Red Boots, Black Soul (Part Three)
Title: Red Boots, Black Soul
Rating: PG
Warning: Swearing, gun, a Whore (of great standing)
Disclaimer: All recogniseable features belong to their respective owners, I dont intend to offend, merely to play.
Summary: The ground is rocky and the aim seems constantly out of reach, but Art's never been one to give up lightly.
AN: So, I finally conquered this bitch. Oh god, chapter three. You guys. Chapter three has been bugging me since forever. But we're back to nomal, now, so next Wednesday should see Chapter Four up. :) I hope you enjoy where this is going, because from here on it starts getting juicy. :D
Part Two
Chapter Three
Desperate Men
David Greene had worked for other illustrious people in the past. Deputy Commissioner Moore was not someone to stand out against the backdrop of his career. He was employed for his expertise, and his discreet nature. Michael Moore had not been the first powerful man David had worked for, and he would not be the last. The man was fierce and cunning and desperate. A mix that did not bode well. But Rome was not built in a day, and while Michael Moore was not rebuilding Rome, he was well aware that patience was a virtue and revenge best kept quiet.
The room was empty but for the man stacked up in his chair and cushions, sorting through papers in the afternoon light.
David didn’t need to say a thing, and the Deputy Commissioner did not look up. David was not paid to be seen, he had his talents, his tasks and frankly, being left to his own devices was something of a bonus on any job, let alone a long standing one.
“And how did the trial go?” Moore asked, his lisp prominent, as David was four steps shy of the desk. He didn’t bother to look up.
“He was there.”
“You saw him.”
“Going by Smith and Marshall’s change in demeanour, he was there. Not long, but enough.”
“And is that enough for you to go by, Mr Greene?” This time Moore did look up. His gaze was hard, but David had seen harder stares. He fixed one on himself every morning.
“He was there,” he repeated. Moore sat up straight and then leant back in his chair. The soft leather squeaked under his change of position.
“Good, that’s very good, Mr Greene. That means our way in is still through Marshall. If we keep our eyes on him it wont be long before Andrew shows his head. He has an end game in this. I want to find out what. We have no room for failure.”
David Greene nodded.
The man paid well, and if his plans came through, being on this side would reward handsomely. But the beauty of his profession was that at any given moment, he could disappear without a trace, and not even Deputy Commissioner Michael Moore would be able to find him.
For now, David settled in the shadows near the doorway.
For now, he had a job to do.
***
Keeping a favour from someone like Dixon Bainbridge was very similar to shooting the man; it was a damn rare occurrence and it was only ever mentioned twice, when it happened and If Bainbridge could forgive the fact, you never brought it up unless you damn well had to - because it would be the only time you did.
However, in his mid sixties, Dixon Bainbridge was a man seeking out the danger in life, and the man had a sense for it. He was everything Art aspired to be, skirting the edge of the law since his teens and still damn well home free. His was a different generation, a different time and Art wasn’t stupid enough to con himself into the idea he could mimic the timeless icon. He was ten years out of that phase, and thankfully Dixon had never been one to remind him; he was a man too stuck in his own glories to put a man down if it could only remind him how far he’d come since. And Art was one such man.
Meeting him on a rifle range was, for lack of better understanding, like meeting an alcoholic in a bar: just customary by this stage in the man’s life. Not that it bothered him, Art was long used to carrying a gun after the last few weeks.
As he approached the man in his live action rifle range, Art watched as he knocked back a hard tumbler of scotch and roared at some target on the range to “damn well stop moving”. Art couldn’t help but wear the tiniest of smiles as he approached, the click of his boots alerting Bainbridge to his presence early enough for Art to know that the shot the old man took at his ‘moving target’ was intentional and completely for Art’s benefit. Art watched as the target, a shaking man in his early thirties who no doubt owed someone somewhere money - which inadvertently in turn meant he owed Dixon money - tried very hard not to faint and hold his target a little further away from his body.
“Thomas, my boy! Pick out a toy and we’ll talk!” Dixon nodded to a few metres away where several other men were holding a selection of long range rifles like a moving display showcase. Art walked over to the second man and took the gun from him. It was heavy enough to really feel it in his hands and light enough that he’d still be able to impress the old man if so required. He hated the damn things, but they’d been favourites of Dixon since his earliest hunting days and they’d been an essential part of Art’s education when Dixon had taken him under his wing.
