Heart (8 page)

D
EX
SHOWED
up the next day, and the day after that, and the day after that. Before he knew it, a week had gone by and he had a job. A real job that, barring his brief stint as a solo hooker, paid more money than he’d ever had in his life. Thirty quid a day meant food and clothes, and with Rick’s help, a sparsely furnished room at a hostel down the road.

The hostel was noisy and scary, but exhausted by long shifts in the restaurant kitchen and guarded by a lock on the door, Dex found he could sleep away most of his time there, curled up on the bare mattress in the corner. He used the shower at the restaurant, washed his clothes at the restaurant, and ate most of his meals there too. The hostel was nothing more than a bolt-hole away from the streets.

One morning, he started his shift early. Rick was hosting a big lunchtime event, and he’d called everyone in to help get ready.

“All hands on deck, kid,” he’d said.

Dex left the hostel at dawn and sloped along the deserted streets, his only company the bin men throwing wheelie bins at the slow-moving rubbish truck. He walked with his head down and his hands in his pockets. A fight in the hostel corridors had woken him in the night, and he was tired and distracted.

A loud shout made him jump. He stumbled, tripped over his own feet, and whirled around. Behind him, he saw the bin men and a small group of teenagers who appeared to be setting up a market stall. He let out the breath caught in his chest. It was okay. It wasn’t
them
. He was still safe.

Yeah, but for how long?

The voice in Dex’s head taunted him the rest of the way to the restaurant. Staying in one place was stupid. It was safer to keep moving, keep running, and hope his old life never caught up with him. Trouble was, he couldn’t find the will to leave the safe haven he’d found in Stoke Newington, no matter how great the risk. And it was a big risk. Braden wouldn’t come after him to silence him. Travellers didn’t talk to the police—or anyone else—about their own business. No. Braden would hunt him down to take him back. To reclaim what was his.

“You’re mine now, boy. You belong to me.”

Dex’s escape would be seen as an insult… an embarrassment, and if Braden caught up with him, there was no doubt he wouldn’t be kind enough to kill him.

So why not keep moving? Hide himself away? Perhaps he didn’t care enough to bother, or maybe, just maybe, he was tired of running.

Dex continued on his way.

At the restaurant, he was the first back-of-house employee to arrive. Bernie, Rick’s wife, let him in and gave him a cup of tea while he set to work turning the dishwasher on and cleaning the last few dishes left by lingering wait staff the night before.

A delivery arrived at the back door as he was finishing up. Rick was nowhere to be seen, so Dex fetched Bernie to deal with the grumpy driver. After, he helped her carry the boxes in. He didn’t pay much attention to the contents—his place was by the dishwasher. Bernie’s horrified screech caught him off guard.

For the second time that day, his stomach jumped into his throat. “What’s wrong?”

Bernie slapped her hand over her mouth and pointed to the box she’d dropped on the counter belonging to the starter chef.

Dex followed her gaze to the box, but it contained nothing but six braced pairs of rabbits. “You didn’t want the rabbits?”

Bernie removed her hand and cringed. “Not bloody whole ones. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. Go and get the order pad.”

Dex fetched the pad and held it out, but Bernie was talking on the phone. She put her hand over the mouthpiece. “Check the order sheet, duck. See what it says. This idiot is sure we ordered them whole.”

Dex stared mutely at the order pad, counted to ten, and held it out again. “I can’t see them.”

Irritated, Bernie snatched the pad and glared at it. When she found what she was looking for, she cursed and hung up the phone. “Bollocks,” she said again. “Rick’s going to kill me. I ordered the wrong ones.”

Dex peeked into the box again. The rabbits were wild, strong boned, and supple. And fresh too. He could tell they’d only been shot the night before. “What’s wrong with them?”

“They usually come in jointed. Rick’s going to go spare when he sees them. I’ll have to go out and get some more.”

“Can’t you cut them up?”

