Chapter 2
Leo Jones spotted an empty table and took two pints over to it.
The pub was old and had beams low enough that he had to stoop to get under them.
The walls were decorated with old theatre posters, giving the place a pleasant bohemian feel.
The table he’d spotted was underneath a poster for A Winter’s Tale.
Leo carefully sat so that he had his back to it.
His friend, Caleb, was late, but at least that gave Leo a few minutes to let what had happened at the meeting sink in.
He wasn’t the best at reading the room, but even he knew that things hadn’t gone well.
Leo tapped his fingers on the table and frowned.
Caleb arrived, his coat speckled with rain. He spotted Leo and hurried over. ‘Sorry I’m late. That took longer than I expected.’
Leo gestured with his chin at the second pint glass in front of him.
‘I ordered you a beer.’ They had been friends long enough that he knew what Caleb liked.
It had been an unexpected delight when Caleb joined him at Askew, Else and Thomas a few months ago.
Now he got to share an office with someone who understood him well enough to not try to distract him with chit-chat when he was trying to work.
‘Ah. Lovely.’ Caleb draped his coat over the chair and sat down. His eyes drifted to the poster. ‘Hah,’ he said.
Leo rolled his eyes.
‘So …’ Caleb said, after a few minutes of companionable silence. ‘The meeting with Charlie. Want to talk about it?’
He didn’t want to talk about it, but he probably should. ‘What was I supposed to do? He had missed a tranche of due diligence. If I’d kept quiet, and there’d been a problem, then the client would have lost money.’
‘Yes, but you could have done it quietly: taken him aside and mentioned it; given him a chance to save face.’ Caleb took a sip of his beer and shook his head. ‘You have no sense of self-preservation. I just hope you don’t take me out with you.’
Leo knew this was a joke, but the thought still bothered him.
Caleb was more junior than he was. He would hate for Caleb’s career at the law firm to be impacted by something he did.
Or an enemy he had made. ‘I’ll do my best to make sure that doesn’t happen,’ he said, solemnly.
‘My mistakes shouldn’t affect you. If there is any fallout, I’ll make sure everyone knows that it has nothing to do with you. ’
Caleb stared at him for a moment then said, slowly, ‘Leo. I don’t think you need to worry about me. I didn’t upset the boss. You did. It’s not a case of the team being rubbish, is it? We’re pretty good. It’s just you being annoying. Just … don’t antagonise Charlie any more than you have to, okay?’
Leo sighed. This was easier said than done. Charlie must have been a good lawyer at one time, but now, he was so concerned with high level things like efficiency and maximising income that he no longer cared about the details. Leo, on the other hand, loved details.
‘I never had this sort of thing happen with Penny.’ Penny’s retirement had brought about many changes. The worst of which was her teams being reassigned to Charles Bexworth Huxley’s area.
They drank in silence for a bit, then Caleb, who could never be down for long, said, ‘Hey, at least we’ve got a bit of time away from the office in a few weeks. Did you manage to get Sarah for our administrator?’
Leo was grateful for the change of subject. ‘I did. And you’re right. Maybe a few weeks away from Charlie’s sight will do us all some good.’
Caleb nodded, not smiling. ‘But seriously, mate, watch your step around Charlie. You embarrassed him by showing up his mistake. There’s no telling what he’ll do to get his revenge.’
***
Vidya braced herself to ask the question that had been bothering her all night. It had been a few hours since the shock of the pregnancy test now and Udeni might be in a more responsive frame of mind. ‘What about … what about the father? Of the baby, I mean …’
Udeni shook her head. ‘I don’t want to tell him.’
‘So, you do know who he is?’ Then, realising what that sounded like, she added, ‘I mean, do you remember his name?’
Udeni looked up, her cheeks reddening under the brown. She shook her head. ‘I was trying to think last night … but it was … you know … It was dark and we’d been drinking and there was the mask.’
Oh, dear. Vidya kept her voice as steady as she could. ‘Okay, let’s make working out who he is our priority. Why don’t you tell us what you do remember?’
‘Hang on, a mask?’ said Angie. ‘What?’
‘At the office thirtieth anniversary party,’ said Vidya. ‘Fancy dress, remember?’
