In my infinite, unknowable mercy, I am allowing the Angel back into my presence. Which is more than Lucifer and Mephistopheles got for their trespasses, if you know your Marlowe. Which puts me one up on the Big Man Upstairs, so in the interests of keeping things nice and level, I'm making her pay for it. She can come, but she is to bring with her two particulars. Firstly, a bag of the nice salt-caramel chocolates from the posh place at Moorgate. That's the price of admission. The price of my not killing her the moment she steps through the door is more complex.
There are heavy, solid thumps at the door, rather than a knock. This, I find when I open it, is because her arms are full and she knocked with her head. And the noise was annoying, but the look on her face is full of joy and the intention to hug, so really I'm glad her arms are full.
"Stop grinning," I say, and she immediately does. "Get in, don't talk." Happily, she does that too. Hasn't forgotten who's in charge, unlike some we could mention.
The Angel stands in the corner of the living room. She thinks I'm going to ask her to sit down. Expectant. I fucking hate expectant people. If you are expecting something from me, and you're wondering why you're not getting it, it's because you're expecting it. Adler's job, for instance, that didn't need a six month gap in the middle, but she wouldn't bloody shut up asking me when. So no, the Angel can stand. And I know that box is heavy, but I'm not telling her to put it down, and God help her if she tries to do so without permission.
You'll forgive me; it's just the mood that I'm in. A show of obedience and deference will do me a world of good. It's part of why I let her come.
That, and the mere idea of going down to that storage locker myself could have raised up hives. Filthy, stinking place, and everything under inches of dust. My little visitor has made an effort to clean off the cardboard archive box in her arms, but at the edges, in the creases, greyness and grubbiness still clings. That dive is the sort of place where she belongs. Nobody would have noticed her popping in and out. I'm too famous these days anyway.
There's a number written neatly on the side in black marker. It's the same as the number hastily scrawled on her arm, scratched into the skin in places where the biro was failing her. Luckily, it's not one digit off the number I gave her, so she's got the right box. Otherwise she could have found herself packaged up in a suitcase and left back at that locker for a couple of days. Not long enough to starve or anything like that. Just to teach her a lesson. I'm instructive, yes, but I'm not cruel.
"It's funny," she giggles. I let her go on. Her desperate gambits have always amused me. Pretty versions of ugly things, like the rainbows on top of spilt motor oil. "But you wouldn't think it would be so heavy, given what it is?"
"Would you like to put it down?"
"Yes please."
"Tough. Stay where you are." The box takes a little of my weight as I pull of the lid and reach for what's inside. "One moth-hole in this, precious, and I swear to you-"
"It's manmade fibre, sir. Moths won't touch it." And neither will I; my hand jumps back from the plasticky mess.
It's been well packed. The headpiece is on top of the gaiters are on top of the jacket, and everything is neat, protected. And the box was nicely catalogued too. "Were you this careful with everything you put away for me, dear?"
"Yes."
"And the files are all-"
"Are all done up in plastic to keep them from warping."
"Good girl." I take the box off her, nod for her to sit down.
The angel plops herself at the end of the couch while I put her housewarming gift to one side. "It's really good to s-" she begins to say.
"Don't. I don't want to hear it. I want to hear about Moran. Properly this time. But since you had so much trouble deciding what you should and shouldn't tell, this time I'm going to be right here to talk you through it."
She leans forward over her knees, head in hands. Moans like it matters, "He doesn't want me to tell you. He asked me not to."
This is difficult for me. I hope you never come to this point your life. I hope nobody else ever has to deal with this. Because I have actually gotten to the stage where I'm bored with putting people in their place. It has stopped making sense. In the angel's case, it stopped making sense years ago, and yet here we are again. She knows she can't win, she knows she can't argue, she knows she's going to fall in line. And yet, here we go again. Forcing me to put her through this again.
I beckon her over to me. Sit her down on the edge of the coffee table, within easy reach. From my shirt pocket I produce a little something I dug up especially for the occasion. It's a safety pin. Pure and simple, bog standard, can't be arsed sewing something, safety pin.
She keens and cries, "Please!", and her hands ball up into these tiny little fists, bundling under her chin. I get one by the wrist and bring it down to me.
"Open your hand." With my thumb and forefinger crushing into the tendons, she doesn't have much choice anyway.
Her hands look older than when we did this last. She spreads her fingers and four fine bones show across the back of her knuckles, standing up like bridges. I open the pin.
This is the left hand. We'll go for the third finger, I think. That's where a wedding ring goes. Let her remember that it's an unreported wedding ring that got her into this. Let her remember who she belongs to. With the point just touching the place between fingernail and nail bed, I ask her, "Who do you work for, angel?"
