in time to catch the man who had followed him, the older one, dressed in cheap grey slacks and a shiny fake leather jacket, openly taking pictures of them from the corner. It was as if he had been waiting for Blume to look up.

Blume made to get up and go over to him, knocking some of his beer over the table. Nadia tugged at his sleeve. ‘Sit down. You can’t arrest him for photographs, and if you’re interested in finding out who he is, that’s Hristjian, he works for Niki. Niki always makes sure he has photographs of everyone. It’s standard practice for him.’

As she spoke, the group got up and left, the older one directing a wink at Nadia and Blume as he passed their table.

‘They paid for my drinks to compromise me; now they’re taking a photo of me with you, presumably for the same reason.’

‘Yes, if you had a wife, maybe. The bar boy will remember they paid – but it is not much. I am not part of some plot to discredit you. I am here for Alina. Have you made an enemy of Niki?’

‘He sent those men and you. I mean, you’re his whore, right? How did you even know I was here?’

‘It is not a large town. Yes, Niki sent them to watch you, but not me. I found out from them you were here. Niki doesn’t know I am talking to you. I have been talking about him to a policeman, a drunk and stupid policeman maybe.’

‘I am not drunk. The way you tell the story, Niki sounds like a swell guy. But the way I hear it, he picked you two up on the cheap. Bargain basement whores. Or am I being too hard? You’re a
dancer
. That’s what you are. Alina, too. Does she dance?’

Nadia sipped her wine and watched him, then nodded as if she had come to a decision. ‘I know your type, Blume. People like you prefer getting praised to fucking. It’s something you learn quickly as a whore.’

She flicked her wrist, as if tossing the word back across the table at him. ‘The fucking itself? About a quarter of the time. The rest is spent telling men how great they are. Even when you men are fucking you need to be reassured, are always saying things like “you like this babe, you want this, you want my cock there, don’t you, baby?” Of course I don’t. Who would? But you have to tell them it is the best thing ever, because if you say no, they go crazy with rage. I said no once or twice at the beginning, then learned to stop. Even the ones who just roll, slobber, and grunt all over you without a word, will usually ask afterwards if you liked it. The answer, by the way, is always yes. Oh, you loved it. Maybe it’s true that men don’t like to talk so much, but they sure as hell want you to talk. They want you to ask about their nice suit, their muscles, the size of their cock, their patience, their wealth, their importance, their job, their looks. They have to hear this from you, so you have to talk to them. And that takes up three-quarters of the time, and it’s worse than the fucking, because it makes your head tired, no? And you are saying all these things you don’t believe, and in Istanbul I had to say them in different languages. It gets into your soul, and you think you are a liar in your soul, because you are.’

She grabbed the bottle and refilled her glass.

‘I have had all sorts of requests,’ she continued. ‘Some you would not believe. But all men want you to suck their cock. You know why that is?’

‘Well, it’s a nice feeling . . .’ Blume felt his voice go small. ‘What I mean is . . .’

‘I’ll tell you why. It’s because it’s the mouth. They want to control your mouth. That’s the most important thing for a man. Alina has a beautiful mouth. In the end, that is not good. Not for what we do. What we did.’

Blume felt a trickle of sweat run down his neck, and the itching was starting up again. He dropped a few pills into his mouth, and drank his beer, which now tasted like floor cleaner, waiting for a break in the conversation into which he might slip some sort of apology. But Nadia was in full flow and no opportunity presented itself.

When she seemed to have finished, he cleared his throat experimentally. ‘So you don’t do that now? Maybe you can tell me about the arrangement you have with Niki?’

‘It is simple. We dance in the club. We attract customers. Sometimes we may go with a man, but only if we like him. It is far better now than ever before. Or I thought it was.’

‘Do they pay you?’ He intended it as a genuine question, not as an accusation.

Nadia looked at him and burst out laughing. ‘What do you think?’

He was still feeling ashamed of how he had treated her a moment ago, and chose his words carefully. ‘I think they might pay you. What I meant to ask is if Niki taxes you.’

‘Niki gets nothing, also because a lot of the men prefer to pay with presents rather than cash. We pay Niki for the accommodation, but he lets us keep our money and he pays us weekly wages. I like Niki. Unless he killed Alina, which I think he could have. In that case, I hate him.’

