Chapter 42
42
‘Gavin, what on earth are you doing here?’
‘We need to talk.’
‘This isn’t a good time.’
You’d think even Gavin would pick up on the hints that this is actually a spectacularly bad time. But he clearly can’t, because he starts walking in. ‘This won’t wait.’
I want to push him back, but I’m hampered by having to make a grab for Roudie’s collar. Rouden’s always had an inconsistent approach to security, sleeping through some visitors and barking like mad at others. But he never bites. Only today looks like it would have been an exception, if I hadn’t caught him mid-lunge. I’m trying to calm Roudie down and repel Gavin when Tony appears at the top of the stairs. He’s shirtless and buttoning his jeans.
‘It’s all right, Genie. Let the doc in. As it happens, I’ve been wanting to have a chat with him and all.’
I look over my shoulder to make eye contact with him.
‘It’ll be all right, beauty, promise.’ Tony looks confident to the point of cocky. That’s intriguing. I step back, dragging Roudie with me.
‘All right, Gavin. If you must come in, I suppose you must.’
Gavin stands in the hall. The puffed-out-chest power pose has gone. Instead, it’s like the rain dripping off his Barbour is pulling his shoulders down. Tony, on the other hand, is racing downstairs two at a time, until he’s behind me, arm around my waist. Roudie must find that comforting. He nudges Tony, allows his ears to be fondled then slinks away.
Tony shows his lovely white teeth. ‘The lounge, I think. Don’t you, Genie? It’ll be nice and cosy in there. You’ll catch your death out here, with what you’re wearing.’ He begins to propel me towards the sitting room. I can’t see his face, but I suspect from how much he’s exaggerating his accent that he’s doing his best leer, as he says, ‘Or not wearing, I suppose I should say.’ He reaches up under the t-shirt to squeeze my ass and I just about manage not to laugh. Now I’m absolutely clear what game we’re playing.
Tony looks over his shoulder. ‘Leave the jacket in the hall, doc. Can’t have you dripping on the upholstery now, can we?’
That time, I don’t quite keep the laugh in, but it’s not much more than a snort.
Tony leads me to the sofa and sits so close, I can smell sweat and sex. He strokes my thigh slowly with one finger. ‘Legs up, I think.’ I lift them across his thighs and he begins to trace patterns over my knees, as he wraps his other arm around me. ‘That’s it. You cuddle up with me, all nice and safe.’
Gavin sits opposite us, upright in the hard armchair that I’m too lazy to replace. He runs his fingers through his floppy hair, noticeably not quite as thick as it once was. It’s obvious this isn’t going as he’d expected. There’s a brown envelope on his lap. It must’ve been inside his jacket, because there’s only the odd raindrop visible on it, already drying in the heat from the log burner.
Tony smiles over at him. ‘So, you wanna go first, or shall I?’
Gavin looks down his nose. ‘I’m here to talk to Charlotte.’
‘We’ll stick with Genie, I think. Cos she prefers it. But go ahead. I’d say she’s all yours, only obviously she’s not.’ Tony’s tone is still exaggeratedly good-humoured, but the sneer is implied.
Gavin shrugs. ‘By the time I’m finished, I think you’d have preferred not to stay, but it’s your choice.’
Tony inclines his head. ‘Do your worst.’
Gavin leans over to me, holding out the envelope. ‘I’m sorry. If I’d known how far things had gone, I’d have told you earlier. But I wanted to give you hard evidence, so you’d know this is me trying to protect you, not interfere.’ He’s using his bedside-manner voice, the one that makes me want to punch him in the mouth.
I take the envelope. Inside there are five photos, grainy but clear enough to make out an extremely attractive woman walking to a car in a hotel car park. They are time-stamped two days ago, and from the quality, I’m assuming they’re CCTV not paparazzi. I hold one of the photos out to Tony. ‘Is that Angharad?’
Tony looks me in the eye. ‘It is, yeah.’
I try to keep my voice softly enquiring when I ask Gavin, ‘And I suppose she was at the team hotel to see Tony?’
‘I’m afraid she was.’ Gavin puts on his fatherly concern face.
I take Tony’s hand, but keep looking at Gavin. ‘And you think I’m going to care about that?’
Gavin gives an exasperated half sniff half snort. ‘Genie, or actually, I don’t know why I’m using that stupid nickname, Charlotte, there’s no point pretending you’re that sort of woman.’
