Dead Beat Read Free

at the same time shocking their families to the core. So Jett liked Fionas, did he? And Fionas meant designer outfits, an item singularly lacking in my wardrobe.
    I flicked moodily through the hangers and ended up with a baggy long cotton shirt splashed with shades of olive, khaki, cream and terracotta that I’d bought on holiday in the Canaries the year before. I pulled on a pair of tight terracotta leggings. That was when I knew the motorway sandwiches had to go. Luckily, the shirt covered the worst of the bulges, so I cinched it in at the waist with a broad brown belt. I finished the outfit off with a pair of high-heeled brown sandals. When you’re only 5’3”, you need all the help you can get. I chose a pair of outrageous earrings and a couple of gold bangles, and eyed myself in the mirror. It wasn’t wonderful, but it was better than Richard deserved. Right on cue, he said, “You look great. You’ll knock them dead, Brannigan.”
    I hoped not. I hate mixing business with pleasure.
     
     
     

Chapter   2
     
     
       We didn’t have to scramble for a parking place near the Apollo Theater, since we live less than five minutes’ walk away. I couldn’t believe my luck when I discovered this development halfway through my first year as a law student at Manchester University. It’s surrounded on three sides by council housing estates and on the fourth by Ardwick Common. It’s five minutes by bike to the university, the central reference library, Chinatown, and the office. It’s ten minutes by bike to the heart of the city center. And by car, it’s only moments away from the motorway network. When I discovered it, they were still building the little close of forty houses, and the prices were ridiculously low, probably because of the surrounding area’s less than salubrious reputation. I worked out that if I pitched my father into standing guarantor for a hundred percent mortgage and moved another student into the spare room as a lodger, I’d be paying almost the same as I was for my shitty little room in a student residence. So I went for it and moved in that Easter. I’ve never regretted it. It’s a great place to live as long as you remember to switch on the burglar alarm.
    We arrived at the Apollo just as the support band were finishing their first number. We’d have caught the opener if they hadn’t left the guest list in the hands of an illiterate. One of the major drawbacks to having a relationship with a rock writer is that you can’t put support bands to their traditional use of providing a background beat while you have a few drinks before the act you came to hear gets on stage. Rock writers actually listen to the support band, just so they can indulge in their professional one-upmanship with lines like, “Oh yes, I remember Dire Straits when they were playing support at the Newcastle City Hall,” invariably to
    The bar at the Apollo reminds me of a vision of hell. It’s decorated in a mosaic of bright red glitter, it’s hot and it reeks of cigarette smoke and stale alcohol. I elbowed my way through the crowd and waved a fiver in the air till one of the nonchalant bar staff eventually deigned to notice me. At the Apollo, they specialize in a minuscule selection of drinks, all served at blood heat in plastic tumblers. It doesn’t matter much what you order, it all seems to taste much the same. Only the colors vary. I asked for a lager, which arrived flat and looking like a urine sample. I sipped tentatively and decided that seeing is believing. As I pushed my way back towards the door, I saw someone who made me stop so suddenly that the man behind me cannoned into me, spilling half my drink down the trousers of the man next to me.
    In the chaos of my apologies and my pathetic attempts to wipe up the spilled beer with a tissue from my handbag, I took my eyes off the source of my surprise. When I managed to make my embarrassed escape, I looked over to the corner where he’d been standing.