Chapter Eight
“I’ve got another twenty four hours in London...the City that never sleeps...come on!”
Dylan sighed still not lifting his face from the bed, barely holding the handset; he’d had a late night and was in no hurry to head out. “I thought that was New York,” he offered with a groan.
Patrick wasn’t taking telling, “come on buddy, I enjoyed our golf last week, but we haven’t hit the town for ages. I’ll meet you at four, dinner on floor thirty of the Shard; I’ve heard it’s amazing there. Then there’s this party, Men and Health Magazine are having a party on a boat on the Thames. Women, free drink and glamour! How can you say no?”
Dylan groaned again, “I’m not in the mood Patrick.”
The other man sighed down the phone, “I don’t know anyone else in town, not anyone that can party like Dylan Wallace anyway. You were never one to turn down a good time...what’s changed? That little ex wife of yours?”
That made Dylan roll over, he took in the fact that he was in his bedroom, not the golf club hotel, but his apartment in London. He was still wearing his suit, and his tie, that was almost choking him as he woke in his post alcohol haze unable to remember getting there.
“It’s nothing to do with her!” It’s EVERYTHING to do with her. “I just need some rest.”
Patrick laughed, “four pm. The Shard. BE there.”
As the phone went dead Dylan tossed it across the room, he tried to sit up, but his head was banging, the world spinning. He groaned, his last memory was hitting a bar in Soho after storming out of the hotel and getting out of his car in the City. Whisky...he’d started with single malts in a hotel bar and moved onto several other places.
And now? Now he had the hangover from hell. Did he feel better for it?
Do you hell? That damned internal vocal reminder refused to settle down. But it was right, he’d drunk to forget the chaos and destitution he’d caused Matilda, and none of that had gone away. Had he worn blinkers through those days? He’d wanted the best for her, the best for them, and he was so sure that one of his tip offs, one of his plans would come good. All she’d needed to do was wait, trust him. For six years he’d thought she’d given up on him, that she’d moved on to pastures new, wanting better, more...not being willing to wait, to see the future he saw. All the time he had been turning the screw, making things harder and harder, straining their relationship beyond belief and forcing her into a ridiculous situation.
He remembered her mother being ill, taken into hospital, Sylvia Davies was a lovely woman, she’d always looked out for him, he had the extra portions of everything for Christmas lunch and she defended him whenever Matilda was critical of her husband. Those years as part of her family had been amazing...he’d not had that until he met her, his mother was a polygamous socialite who didn’t have a maternal bone in her body, holidays in his childhood had been to Cannes to shoulder rub with rich and famous men, he’d tagged along or been palmed off on the latest in a string of nannies. But time with the Davies family, coming home to a wife who’d made him dinner, waking up with a woman who loved him was a long time ago. Many years where his bitterness and hatred had escalated in rapid proportions.
Hong Kong had been his most confident tip off to date. He could remember his elation at the thought of finally getting his chance. Admittedly he’d not been as honest as he could have been to Matilda, but then she’d been jaded, snappy before that point. He’d called her, told her he was heading to Hong Kong; she’d been disappointed, but no more. Dylan sighed remembering how he’d got the remainder of the money that he needed for the trip, phone calls to a loan company, the money transferred directly to his contact and partner for the deal. He’d never thought that the debt would land on her.
He’d been in Hong Kong a couple of days when she stopped answering her phone. It was hectic there, business was good, the deals were brokering, he’d presumed that he could work things out with her, make it up to her once he got back to London, but after a couple of months the divorce papers appeared at his desk.
Instead of dealing with how that made him feel, he signed them, not contesting the grounds of unreasonable behaviour, and posted them back. He was moving on to New York high on success when the decree absolute found him, and by then he didn’t care about her anymore, and he told himself he hadn’t until he walked into her hotel a week earlier.
A shower helped. He felt a little more alive. But as he scrubbed himself clean the image of Matilda’s mother Sylvia popped repeatedly into his mind. He couldn’t imagine the house in Oxfordshire without her in it. To him she epitomised everything that a mother should be, she was always happy, smiling, always hugging her daughter, and later him, and then there was the constant smell, fresh bread, coffee, cakes, pies. The house was so homely, and that was what he’d loved, along with the banter between the parents and their children. How would it be without her there at the helm? How had Matilda coped with losing someone so important?
