Joanne Marsden stretched like a lazy cat on the 800-thread count Egyptian cotton bed sheets. It had been a nice evening. The dinner had been delicious and the wine extraordinarily good. Felix was a generous host and an attentive companion. She liked spending time with him. Through half-opened eyes, she watched as he dressed. He was a very handsome man and, apart from a slight paunch, his body wasn’t bad either.
‘I’ll be back in a few weeks,’ he said, tying his tie. He tightened the knot, then bent to look in the mirror and straighten it. ‘Will I see you then?’
She shuffled into a sitting position and let the sheet slip down to show her breasts. Reaching up with both hands, she caught her expensively highlighted blonde hair and lifted it off her neck. It was a position that showed off her figure to its best advantage. She knew it, the man who watched appreciatively knew it. Dropping her hair, she smiled. ‘I think that could be arranged. Let me know when.’
After he left, she lay back, enjoying the peace and comfort for another hour before she climbed from the bed. Unusually, she was free until that evening and it was lovely to be able to enjoy the luxury The Ritz had to offer without having to rush away. She had a leisurely shower, wrapped herself in a soft cotton bathrobe and ordered room service from the very extensive menu. It was better to avoid the restaurant in the morning; there was always the chance she’d see someone she knew. Far better to have a relaxing breakfast in the comfort of the extremely plush room.
Half an hour later, room service knocked on the door, delivering excellent bacon and eggs, toast and coffee. She switched on the TV and sat watching the news as she ate. It had been an enjoyable evening, a good night, and now, a relaxing morning. Really, Felix was a dream customer, she wished they were all like that.
The room was hers until eleven. Enjoying the luxurious surroundings, she waited until the last minute before gathering her few belongings and leaving the room. She’d have asked the concierge to order a taxi but the foyer was busy, the concierge surrounded by a group of anxious-looking tourists. She threw him a smile that he acknowledged with a pleasant wave and headed out onto the street.
Her thin coat and skimpy dress were no match for the bitterly cold wind that swirled around the front of the hotel. Shivering, she wrapped her arms around herself as she waited for a taxi, relieved when one pulled up just a minute later to drop people off. She climbed into its welcome warmth, gave the driver her address and sat back with her eyes shut as the taxi made its way through the busy streets to her apartment.
King Edward’s Road, in Hackney, was a relatively quiet tree-lined street. Her apartment was on the fifth floor of a six-storey apartment block, an ugly building which stood out for all the wrong reasons among its more attractive neighbours. Joanne didn’t care; it was functional and she spent little time there. Surprisingly, there wasn’t a lift, just one main central stairwell that served all the floors, and emergency exit stairs at the end of each block. The stairwell invariably stank of human waste, homeless people finding it a good place to spend the night despite the security men’s endeavours.
She didn’t think they tried very hard but she never complained even when she returned late one night and had to step over a young man curled up in a distinctly malodorous sleeping bag. One flight of stairs up, she’d grunted with annoyance. It wasn’t in her nature to do nothing. Returning to his unmoving body, she took a closer look. ‘Well, you’re breathing,’ she muttered, opening her purse. She took out two tens and tucked them under his cheek. He didn’t stir.
There was nobody to step over today; she climbed the stairs to her apartment and pushed open the door. Her landlord rented it as an apartment, but it was, in fact, a tiny bedsit. A sofa bed that she rarely used sat against one wall. In one corner, a tiny fridge, a two-ring hob and a microwave formed a compact kitchenette; in the other corner, a door opened into a small room that was euphemistically called the bathroom. It was a wet room, slightly bigger than the average shower tray. There was a toilet, the tiniest wash-hand basin Joanne had ever seen, and a shower that trickled barely-warm water any time she had the misfortune to need to use it. Luckily, that wasn’t very often.
She had a few hours to spare. Taking off the dress and underwear she’d put on the day before, she dropped them into the suitcase that lay open on the tiny table in front of the apartment’s only window. She shrugged into a robe, picked up the book she’d brought from home, and sat on the sofa with her legs curled under her. Her life was so neatly compartmentalised that she had no problem switching off and relaxing for a few hours.
Mid-afternoon, she put down the book and made a mug of coffee. She’d never bothered plugging the fridge in so, while she was there, she drank it black. The mug, a jar of coffee and a teaspoon were the only items in the apartment’s single kitchen cupboard. Nothing else. She never ate there, rarely ate while she was working; that Ritz breakfast earlier being an unusual luxury. She worked three days in a row, sometimes with barely a break, and afterwards, she’d head home exhausted to her house in Royal Tunbridge Wells where she would relax and eat well for a week before doing another three-day stretch.
