Prologue
January 2000
Bee hissed under her breath at the cab driver sitting in all his Rothman-breathed, greasyhaired splendour while she hoisted boxes and boxes of stuff from the back of his estate car. Then she turned to hit Mr Arif, the corpulent property agent who was waiting for her on the front step, with one of her sweetest smiles – when what she actually wanted to do was put his testicles into a Corby Trouser Press and squeeze them till they popped.
It was one of those days. Wild and woolly. The sky was an intense blue and full of overfed clouds being dragged across the sun by an insistent wind, and it was bitterly, almost sadistically, cold.
Mr Arif sucked in his gut to let her squeeze past in the doorway and smiled at her unnervingly. Bee nearly gagged on the smell of his liberally applied aftershave.
‘Maybe, Mr Arif,’ she began sweetly, ‘it would be easier if you waited for me in the flat.’
‘Oh yes, Miss Bearhorn, of course. I will await you. Upstairs.’ He backed away, grinning at her as if she was the answer to all his prayers. And in a way, she was. She’d phoned him that morning, asked to see a selection of flats, looked at this one off Baker Street just an hourafter their phone conversation, told him she’d take it, gone back to his office, filled in some paperwork, given him cash for three months’ rent in advance and was now moving in a mere four hours after first contacting him. He’d probably never had to do so little for his commission.
It really was a bloody miserable flat but with the meter running on the minicab and John threatening to do something unmentionable in his cat box at any minute, time to find the perfect flat hadn’t been a luxury available to her. And, besides, she quite liked the anonymity of the area around Baker Street. The blandness of it. There was no ‘scene’ in Baker Street, no vibe, just streets of blank-faced mansion blocks full of foreigners and retired people. In her current state of mind, Bee wasn’t ready to fall in love with a neighbourhood again. And, anyway, this was only going to be temporary, just six months to get her life back together, make some money, and then she might even buy a place somewhere.
An elderly lady with intricately curled silver hair and a tartan-jacketed Dachshund was waiting outside the lift as Bee made her way up with John in his carrier. She smiled at Bee as she pulled open the metal grille and then down at John.
‘Well, well, well,’ she said, addressing the cat, ‘you’re a very handsome young man, aren’t you?’
Bee smiled at her warmly. Any friend of John’s was a friend of hers.
‘What a beautiful creature,’ the woman said, ‘what d’you call him?’
‘John.’
‘John? Goodness. That’s an unusual name for a cat. What type is he?’
Bee stuck a finger between the bars of John’s carrier and played with the fluff on his chest. ‘He’s an English Blue. And he’s the best boy in the world. Aren’t you, my little angel?’ John rubbed himself against her finger, purring loudly.
‘And who’s this?’ Bee asked, addressing the small, bizarrely shaped dog sitting at the old lady’s feet. She didn’t really want to know but thought it only polite, having discussed her own pet in such detail.
‘This is dearest Freddie – named after Freddie Mercury, you know?’
‘Really!’ exclaimed Bee. ‘And, why – er – Freddie Mercury?’
‘He loves Queen, would you believe? He can howl his way through the whole of “Bohemian Rhapsody”.’ She chuckled and eyed her pet affectionately.
Well, thought Bee, you never could tell about people, you really couldn’t.
‘So, dear. Are you moving in today?’
Bee nodded and smiled. ‘Number twenty-seven.’
‘Oh good,’ said the old lady, ‘then we shall be neighbours. I’m at twenty-nine. And it’s about time we had a new young person about the place. There’s too many old people in this block. It’s depressing.’
Bee laughed. ‘I wouldn’t call myself young.’
‘Well, dear – when you get to my age, just about everybody seems young. Alone, are we?’
‘I beg your pardon.’
‘Are you moving in alone?’
‘’Fraid so.’
‘Oh well. A beautiful young thing like you, I shouldn’t imagine you’ll be alone for long.’ She squeezed Bee’s arm with one tiny, crêpey hand and shuffled into the lift. ‘Anyway. I’d better get on. It was charming to meet you. My name is Amy, by the way. Amy Tilly-Loubelle.’
‘Bee,’ said Bee, feeling for once like her name wasn’t quite so whimsical, ‘Bee Bearhorn.’