But that was years ago now and Dixon had moved beyond hunting game and headed deep into the realm of politics, buying out investments and picking and choosing the leaders as he liked. If anyone could damn well help it was Dixon. But just damn well asking for Nick’s release was ludicrous.
The art of getting what you wanted was asking what you needed.
And Dixon Bainbridge had a past as shady as they came, with a long list of deeds and misdeeds, one of which was helping design Belmarsh prison.
The man seemed determined to withhold any type of conversation until Art had certified the demise of three targets and no doubt given the poor sods holding the damn things enough of a fright to cut their lives back a few years. The weight of the gun and the rapport as he shot it were old friends and ones that he was willing enough to invite inside, but as he set it down for the third time he fixed his gaze on the old man ordering the targets to be changed.
“Belmarsh, Dixon,” he said and it was enough to get Bainbridge’s attention. He frowned and his moustache quivered.
“Belmarsh, what of it?”
“Word is that’s where the Eleven are being held.”
“Naturally, m’boy.”
“I need to break one of them out.”
“From Belmarsh?”
Art cocked his head in the tiniest of nods and Dixon laughed, a great booming chuckle. Art couldn’t imagine that voice coming out of someone any younger than fifty. The concept that Dixon Bainbridge had been a boy with his voice breaking into that once upon a time was almost too impossible to imagine. If someone had told him that Dixon Bainbridge had been born with that voice, a moustache and a gun in one hand he’d of believed them in an instant. He was a figure that no one messed with, not even Mother Nature herself.
“Ha! Come now, boy! Don’t be foolish, what on earth makes you think you can manage that?”
“What makes you think I can’t?”
“You wouldn’t be here if you didn’t need my help, Sonny. And if you need help, then you know you can’t do it.”
“I came because your help would make it easier.”
“Thomas, if you’re going to break a man out of Belmarsh Prison then that’s a job all of your own. I can’t help you.”
“You wont help me?”
“I wont help you,” Bainbridge repeated and Art had to breath deep before he said something petty. He’d learned the hard way a long time ago it was a bad idea to be childish around Dixon. That and the man had a gun.
“All I want are the maps.”
“The maps?”
“You helped design the place. I want to see your maps.”
“Son, that prison is as impenetrable as the diamond mines in Angola during the civil war. That’s a near impossible task! I helped build that damn place myself. That’s a fortress you can’t break, sonny, let me assure you! Wiles wont be enough to get you in there.”
“If you’re not going to help, Dixon, would you just say you’re not going to help.”
“I cannot help you, Thomas. My files were destroyed in ’94, the whole place burned to the ground, I escaped with a bathrobe, six knives and a rare Swedish dinner set from the sixteen century. There is nothing short of a bomb that is going to get you inside that fortress, I can assure you that.”
Art looked between the old man with his bristling handlebar moustache doing most of the talking and the men at the other end of the target range, shifting from foot to foot while they waited for someone to shoot at them again.
This whole thing was insane.
And another dead end.
Dixon’s maps were gone, and an already brief visit to Moss had hit another wall. Wherever the designer specifications for the damn prison were, they weren’t on a damn database. Art frowned and tried to hold his disposition. Showing Dixon Bainbridge weakness was like blood in the water, it only excited the shark.
“If you won’t help then I’ll have to figure it out another way then.”
“You shall indeed,” Bainbridge said, his voice booming and Art nodded, walking past him back towards the entrance, throwing his farewell behind him as he neared the door but determined not to turn around and see the gleam of victory in the old man’s steely gaze.
“I’ll let myself out.”
Dixon may or may not have heard it over the sound of his rifle, but Art didn’t care.
He hadn’t got as far as he had by letting other people’s damning disappointments and egotism get in his way, and Dixon Bainbridge was not someone he was going to cry over. No matter how much help he’d been when Art was young and ruthless in his own hatred and petty in his determination.
Art had learned young that the only person you could count on was yourself.
Which is why it was so damn hard to work out how Nick had got through his defences without even trying.
So far, all he’d come up with was that he’d been the one to let him in.
Well, there was always a first time.
Art sighed as he stormed back up the corridor towards the front door.
