Bang: Memoirs of a Relationship Assassin (7 page)

Her phone rang, and she switched it to voicemail without so much as a glance. Neither of us mentioned it – we just kept chatting. I was getting somewhere.

Then I glanced round and noticed a little cluster of women near the inner doors. I recognised Teri and Nicola, plus three others, all watching me and Becky.

“What?” said Becky, causing them all to giggle. Playground stuff.

“You’re not allowed to flirt with the couriers!” chimed Nicola.

Teri added “Yeah, what will hubbie say if he finds out?”

Becky’s face flamed – “He’s not my hubbie yet!” – as she hastily scribbled her signature on the parcel receipt. The other girls laughed their heads off. I smiled, but said nothing, not even wanting to acknowledge that Becky had a fiancé. Behind my smile I was irritated. This was ruining our connection. Please, I begged the girls silently, sod off back to your desks right this second.

“You watch yourself, John!” called Teri. “She’ll stick her hand in your trouser pocket and tell you she’s looking for her keys!”

Becky gaped. “Teri! I don’t do that any more!”

As the group eventually wandered away, Becky said she was sorry about that lot, and I said it was fine, don’t worry about it. “Like being back at school, isn’t it?” I put on a girly voice.
“My mate fancies you!”

She laughed, less embarrassed now. “Tell me about it!”

I didn’t want to push my luck after all that. “Listen, I might be in again later. I think another parcel came in as I left. So see you this afternoon?”

“Okay, cool, see you later.”

Phase 6: Anticipation.

Thursday 10 June.

I didn’t show.

It would have been easy to go wandering back in there, after having broken the ice so well that morning. I had the fake parcel all wrapped up, ready to go. But instead I stayed at home and played pinball.

It’s a genuine oldie, my pinball machine. Cost a lot of money to get it refurbished, but there’s a whole network of pinball enthusiasts out there if you know where to look, with plenty of spare parts and expertise. Thanks to their help, I had a proper pinball machine from the mid-Seventies flashing and chiming in my living room. Could spend hours on it, trying to beat my high score, pumping the flippers and singing away to myself. That deaf dumb and blind kid, sure plays a mean pinball!

So that was Thursday afternoon gone, and then I went down the pub with Darren. Got in three times as many rounds as him while he babbled on about this girl he was shagging. But Asquith and Bream Consolidated had to do without me.

Why? Because I wanted her to want me.

It wasn’t as if we were having some great romance or anything. Wuthering Heights this ain’t. But I wanted to trigger some small feeling of eagerness in Becky. Even if it was just looking forward to another little distraction from work.

Making a woman meet you halfway isn’t something you achieve by following her too closely. You play a few cards to show you’re keen, but then you keep the rest of your hand hidden, see if she wants to play the game.

I wanted her to wonder where I’d got to.

I wanted her to miss me, just a little.

Phase 7: Isolation.

Friday 11 June. 12.05pm.

There was a middle-aged woman struggling across reception with a chair, carrying it out of the main office and into a meeting room. Without even thinking, I stepped up to give her a hand. She was relieved, thanking me as I carried it into the room. No problem, I said breezily, popping the chair down and walking back to the reception desk. Becky was watching me with a smile on her face.

I’d love to be able to tell you that was meticulously planned. That I’d set the whole thing up so that I could show her what a nice guy I was. But that would be bullshit, so I’ll admit it was pure luck. By itself, nothing very important. But little things like that can add up quickly.

Becky said “Look at you, knight in shining leather,” and I shrugged as if embarrassed, as if I’d been caught doing the boy scout thing, whoops, you got me.

She looked great. I hadn’t paid much attention to her clothes before. Bland office stuff, blouses and jackets. But it was Friday, so now I noticed her white t-shirt and blue Levis. You couldn’t get much simpler, but it looked good on her, showing off her curves. Her auburn hair wasn’t pinned up today either, but fell down onto her shoulders in lightly-curled waves. Teardrop earrings instead of hoops. Had she made an effort for me?

“What happened to you yesterday then, mister? Where’s this other package?” So she
did
notice that I hadn’t come back.

“Ah, threw it away. Didn’t look important.”

