Rock a Bye Baby (13 page)

‘Is Pete dangerous?’ she asked.

She didn’t really care. Johnnie’s closeness would
make her tongue stick to the roof of her mouth if she didn’t say something.

‘In a way. Never mind them. Don’t know about you, girl, but I’ve had enough of this party. How about me and you take a walk along the beach?’

She smiled. ‘Yes.’

Close and warm they strolled off beyond the beach huts. Tiny lights from hundreds of caravans herded into coastal sites twinkled like fireflies.

‘Hang on.’

Johnnie unzipped his motorcycle boots and socks. He also took off his jacket. ‘Too warm and too heavy,’ he added. He was forced to carry both. The jacket he slung over his shoulder; the boots he carried beneath his arm. He shoved his thick socks into his boots.

Marcie slid her feet out of her shoes. They fitted inside her shoulder bag.

The clouds had fallen like a wad of rolled-up bedding onto the horizon. The stars had come out. The evening that had not started so well now turned magical as they walked and talked their way in one direction along the beach, then changed direction and headed back again. The sand was damp beneath their bare feet.

‘Am I forgiven?’ he asked her.

‘For leaving me at the bus stop?’

‘Yeah. There’s nothing else to forgive me for is there?’

She shook her head and smiled. ‘I can’t think of anything.’

‘Great. We can kiss and make up.’

‘Can we?’

Her voice trembled with laughter.

They turned to face each other.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said.

His voice was soft.

‘Apology accepted.’

He took hold of her hand. They began to walk.

Her hand was warmed by his. Her toes were cooled by the wet sand.

‘I liked the card by the way.’

‘Even the fishing rods?’

He laughed. ‘I’ve tried fishing. I’m not very good though. You’d starve if you had to depend on me for a fish supper, I can tell you.’

‘Chips only?’

He laughed, a big, throaty, infectious sound that got her laughing too.

Time flew. They talked of their families. Marcie told him that her father had been abroad working and had only just come home.

‘It was all to do with the Navy,’ she said.

Thankfully, he believed her.

‘My dad’s away at times too. That’s nothing to do with the Navy.’ He looked away. She fancied he was unwilling to tell her what his father did and she
wondered if he too had done something to be ashamed of.

Now the ice was totally broken, it seemed only natural that they should kiss and hug a lot more. By the time they’d put their footwear back on kissing and hugging had become something they just
had
to do.

Johnnie had left his bike in the pub car park. A church clock struck eleven. She’d be home by eleven thirty as agreed with her father. She told herself that it didn’t matter that Johnnie would be taking her home and not Alan Taylor. It would be alright; she had to believe that.

It was gone ten o’clock and Rita had been drinking heavily when she finally got round to calling her father. She told him that she was staying with Patsy, another friend.

‘Marcie’s got a lift home so there’s no need for you to pick her up. Marcie can be a right little tart when she wants to be,’ she added with a slurred laugh.

‘Sure, sweetheart. That’s fine. As long as you’re OK,’ said her father. Alan Taylor put the ivory coloured phone back in its cradle.

He didn’t believe a word of it, of course. He loved his daughter but she could be a right little baggage at times. She knew what she wanted and went after it no matter what anybody else might think. A bit like himself really.

However, that wasn’t what had set his teeth on edge. He’d been counting on Rita making up a different excuse for staying late at the party. It would have been a lie, but he didn’t care. He would have had Marcie to himself. But maybe Rita was already lying about Marcie having a lift home. Sometimes it
was hard to tell with his daughter. It depended whether it suited her to lie.

Stephanie was thumbing through a magazine. A glass of gin and tonic plus a lit cigarette sat on the coffee table in front of her. ‘Is your little princess staying out again?’

She said it in a desultory, lazy manner while continuing to study the stick-like fashion models. One was called ‘The Shrimp’. Another ‘Twiggy’. In Alan’s opinion they both had as much charisma as a wire coat hanger. Too skinny by far.

He swigged back his own drink. At the same time his eyes strayed to his car keys.

‘She’s staying over with a friend. Somebody called Lynette.’

He’d already forgotten what the friend’s name was. It didn’t matter.

Stephanie picked up her glass of gin and eyed him over the top of it. ‘Do you know this girl?’

