Jill Mansell - Mixed doubles

‘Okay if I disappear for an hour or two?’ asked Kit, when he had hung up the phone.

‘You can disappear for the next twenty years if you want to.’

Kit decided to ignore this. He reached for his jacket.

The last Rennie was noisily crunched up and swallowed. ‘Don’t bother sending me an invitation to the wedding, by the way.’

His father was clearly still simmering with fury, his face red, his fists clenched on the desk. Kit wondered if he was about to have a heart attack.

To placate him, and maybe lower his blood pressure a couple of notches, he said, ‘Dad, it doesn’t have to be like this. If you got to know Liza, you’d understand—’

‘Christ almighty, what is this?’ Leo roared, thumping the desk with his hand. ‘Who d’you think we are, the bloody Waltons?’

So much for making an effort. Kit shrugged.

‘Fine, have it your way,’ he said shortly. ‘I’ll be back around one.’

Marriott’s was the smartest jewellery shop in Bath, occupying a prime position on one of the smartest streets. Inside, the décor was opulent and suitably restrained, all slate-grey velvet, gleaming silver and the kind of lighting that made the most miserable diamond chip glitter like the Koh-i-noor.

Not, of course, that Marriott’s went in for diamond chips, Kit thought wryly. He wasn’t likely to forget this fact either, since as a child – and with Christmas approaching – he had heard his mother say Marriott’s was her favourite shop. He had duly trotted along with his pocket money the following week and asked one of the assistants to show him some necklaces. Very sweetly refusing to accept Kit’s seventy-three pence, the assistant had popped a Bic biro into one of Marriott’s sumptuous satin-lined, slate-grey velvet boxes and sent Kit happily on his way.

Now he was browsing with rather more than seventy-three pence in his pocket, and just as well.

There were some pretty startling price tags on display.

One of the assistants approached noiselessly across the plush, pale-grey carpet.

‘Diamond rings ... er, engagement rings,’ Kit murmured, slightly embarrassed.

She smiled.

‘Certainly, sir. How many?’

Kit relaxed and grinned back.

‘Just the one, for now.’

The woman, who was in her early forties, began unlocking cabinets. She was plump but attractive, with baby-blue eyes and a dimply smile. Kit wondered how long she had worked here and if she was the one who had given him the biro in the velvet box all those years ago.

The first tray of rings was brought out for Kit’s inspection. He picked up one, a fire-flashing oval solitaire, and turned it this way and that, imagining it on Liza’s finger.

The assistant was wearing L’Air du Temps. She smiled at Kit. ‘I know, it’s a beautiful ring.’

The more he thought about it, the more he felt she could be the same woman. Kit glanced at the other customers in the shop – a smart American couple, an old man and a middle-aged woman in a crumpled green Barbour – and said, ‘Have you been working here long?’

There was suppressed laughter in the assistant’s eyes. ‘Fifteen years. Why?’

‘Sorry,’ said Kit, ‘it wasn’t meant to sound like a chat-up line. I just wondered if—’

‘Everybody FREEZE!’ screamed a male voice as the door was flung open and two men in balaclavas burst into the shop.

One of the other assistants let out a terrified whimper. The American couple, like something out of a gangster movie, put their hands up.

‘Nobody move!’ yelled the second balaclava-ed figure, yanking open a black leather bag and grabbing the tray of rings Kit had just been looking at. The oval solitaire disappeared into the bag along with the rest. The first man pointed a sawn-off shotgun at the assistant who had whimpered.

‘Unlock the rest of the cases,’ he ordered roughly. ‘Go on, do it NOW’

When the second robber had pushed past him, the rank stench of sweat had filled Kit’s nostrils.

Now the man had moved away he could smell L’Air du Temps again.

Jewellery and watches were being hurled into the bag. Kit’s assistant watched the men, her expression petrified.

Kit, in turn, watched her trembling fingers slide with agonising slowness off the counter. He knew she was reaching for the panic button. Out of the corner of his eye he saw the shotgun swing in their direction.

‘Get away from the counter!’ screamed the balaclava-ed face. ‘Don’t touch anything!’

Since it was a silent alarm system, no one knew whether or not the button had been pressed.

Kit’s assistant moved as instructed towards the wall.

‘Not that far! Christ, she’s going for the pressure pads,’ the robber yelled. He charged towards her bellowing, ‘You asked for this, you stupid bitch,’ and brought the butt of the shotgun down on her blonde head.

The sickening THWACK and the sound of her scream as she crumpled to the floor was awful.

‘Des, for fuck’s sake get a move on,’ yelled the robber, turning his back on Kit for a split second.

Kit hurled himself forward, rugby-tackling him to the ground and knocking the gun out of his hands. Everyone in the shop watched it shoot across the carpet, ricochet off one of the ebony cabinets and slither to a halt at the feet of the other robber.

Kit watched him pick up the gun and take aim. He heard the woman in the green Barbour exclaim, ‘Don’t do this, please don’t do it!’

He heard the muffled voice of the man on the ground snarling, ‘Just kill the bastard.’

As he turned his head, still in that same split second, Kit saw the blonde assistant struggling to sit up. Blood was pouring from her head, the collar of her white shirt glistened crimson and one of her dark-blue shoes had come off.

Kit turned back. He still had his arms around the legs of the robber he had tackled to the ground.

‘Let go of him,’ yelled the one with the gun.

‘Jesus Christ,’ screamed the American woman, gibbering with fear, ‘can’t somebody do something?’

Kit watched the man’s eyes through the holes in his balaclava; they were wild with terror and panic.

Des, in turn, stared at the two figures on the ground, at the brother he idolised – only just out of Strangeways after a five-year stretch for armed robbery – and at the dark-haired boy clinging to him like a bloody leech, preventing his escape.

In the distance, Des heard the faint sinister wail of police sirens.

The American bitch was right; somebody had to do some- thing.

He cocked the gun. Then, his finger shaking, he pulled the trigger.

Chapter 49

If there was anything less alluring than a frumpy wig, it was a wet frumpy wig. Liza, admiring her reflection in the ladies’ room of the Queen of Puddings in Windsor, resisted the temptation to run a comb through the straggly mess. The condescending manner of the maître d’, who clearly regarded her as some kind of eccentric bag lady and wasn’t bothering to conceal his distaste, deserved a special mention, she felt.

Otherwise the Queen of Puddings couldn’t be faulted. The chef, a young Australian who had previously trained under Michel Roux, had a sublimely light touch. Liza had given the flash-fried smoked salmon with lime sauce top marks and the roast gigot, pink and tender, had been served with possibly the best potatoes – baked with olive oil, garlic and sage – she had ever eaten in her life.

Looking forward to a pudding, a buttermilk bavarois with raspberry coulis, Liza made her way back to the dining room. She saw the maître d’ mutter something under his breath to one of the young waiters and knew she was being talked about. He was probably warning the boy to keep an eye on the cutlery, make sure none of it walked.