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718 Welbeck Street.
That’s the address Joseph has given Ryan and Angela. They’re ready to go. Angela’s going to keep a watch outside, and Ryan’s going in. And, afterwards, the rest of the squad is going to arrest Joseph now that Angela and Ryan can identify him. He’s trusted Ryan and Angela, and as a result there’s enough to incriminate him. The text message, Ryan and Angela’s evidence … it will be enough to demonstrate he was running a crime ring, enough to send him down for decades.
The only thing missing is the baby. Still lost.
As they’re walking over, another message appears.
Go into the address in the previous text and say you’re here to do painter/decorating. Once you get to the proprietor’s office, say I sent you. JJ.
Ryan turns to Angela. ‘This is it,’ he says. ‘This is how he gets the addresses of the empty houses. This office. We’ve got him. We’ve fucking got him.’
‘I know,’ Angela says, buzzing. ‘I know.’
Ryan and Angela walk along the rainy March streets, Ryan thinking of his brother and of Old Sandy, too. Thinking about how he kind of has changed the world. Just a little bit. In his own small way.
Ryan blinks back some emotion or other that he can’t name. They reach the address. Nicola walks away from him, perfectly in character, leaving Ryan to enter the building. A law firm, apparently. Looks well-to-do.
A woman is sitting in reception. She’s pretty. Cascades of dark hair, big eyes.
‘Need any painting or decorating done?’ he says, a big, fixed, hopeful smile in place.
‘What, just – spontaneous decorating?’ she says with a dry laugh. Something turns over in his stomach at that laugh. He didn’t expect this. He thought she’d be in on it. He’d thought she’d understand the code.
‘Er, yeah?’ he says.
‘Sure, we’ll just pull all the furniture away from the walls right now then, shall we? Do the legal work while you paint?’
‘Okay, I’m game if you are,’ he says easily.
‘We’re all right, thanks,’ she says. ‘But if we ever want some unplanned decorating done – you’re our man.’
She ignores him, turning her gaze back to her computer.
‘Can I just check with the owner?’ he asks.
‘How do you know I’m not the owner?’
‘Well, are you?’
‘… No.’
They hold each other’s gazes for a second, then explode into laughter. ‘Well, pleased to meet you, not-the-owner,’ he says.
‘Likewise, spontaneous decorator.’
She smiles at him, like they know each other, and shouts over her shoulder. ‘Dad?’ she says. ‘Someone here for you.’ She glances at Ryan just as he heads into her father’s office. ‘I’m Jen.’
‘Kelly.’
Day Minus Seven Thousand One Hundred and Fifty-Seven, 11:00
Jen’s eyes open. Please be 2022. But she knows it isn’t.
Hip bones. An old phone. A really, really old bed, God, it’s that low one that had the wooden sides. Air rushes out of her lungs. It isn’t over.
She sits up and rubs her eyes. Yes. Her flat, her first flat. The one she bought when she’d just started work. She’d put down a three-thousand-pound deposit; laughable in 2022.
It has one bedroom. She gets up and follows the worn path in the tattered brown carpet into the hallway and then into the living room. It’s been made boho by her soft furnishings: a chintzy curtain separates the sitting room from the kitchen, purple cushions line a deep windowsill to disguise the damp. She gazes at it now, in wonder. She’d forgotten almost all of this.
