Sneak Peek Week!! MISS TAKEN IDENTITY

Read the first six chapters of Book 1 in The Miss Trilogy, a fast-paced con-gone-wrong.

The text might contain language or sexual references unsuitable for under 18s.

© Annie Holder 2017

Murderous gangsters, bent coppers, cheating wives, greed and lies – in Miss Taken Identity, no one is quite what they seem.

One final grift to set him up for life – and it’s a peach.

The Marks are fools, the double-cross pure poetry, and it’ll net him millions.

What career con-man Ricky McAllister hasn’t bargained for is ending up a corpse in a rich man’s mansion, unwittingly setting in motion a rollercoaster of backstabbing and betrayal.

How did Ricky wind up dead, and who will pay the ultimate price for his avarice?

MISS TAKEN IDENTITY by Annie Holder

ONE

Nathan Palmer takes the precaution of pulling on a balaclava and gloves as he approaches the wide open front door of Pickford Lodge.  He’s confident of entering unchallenged.  If the information he’s been given is accurate, there’s only one man left inside this building, and he’s well beyond voicing any objection to Nathan’s presence. 

The chandelier in the grand hallway refracts pinpoints of bright light across the high ceiling like a twinkling galaxy of stars. 

An antique chair incongruously occupies the centre of the tiled floor.  Tangled around the legs are the severed strands of brocaded curtain tie-backs – they look as if they’ve been used as bonds to secure a prisoner, and subsequently sliced through with a blade.  Beyond this solitary chair is the scene he’s here to verify.

Sure enough, he knows the dead man lying at the bottom of the stairs.  Knows him, and hates him.  This man is utterly responsible for the reprehensible way Nathan Palmer now has to live his life.  That he’s dead should come as a relief to Nathan, but it doesn’t.  All this corpse does is present him with a fresh set of problems. 

He’s supposed to be calling the police.  He definitely isn’t meant to be here in person…but when you’ve got a crime scene to strip of incriminating evidence before the local plod rock up, you can’t hang about pondering the personal ramifications of this latest in a long line of catastrophes. 

Nathan Palmer wrinkles his nose against the stench emanating from the body at his feet, and begins his unpleasant but necessary task with the speed and efficiency of long practice.

TWO

Nathan flicks from headlights to sidelights, and swings his car through the gap in the chain-link fencing, body swaying from side to side in the seat as he creeps the luxury BMW he’d never be able to afford on an honest copper’s salary across the uneven waste ground – it’d be just his luck to get a puncture or chip an alloy wheel driving into something in the dark.

A long-abandoned industrial unit stands at the rear of the otherwise empty site, and Nathan drives past it, stopping his car between the remains of the building and the rear fence separating site from railway line.  He flashes his headlights once, and waits.  A corresponding flash flares from the darkness at the other end of the building, so Nathan gets out of his car, takes his torch from the glove compartment, and retrieves something from the boot.

The winter wind whips across the flat, exposed ground, causing what’s left of the rusting steel-framed structure to creak and grind eerily in the blackness to his right.  Every unexpected sound makes his stomach tighten with apprehension, but he keeps his pace brisk, stumbling a couple of times on the rubble littering his path, making the torch beam waver crazily.  As Nathan approaches, the interior light briefly illuminates a tall, lithe figure stepping from the other vehicle.  As the door closes, Nathan’s torch is once again the only brightness.  He comprehends the impossibility of shining it either directly into the face of his companion or in more general exploration of the immediate surroundings.  Such an act implies suspicion they’re not alone, suggesting he doesn’t trust the word of the other man; a suicidally unwise intimation.  He just has to hope no one else has tagged along for this ride and complete the job he’s come to do.

Remaining silent, torch beam prudently pointing at the least provocative thing he can think of – the ground between their respective feet – Nathan waits politely for permission to begin.

Despite their earlier conversation, Jimmy Chadwick’s rich, silky voice betrays no hint of disquiet, “Good evening Detective Sergeant Palmer. You mentioned on the telephone there was something important to discuss; so important it couldn’t wait.”

Nathan nods earnestly, “Yeah, I did.  It is important.  I’ve just had to go tearing down to Kent to do some tidying up.  You’re not going to like what I found.”

Nathan swings what he’s carrying into view, placing it on the ground, and using the torch to illuminate the partially-unzipped holdall containing what appears to be many bundles of £20 notes.  In the blink of an eye, Jimmy leaps sideways, yanks open his car door, and snaps on the headlights.  Nathan recoils, dazzled, his eyes by now accustomed to the dark.  Despite swiftly sidestepping the direct path of the intense beams, he’s unable to avoid the black, gold, and purple dots that pulse and burst across his vision.  By the time his pupils readjust, the tall figure is already crouching over the bag, scrabbling inside,  “Where did you say this was?”

“Kent.  An enormous-great mansion in the middle of nowhere, belonging to a bloke called Marc Pickford; heard of him?”

Chadwick doesn’t answer, appearing tense but unsurprised, as if Nathan hasn’t yet told him anything new.  After fanning a long, thin thumb across the edge of one of the bundles, and tossing it back into the top of the bag, he turns suspicious, narrowing eyes upon Nathan, “And how did you know it was there?”

“Because it’s a crime scene.”

Chadwick wipes a bony hand across his mouth, as if removing an unpleasant taste, and eases slowly to his feet.  He points to the holdall’s contents, “That’s mine, Nathan.  Did you know?”

“No…I didn’t!” stutters Nathan truthfully, adding speedily, “But I…made an educated guess based on evidence.”

It takes only a fraction of a second to realise what a spectacularly foolish choice of word that is, as Chadwick rounds upon him, growling, “Evidence?”

Not for the first time, Nathan registers detached amazement at the strength disguised within the slim frame, as Chadwick grips the front of his jacket, drags him violently around, and throws him forcefully against the side of his car.  Painfully winded; suddenly terrified, Nathan pants frantically, “I went there first!  I cleared it before it became a crime scene!  I removed what I thought were the obvious links to you – that’s what I’m trying to say!”

The man hammers him repeatedly, almost rhythmically, against the Range Rover’s bodywork, “What…were…the…links…to…me, Nathan?  How the fuck did you end up in Kent ferreting around where it’s no concern of yours?  How is a crime scene in the countryside a Metropolitan Police problem?” 

Chadwick’s face is so close that Nathan can feel the warmth of the other man’s breath on his cheek.  Dropped in the dirt, his torch spotlights a circle of rusted metal on the side of the ramshackle building, so Nathan keeps his gaze fixed firmly on that rather than daring to make direct eye contact as he gurgles, “Because of Ricky McAllister!”

A jolt passes through his aggressor like a bolt of electricity.  Nathan feels it spasm the nimble body.  He tenses for another bombardment.  Unexpectedly, Chadwick releases him instead, shoving Nathan away as if his physical proximity disgusts him.  Nathan totters unsteadily, righting himself by grabbing imprudently at the Range Rover’s wingmirror.  Fortunately, it doesn’t snap off.  He straightens slowly, uncurling with a low grunt at the dull pain already pulsing through his bruising shoulder blades.

Chadwick lights a cigarette, the chilly gusts whirling the smoke away from his lips as he demands, “From the beginning, Nathan, if you would be so kind…”

Nathan leans gingerly against the side of the car, as standing upright and unsupported makes his chest ache every time he draws breath.  Perhaps repeated pummelling against the vehicle has cracked a rib?

Holding out a staying hand, Nathan reaches very deliberately – like a magician assuring a sceptical audience there’s nothing up his sleeve – into his inside jacket pocket, withdrawing a police warrant card in his fingertips and holding it out to Chadwick.  With one wary glance, the figure snatches it, whips round to the front of the vehicle, and examines it in the headlight beam.  By the time he wanders back, a slow smile is spreading across the aquiline features.

“What is this all about, Nathan?  Where did this come from?”

“Same crime scene.”

Jimmy might be smiling now, but Nathan’s deeply troubled.  It’s quite evident Chadwick has no idea what’s befallen his favourite.  Nathan doesn’t want to be the one who has to tell Jimmy that counterfeit cash and Ricky’s unfathomable ID aren’t the only things he found at Pickford Lodge…but it appears there’s no alternative.

“I need to get something else out of the car.”

“Hurry up.”

Nathan edges nervously past Chadwick and jogs to the BMW, retrieving a stuffed packet from the passenger seat.  Trotting back, every step jarring his bruised body agonisingly, he holds out the envelope to Jimmy, who receives it with a wordless lift of one questioning eyebrow.

Nathan gestures, “Also at the crime scene.  Your name’s scribbled all over it.  Another one of the reasons I rang you.”

Jimmy opens the passenger door and perches on the seat, using the interior light to illuminate his perusal of the papers.  There are several sheets with his name written in the top right-hand corner.  His expression betrays some familiarity with the contents.  The other pages are obviously new to him.  He spends some time over these, reading in reasonable detail, eyes widening in disbelief.  Nathan holds his breath, and tries to become invisible.  The further Chadwick progresses through the packet, the more dangerously his dark eyes glitter and flash.  At length, what escapes from between clenched teeth is the low, resonant, powerfully-delivered, “I’ll kill him!”

Nathan swallows.  Here it comes; the unavoidable denouement of this terrible night.

“That lying, cheating, scheming little shit!  He’s gone too far this time!  Too far!  I can see now I’ve indulged that selfish little bastard too much; too long.  I’ve turned so many blind eyes to his mischief over the years because that’s all it ever was – mischief – but this!  This!”  Here, Chadwick shakes the thick sheaf of papers violently, making them flap heavily like a helpless pigeon impaled upon the talons of a bird of prey.

