Dangerous Promises (4 page)

She was trying to work out which part of him she hated most: the curved dome of his paunch straining against the cotton of his white shirt, his heavy, jowly face with its piggy eyes or his abnormally small feet sheathed in a pair of brown leather brogues. Then, of course, there was his hair, thin and sandy coloured, brushed back from a wide forehead. Or his fleshy fingers with their neat manicured nails. And that was just the physical stuff. When it came to personality, she hardly knew where to begin.

It was quite remarkable, she thought, that one man could be in possession of so many ugly traits. He was arrogant, controlling, overbearing, greedy and callous. He was conceited and quick-tempered. He was a snob. Already he was eagerly looking forward to the New Year’s Honours list when he would, or so he’d been assured by people in the know, be receiving a knighthood for services to industry. She gave an inner hiss. Services? Since when did manufacturing arms count as a bloody service? It was a disgrace, a crime against humanity. And when he became
Sir
Paul Farrell he’d be even more pompous than he already was.

It was hot and stuffy in the room, the radiators blasting out a fierce heat. The curtains were pulled across but, even above the noise of the television, she could hear the sound of the rain battering against the windows. Her mother was staring at the screen with a glazed expression on her face. Beside her, on the small mahogany table, was a glass of vodka and tonic. Not the first of the day, and probably not even the third or fourth.

Once, a long time ago, Christine Naylor had been considered a catch. In her twenties she’d been a socialite, a tall willowy blonde, a model who had appeared on the front cover of
Vogue
. Now, although still slim and attractive, there was something brittle about her, something fragile and damaged.
He
had done that.
He
had made her weak and shallow and stupid.

Mona returned to studying her father, aware from his scowl that he still had the hump with her. They’d been late, almost twenty minutes late, for the appointment and he hated wasting money. It was Dr Lund’s policy to charge for the whole hour no matter what time his patients arrived – a nice arrangement for him, but not so agreeable to those who had to struggle with the vagaries of London’s public transport system.

‘It wasn’t my fault,’ she said, for the tenth time that night.

‘You should have got an earlier train.’

‘Why? I’m not psychic. How was I to know there were going to be signal problems?’

‘Nothing’s ever your fault, Mona. One day, perhaps, you’ll start taking responsibility for your actions.’

Oh, here it comes, she thought, another damn lecture. He just couldn’t help himself. She wrinkled her nose and closed her ears, letting the words wash over her.
Responsibility… disappointment… duty…
It was always the same. He was like a stuck record repeating the same pathetic complaints over and over.

Of course if it hadn’t been for that unfortunate ‘incident’ a year ago, she’d never have been forced to see Lund in the first place. He was an unpleasant skinny man with a protruding Adam’s apple and a reddish beard. A psychoanalyst. At least that’s what he called himself. Money for old rope was what she called it. All he did was sit there in that black leather chair, asking stupid questions about her childhood and making odd little bobbing gestures with his head.

Perhaps Lund thought the beard made him look like Freud. She wasn’t up to speed with Freud’s theories, but had an idea that he’d believed the root of most women’s problems lay in some kind of sexual neurosis. But then he would have believed that, wouldn’t he? He was a man and all they thought about was sex. Well, sex and money. Lund was probably of the opinion that deep down she wanted to sleep with her father whereas all she really wanted to do was to kill him.

Lund had only asked her once about the fire. Had it been an accident or…? And she had told him the truth, or at least as much of the truth as she’d felt like telling him, that the house was a Gothic monstrosity, a blot on the landscape, and that she’d been doing Hampstead a favour by attempting to raze it to the ground. She was not sure if he’d taken her seriously. What she hadn’t mentioned – she didn’t trust doctors or their confidentiality clauses – was that she’d been hoping to dispatch her father at the same time.

‘Are you listening to me?’

Mona gazed at her father and raised her eyebrows. ‘I don’t need to listen. I know it all off by heart.’

‘And I’ll go on repeating it until you finally start to take some notice.’

‘You could have a long wait.’

