Louis Vaughn, could never quite figure out what it was that he had done but he'd become a man in demand. That demand had come about very much either by accident or the luck of being in the right place at the right time, he’d carved out a second career as an escort. No, not the dirty sort of escort but a person who could be relied upon to behave properly when they are in the company of women and in particular the women who called upon his services. The other sort of escort was not what Louis was about.
Louis could be relied upon to not only behave but also engage in often quite inane small talk and not get bored. Most importantly, Louis would not try anything on with the women that he was escorting to all sorts of social events. He never betrayed anything that was said or revealed during an event or dinner or anything. His job was merely to be a +1 for a woman for a few hours. For that service, he was rewarded very well for his services.
It had all come about because of his is job as a property surveyor and valuer for a large West End (of London) Estate Agent that had led to him becoming an escort. The sorts of properties that he helped sell brought him into contact with the sort of clientele who value discretion very highly when it comes to their money.
One bright spring day, he’d been called out on a surveying job by a recently separated socialite to value a house that she was interested in buying. His job was to survey the property and value it as well as point out any problems or possible problems with the property. As a qualified surveyor he was the perfect person for the job. He only took on these jobs when the property in question was being sold by another agency. Professional conflicts or rather the avoidance thereof was very important to Louis.
This particular property had a huge damp problem in the cellar. The prospective buyer was furious and demanded to see it for herself. Louis duly showed her the problem and said,
"To be honest, Ms Pendleton, I would not buy this place even if you paid me all the tea in china. This property is grade two star listed, which means that fixing the damp problem will more than likely cost close to a hundred grand to sort out. I’m guessing that from the time that this property has been on the market, that the seller won't reduce the price accordingly. So, Ms Pendleton, walk away and spend your husband’s money a bit more wisely.”
When she’d recovered her composure, Ms Pendleton did walk away from the purchase of that particular property. Mrs Pendleton had shown her appreciation of Louis by inviting him to accompany her to a charity event that night. He didn’t have anything else to do that night so he went with her and the evening was a success.
Word soon got around in the social circles that women like Mrs Pendleton moved in, that he was the perfect gentlemen for these situations. Some people called him an escort, but he preferred the term companion mostly because there was none the sordid stuff usually associated with escorts. His USP was that he didn’t charge a penny for his services. He was just there to be the substitute 'plus 1' at an event when the regular 'plus 1' was unavailable. As a result, his social calendar was soon full and, as they say, the rest is history.
[three and a bit years after the dinner with Mrs Pendleton]
“Who is it tonight and where?" asked the receptionist as Louis left work wearing an impressive three-piece suit.
“Mary-Sue Patterson and to Dinner at the Savoy and the Opening night of Iolanthe at Covent Garden,” replied Louis with a bit of a grimace on his face.
"Why the face? When was the last time you cooked at home then?"
"It is not that. She is over here with her husband, who is up north with the US Ambassador on some trade mission. That’s ok in itself, but she chews gum like it is going out of fashion. Even during dinner, she chomps away with her mouth wide open. Sorry, but that is not the nicest thing to look at over dinner.”
"Why didn't you say no then? I'm sure that there are plenty of other pretty women who'd love to be on your arm tonight?"
“This one is for the Boss. He’s hoping to get the Patterson’s to buy that property in Cheyne Walk that came on the market the other day.”
The receptionist understood Louis perfectly. The property in question had an asking price of £5.5million. His share of the commission he'd receive on the sale would top up his end of year bonus very nicely.
“I don’t know why you bother with working here. You could earn far more going full time as an escort?”
Louis smiled.
"I don't charge them a penny other than expenses. That's why I get the best commissions… apart from tonight, that is."
“Don’t you like Opera?”
"Pointless rubbish if you ask me, but I do whatever it takes to make the lady happy apart from bonking them. Do that, and you don't last very long in this game.”
They both laughed.
[Two months later at a Restaurant in Chelsea]
Louis was dining with a woman who’d become something of a regular client. Tonight, he was entertaining her as her husband was away on business. She enjoyed his company because she had someone to talk to. This was not all that unusual for the women that Louis entertained. Most of the husbands appreciated his skills but, a few were a bit iffy about it.
The couple had just finished their main course when a man burst into the restaurant. It was the husband of the woman he’d been with all evening. He quickly spotted his wife and came directly to their table.
“So, this is where you are hiding with your lover. Don’t think I have not been aware of your sordid little affair for some considerable time. Well, it is over right now, you understand! You are coming with me!"
He grabbed his wife’s wrist and dragged her to her feet. Louis knew better than to interfere in situations like this.
He took a couple of steps towards the exit. Then he stopped and turned around and returned to the table where Louis was sitting.
“I’m going to make sure that you never bed a woman again, you failed gigolo you. Your time is up, understand?”
He didn’t wait for an answer but dragged his wife out of the restaurant.
Louis sat there for a few minutes before dropping three twenty pound notes onto the table and walking out with his head held high. Louis prided himself in not losing his temper in any situation, especially one like this. He’d accepted that situations like this might happen from time to time. He’d done nothing wrong so his conscience was clear.
Once outside the restaurant, Louis pulled his coat up around himself, as a chill wind had blown up. He looked for a Taxi but as usual, none were around just when you needed one so he started to walk towards the nearest Tube station, Fulham Broadway.
[Two days later]
Louis had a 'date free' night for once. He was bored at home, so he decided to go out for a walk and get something simple to eat in a bistro that was near his home in Battersea. He’d only walked about 200yds when a White Transit drew up alongside him. Three men jumped out armed with iron bars. They proceeded to give Louis a real beating right there in the street. With Louis lying prone on the ground, the leader of the trio stood over him and, said loudly,
“This is to make sure that you can’t bed another woman again.”
The man proceeded to kick him several times right where it hurt. A lot of blood started to flow. This, seemed to satisfy the thug. After a brief call, he and the others got into the van which then sped off towards Wandsworth. The van was later found, burned out at the back of Sandown Park Racecourse.
Two passers-by had witnessed the whole thing and called ‘999’. The Police were soon on the scene. Louis was given first-aid by the Police until the Ambulance arrived to take him off to Charing Cross hospital.
[Four Days Later]
“Louis darling,” said the trio of women who were the first visitors who were allowed to see him.
He managed a smile to the trio. They were women he’d been out with many times. He was surprised to see them all together.
"Hello, Ladies,” he said trying, to be cheerful but, it was clear to the visitors that he was anything but that.
“You, poor man. You look awful,” said another of the elegantly dressed women.
“Don’t say anything, just listen,” said the third of the trio.
A puzzled look appeared on his face. Then a pained look replaced it as he tried to move a bit in the bed. The four broken ribs he’d suffered in the attack were very painful.
When he’d stopped moving, the leader of the ‘pack’ said,
“We have arranged for you to go down to Dawn Barnes to recover. She will get you back to health.”
“We?” muttered Louis.
The leader smiled back at him.
“Yes, your women. All those who you entertain and suffer with at times. You are the perfect gentleman and have never tried anything on with any of us. Now it is our turn to give you something back. We all want you to get better soon so that we can enjoy your company again.”
Louis’s face went sad.
“I’m afraid my days of entertaining are over for good. Would you want to be seen out with someone who looks like this?”
He had a point. A knife had been used to slice two large wounds in his face.
“Surely that can be repaired by a decent plastic surgeon?” asked one of the women.
Louis shook his head.
“I don’t have the money for that sort of thing. Sorry ladies, my time escorting you is over once and for all. Those guys did a number on me and more than just my face you understand.”
“Do the Police have any leads on who did it?” asked another.
“I know who may have organised it but when I was beaten up, he was in Los Angeles so has a perfect alibi. As to who did it? The Police have a good idea but again no real proof.”
He sighed and grimaced as his ribs shifted.
“It was professionally done and that is all anyone can say.”
There was silence in his room. Then Louis said,
“I’ll be all right. The docs say I can leave after the weekend. Then I’ll go home to recover.”
The three women looked at each other then back at Louis.
“Didn’t you hear anything we said? You are being taken care of and all of your women and their husbands are behind us when we say that. We won’t take no for an answer.”
Louis knew the trio well enough to know when he was beaten so he didn’t put up any more resistance.
“We’ll go to your home and bring you some clothes to wear while you are recovering.”
Louis shook his head.
"That's not possible, I'm afraid. My home was ransacked while I was in the operating theatre. Every item of clothing that I owned was cut into little pieces, all my furniture smashed up. The Police told me that it was a total wreck. Then they took the stuff I was wearing on the night as evidence, so I’m virtually naked.”
The leader of the trio smiled.
“At least one of us is bound to know your sizes to we will get something for you. Leave it to us, understand?"
Louis nodded.
The leader saw that he was getting tired.
“It is time we left. Some more of us will be visiting tomorrow. We have a rota all setup.”
This pleased and dismayed Louis at the same time. He’d been very careful about keeping whom he’d escorted private. All the women knew that he didn’t tell tales and that was very important to these women and even more to their husbands.
They said their goodbyes and left him alone.
