the Cellar, so Jessie shouldn’t have been surprised to find that it was downstairs from street level. Narrow, steep stairs. Stairs which made her walk oh, so carefully in her four-inch-high heels. The last thing she wanted was to fall flat on her face.
The music reached her ears only seconds before the smoke.
Jazz.
Not Jessie’s favourite form of music. But what did it matter? She wasn’t there to enjoy herself. She was there to do a job.
The bouncer standing by the open door gave her the once-over as she slowly negotiated the last few steps.
‘Very nice,’ he muttered as she walked past him.
She didn’t answer. She straightened her shoulders and moved further into the smoke haze, her eyes slowly becoming accustomed to the dimmer lighting as they scanned the not-so-crowded room. Nine o’clock, she reasoned, was between times. Most of the Friday after-work drinkers had departed, and the serious weekend party animals had not yet arrived.
She’d never been to this particular bar before. She’d never heard of it. It was Jack who’d informed her that it had a reputation as a pick-up joint.
The décor was nineteen-twenties speak-easy style, with lots of wood and leather and brass. Booths lined the walls, with tables and chairs filling every other available space. The band occupied one corner, with a very small dance floor in front of it.
The bar itself was against the far wall, semicircular in shape, graced by a dozen or so wooden-based, leather-topped stools. A long mirror ran along the back behind the bottle shelves, which gave Jessie reflected glimpses of the faces of people sitting at the bar.
There were only half a dozen.
She recognised her target straight away. He was sitting in the middle, with a blonde sitting next to him on his left. There were several vacant stools to his right. As Jessie stood there, watching them, she saw the blonde lean over and say something to him. He motioned to the barman, who came over, temporarily blocking Jessie’s view of the target’s face in the mirror.
Had the blonde asked him to buy her a drink? Was he right at this moment doing exactly what his wife suspected him of?
Jessie realised with a rush of relief that maybe she wouldn’t have to flirt with the creep after all. If she got over there right now, she could collect evidence of his chatting up some other woman without having to belittle herself.
Jessie’s heart pounded as she headed for the bar, nerves cramping her stomach. She still hated doing this, even second-hand.
Think of the money, she told herself as she slid up on the vacant stool two to the right of the target. Think of Emily’s beautiful, beaming face on Christmas morning when she finds that Santa has brought her exactly what she asked for.
The self-lecture helped a little. Some composure returned by the time Jessie placed her bag down on the polished wooden bar-top. Very casually she extracted the mobile phone, pretended to check her text messages, turned on the video then put it down in a position which would catch what was going on to her left, both visually and verbally.
‘Thanks,’ the blonde purred when the barman put a glass of champagne in front of her. ‘So what will we drink to, handsome?’
When the barman moved away, Jessie was able to watch the target’s face again in the mirror behind the bar.
There was no doubt he was handsome, more handsome than in his photograph. More mature-looking, too. Maybe that photo in her bag was a couple of years old, because his hair was different as well. Not different in colour. It was still a mid-brown. But in place of the longer waves and lock flopping across his forehead was a short-back-and-sides look, with spikes on top.
The style brought his blue eyes more into focus.
That was another thing that looked different. His eyes. In the photo they’d seemed a baby-blue, with a dreamy expression. In reality, his eyes were an icy blue. And not soft at all.
They glittered as he smiled wryly and swirled the remains of his drink. He hadn’t noticed her arrival as yet.
‘To marriage,’ he said, and lifted his glass in a toast.
‘Marriage!’ the blonde scorned. ‘That’s one seriously out-of-date institution. I’d rather drink to divorce.’
‘Divorce is a blight on our society,’ he said sharply. ‘I won’t drink to divorce.’
‘Sex, then. Let’s drink to sex.’ And she slid her glass against his in a very suggestive fashion.
Jessie, who’d stayed surreptitiously watching him in the mirror behind the bar, saw his head turn slowly towards the blonde, a drily amused expression on his face.
‘Sweetheart, I think you’ve picked the wrong guy to share a drink with. I’m sorry if I’ve given you the wrong impression, but I’m not in the market for what you’re looking for tonight.’
Jessie almost fell off her stool. What was this? A man with some honour? Had Dora been right about Mr Marshall after all?
‘You sure?’ the blonde persisted with a sultry smile playing on her red-painted mouth.
‘Positive.’
‘Your loss, lover,’ she said and, taking her glass of champagne, slid off her stool and sashayed over to sit at a table close to the band. She wasn’t by herself for more than ten seconds, before a guy who’d been sitting further down the bar had taken his beer with him to join her.
Jessie glanced back into the mirror to find that her target had finally noticed her presence, and was staring at her. When their eyes connected in the glass her heart reacted in a way which it hadn’t in years. It actually jumped, then fluttered, then flipped right over.
Her eyes remained locked with his for longer than was wise, her brain screaming at her to look away, but her body took absolutely no notice.
Suddenly a man plonked himself down on the vacant stool that separated them, snapping her back to reality.
‘Haven’t seen you in here before, gorgeous,’ the interloper said in slurred tones, his beery breath wafting over her. ‘Can I buy you a drink?’
He was about forty, a very short, very drunk weasel of a man in a cheap, ill-fitting business suit that bore no resemblance to the magnificently tailored Italian number the target was wearing.
‘No, thanks,’ Jessie said stiffly. ‘I like to buy my own drinks.’
‘One of them feminists, eh? That’s all right by me. Cheaper this way.’
‘I also like to drink alone,’ she added sharply.
The drunk laughed. ‘A sexy piece like you shouldn’t be doing anything alone. What’s the matter, honey? Last guy do you wrong? Or ain’t I young enough for you? Trust me. I’ve still got it where it counts. Here, let me show you…’
He was actually fumbling with his fly when two big hands grabbed him and literally lifted him off the stool.
‘Let me show you something, buster,’ the
