Page 130 of The Hallmarked Man (Cormoran Strike #8)

‘Dunnae talk aboot tha’!’ she said furiously. ‘ Ah need ye tae come! ’

‘Where are you?’ said Strike, trying to tug his notebook out of his pocket again.

‘Jus’ come tae the Golden Fleece, f’ fuck’s sake!’

‘Where is that?’

‘Ye know where, it’s the only place Ah’m safe, kinda, but Ah’ve gottae be careful, Ah think they’re watchin’ me—’

‘Are you Rena Liddell?’

‘DUNNAE SAY MAH FUCKIN’ NAME !’ she howled.

He heard the clunk of a call box receiver being slammed down.

Shit.

Strike was now exceptionally hungry in addition to being slightly drunk, so he caved in and ordered chips and calamari rings from the bar snack menu. Barely had the waiter departed than Kim entered the bar at last.

‘I’m so sorry, I’ve never been late for a job,’ she mumbled.

As she sat down beside him, Strike saw by the limited illumination of the booth that he wasn’t the only person with facial injuries. Someone had very obviously gouged Kim’s face, leaving deep, bloody scratches. Her right eye was puffy and Strike could see bruises forming around it.

‘What happened to you?’

‘I – it’s – Ray – you know, my ex?’

Rendered slower in comprehension than he usually was, because of all the Ardbeg he’d consumed, Strike said,

‘The jobless bloke, yeah – he did that?’

‘No, it was – I told you he was with someone when we got together, didn’t I? Well, it was her.’

‘Christ,’ said Strike.

‘I opened my flat door and she was standing there, waiting,’ said Kim. ‘Look, I’m really sorry, can I get a proper drink, I really—’

In no position to refuse, given how much Ardbeg he’d already consumed, Strike raised a hand to summon the waiter and, as Kim was now sitting with her face in her hands and muttered ‘anything’, Strike ordered her an Ardbeg, too.

When her drink arrived, Kim took a large swallow then coughed and said,

‘God, that’s disgusting, what is it?’

‘Whisky.’

‘Oh… well, I s’pose it’ll do the job.’

She tipped more down her throat.

‘What made your ex’s ex turn up today?’ asked Strike.

‘Because Ray’s killed himself,’ said Kim baldly.

The image of Charlotte lying in a blood-filled bath swum up out of Strike’s subconscious. He remembered the shock of a previous suspect being found hanged in her garage.

‘Fuck, I’m sorry.’

‘It’s nothing to do with me,’ said Kim quickly. ‘We split months ago, it’s not my fault, but she’s looking for someone to blame. She was the one pestering him for money all the time. They’ve got kids together,’ she added.

She took another gulp of the Ardbeg.

‘I opened my flat door and she was there on the landing, waiting. She grabbed me by the hair and punched me right in the face. She had me on the floor, then she was kicking me, then she was on top of me—’

‘Isn’t she police?’ said Strike, who dimly remembered what Kim had told him in the Dorchester.

‘Yeah. If she’s that fucking worried about her kids, you wouldn’t’ve thought she’d want to be arrested right after their dad died, would you?

My neighbours came out onto the landing, he pulled her off me, and his wife called the cops.

I had to give a statement. Then I get outside to my car and find out she’s keyed it and smashed in all the windows.

I had to get a taxi here. I don’t know how I’m going to follow Mrs Two-Times home. ’

‘I wouldn’t worry about that,’ said Strike. ‘She’s not going to shag anyone else tonight.’

‘Oh God, you’re so nice,’ Kim said, and she leaned into him before draining her glass of whisky. ‘Can I get another one?’

Strike had some misgivings about ordering her a second drink, but he raised his hand nonetheless. If he hadn’t ordered food he’d now be on the way home, but he was starving and wanted his chips.

By the time his food and Kim’s fresh Ardbeg had arrived, she’d twice more leaned into him, pressing her right arm into his left, with breathy little laughs.

She seemed understandably shaken by the news that her ex-boyfriend was dead, but he didn’t like the flirtatiousness that was creeping into her behaviour, either on its own terms, or in the context of recent bereavement.

Meanwhile, he’d been given only three calamari rings, which didn’t seem much of a reward for staying put. He helped himself to chips.

‘There he is, that’s Ray,’ said Kim, showing Strike a photo on her phone, though he didn’t particularly want to see it.

Ray had been a good-looking man with the same kind of thick, prematurely grey hair as Barclay.

Strike wondered whether he was being shown the picture because Kim stood beside Ray in a very revealing handkerchief top.

‘That was in Ibiza,’ said Kim, with a catch in her voice, turning the screen back towards herself and examining the picture. ‘Oh God,’ she said, with sudden emotion, scrolling through pictures. ‘He did it in his car. Exhaust fumes. I don’t know why I’m…’

She began to cry. Strike, who didn’t want to make any physical gesture of comfort, and was struggling to marshal his thoughts, given his tiredness and the large amount of whisky he’d drunk, said,

‘’S a shit thing to happen.’

Exactly as he’d feared, Kim now slumped into him and stayed there, sobbing, as Johnny Kidd & the Pirates began singing over the speakers.

When you move in right up close to me

That’s when I get the shakes all over me…

Fuck’s sake, thought Strike, now unable to reach his chips without dislodging Kim.

Glancing down, he saw her mobile lying face up in her lap, showing her, nude, displaying her tan lines in a mirror.

He looked away, hoping the lack of a consoling arm around her might persuade her to shift, and after a minute, it did.

With another breathy laugh and a whispered ‘sorry’, she straightened back up, and wiped her eyes with the back of her hand.

‘Oh shit!’ she said, with poorly feigned embarrassment, flipping over the mobile. ‘I don’t know what I’m…’ Turning her shining brown gaze fully on him for the first time, she uttered a little gasp. ‘Wait – what happened to you? ’

He was too slow to stop her touching him lightly on the side of the face.

‘Spade,’ he said, reaching for the last of his chips.

‘A spade ?’

‘Yeah. Look, I’m going to have to—’

He raised his hand for the bill, and as he did so, Kim slid a hand onto his thigh.

‘You’ve been so nice. Thank you.’

He reached down, took her wrist and threw her hand back into her lap.

‘Don’t.’

‘What?’

‘You know what. We’re not going to fuck,’ said Strike, more forcefully than he’d have done had he not drunk so much. ‘Ever.’

‘What? I didn’t—’

‘ Enough, ’ said Strike, whose tongue felt far heavier than it should have, but whose anger at himself, and the mess he’d made with Robin, had at last found a target. ‘No more accidental texts, none of it, all right? And keep your fucking nudes to yourself.’

He was hyper-aware of Kim sitting rigidly beside him as he paid his bill. He didn’t doubt she felt angry and humiliated, but he didn’t care. Having paid, he got up with difficulty, pins and needles in his legs, and said, without looking at her,

‘See you at the office.’

He left, and only by a miracle of luck did he avoid tripping over the rug for a second time.