I half expected him to ruffle her hair, but fortunately for his hand, he didn’t. “Nice. C’mon, Luc, we’re going.”
“Um…so…I kind of have a job to do? And a teenager I’m responsible for?” I really wished I’d been able to sound surer about both of those things.
“Your job’s working for me,” Saint pointed out, temporarily forgetting he wasn’t into hierarchies. “And the kid’ll be fine. Leave her a pack of cigarettes and a credit card for emergencies.”
Jaz nodded. “Yeah, leave me at home with a pack of cigarettes and a credit card. Esther will love it.”
“You don’t even smoke,” I retorted.
“I’m going to start because you’re a bad parent.”
“Hey,” I protested, stung. “I am a below-average parent at worst. And I’m sorry, Saint, but—”
“Got to be now, Luc,” declared Saint.
“Does it, though? Does it really?”
“It’s the moment,” Saint was still declaring. “I can feel it in my balls.”
The spirit of Oliver swept spontaneously over me. “Can you not talk about your balls in front of my foster daughter?”
Saint was visibly unmoved. “What can I say, the Gentlemen have strong opinions. Now, time’s wasting. Get in the car. Kid can come if she wants—it’ll be an education.”
I was pretty sure it wouldn’t, in fact, be an education. I was pretty sure that itwould, in fact, be a complete disaster. But just like the last time Saint had decided to drag me off on one of his awful, selfish, posh-bastard whims, I really didn’t think I had much choice. Or if I did, the choice was to go along with what he wanted or accept that he’d pull CRAPP’s funding and get me and everybody I worked with fired.
Fuck.
I looked back at Jaz. She’dprobablybe okay on her own. But only probably. And maybe onlyokayin the sense that she, personally, would be perfectly happy. Not in the sense that she’d stay out of trouble. At the very least, I suspected that she’d be off down the park with Spud the moment my back was turned.
Fuck.
“Jaz,” I said. “It’s looking a whole lot like we’re going to need to go and put a punk band back together. You all right with that?”
Jaz looked suspicious. “How long’ll it take?”
I had no idea. “I have no idea.”
Without further comment, Jaz vanished into the kitchen and returned with half a loaf of white bread and Spud. “Can’t leave him if we don’t know when we’re coming back.”
Fantastic. The teenager with trauma-related anger issues was a more responsible dog owner than me. Actually, I was kind of proud of her for it, whichmaybewas a positive parenting sign? “And the bread?”
Jaz looked at me like she couldn’t possibly imagine how I could bear to be me. “Might get hungry.”
Instead of the bike, Saint had rocked up in a jet-black Cadillac convertible like an edgelord Elvis. Jaz jumped in the back far more enthusiastically than she ever got into the car with me, and Spud jumped in after her. I hung back to lock the door and send Oliver a quick note sayingTook jazz and spud to get band with saint will explain later.Which was all I could manage before Saint bullied me into the passenger seat. Which felt like a metaphor for my life right now.
We were halfway along the A13 before I thought to ask where we were actually going.
“Clapham,” said Saint, as if it was an explanation.
“Okay.” I attempted a conciliatory nod. “Why Clapham exactly?”
“Gary the Cosmic Fuckstone.”
Ah. Right. Because we hadn’t actually had this conversation yet. “Umm, I’m not sure that’ll work.”
“It’s fine.” Saint waved a hand that I was pretty sure he should have been keeping on the wheel. “Me and the Fuckstone, we go way back.”
“It’s not so much—”