Louis spent some time wondering what had just happened. Eventually, it dawned upon him that the 'women' in his life were taking charge of his rehab. He wondered what would happen if…? He shuddered and tried to think of other and much nicer things. Sadly, however hard he tried, he failed.
His mood was made worse by the arrival of the Police. They didn't have any good news for him. It was as if his attackers had disappeared into thin air. They explained that they didn't have enough evidence to get a warrant to get the phone call information from the husband of the woman he'd been at the restaurant with when the husband arrived and threatened Louis.
He started to explain something to the Detective Inspector but gave up. He felt that it was hopeless. The Detective could not get his head around the fact that Louis was not an Escort in the normal sense of the word. No Money and certainly 'No Sex' was not in the Policeman's vocabulary. His departing words were,
"Are you sure you are for real and not a throwback to the nineteen-thirties?"
Louis smiled back at the Officer.
“Yes. Perhaps I was a throwback to a bygone age? All that is over now. Those thugs have ended my little sideline. What self-respecting woman would want to be seen in public with me now? Even if I got the damage to my face fixed, my reputation is now shot to hell. I am now a liability when it comes to women."
Then he found out where the source of the news came from when one morning, yet another white-coated doctor came to visit. Then Louis saw who it was, it all started to fall into place.
“Helen? What are you doing here?”
The Doctor Helen Sanderson was one of the women who Louis had escorted a few times back in the early days of his career as an escort.
"Hello, Louis. I'm the A&E Consultant here now. I was on duty when you were brought in. I was tied up with a coronary otherwise, I would have treated you.”
Louis collapsed back into the bed.
“Does everyone know?”
“Know what?” replied Helen with a smile.
“Don’t give me that. Doctor Amin gave me the bad news two days ago.”
Helen smiled back at Louis.
“But you are alive. From the details that the Police gave me on the night, and just seeing you tells me that you had one hell of a beating. To be honest, apart from that obvious thing, you got off very lightly. When I saw who it was, I almost cried on the spot. Louis, you are a very special person to all of us.”
"Yeah, but I'm stuffed if, you know what I mean."
Helen took hold of his hand.
"You have a lot of friends, in case you hadn't realised it before now. You won't be alone."
Louis couldn’t hold back the tears any longer.
"That's not what I mean. Friends? We shall see once they know the gory details of what happened to me. Then the media will come sensing a nice bit of scandal that will do their business a lot of good. Who will stay with me then? You know as well as I do that almost of the women I have ever escorted want to stay well out of the limelight. Once the press gets a sniff of what happened to me in terms on injuries, they'll be gone in a flash."
Helen didn’t react right away.
"Then we will have to keep them out of it, then won't we then?"
"And just how do you intend to do that?"
Helen smiled back at him.
"By getting you out of here, ASAP and somewhere where the media can't get at you or the people helping you."
“Like… oh… the dark side of the moon for instance?”
Helen laughed.
“That’s more like the Louis I know and love.”
“This is silly,” complained Louis when Beverly McBride appeared in his room to get him ready to leave the hospital.
“There have been a few reporters sniffing around outside. That means we need to disguise you just to make sure.”
“But an old man? Really?”
Beverly, who'd been a makeup artist in the Film industry before she'd married an Oscar-Winning Director, just grinned back at him.
"That is easy. Just give me an hour or so, and even your mother would not recognise you."
Louis gave her a look that could kill.
“Leave that woman out of it. She’s a stuck-up prude from Tunbridge Wells.”
"Ok, but you get my gist."
Louis did get what she was going on about.
“What about all the formalities? My painkillers and all that?”
“Doctor Helen is taking care of that. We are going out through A&E. I got Antonia’s Husband to volunteer to get made into an oldie. He’s down in A&E at this very moment. You are going to swap with him. Then when he’s moved up here, he'll take off the makeup and simply walk out of the Hospital."
“But…”
Then Louis saw what was going on.
“So, the press will see an Oscar-winner leaving the hospital and think nothing of it?”
“Yes, especially as a very well-known director friend of his is a patient here at the moment. He’s got a Hernia that was operated on yesterday. He will tell them the truth that he was visiting someone he's worked with, including the name which can be confirmed by the director's agent. It is the perfect cover for our work."
She let that sink in before saying,
“Shall we begin?”
It took Beverly nearer two hours before she was satisfied with the new ‘aged’ Louis. When she was done, she called Helen.
Five minutes later, a nurse appeared, and without a word, took the now wheelchair-bound, Louis away and into the Lift.
Twenty minutes later, the same nurse appeared with someone who looked like Louis and left him in the room with Beverly.
Down in A&E, what appeared to be concerned relative wheeled an aged man out of A&E and helped him into a waiting car. There were some press hanging around but thankfully ignored the man who seemed to be drooling a bit.
A little over an hour later, the car, pulled into a long drive. It stopped outside a large house deep in the country on the Surrey/Sussex border. The now alert 'old' man smiled when he saw the tall, blonde and very lithe figure of Dawn Barnes come bounding out of the house that was going to be his home for the foreseeable future.
"Hello, Darling. It is so nice to see you again. When I heard about your situation, I dropped everything, got on the first available plane and here I am.”
“You really didn’t have to do this for me,” complained Louis.
“Shut the hell up Louis. You got me back on the straight and narrow after my divorce from that love rat Johannes. I owe you more than you think. Besides Jacques… wants to meet you.”
“Jacques?” asked a surprised Louis.
“Yes, my lover and husband to be.”
Louis just shook his head.
“Can we get inside so that I can take this stuff off my face and get rid of this wig?”
Dawn just laughed and wheeled him inside her house. Right from the outset, it was clear that she had not long been back in the country very long as there were three suitcases in the hall still with airline bag tags on them.
“My brother came by and set up a bed for you in here," said Dawn as she wheeled Louis into a large room on the ground floor.
“We thought it would be better rather than having to struggle with the stairs until you get those casts off your ankles. There is a bathroom with a shower and toilet next door.”
Louis looked at the room.
“This is your dining room? Won’t you need it?”
Dawn laughed.
"I've lived here for nearly five years, and five is about the number of times I've eaten in the room since then.”
Louis knew that he’d lost the argument even before it had started. Still, he thought, it all made sense.
Losing arguments to the women who were now in control of his life, was beginning to become something of a habit for him.
[To be continued in Part 2]
Louis struggled with being out of Hospital. Hospital had order and purpose which was his life or rather had been his life. He’d compartmentalised his work and social life for years and the order in the Hospital had been perfect for him. Once discharged, it took him a while but he managed to impose some sort of routine with his host Dawn. Dawn was by nature an impulsive person and as such, the antithesis of Louis.
It was a 'sort of routine' as it also depended upon the reliability of the women who'd volunteered to help him with his rehab. Some of them were just bad at timekeeping. Still, it mostly worked and, by the end of the second week and with his broken ribs healing quite nicely, he decided that it was time to get everyone together.
"Dawn, would it be possible to get everyone who's been visiting me both here and in Hospital together? I need to tell them something and, it is probably better that they all hear it at the same time."
Dawn laughed.
“You mean about your thing?”
Louis knew instantly what she was referring to.
“Yes,” he replied quietly.
“They all know. Helen told them at the outset. She wanted them to know so that if for some reason they had to help you dress and saw what wasn’t there, they would not freak out.”
Louis felt deflated. The only positive point was that he had been spared, the very embarrassing task of telling them about his injury.
“Did anyone ‘freak out’ as you aptly put it?”
Dawn laughed.
“That’s the strange thing. Not one of them did. They all felt even sorrier for you and far more determined to help you get yourself back on your feet."
While that was good news, Louis knew that there was one thing he had to tell them.
"Dawn, I'd still like to get everyone together. To say thanks but, there is something else that needs to be said."
Dawn looked at him seriously.
“I don’t like the sound of that. Is it that bad?”
Louis shook his head.
“It depends upon your point of view. It might change a lot of people’s opinion of me.”
Dawn knew he was serious.
“Let me sort it out. I’m sure that we can get something together.”
Despite Dawn’s best efforts, it was almost two weeks before she could get almost everyone together in the same place. Two of the others were going to be connected by Facetime as they were in Barbados and Antigua.
The day dawned and, Louis was understandably very nervous. Dawn had tried her hardest to get him to confide in her but, he was adamant that he had to tell everyone, at the same time. He was about to reveal his innermost secrets to a bunch of women, each of which, could if they desired, make what was left of his life a living hell.
"Are we ready, girls?" asked Dawn.
There followed the sound of 'yes we are', from the people on the call all speaking at once.
“Are any of you within earshot of someone who is outside our little group?” asked Dawn.
A chorus of 'No, we aren't' came from everyone.
“Good, here’s Louis.”
Dawn moved the camera to point at Loius.
“Firstly, I want to thank everyone for helping me out in my time of need. None of you needed to have lifted a finger to help me but you all did so thanks. I mean that from the bottom of my heart.”
“Get on with it Man, we are losing valuable time on the Courts,” complained Janice Long, who was in Barbados.
"As you know, the people who attacked me were under the impression that I'd had an affair with women such as yourselves. We all know that this was not true but, they made it impossible for me to have sex with a woman in the future. In plain language, they cut my dick off and took it with them. Reading between the lines from what the Police have told me, it was probably used as evidence so that they could get paid by those who hired them."