Angie’s eyes grew huge. ‘It was someone you met at the office party? Someone we work with? Oh my God.’
Udeni pursed her lips. ‘Now you’re definitely judging me.’
Vidya bit back the response she would have liked to make. ‘He was wearing a suit and a rabbit mask, right?’ She glanced over to corroborate; Udeni nodded.
‘Oh. Oh,’ said Angie. ‘That narrows it down to Legal Team B. Those were the guys who turned up late wearing identical rabbit masks and their work suits. They looked like something out of a gangster movie when they walked in. I remember.’
Vidya slipped out from under the blanket and returned with her laptop. She typed the company’s web address and navigated to the staff pages. ‘So, it’s one of these guys.’
Team B had six members in it.
‘We can rule out the two women, I assume,’ said Vidya.
Udeni tilted her head and studied the pictures of the men. She chewed her lip. ‘I don’t think he was Black … No. He wasn’t.’
That left three white guys about her age. Angie read their names, Piotr Kowalski, Leo Jones and Caleb Fotherill. ‘Okay. Any other clues?’
‘Like I said,’ replied Udeni, ‘it was dark. We didn’t turn the light on in the room.’
Angie raised her eyebrows.
‘There was quite a lot of light coming in through the windows … and, you know, we were in a hurry.’
Which was too much information to know about your little sister, really. ‘Okay. Anything else you can remember that might help us narrow it down between these three guys?’ Vidya said. ‘But nothing a sister doesn’t need to know, please.’
Udeni tipped her head back against the sofa. ‘He was sexy and tall – I had to look up to kiss him.’
That wasn’t helpful. Udeni was only five foot three.
‘Okay.’
‘He was funny and, you know, thoughtful, and he was a good dancer.’
Vidya shook her head. ‘Still not helping us narrow it down here. Anything physical that might distinguish these three guys?’
They all looked at the colour photos. All three men were wearing suits and standing in the same pose, arms crossed, bodies angled slightly, looking at the camera.
Leo had cropped brown hair and dark eyes, Piotr also had short dark hair and brown eyes, Caleb had dark curls and blue eyes. Only Caleb was smiling.
‘Hair? Curly or straight?’
‘Soft,’ said Udeni. ‘I don’t remember if it was curly or not. Sorry.’
They might have different haircuts by now. These photos were probably a few years old.
‘Eyes?’
Another shake of her head. ‘Can’t remember. They were nice eyes. Smiley.’
Vidya swallowed the urge to roll her eyes. ‘You must remember something that identifies him.’
‘He had a tattoo,’ said Udeni.
‘Oh, that’ll help. Maybe Angie and I could see it on him in the office. Is it somewhere visible in workwear?’
Udeni shook her head. ‘It was here.’ She gestured to the front of her shoulder, just above her breast. ‘It was something magical,’ she said. ‘Like a creature from Harry Potter or something. About this big.’ She held her fingers about three inches apart.
‘You can remember a three-inch tattoo on his chest but you can’t remember his face well enough to pick him from a line-up of three?’
Udeni shrugged. ‘It was dark. And we took turns with the mask. It was funny at the time.’
Ew. Ew. ‘Too much information.’
Her sister shrugged again. ‘You asked.’
Angie had been quietly typing on her phone for a while. She put it down. ‘I think you can disqualify that guy.’ She pointed.
‘Leo Jones?’ Vidya read off the website. ‘Why?’
‘He’s a real miserable sod. I don’t think he’s even got a sense of humour, so he’s not likely to be funny, and I think he’d rather gouge his own eyeballs out than dance.’
Both the sisters turned to look at her.
‘Wow,’ said Udeni. ‘What did he do to you?’
‘Me? Nothing. I just know a few people who have worked with him. Apparently, he’s difficult to work with and generally very cranky. I just double checked it was him.’ She waved her phone. ‘I didn’t want to rule out the wrong guy.’
They all stared at the serious face in the photo of Leo Jones.
‘Well,’ said Udeni. ‘My guy was definitely not cranky. He was funny and sweet.’
‘So, we’re down to two,’ Angie said.
‘Any goss on the other two?’
Angie tapped the picture of Piotr. ‘I’ve worked with him.
He’s really nice and fun. He could be your guy.
