Private London (Private 4)

Chloe laughed and regretted it immediately. The room seemed to spin a little more again and she took a deep breath and steadied herself. Back on the wagon tomorrow, she thought. She couldn’t afford to get drunk. ‘No, I’m good, Ryan,’ she said, finally remembering his name.

‘Have a glass of water,’ the barman said, handing her a glass he had just poured out.

‘Cheers.’ Chloe said, taking a grateful sip of the water.

‘Chloe, isn’t it?’

‘That’s right.’

‘Reading psychiatry and law?’

‘You been researching me?’

The barman flushed a little. ‘No, your friend Laura told me.’

‘Come on, Chloe, stop chatting up the help,’ Hannah called out to her as she led Laura through the heaving masses towards the door. Chloe caught Ryan watching the two of them leave, Hannah putting on the extra bit of wiggle, giving it the Shakira shimmy – knowing that Ryan would be watching. Chloe felt a twinge of sympathy for the barman. He wasn’t even watching Hannah, his gaze was fixed on Laura. Fixed on her with the wet-eyed, puppy-like devotion of the truly lost cause. Chloe smiled ruefully. Laura was going to break a lot of hearts at CUL over the next two years before she finally tossed her mortar board in the air. Hell, Hannah would too. The pair of them drew attention from the men in the bar as they passed like a powerful magnet draws iron filings. Some of them getting an angry look or an elbow in the ribs for their trouble from unhappy girlfriends.

‘Catch you later,’ Chloe said to the still-distracted barman. Finishing the glass of water, she turned to leave but her right leg seemed to give out under her and she crashed towards the floor.

Chapter 18

‘DAN CARTER,’ I said to the willowy blonde standing imperiously behind the counter at the reception of Scott’s restaurant.

Might seem strange to some to come straight from a murder scene in King’s Cross to a swanky restaurant in Mayfair. But the sad truth was that you got used to it. You had to. Otherwise you didn’t function. It wasn’t that you didn’t care. It was that you couldn’t make it personal. You couldn’t afford

to.

Scott’s had always been popular, but the currently highest-paid actress in the world – you know, the brunette with the killer smile – had recently declared it her favourite restaurant in London. And now Scott’s had taken over from The Ivy as the place to be seen dining.

I flashed the receptionist a charming grin. She didn’t exactly sneer as she looked down at her bookings list but the fraction of a millimetre that her left eyebrow moved conveyed just the same emotion.

I looked down at the deck shoes I was wearing. Maybe she thought I should have been wearing socks?

‘Don Cotter?’ said the receptionist.

‘That’s Carter,’ I said. ‘Dan Carter.’

She beckoned us forward, led us into the restaurant proper and up to our table.

‘See, Alison?’ I said. ‘As good as my word. Private appreciates the business you throw our way.’

‘You and your associates do a good job, Dan. It’s that simple. Keep doing it and we’ll keep hiring you.’

Alison Chambers was the niece – and the apple of his eye – of Charles William Chambers of Chambers, Chambers and Mason. Private London operates in a number of diverse areas. Personal security and detective work for people rich enough to afford us and who don’t want police involvement for whatever reasons. And on the other side of the coin we worked with the Metropolitan Police on contract with our forensic division. But we also did a great deal of financial and corporate investigation. Industrial sabotage, intellectual theft, fraud. Computer forensics.

So it suited us well to keep in with the firm that occupied the offices below and it suited me to keep in with Alison Chambers. Her uncle might have had his name on the front of the building but Alison was the powerhouse in the firm.

I watched her studying the menu, multicoloured reading glasses perched delicately on the end of her shapely nose like an exotic butterfly ready to take flight. Her large, brown eyes as she considered the entrées as intent as if she had been scrutinising a million-pound contract.

‘I’ve heard the prawn cocktail is good here,’ I said.

She didn’t laugh. ‘How about you make yourself useful and order some wine? Something with bubbles in it,’ she said instead.

I held a finger discreetly in the air and beckoned a waiter across. He smiled professionally as he approached and then for real as he saw Alison.

She has this effect on men. Even gay men. Especially gay men, come to think of it. And this in a restaurant where three tables across Liz Hurley was sitting with some actress whose name I couldn’t place. But she was tipped to be Doctor Who’s next travelling companion and was wearing a skirt even shorter than that worn by the current one.

I notice details like that. It’s my job. I’m a detective.