Louis swallowed hard and carried on.
“I have decided that Louis is no more. From now on, it is Louisa. So, ladies, there will be no more going to events with me on your arm. I know of a couple of very suitable gentlemen who could fill my boots, and I'll be happy to give their names to your husbands so that they can be vetted."
Louis swallowed again.
“As I said, I will be known as Louisa from now on. If any or all of you want to bail out now and have nothing more to do with me, then, I will fully understand. There are at least two of you that may have issues due to your religion. I understand, so don't feel that you have to be helping me because you have some duty to me. You don't. I understand."
“As I said, I am going to need a lot of help. Dawn can only do so much. I will not burden her too much. It isn’t fair.”
Louis paused.
“I think I have said all I wanted to say, so the floor is open to you.”
To everyone's complete surprise, Mary-Lou, who was in Antigua, started clapping. All the women on the call soon joined in.
When it died down, Mary-Lou said,
"It was to be expected. Louisa, when I was told about the extent of your injuries, I didn't need my degree in Rocket Propulsion to realise that you would have to become one of us. I'm in. I'll be back in England next week. If no one else helps out, then I'm the girl. Oh, and hubby says that he's onboard as well. I discussed what I thought might have happened with him the other evening. He was on board with whatever I wanted to do. It is left to us old girls network to make Louisa a success but, we have the backing of our partners and husbands. What about it, girls?"
One by one, they all came around. That included both Shireen and Toyah who being Muslim and Jewish respectively said that their partners had agreed to help. As Shireen put it,
"Louis was no longer in a position to make improper advances to me, not that he ever did, so why not help?"
Louis/Louisa was very much taken aback by this show of solidarity. He'd expected at least half to back out for one reason or another.
"Ladies, thank you very much for the vote of confidence but, there is a long way to go."
Mary-Lou came right back and said,
"I've told my other half that any plastic surgery you need will be pro-bono or, he can spend the rest of the year sleeping in his car. Louis saved my bacon more than once when he was still making other women into film stars.”
That raised a good laugh amongst the girls. Even Louis/Louisa joined in. The ice had been broken, which was what he'd wanted all along.
Louisa had no illusions that it would happen overnight but, each of the women in her life took charge of one aspect of her education. As, Louis, she'd had a view of just one part of what is needed to make women who they are. Now she needed to get the big picture or, as Mary-Lou said, 'details darling, details'.
In between, five bits of plastic surgery on her body, and classes in deportation, dress, makeup, speech, and life Louis gradually disappeared from view, and Louisa rose from the ashes of Louis and began to act and behave like his teachers.
Her big coming-out event was scheduled for Valentine’s Day. This was almost nine months since the attack on Louis. Several of the girls referred to Louisa as their ‘baby’. She was in most respects but gradually, the baby grew up and a week before the big day, Louisa made her first shopping trip on her own.
Her task was to buy a suitable outfit for the big reveal. Shireen and Toyah were around to observe the event from a respectable distance. Due to work and family commitments, they have been less involved with the 'Educating Louisa' programme than the rest so they were ideally placed to see the foo-pahs both large and small that Louisa would inevitably make on her first solo trip into the big bad world of London shopping.
Her first foray into a shop went well. Louisa overcame her embarrassment and was measured properly for a bra. She chose some delightful underwear and got top marks from her observers.
The problems started when she went into the first shop to try on a dress. The owner of the shop was a man, a gay man.
For the first time, she would have a man who wasn’t a doctor or a nurse touching her.
When Louisa realised this, she bolted out of the shop and ran down the street in a blind panic.
Louisa was crying when Toyah found her. She was also shaking a lot.
Toyah and then Shireen took it in turns to comfort her. When Louisa had recovered a bit of her, composure the trip was abandoned. The three of them retreated to Janice Long's apartment in Chelsea to recover, and plan their next move.
It soon became clear to everyone that Louisa has developed a deep phobia about men touching her.
“So, Louisa is a Lezzie then?” said Dawn Barnes.
Despite the crudeness of her description, it was probably accurate.
"Better to have found out now than during her first date, isn't it?"
Then Shireen asked,
“Do you fancy any of us?”
Louisa was in a bit of a spot. She thought for a bit before answering.
"You are all my friends. Well, my only friends. I would not want to ruin that but getting a crush on any of you. I didn't, when I was Louis, and I won't do it now. I don't want to lose any of you as a friend."
None of those present said anything.
Louisa thought again and said,
"I love all of you to bits for what you have done and are doing for me. But I simply have no interest in having a fling with any of you. That was how I managed to be an escort, and I would not dream of doing anything more than a bit of flirting with any of you. You are all far too dear to me for risking any or all of my friendships.”
That seemed to change everyone’s attitude towards Louisa.
Privately, a couple of his rehab team admitted to thinking about possible male partners for Louisa. The shopping trip catastrophe killed any of those ideas stone cold dead in a flash.
Louisa was still recovering from the event when a development in the search for whoever had put out the contract on Louis surfaced. This came with a visit from Inspector Thomas from Scotland Yard.
“We thought that you should know what has happened in the investigation,” explained the Inspector.
“Last week, we arrested three men in conjunction with a series of jewellery robberies that have taken place in the past three years in West London and Southern England.”
“I think I remember reading about one of them. One of the ladies I escorted was at one of the houses for an event a week before the theft,” replied Louisa suddenly interested in what the Inspector was saying.
“Yes. That is true. Thanks to your list of your clients and other information we received from other agencies, we have been observing two men for the past few months.”
Louisa knew who at least one of them was.
“As I said, last week, we arrested three men just one day after another robbery at a large house just outside of Winchester. They were charged a few hours ago and will appear at Southampton Magistrates Court tomorrow morning. The initial charges are just related to this latest robbery but, one of them was foolish to leave a good amount of evidence at his mistress's home that not only incriminates him but the others in all the other robberies."
He took his phone out of his pocket, and after a bit of fiddling, he showed Louisa a picture.
“Do you know this man?”
It only needed a glance for Louisa to recognise the picture.
“That’s Roland… Roland Gardener. I escorted his wife to a couple of events. He was fully on board with me escorting her.”
Then Louisa smiled.
“He is Canadian. He was away in Canada on business when I escorted his wife.”
“That is correct,” said the Inspector.
“I can’t believe that he is behind the attack on me,” exclaimed Louisa.
"He isn't. Of that, we are almost certain, but he is one of those under arrest."
Then he showed Louisa another photo.
“I don’t know him.”
"That is Roland Gardeners 'goto’ man. His name is Henrik Fortuna. He’s another of those under arrest.”
Then he showed her another picture.
Louisa shuddered when she saw it.
“That’s the man that did… did this to me.”
“Thank you for that. We already knew that but needed your confirmation. Mr Fortuna had a good number of incriminating Text messages on his phone. A Text message exchange between him and this man just before and after your attack plus a photo of you lying on the ground is pretty damming evidence. Mr Fortuna has done a deal with us to make sure that the third man gets sent down for life."
“What’s this man’s name?”
"Oh, sorry. His name is Costa, Miguel Costa. He's Mexican and has worked for the Cartels in Mexico and also in Canada. He's a hitman, pure and simple. We had no idea that he was in the country, but we collared him as he tried to get on a ferry to Dublin three days ago.”
Louisa thought for a moment before asking,
"But who ordered the hit on me? If it wasn't Roland Gardener, then who?"
He then showed Louisa another picture.
“But that’s John Peterson? He was my boss at the agency.”
“Yes.”
“Oh shit,” exclaimed Louisa.
“The Office Summer Party. That must have been when it all kicked off.”
The inspector didn’t say anything.
“His wife, Sophia, got drunk and came onto me in a big way. All sorts of pictures appeared on Social Media of her kissing me. I was summoned into his office and given a formal warning about my behaviour.”
Then she thought again.
“But I never spoke to her again? I don’t understand?”
“Sophia kept a diary. You were targeted because she used your name as a cover for her real lover. What we understand is that he found the diary and went berserk. She ended up with a real beating that put her in hospital for close to a week, but that wasn't enough. He wanted revenge on you personally. His wife had tried to warn you, but he threatened her with being committed if she spoke to anyone. Your boss was in a perfect position to provide details of houses that had changed hands in recent years to the gang. Naturally, those details included the location of safes and even strong-rooms in those properties. His contacts in the gang put him onto Mr Costa, and the rest is history."
“Do you have enough evidence to convict him?”
“We do. We have evidence of two transfers of large sums of money to an account in the Cayman Islands. Mr Costa is known to use it both before and after the attack on you."
Louisa breathed a huge sigh of relief.
The Inspector smiled.
“There is something else that you should know.”
Louisa looked at him, slightly surprised.
"Sophia Peterson wasn't drunk. She was off all booze, on medical grounds and was only drinking tonic water. Now that her husband is in custody, she spilt the beans. We interviewed one of the waiters who worked that evening. He has told us that her husband gave him something that her husband called an 'aphrodisiac'. It wasn't. Her drinks were spiked with something that made her appear drunk.”