“If that cocky little fucker thinks he’s getting away with this!  He’s going to suffer for this, Nathan.  He’ll be begging me to put an end to his pain!”

This is it.  The moment.  Nathan opens his mouth, but no sound comes out.  He shuts it again, but knows he can’t stay silent.  He has to say it.

“Mr Chadwick, I need to tell you…something else.  The reason…um…the reason that house in Kent is a crime scene isn’t anything to do with your counterfeit money, Ricky’s dodgy ID, or whatever’s in that envelope, as far as I can tell – because the local Plod don’t know a thing about any of them.  I cleared them out before their team even got there.  The reason it’s a crime scene is because…well…because…there’s a corpse in it!”

Chadwick stands slowly, like a snake uncoiling, again advancing upon Nathan with that unexplained threat still glinting in his evil eyes.  Nathan feels a small seepage of urine trickle onto the fabric of his underpants, and clenches everything to prevent the humiliation of wetting himself in Jimmy’s presence, croaking, “His pain’s over, Mr Chadwick.  There’s no need for you to kill him.  Someone’s already done it!”

Expecting a violent reaction of some sort, Nathan is nonetheless completely unprepared for the form it takes.  Chadwick’s legs buckle and he staggers backwards as if Nathan has reached out and pushed him, plonking awkwardly down onto the passenger seat and tumbling sideways like a ragdoll, almost rolling straight out of the vehicle onto the ground before recovering sufficient presence of mind to grab the headrest.  A noise escapes him that sounds unbelievably like a sob.  Grimly fascinated, Nathan simply stands and stares.  All London’s incessant noise ceases the moment the words leave his lips.  No cars whoosh and rush on the distant road.  No air traffic whines overhead.  No goods trains roar past them on the night-time line.  Even the wind stops its persistent worrying at the rusting metal ruins.  Every city sound is blotted out by the deafening, rapid pounding of Nathan’s overstraining heart, thudding in his ears like Dancehall bass.

Chadwick gapes uncomprehendingly, jaw working, lips clamped tight shut, breath coming in sharp bursts from flaring nostrils.  At length, he manages to gasp, “Tell me!”

Nathan swallows and keeps his eyes downcast as he dispassionately reports, “He was on the hall floor at the foot of the stairs.  He was cold, but not rock hard, so I don’t know how long he’d been there…you’ll have to wait for pathology reports from the case file, if I can get my hands on it.  From body position, I’d say his neck had snapped, but, again…pathology…  His nose was definitely broken – claret all down his front.”

Jimmy inhales violently, doubling over in the seat as if he’s been punched in the stomach.  Nathan pauses his commentary, and mutters faintly, “Sorry.”

Jimmy takes a deep breath and runs flat palms over his greying hair, smoothing; soothing…trying to rub away the grief; push it down the back of his neck and make it slip away behind him, dispensed with; forgotten.  Elbows on the dashboard, he sinks head into hands.  Nathan’s torn, on the one hand convinced witnessing the slipping of Chadwick’s mask of invulnerability won’t bode well for him in the future; on the other, both shocked and surprised by how extremely affecting it is to spectate upon the man’s obvious torment.  To Nathan’s considerable amazement, thin lines of tears track from under Chadwick’s long lashes, traverse the hollows beneath the prominent cheekbones, collect momentarily at the corners of the tightly-pressed lips, and finally drip from chin to lap in a steady stream.  Nathan’s doing only what he must to preserve his own corrupted hide, but he can’t help feeling for Chadwick.  The isolation of the man’s position has never appeared more starkly-defined than at this very moment.  What price wealth, power, and total control if it marches lockstep with such agonising loneliness?

Thus occupied, Nathan’s startled by Chadwick struggling out thickly through continuing tears, “Twenty-eight years I knew Richard McAllister…  Twenty-eight!  He was a boy…a little, clueless boy…but by God he had self-confidence by the bucket-load!  People said he was cocky, but they didn’t understand.  What he had was superlative self-belief.  He just couldn’t entertain the possibility of failure, ever!  To Ricky, there was always a way to pull it back from the brink.  You just had to give your brain a bit of exercise and you’d discover it.  I don’t expect you to understand, but there’s something quite irresistible about that, Nathan…something utterly compelling about a person who doesn’t know when they’re beaten.  It’s maddening, certainly, but so much more than that.  You know, he could talk his way out of anything?  He had such a singularly agile mind, and a way of carrying you along with whatever he was doing that made him impossible to resist.  Deep down you suspected manipulation, sure, but it was such an enjoyable ride you’d let him do it anyway…”

Jimmy’s tone is wistful, longing for something – someone – he can never have again.  He’s far from here, reliving moments spent with a man common knowledge had always tacitly understood as more than just another employee.

Chadwick shivers suddenly, and blinks uncomprehendingly about him, as if he can’t believe the world’s still turning.  In his heart, Nathan Palmer remains a decent man.  He’s made some rash decisions, the consequences of which have resulted in the life he lives today, but his innate compassion prevents him observing another human’s suffering without at least attempting to offer some comfort.  As Chadwick wrestles with the onslaught of grief, a long-forgotten memory surfaces within Nathan Palmer, astonishing him with its clarity.  Hesitantly, he ventures, “I know what it’s like to lose a…um…a mate.  My best friend, Danny, was killed when we were kids.  We did everything together – he was more like a brother, really.  He got into a bit of trouble with some lads on our estate…we weren’t into the gang stuff, but some of them were going that way, and what started as a row over nicking our football turned into pushing and shoving and, before I knew it, one of them stuck this flick-knife in my mate and there he was, lying across my legs, blood pumping out of him like a fountain.  I cried and cried for help and eventually someone did come.  They called an ambulance and the police but it was too late by then.  Danny just died on the pavement, with all these people watching but no one doing a damn thing to help him.  I couldn’t really get my head around it.  His football was in the gutter about three feet away from us, and it seemed so stupid that he’d sacrificed his life for it.  At the time, I can remember thinking it wasn’t worth it – not even a particularly good football, you know?  Not a leather one or anything, just one of those crappy plastic ones you get from the petrol station.  My mate defended it so hard because we were pissed right off with the bigger kids taking whatever they wanted of ours whenever they liked.  It was the principle of the thing.  It’s sort of why I became a copper, actually,” Nathan smiles mournfully, “For the principle of taking a stand for right against wrong.”  He thinks about what he’s done today; just today, let alone the years – has it really been years – of his shameful corruption, and shakes his head regretfully. 

The irony of his words is not lost on Chadwick, who makes prolonged and unexpectedly-ruminative eye contact, “How do you feel about your principles nowadays, Nathan?”

Nathan shrugs defensively, “Life isn’t as black and white as it was when I was thirteen.  The grey area in the middle is where you do what you must to survive…isn’t it?”

“Quite so, Nathan, quite so.”

Silence again.  Jimmy stares blankly at the circle Nathan’s torch beam makes on the side of the building.  Nathan wonders why Danny Boyd suddenly charged so forcefully from the past; a harrowing recollection he’d mistakenly assumed would be diluted by the passage of time; something so deeply personal he can’t now believe he shared it with Chadwick, of all people!  Perhaps it had been the shocking sight of McAllister in that elegant hallway, glassily staring at nothing?  Nathan recalls Danny’s big, brown eyes gazing up at him.  Danny had understood what was going to happen long before Nathan himself had worked it out, and retained that steady, knowing stare for the four minutes it took him to die across thirteen-year-old Nathan Palmer’s brand new jeans.

As Nathan pictures Danny Boyd, whose unseeing eyes had continued to stare intently upwards at the space where his best mate’s face had been until the ambulance man closed them, Chadwick again slumps forward in the car seat, finally losing his battle to hold the torrent of emotion in check, chest and shoulders heaving with tortured sobs, hands flopped helplessly in his lap as if he’ll never have the strength to move them again.

The grey area, where you do what you must to survive, seems to be expanding to cover the planet.  Unable to believe what he’s doing, as if responsibility for the limb and its independent movement belong to someone else entirely, Nathan watches his own right hand lift slowly, place itself on the shuddering shoulder of the most dangerous man he’s ever met, and remain there.

THREE

Annelisse delights in the sudden rigidity of Phil’s body on top of her; the gasp, groan, and shudder as he orgasms.  She loves that she can still excite and satisfy him after all these years.  Unlike her husband, Phil’s desire for her hasn’t faded.  Fired up by her at twenty-seven, Marc was bored by thirty.  By forty, she’d ceased to exist.  It would have hurt, but for Phil’s undiminished devotion.  Her entire sixteen-year marriage in the arms of another, and not a shred of guilt.

Phil sighs contentedly, kisses her shoulder, rolls off her to check the time on his ‘phone.  Annelisse stretches, wriggles, and giggles lazily as she watches the velvet blackness of Phil’s long fingers tickle their way across the milky whiteness of her firming, swelling lower stomach.

“I’ve got to go soon.”

She frowns, “Mmmm…not just yet…”

“Five minutes.”

“Okay.”  She closes her eyes and rests her head back against him. “Do you think he can feel it?”

“What?”

“Peanut.  Do you think he can feel you squidged on top of him?”

Phil chuckles, “Four months…he’s about the size of a potato.  I doubt I’m bothering him.  When he starts to get in the way, you’ll have to go on top, won’t you?”

Annelisse gasps and digs him in the ribs with her elbow, “Will I even feel like it by the time I’m that pregnant?”