’ She pointed to Caleb. ‘I haven’t worked with him – he’s only been at the company for eight months or so.
From what I’ve heard, he’s nice too. He even gets on with grumpy Leo, but apart from that …
I know nothing. Certainly, nothing that would rule him out as the baby daddy. ’
Vidya sighed. ‘Okay. So … they’ve both got dark hair, a good sense of humour and are potentially good dancers. That still doesn’t help us distinguish between them.’
‘And there’s the tattoo.’
‘Which is not in a place that we would be able to see at work and we don’t even know what it is exactly.’ She closed the laptop and rubbed her face. ‘Oh, God.’
‘It’s a pity we can’t just ask,’ Angie said, gloomily.
Vidya rolled her eyes at Angie. ‘At work? Can you imagine?’
Angie grinned. ‘You’d be hauled into HR so fast.’
Udeni looked from one to the other. ‘Wait, why?’
‘We’ve had a lot of “appropriate behaviour in the workplace” discussions lately,’ said Vidya. ‘A lot.’
Angie leaned forward. ‘One of the male managers got drunk at an event and asked people personal questions about their sex lives. It made everyone really uncomfortable, and it got reported. Then the company decided everyone should have training because they didn’t want to be that sort of workplace.’
Udeni frowned. ‘Isn’t this a slightly different situation?’
‘Not really,’ said Vidya. ‘Me rocking up and asking someone if they’d slept with my sister, who was too drunk to remember who she slept with …
that would have consequences. Especially if it’s the wrong guy and they take it the wrong way.
’ She shook her head. ‘We need to find out which one it is first, before we do anything else.’
‘Or we could agree we’re not going to tell the father,’ said Udeni.
Vidya contemplated this for a minute, trying to be supportive, but it was too preposterous to get her head around.
‘How can you not want to know?’ she demanded.
‘Apart from all the practical stuff, like money. This child …’ she gestured to her sister’s belly, ‘… this child is going to have half his characteristics. All you’ve got is tall, funny, sexy, good dancer. Don’t you want to know more?’
Udeni was quiet for a moment. ‘I suppose it would be good to know a bit more about him from that point of view.’
‘So, we need to narrow it down between these two guys,’ Vidya pressed.
How was she the only one seeing the importance of this?
‘And most children want to know about their parents, so when the child is old enough to ask, you should be able to tell them.’ She looked at Angie for support, but she said nothing.
‘I suppose it would be handy to know if there are any illnesses in the family,’ Udeni said. She turned to their housemate. ‘What do you think, Ange?’
Angie looked from one sister to the other. ‘I think … I think it’s your choice,’ she said, carefully. ‘But if it were me, I’d want to know. In case I change my mind about telling him.’
Udeni stared at the wall opposite for a moment. ‘I don’t think I would ever want to tell him,’ she said. Her hand wrapped protectively around her still flat midriff. ‘But yeah. I see your point that if the baby wants to know later on, I should at least be able to tell them.’
Vidya held her breath.
After a few more seconds, Udeni said, ‘Okay. Let’s find out which one it is. You can’t tell him though.’
‘Of course,’ Vidya said. Thank goodness Udeni was seeing sense. Her little sister was impulsive and anything that helped keep her options open at this stage was a good thing. ‘So, how do we do this?’
Angie typed into her phone. ‘Apparently, Piotr’s in the US at the moment,’ she said. ‘But I know enough people he’s worked with; I can try and find out more.’
‘Any chance you could get assigned as admin assistant for the team?’
Angie shook her head. ‘Not for the next couple of months. I’m with Team A for the next six weeks. How about you?’
‘I … could try.’ Normally, Vidya was part of the admin support team, but for the last year and a half, she’d been working with the IT team, first with digital archiving and now on a project to safely incorporate AI into their working practices.
She hadn’t worked as a paralegal administrator for a while.
It was highly unlikely that she was going to be able to pick and choose which projects she got assigned.
‘It would really help if I had more to go on, so that I can figure out which one of these two guys it is.’
‘I’m sure you can work it out.’ Udeni looked at her with an expression full of trust. ‘I know you can.’
Vidya stared at her sister’s big eyes and, as she always did, melted. ‘Fine. I’ll see what I can do,’ she said.