“Eh?”
"We don't know all the details yet but, it is clear that he knew about her use of ‘Louis’ as an alias before the office party, so he engineered everything that transpired. For some weird reason, he just wanted to see his wife and you in a compromising situation. It was after that event that he put into action his plan to take you out of the picture permanently.”
The Inspector let that sink in for a few seconds.
“He put out a contract on you a week before the party. The instructions were not to do anything before he was out of the country the following week. The almost perfect alibi, or so he thought."
Louisa sat back.
“All that because his wife used my name instead of her lover’s real name?”
“That’s it in a nutshell.”
“Who is the lover?”
He smiled.
“Your brother.”
Louisa sat down, shaking.
"My brother? He was killed in Kandahar, what…? Eight years ago?"
“That’s what we thought. However, we have evidence that he’s still alive and in London.”
No one said anything for several seconds.
Eventually, Louisa said,
“This is not good. Not good at all.”
“Why? Why do you say that?” asked the Inspector.
"He and I had a huge falling out before he went overseas. He defrauded our parents out of around fifty grand. He was always getting into trouble with the law. After he joined the army, he was ok. That all changed after he did a tour to Afghanistan. He came back a different person. His whole attitude was that the world owed him a life of luxury, but I didn't believe a word of it. Twin brothers often know this sort of thing. I thought that he would leave the army and strike out on his own, but then I caught him dipping his hands into our parent's savings as if it was his very own nest egg we had this big bust-up. He escaped having to face our father by going back to Kabul. Then a month later, we received the news that he’d died when a missile hit the Helicopter he was travelling in when going on a mission.”
Louisa paused to gather her thoughts.
"According to the Army, there was a massive explosion mostly from the explosives they were going to use to blow up a Taliban supply route. There was little or nothing left of those on board. Our parents… well, they took it hard. I didn't believe that he was dead. That thing that twins have again. Now you tell me that he’s the reason that I was attacked?”
“That’s the scenario given the information we have at the moment.”
Louisa muttered a load of very nasty swear words under her breath.
Finally, she said,
“Do you know where he might be?”
"So far, we know that he's in London. As yet, that is it. We have circulated the most recent photo of him to all Police Divisions in the Capital as well as Thames Valley, Surrey, Sussex, Kent, Bedfordshire and Essex Constabularies.”
"That will do nothing. If I know my brother, he's changed his appearance. I would bet that he looks like a Muslim. Shaven head, beard and traditional clothes."
Everyone looked at Louisa in astonishment so Louisa explained the background to her statement.
“Before he went to Afghanistan for his first tour, he read the Koran and studied Muslim culture. He even asked me to go to visit a Mosque with him. He said that if he was going to be a peacekeeper, then the very least he should do was to try to understand their society.”
An eerie silence fell over the room.
“You know that I’m going to have to pass this information on to the Security Services?”
"As you see fit. Your next question may well be about, could he be responsible for the incident with the Surface to Air missile? The answer is yes. Every time I thought about his death, I got an image of him watching the chopper going down in flames. He was always causing trouble, but somehow it was never his fault, and he never got caught, but he was always easily led. I don't see him going over to the other side a big problem for him. Just tell him what he wants to hear and, he'd be your best friend… Until the next time, that is."
Louisa hesitated before saying.
“My brother was injured by an IED on his first tour. Nothing more than a flash wound but I knew it when it happened. A lot of twins are like that. I never felt a thing when that helicopter was supposed to have exploded. That has always led me to believe that he was still alive but I never had any proof so I never said anything. What you said was a surprise but not altogether a shock if you get my meaning.”
“That is a very sanguine description of your flesh and blood,” said the Inspector.
Louisa smiled.
"I lost count of the number of times he tried to get me to take the fall for him when he was the instigator. One time he stole some things from a shop in town. He scarpered with the loot. The Police nabbed me as I walked down the street. I fitted the description perfectly. The problem was that when he did the dirty deed, I was in the process of having a filling at the dentist. They let me go once the dentist had checked my teeth. Even so, he sweet-talked his way out of getting prosecuted. We were both banned from that shop for life. That's why, when I fell out with him for the last time over taking money from our parents from then on, he was my brother in name only.”
“What about John Peterson? What’s going to happen to him?”
“He is in custody. We will charge him with conspiring with others to rob thirty-two properties over the past three years. We will probably add conspiracy to cause grievous bodily harm and GBH on his wife. The latter is all recorded on CCTV. Putting her in hospital will earn him five years in prison at the very least. There are other charges, that need not concern you. These will be presented to his legal team in the next few days. It would not surprise me that he gets at least fifteen years even with a guilty plea."
“But he knows that I’m still alive?”
“It appears that he does. He does not care one way or the other. He got what he felt was his revenge on you for his deranged mind telling him that you were sleeping with his wife. She's left him and gone into hiding. The last time we spoke to her, she felt sure that he was going to come after her. Her phone went dead and hasn't been on the network since then. Her last known location was in Wrexham, but that means nothing as I’m sure that you are only too aware.”
Louisa started to say something but stopped.
Then she said,
“That’s the reason no one in our little group could contact her. She’s the only one of the women that I ever escorted who has not either helped me directly or sent their best wishes for me. What you have said, Inspector fills in those blanks."
“I wonder…” muttered Louisa.
“If it is true that my brother has become a Muslim, she could be with him and, if so then to fit in, she could be wearing Muslim dress. Wearing a Hijab or a Niqab, she would appear as just another Muslim woman. If she acted properly in that role, then it would be the perfect cover. That way they, could travel as a couple, and no one would question it. But that is all supposition on my part so, I could be very wrong."
Deep down, Louisa hoped that she was indeed very wrong. She and her brother had always been like chalk and cheese. The bad set of genes went to her brother. That fact was clear to the whole family by the time they were five. Still, they lived in hope that time would make them both good people. They had even gone a year without speaking to each other. That was because of the grief that Louis had received due to the behaviour of his brother.
An awful lot more questions remained unanswered. Louisa was happy with one thing. That was the confirmation of Louis’s feelings that his brother was still alive. Finally, someone had the sense to see beyond the obvious and believe her claims that his brother was still alive.
The fact that her brother might seek revenge against her was worrying.
[to be continued]
Louisa continued her rehab with renewed vigour now that she’d got the news of her transition off her chest. After a gap of almost three weeks, another shopping trip was organised. This time, she managed to buy some clothes and even go for a Coffee on her own. It almost ended up the same way as the first. She was drinking her coffee when a man started to chat her up. It was only the intervention of Toyah that prevented a disaster.
Toyah had seen what was about to happen and, as the man began his second chat-up line, she came and sat next to Louisa. Then totally out of character for her, she embraced Louisa and kissed her. The man took the hint and left them alone.
“Sorry,” said Toyah.
“Thanks, and there is no need to be sorry. I think I need to start wearing a wedding ring.”
Toyah laughed.
“That might keep them away but darling! You are pretty hot. I saw the mental undressing that pretty well all the men in here did to you as you walked in.”
“I felt unclean.”
"Think of it as a compliment. Most of them would not say no to hopping into bed with you. Luckily, the majority of them are far too timid to even pass the time of day with you. The ones to watch out for are the chancers. That guy was one of those."
“But how should I deal with them?”
"Sitting here with a hot drink in your hand, it seems so easy. Tell them in no uncertain terms, that you are not interested. If they persist, then simply pour the lot over them. You know where I mean. Do the deed and walk out. If they raise a stink, then we’ll all be behind you. You aren’t into men. Your history will keep you safe.”
Toyah laughed.
“It does not always work though.”
“How so?” asked Louisa.
“I did that and ended up marrying him.”
"But… I thought that as you were Jewish, your marriage had been arranged. by your families?"
“I have not always been Jewish. Some of the more traditional families still won't accept me. It is the female line that shows how Jewish you are. I have a little bit of verifiably Jewish blood in me which, was good enough for my husband’s family.”
“Speaking of that… how are you going to explain the kiss?”
Toyah laughed.
“He’ll understand. He is a man after all and he knows the situation that you are in and that you are learning the ways of womanhood. Just don’t broadcast it to the others. I’ll have a word with Shireen.”
“You like her, don’t you?”
"I do and, she is a lovely kind woman. Most Muslims are like that. The hardliners in almost every religion and especially ours like to emphasise the differences rather than what we have in common."
“But the situation in Israel?”
"Is a different universe. My family hate what is going on there in the name of our faith. The local Imams at the Mosques near our Synagogue know this and, we get along fine but, it only goes so far."
Then she changed the subject.
“What’s next?”
“Buying some shoes. Thankfully, I don’t have large feet. Well a little on the large size for a woman but I think I will manage.”
“What if the assistant is a man and tries it on with you?”
Louisa smiled.
“Then my knee and his jaw will have a meeting.”
Toyah got up from the table and after another brief kiss, she whispered,
“That was for effect. Two men at the back have been glaring at us for several minutes.”
Louisa returned the kiss.
“Thanks,” she whispered.
Then they walked out of the café holding hands.