Phil hugs her closer to him, “From previous experience, probably not.  I’ve got to get back to work, babe.”

He kisses her cheek, gets up, starts to dress hurriedly.

Annelisse rolls onto her side, wraps an arm across her stomach, and watches him rush around retrieving his scattered clothing, “Part of me feels guilty.”

Tying his tie, Phil stops mid-knot, staring at her disbelievingly, snorting sarcastically, “Which part?”

Annelisse pouts and says nothing.

Phil sits on the edge of the bed and looks steadily at her, betraying no emotion.

Annelisse sits up, takes his face in both her small palms, and kisses him ardently.  Phil’s warm hands curl around her hips and squeeze firmly, fingers pressing into her skin.  He smiles as their lips part, “Don’t try to butter me up.  All this ‘I feel guilty’ bollocks!  I have asked you twice to marry me.  Twice!  And twice you said no.  So, you don’t feel that guilty about cheating, do you – or you wouldn’t have refused me in the first place?”

Annelisse drops her hands from his face, exhaling moodily and thumping back against the padded headboard, tugging at the tumbled covers, tucking her knees up against her chest, folding her arms defensively around them, turning her face away from him.

Phil sniggers and crosses to the table, slipping on his jacket and filling his pockets with wallet, keys, mobile ‘phone and warrant card, admonishing, “Sulking like a teenager doesn’t change the facts!”

Annelisse straightens the bedclothes prissily, scowls, avoids eye contact.

“I begged you to be with me!  You said no…but you couldn’t leave it, could you?  You wanted to have your slice of chocolate cake and eat it!”

Annelisse giggles behind her hand, knowing she should be taking this telling-off more seriously, “And why did you turn me down, Annie?  Because I couldn’t give you the lifestyle he could, eh?  Most of us manage on our average pay packets; you two seem to need the GDP of a small country to keep you going!”

“It’s taken me a long while to realise what’s important, I admit – “

“Bullshit!  The only reason you’re stringing me along now is you’re having an inconvenient brown baby you can’t pass off as his!  You’ve no choice but to throw in your lot with me!  It’s lucky for you I’ve loved you for all this time; that I’m prepared to put up with it.”

“I’ve wanted a baby for so long…”

Phil slides on his overcoat, “What a shame Marky-boy wasn’t up to the job.”

“Are we doing it, Phil?  Are we going, for real?”

“You’re asking me to give up an awful lot, Annie.  You’re expecting me to walk away from a second marriage, my sons – “

“You’ve cheated on Jonelle, with me, for the entirety of your marriage – it can’t be that precious to you!”

“You’re asking me to leave my boys, Annie!  When the baby’s born, you’ll understand…”

“I want us to have what we should have had sixteen years ago – our family.”

“So, why didn’t you say yes to me when I asked you, before your flashy engagement party, huh?  Something about the obscene amounts of money, wasn’t it?  And his family owning half of Sussex?”

“I was young!”

“And greedy.  And now you’re middle-aged, and desperate.”

“Phil, I want – “

“You want an easy life, sweet…only now it’s getting complicated, isn’t it?”

“When the baby comes, if I’m still there, his bloody family will make mincemeat of me in the divorce court.  They’ve never liked me!  If I go now, before anyone knows I’m pregnant, fifty per cent of it is ours, Phil!  Fifty per cent of tens of millions is plenty enough to start a new life with – even for me!  You’ll be able to give Jonelle the house, maintenance, a share of your police pension, without batting an eyelid!  That’ll be chicken-feed compared to what we’ll have…but we must keep the baby, and us, a secret until the divorce is settled.  After that, it’s none of his business anyway.”

Phil glances distractedly at his watch, “But you told me there’s no money!”

Annelisse rolls her eyes in exasperation, “I knew you weren’t listening; you were just trying to get my knickers off!  There’s assets, but no cash, I said!”

Phil shakes his head dismissively, “If you want to do a moonlight flit, we need ready cash, Annie.”

“But he can’t seem to generate any!  Whenever he tries to do anything, his interfering father steps in and shuts it down.  His hands are tied!  God knows how he ever stood up to the old bastard long enough to make all that money in the first place, he’s such a…a…buffoon!”

Phil laughs richly, “Good word!  That’s exactly what he is! It’s not a new phenomenon.  He’s been a buffoon since university.  He was a buffoon when you married him…”

“It didn’t get under my skin as much then.”

“But the longer it goes on, the more annoying it becomes?  Serves you right!  If there’s no money, we’re not going anywhere, are we?” His hand is on the hotel room doorknob, about to turn it, return to reality imminent.

“I know how to get some!”

Sarcastic, he scoffs, “Really…”

“Yes!  All that matters is Peanut stays a secret until the divorce is done…until we’ve got our share of the money.  We just need enough to live on until then.”

Suddenly suspicious, Phil asks, “Annie, what are you going to do?”

“Free up some cash for us.”

“How long will that take?”  She can’t do it.  She’s clutching at straws.

“I don’t know.”

Phil points at her stomach, “He’s showing already.  I don’t care how much you say Marc ignores you, soon he’s going to be showing too much for you to hide.”

“I’ve got an idea!”

“It better not be a stupid risk – “

“Phil, we’ve been taking stupid risks for sixteen years!  At least this one’ll make you a multi-millionaire!”

Phil shakes his head again, opening the door.  He pauses on the threshold, turning back towards her, “You’ve shafted me twice before.  Why should I believe you won’t do it again?”

Annelisse sits up in the bed, letting the covers fall to expose her naked body once more.

“Annie, I’ve got to go back to work.”

“If this comes off, you’ll never have to work again.  We can just stay in bed and screw all day – ”

“With a pair of little brown eyes watching you from the doorway: ‘Mummy, what are you doing?’  I don’t think so, somehow.”

Annelisse beams and strokes her stomach, “It’s exciting!”

Phil smiles, enchanted by her delight and maddened by her naivety, “It’s hard work is what it is.”

“I want this, Phil.  You, me, our baby…”

He pretends to bang his head against the edge of the hotel room door, “You drive me nuts, you know?  You’re an addiction I can’t shake.”

Annelisse grins, eases back onto her elbows on the bed, opens her legs, beckons him.  Phil closed his eyes, grips the door handle, struggles to master his burgeoning erection, “I’m going back to work.  You show me something concrete – dates, times, how you’re going to get this money…then we’ll see.”

“And if I don’t?”

“You’re stuck there.  I’d love to be a fly on the wall when your landed gentry in-laws arrive at the hospital and clap eyes on their African grandchild.”

Annelisse gapes, “You’d just drop me in it?”

“Why not?  You’ve done it to me twice.”

Annelisse smiles, kneels up, lifts her hair from her neck, writhes her pelvis, throws back her head, and breathes, “Come on, darling, you know you want to.”

“Oh yeah, I want to…but I’m not going to unless it’s worth my while.”

She glares at him, hands on hips, seduction abandoned, “You shit!”

“You and I have danced around this for too long, Annie.  You’re asking me to make a huge sacrifice.  How do I know you really mean it this time?”

****

Nathan Palmer closes one eye, adjusts his trajectory, aims, throws, and scores a direct hit, the foam stress-ball bouncing off the side of Phillip Fishmandatu’s bowed head, “Striiiiikkkkkeeeeaaaa!”

Phillip lurches in his chair and glares at him, “You need a kick up the arse sometimes!  What makes you think stuff like that is a good idea?”

“What is the matter with you?”

“Huh?”

“You’ve been a miserable sod all afternoon!  I’ve asked you questions and you’ve completely ignored me.  Did you even notice the phone ringing just then, ’cos you ignored that too…?”

Phillip rubs his eyes, subsiding into his chair like a deflating balloon, “Sorry mate, I’ve got a headache.”

Nathan leans forward across his desk, teasing, “I’ve told you not to shag at lunchtime.  It wears you out.”

Phil laughs.  He can’t help it.  Sheepish, he glances around the open-plan office before also leaning towards the centre of their facing desks and muttering, “How did you know?”

Nathan winks, “The look on your face, mostly.  How is the divine Mrs P?”

Phillip wonders what to say.  He desperately wants to unload the explosive secret he’s been carrying around for two months.  If anyone can be trusted with it, it’s Nathan.

He sighs, takes a chance, “She’s pregnant, Nate.”

Nathan blows out his cheeks in an amazed whistle, “You de man! Baby number four!”

“Not ideal, eh?”

“No…could be a bit embarrassing for her when the time comes, couldn’t it?”

“I don’t think it’ll come to that, Nate.”

“She’s getting rid of it?”

“No, she wants it.  She thought she couldn’t have one!  It’s not as if we’ve ever taken any precautions.  Both Marc and I have had sixteen years’ go at it.”

“Jesus!  Has it been that long?”

“Yeah…between splitting up with Simone and getting with Jonelle.”

“Bloody hell!  I knew it’d been a long time, but…”

“Yeah.  Crazy, right? I should’ve had some self-respect and walked away the first time she turned me down…but I love her, Nate…and she loves me.”

Nathan fidgets, wanting to be frank but concerned about angering his friend, “She loves money more though, eh?”

“It’s not that exactly…she’s just got used to being able to have what she wants without worrying about how much it costs.  It’s a hard habit to break, I think.  She says there is a way we can have the life we both wish for.  She can divorce Marc and get her half – “

“Shit!  Half the Pickford millions?”

