Altered Life Read online

CHAPTER THREE

  BEFORE I COULD say anything, the door opened and Carol the receptionist put her head in. She was a woman in her early forties with an over-elaborate dress sense topped by a swirl of dark hair that became lighter as it spiralled further from her head, like cream dropped into coffee. I stared at her in fascination.

  ‘Can I interest anyone in a drink yet?’ she asked.

  Brand looked up at her. ‘Shut the door, Carol. Don’t interrupt again unless I ask for you.’

  She retreated quickly and closed the door. I waited but Brand said nothing.

  ‘You’re sure?’ I said.

  ‘It was her,’ he replied bitterly, lowering his head to stare at the table. His attitude had changed. When I’d arrived he’d been confidently in control; now he gave off a quiet despair, like a man who’d lost something he knew he’d never get back. I found myself beginning to feel sorry for him. ‘No one else apart from me knows the things that she knows,’ he said. ‘No one else could have set it up. You ever been married?’

  ‘Long time ago. It didn’t take.’

  ‘She run off?’

  ‘I don’t remember. Look, are you saying that Tara is trying to steal your business?’

  He looked at me severely. ‘Damn right I am. Do you get it now?’

  ‘Why would she do it?’

  He raised his hands and let them drop on the table like dead weights. ‘Call me old-fashioned, but I thought it was your job to find out that kind of thing.’

  I sat back in my chair and looked at the people in the large room outside. They were mostly in their twenties and casually dressed in denim and tee-shirts. Hopelessly trendy. Behind them, filling each wall, racks of computer modules stood with their lights flashing, like Cubist Christmas trees. Cardboard boxes containing more hardware were stacked in one corner. ‘Is she here?’ I said.

  ‘No—she’s in London, with a client.’ He seemed to make up his mind about something. ‘Look, if it weren’t for the fact that it’s Tara I’d be dealing with this myself. But this is too difficult for me. So what I want from you is confirmation, one way or the other. Find out what she’s been up to, who else is involved, what the plan is.’

  I looked at him for fully fifteen seconds without saying anything. He took the scrutiny. Then he stood up abruptly and said, ‘There’s someone I want you to meet.’

  ‘It won’t help,’ I said. I was beginning to feel exasperated. Clients who don’t listen are more common than I’d like, but this one was beginning to irritate me with his unwillingness to take heed of what was fairly expensive advice. I added, ‘Did I mention, I don’t get involved in family disputes?’

  ‘You’re on the clock right now. It won’t do any harm. Don’t argue with a client, Sam, you’ll never win.’

  Without waiting for my reply he opened the office door and was striding away. I followed reluctantly. I glanced around at the staff. They took no notice of our re-entry into their world. Carol the receptionist showed me a sample from her repertoire of frosty glances as we passed in front of her to cross into the other half of the office, which was almost empty. I gave her a warm smile, just to worry her. ‘This is the consultancy division,’ Brand said briskly. ‘Ah, here’s one of the people I wanted you to meet.’

  A slim woman with hair the colour of sun-dried straw was sitting on the corner of a desk. Her head was bent down as she read from a sheaf of papers. She looked up when she sensed us watching her. Her appearance was a neat blend of geometric shapes: her eyes were astonishingly round and almost transparently blue, set in a face that was mostly oval but with two straight and prominent cheekbones that lent her a serious, hard-edged look. Her skin was smooth and appeared to have been recently tanned. She wore a sharp grey suit that fitted her at every place that it touched her body, which was lean and athletic and radiated energy. She held herself at a slight angle and moved her gaze from one of us to the other, calmly expectant. Her large eyes made me feel inspected, measured and noted. What the judgement was, I couldn’t tell.

  Brand stepped forward. ‘Laura—I’d like you to meet Sam Dyke. He’s helping with that business I told you about.’

  The woman held out her hand and I shook it. Her fingers were so slender it was like grasping a bunch of pencils. ‘Laura Marshall,’ she said. She looked around and said quietly, in an amused voice, ‘Do you buy this idea of Rory’s?’

  ‘I don’t know enough one way or the other.’

  She turned to Brand. ‘Rory, Mr Dyke’s being diplomatic.’

  ‘That’s the first I’ve seen of it,’ Brand said, and took my arm to lead me further into the open space. I shrugged at Laura Marshall as we passed.

  Two women in their thirties sat side by side at a long desk looking down into purple Sony laptops and saying nothing. Their fingers moving silently over the keyboards. An older man with thinning hair leaned back in his chair, engaged in a long telephone conversation that was evidently boring him. I guessed these were consultants.

  Brand led me to a desk where a large man in a suit the colour of slate was towering over a seated woman with a stiff helmet of white hair. They were talking quietly to each other. Brand walked into the woman’s eyeline and the man immediately stood upright and grinned at him with a mouth full of white teeth.

