The rush was already fading as she zigzagged the Soho streets. She checked her phone. It was 12:45 p.m. Just as she suspected, there was a message from Ricky, if he really was Ricky, on Tinder.
Hi, Lola. You on your way?
Give me ten minutes, she texted.
Waxy O’Connor’s was two streets away. It was a cavernous Irish pub, large enough to permit Natasha to scrutinise her prey without the unwelcome intimacy of The French House or The Ship. If Ricky looked hot, she’d introduce herself. Lola’s online portrait was sufficiently like her own. If less than hot, she’d ignore him and enjoy her lunch. They made an excellent crab sandwich in Waxy’s. If he confronted her, she’d smile and tell him he must have made a mistake.
There he was, just as she suspected, swiping his phone, darting glances towards the door. He’d said he was an architect, in a long-term relationship, looking for a sexy, independent woman under thirty for the occasional hook-up, maybe more. She turned back to her crab sandwich. There was no way he was five foot eleven, and he was at least ten years older than the photograph. Bloody cheat. She had no intention of talking to him anyway. Witnessing male trepidation was always fun. It would take someone very special for her to take it further. It was just a game.
A year ago Luke had cooked her favourite Chinese duck, opened a bottle of expensive wine and asked her to marry him. He wanted children and he wanted her to be their mother. She had felt an icy shiver, tried to calm herself with slow breathing and finally, in answer to his pleading, reminded him how hard it was for her to commit. Touching on the chaos of her own childhood, she told him that he more than anyone should understand the dangers of intergenerational damage.
He had tried to reassure her, held her close, whispered that all would be fine. But the conversation had unsettled her. Far from the romantic ending he had hoped for, she had pulled away, saying she needed time alone, leaving him on the sofa watching Formula One. She had gone to the bedroom and tried to ground herself by surfing Tinder. An hour later she had resurrected Lola, the fake identity she had adopted years ago when she first came to London. Lola even had her own Facebook profile. She was pretty, just under twenty years old and within a few months she had gathered more than fifty friends her own age.
From the corner of her eye she glimpsed Ricky. It was clear he was fed up with waiting. He looked at her briefly and she thought she detected a flicker of suspicion. She looked away. He stood up and walked out. She finished her apple juice and crab sandwich, paid her bill, left a generous tip for the waitress, picked up her stolen goods and set off for the tube.
Chapter Three
Mel
‘So, the deal is, you just sit there and listen.’ Mel concluded her few words of instruction to the new pupil.
‘Say nothing?’ Natasha looked incredulous.
‘Exactly.’
‘Even if I can help?’
‘Especially if you think you can help. Speak to me later, ask anything you like, only not in front of the client.’ Was Mel imagining it or was that disdain in Natasha’s arched brows and crooked smile?
‘So, this morning… Was it…?’
‘That was helpful. But, if you’re left alone with the client, stick to pleasantries.’
‘I’m terribly sorry, I…’
‘Forget it,’ replied Mel.
Natasha moved to the tall window, lowering the blind to shut out the shaft of afternoon sunlight that gleamed across the cold glass of the conference table. Then, with the grace of a dancer, she sat, setting out her papers and her laptop, and waited.
The day had got off to a bad start with Mel arriving late for the Principal Registry, the main family court in Central London. It had been a mistake to drive her son to school, though at the time it seemed an opportunity for twenty minutes’ uninterrupted conversation. Traffic had been heavy and slow, conversation had been desultory and largely one-sided, culminating in Jacob turning up the volume of some ranting, incomprehensible radio chat show when she had tried to introduce the topic of revision.
Neither said another word until they reached the school gates at which point, he mumbled, ‘Thanks, Mum,’ in response to her cheery, ‘Have a good day, darling.’ She set off for the nearest tube station and after a ten-minute search for a parking space, managed to wedge her tiny Hyundai between a couple of monstrous four-by-fours.
The journey from East Finchley station was longer than her usual route from Finsbury Park. There were no spare seats, the train stopped twice in tunnels and the crush in the carriage meant there was no chance to take a final flick through Mrs Patel’s financial statement. They pulled into Holborn station at 9:45 a.m. She’d asked Mrs Patel to be there for 9:30 a.m. and the case was listed for 10:30 a.m.
Mel raced down High Holborn to the Principal Registry, a large square building at the top of Chancery Lane. There was a long queue at the security desk just inside the front door and it was close to ten o’clock when she stepped out of the lift onto the fourth floor where the hearing was due to take place. The usher told her that Mrs Patel was with her representative in one of the small conference rooms.
‘What representative?’ asked Mel. Did the usher mean her solicitor, who might turn up to reassure the client and would be none too pleased about his barrister arriving half an hour late?
‘Her barrister, Miss Baker.’
‘Miss Baker’s not her barrister, she’s my pupil.’
‘Well, she signed her name here.’ The usher showed Mel a list of the morning’s cases. There, next to the name of the client and in a box marked Counsel was written in neat cursive script, Miss Natasha Baker.
Mel felt a rush of irritation. Natasha might be a qualified barrister, but she was still just a pupil. She had no right to put her name on the list as Counsel. Mel crossed out Natasha’s name and put down her own. Then, after a moment’s hesitation, she wrote Natasha’s name underneath her own. The judge would need to know who was in court.
Mel found the conference room at the end of a long corridor. Through the glass she could see Mrs Patel, a large woman in a bright green dress and heavy gold jewellery. She was talking with apparent animation to a much younger woman in a smart charcoal grey suit. Mel recognised the younger woman immediately. She’d seen her around chambers but hadn’t connected her with the name. Natasha looked far too mature, too poised to be a pupil. Her thick mid-blonde hair was swept elegantly off her face and pinned high at the back, and she sat facing Mrs Patel, calm and confident, as if she had been doing this job all her life. She appeared to be listening intently, typing on her laptop while referring occasionally to the neatly annotated paper statement which lay on the table beside her. Mel was desperate for a pee but that could wait. The important thing was to meet her client and take control.
‘Mrs Patel, good morning. I’m so sorry I’m late. Good morning, Natasha.’
‘Hi, Mel,’ said Natasha.
The greeting felt unduly casual given they had never met before. Mel knew she should have arranged a meeting with Natasha, talked through what was expected of them both in the pupil–supervisor relationship. But it had all happened so suddenly. There had been no time. The meeting would have to be postponed.
‘So, we’d better get started,’ said Mel. ‘We’re on in half an hour.’