“Shhh, keep your voice down!  Yeah – half the value of that mansion, the villa in Spain, the art collection, the jewellery, the antiques, the cars…  You’ve got to be looking at maybe twenty mill!  She gets the money she can’t live without, the baby she’s wanted forever…and I finally get my girl – “

“And live happily ever after?”

Phillip shrugs defensively.  He doesn’t like Nate’s sceptical tone.

“What about your boys?”

“I know!  But I’ve got a good relationship with Reece, haven’t I?  Just because I’m not with their mum doesn’t mean I can’t have the same sort of closeness with Mike and Tyler.”

“Phil, your split with Simone was fairly amicable, really.  You were too young to be married, you drifted apart once you had Reece…but you both put him first, and neither of you was with anyone else then.  You didn’t leave Simone for another woman, a new baby and twenty million quid!  Do you think the twins’ll still want to hang with their daddy when they get a bit older and realise they were second-best to a fat wadge of cash?”

Phillip hisses angrily, “I’m not going for the twenty million quid!  The money’s for Annie!  You know she won’t leave Marc without it.”

“Why not just stay the way you are?  You have your boys, Jonelle’s blissfully ignorant, and Annie keeps her first-class seat on the gravy train!”

“Because of the baby!  It changes everything.  We’ve got five months.  The clock’s ticking loud, man!”

Nathan rubs a hand across his stubbled chin, “Fishy, what were you thinking?”

“We relaxed!  If it hasn’t happened for sixteen years, it’s never going to, right?  We’re in our forties!  What are the chances?”

“The planets just aligned for you, mate.”

“Not for me!  Oh, Nate, I’m in shit up to my eyebrows – “

“What do you want?”

“I want Annelisse.  I always have.”

“Easy decision then.  Go for her plan, take the money, do a runner.”

“It’s not an easy decision!”

Nathan thumps the desk aggressively.  A few heads briefly turn in their direction.  Lowering his voice, Nathan leans closer, “You’ve been obsessed with her for as long as I’ve known you!  It won’t change now.  Whatever happens, no other relationship will ever survive because you’re tied together with a bit of invisible elastic.  You try to pull away, but you always bounce back to one another again.  You might as well yield to the inevitable.”

“If I’d had my way, we would have married sixteen years ago, and none of this other crap would ever have happened!”

“But you wouldn’t have the twins – “

“No, agreed…but I’d still have Reece, and I might have other children instead of the twins…and a lot less heartache.”

“I doubt it.  Not with her.  Two years of hearts and flowers, then she would have run off with a rich bloke and left you in tatters.”

“You’re probably right.  She’s not known for her reliability, but I can’t seem to function without her.  You know I had sex with her at my wedding?”

“What?!”

“Oh yeah, I’m a classy dude and no mistake!  While Marc was propping up the bar getting drunk with all our old Uni mates the way he does, and my new wife was on the dancefloor in her expensive, white dress with all her bridesmaids, I was in the back of the cloakroom screwing the woman I really loved.  I shouldn’t have married Jonelle, but what was I supposed to do?  Annie had turned me down twice in five years!  I didn’t want to be on my own forever.  I just drifted into that marriage.  Jonelle made the decision and I didn’t argue.  I was fond of her, but that’s not a basis for the rest of your life, is it?  I loved Annelisse with a passion from the first moment Marc introduced her to me.  He was meant to be marrying some girl he worked with – but he got cold feet at the last minute, apparently.  I never met her.  He went on holiday to Spain ’til the dust settled, and came back engaged to Annie!  He rang me and said he was really going through with a wedding this time.  We met up for a beer in some pub by the river and he introduced her.  She was in this tiny summer dress, Spanish tan, big smile, no bra…”

Nathan starts sniggering, which makes Phillip smile too, relishing the perfection of the memory, “Marc buggered off to the bar to get a round in.  We locked eyes.  Something…happened…  We first had sex about two days later, in that crappy flat I had in Brixton after I got divorced.”

“I remember.  The bedroom was so small you had to sleep with your feet in the wardrobe.”

“That’s the one!  We screwed across every inch of that place…up the walls, everything!  She still married him, though…but kept coming back to me.”

An expression of genuine sorrow crosses Fishmandatu’s face. Nathan notices it, and ventures, “Ever regretted it?”

Phil’s firm shake of the head is unequivocal, “Not for a second.  I can see it’s dumb.  I can see how I’m being used sometimes, but I don’t care.  I can’t stop.”

“Decision made, then.”

“I’m a bastard, aren’t I?”

“Hey, neither of us is Mother Theresa!”

“I wish I could take the boys with me.”

“You know that’s impossible…and could you really do that to Jonelle?”

“No…but, truthfully, leaving them behind is the only bit I’m struggling with.”

“Dealing with that guilt is your penance for the sin.”

“I can carry guilt around, Nate.  I’ve been having an extra-marital affair for sixteen years with the wife of one of my oldest friends.  I don’t care about any of that – my wife, my so-called mate – only my sons…”

“Is it worth sticking out the rest of your life with a woman you don’t love?  You’re forty-four, not eighty-four.  You have to decide: your happiness, or theirs.”

“They’re my sons!  Their happiness is my responsibility!”

“What about your new child?  Leave Jonelle or don’t but, either way, Family Fishmandatu’s got a shock coming, hasn’t it?  Your marriage might not withstand it anyway.  Your boys might not speak to you after they find out.  By that time, the Pickford dynasty’s expensive lawyers will have booted out his penniless, adulterous wife and her disgracefully-brown baby…and she won’t want you, because there’s no money.  You’ll have lost everything.  At least twenty mill in the bank’ll take the edge off the hurt of being without your boys…and you might not lose them.  They might quite like their new and improved, fancy, rich daddy.”

“Are you telling me to leave my wife, Nathan?”

“I’m being a proper mate and walking you through your options, that’s all.  It’ll take over a year for the divorce to come through, won’t it; as I imagine Pickford’ll contest it the whole way?  What you going to live on ’til then?”

“She says she can get some money.”

“Off him?  She nicks cash off him, the lawyers’ll have a field day! She’ll never get her half of the fortune!”

“No, not from him, apparently.  She says some other way.  The baby and I stay secret until the divorce is final and she gets her half, all above-board.  In the meantime, they separate.  He’s none the wiser.  He knows she wants a divorce, but not that she’s pregnant, and certainly not that it’s mine.”

“Some other way?”

“Yeah…she was cagey about that – “

“So?”

“I told her I wanted the full plan before I made my decision.  I said if she messed me around again, she was on her own.  There’s too much at stake this time.”

“Nice, bro!  The pressure’s on her for once.  Is she showing?”

“Little bit…just starting to.”

“She must be papping herself.  If she doesn’t get into her nightie quick enough at bedtime and he spots it…?”

Fishmandatu nods.

“The onus is on her to amass an escape fund, then!”

“That’s about the shape and size of it, yeah.  I can’t, can I?  I’ve got an ex-wife, a new wife, a mortgage, a son with student loans to clear, seven-year-old twins growing out of stuff so fast I can’t keep up…there’s no spare cash in my bloody account!”

“And she’s surrounded by assets worth tens of millions she can’t touch until she’s legally permitted to!  Daft, isn’t it?”

“Because she’s insisting on keeping this baby!  It’s what’s causing all the trouble.”

“Did you point that out?”

Phillip rolls his eyes at Nathan, hissing sarcastically, “Oh, didn’t think of that…!  Of course I’ve bloody pointed it out!”

“But she won’t be swayed?”

“Nate, she’s longed for a baby for fifteen years…would you be swayed?”

“Fair point.”

“Whichever way I jump, I risk losing contact with one or more of my children.”

Nathan sits back in his chair, tapping the blotter on his desktop with the end of his biro, “Heard of these things called condoms? Wonderful invention!”

“All right!  Bit late for all that?  I could close that stable door, but my horse is already halfway across the next field!”

Nathan smirks, “I’ve made some stupid decisions in my life, mate, but …!”

Phillip groans, rubbing his hands hard through his short hair, “What would you do, Nate?”

Nathan wags an admonitory finger, “Oh no! I’m not getting into that.  If it all goes wrong, you’ll be blaming me!  No, no, Fishy; what I’d do doesn’t matter a jot!  It’s what you’re going to do that’s important.”

“And I can’t decide…”

“It hinges on the money, right?  Where’s she getting it from so you stay in the clear?”

“I don’t know!  I can’t even begin to guess what’s going through her head.”

“For Christ’s sake, you’re a Detective Sergeant!”

“So?”

“So, find out, pronto – before it bites you on the arse!”

FOUR

Ricky stares vacantly at the brown patch of damp on the living room ceiling, mind blank, concentrating only on the tightness of his chest as he draws in the smoke, holds it for a second within, exhales through flaring nostrils.  The rain hammers persistently on the concrete walkway outside the front window, the odd gust driving an occasional harsh spattering of fat droplets against the glass.  He listens to the rustle, mutter, and sigh of Tammi sitting cross-legged on the floor before the coffee table, sorting through the letters she’d been to the Post Office that morning to collect.

She mumbles incessantly, dividing the post into piles, deciding what’s worth opening, “Junk.  Junk.  Half price sofas.  Do I want a credit card?  Have I been injured at work?”  Here, she stops, snorts mirthlessly at a private thought, and continues, “I really should go more than once a month…but it’s always ninety per cent crap!”

Ricky grunts assent.  He never gets any post.  He’s way too far off the radar, and that’s how he likes it.

“My God…”

The tone of Tammi’s voice rouses Ricky from his somnolent contemplation of the ceiling.  She holds a good-quality envelope in one trembling hand, staring at it as if it contains something lethal; the last-remaining sample of the smallpox virus, sent to one Tamise Rivers in a thick, cream envelope with a crest on the back.

