Songbird

Alice thanked him. ‘The boss is especially keen to have the club emptied and locked for the night.’

‘Why? What’s got into him? Most nights he’s here till all hours, him and his cronies, gambling and drinking. What’s so different about tonight?’

‘Sure, it’s no good asking me!’ Alice rolled her eyes to the heavens. ‘Best do as he says though. Ye know what a vile bugger he can be.’

‘Alice …’ Jack lowered his voice to a whisper. ‘He doesn’t know, does he?’

‘If you mean, does he know Madeleine was with you all that time, the answer is no – at least I don’t think so. He hasn’t said anything.’

Jack was concerned all the same, ‘You and I both know, he’d go mental if he found out. Not because anything would have happened between me and Madeleine.’ He smiled a sad little smile. ‘He knows the way things are with me. It’s just that I care about her! When I caught her crying in the back alley that night, I knew she needed to get away from him … if only to send him the message that she’s not his sole property to do with as he pleases!’

Alice understood his frustration. ‘The trouble is, she loves him – though God only knows why.’

‘I’m well aware of that,’ Jack sighed. ‘It was plain enough – the way she kept mentioning his name, even wanting to get back to him from the minute she came in through the door.’

‘Well, it was Drayton who put her up there in front of the crowds,’ Alice conceded. ‘Unfortunately, she seems to think she owes him for that for all eternity, when all the time any self-respecting club-owner would have cut his arm off for the chance. Anyways, all we can do is hope she comes to her senses, sooner rather than later.’

‘I did right, didn’t I?’ Jack asked worriedly. ‘I mean, offering her my spare room for a while?’

‘Of course you did the right thing,’ Alice assured him. ‘No way should we have let her come to me because, as we suspected, it was the first place he came looking.’

Jack pursed his lips, folded a bar-towel and placed it over the pumps. ‘For her own sake, I wish she could see him for what he really is. A complete bastard!

He knew how fond Alice was of her. ‘She’s too trusting, and he knows it.’ The anger trembled in his voice, ‘I tell you, Alice, if it wasn’t for her asking me not to, I’d have tackled him long before now. But she won’t have it. As it was I pleaded with her to stay on at my place – even offered to move out for as long as she wanted. I tried all ways to stop her from coming back here to him, but she wouldn’t be told.’

Alice chuckled. ‘That’s the way she is – headstrong and independent. But I’m keeping an eye on things, don’t you worry.’

‘Alice, promise me. If he hurts her, you will tell me, won’t you? I can’t abide bullies.’ Jack’s face darkened. ‘I swear to God I’ll swing for him if he touches her again.’

‘I will.’ Alice could lie convincingly when necessary.

And she was lying now.

The last thing she wanted was to involve Jack any deeper. He was a sensitive young man, albeit strong and able, and no doubt in a fair fight he could easily take on a man like Drayton. But there were others – ruthless criminals and villains who, if paid enough, would snuff his life out like a candle.

Alice could never risk that happening.

Losing no time, Jack went away to instruct the others, ‘The boss wants us off the premises – like now.’

‘Why the hurry?’ The old barman had been with Drayton these past four years.

Jack shrugged. ‘Who knows?’

‘Another closed game with his mates, is it … losing their ill-gotten gains at the table.’ The man gave a snort of disgust, ‘Bloody fools. More money than they know what to do with.’

Having located Raymond, Alice asked, ‘How long before you’re done?’

Six foot tall, with shoulders wide and strong as an oak door, Raymond often doubled as a bouncer, evicting the undesirables. ‘Half an hour tonight,’ he answered shyly, avoiding Alice’s eye. ‘Back at eight in the morning to finish off.’

Alice nodded, and then gave a stifled yawn. ‘It’s been a long tiring day, and I need my sleep.’ Bidding him farewell, she hurried away to get her coat.

Before leaving, she intended to have a quiet word with Madeleine. She was deeply suspicious. Steve Drayton was acting out of character and it worried her. What with Maddy taking off the way she did, without so much as a word, and then turning up out of the blue like that … and all he had done was give her a gentle chiding. It was not like Drayton to suffer public humiliation quietly. There would inevitably be some kind of retribution.

In her dressing-room, Madeleine had changed into a robe and was seated before the mirror, removing the make-up from her face.

Engrossed in what she was doing, she did not hear him come in. It was only when he stepped forward that she saw his image in the mirror.

‘God Almighty, Steve!’ she exclaimed. ‘You scared the daylights out of me.’

Before she could turn round, he was on her, his long lean fingers toying with her hair, caressing her slender shoulders, then sliding down towards her breasts. When she raised her head, he leaned forward to kiss her on the neck.

Suddenly, without warning, he clenched his fingers about her throat and squeezed.

When she began to struggle, he increased the pressure until she could barely breathe.

Then, just when it seemed she might pass out, he released her.

‘You’ve been a bad girl,’ he murmured. ‘You walked out on me without a word.’ He tutted. ‘That was so cruel.’

Cursing her to hell and back, he began to pace the floor, madly ranting on about what she had done to him. ‘Weeks you’ve been gone, and not one word! I went to the flat twice, and it was empty, so I knew you hadn’t been staying there. Then you just walk back in, as though nothing has happened. Did you never think how I felt? Christ! I was almost out of my mind, not knowing what was going on, not to mention being slagged off by the regulars with their smartarse remarks. “Where’s your woman? Frightened her off, have you?” Laughing at me behind my back!’ His face looked wild.

‘I’m not your woman,’ Maddy said hoarsely. Shaken by the brutal way he had gone for her throat, she recalled Alice’s warning that, ‘One of these days he’ll lose control, and Lord only knows what he might do!’

Her open defiance stopped him in his tracks. ‘What – did – you – say?’ he whispered.

Holding her head high, she shakily repeated the words. ‘I said, I’m not your woman.’

‘Is that so?’ Throwing his head back, he startled her by laughing out loud. In an instant, the laughing stopped. ‘So, if you’re not my woman,’ he demanded, ‘whose woman are you?’

‘I’m my own woman,’ she answered. ‘That’s who I am.’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ he sneered. Dropping into the nearest chair, he regarded her with suspicion. ‘Explain!’

Sensing the onset of a fierce argument, Madeleine chose not to answer. Instead, she put her hands up to her neck, remembering what he had done; remembering what Alice had warned so many times.

‘I’m talking to you, bitch!’ He was out of the chair and standing before her. ‘Answer me!’

Ignoring him, she hurried to the door. ‘I had something important to tell you,’ she confided angrily, ‘but I can see you’re not in the mood for talking. Not to worry. It can wait till tomorrow – if I can still speak, that is, let alone sing.’

‘Where the hell do you think you’re going?’ In two strides, he was across the room, where he slammed shut the door and thrust her against the wall. ‘Don’t fight me, sweetheart,’ he murmured. ‘You know I don’t like you to fight me.’ His tongue was rough against her skin as he licked the length of her neck, where the marks of his fingers still showed, and downwards, towards the rise of her breast.

Against all her instincts, Madeleine felt herself succumbing to his touch. ‘No! Let me go,’ she whispered. ‘I don’t want …’ But her words fell on deaf ears.

Even as she protested, she could not help but love him. Yet it was an uncomfortable love, a love that she knew deep down was not returned in the way she needed it to be, and never could be. Steve Drayton was too damaged a person to know what love meant.

Yet she would have given anything for him to love her completely, to care for her as a woman. And especially now, when she desperately needed him to see her as a future wife.

‘Don’t ever tell me you’re not my woman.’ The tip of his tongue encircled her ear. ‘You will always be my woman,’ he murmured passionately. ‘And God help anyone who tries to come between us.’