Chapter 6
Wednesday, April 21st. 11:14 am.
Nicole’s mobile sounded with its usual ‘do you think I’m sexy’ ring tone, as she’d just purchased two large latte’s at their usual coffee bar on Grenville Street.
‘What’s up now?’ she thought, not looking at the caller display, but presuming it was Hartley.
‘I’m having coffee with Eve, can’t whatever it is wait?’ she remarked sounding a tad frustrated.
‘It’s me.’
‘Oh,’ she whispered, instantly recognizing Alf’s voice, ‘Sorry, I thought it was my husband.’
‘I gathered that, with the wonderfully endearing tone you answered. We need to talk. When would be convenient. It has to be within the next couple of hours though, otherwise we’re fucked.’
‘Why, are things not going to plan?’
‘Yes, apart from one important factor, but we can’t talk on the phone. Where and at what time can we meet? Like I said, it’s urgent?’
‘Just a minute. Can I ring you back?’ she said, with her mobile wedged between shoulder and ear, whilst carrying the tray of drinks to the table, where Eve was waiting patiently.
‘No, we’ve no time for pleasantries; we need to talk - now.’ He replied with emphasis, slowly elongating his last word.
She had to think quickly but speak quietly, as Eve’s ears had pricked up, and was clearly trying to listen in on her conversation, wondering why the look on Nicole’s face had changed. When she’d gone to buy their drinks, she was a woman looking forward to going shopping. Now she had the appearance of exasperation.
‘One thirty, your place. OK.’
‘See you then.’
‘Is everything alright?’ enquired Eve sounding somewhat concerned.
‘Yes, all’s good.’ replied Nicole wearing a smile. Being an excellent and extremely convincing liar, even her best friend wouldn’t think that anything was out of place.
‘Where should we start?’ remarked Eve sounding cheerful, but inside still wondering what her best friend could be holding back from her. ‘Harrods, Selfridges or should we hit the Kings Road?’
Nicole’s mind had wondered off again, and it looked like she was now on another planet.
‘Wake up Nicole, I’m talking to you.’
Nicole was clearly elsewhere.
What was disrupting their plans?
Why was it so urgent, that she was going to have to interrupt a day’s shopping with her best friend?
‘Nicole.’ Eve was now on the point of raising her voice, trying to get her attention.
‘Sorry,’ she answered, ‘I was miles away. What were you saying?’
‘Where do want to start, Harrods, Self…’
‘Err – no, unfortunately,’ interrupted Nicole, ‘something’s cropped up. I need to be somewhere else once we’ve had coffee.’
‘What’s up with you today?’ Eve was getting more and more suspicious. ‘It’s not like you to miss out on a shopping spree. Your definitely not short of cash, so it must be Hartley. He’s not been hitting you or anything like that has he. I’ll kill him if he’s even laid a finger on you.’
‘Oh Eve,’ Nicole was more concerned with what Alf wanted, than to be bothered about her best friend and a shopping trip. ‘Shut the fuck up. I’ve got more important things to think about, other than walking around designer outlets.’
‘No need to talk to me like that,’ Eve was clearly upset with the way in which she was being spoken to, ‘I thought we’d met up for pleasure, not a slanging match.’
‘We had, but I’m afraid other things take priority.’ Nicole’s demeanour had changed into a rather serious mode.
‘What time is it?’ she said under her breath, as she lifted her wrist to glance at her watch.
‘Ten to twelve.’ She thought, obviously time conscious.
‘What’s more important than your best friend and a shopping trip?’ remarked Eve, trying to rectify the situation.
‘Wealth. ’ Answered Nicole unreservedly, ‘and my wealth in particular.’ she added.
‘And have you not got enough of that?’ Eve couldn’t fathom out why Nicole would want more. After all she was married to a millionaire jeweller, and being Hartley’s wife and joint proprietor of the company, was a millionaire in her own right. Had everything any woman could desire. And more than most people could even dream of.
‘One can never have enough.’ Nicole glanced at her watch again.
‘I’m going to have to go. I’ve got things to do. I’ll be in touch.’
Without a bye or leave, Nicole rose from her seat and left. Leaving Eve, sat in the coffee shop alone. Wondering, what on earth her so called best friend, was either up to, or involved in.
* * *
Bang, bang, bang.
Nicole knocked hard on Alf’s front door.
The door was opened almost immediately. He’d understandably been expecting her, and was waiting, not very patiently.
‘No need to bang like that,’ he said sternly, ‘it’s a good job not many people come round the back. All you’re doing is bringing attention to us. Fortunately there’s not many folk around here know who I am, and, hopefully if they do see us together, they’ll just think I’ve got a prosy in to service my shaft.’