‘And what sort of woman would that be, exactly?’ I ask, my voice less soft now due to the hint of disdain.
‘The sort who’s happy to be one of several. Just low-level entertainment for a man who doesn’t care about you.’
I smile slowly, sliding my hand up Tony’s arm, enjoying the curve of his bicep. ‘Oh, Tony takes excellent care of me, I can assure you.’
Tony gives me a long, slow smile but doesn’t say anything.
Gavin’s face is angry now, a look I remember. ‘So that’s it, is it? You’re so caught up by him, you’re grateful for what you can get. Even if he’s more interested in someone else. I thought even you had more dignity than that.’
Tony leans forward, but I tighten my hand on his arm. ‘No, darling. I can deal with this.’
I sit back and look hard at Gavin, until he breaks my gaze. ‘If Tony was more interested in Angharad, why wouldn’t he tell me that?’
‘Don’t be a child. You know players, you know how they operate. The sense of entitlement. Stringing women along until they’ve served their purpose. The lies.’
I smile. ‘But that’s exactly the point. One man in this room has lied to me, about working late, and on-call shifts and weekend conferences. But it’s not Tony.’ I turn to Tony, ‘So, did you invite her there?’
Tony’s face is serious. ‘No.’
I nod. ‘I thought perhaps you hadn’t. She just turned up?’
‘She did, yeah.’
I look at Tony for a moment, trying to work out if he and I are running on the same lines. ‘And did you think that was rather odd?’
‘It struck me as strange, yeah.’
‘Because how would she know where we put our players before that particular away match? Unless someone told her.’
Tony crinkles up his eyes. ‘Yeah, and why’d she think I wanted to see her? When all I’ve done since I got here is block her number.’
‘Unless someone told her?’ I ask again.
Tony smiles his partner-in-crime smile. ‘Exactly, love.’ He looks across at Gavin. ‘And that touches on what I wanted to talk to the doc about.’ His smile gets nastier. ‘Cos ever since Genie told me she reckoned someone was out to cause her trouble, I’ve thought it had to be over something personal. So, you’ve always been in the running, but it took her getting that cake tin thing for me to be sure.’
Gavin begins to bluster but Tony cuts through. ‘See, I had a little something lined up for Genie’s Christmas present.’ He strokes the necklace where it crosses my collar bone. ‘And I knew she’d not take it, if I gave it her direct. So, I thinks to myself, why not just make sure I get her Secret Santa ticket? Only no one had it, and what’s more, none of ’em had ever picked Genie. The odds, well, let’s just say I’m betting they’re slim enough they could do with a few cakes of their own. So, I thought to myself, who’d wanna make sure they got to decide what Genie’d get, year after year?’
Gavin splutters, in what I assume is an attempt at denial. Tony ignores him.
‘And that baking tin, it was a bit of a hint, weren’t it? Cos from what Genie’s told me, you’re the only bloke round here who’d think the kitchen’s the best place for her. So, I texted Monica’s PA, asking who puts the slips in the jar. Turns out she’s quite a fan of yours, ain’t she, doc? What with you being so helpful, doing that every year.’
Gavin draws himself upright. ‘That’s hardly proof of, well, whatever you’re insinuating.’
Tony shrugs. ‘Nah, it’s not. But you not wanting Genie to know she’s appreciated, getting her believing all the lads see her as like domestic help, well, it’s suggestive. So, while I was hanging round waiting to play yesterday, I did a bit of research. And you know, Genie, beauty, you should start paying more attention to boring blokes at parties. Cos it turns out, Gavin’s old mates the Craigs, their firm’s not just software, it’s more spyware.’
‘Really?’ I should’ve guessed, they were always sneaky, even when I knew them as students.
Tony grins at me, back to furiously cheerful. ‘Yeah, really. And when I passed that on to my security guy, he matched up bits of the code on your laptop to some of their commercial stuff.’
Gavin’s mouth has tightened. ‘I fail to see the connection.’
Tony laughs. ‘Maybe you’d better get some glasses then, doc. Cos your best mates playing nasty tricks on your ex-missus, that don’t feel like a coincidence.’
Gavin mutters about circumstantial evidence, and slander might be scattered in too.