She laughed. And I noticed her eyes were now doing the scanning thing, left and right over my face. I felt my pulse jump a bit – that was one of the small signs I had been looking for. I hadn’t shaved for three days now, and the stubble was nice and even, so maybe that was it. She didn’t like her boys too pretty.

“You’ve been delivering packages to other places, haven’t you? I just know it.”

“Who, me? How could you say that?”

“I know your type. Cheating swine. You’ll deliver to anyone. You’re just a – ”

“Slag!”
we chorused, giggling like kids. I silently thanked her mate Laura for the gift. Nothing brings two people together better than having a laugh over somebody else.

Her telephone rang again, and she rolled her eyes. It seemed like a genuine call, so she caught me by surprise by saying “Hello, Chinese laundry? Look, for the last time, I’ve never heard of Asquith and bloody Bream, all right? Yes, you can pick up the bed sheets at four, goodbye!”

I guess you had to be there to see the way she did it, but it did crack me up. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve had to fake laughter to show some woman how much I appreciate her sense of humour. (The worst was Mrs Baker, who saw herself as a female Tommy Cooper. Only in looks, I once replied. That didn’t go down too well. Fortunately I do, so that took her mind off it – just like that.) But with Becky it was all too easy.

Or so it seemed. I should have known better. I asked what time she got off for lunch.

“Um, about half an hour.”

“Wanna go grab a sandwich somewhere?”

Can you imagine me asking this at the start of the week, without getting to know her, without all the jokes and flirting? No chance. But now it was a doddle. Got to lay that groundwork or you get nowhere.

“Er… actually I can’t. I’ve got someone’s leaving drinks to go to.”

Shit. I got nowhere.

“Okay, well what about after work? Just down the pub for a quick one?”

Becky pulled a kind of sad face. “I can’t tonight. We’ve got… I’ve got friends coming round for dinner. Got to cook and everything. Sorry.”

Game over.

I said it was no big deal. But my mind was racing. I had to isolate Becky if I was going to make any progress with her. I had to get her out of the office, out of the work environment and away from the safety of her friends. I had to get her and me together. That was the next step. But I’d hit a brick wall.

To be fair, they sounded like genuine excuses. I can always tell when someone has come up with a lie on the spur of the moment, but I reckoned she was being honest. And I knew she liked me. Of course she did. But it wasn’t enough. That ‘we’ had reminded me that I was chatting up a woman who was engaged to be married.

“No problem, maybe another time.” I picked up my helmet and smiled. “Have a good weekend.”

“Bye,” she said softly.

And I walked out of Asquith and Bream Consolidated for the last time.

A smarter, more sensitive man than me would have realised at that point he was wasting his time. He would have accepted defeat gracefully, and let the girl get on with her life without pestering her. A less perceptive bloke might have just kept going, bullishly demanding to take her out, not accepting no for an answer. He would have ended up angry and rejected. A more romantic, sweet-talking smoothie would no doubt have resorted to flowers and chocolates, to sending little cards and teddy bears, plucking on her heartstrings. He would have got nowhere with Becky. It would take more than a few cheap trinkets to make her forget her fiancé.

But I wasn’t any of those men.

I was a professional. And there was seven grand at stake. So I wasn’t giving up now.

Phase 8: The element of surprise.

Friday 11 June 5.31pm.

Hometime.

People had been coming out of the building in dribs and drabs for a while now. Then a group of girls burst through the doors and down the steps, eager to be away. Half a dozen of them, including Becky. They hit the pavement and headed up towards the main road, chatting animatedly.

I roared round the corner on my motorbike. Screeched to a halt beside them.

See those faces! For a second they didn’t know whether to scatter like sheep, or keep walking and ignore me, or stop and stare, or what – it was pretty funny. I pulled my helmet off. I would have been grinning anyway even if that wasn’t part of the plan.

“John!” Becky smiled, surprised.

“How’s it going?” I said, directly to her. “Fancy a ride home?”

The others – including Laura, Nicola and Teri – all came out with that weird half-squeal half-scream noise that doesn’t occur anywhere in nature except in packs of office girls, and possibly hyenas mating.

“C’mon, I’ll give you a lift.” I reached into the storage box at the rear of the bike and pulled out a spare crash helmet.

