hen we got to the top of the steps and outside Laura asked me what I thought I was doing dragging her out of there?
“Laura Riley, we both know if you didn’t want me to drag you out of there we wouldn’t be standing here right now,” I said. I remember placing my hands on my hips; trying to be ‘the man’. She raised an eyebrow. “So it is you, Eddie!” She said playfully punching me in the arm and for a moment I thought she may just be batting for the other side.
I asked her if she had a little time for coffee and she pointed out that she was working and had a fight to go and break up. As if on cue the security guards came out of the gallery with my cousins in tow. “I’m still working till midnight,” she leaned in and said.
“OK Cinders I’ll see you here when the clock strikes twelve!” Pointing to the ground I leaned in, our mouths were mere millimetres apart. She drew back sharply. ‘Definitely gay’ I thought. Which to me was a good thing, you see I wasn’t looking for a girlfriend, wife or otherwise female ‘partner’ I was looking for a bodyguard, the best bodyguard I could acquire, and she was now stood in front of me.
There was a power struggle on as the older generation was taking a back seat and I didn’t intend to lose. My father had been the head of this family, I had succeeded him, I intended for it to remain that way. Laura being gay meant that I didn’t have to worry that she would get any stupid crush on me, as not to blow my own trumpet too much, I being a ‘very’ good-looking Italian descended young man, who was enough to get any straight girl into bed which had been proven time and time and time… well, you get the picture.
Her answer when I asked her to come and work for me near floored me. First, she asked if I was related to the ‘bozio’s’ in the gallery earlier? When I admitted that yes I was, she informed me she wasn’t going to work for a criminal again.
I had ways and means of making my proposal more attractive, so I promised her she would never have to undertake any criminal activity on my behalf then I asked her what her pay was and offered to triple it.
“I have no objection to breaking the law. It just depends in what capacity.” I knew what she meant, I had those same lines. Two days later she turned up at my house, bags in hand. Our staff lived in, one of them had ‘left’ recently and the attic room was available.
She was like a ghost. I didn’t see her; her presence totally unknown until I was headed out and she would be by my side. We had a gym in the house, a big old townhouse. She used it when I wasn’t requiring her services. I’d literally never had a better employee.
About four weeks later I had a consignment arriving off the north coast of Scotland. It was July and a scorching hot day. The delivery was just off the coast of Shiant Islands Garbh Eilean. I already knew the second my boat was spotted in the area the coast guard would make their presence known.
However, I’m out for a jolly with a lady. I took my position at the helm Laura took her position lying on the deck sunbathing. She had spent hours in her room covering her scars with waterproof makeup. Sure as; the coastguard pulled alongside.