After the success of the shopping trip, the team decided that Louisa should have a ‘grand day out’. That day out was to go with most of them to Ladies Day at Royal Ascot. The prospect of going to such a prestigious place terrified Louisa, but the ‘team’ would not take no for an answer.
"But, darling, we will all be with you. Strength in numbers and all that."
Louisa found herself being taken to shop after shop in search of the perfect outfit for the day. As it was Royal Ascot, she also had to wear a hat. This was something very new to Louisa. Even as Louis, he'd only worn something on his head twice in his life. The first was a rented Mortar Board for his graduation. The second was when he'd mistakenly agreed to go bungee jumping. This time, the 'team' had a great time choosing her outfit. In the end, Louisa's plea for modesty won out, and she ended up in a floaty dress that didn't reveal too much of anything.
The trip to Ascot went fine despite Louisa being sure that she’d be exposed as a fake woman. It did give her more confidence to go out on her own at least as alone as having one watcher keeping an eye on her.
“Come with us,” said Janice as they all took part in a regular video meeting.
“We are going down to the Riveria. Hubby is shooting a film in Provence.”
The thought of having to wear a swimsuit horrified Louisa.
“I can’t. Besides, I don’t have a passport.”
“Poppycock. You can get one in a few days if you want one.”
Louisa shook her head.
“I’m going nowhere yet. I want to feel comfortable in myself and being just another woman and not someone to be stared at and photographed. I am most certainly not ready for the Louisa ‘Swimsuit expose Issue’. Some of the team knew what Louisa meant. Once it had been explained, there was a general acceptance that Louisa was going nowhere this year.
Then she took a deep breath.
“I think I need to be on my own for a while. Not in London but somewhere quiet.”
“Like a Holiday Let?” asked Mary-Lou.
“Just like that but nowhere near a beach. A place where I can relax and try to be my new self.”
There was a good deal of laughter, but after a lot of discussion, it was agreed, that Louisa needed to start living on her own, even if it was just for a month.
Before she knew it a cottage, had been rented for her. It was just outside the town of Ludlow in Shropshire. Helen Sanderson volunteered to take Louisa there and let her borrow her car. Louisa and Louis before him had never owned a car, having almost always lived in central London. Louis had a driving license and had used one of the company cars when the need arose but that was it.
Louisa had objected at first, but when Helen had explained to her that she was not going to be far away and that the insurance for the car was already taken care of, she agreed to the plan.
“This looks very nice,” said Helen as she inspected the property that was located on the edge of a small hamlet near Ludlow.
“Seems so,” replied a slightly disinterested Louisa.
"What's wrong, darling?"
"I was just wondering if 'this is it ' for me?"
Helen took a few seconds to realise what she’d meant by that statement.
"Nonsense, darling. We will be here for you."
"You say that now but haven't you realised that some of the team are not so enthusiastic about helping in recent weeks? It is as if I am not interesting enough now.”
“Rubbish. I think that people just have the holiday bug. For many of us, this is our once chance to get out of London for some R&R just like what you are doing.”
“I’m not so sure. Take Beverly, for instance. Her Facebook page shows that she'd not doing a lot at the moment, but when it comes to helping me, she's suddenly as busy as hell."
"Don't let that worry you. Let's wait until September, eh? Then we shall see who is here for the long haul."
“I suppose so.”
Louisa’s reply wasn’t that enthusiastic. Helen recognised the trauma that Louisa was going through. Her only friends were the women who she’d escorted.
“You have enough food for a few days,” said Helen changing the subject.
“Tuesday is Market Day in town. Why don’t you go and see what takes your fancy?”
“Maybe.”
Helen looked at her watch.
"I have to be going now. You have my number. I'm in Hereford all weekend with my mother, so if you need me just give me a call."
Louisa managed to force a smile onto her face.
“Stop fussing… Please.”
The month seemed to go by in a flash for Louisa. For the first time since her ‘event’, she was alone. She busied herself by going into town most days. She went as far as Malvern on a couple of occasions. No one shouted out, 'look at that fake woman' so her confidence grew and grew.
She experimented with new looks thanks to the charity shops in the town. Some were total failures, but slowly, she developed her very own style. Louis had always had a good eye for what looked good on the women who he'd escorted. After a few failures, she realised she'd not lost the knack. This gave her a lot more confidence when going out and dealing with the people she met in daily life.
Louisa still had problems when in close company with men, but it was getting better as time went by.
Helen came to collect Louisa at the end of the month, she encountered a very different Louisa from the one she left behind.
“What happened?” asked Helen.
Louisa smiled.
“I think I sort of grew up. I came of age as a woman. Well… not quite but more like a teenager. There is so much to learn but I’m getting there.”
“Where next?”
For a moment, Louisa thought that Helen had meant where they were going that day.
“I think I need to get a place of my own.”
“But you have a place.”
“That was Louis’s place.”
Helen got it in a flash.
She grinned,
“Everyone will be happy to hear this.”
“And be glad to see the back of me?”
Helen laughed.
"Quite the opposite. I know for a fact that you are part of the group. For life."
“Really?”
"Wait and see, ok?"
“Helen! Please!”
Helen smiled.
"I know nothing officially but, there has what the spooks say, some chatter amongst those in foreign climes about doing something when they return from abroad.”
Before Louisa could answer, Helen said,
"It is time for us to go. Otherwise, the agent will think that you are staying for another month."
The news that Louisa wanted to find a place of her own, spread through the group like wildfire. Things started to move in the background. Louisa’s old home was soon, emptied, cleaned and put on the market. The women in his life had all sorts of contacts, and after a few phone calls, it was all in hand.
Louisa had sort of expected this. She was fully expecting that one by one, those women would find another plaything or interest, to occupy them. What she didn't realise was that the men behind those women were also keeping themselves informed. They'd all understood from the beginning that by employing Louis to escort their wives and partners, they'd exposed him to a certain level of danger and that they felt partially responsible for what happened to Louis. As a result, at least two of them issued ultimatums to their wives about not dropping Louisa as a friend now that she was on the way to recovery. Several didn’t need that hint but knowing that the men in their lives were very much behind them in what they were doing made them feel a lot better.
Instead of dropping their contacts with Louisa, they all got together and started to plan how they could help their friend find not only a place to live, but also to get some purpose in her life. At the start of the meeting, Toyah reminded them all that this was for the long term. They all owed Louis and now Louisa a lot. Least of all was how they'd all become friends.
It was Helen who had said,
“The biggest stumbling block will be Louisa herself. Remember that she is used to being in charge and doing things for herself. She was the one who got us into the best Restaurants and the best tickets for Shows, the Opera and the like. We have to be very, very subtle in how we get Louisa to play ball.”
None of the others disagreed with that statement. It was going to be a big challenge.
"Now that Louis's place is up for sale, we need to find out where Louisa wants to live," said Shireen.
“And what she wants to do with her life. She isn’t rich like us,” said Toyah.
That hit home hard to a few of them. Louis had been little more than the 'hired help' at the start. Because of his pleasant nature, the ability to keep his mouth shut, and his steadfast refusal to get involved with any of them he'd gained a lot of their confidence, but she wasn't, as Toyah said in a slightly different set of words, 'really one of them'.
Helen and a few others had married into money, so they knew what Toyah meant.
“She’s good at selling houses,” said Helen when they were toying with what sort of career Louisa might follow.
“But far too well known in London,” countered Shireen.
“I get the feeling that she wants to remain as invisible as possible.”
"If she was interested in a man, then I know someone who would jump at the chance of marrying her," said Mary-Sue.
“Even with her… plumbing?” said Dawn.
"Yes. He's, got four kids. The last thing he needs is more brats. Those are his own words, not mine."
There was a bit of laughter.
“What does Louisa say about what she wants to do or where she wants to live?” said Janice.
There was silence in the room.
"Don't you think that she should at least get a say in all this? We can't all be mothers of the bride organising the wedding from hell now, can we eh?" she added.
After that, they resolved to try to wheedle out of Louisa what it is that she wanted to do with her life.
Louisa was struggling with the same problem herself. She'd only ever worked as an Estate Agent. She'd gotten into it after graduating with a degree in Architecture but hadn’t wanted to spend even more years qualifying for RIBA [1] membership. Her one-bed flat near Putney Bridge would easily sell and then she'd have some capital behind her but where to go and what to do were questions that she had no answers for. The one thing that she was certain of was that she did not want to keep on relying on the hospitality of her friends for much longer.
Helen came to visit one day with an idea.
“Have you ever ridden a horse?”
“Where exactly would I do that? I’ve never lived in the country.”
“Where are you now then?”
“Ok. I’m in the country but I’ve never been on anything but a Donkey at our School Fete.”
“Good. Then there is no time like the present to learn is there?”
Louisa knew the look that Helen had on her face. She was not going to accept no for an answer.
With a sigh and a shrug of the shoulders, Louisa agreed.
It turned out that Helen had not ridden since she was a teenage girl. She’d given it all up when becoming a doctor became more important to her than playing with ponies. Her family still had contacts at a Stables about 10 miles from where Louisa was staying.
