Chapter 7

Meeting up with Lyndsey on Monday for their now regular shared lunchtimes was a pleasure, Mason thought as he rushed from the depot to the café they had selected for today. It was a raw day, drier but much colder than Sunday, with possible snow forecast for Wednesday night and Thursday morning, with a bitter wind coming in from Siberia. He was a couple of minutes late and she was already sitting at a table, but she greeted him with smile and got up to exchange the kiss and hug that had now become second nature between them.

“Sorry, Mason, but I saw this table by the radiator and grabbed it before anyone else did, and I am sitting with my back to it, while you get the full benefit of a cold blast every time that door opens.”

“That’s all right, Lynds, it was even colder this morning at 6, when I started my round. I told you I don’t feel the cold. Anyway, if the snow comes in and it is half as bad as they say, even if it manages to thaw by Saturday, it is likely that all the games in my league will be called off.” Mason said, after they ordered their lunch.

“So, what do you generally do when there’s no football?”

“Often, I just go find another game to watch, like the reserves, A or B team, as I pretty well know all the players,” grinned Mason, “but this time around they’ll all be postponed, so we could go visit your father, if he’s free, and start working on your side of the April Fool.”

“Do you think you are ready to face him so soon?”

“Well, we’ve been meeting up daily now for nine days. You have picked up most of my likes, dislikes and curious habits, plus pretty well all of my secrets, and I know much more about you than I did before.”

“You’re right, we’re almost buddies. We seem to feel comfortable with each other, to the point where to strangers we look like a real genuine couple. Yes, if we are determined enough, I’m sure we could pull this off. Now, do we concentrate on how relatively poor your ambitions are—”

“—Compared to Gareth, you mean?”

“Well, he did go to the same type of school and university as my father did and is likely to have a well-paid job for life and will be groomed to take over the bank in time, he can provide opportunities for his children and he will inherit a fortune when his father goes.”

“You mean, like you will?”

“Not quite, Daddy’s shares in the company are obviously worth a lot, but I couldn’t simply sell them, they are the basis for whatever family control of the business we still have, so I will only have them on trust until I can hand them onto the next generation.” Lyndsey was defiant in the statement of her so-called fortune and had her eyes fixed on Mason’s, who returned her challenging glare with eyes crinkled in amusement, “I do have some money of my own, in a trust fund, which I have never actually touched, or even have any idea what’s in there.” After a pause in which Mason merely nodded, she continued, “All right, Daddy paid all my tuition fees, he bought me my car and he pays my share of the flat rent, but other than that...” and she couldn’t maintain eye contact with the laughing Mason, without laughing herself, “ ... I pay my way.”

“Hey, I’m not criticising, if I had a rich father, then I wouldn’t stand in his way over what he wants to pay for either. We both know how much he cares about you, that much is clear when he provides enough back-up to make sure you’re safe. That concern about your protection is probably why he doesn’t like Gareth.”

“Why, do you think?”

“Because Gareth’s bank may not be the ancient, trustworthy and robust mercantile bank that it pretends to be.”

“And how would you know that?”

“Probably the same way your father did, by hacking into their files.”

“You did that?” she gasped.

“Not personally, no. Like your father, I found someone to do that for me. Your father paid someone, or already employs someone to do it, while I just called in a favour from a mate from my military days who owed me one.”

“So what did he find out?”

“She, actually, my pal, hacked into the bank’s files for the latest financial reports, and the figures don’t add up.”

“In what way?”

“Their listed customers are like other small mercantile banks, partly out of the old school network, mostly family, family friends or friends from school or college. Most of the income is small beer, yet they maintain offices in the City of London and pay out inflated salaries to the directors and family members, plus buying their properties, cars, etc.”

“Which means?”

“They either have a secret goldmine hidden away, or they have a second set of books showing who the real customers are, a set of accounts that’s not accessible online.”

“And these are bad guys?”

“Yeah, either money laundering for organised crime, prostitution, protection money, online gambling, rogue heads of states who want to deposit their bribes abroad, terrorist organisations ... there’s a long potential list.”

“So Gareth’s boasting about his wealth is all hot air?”

“Oh, he has money, for now, but is it sustainable? He’s highly paid, but he spends high, his flat was bought by the company, supposedly on a mortgage, but in the two years since he moved in he has not paid back a penny on the mortgage, but the deeds were mailed to him, according to the files. So it looks like a gift, a company perk, but not declared. So he is open to tax evasion on benefits paid, I make that a cool £112,500 in unpaid taxes from 2014/15, plus interest since. His cars were bought for him, but are still owned by the company, so I am not sure if he’ll have much in way of assets after his lawyer has kept him out of gaol. I’m sure your father has all this info on Gareth.”

“I am sure you’re right. Perhaps that is why I couldn’t trust him that far. He didn’t seem real.”

“So why do you want me to meet your father, if you are now feeling lukewarm about marrying Gareth?”

“Why, don’t you want to meet my father?”

“Sure I do, he sounds like an interesting guy to meet. But how do you want me to play this if I no longer need to emphasise my inferiority to Gareth?”

“Just be yourself, Mason. He’ll smell a rat otherwise.”

“Mmm, OK.” Mason agreed, “but I am still unsure of why you still want me to pitch a joke engagement on your father.

“I suppose I want him to accept that whoever I want to marry in the future will be my choice and not his.”

“OK, I guess I owe you that much at least, for all that you have managed to do for me.”