Compartmentalised, it worked well for her.
At seven, she took underwear from a drawer, and a tight-fitting low-cut black dress from the single wardrobe. Her next customer didn’t appreciate subtlety so she applied make-up with a heavy hand, thick eyeliner, lashings of mascara, loud red lipstick. She was smiling at her reflection in the small mirror on the wall when her personal mobile rang.
She stared at it, first in surprise and then with suspicion. It rarely rang. She preferred to be the one doing the calling. It was better for her, easier, and the few friends she had knew that. Picking up her phone, she looked at the screen. Megan. With a quick look at her watch, Joanne decided she had time to spare. ‘Hi, this is a surprise.’
‘Joanne, hi! Yes, listen, I’m sorry, I know you don’t like us calling you but this is important.’
She was fond of Megan, they’d been friends for a long time, but there was something in her voice, a barely discernible undercurrent of distress and, suddenly, Joanne was sorry she’d answered. ‘What is it?’ Her voice was cool rather than encouraging.
‘I was speaking to Beth earlier, and we’re going to go away for a night. Just us. The three of us, like old times.’ There was silence for a few seconds. ‘Next week, Joanne. Just one night. It’s really important to me. Do say you’ll come.’
Her fingers clenched the phone. Like old times? The three of them had only been away together once. One night, over twenty years ago, and it had been a disaster. She’d say no. It was a silly idea.
‘Please,’ Megan said.
Joanne’s job had made her sensitive to nuances, to the way people spoke rather than the words they used. There’d been a hint of distress in her voice and now a clear note of desperation in the please. She frowned. There was definitely something wrong. Megan was one of the few people she counted a friend, her and Beth. They met once a month or so, usually for dinner, sometimes for a drink, but they’d never been away together since that one night. Joanne wasn’t sure if that had been a conscious decision, or if their lives had just been too busy. Now, despite her feeling that there was something bothering Megan, the idea of getting away for a night with her two old friends appealed to her. It would be fun. ‘Okay,’ she said before she changed her mind. ‘And next week is good for me. So,’ she said, checking her watch, ‘where are we heading?’
‘Capel-le-Ferne.’
Joanne swallowed. She must have misheard. Megan couldn’t possibly have said what she thought she’d heard. ‘I’m sorry, there’s interference on the line, where did you say?’
‘Capel-le-Ferne,’ Megan repeated. ‘Don’t worry, I’m not suggesting the same bungalow. There’s a spa hotel there now. I thought we could stay there.’
‘Are you sure that’s a good idea?’ Because it wasn’t, it was a stupid crazy idea.
A soft sigh came down the line. ‘This is important, Jo. I’ll explain when we get there.’
Why had she answered the damn phone? What possessed her to have agreed to go? She was about to say she’d changed her mind, when she heard that soft pleading voice again.
‘Please, Jo.’
They had been friends for long enough to warrant doing something she didn’t want to do, hadn’t they? ‘Okay. I’ll go along with it. Text me the details.’
‘You won’t let me down?’
‘I won’t. But I don’t know why you want to go back there. I think it’s an absolutely crazy idea, but it’s obviously important to you so, as I said, I’ll go along with it even though I don’t like it.’
Megan’s soft laugh came down the line. ‘Friday then. I’ll text you the hotel’s postcode. We can check in after two. Come as early as you can.’ The line went dead.
Throwing her mobile on the table, Joanne stood for a moment thinking, wondering if she should call Beth and find out what the hell was going on. Joanne glanced at her watch with a groan. It would have to wait until the next day.
She slipped on her coat, checked in the mirror to make sure everything was just so and stared at her reflection, wondering again what had possessed her to say yes. The three of them had kept in touch all these years, she considered them her best friends, went to their various parties, listened to their stories, but they weren’t that close anymore, were they?
Still staring at her reflection, she rubbed her lips together. That shade of red did nothing for her. What would they say, these old friends of hers if they knew the truth? They thought she worked in public relations; in truth she did, but to be accurate it was private relations, very private. She wasn’t ashamed of what she did for a living, but she wasn’t sure her two friends would view being an escort as a good career move. Even a high-class very expensive escort.
Call girl. Hooker. Prostitute. Sex worker. She lifted a trembling finger to wipe away a smudge of eyeliner. It had been her choice. And now Megan was dragging her back to the place where she’d made that decision.