Louisa’s first encounter with a horse was not brilliant. The normally pretty docile animal named George tried to throw her after less than five minutes on her back. Helen saw why and laughed.
“Louisa, relax. You were hanging on for dear life. Let the horse take the strain.”
Her words proved to be perfectly correct. Once she’d relaxed and had stopped pulling the poor beast one way and then the other, peace was resumed and the remainder of the ride progressed smoothly.
Louisa started to enjoy herself before the pain in her posterior took over.
“I’ll never be able to walk again,” she complained when they were back at the Yard and had dismounted.
Helen laughed.
“I’ll be sore a bit as well. You’ll get used to it. All it needs is time and practice.”
“And a load of money? This riding business is expensive.”
Helen smiled and took Louisa’s hand.
"Look over there. What do you see?" she asked pointing at a small building near the stable block.
“It looks like a small cottage.”
“It is. It can be yours if you want it. They have an opening for a Business Manager. The cottage has two bedrooms and comes with the job. What do you say?”
Louisa was stunned.
"You can get all the riding practice you want then. All the girls are in on this and everyone apart from Shireen is a keen rider. You can bet that they will all be booking rides here pretty frequently.”
Louisa sat down on a bench and tried to get to grips with what Helen was saying.
“I guess I should have seen this coming?”
“Seen what coming?”
“People wanting to see the back of me?”
“Didn’t you hear a word that I just said? The girls will all want to come here for rides. Don’t you want a chance to get on your feet again?”
“But, I know nothing about running a place like this. Nothing at all.”
"Nonsense. You have a good business head on you so why not give it a chance? It is not as if you will be expected to muck out the stables. You will be the boss of the day-to-day operations of this and the other three stables that are in the group.”
“I don’t know.”
"Why don't you think about it? There is no need to make a decision today.”
“Gee thanks!”
Helen laughed.
“You do know that we all think the world of you, and we all mean that. All of us want you to get on your feet again. You really don’t know how much you were appreciated by us all for being our escort and nothing more. We were able to hold our heads up rather than sulking about hoping that no one would see us with a man that wasn’t our husband.”
“That’s ancient history now. I know that I need to do something with my life but I don’t know what to do. I’m hardly qualified for anything other than selling houses.”
“I’m just asking you to think things over ok?”
Louisa knew that she was right.
“Sorry Helen, you are right. I’ll think things over.”
Thinking things over and especially about what she should do next was not something she'd done before. As she thought back, it wasn't something that Louis had ever done before. He'd just seemed to fall into things, land on his feet and run from there. There wasn't a 'grand plan' for his life. Even starting to become an escort in the way it did, happened by accident.
Now, she was faced with a choice and she just didn't have a clue about what to do. The women in her life tried their hardest to help but she was resolute about one thing and that was that it had to be her decision and hers alone. If she was going to fall flat on her face then it would be her fault and no one else's.
Gradually, it dawned upon Louisa that Helen’s offer had given her a chance to build a life. If the job didn’t work out, she would have time to find something else. The cottage that came with the job would provide her with a base to build that life. There would be money in her bank from the sale of her London Flat that would be more than enough to put down as a deposit on a house or apartment in the future.
Then she understood that there were still a few legal hurdles to get over before that could happen. One of the biggest was ensuring that her credit history was carried over would be one of them along with her bank account and all manner of other details that needed to get changed before she would be ready to take her place in society. What that place was, was another matter entirely. So far, she’d been pretty anonymous but that was all going to change should she take this job or any job for that matter.
After two more trips to the Stables with Helen and even more aches and pains from riding, she was ready to tell her world about her decision.
“Some of you will know already that Helen has been a busy little bee,” said Louisa to everyone. For once, all the women were present in person and looking wonderful.
“She took me riding. I ached for days afterwards but she has found a way for me to start my life as a woman and not have to rely on the wonderful generosity of you all not that it isn’t appreciated, it is. It is time for me to either sink or swim, out in the big bad world as a woman. I know that thanks to all your efforts, I will be far better equipped to climb onto the back of this horse on my own than if you had not been there for me in my time of need."
Her feeble attempt at a joke did manage to get a few titters.
“I’m only going to be a few miles from here so if any of you fancy a spin on the back of a horse, Helen will be able to direct you to my humble abode. It isn’t much by the standards that you all are used to but I have to start somewhere, and this position allows me to dip my toe in the waters of being a woman in society.”
Louisa took a deep breath.
"I owe every one of you a great debt. The same goes for your partners, husbands and lovers. Without their trust in Louis, he would not have met such a diverse bunch of women that you all are. Thanks to that trust and your belief in me, I am about as ready as I’ll ever be to move on with my life.”
Louisa sat down and wiped a tear from her eyes. It soon became apparent that she’d forgotten to use waterproof mascara that morning. Dawn took her aside to repair the damage before returning her to the room where the rest of the ‘team Louisa’ were assembled.
They all wished Louisa the best in her new venture. Louisa felt that for a few, this was them saying goodbye. She knew that Helen would be visiting regularly but, how many of the others would venture out of London to see her and take one of the horses for a ride? She knew that only time would tell on that.
Louisa was in one of the stables seeing to one of the horses. The owner was not a not very horsey woman and just wanted to turn up, get on the back of the beast, go for a ride and then let others look after the animal while she exited stage left at a great rate of knots. All the stable staff knew that she had a ‘toy-boy’ lover stashed in a cottage a few miles away but going for a ride set up her alibi perfectly. It was this horse that Louisa was brushing down after her owner had left.
The animal’s coat was wet through. The rain had not stopped all day. Drying her off and seeing that she was fed and watered was a part of the job that Louisa had not expected to do when Helen offered her the job but the two stable hands were away at College that day so it was down to her to man the fort.
She was just finishing grooming the horse when she heard a vehicle come over the metal bridge that crossed a stream adjacent to the stables. It was already 4 pm and, there were no more rides scheduled for the day. Helen had been for her weekly ride the previous day, so she had no idea who would be calling at this time of day.
Louisa was surprised to see Shireen get out of a Fiat 500. She’d only ever seen her in her husband’s Mercedes.
"Hello, Shireen, come into the office. This rain is horrible."
"Thanks, Louisa."
“Take a seat. I’ll put the kettle on.”
"You are a star, Louisa."
"Hardly, but thanks all the same."
Louisa filled the kettle and plugged it in.
"This is a pleasant surprise, Shireen. You haven't been here before, have you?"
“No. I called Dawn and, she gave me directions.”
Shireen didn't want to look directly at Louisa.
“What’s wrong?”
"It is my Husband, Riaz."
"Oh yes, I remember him. His business was making clothes, was it not?"
"Yes, he was."
"Was? What happened, Shireen?"
“He went back to Pakistan on business and… and he was dead found in bed. They are saying that it was a heart attack.”
Louisa swore.
“Sorry about that. The swearing.”
“That’s all right Louisa. I understand.”
“What happened?”
“This was in his home town. That is in the tribal lands in the north of the country. This all happened last week. I only found out when his brother arrived here this morning.”
She looked down at her feet.
“His brother is a nasty man. He went off on a rant when he saw me outside without even a Hijab on. He is assuming that I am going to marry him as is the custom in his family.”
Shireen visibly shivered.
“The thing is that Riaz and I are or were both gay. We married… our marriage was in name only. We did it to save a little face for our families. We were both supposed to have arranged marriages but we could not do that so we married each other. Then we could live our lives as we felt we should but very, very discreetly. I can't marry the man. I don't speak Urdu beyond a few words and he wants me to go and live in Pakistan while he runs the business from here."
Louisa was stunned by this news. Then she realised that a few things that Shireen had said to Louis and then to Louisa started to make sense.
“You were a couple just to hide that from your families?”
Shireen nodded.
“What did your Husband’s Brother say?”
"It's is not what he said but what he wants. In their world, the family has to look after people like me. That means marrying him and having his children. He will take over the business or that's what he thinks is going to happen."
“But you don’t want it to happen?”
“Not if I can help it. He’s already trying to get me to sign over the company bank accounts. That’s when I fled. My brother-in-law had the keys to the Merc so I took my car and after speaking with Dawn, here I am."
Louisa got up and went over to Shireen and hugged her.
“You are welcome to stay here.”
“Thanks. That’s what Dawn said that you would say.”
Louise looked up at the clock on the wall.
“I think it is time to shut up shop. Why don’t you get any things you have in the car and head upstairs? I’ll check on the horses and join you in a few minutes.”
“Thanks.”
“No more thanks. You have not tasted my cooking yet!”
[to be continued]
[1] RIBA : Royal Institute of British Architects.
That evening Shireen poured her heart out to Louisa. It was clear from very early on that Shireen was as they say, 'up shit creek without a paddle '. It was only when Louisa asked about Riaz's health, that a glimmer of a plan started to make sense.
“What about Riaz’s health? Didn’t you know about his heart problems?”
Shireen nodded.
"Of course, I knew all about it. Riaz had a pacemaker fitted at St Marys’ Paddington, three years ago. I didn’t say at the time but he was in the hospital when I first met Louis. You escorted me to a dinner in his place."
“Oh yes. You said that he’d been called back to Pakistan due to a family illness if my memory serves me well?”