“What’s that?” Ricky asks.

He can see her balancing whether to tell him, and detects the split-second in which the decision to remain silent is made.

Ricky wants to know about that envelope with the crest.  He struggles to a seating position with some difficulty, ancient sofa springs creaking expressively as he turns, metal squealing abrasively on metal, inadequately-supported upholstery hindering his movement within its capacious embrace.

The envelope transfixes her.

He smiles around the cigarette in the corner of his mouth, reaches slowly across the table, and suddenly clamps his fingers firmly to either side of her jaw.  He pushes inwards until she winces and tries to pull away.  The rod of iron that is his reaching arm holds her in check.  As he squeezes he can feel the shape of her skull, the indentation where teeth meet gum.  A tiny pant of pain escapes her.

He growls, “I said ‘what’s that?’”

With effort, Tammi’s mouth forms a moue against the pressure of his fingers, and she mumbles indistinctly, “Mmmmfff.”

Ricky enjoys the titillation of her palpable fear, but knows he’ll release her – because he wants to hear the explanation.  He holds onto her for a slow count to twenty in his head before letting go abruptly.  Her hands fly to her face, gentle fingertips massaging her aching cheeks.  She opens and closes her mouth, checking it still works the way it’s supposed to.

When she eventually locks eyes with him again, her stare is pure poison.  Ricky’s baby blues are as ingenuously empty as ever, his countenance blank, betraying no hint of what goes on behind the mask.

Quietly, he demands, “Well?”

“It’s just a letter.  Probably more junk.”

She turns her face away quickly.

“I disagree, Tam.”

Anger administers a sudden shot of reckless bravery, “What if I don’t think it’s any of your business?”

“Well, that’s different.”

Like a cobra striking, the arm shoots back out, only this time it isn’t her face but her windpipe he’s grasping.  She grabs ineffectually at his wrist, only half-heartedly pulling because she understands the foolhardiness of determined retaliation.  However alarming, it’s better to let him strangle her for a little while.

Conversationally, as he crushes her neck and restricts her breathing, he murmurs, “Tam.  Everything’s my business, isn’t it?”

She croaks, “Yes, yes, let go, let go,” pulling at his sleeve.

He smirks and eases the pressure, but doesn’t release her.  There’s still a little bit too much fight in her for that.  He pulls slowly on his cigarette, withdraws it from his lips with his free hand, and threatens her cheek with the burning end, watching her pupils focus and fixate fearfully on the smouldering butt, before sniggering and stubbing it out casually in the overflowing ashtray, continuing to squeeze her gasping throat.  Tammi swallows and gulps with difficulty, clutching the handful of his sleeve, wide eyes reddening, brimming and, to Ricky’s barely concealed astonishment, dropping a couple of big tears onto his wrist.

Ricky snatches his hand away as if scalded, and Tammi scuttles backwards on her bottom into the centre of the living room carpet, putting safe distance between them, rubbing at her neck with frantic fingers.  Despite considerable efforts to calm herself, Tammi’s tears flow unabated, dripping off her cheeks onto the fabric of her jeans, making darkening, spreading circles on the light material.

Unaccustomed to exhibitions of tenderness, Ricky nevertheless finds himself seconds away from lurching involuntarily around the table, crawling across the floor, and pulling the softly sobbing woman against him, when she glances up, meets his eye, and freezes him providentially in place.  He thanks his lucky stars she chose that moment to pull herself together.  Nothing lowers you in their estimation like being nice.  The relief is profound, as if someone has rescued him from the path of a speeding car in the nick of time.

Shaken by the bewildering intensity of his desire to comfort her, he reaches again for his cigarettes, taking his time extracting one from the packet, fumbling fingers lifting it to dry lips.

As Tammi wipes and sniffs in the centre of the carpet, Ricky plucks the envelope from the table-top and examines it.  The crest on the flap at the back is matched by a smaller one to the front top left-hand corner.  A white stallion rears across a heraldic shield with a Latin inscription curling beneath it.  The address of Tammi’s PO Box is written in ink which has soaked into the parchment-like stock, making each letter of the elaborate, swirling script mingle with the one next to it, rendering it all-but-illegible.

Tammi’s eyes flick anxiously between the envelope and Ricky’s face.  Keeping his unwavering gaze on her, he slides one finger under the flap and tears it open.  Tammi reaches out a hand, perhaps entertaining an attempt at prevention, but doesn’t move.  Instead, she whimpers, “Please.”

Ricky slides the folded letter out, and lets the discarded envelope fall to the floor at his feet, “Please what?”

“Please can I at least read it first?  It is my letter.”

With one flick of his wrist, Ricky unfurls the pages and glances down, threatening to peruse their contents.

“Rick.  It’s my letter.”

“Who’s it from?”

“My sister.”

What?  “I didn’t know you had a sister.”

She’d claimed to have no family.  She’d presumed to lie to him!

“No…well, we’re not what you’d call best mates.  I haven’t had any contact with her for seventeen years.”

Suspicious, Ricky’s eyes narrow, “How did she know where to find you, then?”

That hadn’t occurred to Tammi.  She blinks, nonplussed, “Good question!  The answer to which I’m quite curious to know myself.”

“Why no contact for such a long time?”

“We…fell out…”

“Over what?  Money?”

“Surprisingly not money, actually.  Well, not directly.”

“Tam, you need to be a bit more forthcoming…or I’m going to read this letter before you do.”

“You can’t!”

She’s indignant, too furious with him to disguise her feelings.

Ricky grins, “Come on, just spit out the goss and you get to read it first.”

He waves the letter in the air, taunting her with it; the firm, thick pages make a crisp sound as they rub together, rocking in his fingertips.  Tammi glares at him, sighing; surrendering, “To cut a long story short, I was left standing at the altar without my chief bridesmaid or my fiancée, because they’d legged it to Marbella…together.  The bunting was barely packed away before they announced their own engagement.  See why I’m not her number one fan?”

Ricky gawps, “Your sister and your husband?  You’re joking?”

“Fiancée…and, no, if I was joking I’d say, ‘Why did the chicken cross the road?’ or ‘How many nuns does it take to change a lightbulb?’  I’m deadly serious, Ricky.  We’re not friends.  I’ve had no contact with her since she ruined my life.  That’s that.  End of.”

“So, why’s she writing to you out of the blue…and how did she know you’d be here?”

“I don’t know the answers to those questions because you’re holding my letter to ransom.  I might be able to tell you if you’d let me read it.”

Ricky laughs, carelessly tossing the sheets towards her and reclining back into the clutches of the ancient sofa once more, feeling it fold in around his lounging body like a toothless mouth.  He smokes, watches; waits.

Tammi gathers up the scattered pages from the carpet before he changes his mind, shuffling them into order, scooting across to lean back against the side of the armchair, coffee table between them providing a measure of protection from McAllister’s unpredictability.  She reads speedily – he’s always been amazed by how fast she can consume text, finishing a page and being on the point of turning over while he’s only halfway down – hungrily absorbing the information within, offering nuggets to imply she’s sharing, “Ah, here we go.  I sent the PO Box address to my mother, a while ago now.  My sister says that’s how she got it.”

“Why’d you send it?”

“She liked a drink.  She wasn’t getting any younger.  I thought if there was any inheritance, I’d like to know about it.  I figured if there was a note of my contact details in her paperwork somewhere, the executor would know where to send the cheque.”

Ricky chortles, “Commendably callous!”

“Thank you.”

He has to ask, “Any inheritance, then?”

“Doubt it.  Not now.  She died eight years ago.  From what little I know, anything she had went to the new husband.  It certainly didn’t come to me!”

“So, Sis has had your PO Box address for eight years?”

“Or longer.”

“You’re clearly the injured party in this.  She’s obviously not that fussed about your feelings.  She’s not writing to tell you you’re about to come into a fortune…so, why?”

“I’m looking!”

She reads further, gradually beginning to chuckle mirthlessly, “For Christ’s sake!”

Ricky wriggles upright on the spongey cushions, “What?”

“The reason she’s writing is to tell me she’s leaving her husband.”

“What do you care?”

“Well, it’s him, isn’t it!  The Runaway Groom himself.”

“Of course…but I ask again, what do you care?”

“I don’t, obviously.  Serves the pair of them right.  I hope they row every day and make each other cry.”

Ricky beams, “You’re such a bitch!  I love it.”

Tammi exhales one short, tetchy breath, and reads on, “The implication is that I’ll be inclined to assist her because of what he did to me.  It’s like she’s conveniently forgotten she did it too…and I’d put money on the whole thing being her idea in the first place!  He would’ve married me for an easy life, because all the arrangements had already been made, and just carried on with her behind my back.  She wouldn’t have liked that suggestion, hence the alternative scenario that played out to my cost.  I’m bloody glad it’s blowing up in her face now!  It’s just a shame it’s taken so long.”

“I still don’t understand why she’s written to you about it.”

“He’s worth a mint, Rick!  It’s apparent she’s completely financially dependent on him.  She needs some mug to finance her separation so she makes a clean break.  She can then go for her half of his fortune without there being any accusations of her helping herself to money she might not be entitled to.  She wonders whether I can front her up enough cash to tide her over.  When the divorce is final, she’ll see I’m generously compensated…both for the loan and the past.”

“Hmmm…olive branch.  So, she does feel guilty?”

“I’d believe that if I thought she possessed a shred of decency, but I’m not sure she does.”

