A Suitable Vengeance (Inspector Lynley, #4)(2)
With a final glance round the room, she picked up the black handbag she had tossed on the bed, checking to make sure she carried only money, her keys, and two small plastic bags which contained the drug. That done, her preparations complete, she left.
A few moments in the lift and she was out of the building, breathing in the mixed perfumes of the city night, that teeming blend of machinery and humanity peculiar to this corner of London. As always, before heading towards Praed Street, she glanced fondly at the smooth stone exterior of her own building, her eyes gliding over the words Shrewsbury Court Apartments which served as epigraph above the double front doors. They opened upon her hideaway and harbour, the only place on earth where she could be herself.
She turned away, walking towards the lights of Paddington Station where she took the District line to Nottinghill Gate, and from there the Central to Tottenham Court Road with its heady miasma of exhaust fumes and its pushing crowds of a Friday night.
She made her way quickly to Soho Square. Here, the patrons of nearby peepshows were milling about, their voices ringing with every possible accent as they exchanged lewd evaluations of the titillating sights they’d had of breasts and thighs and more. They were a surging mass of prurient thrill seekers, and Tina knew that on another night she might have considered one or more of them as possibilities for an amusing encounter of her own. But tonight was different. Everything was in place.
On Bateman Street, a short distance from the square, she saw the sign she was looking for, swinging above a malodorous Italian restaurant. Kat’s Kradle, it announced, with an arrow pointing into an unlit alleyway next door. The spelling was absurd, an attempt to be clever that Tina always found especially repellent. But she had not been the one to select the rendezvous, so she made her way to the door and descended the stairs which, like the alley in which the club was housed, were gritty and smelled of liquor and vomit and plumbing gone bad.
In nightclub hours, it was early yet, so the crowd in Kat’s Kradle was small, confined to a scattering of tables that surrounded a postage stamp dance floor. At one side of this, musicians were taking up a melancholy piece of jazz on saxophone, piano, and drums while their singer leaned against a wooden stool, smoking moodily and looking largely bored as she waited for the appropriate moment to make some sort of noise into a nearby microphone.
The room was quite dark, lit by one weak, bluish spotlight on the band, candles on the tables, and a light at the bar. Tina made her way to this, slid onto a stool, ordered a gin and tonic from the barman, and admitted to herself that, for all its grime, the location was truly inspired, the best Soho had to offer for a liaison meant to go unobserved.
Drink in hand, she began to survey the crowd, a first viewing that gleaned nothing but an impression of bodies, a heavy cloud of cigarette smoke, the occasional glitter of jewellery, the flash of a lighter or a match. Conversation, laughter, the exchange of money, couples swaying on a dance floor. And then she saw him, a young man seated alone at the table farthest from the light. She smiled at the sight.
It was so like Peter to select this sort of place where he would be safe from the mischance of being seen by his family or any of his posh friends. He ran no risk of condemnation in Kat’s Kradle. He faced no fear of trouble, of being misunderstood. He had chosen well.
Tina watched him. Anticipation curled in her stomach as she waited for the moment when he would see her through the smoke and the dancers. Oblivious of her presence, however, he looked only at the door, running his fingers through close-cropped blond hair in nervous agitation. For several minutes Tina studied him with interest, seeing him order and down two drinks in rapid succession, noting how his mouth became harder as he glanced at his watch and his need expanded. From what she could see, he was dressed quite badly for the brother of an earl, wearing a tattered leather jacket, jeans, and a T-shirt bearing the faded inscription Hard Rock Cafe. A gold earring dangled from one pierced earlobe, and from time to time he reached for this as if it were a talisman. He gnawed continually at the fingers of his left hand. His right fist jumped in spasms against his hip.
He stood abruptly as a group of boisterous Germans entered the club, but he fell back into his chair when it became apparent that the person he sought was not with them. Shaking a cigarette from a pack that he removed from his jacket, he felt in his pockets but brought forth neither lighter nor matches. A moment later, he shoved back his chair, stood, and approached the bar.
Right to mama, Tina thought with an inward smile. Some things in life are absolutely meant to be.
By the time her companion nosed the Triumph into a parking space in Soho Square, Sidney St. James could see for herself how finely strung his nerves had become. His whole body was taut. Even his hands gripped the steering wheel with a telling control which was inches short of snapping altogether. He was trying to hide it from her, however. Admitting need would be a step towards admitting addiction. And he wasn’t addicted. Not Justin Brooke, scientist, bon vivant, director of projects, writer of proposals, recipient of awards.
“You’ve left the lights on,” Sidney said to him stonily. He didn’t respond. “I said the lights, Justin.”
He switched them off. Sidney sensed—rather than saw—him turn in her direction, and a moment later she felt his fingers on her cheek. She wanted to move away as they slid down her neck to trace the small swell of her breasts. But instead she felt her body’s quick response to his touch, readying itself for him as if it were a creature beyond her control.