He knew he shouldn’t be as damned surprised Dixon hadn’t come through with the plans as he was, but it made what he had to do next very easy. Dixon Bainbridge wasn’t going to help and simply supply him with the maps, then what he had to do was get the plans for the prison another way, but that still left him with a giant gaping hole when it came to knowing where the hell Nick was. It wasn’t like he could walk in himself and ask to see him.
No.
That was ludicrous.
He couldn’t do it; there was no chance in hell that they were going to clear Andrew Thompson to see Nick. Any of the aliases he had used would red flag in an instant. He could make a new one, but it would just be another countermeasure far too easily put under suspicion. Male visitors who looked even the smallest bit shifty were more often turned away for basic offences these days, and Nick was part of the damned Rebel Eleven. No, he needed another way.
His lips were turned down in a pout as he came to the front door and for the briefest moment as he reached out for the handle he caught his reflection. He looked pale and wan and his hair was starting to get too long to the point he was starting to look like a girl again. It had happened before, or what was worse, he’d start getting mistaken for that Jacquettie model again. That was the last thing in the world he needed, getting mobbed by girls obsessed with some idiot promoting hairdryers. But at that exact angle, in the light reflecting on the glass, he looked like a girl.
Art blinked, a tiny smile creeping onto his lips.
He couldn’t see Nick, no. But there was one thing that any man stuck in a prison was always willing to give up next to anything for, that guards were unable to keep their attentions completely alert over.
Art grinned, his blood pounding through his veins all of a sudden, a rush of adrenaline at the lunacy of his own idea. But that was the thing, it was a little bit insane, and could backfire like all hell, but at the same time, risk taking was his thing, stupidity was his thing, and the idea was fun. Art laughed, shaking his head a little, his hair moving around his cheeks as he pulled open the door and half ran down the steps towards his car.
That decided one thing; he grinned as he slid into his seat, reaching up to run a hand through his hair as the door slammed behind him.
That solved just one part of his problem, though.
He had survived long enough to know that a job like he one he had was impossible on his own; he was always going to need help in the end. Not that the knowledge could hinder the bursting adrenaline running through him. His idea simply added a few stops on his tour, ones he could handle without question. They were easy. No, the hard obstacle he was finally up to tackling was going to be harder than the insane idea that might just be enough to get him all the first hand information he needed. The hard part was he needed a crew for the breakout; no matter what he was going to do, he was going to need help to get Nick out of the prison.
There were only very few men Art trusted enough with his own agendas. One had cashed his cheques in and moved to the Australian sanctuaries, out of the Rebellion’s grasp, the traitorous retiring idiot; the other was sitting in a holding cell, being readied to move into maximum security, and a third had gone underground. He was the only man Art knew he could trust to help get Nick out.
Serge knew how to keep himself afloat, between him and Tom, Kasabian had played their cards to perfection for years and kept themselves stable and out of trouble. Once they’d have heard of the uproar they would have headed underground. They would have disappeared like they’d never existed, simply walked out of their previous lives and into another, fully furnished and completely hidden.
He needed Kasabian, and there was only one man in London who they would have trusted for their identification and maybe, just maybe, even their location.
Leroy.
Art smiled.
It was so easy it was almost perfect; after all, he was going to need new identification of his own.
***
Eleanor’s manor in London was a monolithic masterpiece full of art and pieces he would have admired for more than one reason if he hadn’t more pressing matters. The last time he’d met up with Eleanor in one of her homes, he’d slept with one of her daughters unintentionally and stolen four or five different things he’d bartered for far more than their worth. Eleanor had just called him a cheeky thing and as an unspoken apology he’d hooked her up with a few men here and there willing enough to do what she asked of them for a reasonable price without impugning on any moral ground. It was a strange relationship he had with the old madam, but she was a useful asset in any situation more than once. She was a good sort amongst a business of hard rocks.
She opened the door in her bathrobe with a cigarette in one hand and a glass of red in the other and it was simplistically Eleanor and Art couldn’t help but crack a smile as the older woman pursed her lips and smiled at him.
“Tommy you flirtatious muffincake, this is a surprise.”
