Stiffed (21 page)

10

The man who has experienced shipwreck shudders even at a calm sea
- Ovid

The kids are at the ice cream counter being looked after by one of Annabelle’s employees, a spotty teenager with a mouthful of braces.  We’re sitting at the back of the shop in a low booth furnished in soft, purple cushions, nursing mochas and a plateful of Annabelle’s deluxe selection.

I’m playing with the cap.  I’ve twisted it every which way, felt round the rim, turned it inside out,
but there is nothing to suggest that it is worth a million bucks; no writing, no bulges.  I’m completely baffled. 

‘Give me that,’ Annabelle demands.
  She seems to have recovered remarkably well, with little sign of the injuries she was carrying earlier. 

She exams the cap
in detail then drops it onto the table, shrugging her shoulders.

‘We must have the wrong cap,’ I say.

‘Is it Kate’s?’ Sally asks.

‘Yeah, it has a water stain on the peak that looks like a rooster,’ I say pointing.

‘That looks like a rooster to you?  How the hell does that look like a rooster?’

‘Look, there’s its beak and there’s its crown.  This is its neck.’

‘J
esus, Tiger, I hate to think what your therapist makes of your ink spot sessions.’

‘I don’t have a therapist.’

‘Well, maybe you should think of getting one, then next time you wake up in bed with a corpse you’ll ring the police not your best friend.’

‘I didn’t ring you, she did,’ I say, pointing at Annabelle.

‘And I can’t apologize enough,’ Annabelle says.  ‘It was a stupid thing to do.’

‘The stupid thing was him
,’ Sally points at me, ‘leaving you on your own to guard that monster.’

‘She insisted on being left alone,’ I protest.

‘That doesn’t mean you have to do what she says.’

‘This is An
nabelle we’re talking about.  Did you think she was going to take no for an answer?  I’d have ended up in a worse state than Redneck.  Covered in Chinese burns.’

Sally looks away.  She knows I’m right.  Annabelle is her own woman. 
God help the man that tries to insist on being chivalrous. 

I pick up the cap again and twirl it in my hands.  It’s just an ordinary Crusaders cap.  Red with a
large, heavily embroidered white C on the front, the bottom of the C extending into a hand holding a sword.  How in God’s name is it worth a million bucks?

‘Maybe one of your kids removed whatever was in here,’ I suggest to Sally.

‘Don’t bring my kids into this, Tiger.’

‘It was just an idea.  They did steal it.’

‘They borrowed it.  You put their lives at risk, you inconsiderate moron.  Joel’s going to have a fit when he finds out about today.’

‘Joel should be happy that you care so much about the little brats.’

‘Those little brats should not have been mixed up in this madness.  If we somehow manage to get out of this mess, Joel’s going to kick your scrawny ass to court and back.’

‘Him and whose army?’

Great, I’ve turned into the gawky kid at the baseball diamond.

‘This army.’
  She waves her right fist at me.  ‘And this army.’  She waves her left arm.

I roll my eyes. 

‘What happened with Pirelli?’ I ask Annabelle, trying to change the direction of the conversation.  It’s impossible to have a reasonable, rational discussion with Sally.  The woman is half-deranged.

‘I signed the
forms, he drove me back to Carrick and dropped me at the factory.’

‘So he now owns fifty percent of Annabelle’s Delights?’
Sally asks.

‘He
thinks
he owns fifty percent.  I signed with my left hand and mis-spelt my name.  I’ll claim it’s a forgery. Besides, I can’t sell or sign over any of the company without the agreement of the shareholders.  Don’t worry about Pirelli, I can handle him.’

‘We’re talking about Aldo Pirelli,’ I persist.  ‘Nobody handles
him.  He’ll hound you until he gets what he wants.’

Annabelle stares into space for a moment then pulls a weak smile.  ‘
We’ll see.  I have friends.’

‘Shareholders?’
Sally says, a puzzled frown on her face.  ‘I thought you own the company outright.’

‘We wanted it
to seem that way.  It adds to the image.  You know, single female entrepreneur builds the company up from scratch.’

‘We?’
I prompt.

‘
I guess you’d find out eventually.  Myself and Jason.’

‘
Jason
is a shareholder? 
Our
Jason?’

‘Jason
’s a silent partner.  He gave me one hundred and fifty thousand for a thirty five percent stake to help get the company up and running.  I still had debts from university and I was having problems raising capital.  I used his money to leverage a business loan from the bank.’

‘He gave you one hundred and fifty thousand,’ I say incredulously.  ‘Where the hell did he get that kind of money?
  Did he rob a bank?’

And if he did, why the
hell wasn’t I cut into the raid?  And why the secrecy?  I’m meant to be his best friend for heaven’s sake!  He’s meant to tell me everything. 

‘He works as a
programmer, he lives at home and has hardly any outgoings.  The money just accumulated.  He was happy to invest it.  He has a passion for chocolate.  If it worked out, he was going to get a supply for life.’

‘Jesus, he must be worth a fortune,’ I mutter.
  He has a stake in a company with thirty five shops and rising.  He’s making money hand over fist and he’s still living with his parents. How can that be right?

‘He’s also employee number two,’ Annabelle
continues.  ‘I’m number one, of course.’

‘Jason works for you?’
 

This is
just getting better and better.  His life is one big lie.  Talk about being cut out of the loop.  When this is all over we’re going to have a serious head-to-head about our friendship and reciprocity.  I have a dead body, he’s the first person I call.  He has a lifetime’s supply of chocolate and he keeps that particular nugget to himself.

‘He does all the software work.  We’re the company in California, as he likes to tell you.  He maintains the website and manages the CRM and ERP systems.’