The girls all started pushing Becky towards me. “Go on Becks!” “Go for it, girl!” “Let him give you a ride!” You can imagine the rest. But she resisted, not sure which way to turn.

I held the bright red helmet out towards her, smiling. She still wasn’t sure. But her eyes flickered over me, over the bike, over the helmet. As if judging distances. Judging how to play it.

See, I knew Becky now. Sure, it felt good to have the handsome young courier show an interest in her. That was fun. But hardly worth risking her relationship for. And like all women, she would never want to come across as easy. She didn’t want anyone, especially friends, thinking she was the cheating kind.

But there had been something else. I’d seen it in her face. A part of her that just wanted to say OK then, leap over the desk and walk out with me, and to hell with what anybody else thinks. There was a little devil in Becky, a little monster that wanted to get out and enjoy herself. She was a lively girl, a fun girl. Not an oh-I’m-engaged-must-be-home-to-make-my-man’s-dinner type. Bollocks to that. This was a girl who used to stick her hand in guys’ trouser pockets to look for her keys.

And my mistake was being too civilised. If I was going to tap into that, I had to sweep her off her feet.

“Let’s do it!” I called, dangling the helmet. “Now or never!”

Becky hesitated – too long. Laura came out of the group and said “Well if she ain’t gonna do it, I sure will!” She strode towards me, reaching for the helmet.

And Becky snatched it out of my hand, pushing past Laura to jump on the bike.

The girls went crazy, whooping and egging her on (all except Laura, who looked like a little girl finding the sweetshop closed). Becky swept her long hair up behind her head, slid the helmet on then swung onto the pillion.

It was a good bike. A medium-sized Honda, all black and red, a few years old but in good condition. Jake did tell me all the details, what CC engine it had and all that, but I’m sure you’re about as interested in that as I was. The pillion was just long enough to get two people on it, sandwiching Becky between me and the storage box at the back. After a week of practice, I could handle it pretty well, for a complete amateur. Jake’s lessons had been useful.

Funny bloke, Jake. Bit scary, actually. Tattoos up his arms, shaved head, piercings. He was one of Darren’s mates, and I vaguely remembered Darren telling me Jake had done some prison time years ago, but no idea what for. If he’d said GBH, it wouldn’t have surprised me.

So it was Jake’s bike, and Jake’s leathers, and Jake’s riding lessons that had got me to that point. Jake the genuine courier with Ontime Direct. He’d been really helpful. It didn’t hurt that I was slipping him a few hundred quid to borrow his bike and gear for a couple of hours every day. But I’d expected him to be a bit more precious about what was, after all, his livelihood. I could well imagine Jake saying
“One scratch on my bike and I’ll kneecap you.”
But he just seemed to trust me, despite not knowing me very well. Darren had told him I was a top bloke, you could trust me till the end of the earth, and that seemed to be enough. Good old Darren.

Anyway, all that mattered was Becky sliding her cute arse onto my bike and pressing herself up against my own cute arse. I twisted the throttle, gunning the engine, called out “Hold on!” She wound both arms round my middle, squeezing me tight. Felt great.

The girls screamed with joy as we roared away – and although I was expecting Becky to scream as well, she just gripped me tighter. Inside my helmet, I was laughing.

All I had to do now was not crash and kill us both.

It wasn’t easy. I’d put in the practice, and Jake had given me loads of tips, but at the end of the day you’re rocketing along at sixty miles an hour with a loaded gun between your legs (story of my life) and it feels like you’re not the one in charge. The Honda’s engine vibrated up through every bone in my body. But I had to look like I’d been riding the thing for years, that I did this every day.

So I opened the throttle and we went blasting through rush hour traffic, weaving in and out of cars and trucks and double-decker buses. And I don’t think I’d ever been so shit-scared in my entire life. Or on such a high.

We slowed at the lights just before Old Street roundabout, engine idling, and I felt Becky lean forward to shout something. “You got this for me, didn’t you?”

“What?” I yelled back.

“This helmet. You bought it for me, just now.”

“No! Of course not! It’s my spare.”

“So how come it’s still got the price tag on it?”

I looked in my wing-mirror and saw Becky behind me, grinning inside the crash helmet with the tag dangling down across her face.