He ran his hands over his face in frustration, he’d abandoned her too. Left her at the same time, they’d argued, he KNEW her mother was ill, but he had chased his dreams anyway. Then the debt had caught up with her instead of him, and she’d had to deal with bankruptcy at the same moment she lost her influential and much loved parent.
He was a bastard. His mother told him repeatedly that he didn’t think of anyone but himself, he learned that from her, but he had always convinced himself that he was different, that he was better than his self indulgent mother. But he wasn’t. Was he?
Self hatred was a horrible thing and he eyed the bottle of whisky that tempted him from the corner of the room. He couldn’t spend another day and night buried in a bottle of whisky.
Mattie was just applying makeup when there was a knock at the door.
“I know, I’m coming, can’t a girl be late for a change?”
Stood there laughing at her was Andrew, who lived across the hall and the closest thing to a friend that she had.
“You can be late for fun, but not for work. COME on!”
Taking her hand he literally dragged her out of the doorway and to the stairs.
For the last three months, since Andrew’s girlfriend had disappeared, she’d been masquerading on her evening off as her. Andrew was a casual worker for a hospitality company, and she’d started to join him. It gave her cash, in her hand, illegal but a life saver for her. It was a long time since she’d had money to spend and she needed more work clothes to maintain the elegance in keeping with her position. When Andrew’s girlfriend left town, there was a vacancy at the company. The work was both erratic and casual, and if you asked no questions you were asked none back. A win all round if you weren’t the tax man.
She’d taken on an IVA, a step down from bankruptcy when her finances became unmanageable. Most of her debt was paid off, but she was committed to paying well over fifty percent of her salary to meet her end of the bargain. It left her with little to play with after rent and travel expenses. If she was caught doing this unofficial job she’d get in real trouble, but she had struggled without things for SO long, and she didn’t mean life’s luxuries, she meant food, drink, clothes. But Mattie’s almost abstract fear was being recognised by someone, friend, colleague, a patron of the Sunset Club, or worse, so she was in ‘disguise’, an auburn hairpiece changed her own hair dramatically, brown contact lenses transformed her own blue eyes, and spectacles, black rimmed but with clear glass all helped. The lenses had been expensive, but SO worthwhile.
Tonight she was joining Andrew at a PR party. These were the easiest nights, drunken people on a free night tipped hugely, especially when they got drunk. For these nights she was the most anonymous and usually earned loads of money serving drinks. The easiest money she could make.
The party when they arrived was quiet, but it had all the makings of a wild night. A decommissioned boat on the Thames with two different bands playing on two of the levels, four bars, two buffets, and dance space for several hundred people. As Mattie joined Andrew behind one of the bars, she could barely see for the money lust washing over her. It was pure greed and self indulgence, but the following day she was planning a trip to the salon, hair, waxing, the whole works. With Dylan being around her was feeling the need to both look AND feel good.
Bar work was easy to her, something that she felt natural doing, and to do it well wasn’t easy, but on the other hand it wasn’t as taxing as some of the other jobs she’d had in the past five years. For a month she was a security door worker at a nightclub, or then there were the night shifts at a rather dodgy petrol station. No she’d done worse, but she couldn’t risk being spotted, recognised.
“Cocktail list.” Andrew called out from her right and glancing up she took the list from him, Mojito, margaritas, sex on the beach. Nothing too challenging. Giving a nod she looked up at the first customer with a smile. Candy from a baby, she sighed to herself as she started to deposit the increasingly larger notes in her back pocket.
“Think of the feast we’re going to have in Khalif’s cafe when we get home, four course breakfast at five am. Sound good?”
Mattie glanced up and smiled at Andrew, “amazing. Counting down the minutes.”
Turning back to the people approaching the bar, a smile plastered on her face, she froze, heart stopping, breath whooshing from her lungs. There in front of her, waiting for a drink, for a moment unaware of who she was, a natural smile on his lips, was Dylan.