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And now here I am. So close. So very close.
I’ll be a whole lot closer if I manage to pull off my crazy scheme.
It is crazy. It’s so crazy I should probably never speak it out loud, not to Dean and not even to myself.
But I’ll have to, because I’ll need his help.
I drop into an internet cafe on my way home, and the soup kitchen location I followed Mr Henley to is easy to pinpoint. New Start. A charity-funded initiative with three branches across the city.
Newtown Lane on a Monday.
A place called Eastspring on a Wednesday.
And Brickwood, where he went, on a Friday.
I call Eastspring in my finest telephone voice and tell them my name is… Amy… and I’m… looking to volunteer… on a Wednesday… this Wednesday…
The guy’s name is Frank and he seems really nice. He tells me they’d love to have me, Amy, and I should head on down for seven o’clock sharp, with some warm clothes and a smile and that’s all I’d need.
But it isn’t all I need.
I pick up some hair dye and bleach at the local chemist when I get off the underground, and dig out my makeup bag once Joseph is bathed and in bed.
Dean watches me sorting through my old lipsticks until I find a light pink, and the expression on his face lets me know he’s expecting an explanation.
“It’s nothing to worry about…” I begin as he hands me a coffee.
“If it’s to do with Henley it’s plenty to worry about.”
I ask him for his help with the hair dye, just so I won’t have to see his face when I explain myself.
He gloves up with an expression of impending doom, and the silence is heavy as I sit in the chair, an old towel slung around my shoulders.
When he’s safely out of my eyeline, I confess in one long monologue that I’ve discovered Alexander Henley uses escorts, about the paperwork in his drawer, about the porn I’ve seen on his browsing history, but I don’t stop there, rattling off all the things I’ve seen and all the things I’ve learned. Big things, small things. Any things.
I tell him I’m going to volunteer at Eastspring, and then, when the time is right, I’ll transfer to Brickwood, I’ll run into Mr Henley and I’ll introduce myself as someone other than his cleaner, and it’ll be great… it’ll be just fine…
I take a breath. A long breath.
“What do you mean, it’ll be fine? Are you …”
I twist in my chair and I don’t need to say anything as my eyes meet his. His widen, the bottle of dye paused in mid-air as he realises what I’m really planning.
“No,” he says. “No fucking way, Lissa. Just no.”
“For Joseph,” I tell him. “I have to get him out of here, Dean. He’s only got me, and this place, and it’s not enough. Being a cleaner’s not enough. He needs more.”
“He has me, too,” Dean snaps. “And he’d rather you were poor than dead.”
Dead.
The word hits hard.
I take a another breath. Compose myself.
“I saw the guy’s card. Some swanky auctioneer from Chelsea. They don’t kill people, Dean, that’s crazy. They just pay them… for sex…”
“And you’ve never had sex. You’ve never been an escort. You’ve no fucking idea what these people are into, Lissa, swanky or not.”
“I want Alexander Henley. Being paid for it is…”
“Insane, Lissa. It’s fucking insane!”
“My only shot…” I close my eyes. “I’ll put the money in a trust fund, for Joe, if they’ll even have me on their books, that is. All of it, every penny, and I’ll keep working… keep cleaning… I won’t get carried away… I won’t…”
His hands land on my shoulders, and he squeezes so hard, as though he’s trying to squeeze some sense into me.
He can’t.
I’m a lost cause.
I know that much.
“For fuck’s sake, Lissa. What if it’s not even him? You even thought about that? What if it’s not Henley who rocks up in some seedy hotel room somewhere, but some slimy random. Some creepy old guy who’s paid to be your fucking first?”
The thought chills me, but it’s nothing I haven’t considered myself.
I gesture to the bottle of hair dye, and he resumes the application with a sigh. “I’m doing everything I can to make sure it is him who rocks up. He likes blondes. He had a crush on Debbie Harry when he was young, I’ve seen the pictures in a box of his old things and…”
“Oh, well that’s just brilliant, then. Dress up a bit like Debbie Harry and I’m sure it’ll be him who shows. Have you lost your fucking mind? Do you have any idea how fucking crazy you sound?”
I shrug, because it does sound crazy, and I lost my fucking mind a long time ago, before I ever got close to Henley’s bedroom. But there’s hope. Just a bit.
