Shake Off Read Online Free Page B

Shake Off
Book: Shake Off Read Online Free
Author: Mischa Hiller
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looked me up and down and asked me if I’d pose for her. I’d fidgeted and declined, worried not so much by being naked in front of her but by ending up looking like the others in the paintings, although in retrospect it would have been an excellent excuse for my visits. “Perhaps next time,” she’d smiled, openly appraising me. I’d been relieved to get out of her studio.
    Lemi handed me a hard suitcase, the sort you could take onto an aircraft. It had little wheels and a retractable handle. I’d sent it to him two weeks ago by minicab.
    “Go on, have a look,” he said. He was like a kid showing someone a puzzle. I opened the case and felt along the inside, looking for clues. I pressed the inside but could detect no telltale give of a false bottom. The lining was flush. Lemi laughed. “Good, eh? You’ll never open it, my friend.” He then bent down next to me and unscrewed one of the feet. By pushing in the resulting hole with his finger the bottom lining came away slightly at one point inside the case, a big enough gap that he could get his finger inside. He ran it between the lining and the edge and the whole thing came away in one rigid piece. Lemi chuckled as it revealed a gap two centimeters deep. “When you put whatever you want in there, make sure you fasten the lining back on around here,” he said, indicating the lip of the removed lining. “It will stick to the case.” He demonstrated. “But this is not for drugs, is it?” he asked as he closed it. It was obvious that the hidden compartment was not big enough for drugs but I let the Turk think what he wanted. I thought maybe I should use someone else: an Algerian I knew in Paris, for instance, although he was too politically active for my liking. The Turk had no political connections, which meant that he was unlikely to be on any intelligence service radar. I said nothing as I handed over £500, plus £20 for one of his teenage sons to take the case to a locker at Victoria Station and post the key to the PO box address I gave him. I inhaled the cooking smells before I stepped out onto the street.
    My next job was to change the $75,000 into shekels. This meant I had to pick up the money from Tufnell Park and take it to a money changer in Notting Hill. It was run like any other bureau de change, except it was owned by an Armenian who laundered money. You gave him large amounts of cash and he split it up into small transactions, redistributing it through the banks, all for a hefty percentage, of course. I had to leave the money with him in a plastic bag and go and wait in a café for a couple of hours while he sorted it out. When I picked the bag up it was a lot heavier than when I had left it, a testament to the poor value of the shekel compared to the dollar. I disliked hanging around there; I suspected that, like Lemi, he was involved in the drugs business and would possibly be of interest to the police.

Six
    E sma avoided me for several days after the incident on my bed, and had stopped coming into my room to flick her duster. This had made bedtime even more of an ordeal for me, and I reverted to rocking my head again. But one night I heard my door open and, fearing it was my foster aunt or uncle coming to tell me off, I turned my face to the mattress, pressed my pillow hard over my head and pretended to be asleep. But I could smell Esma, a soapy medicinal smell. Her hair was on my back before her hands and lips, and she muttered something in Kurdish that included my name. I turned over and she wiped my wet cheeks, sliding under the cover with me. We explored each other in the dark until we were breathing fast and shallow. Then we lay face to face, our noses touching, and used our hands on each other until hers were sticky and mine were wet. We lay together for a bit, catching our breath. In a fit of whispered giggling we searched for her underwear in the tangle of sheets—then she was gone. The next morning she’d stripped my bed and washed

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