  ‘Well well,’ he said jovially. ‘Rory Brand comes to visit the little people.’

  ‘Shut up, Eddie,’ Brand said. ‘Betty, this is Sam Dyke. He might be doing some work for us.’

  The woman glanced up as though whatever I did was of no interest to her, so long as it didn’t interfere with the smooth running of her own life. She had a face as thin and pale as Eddie’s was full and florid. She also had a spiky manner that seemed to match her appearance. ‘We’ve got those newsletters to get out tonight,’ she said. ‘You have to go over them before we put them in the mail.’

  ‘I know,’ Brand said, ‘I haven’t forgotten. How could I, with you on my back every half hour?’

  Eddie took this as an opportunity for a bout of laughter. ‘Got your number, Betty!’ he crowed. As he turned, I saw a pack of muscle move in his shoulders. He was big, I thought, but he wasn’t fat. He looked at Brand, grinning. ‘Don’t be such a tosspot, Rory. Betty’s only looking after business, aren’t you, love?’

  Brand turned to me, including me in the conversation. ‘Betty’s worked here longer than anyone else. She’s the keeper of the flame.’

  ‘Loyalty’s a rare virtue,’ I said, looking at her.

  She wore large round glasses that slipped down her nose as she found some paperwork on her desk to sort through. She seemed flustered to be suddenly the centre of attention.

  ‘Someone’s got to get the work done here,’ she said.

  ‘What’s this then?’ Eddie said, nodding familiarly at me. ‘New blood?’

  Brand said, ‘A special project. Sam, this is Eddie Hampshire, one of our longest-serving consultants. Don’t worry, Eddie, Sam’s not here to steal any work from you.’

  Eddie threw his head back and laughed again, showing the dark insides of his molars. ‘Take it!’ he said to me. ‘Take it all! See if you last as long as I have.’

  ‘You don’t look that old,’ I said mildly.

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘I said you’re bearing up. Being a consultant seems to have treated you well.’

  Hampshire looked at me closely. ‘Are you saying I’m fat?’ There was a sudden tension in the air. Betty turned away; Laura Marshall had come up beside us and looked on with amusement.

  I’d seen Eddie’s kind of bully before—the type that sets the emotional temperature for everyone else through sheer force of personality. He’s happy, everyone else is happy; he’s down, everyone else has to watch their step. I didn’t like them. And I didn’t mind letting them know.

  ‘You’re pleased to be here,’ I said. ‘Why don’t we leave it at that?’

  He stared at me bluntly for a moment, then allowed the smallest of smiles to lift the corners of his lips. �
�The life I’ve lived, Sam, I’m pleased to be anywhere.’ His mouth opened and the laughter came rumbling out again, though there was no sign of it in his eyes.

  We turned to go, and I noticed that behind us Eddie stopped laughing at once, as though a tap had been turned off. I felt his gaze following us as we walked away and I wondered whether he always found life so amusing.

  Brand said, ‘Do you get it now?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘These are real people, Sam. With livelihoods. Betty’s been with us seven years. The longest of anyone here. She’d be devastated if anything happened to the company so that it had to be sold.’

  ‘And Eddie?’

  ‘Ah, Eddie. One of our peak performers. Gives delegates a good time on courses. Always out in the hills somewhere, either going up or sliding down a rope. The delegates love him.’

  ‘You’re less keen.’

  ‘Let’s just say there’s only so much bonhomie you can take, isn’t there?’

  I’d thought he was tiresome after a couple of minutes. I wouldn’t have liked to work with him day in and day out.

  Brand walked me to the door.

  ‘I can’t persuade you, can I?’ he said.

  ‘I’m sorry. There’s nothing here for me. At this point I’d be wasting your money.’

  ‘I wish I was as sure as you are,’ he said. He drew a long breath and stared past me, a look of deep pain haunting his eyes. ‘Something’s going on and I don’t like it, but I can’t twist your arm.’

  No he couldn’t. But he should have tried harder.

  The next morning, my telephone rang as I was having breakfast.

  ‘Mr Dyke?’

  ‘In business hours, yes.’

  ‘Sorry to be so early.’

  She identified herself as Laura Marshall, the blonde woman from Rory Brand’s office. Her voice was cold and dispassionate but held an odd tremor.

  ‘What can I do for you?’ I asked.

  ‘They killed him,’ she said. ‘They got to him and killed him.’

  ‘Killed who?’ I said.

  ‘Rory, you fool. They killed Rory. He was found dead in his office this morning. They’d broken his neck. I want you to find out who did it. I want you to find out who did it and kill him. Do you understand?’