"You." Yes. Correct. I push the pin just deep enough to draw blood.
"Who pays you, then?"
"You do."
Correct again. I push the pin deep enough that it stays in without my touching it. Her hand starts shaking when the point scratches inside the nail.
"Who left you one of his best bolt-holes for a flat in his will, and let you take it whether he was dead or not?"
"You did. Thank you." Oh, very good, I like the gratitude, and I put my thumb to the curved end and push hard. See, once we've started this, we don't stop until the pin is closed again. The kindest thing I can do is push hard. I'm trying to think of one more question when she earns her release. A drop of blood has broken from the bead beneath her nail, and is rolling down the pin. It drips off, and would stain the knee of my trousers if she didn't put out her good hand to catch it. Good girl. She remembers fast, this one. I change my grip, holding her elbow with her arm braced all along mine, and finish it.
Once the point of the pin emerges from the skin at the other end of the nail, "Did you bring the chocolates?"
"They're in my bag."
So I can hook the safety pin shut and we're finished. She grabs her hand back, folding it tight beneath the other. Her head is buried away toward her shoulder, eyes screwed tight shut. Not even crying. Trembling all over, but not crying.
"…Are you alright?"
She nods. Tells me, "I'm really sorry."
"I know you are, love."
"What do you want to know?"
"I want to know where they live, the Kingsley-Morans. All three of them, God help us…"
She keens, but this time there's no defiance in it. The only person she's fighting now is herself. This, to my utter disgust, is when the tears start. "Dalston. I don't actually know the name of the street, but I can get it up on Google. There's a jazz bar at one end of the street and a Nandos at the other, it's pretty unique."
"…Three of them in a flat."
Both her hands, including the one with that most unusual piercing, clap tight over her face. Mumbling through them, "Two floors, though, over a vinyl shop, but at the wedding they were talking about moving out of the city if Tom can get a job at a quieter hospital because Peter's getting to this age where he understands that Daddy's up all night stitching up knife-crime victims and pumping people's stomachs and-"
I grab her hands away. "You were at the wedding?"
"I didn't go to the night thing. I don't think he noticed. He never even called to ask why."
As a supposed friend and former associate of Moran's, I feel for her. As somebody who was supposed to be my agent and keeping an eye on the prick, "Why didn't you go?"
"…Didn't have a date or nothing, did I?"
Starting to wish I hadn't been so quick to close the pin. But I let go of her hands before the trickle of red coming down from it can touch me. With just the tip of my finger, I reach out and flip the safety pin back and forth, but that's all. "I don't think I need to tell you, you fucked up."
"You don't need to tell me."
"Royally."
"Yeah, massively. Really big-style. I know I did. I'm sorry."
"I think you should start giving up current mobile numbers for both of the new, improved Moran collective, don't you?" She nods and starts spewing numbers, but I stop her. She can write them down for me in a minute. "What else, what else… Let's see, we could have some idea of Tom's working schedule, couldn't we? We could have a list of who all sat on Moran's side at this so-called wedding. Can't imagine that was a packed-out chapel. Oh, do you know what we could have? We could have the address for little Peter's school!" She shakes like somebody dying of frostbite. "And then, while I'm working through all that, you could take yourself and that box down the post office and have it sent to the home of the Kingsley-Morans, once I've put a note in with it and you've got said-home up on Google. Alright?" My angel nods, dragging her eyes dry with her undamaged hand. "Then why are you still crying, please?"
Breaking into a frankly disrespectful sob, "I just feel like such an awful person."
"You are an awful-" Mimicking the tearful shakes, "pe-he-he-her-son. You've disappointed me more than I thought you were capable of doing. But you're going to redeem yourself now, aren't you?"
"Yes, sir."
"Is it Moran? Is that why you feel bad? You feel like a traitor? Well, don't. The most traitorous thing you could do for Moran is help him to stay away from me. That's not just lying to me – and we've discussed in the past what happens to people who lie to me, you've witnessed that, and please don't think your little lies of omission don't count – but you're helping him lie to himself. This isn't what he wants. Not deep down. He's not a house-pet, our Seb. You know that. If you take a good hard look at it, you'll realize you know that, angel. He's not domestic. Husband and sprog and nine-to-five and Liverpool matches down the pub, that's not our Seb. Remember when he bumped off the entire Man United final squad for beating his Reds? Ah, how could you, that was before you joined us… He was over the moon. High on it. That's what he's built for. So don't stand there, with that gormless frigging look on your face, and try to tell me that the Colonel is happy. Don't tell me he likes this ugly little burrow he's dug out for himself. He doesn't. Okay?
"And if you love him, angel, sweetheart, terms of endearment, a chuisle, as we would have said it in the old country, you'll help me open his eyes to that."