Bernie shook her head, already flapping and looking for her keys. “He’s at the fish market. He won’t have time to cook the dish if he has to joint them too, and the others aren’t in till ten.”

“I can cut them.”

Bernie paused and gave him a strange look. “Really? You know how to do that?”

Dex nodded and pulled the box closer. He knew his way round a dead rabbit. Hares and squirrels too. “Which board do I use?”

“Red for raw meat. Hang on. I’ll get you a knife. Are you sure you’ve done this before?”

“A few times. How do you want them?”

Bernie shrugged. “Jointed, and I suppose that means skinned too.”

“Unless you want to eat the fur.”

Bernie pulled a face. “Christ, no. I can’t imagine why anyone would want to eat a rabbit, anyway.” She pulled the first rabbit from the box and laid it on the board with a shudder. “How about we try with one, and if it doesn’t work out, we can hide the evidence and I’ll face the music.”

Dex reached for the rabbit and set to work, skinning it and removing the head before he cut off the legs. Left with the saddle, he separated the ribs and trimmed off the excess sinew. The familiar exercise took a few minutes, and when he was done, he looked up to find Bernie watching him with shrewd eyes.

“You really have done that before, eh?”

“My da taught me.”

Bernie peered over his shoulder at the jointed rabbit. “Looks to me like he taught you well. Think you can finish the box before Rick gets back from the fish yard?”

“How long will he be?”

“Twenty minutes?”

Dex counted the eleven remaining rabbits and shrugged. “I can try.”

And try he did. By the time Rick appeared in the kitchen half an hour later, the only evidence of Rabbitgate was the crumbs of the bacon sandwich Bernie had brought him in gratitude.

The rest of the day passed in a steamy haze of dirty dishes, pots, and pans. No one mentioned the rabbits, and as was his habit, Dex kept his head down and worked hard. There were six chefs on Rick’s team who worked on varying shift patterns. They all seemed nice enough, but he knew better than to look them in the eye.

After the busy dinner service, he found himself the last one left in the kitchen. He swept and mopped the floors, and then turned out the lights before heading upstairs to get changed.

“Not so fast.”

Dex jumped a mile, one foot frozen on the stairs. He turned to face Rick with a deep sense of foreboding. Rick had been in and out of the kitchen all day, working the bar and generally doing anything that needed doing, but he’d disappeared into the office a while ago. Perhaps he’d read the order pad.

Rick beckoned him down from the stairs. “Come with me.”

Dex followed him with trepidation, knowing better than to argue. If Rick was angry, Dex would accept his punishment. It was easier that way. He followed Rick to the food prep area of the kitchen, and waited, as instructed, as Rick vanished into the huge walk-in fridge.

Rick returned with a large white tray of various items of meat and fish. “Get some boards and some knives. Red for the meat, yellow for poultry, and blue for the fish.”

Dex coughed into his elbow and obeyed, mystified. What was Rick going to do? Make him eat raw chicken or something? Teach him a lesson?

He set out the boards and filled a tub with warm water for the knives. Rick stepped back and folded his arms across his chest. “Get the pheasants and cut them into quarters for me.”

Dex found the brace of birds and made short work of cutting them up. Rick inspected his work, but Dex didn’t dare try to read his expression.

“Now the lamb,” Rick said. “Get the ribs off and portion the racks.”

Dex reached for the sheep carcass and frowned. He’d never seen one before, but it looked pretty similar to a goat. He picked out a slightly bigger knife and set to work. It didn’t take long, and when he was done, Rick seemed amused.

“Now the fish. Fillet them.”

“Take the bones out?”

“That’s right.”

Dex moved to the blue board, changed his knife, and removed the flesh from the three fish Rick set out in front of him. He stood back when he was finished and chewed on his lip. It had been a while since he’d tackled a fish. There was no real water near the site in Hatfield, only the stream that grew the wild watercress.

Rick laughed. The chuckle came from deep in his belly, and for the umpteenth time that day, Dex jumped out of his skin.