‘The what?’

‘Customer relations management and enterprise resource planning.  They help us build relations with our customers and suppliers and to manage the company as efficiently and effectively as we can.  You know, coordinate our purchasing, inventory, accounting, personnel, distribut …’

‘Unbelievable,’ I cut her off.  She’s slipping into work boss mode.  As much as I’d like to know
about how the company is organized and works, it’s Jason I’m interested in.  ‘And he just omitted to tell me all this?  It just kind of slipped his mind?’

‘He was respecting my wish to keep it secret.  That’s what friends do; they hold confidences.  He would have told you, but I asked him not to.’

‘Why?’

‘For business reasons.
  And now I’ve told you I’ve broken my own confidence, not him.’

This is just great.  I am officially having the world’s
shittiest day.  I can’t even trust my best friend to rat out other people’s secrets.  That’s his job.  How else am I going to get juicy snippets of gossip?

‘So Jason is the only other shareholder then?’
I ask.

‘Yes.  The money from the bank was just a loan.’

‘So if Jason was to … you know … then you’d be the only shareholder.  Like on Aldo Pirelli’s contract forms.’

Annabelle looks at me, then at Sally.
  ‘Where
is
Jason?’ she asks.

‘She didn’t tell you?’ I motion to Sally.
  ‘I thought she was your best friend.’

‘Tell me what?’

‘You were the one that phoned her,’ Sally says.  ‘You could have told her then.’

‘TOLD ME WHAT!’
Annabelle says loudly.

Most
of the shop’s occupants swivel their gaze to check out the commotion. We must look like tornado survivors with all of our cuts and bruises.

I wait fo
r them to avert their stares then whisper:  ‘Barry White is holding Jason and Paavo hostage.  For the million dollars.’ 

I lift up the cap again
and start playing with it.

‘Barry White is …’ she trails off.  ‘Then what
the hell are we doing sitting here chatting?  We need to rescue them.’  She starts to shuffle out of the booth.  ‘How am I going to cope without Jason?’

‘Anna, wait.
’ I grab her arm.  ‘It’s not so simple.  There are three of them.  Barry White, his sister and his younger brother.  They’re armed and they’re psychotic.’

‘How do you know?’

‘When I was looking for Storm and Cyclone they chased after me – Denise and his younger brother.  They were driving a red Beetle.  The modern version.’

‘You could have led those monsters straight to my kids,’ Sally says.

‘Yeah, but I didn’t, did I?’

‘Will you two stop bickering,’ Anna says.  ‘
We need to rescue Jason. And Paavo.’

* * *

We’ve moved to a store room behind the shop, leaving the little brats out front.  Annabelle has rung the factory to find out where the van taken by Paavo and Jason to move Marino and Junior is presently located.  The distribution manager can track them all using GPS apparently.

‘The police have called to the factory looking for me,’ Annabelle says, replacing the receiver in its cradle.  ‘You’re headline news: CNN, Fox, you name it.  The shootout in the mall was captured on their CCTV cameras.’

‘Great.
’  I wonder if a Crusaders scout has been watching?  3-0 isn’t bad when it was two playing against four, and the four were armed.  I would have thought it might at least merit a spot in the lower order.  ‘What did he tell them?’

‘The truth – he hasn’t got a clue where I am and
he hasn’t seen me all day.’

‘But he could locate the van you’re driving.’

‘But he didn’t.  The police have confirmed that everyone got away and that nobody was shot with the exception of one of those who started the shooting.’ 

‘Cowboy,’ I mutter.
  It’s a miracle no-one else took a bullet and that Cowboy got away.  Juan’s shot must have only winged him.

‘
Everyone else is just suffering shock and a few cuts and bruises.’

‘Thank God for that.’ 

I can’t believe that Redneck managed to walk out of there.  I hit his knee into the bleachers.
He must have one hell of a limp.  Maybe the scout might not be so impressed; it looked and sounded like a solid hit, but it only trickled out to second base.

‘
Pure luck,’ Sally says.

‘Well, it’s about time we had some
for a change,’ I counter.

‘He said you wer
e like John McClane in Die Hard,’ Annabelle says.  ‘Wading in with nothing but a baseball bat to save the girl and taking on four armed hoodlums.’

Well, at least that sounds like the media are treating me as a give-i
t-a-go hero rather than a bad guy, even if I’m not going to make the Crusaders team.  I suspect the police have a different view, especially Joe Gerlach.  The garbage through the window stunt will probably haunt the rest of his career; the amusing anecdote they tell all new recruits. 

‘And cause chaos and massive panic,’ Sally adds.  ‘It’s a wonder that nobody died.’

‘But they didn’t, did they!’  I feel like a broken record.  Some people just refuse to be grateful.  I rescued her from those lunatics; if it wasn’t for me heaven knows what she’d now be experiencing.

‘He said you sped out of there like
Dale Earnhardt,’ Annabelle says to Sally.

‘Well, I … just floored it!
’

‘And it’s a wonder no-one was killed when you flew through the fence and skidded onto the road,’ I add.  ‘It could have been a massive pile-up.’

‘But it wasn’t, was it?’

‘Do you two want to get a room?’ Annabelle asks.

‘What?’ ‘No!’  I and Sally say at the same time.

‘There’s so much sexual tension
in here I feel like I’m in an episode of Moonlighting.’

Sexual tension?
  If she thinks this is sexual tension it’s no wonder she’s single.  This isn’t sexual tension it’s … it’s frustration, annoyance and intolerance, and there’s nothing sexual about it.  The woman isn’t remotely attractive.  She’s a bloody nuisance.  Why Annabelle rang her in the first place is still a mystery.