Eleanor knew what he did, knew he was good at his job and she wasn’t stupid enough to think this was just an uncalculated visit. Not when most of the Rebellion had gone underground, or their work gone underground, at least. Eleanor knew the instability, she knew the risks and the rewards of keeping discreet, even if she was discreet about the moral things and tended to be as loud as possible about her erotic indiscretions. But the thing about Eleanor was she’d been around so long, and fucked so many of those in power, the woman was safe from pretty much anyone. Strings could always be pulled, and even if one or two were pulled taught, Eleanor had others she could persuade with a damn simple phone call.
He wasn’t after her connections, however. He had other things on his mind.
“Eleanor, you look as stunning as ever. New haircut?” he smiled, the complement working well enough that she dropped one arm from the doorway.
“Well aren’t you a charmer,” she simpered and his grin widened a bit.
“Can I come in?”
“Course babycakes. Do you need to see my girls?”
“I’m here for you, and only you,” he winked and Eleanor bowed aside, letting him inside. The place was just as richly furnished as he remembered and a part of him immediately itched to start a list of things he wanted, things he could sell so easily and disappear with.
He made himself stop.
Eleanor lead him down the hallway and towards the parlour.
“It’s a good thing you’re not here for my girls, Tommy, they’re not here at the moment, they ran off on me, to the Swedish slopes.”
“How’re they doing?” he asked more out of courtesy than actually wanting to know. Eleanor answered him regardless of whether she knew what the inflection in his voice meant or not.
Art couldn’t help but wonder for a second if Nick knew how to pick all his lies.
“Come now, Tommy, we both know you’re not here after the girls.”
“I have a favour to ask,” he murmured, following her into the parlour and watching as she sat herself down.
“Bring me my bottle would you, darling?” she asked, motioning towards the wine bottle on the antique side desk. Art wandered over and retrieved the bottle, topping up her glass as she finished the last of her smoke. It was only then that he settled in the opposite couch and she turned her whole attention towards him.
“What are you getting up to then that you need Eleanor’s help, you silly boy?”
“I need to get someone out of Belmarsh Prison,” he murmured, looking at her.
“And I need your help to do it.”
He fixed his gaze on Eleanor, held her stare and waited. She took a long drag from her cigarette and her lips curved down in the smallest of frowns for a moment.
“Honey sweetums, if they’re in there then they’re not coming out for nobody.”
After everything that had happened from the moment Nick had made him run and he’d sworn to break him out, he knew that it was going to be a long hard road. Only now it had changed from Nick being in prison to Nick being in Belmarsh Prison, and painfully within reach of everyone based in London and under the watchful eye of the entire Metropolitan Police. They would not let the Rebel Eleven go lightly, and anyone who knew anything knew that the eleven of them weren’t just going to Belmarsh; Nick had been sentenced to twelve years to be stationed at Belmarsh, but Belmarsh prison was a halfway house, and they were all of a sudden desperate men.
Desperate men could accomplish anything.
Art was beginning to understand the sentiment entirely.
In the public eye, he had twelve years to break Nick out. In reality, Nick had a clock over his head that lasted only as long as the Commissioners impatience. And with Michael Moore as his right hand, that impatience wasn’t going to last long at all.
And so the clock was ticking, and Art could hear it constantly.
“This one is. I won’t leave him there.”
She was quiet again for a moment and Art didn’t move. She knew far too much about him already, he was a figment of so many imaginations; so many unfinished case files and if Eleanor knew anything about Nick then a slip here or there could land them both in deep water. But he couldn’t help it. He needed her help and he was praying she would give it, because every night he went to bed alone he could hear nothing but the telltale heart beating in his chest, the timer on Nick’s sentence and it’s damning end. He drifted to sleep in the wee hours each night, feeling out of place and alarmed as he contemplated forgetting him, moving on and leaving Nick to his sentence. Feeling how easy it could be go mad. Reminding himself how important it was to get Nick out. How he’d promised.
And he needed Eleanor’s help for himself just as much as for Nick.
“What do you need, muffin?”
Art stopped. It was a mad plan, but his plans had never been sane. There was no point in sane, no point in safe. Sane and safe never worked. There was nothing to achieve in safety. If there was nothing to risk there would be no reward, and Nicholas was reward enough to risk everything. And to risk everything, to get him out, it would have to be insane.