Her father gave a grunt and leaned forward to retrieve the
Financial Times
from the coffee table. She saw his eyes flash with anger as his gaze fell on the copy of
Socialist Worker
she had deliberately left lying underneath. On the front cover was a tirade about Neil Kinnock’s suspension of the Liverpool District Labour Party after a Trotskyite militant group had tried to take control.

‘What’s that rag doing here?’ he snarled. ‘What have I told you about bringing that rubbish into this house?’

‘It’s not a rag,’ she replied calmly. ‘Just because you don’t agree with its views, doesn’t make it worthless. Anyway, if I was you I’d be keeping a close eye on the enemy. It’s always good, don’t you think, to know what they’re up to?’

‘What they’re up to, my dear, is anarchy. And come the revolution, they’ll be chopping off your head as well as mine.’

‘Maybe,’ she said. ‘Maybe not.’

He gave a thin, mirthless laugh. ‘Imagine they’ll spare you, do you? Well, I wouldn’t be too sure. In case it’s slipped your mind, you’re living in this house too, using its electricity and gas and water, eating the food I put on the table and happily spending my money. And that, my darling daughter, is what is known as collaboration.’

Mona gave a shrug. ‘We’ll see.’ In truth, she wasn’t exactly gripped by the far left either. Although she’d briefly dabbled, she’d found the people tedious and, in their own way, as egotistical as her father. She only feigned an interest in order to wind him up.

As he flicked to the back of the
Financial Times
and began studying the share prices, Mona’s thoughts drifted away from her father and on to Sadie Wise. They were going to be good friends, the best, she was certain of it. It wasn’t often that you met someone and felt an instant connection. They had understood each other right from the off, creating a bond that could never be broken.

It had been an impulse to jump off the train and follow her out of the station and on to the street. But it had been the right thing to do. Now she knew where Sadie was staying, she could arrange to accidentally bump into her again. They could go for a coffee or a drink in the pub. Maybe she could even help her look for Eddie. Yes, it would be fun, the two of them searching together.

But then Mona frowned. Of course she couldn’t do that. What if someone saw them? It would blow the whole arrangement out of the water. She had to be cautious, careful, to tread softly. Still, there was nothing to stop her from going to Kellston and checking that Sadie was okay. She would just have to keep her distance, that’s all.

Mona’s gaze slipped back towards her father. A tiny smile played around her lips. She felt the usual shudder of revulsion but this evening, at least, her disgust was moderated by the knowledge he would soon be dead.

5

Sadie woke up on Saturday morning, surprised that she had slept so well. The traffic had eased off after midnight and she’d fallen asleep shortly after. She stretched out her arms and yawned. Suddenly the pleasure she felt at being well rested was replaced by a dull feeling of dread as she recalled the arrangement she’d made with Nathan Stone. What had she been thinking? But there was nothing she could do about it now. She couldn’t cancel. She didn’t even have a phone number for him.

Shivering in the cold morning air, she got out of bed and turned on the fire. Then she grabbed a towel and her wash bag before padding along the landing to the shared bathroom. Thankfully it was empty. Her plans for taking a shower, however, were instantly thwarted by the discovery of yet another meter. If she wanted hot water, she was going to have to pay for it.

Sadie muttered a soft curse and trotted back to her room, hoping no one would nip in and take her place while she was gone. Apart from Velma’s and her own, there were two other rooms on this floor but she had no idea if they were occupied or not. From the bowels of the house, she could hear a thin clink of cutlery and the clatter of plates. Breakfast was being served.

The bathroom was still vacant when Sadie got back. She fed the meter and turned on the shower, disappointed but not entirely surprised to find that the flow was hardly torrential. After locking the door, she stripped off and stepped into the water. At least it was hot and she was able to have a proper wash. She’d meant to shower last night – there was something about trains that always made her feel dirty – but hadn’t got around to it. She’d felt so tired that she’d just had a wash and gone to bed.

Once she was scrubbed clean, she dried herself off, brushed her teeth, pulled on her pyjamas and scurried back to her room. Quickly she got dressed, wondering what she was going to wear that night. What did people wear to the dogs? All she’d brought with her were jumpers and jeans and they weren’t going to be suitable. What was it Stone had said?
Presentable.
Which meant she was going to have to go out and buy something new, an added expense she really didn’t need.