Tony shakes his head. ‘Thing is, there’s plenty more where that came from. Like I feel a bit sorry for Angharad. Cos me and her did have a little chat.’ Tony looks at me. ‘With LeMar in the room the whole time.’
I smile, I’ve no more anxieties in that direction.
‘And she was going on ’bout how I’d sent her stuff. Personal stuff, that’d seemed like it’d be off me. Like she got a shirt, apparently, and a real nice top. Only obviously, they weren’t from me, but they came from someone at the club all right. So, when she got an email, from a Covenly account, saying come to the hotel, I’m wanting to see her, she believed it, didn’t she?’
‘Poor Angharad.’ I mean it. I can’t think of anything worse than believing Tony wanted to meet, then finding out he didn’t.
Tony strokes my fingers. ‘It’s all right. I’m gonna send a mate of mine her way. Retired out of the game six months, bored, loves being in the tabs, made of money. And all the emotional sensitivity of a breeze block.’
‘Oh, that sounds perfect.’ I smile.
‘Don’t you go getting ideas, you’re stuck with me now.’ Tony kisses my hair, then looks back to Gavin. ‘Thing is, doc, that was you getting too clever for your own good. Cos the club’s security took a look at that email, and it might be a false account but it was sent off your laptop all right.’
Gavin’s cheeks had been flushed, but they now drain white except for irregular red blotches. ‘Will you tell Monica?’
Tony looks at me, eyes soft. ‘Up to you, beauty.’
I think about how Monica was nice to me, or nice for her anyway, last time we spoke. And how what she said has as much to do with me and Tony being back together as Katia’s advice. And about her beautiful twins, and that decides me.
‘So long as there’s no repeat of any of this, personally, I’d let it go.’ I turn to Tony. ‘But it doesn’t just affect me. You’ve been worried too, haven’t you?’ And actually, I think Gavin’s caused Tony far more anxiety than me. I was too busy getting myself muddled over Tony to take much notice of any of this.
Tony chews his lip. ‘How you handle this, it’s gotta be your decision. But if anything happened to you…’ His eyes dart away.
I squeeze his hand. ‘It’s all right, darling. It’s not that Gavin’s stalking me because he’s obsessed with me, or anything like that, is it, Gavin?’
Gavin’s eyes open wide, and he’s so obviously horrified by the idea, I almost laugh.
‘No, of course not, far from it. I wanted to stop you making a fool of yourself, or me. Or Monica.’
Tony pulls a confused face. ‘This whole thing, Genie, dunno if you’ve noticed, but it’s dead weird.’ He looks across at Gavin. ‘Give us a minute, will you, doc? Me and Genie have to figure something out.’ Tony takes my hand. ‘Cos I think we needs to think ’bout what we’re doing next. Like if you’ve got a hankering to try your hand at player care somewhere new, we can do that. But I like the club, and I wanna buy the house. So, I’d prefer to stay, if that’s all right with you?’
I nod quickly, smiling. ‘That’s exactly what I want.’
Tony grins. ‘That’s good, cos the pup’d find Spain a bit hot. But it means I reckon we need more of a guarantee than a promise this won’t happen again. Cos me and Gary King exchanged a few texts, when I was on my way back tonight. And he reckons he didn’t get a contract extension here after a medical that weren’t exactly kosher, and it struck me, it was Chrissie that did mine, not the doc.’
I bite at my lip, thinking it through. ‘What if Gavin told Monica he wanted to give up his role at the club? To focus on the twins, something like that?’
Tony weighs it up. ‘Yeah. I reckon that’d be OK with me. How ’bout you, doc?’
There’s an almost imperceptible nod from Gavin.
I give him a hard stare. ‘But I am going to go to HR. I’ll tell them I’ve got better things to do than bother with you now. But if anything like this ever happens again, to me or anyone else, all this will be on record, ready to go straight to Monica. Understood?’
Gavin nods again.
Tony grins at me. ‘All sorted, then. And I dunno ’bout you, but I’m ready to get on with being like disgustingly happy.’
I nuzzle into Tony’s neck. ‘Umm, me too. So, Gavin, it’s time you left.’
Gavin starts to scurry out, but as he passes, he reaches out a hand like an appeal. Tony’s arm blocks him. ‘Nah, I don’t think so, mate. No one’s gonna touch my girl without her say so, OK?’