“I’m still struggling with why she’s written to you?”

“Once upon a time, a while before you knew me, I was actually a success in my life.  I did well.  I made money.  I was good at it. Everything was different then to how it is now.  That’s the Tammi she knows, the one she remembers…she has no idea things have changed.  She thinks I would effortlessly be able to advance her what she needs because, in the past, I could have done!”

“How much is she asking for?”

“Two hundred grand.”

Ricky convulses.  The sofa springs squeal as if under torture.

“You were good for two hundred grand?”

“Oh yeah.  I was probably good for more than that in those days.”

Ricky’s throat clucks like the death-throes of a turkey.

Tammi wants to laugh but doesn’t dare, pressing her lips together to prevent them even smiling, before placidly clarifying, “You can stand down from Def Con One, Rick – there’s no money.  I haven’t had a bean since well before I met you, and I certainly don’t have now, do I?”

Ricky shakes his head, mouth and eyes wide, unable to speak.

“Her husband can trace his family back a thousand years.  They are proper old money – stately homes, art, antiques, land.  It should’ve been mine, but it’s hers.  Clearly, she’s had enough of the oppressive regime, but perhaps not of the cash…hence the desire for the quickie, uncontested divorce.”

“How did you end up snaring a bloke like that in the first place?”

“What are you saying, that I’m not good enough?”

“Tam!  I found you on the streets covered in shite…you didn’t exactly give off the air of someone who hobbed with the nobs!”

“Appearances can be deceptive – “

“Are you telling me you’ve been on a wind-up all these years?  Do you know how much blood you can lose in five minutes?”

“I struck lucky!  But I worked for it.  I didn’t skive off school.  I did my exams.  I got a referred into a decent job straight out of Uni, and got my head down and grafted – because there was all this money sloshing around me and I wanted my share of it.  I made the most of the leg-up I’d been given.  By twenty-five, I had a decent job, a good wage, a nice lifestyle in this family investment business run by a clueless, upper-class chump called Marc Pickford.  He had no real idea what he was doing, but Daddy was rich and nepotism had clearly protected him despite his hopelessness.  Having a plonker for a boss can be frustrating, but it can be handy too.  If they’ve no idea what’s supposed to be happening, they don’t know whether you’re bending the rules or not.”

“And so you bent them?”

“I…flexed them a tiny bit.  Not enough to cause problems, but sufficiently to make life a little bit more comfortable.”

Ricky smiles broadly.  An new expression has settled on her face. Usually, she’s sunken-eyed, hunted, wary, watchful, trying her unobtrusive best to blend into the background.  Now, however, she’s expanding to dominate the space around her.  She’s enjoying the recollections, savouring the memories.  It’s revealing, fascinating; alluring.

“As time went on, I realised how far my feet were under the table, how secure I was…and I started to notice that Marc was undoubtedly dumb, but he was like a dozy, faithful dog that wags its tail every time you come into the room.  I started to think about my future…and about how to safeguard it.  I flirted with him like you wouldn’t believe because it made my life easier, but I also enjoyed it in a recreational way.  He had a sports car, a platinum credit card, a lovely converted warehouse apartment right on the Thames, and it was nice to feel special.  He treated me well.  He used to make a big fuss of me, and I wasn’t really used to that.  I gave him what he wanted, and he made me feel good about myself.  Then, one weekend after we’d been dating for a little while, he took me home to meet Mummy and Daddy.  When we rolled up in front of this stately home, I nearly wet myself!  Gardens like Richmond-bloody-Park!  Suits of armour in the hallway, forbidding portraiture glaring down from every wall, chintz on the sofas, velvet canopies over the four-posters.  I realised I’d hit major paydirt, and he metamorphosed instantly from brainless totty into endearing sweetie.  That was my future, right there!  I put in the hours, sucked up to the parents like nobody’s business, toiled to make his funds the best-performing in their sector, did everything I could to make him happy…the proposal was pretty swiftly forthcoming.  The family loved me!  I was suitably-presentable, going places, brighter than their dickhead son so I could keep him out of trouble…I’m sure Mummy and Daddy told him to secure me pronto.  I was so pleased with myself!  Not even thirty and my life was sorted.  All I had to do was get pregnant and I was safe as houses – massive, tapestry-filled, ten-bedroom houses…”

Ricky’s chuckling, energised, as unformed ideas flutter around him like butterflies seeking succulent blooms.

“Did it happen?”

“Yeah, I made sure of it.  I timed it for a couple of months before the wedding, crossed my fingers, uncrossed my legs, and got on with it.  By the time the ‘I do’s’ rolled around, I was two-and-a-half months gone.  Perfect.  Not enough to show in the frock, but sufficient to be out of danger, or so I thought.  Life couldn’t get any better.  Yes, my husband was a fool…but he was a nice-looking, good-natured, thoughtful, harmless, obscenely rich and well-connected fool.  As long as I kept him that way, his wealth would supply my comfort.”

“But it never got to that.”

“No.  It never got to that.”

“Because?”

“Annelisse showed up and turned it all to shit.  My sister is very different to me in personality, behaviour…she’s a lazy waster, basically.  She’d only surface when she needed money,” Tammi drums her fingers onto the letter where it lies on the coffee table, “Leopards don’t change their spots, eh?  I’d give her a couple of grand now and again to stay away from me and not cause me any embarrassment.  Usually, I’d arrange for her to come to the flat when I knew Marc would be out, so I could keep her a secret.  The day it all started to go wrong, I’d had to stay on at work to keep an eye on some specific transactions and he got home from the office before me.  She rocked up unannounced, obviously after cash, and I understand there was some initial confusion.  He thought she was me, and it all got a bit like some bad Shakespeare play until they worked out what was going on, but by then the secret was out – “

“Wait, I don’t understand.”

“We’re identical twins, Ricky.  People who don’t know us well struggle to tell us apart.  We do look very physically alike…but we’re very different people – “

“This is like something off the telly!”

Tammi pulls a face, “Only way more outlandish!  By the time I got home from work, there was Annie, curled up on the sofa, nursing the biggest brandy you’ve ever seen and flirting her little socks off…and he was sitting there with a grin and a hard-on, imagining – “

“Twins…” Ricky wears a faraway look and beatific smile.

Tammi’s lip curls contemptuously.  Mercifully, he doesn’t notice.

“Anyway, that was where it all started.  You see, I was conscientious.  I was good at my job and I worked hard – first one in, last to leave.  I put in the time and effort at the office but, unfortunately, that freed up my sister to put in the time and effort with my fiancée – so much so that on the day of my wedding, neither groom nor bridesmaid were anywhere to be found.  Someone, I can’t remember who, went to the flat and found a note addressed to me.  It said he couldn’t go through with the wedding because he loved Annelisse.  She was just so much more fun, because I was always at work.  What the dolt couldn’t see was that I was at work covering his hopeless arse, safeguarding his position to retain mine, making sure he was perceived a success instead of the failure he really was.  They would be spending some time in Spain to give me a chance to move out of the flat.  Oh, and it might be advisable for me to resign, because it would be awkward at work, and otherwise he’d have to find a reason to sack me, which wouldn’t look good on my CV.  I could hear that snidey bitch’s voice behind every word.  It was Marc’s handwriting but she’d dictated it, and he was spineless enough to let her.  The shock, the shame…the dashing of all my high hopes!  I miscarried.  I had a sort of a breakdown.  I ended up eventually where you found me, with nothing.  It seems she came back from Spain with an engagement ring as shiny as the future she’d stolen from under my nose.  I’ve never really been the same person since.”

“Bloody hell!  And that’s it?”

“That’s it.  Everything.  You know it all.  She says here his funds are floundering, so their lifestyle’s suffering.  My heart bleeds for her.”

“All those connections, can’t he just keep ticking on, tucking up more rich idiots for investment cash?”

 “Things changed, didn’t they?  There’ve been recessions.  Making money got a lot harder to do.  The old school tie wasn’t enough any more, you actually had to know how to do the job you were being paid millions a year for!  That’s why I was there, to keep the ship afloat!  I imagine, once I was gone, his incompetence was exposed and he was done for.  Potentially, his reputation is now so sullied, no one will trust their money to anything he’s in charge of!  Cinderella’s gilded coach has turned back into a pumpkin, so she’s off.  That’s what she’s like, no loyalty…  Once she gets him to liquidate the assets for a divorce settlement, she’s sitting pretty.  Until then, she wants her previously successful sister to sub her – “

“In return for generous recompense down the road.”

“Yeah.”

“Do you know what I’m thinking?”

“Hardly ever.”

“I’m thinking this has got Big Earner written all over it.”

“Oh, no!  No, no!  We’re not going there!  Nothing ever goes right with Annie in the mix!  However tight you think you’ve sewn it up, it’ll go wrong!  That’s what she does, screw with all your best-laid plans!”

“This is the ultimate gift, Tam!  A peach of a Long Con where we’ll hardly have to do a stitch of research because you know all the background!  You’ve been working the inside since birth!  The mark’s come to you, with no roping.  How often can you say that?”

“I don’t want – “

“Stately homes?  Works of art?  We’ll go down in grifting history!  In the future, they’ll be saying ‘if only we could pull a job like Rivers and McAllister!’”

“Have you been at the lighter fluid again?”

