Читать книгу Mhairi McFarlane 3-Book Collection: You Had Me at Hello, Here’s Looking at You and It’s Not Me, It’s You - Mhairi McFarlane, Mhairi McFarlane - Страница 29

‘Are you going to tell Rachel about this story, then?’ Ben asks Simon, on his return. I’d have liked to sustain the illusion that this isn’t about business for a little longer.

Yet I add: ‘Yeah, what is it? I’m curious.’

‘Can I trust you? Is this off the record?’ Simon says, warily, pushing forward on his seat, eyes darting round the bar as if my plainclothes associate might be loitering by the fag machine.

‘I don’t come to wine bars wired for sound.’

Simon glowers at me.

I make a cross on my chest with a fingertip. ‘Promise this goes no further. On my life. You are safe to speak.’

Simon leans further forward. ‘I’ve got an important client who’s ready for an interview. With the right paper.’

‘We can’t pay big money,’ I say.

‘I said the right paper, not the one that can pay the most.’

‘Who is he?’

Simon leans back again, scrutinises my face as if it’s a map that contains the key to my trustworthiness. ‘She. Natalie Shale. So wife-of-client, strictly speaking.’

My pulse quickens, before natural pessimism returns it to normal.

‘She doesn’t do interviews.’

‘She didn’t, I’m advising her differently.’

‘To who?’

‘Her husband’s last solicitor,’ Simon says, mouth twitching slightly, possibly in irritation at being doubted. ‘I’ve taken over from a colleague who’s snowed under.’

‘You must be doing well to get given it …?’

‘Simon’s in line to be made a partner,’ Ben supplies.

‘So, you up for it or what?’ Simon asks me.

‘Natalie would do a face-to-face piece, photos, everything? An exclusive?’

It’s been a while since I got truly excited by a story, but I can feel the proper journalist in me stirring after a long, deep, Rip Van Winkle length sleep. My news editor will do somersaults.

‘Yes. But no spoilers on the fresh evidence for the appeal, and I’d want your assurance that it wouldn’t be a dredge of hubby’s murky past. She’s very sensitive about it, as you can imagine. She doesn’t want to do anything that’s going to dim the glory when he’s freed.’

‘What if he isn’t?’ asks Caroline.

‘He will be,’ Ben says.

I make a noise of agreement.

‘Why?’ she persists.

‘Because he’s innocent … and because he’s got a great legal team,’ Ben says, tipping his bottle to clink it against Simon’s. Ever the optimist.

Caroline glances at me and I know she’s thinking, since when was that a guarantee? Ever the pragmatist.

‘He needs great barristers,’ Simon says, evenly. ‘And as a miscarriage of justice he needs attention, so Johnny Judge accepts you don’t get that many people holding placards outside the Court of Appeal and tooting vuvuzelas unless there’s a bloody good reason. We need to keep it in the public eye. Natalie’s interview could help with that.’

Simon pronounces bloody as ‘bladdy’ and I wonder if he went somewhere properly flashy like Eton or Harrow.

‘And Natalie’s very media friendly,’ he concludes. ‘If you get this right, it’s made of win.’

‘I thought you said she doesn’t do interviews?’ Caroline asks.

‘He means she’s attractive,’ I say.

‘Correct,’ Simon says. He reclines, so laidback he’s practically horizontal, figuratively as well as literally.