Shadow Box (27 page)

“Oh, a gentleman was looking for you earlier.”

“Who?” I asked.

He spoke to the woman next to him. She leant over.

“English guy, very big.” She made herself look large by pulling her shoulders up and widening her arms. “Half an hour ago. Said he was an old friend. I told him you’d checked out.”

“Thanks,” I said, gulping down fear. Another “old friend”. I think I knew who this one was. “If he comes back, I’m still not here,” I said. I winked as if I was simply being cheeky about someone I wished to avoid. Actually, I was shitting hot conkers at the idea that Donnie had come to pay me a visit. My temporary hotel switch had been lucky. I hoped it might temporarily put him off my scent.

“Sure.” She winked back.

I went up to the room on the sixth, threw my bags down and headed straight for the bathroom. The blood was beginning to seep through my makeshift bandage. I untied it and peeled the toilet roll off. The cut was becoming sticky and dark. I dabbed at it with antiseptic; it stung like hell, but I had to do something to fix it. I couldn’t risk hospital. I patted it as dry as possible, undid the superglue with my teeth, and applied spots of adhesive along the edges of the gash.

The sting of the disinfectant was nettle rash compared to the burning of glue on raw flesh. I held my breath and squeezed the edges of the cut together. The glue bonded the skin instantly, like chemical stitches. Once it had fixed, I taped it over with a layer of Band Aid, then wound the bandage over the length of the wound.

It hurt like shit, but I was getting used to pain.

I lay down on the bed. It had been quite a morning.

Donnie left the hotel and got a cab to an address on Canal Street. It was time to arm himself.

I woke up at 6 p.m. My arm was throbbing, but the bleeding had stopped. I got up and swallowed some paracetamol with a Coke, switched the telly on and looked again at the note from Dolan. It was a trap, whichever way I looked at it. Either I was going to walk into the barrel of a gun or, if the intel was well meant, I would be getting deeper into some form of trouble.

None of this was helping me find Sophie.

On the other hand, I considered, while Sharpie wasn’t here, I might gather useful intel that would get me back in the good books. I could make use of my pre-emptive arrival in New York.

I cracked open a beer, ate a bag of complimentary pretzels and watched the early evening news. It was only about New York, as if the rest of the world didn’t matter. I hummed and hahed about what to do. I looked at my watch: 7.30 p.m. I couldn’t stay in all evening. I showered, put on a smart jacket and was outside on the street by 8.00 p.m.

At 8.10 p.m. I was in a cab heading towards 51st Street, wondering what the hell I was doing.

Le Bernardin was uber-swanky. No two ways. Red rope, doormen who looked like extras from a Batman movie. The cab driver had told me it was one of New York’s top five restaurants and he hoped my credit card would stand it. Did I work on Wall Street or something?

I told him I wouldn’t be eating there. I would probably have a burger in a nearby diner and watch.

I jumped out of the cab behind a queue of fat-cat limos that idled outside the modern glass and steel canopy of the restaurant. I kept a distance as the limousines deposited their rich contents onto the sidewalk. I didn’t recognize anyone; they were a mixed clientele in terms of age, but the thing they had in common was that they all looked like they could afford dinner there. I watched for a couple of minutes until a doorman noticed me, so I crossed the road and looked on from the other side.

I waited until just after 8.30 p.m. and saw nothing out of the ordinary. I didn’t want to hang around too long for fear of being conspicuous, so I wandered further up 51st Street and found a Belgian bar. I ordered a Leffe and sat at the bar flipping the beer mat, wondering what to do next. I was still curious as to why I had been tipped off to go to Le Bernardin – nothing dramatic seemed to be going on there.

Three-quarters through my beer, I got antsy again. I was just wasting my time. I resolved to go back downtown and get something to eat. But once I was back on the street, I couldn’t resist another look at Le Bernardin and approached it from the other side. As I began to walk past, I caught the eye of the doorman who had seen me earlier.

“Hi,” I said.

“Good evening, sir.”

“I’m waiting for a date. She’s half an hour late – can I wait inside?”

I peeled a twenty from my back pocket and he opened the door for me. In New York, money talks. For all he knew I might have been Justin Timberlake.

“Do you have a reservation?” The waitress’s accent was French, she was very good-looking and a little snotty.

“I don’t. I was waiting for a friend, who’s late. Will you have something free in half an hour or so?”

She ran a long finger down the bookings sheet.

“Your name?”

“Kelly,” I said, sounding very English. She looked at me and back at the sheet. Cracked a half-smile.

“I think so,” she said. “Just for two?”

I nodded.

“In about twenty minutes. Perhaps you would like a drink at the bar?”

“Sure,” I said. “Thanks.”

I ordered a Bloody Mary, hot and spicy, almost a meal in itself. The price tag would have bought dinner in most other places. From the bar, I could get glimpses into the dining area. It was incredibly sleek, with sculptured walls, crisp white linen on the tables, leather-and-chrome chairs. It reminded me of an ocean liner from the 1930s. The lighting was subtle and golden, and the waiters drifted silently in starched, Chairman Mao jackets. My eyes followed them as they carried dishes of precise-looking food to tables. Quantity clearly wasn’t their selling point. Everything filled about a quarter of each plate.

From my vantage point I could see between two pillars while keeping myself well concealed. I followed the journey of another waiter to a table and saw him deliver a dish to a glamorous-looking blonde woman, middle-aged and well preserved. I recognized her instantly and realized the reason for the tip-off.

It was Cheryl Kelly.

Tommy’s wife had been missing for as long as her daughter, Sophie. I hadn’t seen Cheryl since I’d been Sophie’s boyfriend in London almost two years before. She hadn’t changed. Her hair looked good, and she was always well dressed in subtle, expensive colours. I looked again, to make sure.

I was absolutely certain when Alexei Bashmakov joined her. The Russian businessman was bald and tanned. He kissed her on the cheek, hugged her and snapped his fingers for drinks; he looked as if he’d had a few already.

Cheryl accepted champagne and drank, raising her glass to the person sitting opposite. With my gaze fixed on Cheryl and Bashmakov, I had barely noticed another presence at the table.

The third person leant over as the Russian filled his glass. The back of his head seemed familiar as he leant into the light, but it wasn’t until he raised his glass in turn to the other two that I thought I recognized him, too. I took out my phone, as if texting, and took as good a picture as I could without drawing attention to myself.

Then I left, sharpish.

“Anna, it’s me.”

“I know it’s you.” Her voice sounded sleepy and husky on the other end of the line. Sexy. “It’s three in the morning. This’d better be good.”

“I’m sorry. It is. There’s been a bit of a development. When’s Sharpie coming over?”

“Er, I think he’s leaving today. Should be with you by the evening.”

“Do you know where he is now? I’ve been trying to get hold of him.”

“As far as I know he’s up in Beaconsfield. He’s been there for a couple of days, he’ll be coming straight from there to New York via Heathrow.”

“OK,” I said.

“So what developments?” she asked.

“I guess I should report straight to Sharpie,” I said.

“Really? Get back in his good books?”

“But,” I couldn’t resist, “I think I’ve tracked down Cheryl Kelly.”

I had raced back to Washington Square after making my excuses at Le Bernardin. I couldn’t speak on the street, and waited for the security of my room before making my call.

I was both excited and anxious about my discovery. To find Cheryl and Bashmakov together was quite something. I was sure Tommy Kelly knew nothing about it, especially if Bashmakov, ugly as he was, was muscling in on Tommy’s wife as well as his business.

The third person at the table confused me – if it was who I thought it was. And it would need some careful thought and delicate handling. I would have to wait till tomorrow to work out what to do.

Donnie had got lucky.

He’d arrived back from Canal Street at around six with the 9 mm: a calibre big enough to make a nasty mess and ensure a kill. He felt happier with a firearm on his hip. He had showered and gone out for a steak and a couple of beers and was beginning to like New York a little better. The portions were massive. For lunch he’d had a sandwich, something called a sub, with enough cheese and ham to feed a family for a week. His steak and chips that evening had brought him to a near standstill, but he’d ploughed on through to the end.

He’d walked back from Greenwich Village about ten and stopped in the square for a fag before going back to the hotel. Then he’d spotted the kid.

He texted Dave.

Found kid. Hes gon back to Washinton Sq mate

He momentarily forgot that his incoming text might wake Pam and set Brandy off. Dave would get his ear chewed. Donnie chuckled to himself, then went back into the square for another fag before finding himself a large Jack Daniel’s to celebrate.

Arr NY 5pm your time. Meet Wash Sq hotel 6.30. SS

Sharpie’s text woke me up the following morning. I stared at it. I really couldn’t begin to act on what I’d seen until he arrived. My arm was still sore, but I changed the dressing and it didn’t look too angry. My superglue stitches had held up. I was eager to get on with looking for Sophie, but thought it wiser for various reasons to wait for Sharp’s nod – and besides, I was worried about running into Donnie Mulvaney.

I had a big breakfast in a diner, then found my way up to the Museum of Modern Art. I found myself drawn to the American abstract expressionists Rothko and de Kooning, whose massive, savage portraits of women were brutally splayed on the white walls. I remembered that my mentor in discovering this work had been Tommy Kelly himself. His connoisseur’s eye had shown me a way of looking at things that revealed meaning: art that expressed the darkness and savagery of the human soul, thinly concealed by a layer of civilization.