“I need you to teach me how to be a girl."
Chapter Four
Rating: PG
Warning: Swearing, gun, a Whore (of great standing)
Disclaimer: All recogniseable features belong to their respective owners, I dont intend to offend, merely to play.
Summary: The ground is rocky and the aim seems constantly out of reach, but Art's never been one to give up lightly.
AN: So, I finally conquered this bitch. Oh god, chapter three. You guys. Chapter three has been bugging me since forever. But we're back to nomal, now, so next Wednesday should see Chapter Four up. :) I hope you enjoy where this is going, because from here on it starts getting juicy. :D
Part Two
Chapter Three
Desperate Men
David Greene had worked for other illustrious people in the past. Deputy Commissioner Moore was not someone to stand out against the backdrop of his career. He was employed for his expertise, and his discreet nature. Michael Moore had not been the first powerful man David had worked for, and he would not be the last. The man was fierce and cunning and desperate. A mix that did not bode well. But Rome was not built in a day, and while Michael Moore was not rebuilding Rome, he was well aware that patience was a virtue and revenge best kept quiet.
The room was empty but for the man stacked up in his chair and cushions, sorting through papers in the afternoon light.
David didn’t need to say a thing, and the Deputy Commissioner did not look up. David was not paid to be seen, he had his talents, his tasks and frankly, being left to his own devices was something of a bonus on any job, let alone a long standing one.
“And how did the trial go?” Moore asked, his lisp prominent, as David was four steps shy of the desk. He didn’t bother to look up.
“He was there.”
“You saw him.”
“Going by Smith and Marshall’s change in demeanour, he was there. Not long, but enough.”
“And is that enough for you to go by, Mr Greene?” This time Moore did look up. His gaze was hard, but David had seen harder stares. He fixed one on himself every morning.
“He was there,” he repeated. Moore sat up straight and then leant back in his chair. The soft leather squeaked under his change of position.
“Good, that’s very good, Mr Greene. That means our way in is still through Marshall. If we keep our eyes on him it wont be long before Andrew shows his head. He has an end game in this. I want to find out what. We have no room for failure.”
David Greene nodded.
The man paid well, and if his plans came through, being on this side would reward handsomely. But the beauty of his profession was that at any given moment, he could disappear without a trace, and not even Deputy Commissioner Michael Moore would be able to find him.
For now, David settled in the shadows near the doorway.
For now, he had a job to do.
***
Keeping a favour from someone like Dixon Bainbridge was very similar to shooting the man; it was a damn rare occurrence and it was only ever mentioned twice, when it happened and If Bainbridge could forgive the fact, you never brought it up unless you damn well had to - because it would be the only time you did.
However, in his mid sixties, Dixon Bainbridge was a man seeking out the danger in life, and the man had a sense for it. He was everything Art aspired to be, skirting the edge of the law since his teens and still damn well home free. His was a different generation, a different time and Art wasn’t stupid enough to con himself into the idea he could mimic the timeless icon. He was ten years out of that phase, and thankfully Dixon had never been one to remind him; he was a man too stuck in his own glories to put a man down if it could only remind him how far he’d come since. And Art was one such man.
Meeting him on a rifle range was, for lack of better understanding, like meeting an alcoholic in a bar: just customary by this stage in the man’s life. Not that it bothered him, Art was long used to carrying a gun after the last few weeks.
As he approached the man in his live action rifle range, Art watched as he knocked back a hard tumbler of scotch and roared at some target on the range to “damn well stop moving”. Art couldn’t help but wear the tiniest of smiles as he approached, the click of his boots alerting Bainbridge to his presence early enough for Art to know that the shot the old man took at his ‘moving target’ was intentional and completely for Art’s benefit. Art watched as the target, a shaking man in his early thirties who no doubt owed someone somewhere money - which inadvertently in turn meant he owed Dixon money - tried very hard not to faint and hold his target a little further away from his body.
“Thomas, my boy! Pick out a toy and we’ll talk!” Dixon nodded to a few metres away where several other men were holding a selection of long range rifles like a moving display showcase. Art walked over to the second man and took the gun from him. It was heavy enough to really feel it in his hands and light enough that he’d still be able to impress the old man if so required. He hated the damn things, but they’d been favourites of Dixon since his earliest hunting days and they’d been an essential part of Art’s education when Dixon had taken him under his wing.