“Think about it!  It’s got everything!  It’s a sitter!  She’s desperate, right?  She never would’ve faced her guilt, swallowed her pride, grovelled to you after all these years if she had someone else to turn to!  You know how they both think.  You know their circumstances, because they were so very nearly yours.  You said there’s a fortune there!  We just have to work out how to release it!  And wouldn’t it feel nice to put one over on the pair of them, after what they did to you?  That’s the cherry on the top, as far as I can see.  I can’t believe you’re considering walking away from a chance like this!”

Tammi frowns.  It’s always been advisable to keep Annelisse at arm’s length, minimising the threat she poses to stability and continuity, but Ricky’s suggesting she embroil herself in Annie’s latest mess up to her already-bruised neck!  In her head, it’s insane to even consider such a thing – yet her wounded soul strains at the leash of possibility.  Wouldn’t it be the most delicious sensation in the world to put one over on Annelisse?  Imagine how satisfying it would be to stand in front of her sister and make damn sure Annie understood exactly what had been done to her, by Tammi’s hand, at Tammi’s instigation – and why.  Revenge of that kind would taste so sweet.

FIVE

What is the matter with her?  She pushes her fish fillet around the plate as if it’s still alive, fork prongs ploughing deep furrows through the creamy sauce.  Marc watches the thick gravy spread and obscure the pattern on the china plate.  He vows he’ll say something once every fork track vanishes, but she scrapes at the plate before he’s ready, and he feels the need to wait another full cycle of reveal, spread, cover, before he can try again.  Nowadays, conversation’s combative; so exchanging information really has to be worth the tiresome struggle.  It makes Marc wonder whether they’ve ever understood one another.  At first, it hadn’t mattered.  Now, when he fancies it’d be nice to have a wife on his wavelength, it’s too late.

He wants to ask what’s making her so edgy, but can’t face the terse response.  He’s taken aback when she speaks, “I need to talk to you about something important.  It isn’t intended as a criticism.  I know you always think I’m having a go at you, but I’m not.  I consider the situation we’re in as much my fault as yours.”

Marc tenses.  Which ‘situation’ is she referring to?  The fact of his teetering employment circumstances, the tatters of their marriage, or something else he’s utterly missed?

“I know you want me to stay out of it and leave you to deal with everything, but I can’t wait any longer for you to come up with a solution.  I’ve taken it upon myself to assist with our most-pressing financial…issues.”

She stops.  Her eyes flick just once from picked-at plaice to husband’s face, before flitting away when she realises he’s staring at her in amazement.  Eventually, when she says nothing further, he stutters, “Have you got a job?”

“No!” she scoffs, as if the very idea is outlandish, “I’ve…approached…someone.”

Instantly on the alert, Marc blurts, “Who?  For God’s sake, you’ve got to be careful!  Think of the scandal!”

“It’s fine.  I spoke to Tammi.”

Marc twitches, his stomach somersaulting, before getting a firm hold of himself and digging a chubby finger into each ear.  He could have sworn she just said Tammi…

“I think my ears are bunged up.  What did you say?”

“Tammi.  I’ve approached Tammi.”

Marc gulps, suddenly salivating excessively, recently consumed fish dinner threatening to make an instant reappearance.  With restraint, he manages to hiss through clenched teeth, “Are you out of your tiny mind?  Have you forgotten what went on, ‘cos I can guarantee she hasn’t!  I hardly think she’s going to look charitably upon either of us in our time of need, do you?  She’ll take great delight in marching that juicy bit of tittle-tattle straight round to whichever society-page editor’ll pay the most to receive it.  What on earth possessed you – “

“What was I supposed to do, huh?  Where else can I go in the whole world for help but to her!”

“So, you’ve seen her?  Kissed and made up?  It’s all jolly nice and you’re best friends again?”

“I haven’t seen her…but we’ve spoken numerous times on the phone over the last few days.”

The self-assuredness with which she delivers this bombshell stuns Marc.  It’s as if he’s standing in the centre of a frozen lake, miles from either shore, and suddenly hearing the ice crack.

He closes his fist around his wine glass, emptying it in one swallow.  Refilling, his hand shakes, and the neck of the bottle chimes repeatedly against the lip of the glass as he pours.

“You stupid cow.  What have you said to her?  You’d better tell me exactly how deep you’ve dug us into the shit.”

Annelisse pouts, “Can you at least pretend to still have some respect for my feelings?  Perhaps try not to be quite so derogatory in the way you address me?”

“Stop being bloody melodramatic!  This isn’t about me cooing sweet nothings in your ear, this concerns you sharing destructive secrets with someone who has every reason to hold a serious grudge against both of us!  The revelation we’re in the middle of a cashflow crisis is dynamite!  Think what it would do to the family reputation!  We’d never live it down, Annie!  You think my mother doesn’t like you now, wait until she finds out it was you who let the cat out of the bag!”

“Oh, you make me so angry!  You care more about what strangers think of you than you do of my opinion – your own wife!  Are you aware of how humiliating it is to stand at the till as every single piece of plastic in your purse is declined?  It’s as if you’re a criminal or something!”

“Now who cares what strangers think?”

“Don’t change the subject!  Putting those big, red bills in your desk drawer and shutting it doesn’t make them go away.  It makes them come back bigger and redder than ever!  At some point, there’ll be a day of reckoning when they cut off the water, the electricity, the telephone, the internet.  How will you fill your time then, Marc, with no sports package and no porn?  Forgive me for caring, but I’d like to face up to this and deal with it before that day arrives!  If you won’t talk to you father about exactly what your position now is within the firm – whether you actually still have a job or not – then I’m taking steps of my own in the meantime.  I can’t wait around forever while you let him flush our lives down the bog!”

“You are the queen of hyperbole, aren’t you?  It’s a temporary blip, sweetie – is that better?  They happen in the finance industry.  Markets fluctuate.  Valuations move.  Currencies dip.  I don’t expect you to understand.”

Annelisse clenches her fists to either side of her dinner plate and attempts to hold her hatred in check.  She has to stay calm.  Extreme stress could hurt the baby.  Marc’s gaining a foothold in this exchange, and she needs to control it to steer him in the right direction.

“A temporary blip, Marc, or a decade of denial?  This hasn’t been five minutes in the making.  This has been chewing away at us for more than half our marriage!  Is it any wonder we can’t have a conversation without it deteriorating into a slanging match – because you daren’t admit there’s a problem in case the editor of some gossip glossy gets a sniff of it, and I’m too much of a coward to rock the boat!  I’m sorry, Marc, but I’m not prepared to pretend any more.  If you won’t have it out with your Dad, then I’m making plans instead.  I wrote to Tammi out of desperation.  I wasn’t sure she’d even answer me, but I felt I had to try.  As I said, I had nowhere else to turn.  You won’t talk to me about anything.  Your parents hate me because they wanted you to marry Tammi and consider me inferior to her in every way.  They blame me for her leaving and what happened to all the funds once she’d gone.  What else could I do?  I threw myself on her mercy, begged her for help, played the twin card for all I was worth – “

“And gave her enough ammo to sink us for good.  Well done, Annie.  Superlatively short-sighted, even by your standards.”

Annelisse absorbs the sarcasm with a pinched smirk and sardonic inclination of her head towards her husband, “You’re so judgemental, darling, especially given how terribly well you’re doing.”

Marc glares at her.  It’s perfectly acceptable for him to address his wife as if she has more teeth than braincells, but to be on the receiving end of such treatment himself is beyond the pale. “You’ve got to admit, Annie, hardly your finest hour.”

“Well, that’s where you’re wrong, because she’s going to give us two hundred grand…and we’re going to give her the place in Marbella.”

“What?”

“You heard.”

Marc shakes his head, incredulous, “Sometimes, I wonder how many marbles you’ve still got.”

“What’s your problem?  I’ve just fixed everything!  I know it’s not a permanent solution, but two hundred thousand in cash is a pretty good cushion while we get ourselves back on an even keel, isn’t it?  It at least buys you some time to stop hiding from reality and face up to your family and your true position.”

Marc sinks his head into his hands, sighing, “Not bad, Annie…not bad.”

“We talked about the past and I apologised.  I know that doesn’t expunge what happened, but she seemed to accept it, and it made her more willing to talk to me.  I explained we were asset-wealthy but cash-poor; that availability of ready-cash was the real problem for us.  She’s prepared to help me…us…but her stipulation is that it’s not a gift, it’s a trade.”

Marc snorts, “She hasn’t changed!  She’s always been a champion deal-broker, Annie.  What are you suggesting – we give her our Marbella place and, in return, what?”

“She gives us a deposit in cash for our signatures, basically.  We transfer ownership of the villa to her.  Then we get the balance once the property’s hers – ten days, a fortnight, however long it takes to process the paperwork.  She said something else too, but I’m a bit sketchy about it – “

“Surprise, surprise.”

Annelisse lets that one go, “Something to do with pounds and euros and avoiding the tax.  I didn’t really understand that part…”

“Hmmm…we sell to her, we’re liable for the tax on the sale.  It’s a capital gain, Annie – heard of them?”

“You’re hilariously funny, you know that?”

“Whereas, if it’s a gift – “

“But, there’ll be a suspiciously large cash payment with no explanation for it?”

“That no one will know anything about.  It’s cash!  It needs to arrive in a very large bag and never touch our bank account.  Where it’s come from is Tammi’s paper-trail to disguise – not our problem.  We just stash it somewhere safe and take a handful out whenever we need it.”

Marc fidgets, cracking his knuckles, shifting in his seat, distractedly trying to pinpoint a pitfall, “Annie, are you sure she’s good for that money?”

“It’s Tammi – what do you think?  If she was good at anything, it was making money, wasn’t it?”