‘You think he could have killed Alina?’ said Blume. ‘Yet you say you like him. What is there to like?’

‘You should have met the others.’ She paused and gave him an appraising look. ‘You think you’re different from those men I was talking about, don’t you?’

‘Yes.’

‘Hmm.’ She tilted her head and seemed to weigh up his body with her eyes, and he felt himself pushing out his chest a little and raising his chin. ‘You know who you remind me of?’

Blume had always fancied himself as having a certain resemblance to Harrison Ford, and wondered if she had spotted it. ‘No. Who?’

‘Niki.’

‘Niki who?’

‘Niki, Niki. Niki Solito. Who else are we talking about?’

‘That’s just stupid. I could fit three Nikis into each of my pockets. Not to mention the tan and the plastic surgery.’

Nadia laughed. He decided he didn’t like her laugh much. It was throaty, full-bodied, altogether too knowing, and masculine. He found it vulgar.

‘I don’t mean physically. I mean:’ she tapped her head, ‘in here.’

‘No, wrong again.’

‘I know men. Were you listening to what I just said? Good, well, some men need more praise than others, and some, who are quite rare, need praise all the time. It’s like a hunger. They can even forget about sex, or, how do you say, they make a sacrifice. All they want is praise. These men make you very tired but they can do some good things. And Niki is such a man.’

‘And what about this supposed similarity with me?’

‘That’s the similarity.’

‘I want
you
to praise
me
?’ Blume affected a tone of haughty amusement, just to remind her who was the whore here. He could feel the nasty tone of a moment ago creeping back into his voice.

‘About how kind and gentle and caring you are, yes. But you also want to hear how big and brave and strong and generous you are. Tough but gentle, no? Powerful or with some power, but kind and just. This is you?’

Blume reached out for the wine.

‘You are also lonely, yes? A lonely man. Most clients need to hear that, too.
They
are lonely. Not the girl with no family and no future lying on the bed in a foreign country being fucked by ugly tourists and beaten by psychopathic Russian pimps. No, the girl needs to hear how lonely these men are. They sit there and look for pity from her, and give her none back. Are you lonely?’

‘I am fine.’

‘Yes, you are. Poor . . . what is your name? Your Christian name?’

‘Alec – but . . .’

‘Poor, lonely, Alec.’

‘That will do. Shut up now.’

To his surprise, she did.

He drank the wine, refilled his glass.

‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘I am upsetting you, even though I am the one who came looking for your help.’

Blume viciously scratched his chest with his fingernails. ‘I am not upset. I need to piss. Will you wait?’

‘Of course.’

When he came back, she was finishing another glass of wine. They had made short work of the bottle. Her lips glowed attractively.

‘I owe you more respect than I gave you earlier,’ said Blume.

‘Thank you,’ she said.

‘You’re welcome.’

They allowed a few minutes to pass in silence.

‘I told you about men and praise?’

‘Yes,’ said Blume. ‘No need to go through all that again. I am sorry – I have been drinking on an empty stomach.’

‘No problem. What I said is true, but some men deserve the praise. They still want to hear it, like all men, but a few deserve it. Praise for them is OK. Please, Alec? I express myself badly in many languages.’

‘You do just fine.’ A warm, forgiving glow had settled over him.

‘Niki likes praise. He wants to be thought of as a good and generous man. That is why he rescued us. He bought our freedom. We praise Niki and he deserves it, too, for that.’

‘Niki? You’re talking about Niki again? As someone who merits admiration?’

‘I think Alina really began to love him. And then he began to love her. So when Alina disappeared, he was very unhappy. Sometimes I think he wants her back, and sometimes I think he killed her. But Alina did not just walk away, not without me.’

‘Niki was fucking Alina?’

‘He was also buying her presents.’ Nadia opened her purse and took out a gold chain, a string of pearls, and a golden bangle. ‘Look.’

‘Those are hers?’

‘From Niki. She showed them to me.’

Blume looked at the items with interest. ‘Alina would have taken her jewellery with her if she was running away.’

‘Niki did not ask me if I had them. You know what I think? I think he cared so much for Alina that he is not even interested.’ She dropped them back in her bag and shut it with a snap. ‘If he asks, I will give them to him, of course.’