“Easy now.” Rick dropped a heavy hand on his shoulder. “Was just testing Bernie’s loose tongue. You’ve got some skills there, lad. You ever worked in a kitchen before?”

Dex coughed into his elbow again. “No.”

“Didn’t think so. You butcher like the best poacher I’ve ever seen. Don’t tell me I’m right. I don’t want to know.”

Dex followed his advice and took the used boards and equipment to the sink. The dishwasher was drained and off for the day, but he knew Rick didn’t like dirty things left overnight. He didn’t realize Rick had followed him until he sensed his presence, leaning on the wall by the plate racks.

“How would you feel about starting your shifts a little earlier, say, around ten, rather than twelve?”

Dex shrugged. It made no difference to him. It wasn’t like he had anything else to do, and the less time he spent in the hostel, the better.

Rick took his silence as agreement. “Good lad. Be here at ten tomorrow. Got somewhere to take you.”

Dex duly turned up on time the following morning to discover Rick had decided to take him to a walk-in center attached to Homerton Hospital.

“You need to see a quack about that cough,” he said in a tone that left no room for argument. “The missus thinks you’ve got TB. Can’t have that if you’re going to be touching the food proper.”

“TB? Like a badger?” Dex eyed the waiting room warily. He’d never seen a real doctor before. Only mad Aunt Madge with her herbs back in Ireland, and that had been more than a decade ago.

“If you say so.” Rick pointed to a chair in the corner. “Sit down. I’ll get you signed in.”

Dex didn’t have the balls to point out he couldn’t sign him in without knowing his full name, but it turned out not to matter. Rick had brought him to an open clinic for illegal immigrants, and no one asked him any questions at all.

And he didn’t have TB or any other infectious diseases they’d tested his blood for. Just bronchitis, apparently, and he was given a bottle of big white pills to take every day for the next two weeks.

He found Rick on the phone when he emerged from the clinic. Dex waited beside him until he hung up the phone with a heavy sigh.

“Looks like I found your hidden talents just in time. Iggy’s walked out on us. He’s gone back to bloody Bristol to make up with that slag he was shagging last year.”

Dex nodded like he had a clue what Rick was talking about. He didn’t. He knew who Iggy was, of course, but he had no idea who he’d been fucking. “Is he coming back?”

“Nope. Doesn’t look like it. What do you say, kid? Want to help me out and learn to cook?”

Eleven

T
HE
BIG
white pills gave Dex a headache and left him lethargic and dopey. He preferred the cough, but with Bernie on his case, he toed the line and dutifully took the pills, and he spent the next few weeks learning the ropes of food preparation and supporting the chefs in the kitchen during service.

He peeled potatoes and cut up meat for the mainline chefs, prepared garnishes and salads for the starter chefs, and chopped more onions than he’d ever seen in his life. By and large, he enjoyed the work, and it made a change from washing pots.

Saturday nights were the busiest. And the most stressful. He kept his head down and his opinions to himself, but it didn’t take long to figure out the kitchen was a pressure cooker when service didn’t go according to plan.

One evening, he knew as soon as the first order came in it was going to be one of
those
nights. The chaos began when a steak came back. Rick, who was running Iggy’s abandoned dessert section, was furious. Steaks were expensive, and seeing one end up in the bin put him in a bad mood for the rest of service.

“Dex! Get me another two tubs of ice cream. There’s no prep on this fucking station.”

Dex fetched the ice cream tubs and put them in the small freezer on the dessert section. Rick looked at the tubs and shook his head. “Goddamn bought-in crap. We used to make our own, but who’s got the time for that when no twat wants to hold down a job?”

The question seemed rhetorical. Dex kept his gaze on the task at hand, rearranging the freezer shelves to accommodate the ice cream, but Rick got impatient. He reached over Dex’s head, jammed the tubs in at an awkward angle, and kicked the door shut with a grunt.