Alfred ‘shifty’ Cunliffe, as he was known to the authorities. Was a relatively handsome man, in some ladies opinions. About five five and around eleven and a half stone. Not very big you might think for a hard nut of a criminal, but he was much more useful as brain, rather than brawn. His hair was light brown and needed to be kept cut to a number two. It had a nasty habit of growing curly. And, as a forty year old criminal who’d spent more than one spell at Her Majesty’s Pleasure, it just didn’t fit the bill.
Having dark brown eyes, and sporting a goatee beard, his smile was tantalisingly engaging.
‘So much for the niceties,’ said Nicole, who’d known Alf from her days when she was training on the catwalk. He was working as a set erector as a way of showing some visible means of support, ‘what the fuck’s going wrong with our plans?’
‘We’ve got Benny the CCTV guy’s lad safely locked up; Matt’s taking care of him.’
‘Don’t hurt him,’ she remarked angrily, ‘he’s the only insurance we’ve got. We need to ensure that the video won’t be recording when you rob the shop, and if any harm comes to him, well,’ she paused, ‘we’re more than fucked.’
‘That’s where the problem lies.’ said Alf, ‘I know that the hard drive is security locked, so that no-one but Hartley and Instaview Surveillance can gain access to it. That way an intruder couldn’t tamper with it. But Benny can’t go to the shop and rig the system, without a worksheet being created by their company secretary. I don’t know how you are going to do it. But, you have to make sure that there’s a problem with the recorder, so that Hartley will contact Instaview, and request an engineer.’
‘How am I going to do that? I still don’t know how to record from our own Virgin box, and that’s supposed to be simple.’
‘All you have to do is unplug the output lead which connects the box to the monitor. That should cause enough of a problem.’
‘Well, if that’s the case, why do we need to involve Benny to do our dirty work, if by unplugging one fucking cable, its done?’
‘But I want it to look like its recording, after the engineer’s been and done the so called repairs.’ said Alf.
‘By unplugging that lead, it will be noticeable that images aren’t being sent to the monitor, so the system can’t be working properly. Hartley will then ring the company; a work sheet will be created. Benny will be sent out to affect a repair and sort it out. Making sure that it appears to be recording, even though its not.’
‘And what video are we supposed to be making?’
‘You, being shagged like mad, in your own shop.’
‘Why?’
‘Somebody else needs to be in the frame for the robbery.’
‘Who?’ questioned Nicole.
‘Chandler.’
‘Chandler,’ she repeated slowly. ‘According to Hartley he’s the guy who’s supposed to be buying the gem. Apparently he had claimed that he knew me. I don’t suppose you know anything about that?’ she said displaying suspicion.
‘Of course I do,’ Alf replied, ‘he had to be informed about who you are, before he spoke with your husband. Otherwise my plan won’t work.’
‘Why?’
‘In order for him to do exactly what we want.’ said Alf. ‘We had to make him believe that he was the one in charge. I got someone close to him, to drop a couple of hints. Like, wouldn’t it be worth meeting Hartley’s wife, in secret, so that you could take a look at the shop, and look at where the diamond was going to be kept. But it would be best to keep Hartley in the dark, just in case he’s got another agenda.’
‘And he fell for it,’ remarked Nicole, frowning, ‘but why bother. Why don’t we just go in and steel it without him being involved?’
‘If we can get him implicated in the robbery,’ Alf grinned, ‘it takes the heat of us.’
‘But why on earth would he want to steal something he’s about to purchase legally?’ questioned Nicole.
‘Insurance fraud.’
‘If Chandler’s on the video, and then the diamond gets nicked. One phone call to the Police will kick-start an insurance investigation. I’ve already prepared a claim form for £30 million, with an excellently forged signature on it. This will be handed into the insurance company’s office straight after the robbery. That should be enough evidence to prove he’s on the make. And once he’s put away, we can sell the rock on the black market.’
‘Just a couple of major problems with this so called plan of yours.’ said Nicole. ‘How are you going to make this video, when, one, I don’t even know this bloke, even though he supposedly knows about me. And two, even if I did know him, where’s the action going to take place.’
‘That’s all been arranged.’ grinned Alf.
‘You are meeting him tonight at the shop, about nine thirty, so that he can do a reccy of the place. Obviously he’s never been there, and he just wants to check that the gem is going to be safely locked away.’
‘In order for that to happen, you must already be in contact with him. But why can’t he just ask Hartley, after all, it is my husband who’s going to be looking after it.’