‘Of course I do!’

He congratulated himself on making it sound as though Rita really did have a friend named Lynette. The truth was he didn’t have a clue who Rita’s mates were – except for Marcie. Marcie was not the sort of girl you could easily forget. She was like her mother – just as irresistible. Even now all these years later he still thought of Mary. Shame she’d never agreed to play ball, but there you are. But
with Marcie it seemed he was getting a second chance.

‘Where’s this Lynette from?’

The cock and bull story was ready and waiting. ‘Convent educated, but hey, you can’t hold that against her.’ Alan laughed at his own joke. Stephanie was unmoved.

‘Her old man’s a big noise up in Battersea. Owns a big Ford dealership and another forecourt a few miles away dealing in second-hand motors. Well wedged up, he is. I could be doing a bit of business there.’

Stephanie had the face of a china doll – cold, shiny and devoid of any expression except one: aloofness. Stephanie made a hobby of being aloof.

‘She’s your problem. That girl takes no notice of me at all. Cocky little cow.’

Stephanie’s voice was as deadpan as her face.

‘You’re the one she worships, so you’re the one responsible for her. And if ever she brings trouble to our door then it’s your fault.’

Alan looked at his watch. He didn’t want to argue with Stephanie. Things between them were fragile, but he wasn’t ready to tell her to clear off just yet.

‘I promised to have a pint with Tony.’

‘Please yourself. As long as I don’t have to mix with him and that blowsy wife of his.’

Alan narrowed his eyes. Stephanie never had a
hair out of place and was always immaculately dressed. She sometimes forgot that it was thanks to the likes of his graft and employing blokes like Tony that she could have the things she had.

He didn’t tell her that he’d already been for a drink with Tony. Living with Steph was claustrophobic at the best of times. She was hardly the only woman in his life, but she kept a nice home and knew how to dress. She looked the part at the legit side of his business and for social events where local bigwigs attended.

‘See you later,’ he said after collecting his keys from the onyx-topped table in the hallway.

He wasn’t sure whether she responded and didn’t care. Their golden years were long over.

The inside of the Jag always smelled of leather. The seats were tan coloured. Walnut veneer lined the dash and parts of the door. There was a lot of chrome both inside and out. Alan loved his car. No matter what other car he ever owned in his life, he would always love this one more than any other.

‘Better than a woman,’ he said to anyone who would listen.

He’d always prided himself on having a feel for cars, one of the reasons he’d started dealing in them from an early age. Things had progressed from there of course; nowadays he had his fingers in other more lucrative pies. But the old respect for a good motor was still there. He normally made it a rule never to
gun the engine from cold, but tonight he broke that rule.

Slamming his foot to the floor he hightailed it along the road from the upmarket bungalows of Leys-down to Blue Town and Endeavour Terrace.

There was a light on in a bedroom window when he got there. Rather than rushing in he turned off the engine and sat thinking about the best course of action.

The first option was to go banging on the door and pretend that he’d gone to pick Marcie up but she wasn’t around. That should get old Tony worried.

He gritted his teeth at the prospect that the lad on the motorbike was venturing where he wanted to go. So far as he could tell, little Marcie was virgin territory, territory he’d earmarked for himself.

An idea came to him. How about dropping him in the proverbial?

Alan Taylor was good at getting what he wanted without people suspecting what he was up to. Owning a nightclub in London had led to dealing with some of the hardest criminals in the East End. The secret was to appear that you were doing them a big favour when in fact you were only taking care of number one. Oh yes, he was good at that.

‘Here goes, my darling,’ he said as he swung his legs out of the car.

Tony answered the door, looking as though he’d been sleeping in a chair. Waiting up for his daughter?

You have to trust them, mate, Alan wanted to say, but decided to save that pearl of wisdom for another day. It helped to have a few ready lines in the arsenal of useful platitudes.

Tony blinked. ‘Alan.’ He threw an expectant look past Alan’s shoulder. ‘Where’s our Marcie?’

Alan adopted the concerned expression he could do so well.

‘That’s the problem, mate. I don’t know. I didn’t tell you before but the other week there was a toe rag on a motorbike trying to pick her up. I scuppered his chances driving past when I did. But I saw him again tonight. He forced your Marcie to go with him. I followed as best I could but you know how it is with motorbikes; shot off down between two bollards along by the beach.’ He sighed a deep, meaningful sigh. ‘Sorry, old son. I lost the bastard.’

