‘I have to go out.’
‘Dad!’
‘Just for a while. It won’t take long, I promise, but…. it’s important.’
‘Un-bloody-believable.’
‘Pumpkin, I’m really sorry…’
‘Actually, it is totally believable. Not like this is the first time you’ve ducked out of our arrangements.’
‘I wouldn’t go if I didn’t have to. It won’t take long.’
‘You’ve already said that,’ she snapped, dropping the remote and folding her arms pointedly.
He walked over to the sofa to stand awkwardly in front of her. If she’d been a little younger he would have cuddled her, teased her out of her grumpiness, won her over with the promise of something, but she was too grown for that now.
‘Look, we’ve got the whole weekend, I’ll…’
‘… make it up to you. Yes, Dad, I know how this goes.’
Seeing he wasn’t going to improve the situation he leant down and gave her a quick kiss on the forehead. ‘I am sorry, Pumpkin. I’ll be back soon. Have your pizza. It’ll be delivered to the front desk and Deri will bring it up. Don’t open the door to anyone else, right? And you can start on with the movie, OK?’
‘Where are you going anyway?’ she asked.
He was walking towards the door as he replied. ‘Shoreditch.’
‘What’s in Shoreditch?’
‘The answers to some important questions, hopefully,’ he said, reasoning her mood would not be made any better by hearing he was going to see the woman he had had an affair with while married to her mother.
DI Chowdhury’s flat was a modest two-bedder on the first floor of a converted Victorian terraced. The long street was made up of a hundred more such houses, most of them flats. Most of them inhabited by young professionals, out all day, often out most of the evening too. In such a road you might know your immediate neighbours but three doors down everyone became strangers. The anonymity of the city right there. He cruised up and down for an infuriating ten minutes before he found a parking space. As he locked the car he noted the bullet marks again, deciding they weren’t recognisable to anyone not in the know, but that they would have to be fixed. The last thing he needed was his employer asking very difficult questions along the lines of why his son’s bodyguard was getting himself shot at. He rang the bell and she pressed the button to open the front door. The stairway that served the three flats in the building was spotless, all painted whitewood and artfully positioned dried flowers. It was a nice place to live, in a quiet sort of way.
Deborah was opening her front door as he reached it.
‘Did you have to kill someone for a parking space?’ she asked.
‘No, but I was prepared to,’ he said, stepping inside. As he followed her through the short hallway to the bay windowed room at the front of the house he noticed she had made something of an effort with her appearance. Her long black hair was loose, which was rare. She wasn’t wearing her work clothes; no suit or smart trousers and no-nonsense blouse. But nor was she in the tee-shirt and jeans that he might have expected, had he stopped to think about it. Looking at the soft fabric of her long, boho skirt and the way it followed the curve of her hips and swished a little as she walked, he was transported back, suddenly. Back to the time when they had meant something to each other. Back to when they had shared intense, snatched moments out of khaki. A night in a hotel. A weekend off base. Even a couple of hours in her quarters. When they reached the sitting room she turned and now he noticed her loose, pale gold cotton top was flattering too. And she was wearing perfume. Not one he recognised though. It was as if she was trying, but determined not to show that she was trying, to look good.From what he knew about women, this was an art form and took ages to pull off. She’d done a pretty good job.
In the corner of the room there was a small dining table and it was laid up with places for two. Seeing him notice it Deborah spoke up.
‘Don’t look so bloody terrified. I made some pasta. Thought we could eat while we talk, that’s all.’
Wrong footed, he tried to hit the right note. He needed to get back to Emily, but he also needed Deborah’s help. And besides, he didn’t want to hurt her feelings. He’d done enough of that.
‘How did I not know you could cook?’
‘Hardly top of our priorities, as I remember. Anyway, you will want to hear what I’ve found out about our friendly neighbourhood Serbs. I’ll fetch the food. Why don’t you pick some music?’ she suggested, nodding towards the old record player and shelves of albums.
‘Wow, that’s quite a collection,’ said Tudor, happy to be given something to do to defuse the moment.
‘I inherited it from my dad. It’s a bit heavy on the seventies for my liking, but I couldn’t bring myself to get rid of it.’
He flicked through the neatly stacked records, smiling when he found one he knew. There was something reverent, almost, about the way vinyl had to be handled, held at the very edges to avoid smudges, dropped flatinto place on the deck, needle lowered with great care to prevent scratches. As Deborah came back into the room carrying a bowl of pasta the first chords of his choice began to fill the little room.
‘Oh, you’re playing my song,’ she laughed. ‘Sweet.’
The band was T. Rex, the track upbeat but heartfelt, Marc Bolan singing the lyrics with a voice that found its place somewhere between fun and heartache:
