The Fire Man (6 page)

Ristorante Di Mario
was a damn sight too quiet for the owners' liking.

Nico Speroni gazed despondently at the virtually empty room. Just two lousy white linen-spread tables occupied in a restaurant with sixty covers! And it was eight o'clock on a Friday night! He was losing a fortune. Still, he mused, at least the tired looking guy with the skinny woman at the window table had opened his account with a good, (expensive anyway), bottle of Barolo; he sincerely hoped that they would get through a few more.

* * *

Karen looks pretty good
, thought McRae. She'd obviously changed into her little black dress, which was a short, tight-fitting number with a scalloped neckline, in the office. He had been surprised by just how elegant she looked. She always dressed well, though invariably in a smart two-piece fitted suit, but tonight she looked genuinely attractive and her dress emphasised her slim legs and pert figure. The long plain face had been made up with even greater care than usual: the lipstick seemed, to his inexpert eye, a softer shade; her hair, normally a mousy blonde, seemed to have picked up more blonde highlights. Altogether – there was no other word for it – she looked fantastic.

McRae was wary whenever he was alone with Karen. For some unfathomable reason, she undoubtedly wanted to have more than a professional relationship with him. It was something she was too cool to reveal openly, but which had become more and more apparent over the past few months. The fact that McRae was divorced and had no obvious woman in his life no doubt made it inconceivable to her that he should remain so evasive.

The mundane explanation was that Drew McRae was both shrewd and ambitious, and even an idiot knew that fooling around with his secretary was not a clever move – not a clever move at all. Apart from that, while he enjoyed her company, she intrigued him and at times like this found her positively alluring, McRae knew in his bones that a relationship with Karen would be disastrous. The woman was too lonely, too damn needy and far too complicated. Truth was, she would be a nightmare. He didn't really know who he was searching for, but he was pretty sure it wasn't Karen. Nevertheless, she certainly looked very enticing tonight.

B
etter hadn't get pissed or it could get tricky
, he thought, already feeling the effects of the Barolo, which was blending with the burgundy he had previously enjoyed in the wine bar.

* * *

After leaving the office, they had dived into the local All Bar One for a pre-dinner drink, canapés (well, crisps actually) and to have a quick business chat while the night was young.

Karen had done a typically thorough job of researching the garments as he'd requested. Employing the site photographs, her personal back-copies of
Vogue
and
Elle
and God-only-knew-how-many websites, she had reached some initial conclusions – intriguing and potentially worrying conclusions, which suggested that Hellenic's brands might not be quite as exclusive as Kanelos had implied.

‘Definitely much nearer to Next and Topshop than Bond Street,' was how she had described the Dido range of youthful little tops and skirts. ‘Trendy, but not particularly well-made, and the fabrics aren't great – too much synthetics.' The Anastasia-labelled garments, mainly dresses and skirts, were dismissed as “a bit mumsie” and the jury was still out on the Xenia range.

In summary, Karen was inclined to the view that it was all distinctly average stuff. More concerning was the fact that none of the brands appeared to be well-known, and Karen's internet searches hadn't produced a single press reference to either the Dido or Xenia labels and only two comments on the Anastasia brand. More than a little surprising, they had concluded.

Deciding that he didn't wish to spoil her evening, McRae had elected not to pursue the debate any further, intrigued though he was. Surprisingly, however, Karen hadn't let the matter drop.

‘Why don't you get a few samples for me and I can look at them with some people I know?' she had asked.

'Like who?' he had responded, rather rudely.

‘Well, I did run a boutique, you know,' she had replied tartly.

‘Of course you did... I'd forgotten that,' he replied, while realising that it was complete news to him. It turned out that the man she always described either as her “ex” or “that bastard” had owned a small dress shop in Harborne ten years previously. Karen, it transpired, had ended up running it for over a year before the guy had done a runner – from both the shop and her.

‘I'll get hold of a few sample pieces next week and let's see what you can find out,' he eventually conceded.

* * *

The meal was satisfactory rather than spectacular –
a touch heavy on the oregano,
he thought – but somehow, by rationing himself carefully, McRae had managed, to Nico's unvarnished disappointment, to avoid ordering a second bottle of wine, although they had concluded the meal with a brandy and a Sambuca. It was almost ten o'clock as they walked through the quiet backstreets on their way to New Street station, where McRae intended to see Karen gallantly onto her train.

The usual drunks, deadbeats and alarmingly under-clad and overweight girls became increasingly evident as they neared the station. As one legless youth in a torn tee-shirt and baggy jeans lurched unsteadily in their direction, Karen took the opportunity to seize McRae's arm. Once the drunk had passed, her arm remained where it had rested.

At the barrier, they paused to check the departure board.
Thank God there was a train in less than six minutes,
he thought.

She turned to face him and McRae could see there was no choice other than to kiss her farewell. She lifted her face towards his and he moved to give her a chaste peck on the cheek, but it was not to be. Her mouth found his and her arms enfolded him.

Within seconds, her tongue was in his mouth and he could feel her breasts and pelvis pressing into him through the thin material of her clothes. Despite himself, McRae could feel his arousal, as he used his strength to subtly hold her at a respectable distance. Eventually he broke away, smiling as he did so, hoping to allay any disappointment she felt at his lack of response. To his surprise, she too was smiling and her eyes contained, he detected, a tiny glimpse of triumph.

‘Thanks for a lovely evening, Mr McRae – see you Monday,' and she was through the barrier.

As he walked away, McRae felt a curious blend of exhilaration and dread.

‘Graeme!'

Cairns turned to face the only person in the world – apart, of course, from his mother – who still insisted upon employing his Christian name. ‘Don't forget to ask Drew to come round for dinner next Friday.'

Moira was standing sternly at the gate watching as Cairns carefully removed his suit jacket, as was his habit, prior to climbing into the car. She seemed perpetually worried about McRae's welfare. It tended to irritate him.

‘I will,' he responded, nodding but thinking that he may, in fact, decide not to. Grim liked Drew well enough, he was a mate, but the amount of time they had spent together lately was beginning to make him more than a little grateful for any relief that came along. Even tonight, for instance, he was spending the evening with him at the football. A salvage buyer of their joint acquaintance had offered Grim a couple of good tickets for the evening Villa game against Manchester City. As a life-long Everton supporter, Cairns wasn't remotely interested, but somehow he had ended up accepting.

And now, instead of a cosy night in front of the box with Moira, he would no doubt once again be chewing over the blasted Hellenic case, freezing his arse off on a hard seat between bouts of rather inferior football. He sighed inwardly and concentrated on negotiating his car through the match-day traffic. He was due to pick-up McRae at 6.15pm, but at this sorry rate of progress he would almost certainly be late.

By the time he finally collected McRae from his apartment just off the Hagley Road, he was indeed late, so they needed to get a move on or they would miss the kick-off.

His worst fears were realised. From the moment he closed the car door, McRae began to obsess over the minute details of the case. Grim sought desperately to deflect him by commenting disparagingly on the potential quality of the match ahead, but to no avail. McRae clearly couldn't get the case out his mind, it seemed to Grim. At last, exasperated, he exploded, ‘Can't we just forget about the bleeding Greeks for one night? I'm sick to death of that claim; it's not as if we don't have another thousand to worry about!'

McRae was silent for an uncomfortable moment, a little stunned by his friend's untypical outburst, before replying, ‘Okay, we'll skip it, but I've have got some ideas that we do need to talk about… tomorrow?'

They completed the rest of the journey in a strained silence before parking, illegally, a few streets away from the Villa Park ground.

Struggling through the turnstiles and negotiating the scrum surrounding the so-called refreshments stand, they made their way into the glaring roar of the auditorium. Adjusting their eyes to the blinding magnesium whiteness of the floodlights and the fluorescent emerald of the pitch, the pair climbed the steps to what turned out to be truly exceptional seats. They were located high in the Tom Ellis Stand, close to the halfway line and merely a few tiers below the holy of holies: the exclusive, glass-fronted, executive boxes.

‘Well, the game may turn out to be rubbish, but these really are fantastic seats,' remarked Grim, who, receiving no response, turned to find he was addressing a fat bald man in an anorak, nursing what smelled like a cup of Bovril.

The anorak wearer merely scowled at Grim before pushing past him.

Where the hell is he?
thought Grim, scanning the crowd below. It was thirty seconds or so before, to his surprise, he finally spotted McRae descending the steps from the executive boxes, above their seats.

‘How did you end up there? Lose your Sat Nav?'

‘No, but I did see something very, very, interesting.'

‘Like what?'

‘Well...' He got no further as 35,000 fans erupted to welcome the teams onto the pitch. ‘Tell you at half-time,' he shouted above the cacophony.

As it turned out, the game was more absorbing than either man had anticipated. Both sides appeared a touch deficient in terms of skill and technique, but that was more than compensated for in furious effort and last-ditch defence. At half-time, affairs were very much in the balance at 1-1.

Deciding that a drink was merited, the two made their way down to the heaving subterranean bar where Grim endured the hectic queue in a heroic quest to purchase two soapy Budweiser beers. Both men shared a genuine dislike for the American beer, which they considered to be no more than a bastardised version of the Czech original. Grim's face as he sipped disdainfully from the plastic beaker was a picture.

‘Almost bad enough to make me give up,' he snarled. ‘So, what was so interesting that you managed to get lost?'

‘Derek Smythson… that's what,' replied McRae. ‘He's in one of the boxes just above us!'

‘No! Wouldn't have thought he was a football man, not in a million years,' responded Grim.

‘Nor me,' said McRae, ‘but you know what was weirder? It looked like he was in with a bunch of guys, one of whom looked just like Friar Tuck!'

‘Who the hell is Friar Tuck?' enquired Grim.

McRae: belatedly realising that his friend was totally unaware of his personal characterisation of the “fourth man”, quickly explained.

‘You have to be wrong, Drew. Smythson would never be unprofessional enough to socialise with a claimant! CFG have rules about that sort of stuff, don't they? Anyway, the guy you call Tuck was just an employee, wasn't he? Doesn't make any sense.'

‘I know it doesn't make sense, which is why I went to get a closer look. By the time I got near enough to the box, though, I could only see Smythson, so I can't be totally certain...' McRae's voice tailed off as he too began to doubt the evidence.

They drank their beers silently for a while and then made their way to their seats for the second half of the match. Grim seemed to have discounted McRae's story completely as he became absorbed in the game, but whenever the crowd reacted to an incident on the pitch by rising to their feet, McRae couldn't help but sneak a discreet look in the direction of the boxes. He saw nothing; no sign of Smythson nor the mythical Tuck.

I must have been mistaken,
he thought.
Grim is right. It is pretty inconceivable that Smythson would be cavorting about at a football match with claimants! It must have been some geezer who just had a bald head, not Friar Tuck at all, but… Smythson is such a distinctive looking guy, he must have been right about him, surely? How many people look like walking corpses? Probably, on balance, it was him, but with a bunch of brokers. Big brokers do loads of entertaining.

Having provided himself with a rational explanation, he turned his attention back to the game. The visitors were now in front and the home supporters were becoming distinctly rowdy in their discontent. He glanced at his watch: only eight minutes to go.

‘What do you think about getting out now to beat the traffic?' he suggested.

‘Good idea,' said Grim, getting to his feet even as he spoke.

Picking their way carefully past the fans on their row, they negotiated their way to the steps and, through a sea of discarded burger cartons, pie wrappers and flattened chips, to the exit. By now, several thousand other pessimists had also begun to desert the sinking ship, and the road outside the ground was already heaving with disconsolate Villa supporters.

‘If we get a move on we can still get onto the Expressway before the rest of the bastards,' shouted Grim over his shoulder, as they weaved across the road between the slow moving cars and towards the side street where the car had been parked. Breaking into a stately jog, they managed, narrowly, to make an expeditious escape. Within less than twenty minutes, they were pulling up again close to the Anchor.

Quite why they chose the Anchor as their default watering hole was always a mystery to McRae. Yes, it was close to the office and the beer was acceptable to his picky colleague, but, in truth, it had little to recommend it. The choice of wine, his own particular concern, was savagely limited, the bar staff were distinctly moody, not least because they seemed to be replaced almost weekly, and the décor had undoubtedly seen better days – better days in the seventies. Still, for some indefinable reason, McRae always felt relaxed there. More at ease than he ever felt in his own flat, to be honest.
Probably because he was there more often
, he thought ruefully.

As Grim ordered the drinks, McRae gazed absently through the slats of the window, into the sodium yellow and grey night. In the street, a continuous hum of passing cars was still detectable, despite the relative lateness of the hour. They had decided to take refuge in the pub for a “quickie” because it would allow the worst of the match traffic to dissipate before they tackled the dreaded Hagley Road.

McRae was feeling more than a little guilt, conscious that his place was hardly convenient for his colleague's route home. It would add at least another hour to Grim's journey. ‘Look, tell you what, I'll grab a cab from here. You can get off back to Aldridge when we're finished. It's crazy to go so far out of your way.'

‘Well, if you're sure. It would be a help, I must admit,' conceded Grim with alacrity, secretly grateful for his boss's unexpected and somewhat untypical consideration. Drew was a decent enough bloke, but was often a bit too distracted (or being charitable, a tad too “focused”) to remember that other people actually had lives.

‘Yeah, no bother,' smiled McRae, ‘but don't forget, I do want a chat about you-know-who first thing tomorrow.'

‘It can't be first thing,' replied Grim. ‘I'm out at nine on that ball-aching theft case in Dudley that you so kindly allocated me. The earliest I could do would be around lunchtime.'

‘Fair enough, unless you want to chat now?'

‘No, I bloody don't,' said Grim. ‘I'm going to take you up on your generous offer and skedaddle right now – but to show how grateful I am, I'll get you another drink before I go, if you fancy it?'

McRae definitely did feel like another drink, but decided that he didn't want it in the Anchor. ‘No thanks, let's get going, eh?'

* * *

Feeling the cold evening air on his face, McRae made the rare decision that a walk might do him some good, and, turning a blind eye to the taxi rank at the end of the street, decided to stroll the two miles home.

The initial feeling of energetic virtuousness had evaporated after half a mile and was replaced by a dogged determination to see his decision through, but first he needed that drink. He knew where he would choose. The Plough and Harrow would still be open. Whatever the bar's other qualities, it did, to his knowledge, possess at least a halfway decent selection of wines by the glass.

Eventually, slumped in the muted Edwardian splendour of the quiet bar and enjoying a nicely cooled glass of passable Chenin Blanc, McRae pulled his biro from his inside pocket. He started to list in his dog-eared diary the issues he needed to follow up the next day. Most people used their fancy phones these days, but McRae had never broken the paper habit.

Most of the outstanding tasks were routine, but lately it was precisely this routine, the hum-drum, that had gone by the board. Hellenic had begun to take over his mind.

After listing the various management issues and outstanding financial reports that he knew required his urgent attention, he inevitably returned to mulling over other things. Things like keeping out of Karen's clutches – she had had a real gleam in her eye lately and it was bothering him – and things like Hellenic, as well as his mother's birthday, which was next week.

McRae's mother, Anna, was not normally a concern to him. She had remarried six years earlier, following the premature death of his father. Fortunately for both Drew and his elder brother Tom, Anna, an exceptionally well-preserved woman of only fifty-four at the time, had not taken too long to strike up a relationship with a new man. The brothers had been mortified at the disrespectful alacrity with which their mother had cast off her widow's weeds, but over time they had both realised what a boon it was that they no longer had to worry about her. It also helped that the new husband had turned out to be a really genuine guy, or at least as genuine as a successful career in newspapers would permit, and she was very happy. Not just happy, but wealthy.

Jeremy Carrington, the second husband, having retired from print journalism, had become a highly sought-after media consultant and seemed able to charge ridiculous sums for the briefest of contracts. Exactly what a media consultant did was a mystery to McRae, but whatever it was, it clearly paid well. So much so, in fact, that the couple had relocated two years earlier to a converted farmhouse near Heraklion in Crete, from which they made only occasional forays into the outside world.

Nice work if you can get it
, thought McRae.

Happy and rather self-centred though she always had been, Anna did have a tendency to fret over McRae, who was only too well aware of her concerns.

Tom, his brother, was happily married with two kids and a plain, plump, but charming wife and securely ensconced in a steady career as a building society surveyor. He lived in Leamington Spa. He was not a concern. Drew was another matter. Indeed, every time Anna had seen her younger son over the past five years, he had appeared, well… rougher.

In his late-twenties, McRae had been an attractive man: tall, slim and with a pleasing, if angular, face. However, over the past few years, his waist line had expanded and his face had become haggard and chalky in complexion. He often looked tired and was clearly working too hard, drinking too much and, of course, smoking too many. Still, not bad looking – he was saved by a pair of rather distinctive green eyes – but definitely unhealthy. If he didn't get a grip soon, so thought his mother, he would have no chance of finding a new woman. Of course, Helen, the ex-wife, was the cause. The divorce had changed Drew, but not for the better.

In Anna's considered view, Helen and her son had been an accident waiting to happen. They had been together, off and on, for years before the marriage and it seemed likely that both had had an inkling that there was something not quite right. Nonetheless, the marriage had, like the outcome of an English penalty shoot-out, always had a certain dreadful inevitability about it.