His expression a mix of alarm and anger, Tony pushed Alan aside and shot down the garden path like a greyhound from the trap.

‘Hold on, mate,’ Alan called out behind him. ‘What you going to do?’

‘Kill the bastard if he lays a finger on my Marcie! I’ll fucking kill ’im!’

‘Hold on there.’

Alan congratulated himself. He’d easily wound Tony Brooks up into a state. It wasn’t just his tall tale about the kid on the motorbike that had done
it. Tony could see the same thing in Marcie that Alan saw: she looked like her mother – a
lot
like her mother.

A low rumble of violence sounded in Tony’s voice. His look was pure evil. ‘Are you taking me to look for her in that road burner of yours or what?’

Alan nodded and kept nodding, anything to calm the stupid git down. ‘Course I will. What are friends for?’

At the very moment when Alan turned the ignition key, a single headlight came into view at the end of the terrace.

‘Could be who we’re looking for,’ suggested Alan.

Tony was out of the car before Alan could tell him to calm down. He had no option but to follow. Not that he’d get too involved at first, not until getting involved was likely to work to his advantage.

The bike slowed then stopped.

Alan had been right. Hair tangled over her face, skirt way above her thighs, Marcie alighted from the pillion.

She looked terrified when she saw her father. There was pleading in her eyes when she turned to Alan.

She opened her mouth to explain. Her father grabbed her arm and swung her in a wide semi-circle towards the gate.

‘Get into the house. Now!’

It was Johnnie he was after.

‘You!’

His shout was enough to wake up the whole terrace.

Johnnie looked at him in disbelief. ‘What’s the score, mate? There’s no harm done. She’s home safe and sound.’

Alan managed to catch Tony’s raised fist before he had time to use it.

‘Steady on, Tony mate. Think of the consequences. Anyway, like the boy said, she’s home safe and sound. That’s all that matters. Get going, kid,’ he said to Johnnie.

‘See you tomorrow.’ The cheeky little sod blew Marcie a kiss.

Alan saw the kid’s grin and guessed it was done on purpose to wind Tony up.

Tony saw it too and was livid. ‘You stay away from my daughter! Hear me? Stay away or I’ll rip your fucking head from your body!’

‘Get going, get going,’ Alan repeated.

Bedroom lights were being switched on in some of the cottages. It was only a matter of time before the police were called. Tony couldn’t afford that to happen. He’d only just come out of nick. If he went on like this he was likely to end up back inside and Alan didn’t want that to happen. Too bloody right he didn’t!

As Tony lurched out of Alan’s grasp and towards him, Johnnie spun the bike in a half-circle, opened the throttle and roared away.

Marcie’s hair had tangled into long strands around her shoulders. It flew out behind her when, wild eyed, she headed for her father, still trying to explain.

‘Dad, he didn’t do anything wrong. I wanted to go with him. Honest I did. He just gave me a lift home. Rita phoned her dad and told him he was going to—’

‘She didn’t phone,’ explained Alan, not wanting Marcie to explain any further. He lied easily. Rita wouldn’t mind. ‘Head like a sieve that girl of mine. Still. No harm done.’

Tony didn’t notice what was being said. His attention was firmly fixed on his daughter.

‘You’re not going to meet that boy again and that’s that!’

‘Yes I am!’ she snapped, uncaring of how disrespectful she sounded. ‘What are you going to do? Keep me prisoner?’

His meaty paw lashed out and caught her cheek. ‘You’re just like your mother!’

Face smarting and eyes streaming with tears, Marcie stared at him.

‘I hate you!’ she shouted. Then she ran off, her feet slapping the broken pavement at the front of the cottages. She heard Alan shouting at Tony to knock it off but she didn’t stop running. Her sight was clouded with tears.

The darkness of the back lane felt cool and safe.
No one could see her crying here. No one could hear her sobbing.

Squeezing her eyes shut she tried to reason what had gone wrong. She’d been so looking forward to having her father home, to being like everybody else. It was bad enough not to have a mother. Her father was supposed to have made up for that.