Afraid of the Dark - James Grippando [100]
“I’ve waited long enough for answers.”
“You know how skittish she is. All I did was look at her and she ran from me.”
Vince climbed out of the cab. A cool mist greeted his skin, and he heard the Cockney accents of passing pedestrians—the nuances of northeast London in his perpetual world of darkness.
“I can’t look at her,” he said as he stepped onto the sidewalk, “which is why Shada won’t run from me.”
Chapter Fifty-one
Stop here,” Jack told the driver. They were in Bethnal Green, a half block away from the Carpenter’s Arms.
Like it or not, Jack had received a crash course in East End pub history from a driver who was apparently determined to become his new best friend. Plenty of pubs in the area claimed a connection to Ronald and Reginald Kray, the East End’s kings of organized crime in the 1950s and 1960s. Carpenter’s claim was more real than most. Once upon a time, it was actually owned by the Kray twins and run by their dear old mum. Somehow over the years the tiny old pub had avoided conversion to flats, and it stood in refurbished splendor at the corner of Cheshire and St. Matthew’s Row.
“Try the Greene King IPA or Staropramen ale on draft,” the driver said as Jack climbed out of the cab.
“Will do,” said Jack.
The cab pulled away, leaving Jack alone on the sidewalk. He was standing in front of a vacant shop that had apparently sold shoes of some sort; a tattered old sign in the window read THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA, BUT THE PEOPLE WEAR PLIMSOLLS—£5. The narrow and crooked one-way street was made even narrower by a block-long construction site across from the Carpenter’s Arms. Jack peered through the cold mist and saw Vince at the pub’s entrance.
Jack felt a pang of guilt for tailing a blind man, but Vince’s claim that he didn’t know who he was going to meet was a crock, and but for the jet lag, Jack would have called him on it immediately. Factor in the pain he was still feeling over Neil’s death, and maybe Andie had been right about the wisdom of deferring to the police. Chuck Mays was not to be trusted, and even if Vince was reliable under normal circumstances, these were not normal circumstances. Jack was starting to feel used, and it wouldn’t be the first time that someone like Chuck had tried to hire the name Swyteck—the son of a former governor—to legitimize some scheme.
Jack was about two hundred feet away, his anger rising, when he saw Vince reach for the door at the pub entrance. Then Vince stopped. Jack’s cell rang, and he answered.
“Stop following me,” said Vince.
The words hit him like a brick. Jack didn’t know how Vince knew, but it didn’t matter. “If I go back to the hotel, I’m going back to Miami,” said Jack. “Either I’m part of this, or I’m not.”
“Don’t be a jackass. It’s not my decision. Chuck set up the meeting.”
“Chuck is about to be indicted for murder.”
“For the third time: That news story was a plant. Chuck didn’t kill his wife.”
“I’m talking about the murder of the guy who was sleeping with her. Who killed Jamal Wakefield?”
“Jamal was butchered. They cut off his foot.”
“I’ve seen more grisly murders for hire.”
“Now you’re talking crazy.”
“Am I?”
“Yes. But let’s have this conversation later. You have no idea what you’re screwing up.”
“Who is your meeting with?”
“I’m not meeting with anyone if you don’t get out of here.”
Jack picked up the pace, now almost close enough to read the chalkboard in the window. “Are you meeting with Shada Mays?”
“I told you: Chuck set it up.”
“That’s the point. I’m not going to lend my name and reputation to secret meetings that I’m not a part of.”
“What are you talking about?”
Jack was acting on a gut feeling that wasn’t his own, but he trusted Andie and Theo, and the fact that they were of the same mind about Shada’s infidelity was enough for him.
“Don’t be a fool, Vince. Don’t let Chuck use you.”
“Use me to do what?”
“To strong-arm Shada Mays into helping Chuck get away with the murder of Jamal