“Don’t get me wrong, I’m perfectly prepared to sell a rapidly devaluing Spanish villa we rarely visit to anyone daft enough to buy it in the current climate, whether it’s your sister or not – but why now, after all this time?”

“I went to her!  She offered me a solution and told me I could take it or leave it.  She fixes problems, doesn’t she?  She always has actually, since we were kids.”

“Where’s she been for the best part of seventeen years?”

“Living her life!  Building her fortune!  We hardly encouraged her to stay in touch, did we?  Face it, Marc, the reason I have no relationship with my sister is our fault, not hers!  What we did was shameful.”

Marc opens his mouth to protest – shameful’s a bit strong – but she silences him with a glare, “It was shameful!  We went behind her back.  We never should have done that.  We could have talked it over amongst the three of us and maybe kept it halfway civil, but we didn’t.  Perhaps if we had, the whole thing wouldn’t have been quite so traumatic for her, but we got so far down the road of the deception there was no going back.  We’re lucky she’s prepared to do this for me…for us.  I don’t blame her for ensuring she gets something in return.  We created the atmosphere of mistrust, not her. She’s just protecting herself…very wisely and characteristically, wouldn’t you say?”

“Yes, I suppose,” Marc sits back, regarding his wife thoughtfully, testing her, “we could sell the villa on the open market any time we like – “

“Perhaps…but then we’d have a lot less money, wouldn’t we…because we’d have to pay the tax.  I’m right, aren’t I?”

Yes, she is right.  This proposal of Tammi’s is the ideal bailout at the perfect time!  How can he save face whilst grabbing this chance with both hands?

“She wants us all to meet and discuss it…tomorrow night…”

“Where?”

“The Lanesborough!”

Marc’s hands start shaking again, and he puts them in his lap to prevent Annelisse noticing.  The first stirrings of arousal tentatively test the stitching of his tailored trousers.  Tammi, his ex-fiancée, his sister-in-law, holds meetings at one of London’s most expensive hotels, and casually agrees to part with hundreds of thousands in cash following a phone call or two?  Oh, there’s potential here…and it excites him!  If he could select anyone to be on the opposite end of a potentially risky endeavour, Marc Pickford would choose Tammi Rivers.  Put simply, she’s brilliant.  If there’s a loophole, she exploits it; a sweetener, she uses it; an oversight, she finds it.  Whatever mess Annelisse might have been making in the middle, with he and Tammi at either end of this, they can ensure its smooth resolution to their mutual benefit.  Marc pictures the Tammi of the past and extrapolates the improvement seventeen years’ further experience must have wrought upon the proficiency of an already skilled operator.

“Well, we’d better go and hear her out, hadn’t we?”

She claps her hands together in girlish glee, “Oh!”

He raises a cautionary finger, “But!  If it sounds like so much bullshit, I’m out of there, no matter how cosy the family reunion.  However…there’s no harm in listening to what she’s got to say…”

“Oh, Marc!” She springs to her feet, rushes around the table, and throws her arms around his neck, squeezing his head awkwardly against her chest, “I’m so pleased, ‘cos I know it’s going to work out!  I’ve got to tell Tammi!”

Snatching up her phone from the breakfast bar, Annelisse is clipping smartly into the hall and up the stairs as Marc hears her say, “It’s me.  He said yes!  What time shall we meet you?”

Marc relaxes in the dining chair, resting his head against the leather, feeling his growing erection push insistently, but not uncomfortably, against the confines of his clothing.  He wonders whether he should follow Annelisse upstairs, but doesn’t really want to.  His desire is not for her.  What’s doing it for Marc Pickford is the tantalising opportunity of a return to his former greatness.

As well as a vital cash-injection and the offloading of a costly foreign property that long ago lost its cachet as his cronies swapped their pads on the Costas for The Hamptons or Bermuda and he was embarrassingly unable to follow suit, Marc has his sights set on a lucrative reconnection with Tammi Rivers and her Midas touch.  He’s after the seven-figure salary he considers commensurate with his talents; remuneration he’s done without for far too long – ever since his father’s representative marched into the family firm’s city office and menacingly advised him of his immediate ‘sabbatical’; shorthand for: ‘the shareholders are losing money hand over fist since Tammi left, it’s your fault she’s gone, and too many people are now whingeing to Daddy about your incompetence for him to ignore it any longer.  Go home, keep quiet, and behave yourself until he decides what’s to be done with you.’

Eyes closed, head tilted back, one warm hand cupping his throbbing genitals, Marc reflects upon the surprising fullness of Annelisse’s breasts as she pressed his unwilling head against them.  Usually completely without an ounce of soft, pleasing, yielding flesh, it appears his scrawny little trophy wife has finally put some weight on.  Perhaps it’s her age?  That their marriage limps endlessly onwards as a sham endured solely for appearances sake is undeniable, but what to do about it is tomorrow’s problem.  For now, Annelisse is the conduit via which renewed sisterly goodwill copiously flows.  If Tammi comes through for him in inimitable style – just like she always used to – it might be high time to affect a permanent alteration in his domestic circumstances.  Annelisse knows him too well now to patiently tolerate his arrogance, and seeks to undermine him at every opportunity.  It would be no bad thing for his self-respect to start afresh.

Marc reaches for his wine glass, polishing off the warming remainder of the alcohol and permitting himself to linger over a fantasy: Tammi very altruistically reinvigorating the career which guarantees his material comfort; and perhaps a flawless, suggestible, easily-impressed young wife to brighten his days, and warm his nights.  Divorce is a disgrace, but everyone’s at it these days; Mummy’s dislike for Annelisse is as potent as ever; and, as middle age piles on the pounds and takes the edge of his wife’s previously fine looks, the time to trade up could be at hand.  His miserable cow of a mother might even deign to crack a smile in the next wedding photographs.  He just has to handle Tammi Rivers right this time. 

SIX

His grifter’s sixth sense had been pricked, nay, impaled like a jouster on a lance, by the light in her eyes as she revealed the details of her past association with Pickford.

The image of such uncharacteristic vigour animating her usually-reticent features won’t leave him alone.  The more he tries to dismiss the memory, the deeper the conviction of its significance embeds itself. 

Richard McAllister is in the local Reference Library now because he wants to know the truth about the woman with whom he’s lived, ducked, dived and survived for so very long, and he can’t do that in the flat with her keenly watching his every move.  He’s supposed to be researching their mark, but if he wanted to trawl the life and times of Marcus Pickford, he wouldn’t bother flogging all the way to the Library.  He’d do it at home on his laptop with the telly on, a whisky on the table, a fag on the go, and one free hand absently massaging Tammi’s inner thigh, because there’s nothing she can do to stop him – not and keep her front teeth, anyway.

What are they to one another?  Not lovers, certainly, despite his best efforts.  If Ricky wants something from Tammi, he has to coerce it forth, which rather ruins the romance.  That fact hardly makes them friends, either.  So, are they business partners?  Such an arrangement implies an equal relationship, which theirs very definitely is not.  Is she therefore his employee?  Hardly.  Employees get paid – and Ricky exercises control by keeping the tightest of reins upon the purse strings.  Is she his prisoner, then?  He baulks at such an idea.  She can leave whenever she chooses!  Yet, she doesn’t go.  She views him with utter contempt, undisguised revulsion, unmistakeable fear…and remains.  Ricky cannot fathom why.  What’s made him toss and turn in his cold, lonely bed these last couple of nights is the unsettling certainty he’s about to be screwed, and not in the way he desires.

If you begin with Tammi, as he’s done countless times before in a bid to discover anything about his mysterious companion, you get nowhere; just a lot of brick walls and dead ends.  However, Ricky’s just found out that if you begin instead with Marcus Stocker-Pickford, Tammi’s chosen fall-guy, and strip away the cleverly-layered onion skin of legitimacy, there sits the truth, plain as day – the most mind-blowing, earthshattering, foundation-rocking discovery Ricky has ever made!

He slumps back in the moulded plastic chair and gapes at the computer screen, as utterly astounded as a small boy who’s just been slapped across the face by Father Christmas himself.

Well, well, well!  Little Tammi Rivers!  Who’d have thought it?  The existence of a twin sister patently isn’t the only staggering secret she’s withheld.  He feels such a fool!  Ricky McAllister, king of the Short-Con, has been comprehensively scammed, and not just for a week or two.  Oh no, she’s clearly been pulling the wool over his stupid, unseeing eyes for fifteen years!  But for the providential arrival of that letter from her twin, he’d never have made the connection between Tammi and Pickford; never have known what a true goldmine he was sitting on!  He should be elated!  This is the best chance he’s ever had to get where he wants to be in life.  Fate has gifted him this opportunity, and he mustn’t waste it.  Logging off the computer, Ricky sighs heavily, gathers up the reams of revelation, and goes to the counter to pay for all his photocopying.

Tammi’s lied to him for the entirety of their acquaintance.  She hasn’t trusted him sufficiently to share.  She’s evidently using him until she’s ready to depart on her own terms.  She deserves all that’s coming; so why, when he pictures her, can he only summon one emotion: regret?

He isn’t sure whether the tears that unexpectedly blur his vision on the homeward bus journey are for the future he’s potentially already squandered, or for the irrecoverable past.

© Annie Holder 2017 

Annie Holder has asserted her rights under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.

First published by Annie Holder in 2017.

This is a work of fiction.  Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination.  Place and public names are sometimes used for the purposes of fiction.  Resemblance to any person, living or dead, is completely coincidental. 

All rights reserved.  No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the author.