‘You’re not bloody getting it, are you.’ remarked Alf.
‘Like I said before,’ he was sounding annoyed, ‘we need Chandler to be implicated. And the only way to do that, is to have video footage of him being in the shop, before the robbery takes place.’
‘How do you know this Chandler bloke?’ queried Nicole.
‘He’s very well known by the criminal fraternity. Being a wealthy business man who frequently does large transactions, under the legal radar. He very often uses criminals to do his dirty work, moving either goods or cash around. Fortunately, Mr Chandler puts feelers out when a large transaction is about to take place, like for example this Appleford diamond. And although he doesn’t know it, his private courier is brother to one of the cash handlers he confers with, and uses, who regularly confides in his sibling.’
‘How’s this going to work then?’ she asked, still not exactly sure how this was supposed to pan out, or even if it would work at all.
‘Like I said, it’s all been arranged, but there are still a couple of bits that you need to do in order for it to work.’
‘Such as?’
‘You’ll need to get away from home at about eight o’clock, so you’re going to have to make up a believable excuse for Hartley.’
‘That’s not a problem.’ she replied. ‘Go on.’
‘Make your way to the shop,’ he paused as he handed her a video camera.
‘Set that up somewhere. Making sure that it will get a good view of you and Chandler having a good time. Put it somewhere he won’t see it. Then switch it on to record,’ Alf pointed at the relevant button, ‘as soon as you hear the front door buzzer.’
‘I think I can manage all that,’ Nicole replied, ‘but I do hope its going to be worth all this trouble.’
‘It will, believe you me, it will.’
‘So,’ she enquired still showing curiosity, ‘what’s it going to be worth? That’s if we get away with it. And who’s going to buy it?’
‘We’ve already got a potential buyer. He’s a very wealthy man from Hong Kong. Apparently he owns a number of Chinese restaurants in London, and he’s prepared to give us £20 million in cash for it. Once it’s in our hands.’
‘That’s a hell of a lot of money,’ she remarked greedily, ‘so when do I need to unplug the cable to the monitor?’
‘Go straight back to the shop when you leave here,’ Alf was clear about the series of events that needed to be in place for the theft to be successful.
‘And sometime around three o’clock do your thing with that cable. Insist that your dear husband gets Instaview to send out an engineer immediately, and leave the rest to me.’
Nicole frowned.
‘Hang on a minute. If I’m only making that video tonight, how the hell can it get copied onto the system?’
‘It won’t.’ replied Alf. ‘After I’d told Benny that that’s what he was going to do, I had a change of mind. It could have been too time dependent, and we can’t risk Hartley walking into the office and catching him doing the copying. So, once you’ve had your shagging session and Chandler leaves the shop. I’ll be waiting outside, take the camera home, and put it onto a DVD. Then when you arrive at work tomorrow morning, I’ll make sure that you get the disc, and all you have to do is put it in your handbag. Make sure that it’s at the bottom underneath your purse and keys, and oh yes, the proverbial kitchen sink. Deliberately hidden, giving the appearance that you didn’t want anybody finding it. Then after me and Lazarus have left, taking you hostage, the police will arrive and start an investigation. Find that the system hasn’t recorded anything, and discover the DVD in your bag. They then play it, and Bob’s your uncle. Chandlers in the shit.’
‘But what about me?’ Nicole didn’t sound too pleased. ‘I’ll be on the video; doesn’t that implicate me as well?’
‘Not really. We’re going to kidnap you as insurance. Making sure that Hartley doesn’t ring the cops before we’ve made our getaway. Yes you will be a suspect at first, until we release you. Then all you have to explain is the reason you made that video.’
‘Which is?’ she replied doubtingly.
‘To blackmail Chandler.’ continued Alf. ‘Because he is worth a fortune, you’d intended selling him the disc. Or if he didn’t pay up, you’d send a copy to his wife, and then sell it to the highest bidder. His reputation wouldn’t be worth shit,’
‘And who might the highest bidder be?’ Nicole wasn’t at all convinced.
‘I don’t know? One of his competitors or one of his henchmen, it doesn’t really matter.’ Alf appeared to be getting a tad frustrated. ‘By the time we get to that point the cops won’t be bothered about what’s on the video - or you. All they’ll be interested in is capturing us, and getting the Appleford back. Oh yes, just make sure you keep your mobile in your pocket, we don’t want them getting hold of that.’
Alf paused for a second to give her time to think.
‘Don’t worry, it’ll all work out. Believe me, it will.’
‘I bloody hope so.’