Her stomach gave a rumble, reminding her that she hadn’t eaten last night. She’d intended, despite the no-food rule, to grab a sandwich from the high street and take it back to Oaklands, but in the end she hadn’t bothered. After the meeting with Stone, her appetite had gone.

Downstairs, she made her way to the dining room. It was a dim, rather gloomy room with a lot of dark brown furniture. The wallpaper was brown too. The only other person there was a plump bespectacled middle-aged man. He lifted his eyes from his copy of
The Times
and gave her a nod. ‘Morning.’

‘Hi,’ she said.

‘Not much of a day,’ he said, glancing towards the windows.

‘No. It looks cold out there.’

There were six square tables in the room but only two of them were set for breakfast. Sadie hesitated, but then chose the empty one. She didn’t want to be rude but she wasn’t in the mood for making small talk either. There was a packet of cornflakes on the table, a jug of milk, a few slices of toast, butter and marmalade. No sooner had she sat down than Mrs Cuthbert appeared.

‘Tea is it?’ she asked.

‘Thank you,’ Sadie said.

Mrs Cuthbert retreated to the kitchen. And then the only noise was the gentle rustle of the man’s newspaper. Sadie poured some cornflakes into a bowl and added milk. As she scooped the cereal into her mouth, she gazed around the room again. There were two long windows, their panes spattered with rain, and a lamp in the corner with a beige tasselled shade. The worn carpet had a swirling pattern of browns and fawns. With little else to occupy her mind she found herself thinking about Eddie. She wondered where he was and what he was doing now. Sleeping off a hangover, probably, if past history was anything to go by. When they’d been together he’d rarely got up before eleven.

A few minutes later, Mrs Cuthbert came back with a stainless-steel pot of tea. She placed it on the table without a word and instantly disappeared again. Sadie finished her cereal, buttered a piece of toast and poured the tea. She was hoping that Velma might come down so she could pick her brains about Nathan Stone. But then again, maybe there were things it was better not to know. She wasn’t looking forward to the evening. It loomed ahead like some terrible ordeal.

Sadie was also feeling bad about not saying anything to Joel as regards the meeting. It wasn’t a big deal, she told herself, and when she’d talked to him on the phone she hadn’t even known about going to the dogs. But would she tell him about the night out? She was aware that she ought to, that in a good relationship there were no secrets, but she also suspected that he wouldn’t be happy about it. She had the feeling that when it was said out loud it would sound much worse than it actually was. Here she was, in Kellston for barely five minutes, and already she was going out with another man. It might be ‘strictly business’ but, no matter how she explained, it would still sound dubious.

‘Eddie,’ she muttered. ‘This is all your damn fault.’

‘I’m sorry?’ the man behind her said.

Sadie turned, smiled and shook her head. ‘Nothing, I was just… It’s nothing.’ She gazed out of the window as she finished her tea. When it became obvious that Velma wasn’t coming, she left the dining room, went back upstairs, collected her jacket and prepared to face the dismal weather.

Outside, the icy wind and rain blasted her face as she walked to the corner. She put up her umbrella and pushed her chin down into her scarf. There had been a market, she remembered, when she’d been here with Eddie. Perhaps she could pick up something smart and cheap – if those two things ever went together – for tonight. Would they be under cover at the track or standing around outside? She had no idea but didn’t much relish the thought of watching a load of dogs run round in circles while she slowly froze to death.

The high street was shabby and dilapidated with a lot of the shops boarded up. At the far end, three tall concrete towers loomed over the area. Even from a distance they seemed cold and inhospitable, like high-rise cells for the poorer residents of the area. She presumed they had been built in the Sixties but they were already showing signs of wear, the exteriors stained a dirty shade of grey from the traffic fumes.

It didn’t take her long to find the market and once she’d got into the centre of it her spirits began to rise. There was music and life here, hustle and bustle. The mingling smells of frying onions, soup and curry wafted in the air. Many of the stalls were selling festive decorations, tinsel and baubles, glittery angels, snowmen, stars and dancing Santas. There were strings of fairy lights, crackers and candles. She couldn’t help but smile as her gaze took it all in.