"That's what I did say but it was a lie. We didn’t want anyone to know about it. The truth was that he was in the hospital with heart problems. I ran the business for almost three months. We were too scared to tell his family back home about it.”
“And your brother in law does not know anything about running the business?”
“He’s a water tanker driver in very rural Pakistan so why would he? He is almost illiterate but where Riaz comes from, he has just a little more education than most women… But he's a man so his word is the law, and women are little more than chattels and baby producers in their male orientated world. I’m far too highly educated for the women of his village. When I went there with Riaz, they treated me as if I had an infectious disease. In the two weeks I was there, I only spoke to Riaz. Men shouted at me for apparently taking in interest in things that were not ‘womens’ business and I should stay in the home cooking and making babies’.”
“Ouch. I can see why you don’t want him anywhere near you, but tradition demands that he takes over?”
Shireen nodded, so Louisa continued.
“But you have control of the company. All of Riaz’s interests in the company transfer to you in the event of his death?”
“That’s not how Ahmad sees it. As I said, he is very traditional, like most men from the tribal areas near the Afghan border. He made it clear to me that a woman’s place is in the home and giving birth to as many children as they can. They cannot own property or assets and are in effect owned by their husbands.”
Shireen sighed.
“This is the life that Riaz and I escaped from. He came from the tribal areas and my roots were in Karachi.”
“Then we need to get you a lawyer. Some of the girls will have contacts. You have rights here.”
“Not in his eyes, I don’t.”
Louisa decided to change tack a bit.
“Did he have a death certificate with him?”
Shireen nodded.
“That’s what he said that this bit of paper was. It was all written in their local language, Urdu.”
“He’s going to have to prove that not only is it genuine but that his brother’s wishes were for you to marry him and go to Pakistan to live. That needs an official and notarised translation of all documentation otherwise, probate will not be granted. That all takes time and money. Does he know that?”
“I tried to explain the law to him. In his eyes, the only law that applies is Sharia law.”
Those words stunned Louisa.
“That’s why we drew up wills when we got married.”
“Then you should be safe under British Law.”
Shireen shook her head.
“His law is the one laid down in the Holy Books and by the Imam’s at the Mosque in his village.”
“That won’t hold water with the courts here.”
Shireen looked worried.
“I am worried in case they try to force me to go to Pakistan...”
“Do you have your passport with you right now?”
Shireen nodded.
“Then it needs to be put somewhere safe then you can’t leave the country without it. Somewhere like a safe deposit box for example?”
“We have one of those.”
Louisa thought for a moment before shaking her head.
"No, this needs to be yours and yours alone. Then you control access to it, and not him. Failing that, give it to Toyah. She will keep it safe and he won’t dare tangle with her husband. Did you know that he was once a Colonel in the Israeli Army?"
“No… She was always very circumspect on what he does for a living.”
“In reality, he’s a consultant for an anti-landmine charity but for public consumption, he is an Investment Advisor.”
Louisa could see that nothing more was going to be settled that night.
“I think we should try to get some sleep. I hope you don’t mind sharing my bed. I have not gotten around to getting a bed for the spare room yet.”
“I’m sure we will be fine.”
Louisa woke up in the early hours. She found that Shireen had wrapped herself around her body. The Full moon enabled her to see how peaceful she was and also how beautiful she was. It was as if Shireen had been hiding her true self all this time.
Louisa cursed herself under her breath. That’s exactly what she had been doing. Louisa and Louis before her had no idea that she was a lesbian. Sure, there had been a few hints but nothing more definite.
To have someone else sharing her bed for the first time was a new occurrence for Louisa. She felt comfortable in a way that Louis had never had when in bed with another woman. She could not help but wonder if this was her destiny all along. What troubled her more than anything, was the vision she had of Shireen sharing a bed and a life with her. That was a very new experience for her either as Louisa or Louis.
The very next morning and with nothing else on the calendar, Louis introduced Shireen to the nine residents of the stables. She'd never really been close to a horse before but soon relaxed when feeding them cubes of sugar with Louisa watching on. It briefly helped Shireen take her mind off of the problems that faced her in London.
Louisa watched as Shireen started to relax, even though she was in the company of a half-tonne animal. The animal that Shireen was petting was a gelding named Shamus. He was the sweetest and most amiable horse at the stables. Shireen seemed to be in her very own little world when working with Shamus.
Later that morning, one of the stable hands introduced Shireen to the soothing art of grooming. Shireen made Shamus’s coat glean.
While this was going on, Louisa was busy calling the others in their group looking for a lawyer for Shireen. She tried not to give too much away other than the sad fact that her husband Riaz had died in Pakistan. Offers of help were immediately forthcoming, and soon, the matter of finding a legal representative for Shireen had been taken out of her hands.
It was Toyah of all people who came up with the name of a lawyer who was not only able but very willing to take the case. The person in question, Tim Jeffries, had dealt with the mysteries of both Muslim and Jewish law for many years. He was from neither faith and was generally regarded, as a very reliable independent third party.
Within two days of his first approach to Shireen’s brother-in-law, all pressure to sign over the business accounts to him disappeared. That gave Shireen the breathing space she needed to get the business into a shape so that it could be sold. She appointed a company to sell all the parts of the business. She knew that they’d take a nice fat fee but she didn’t care. To her, just thinking about the company made her think of her late husband.
Just as that the sale process had been started, a startling revelation came from Pakistan. This was in the shape of a new will that was according to the brother-in-law, written by Shireen's late husband literally hours before his death.
This naturally made Shireen very depressed. Louisa was there for her, but it fell to other members of the group to also pitch in and help. The claim on her by her brother-in-law, was always brought up at the meetings between the various legal people, that were representing her and her brother-in-law.
Shireen was terrified at the stalemate. She couldn't sleep at night even though by now, she had her very own room at Louisa's home.
A veritable impasse was reached until it became clear that the signature on the new will was forged. The very next day, Riaz’s brother went back to Pakistan leaving a hefty legal bill unpaid.
As the days went by, there was one solution to Shireen’s family problem that became clear to Louisa. While it had gone back to Pakistan, is wasn’t over and could return at any moment. She raised it at a meeting with the rest of the group apart from Toyah, who was being taught how to groom a horse by Shireen.
"Who to? Shireen is a lesbian, as you know," asked Dawn.
Louisa took a deep breath and said,
“Louis.”
It took a moment for the group to understand what Louisa was saying.
“But you are Louisa now?” said Helen.
“Yes. So? I change my name back to Louis, put on a suit, get married, change it back and then continue living with Shireen.”
“Do you love her?” asked Dawn.
"Difficult to say at the moment. I care for her, and…"
Louisa looked around the group nervously before adding,
"We did spend the night together in my bed when she first arrived because it was the only bed available and… I kind of liked it. I thought that she needed not to be alone..."
There was silence from the group.
"That would solve the marriage problems that Shireen is having all right," remarked Janice.
“But what about the business? This new will could complicate matters. I know from bitter experience. It took me over a year and a heck of a lot of money before I could sort probate on No 1’s business. The partners wanted his share for next to nothing.”
“The business will be sold to the highest bidder,” said Louisa.
“Shireen has already engaged a company that specialises in that sort of thing.”
“Did Riaz have life insurance or at the very least critical employee insurance?” asked Helen.
No one knew the answer to that.
"We'll have to ask Tim Jeffries. Shireen turned over all their documents to him," said Louisa.
"He won't tell us. Client confidentiality and all that" remarked Dawn.
“He does not have to tell us the details or amount just if it existed.”
“Shireen could challenge this new will in the courts. Who knows if it is real or just made up by the brother-in-law?” argued Helen.
“Time and money and lots of both. I know from bitter experience with my own father,” said Janice.
Everyone knew what she meant.
“I’ll have a talk with Shireen and send out an update,” said Louisa.
No one disagreed with that.
That evening, Shireen cooked up a very delicious lamb tagine for her and Louisa. When they’d eaten, she said,
“Ok, Louisa darling, what did the council of war decide?”
"Nothing much. It is all very complicated."
“That’s why I’m paying Tim a good wedge to sort out.”
Louisa nodded.
“That won’t stop the claim on you as a person by Riaz’s brother.”
The mention of that made Shireen’s face, turn rather pale.
“There is one solution that will solve a lot of problems.”
“What is that genius?”
“Marry Louis.”
Those two words stunned Shireen.
“But… Louis is no more?”
"My DNA says otherwise. Biologically, I am a man. Marry me after I change my name back to Louis and, that saves face with your family and also gets, you know who, off your back," said Louisa.
“Marrying Louis should also keep Riaz’s family off your back. You are married to a man and that would stop them from losing face in their community.”
“My family know about me.”
“Eh? Since when? You told me that no one knew?”
"I did and, I thought that they didn't know. But my father… He says very little. When I went to see them and to tell them about Riaz, all he said to me was, 'you are free to be who you want to be now'."
“What about your mother?”
"When it was explained, to her, she refused to speak to anyone about it for over a week. Dad says that she went to the Mosque every day, which was very unusual for her. After a week, she pronounced that it was not true and that I was just, being silly."