But that was years ago now and Dixon had moved beyond hunting game and headed deep into the realm of politics, buying out investments and picking and choosing the leaders as he liked. If anyone could damn well help it was Dixon. But just damn well asking for Nick’s release was ludicrous.
The art of getting what you wanted was asking what you needed.
And Dixon Bainbridge had a past as shady as they came, with a long list of deeds and misdeeds, one of which was helping design Belmarsh prison.
The man seemed determined to withhold any type of conversation until Art had certified the demise of three targets and no doubt given the poor sods holding the damn things enough of a fright to cut their lives back a few years. The weight of the gun and the rapport as he shot it were old friends and ones that he was willing enough to invite inside, but as he set it down for the third time he fixed his gaze on the old man ordering the targets to be changed.
“Belmarsh, Dixon,” he said and it was enough to get Bainbridge’s attention. He frowned and his moustache quivered.
“Belmarsh, what of it?”
“Word is that’s where the Eleven are being held.”
“Naturally, m’boy.”
“I need to break one of them out.”
“From Belmarsh?”
Art cocked his head in the tiniest of nods and Dixon laughed, a great booming chuckle. Art couldn’t imagine that voice coming out of someone any younger than fifty. The concept that Dixon Bainbridge had been a boy with his voice breaking into that once upon a time was almost too impossible to imagine. If someone had told him that Dixon Bainbridge had been born with that voice, a moustache and a gun in one hand he’d of believed them in an instant. He was a figure that no one messed with, not even Mother Nature herself.
“Ha! Come now, boy! Don’t be foolish, what on earth makes you think you can manage that?”
“What makes you think I can’t?”
“You wouldn’t be here if you didn’t need my help, Sonny. And if you need help, then you know you can’t do it.”
“I came because your help would make it easier.”
“Thomas, if you’re going to break a man out of Belmarsh Prison then that’s a job all of your own. I can’t help you.”
“You wont help me?”
“I wont help you,” Bainbridge repeated and Art had to breath deep before he said something petty. He’d learned the hard way a long time ago it was a bad idea to be childish around Dixon. That and the man had a gun.
“All I want are the maps.”
“The maps?”
“You helped design the place. I want to see your maps.”
“Son, that prison is as impenetrable as the diamond mines in Angola during the civil war. That’s a near impossible task! I helped build that damn place myself. That’s a fortress you can’t break, sonny, let me assure you! Wiles wont be enough to get you in there.”
“If you’re not going to help, Dixon, would you just say you’re not going to help.”
“I cannot help you, Thomas. My files were destroyed in ’94, the whole place burned to the ground, I escaped with a bathrobe, six knives and a rare Swedish dinner set from the sixteen century. There is nothing short of a bomb that is going to get you inside that fortress, I can assure you that.”
Art looked between the old man with his bristling handlebar moustache doing most of the talking and the men at the other end of the target range, shifting from foot to foot while they waited for someone to shoot at them again.
This whole thing was insane.
And another dead end.
Dixon’s maps were gone, and an already brief visit to Moss had hit another wall. Wherever the designer specifications for the damn prison were, they weren’t on a damn database. Art frowned and tried to hold his disposition. Showing Dixon Bainbridge weakness was like blood in the water, it only excited the shark.
“If you won’t help then I’ll have to figure it out another way then.”
“You shall indeed,” Bainbridge said, his voice booming and Art nodded, walking past him back towards the entrance, throwing his farewell behind him as he neared the door but determined not to turn around and see the gleam of victory in the old man’s steely gaze.
“I’ll let myself out.”
Dixon may or may not have heard it over the sound of his rifle, but Art didn’t care.
He hadn’t got as far as he had by letting other people’s damning disappointments and egotism get in his way, and Dixon Bainbridge was not someone he was going to cry over. No matter how much help he’d been when Art was young and ruthless in his own hatred and petty in his determination.
Art had learned young that the only person you could count on was yourself.
Which is why it was so damn hard to work out how Nick had got through his defences without even trying.
So far, all he’d come up with was that he’d been the one to let him in.
Well, there was always a first time.
Art sighed as he stormed back up the corridor towards the front door.
