“Good, thanks,” says Rob. “How about thirty grand to kill someone for me? Half now, half when it’s done.”
Eddie considers this. “Does it have to be in America?”
“ ’Fraid so, old son.”
Eddie puffs out his cheeks. “Why me?”
“I trust you,” he says. “The woman I need you to kill is a piece of work. I need someone good. You still do the odd job?”
“Now and then,” says Eddie.
“Course you do,“ says Rob. This is all part of the business. Rob hires the right person for the job, Rob gets paid, and Rob doesn’t get killed by François Loubet. The circle of life.
“I don’t know, though,” says Eddie now, shaking his massive head. “America? A woman?”
“Yeah, but thirty grand, Eddie. And I need the best.”
“Yeah,” agrees Eddie. “I suppose so.”
Rob holds up a photo to the camera. Two women. Taken a couple of hours ago. “You kill the young one. Amy Wheeler.”
“What if I have to kill the older one?” asks Eddie.
“Don’t,” he says. “She’s famous, and we don’t need the attention. She’s Rosie D’Antonio.”
Rob sees Eddie look away from the camera, trying to hide something in his eyes. “Rosie D’Antonio?”
“The writer, yeah,” says Rob. “You all right there? Look like you’ve seen a ghost?”
“Right as rain,” says Eddie, seemingly fully recovered from whatever that was. “When do I go?”
“Now,” he says. “For reasons we don’t have the time to talk about, I need this done quickly. City Airport as soon as you can. Use my plane.”
“You got a plane now?”
“Two. One in Dubai, one in London.”
Eddie nods and looks around at the golden decor behind Rob. “Two planes and no dartboards. Times change, eh?”
“They do, Eddie old son. They do.”
Eddie will get the job done, Rob knows that. No flash, no ego. Not like that dumb Navy SEAL, Kevin. Just in, bang, bang, out. Then Rob can stop worrying about François Loubet.
And that’s why old friends are so important.
31
Steve Wheeler stands at the top of the steps leading down from the private jet. He has drunk probably the equivalent of six pints, and the onboard chef had fashioned him a rudimentary “steak bake” from veal, Wagyu beef, and panko breadcrumbs. The moment the hatch opens, the humid South Carolina air hits him like the breath of an angry beast. He probably shouldn’t be wearing a denim jacket and a sweatshirt. But that’s what he always wears, and America will have to change before Steve does.
The sky is the blue of a dream. He is no longer in England, and that thought makes him want to turn back immediately. He is sure they will fly him home again if he asks politely. On the horizon he sees a freeway, speeding cars glinting and metallic in a way familiar from films but alien to Hampshire. Also the freeway signs are the wrong color. And why does he have the word “freeway” in his head? It’s a “motorway,” Steve, don’t get sucked in.
The adverts on the side of the small private terminal building seem so tantalizingly similar to adverts he might see at home. And yet the teeth are whiter, the hair shinier, and the slogans more sure of themselves. Steve runs a hand through his hair, touches his teeth with his tongue, and feels considerably less confident than he has been in a long time. What will they make of him here?
Brad, the flight attendant, stands behind him, swaying slightly, in the manner of a man unused to drinking a great deal of beer at altitude.
“You might want to put on your sunglasses,” Brad suggests.
“I don’t have sunglasses,” says Steve. “I’m not a male model.”
“A hat, then,” says Brad. “A hat at least.”
“I don’t have a hat,” says Steve. “Who has hats at their beck and call? Perhaps we should just turn round and head back? Can we do that?”
“Sure,” says Brad. “Depends if you came here to do anything important.”
That’s annoying. He did come here to do something important. He came here to help Amy. Though Lord alone knows how. The very idea that Amy might need any sort of help seems ridiculous to Steve.
Amy was made of steel from the day they met, and for the last five years she has been the helper.
They don’t really talk about anything, Steve and Amy, in their daily chats. Steve is not a lonely man, no, not that, think of his friends in the village, there’s always someone there, someone to have a pint with. So she isn’t there to stop him feeling lonely.
So what is it that Amy does? When they chat about nothing?
They certainly don’t talk about grief. There are other people to talk to about that if he ever felt the need. Margaret from next door lost her father not so long ago. Tony Taylor from the pub, his wife left him, and there are online forums if things get bad.
The police offer a grief-counseling service to former officers, but he’d be laughed out of town if he took them up on that sort of thing. Resilience is an underrated quality in Steve’s mind, and so grief counseling was never for him.
He often explains this to Amy on their calls. Talks through why he doesn’t need grief counseling, why he can handle it himself. Why grief is private. Amy is very good about it, to be fair, never presses the point. They just have a good old chat about their days instead, maybe talk about Debbie for a bit, and sometimes Amy will tell a funny story she has remembered about her. Yep, plenty of people bang on about grief counseling, but Amy isn’t one of them. She respects his opinion, Steve reckons, knows he doesn’t need it. So they’ll laugh and cry about all sorts of things, the two of them, but no one ever mentions grief.