“But it isn’t so, is it?”
"My father is a good man. He told me that Riaz had told him about us a year or so back. He knows that there are a good number of members of the LGBT community who are also Muslim. Most of them live undercover and in fear for their lives. He told us that it is no way for us to live and he gave us his blessing. I received a text at the weekend from him saying that my mother has accepted who I am but does not want to meet me. That is about as good as I could expect.”
“At least she isn’t calling for you to be stoned to death.”
Shireen shuddered at the thought.
“That is the reason why II will never go back to Pakistan. It is just too risky. All it needs is one word, one phone call, one post on social media and it would be the end for me.”
Louisa let things settle for a few minutes.
“What about marrying Louis?”
Shireen shook her head.
"No. But I will marry Louisa. These past few weeks, I have grown to understand why I and everyone in the group love you so much. You never made any demands on us. You still don't even after everything that has happened to you this past year and a bit.”
“I don’t know what you mean?”
“That’s the whole point. You don’t even see it when it is staring you in the face.”
Louisa sat there with a blank expression on her face.
“You would do anything for any of us and never expect anything in return. Remember when Helen spilt that drink over your suit?”
“Yes. So?”
“Think back to how much you resisted letting her buy you a new one. It took weeks.”
“I didn’t know that you knew about that.”
“Helen was the one who told me about you being an escort in the first place.”
“Oh! I didn’t know.”
“That does not matter. What matters is that it is you being you. Giving yourself to us and never expecting anything more than our company in return. I’d be willing to bet that not all of the women in your life were like us? Some were complete bitches, or worse yet, you put up with them and their sometimes, menstrual crazies. You just took it all on the chin. You never passed judgement on them or, their behaviour. You never told their partners what confidences they told you. We trusted you to be the perfect partner for the evening and, you never let us down."
"Then after…, you know what, you resisted our attempts to help, but, thanks to the likes of Helen and Janice, we took over and helped you out. You were reluctant to accept our help but, we steamrollered you into submission. Then I came along with all my problems, and you came to my rescue. Then you offered yourself to me unconditionally, and still, you never asked for anything in return, including for me to love you. Am I right?"
“I suppose so.”
“Why did you never have a serious girlfriend? Never get engaged? Never get married?”
“Because I was… I am a boring old fart?”
"That as well. My guess is that most women wanted more… excitement, more fun, more risks from you. They wanted you to make demands from them. We love to tease, say no, and then after a suitable interval, we would say yes. That would let you think that you won the battle when it was them who let you win that skirmish."
“Do you understand what I mean by demanding nothing from us?”
Louisa looked down at the table. She felt ashamed, inadequate and very much lost for words. Shireen had torn apart the very essence of Louis and Louisa.
“Now you are offering to marry me. No conditions. Nothing.”
“I don’t know what to say.”
“You don’t have to say anything.”
Shireen came around the table and surprised Louisa by removing her Hijab and sitting on Louisa's knee.
"Yes, I will marry you, and I'll be proud to be your wife."
“But your religion?”
“I am done wearing a Hijab unless I go into a Mosque which I rarely do. You aren’t religious, are you?”
“No, not really.”
“Then we are good.”
Louisa started to cry.
“There is no need to cry. This is a day to be happy, isn’t it?”
"It is, and I am."
“Then we are good.”
Shireen's expose of Louis and now Louisa's inner workings his Louisa hard. She'd never thought of herself like that. To be told that part of what he, and now she had thought of as his charm was also a major reason why he'd never really had much of a relationship with a woman. Then…, his escort work was no strings, no nothing and especially no commitment and nothing in return other than mostly good company for an evening.
That was his and nor her heart ripped right open and exposed for everyone to see. That hurt Louisa to the core.
That night she cried in bed. Sleep was pitiful until Shireen came in and comforted her.
“Thank you for last night,” said Louisa when she came down to breakfast.
"It is me who should apologise to you. I said some things…, well, an awful lot of things I shouldn't have done. I was like the proverbial bull in a china shop. I just couldn't stop myself. I’m sorry.”
Louisa shook her head as she poured herself some tea.
“No… You were right in what you said. It needed to be said. I was a total schmuck! I could not see what I was doing to myself. I was fooling myself that I was popular with women.”
“You were with us.”
"That was different. What, I meant to say is that, because of going out with all of you, I thought that I was successful with women in general. That was completely wrong. I owe you a big thank you for putting me straight."
Shireen looked a bit unhappy.
“Does that mean…? Does that mean you don’t want to help me?”
“I do want to help and… I am beginning to like having you around here.”
“Is that all? Like having me around?”
Louisa sat down at the kitchen table with her tea.
"Shireen… After my problem, I never dreamed that I'd have a relationship with a woman. Then you come along with your problem, and the old me took over to help you without thinking about myself, only you.”
Louisa looked down at her cup as if she was ashamed of herself.
"There is no need to be sad, Louisa. It isn't wrong to think of others, but sometimes you have to think about yourself and do what is right for you rather than everyone."
Louisa didn’t move other than to cup her tea with both hands.
"If you would like to marry me, then I would like to marry you. I don't know if we will fall in love but only time will be the judge, on that. I might even learn to ride a Horse.”
Louisa laughed.
“That’s something we might do together. I’ve had three lessons and regretted every minute of it for about a week afterwards.”
“Greetings Inspector Thomas. This is a bit off your normal track so I guess that it is not a social call,” said Louisa.
“It is official I’m afraid. It concerns your brother.”
“I was sort of expecting you. Come on inside and I’ll put the kettle on.”
The two of them went inside the office where Louisa ran the stables.
“Right inspector, how can I help you,” said Louisa after she’d put the kettle on to boil.
“It is not how you can help me but I need to give you an update on your brother.”
“Do you know where he is?”
The Inspector nodded his head.
“We do. He and Mrs Peterson travelled by Eurostar to Brussels the day before we put out the alert on him. We lost them there but she used her ATM card at a machine in Nimes two days later.”
“Sounds like they are heading south?” said Louisa.
“That’s what we thought so we, with the aid of Interpol, alerted all the airports and ferries in Spain but there was nothing. Then we got a report of them on a Ferry from Bari to Albania.”
Louisa laughed.
“What’s so funny?”
“My brother was not only a bully but he was a master of misdirection. It seems that he has led you lot a merry dance.”
Louisa made the tea before sitting down opposite the Inspector.
“So that’s it then? They are gone?”
He shook his head.
“Not quite. Two days after they took the ferry, Mrs Peterson walked into the British Embassy in Tirana, the capital of Albania. She was alone. Your dear brother had taken all her money and disappeared into the sunset. She had about twenty euros to her name. Two of her own bank accounts totalling some eighty-six thousand pounds were emptied. She trusted him and… Well, she paid the price.”
“Did she say where he was going? Or rather talked about going?”
“I think he did a lot of misdirection with her. We do know that he obtained a visa for Saudi Arabia. She was with him when they got the visas. The Saudi’s have confirmed that they issued a tourist visa to her but a special Haj visa to him. That is how you get into Mecca and Medina. She could not go because she’s not a Muslim. She said that they had planned to fly to Jeddah. She’d wait there for him to complete his pilgrimage. But it never came to pass.”
“Where is she now?”
“The Embassy has arranged for her to be repatriated but she’ll have to pay the costs. We won’t be pressing charges. I or one of my officers will meet her plane when she gets back. She has a lot of questions to answer. At the moment, we are not sure if she has actually broken any laws but we want to be sure.”
Louisa thought for a moment. Then she nodded her head.
“My brother conned her so yes, she’s probably suffered enough.”
The Inspector smiled.
“I hoped that you’d say that. We will keep the file on your brother open but… the chances are that he’s not coming back here any time soon. We will make it clear that she is persona non grata with all her old friends in London. She comes from West Yorkshire and we may well suggest that she goes back there. The last thing any of us want is for her to find you and to tell your brother. We do not want him coming back here.”
Louisa shook her head.
“I would not be so sure of him staying away forever. A bad penny and all that! That money will run out and then?”
The Inspector did not disagree. Louisa hoped that she was wrong but only time would tell on that one.
Shireen returned later from a trip to the supermarket just as the Inspector was leaving.
“Who was that? I didn’t recognise the car?”
“That was Inspector Thomas. He came to give me an update on my brother.”
“By the look on your face, it wasn’t good news.”
“He’s gone for the time being but…”
“Ok. I get you.”
Shireen smiled.
“I think that it is time for me to escort you to dinner.”
Louisa had been about to say something but was stopped in her tracks.
“But…?”
“Don’t say it… You simply don’t have anything to wear!”
The couple burst into laughter.
Louisa now had an escort of her own.
[the end]
[Postscript]
Louisa’s will prevailed and it was Louis who married Shireen. She sent a copy of the marriage certificate to Pakistan but never received a reply.
Almost six months after their marriage Louisa was showing a prospective client around the stables when she had a feeling that the ‘reaper’ was walking all over her. That was then she knew that her brother was dead.
That fact was confirmed more than a week later when the news came through about a UK citizen dying in a suicide bomb attempt on a US Army post near Kabul Airport.