He knew he shouldn’t be as damned surprised Dixon hadn’t come through with the plans as he was, but it made what he had to do next very easy. Dixon Bainbridge wasn’t going to help and simply supply him with the maps, then what he had to do was get the plans for the prison another way, but that still left him with a giant gaping hole when it came to knowing where the hell Nick was. It wasn’t like he could walk in himself and ask to see him.
No.
That was ludicrous.
He couldn’t do it; there was no chance in hell that they were going to clear Andrew Thompson to see Nick. Any of the aliases he had used would red flag in an instant. He could make a new one, but it would just be another countermeasure far too easily put under suspicion. Male visitors who looked even the smallest bit shifty were more often turned away for basic offences these days, and Nick was part of the damned Rebel Eleven. No, he needed another way.
His lips were turned down in a pout as he came to the front door and for the briefest moment as he reached out for the handle he caught his reflection. He looked pale and wan and his hair was starting to get too long to the point he was starting to look like a girl again. It had happened before, or what was worse, he’d start getting mistaken for that Jacquettie model again. That was the last thing in the world he needed, getting mobbed by girls obsessed with some idiot promoting hairdryers. But at that exact angle, in the light reflecting on the glass, he looked like a girl.
Art blinked, a tiny smile creeping onto his lips.
He couldn’t see Nick, no. But there was one thing that any man stuck in a prison was always willing to give up next to anything for, that guards were unable to keep their attentions completely alert over.
Art grinned, his blood pounding through his veins all of a sudden, a rush of adrenaline at the lunacy of his own idea. But that was the thing, it was a little bit insane, and could backfire like all hell, but at the same time, risk taking was his thing, stupidity was his thing, and the idea was fun. Art laughed, shaking his head a little, his hair moving around his cheeks as he pulled open the door and half ran down the steps towards his car.
That decided one thing; he grinned as he slid into his seat, reaching up to run a hand through his hair as the door slammed behind him.
That solved just one part of his problem, though.
He had survived long enough to know that a job like he one he had was impossible on his own; he was always going to need help in the end. Not that the knowledge could hinder the bursting adrenaline running through him. His idea simply added a few stops on his tour, ones he could handle without question. They were easy. No, the hard obstacle he was finally up to tackling was going to be harder than the insane idea that might just be enough to get him all the first hand information he needed. The hard part was he needed a crew for the breakout; no matter what he was going to do, he was going to need help to get Nick out of the prison.
There were only very few men Art trusted enough with his own agendas. One had cashed his cheques in and moved to the Australian sanctuaries, out of the Rebellion’s grasp, the traitorous retiring idiot; the other was sitting in a holding cell, being readied to move into maximum security, and a third had gone underground. He was the only man Art knew he could trust to help get Nick out.
Serge knew how to keep himself afloat, between him and Tom, Kasabian had played their cards to perfection for years and kept themselves stable and out of trouble. Once they’d have heard of the uproar they would have headed underground. They would have disappeared like they’d never existed, simply walked out of their previous lives and into another, fully furnished and completely hidden.
He needed Kasabian, and there was only one man in London who they would have trusted for their identification and maybe, just maybe, even their location.
Leroy.
Art smiled.
It was so easy it was almost perfect; after all, he was going to need new identification of his own.
***
Eleanor’s manor in London was a monolithic masterpiece full of art and pieces he would have admired for more than one reason if he hadn’t more pressing matters. The last time he’d met up with Eleanor in one of her homes, he’d slept with one of her daughters unintentionally and stolen four or five different things he’d bartered for far more than their worth. Eleanor had just called him a cheeky thing and as an unspoken apology he’d hooked her up with a few men here and there willing enough to do what she asked of them for a reasonable price without impugning on any moral ground. It was a strange relationship he had with the old madam, but she was a useful asset in any situation more than once. She was a good sort amongst a business of hard rocks.
She opened the door in her bathrobe with a cigarette in one hand and a glass of red in the other and it was simplistically Eleanor and Art couldn’t help but crack a smile as the older woman pursed her lips and smiled at him.
“Tommy you flirtatious muffincake, this is a surprise.”
