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‘Yes. Mostly. But I was good at it. I thrived. I earned enough to get a small room in a bedsit and finally had something to call my own. I dreamed of owning a nice house in a pleasant area, somewhere where I could be happy. Over the years, I advanced upward until I reached where I am now.’
‘And what is it you do now?’
Pin pricks tingled up my spine as I met her eyes. I didn’t see judgement there. No, she looked at me openly, neither fearful nor disgusted.
‘I’m an enforcer for one of the top crime syndicates in Glasgow.’
Her eyes widened slightly before she reached out and patted my hand. ‘You survived despite a terrible start. No one can begrudge you that. So tell me about this job.’
‘There’s a woman.’
Gladys smiled wryly, her eyes glittering at that snippet. ‘Go on.’
‘She’s my boss’s daughter. He arranged her marriage to a rival gang’s leader, and the guy is a terrible man. While none of us are saints, he’d make the devil himself seem reasonable. So she ran away, and they tasked me with bringing her home.’
‘To a man she despised?’ The words were like a gut punch.
‘Yes. But she was more than I’d bargained for. Like a little hell-cat, she made my life a misery. At first. She cut up my cash cards, threw my phone in a river and burned my car to the ground.’
‘Good,’ Gladys said. ‘Sound’s like the lassie knows what’s right.’
‘Sparks flew, despite the rage, and we ended up giving in to temptation. Repeatedly. And somewhere in there, I lost more than just my bloody mind. I fell for her.’
‘Oh, sweetheart.’ Gladys tutted as she resumed patting my hand with her cold, papery palm.
‘I thought about just staying on the road with her, disappearing with her. But when I let her know her younger sister would be next in line, she was resolute about going home.’
‘Has she married him yet?’
‘No. She has two days until the wedding.’
‘And you are going to stop it? Yes?’
‘How can I? You don’t just go against this man and survive. He’d kill me, and possibly her.’
‘It will kill you not to try, won’t it? If you think she feels the same way about you, it has to be worth a try. You need to hold on to love, however it presents itself.’
‘What about if you love her, let her go?’
‘Utter hogs-wash,’ Gladys said, making a sweeping motion with her hand. ‘Said by an utter coward who refused to stand up for the person they loved.’
‘I don’t think she’d come with me. What about her sister?’
‘Is she worth less than her sister? Should her life be derailed for another? No.’
My mind swirled with thoughts, regrets, and flashes of Esther. Her sweet, bratty smile, the way she laughed with abandon when she finally let go. The way she looked when totally relaxed in my arms, her chest raising as she slept. The way I felt when I was with her. Could I really let her go? I’d been fooling myself with the belief that I could.
‘If I don’t die, we’d need to disappear. For good.’
‘Choose somewhere warm,’ Gladys said, popping the lid back on her biscuit tin.
‘Why?’
‘It helps with my arthritis.’
‘What?’
‘If you are going on an adventure, I want to come. I can’t spend another ten years fading away in that old house while you are off living a grand adventure.’
