Page 13 of Hard Lessons

“There’s a bank over the road. I’m sure they’ll be able to help.” Serena shrugged. “Or Fleet Street is just a short cab ride away, plenty of journalists there who’d like to see these pictures, quite the political scandal. Would be worth money to them and us.”

“Bastards,” David spat.

“Bastards make the world go round.” Serena smiled sweetly. “Or so it seems.”

“Even if that bank could give me that kind of cash I haven’t got those funds.” David folded his arms and puffed up his chest.

Luca walked to the window and glanced out. He didn’t hide the fact he had a gun shoved into the waistband of his trousers.

“Oh, crap.” David seemed to deflate as he scrubbed his fingertips over his damp brow. Clearly guns weren’t his thing. Too bad he’d picked dangerous allies and enemies.

“I know you were getting big hand-outs from my uncle for a long time,” Luca said, “and no doubt even bigger hand-outs lured your fickle loyalty away. So I know you’ll have those funds available without question.”

“It’s not my bank. That one.”

“He’s lying,” Serena said. “I saw his card in his wallet. It had that black horse on it.” She hadn’t seen it at all, but she hoped David being in the state he was in, he’d fall into her trap. The bank was convenient for Westminster and his local drinking hole after all.

David glared at her. He fiddled with his tie as though it were still too tight from where Luca had grabbed it. He really was sweating hard now, his brow and top lip shiny. She prayed he wouldn’t go and have a heart attack on them. “Okay, yes, that’s my bank.”

“Come on then,” Luca said, slapping David on the shoulder. “No time like the present, let’s go withdraw some cash so we can get rid of those pesky pictures forever, huh, and you can go back to your shitty little politician life and your wife will live in blissful ignorance.”

* * *

Ten minutes later,Serena was flicking through a leaflet about mortgages as she waited in the lobby area of the bank. She’d found a seat and was waggling her heel and hoping she looked like a regular customer. Luca was by the door talking on his phone—his leather jacket covering his weapon. She wasn’t sure if it was a real call of if he was making out he was doing something so he could lurk.

David had been ushered into a back room with a senior bank teller. She hoped to hell he was sticking to his side of the bargain and that he feared his wife finding out about his philandering ways enough to pay up and not grass them up.

She didn’t fancy going down for extortion within a day of setting foot on UK soil.

I have to stop doing this shit. Iwantto stop it.

Just as she thought her nerves were going to fry, David appeared. He carried a small blue rucksack and walked quickly toward the door.

Serena jumped up.

Luca put his phone away.

They followed him. Sticking close, trailed him back over the road to The Rook and Tower.

“Well,” Luca said gruffly when he’d cornered David in the bar area.

“I’ve got it.” David frowned and held up the bag. “Now get rid of those photographs.”

Serena took the bag and opened it. “It looks like he’s telling the truth.”

“Of course I am, do you think I’m a fool?”

“Si, I do,” Luca said. “A very big fool.” He withdrew his phone. “But you held up your side of the bargain and as I’m an honest man these are gone.”

He began deleting the pictures.

“How do I know they’re the only copies?” David said.

“You’ll have to trust me the way I did you, just now, in the bank.”

“Why would I rat you out. I don’t want the police sniffing around me.” David shuffled from one foot to the other.

The last photo and then the video disappeared.

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