Eleanor knew what he did, knew he was good at his job and she wasn’t stupid enough to think this was just an uncalculated visit. Not when most of the Rebellion had gone underground, or their work gone underground, at least. Eleanor knew the instability, she knew the risks and the rewards of keeping discreet, even if she was discreet about the moral things and tended to be as loud as possible about her erotic indiscretions. But the thing about Eleanor was she’d been around so long, and fucked so many of those in power, the woman was safe from pretty much anyone. Strings could always be pulled, and even if one or two were pulled taught, Eleanor had others she could persuade with a damn simple phone call.
He wasn’t after her connections, however. He had other things on his mind.
“Eleanor, you look as stunning as ever. New haircut?” he smiled, the complement working well enough that she dropped one arm from the doorway.
“Well aren’t you a charmer,” she simpered and his grin widened a bit.
“Can I come in?”
“Course babycakes. Do you need to see my girls?”
“I’m here for you, and only you,” he winked and Eleanor bowed aside, letting him inside. The place was just as richly furnished as he remembered and a part of him immediately itched to start a list of things he wanted, things he could sell so easily and disappear with.
He made himself stop.
Eleanor lead him down the hallway and towards the parlour.
“It’s a good thing you’re not here for my girls, Tommy, they’re not here at the moment, they ran off on me, to the Swedish slopes.”
“How’re they doing?” he asked more out of courtesy than actually wanting to know. Eleanor answered him regardless of whether she knew what the inflection in his voice meant or not.
Art couldn’t help but wonder for a second if Nick knew how to pick all his lies.
“Come now, Tommy, we both know you’re not here after the girls.”
“I have a favour to ask,” he murmured, following her into the parlour and watching as she sat herself down.
“Bring me my bottle would you, darling?” she asked, motioning towards the wine bottle on the antique side desk. Art wandered over and retrieved the bottle, topping up her glass as she finished the last of her smoke. It was only then that he settled in the opposite couch and she turned her whole attention towards him.
“What are you getting up to then that you need Eleanor’s help, you silly boy?”
“I need to get someone out of Belmarsh Prison,” he murmured, looking at her.
“And I need your help to do it.”
He fixed his gaze on Eleanor, held her stare and waited. She took a long drag from her cigarette and her lips curved down in the smallest of frowns for a moment.
“Honey sweetums, if they’re in there then they’re not coming out for nobody.”
After everything that had happened from the moment Nick had made him run and he’d sworn to break him out, he knew that it was going to be a long hard road. Only now it had changed from Nick being in prison to Nick being in Belmarsh Prison, and painfully within reach of everyone based in London and under the watchful eye of the entire Metropolitan Police. They would not let the Rebel Eleven go lightly, and anyone who knew anything knew that the eleven of them weren’t just going to Belmarsh; Nick had been sentenced to twelve years to be stationed at Belmarsh, but Belmarsh prison was a halfway house, and they were all of a sudden desperate men.
Desperate men could accomplish anything.
Art was beginning to understand the sentiment entirely.
In the public eye, he had twelve years to break Nick out. In reality, Nick had a clock over his head that lasted only as long as the Commissioners impatience. And with Michael Moore as his right hand, that impatience wasn’t going to last long at all.
And so the clock was ticking, and Art could hear it constantly.
“This one is. I won’t leave him there.”
She was quiet again for a moment and Art didn’t move. She knew far too much about him already, he was a figment of so many imaginations; so many unfinished case files and if Eleanor knew anything about Nick then a slip here or there could land them both in deep water. But he couldn’t help it. He needed her help and he was praying she would give it, because every night he went to bed alone he could hear nothing but the telltale heart beating in his chest, the timer on Nick’s sentence and it’s damning end. He drifted to sleep in the wee hours each night, feeling out of place and alarmed as he contemplated forgetting him, moving on and leaving Nick to his sentence. Feeling how easy it could be go mad. Reminding himself how important it was to get Nick out. How he’d promised.
And he needed Eleanor’s help for himself just as much as for Nick.
“What do you need, muffin?”
Art stopped. It was a mad plan, but his plans had never been sane. There was no point in sane, no point in safe. Sane and safe never worked. There was nothing to achieve in safety. If there was nothing to risk there would be no reward, and Nicholas was reward enough to risk everything. And to risk everything, to get him out, it would have to be insane.
“I need you to teach me how to be a girl."
Chapter Four