Free Diary of an Unsmug Married by Polly James Page B

wouldn’t be tempted by an American Psycho lookalike half my age. Maybe he’d think the same thing about Johnny, the oil-rich Putin lookalike, too – but Max doesn’t know about him , yet, does he? Oh.
    That’s a bit of an uncomfortable thought but, even so, I don’t know whether to find Max’s faith in me touching, or arrogant. Maybe he thinks it’s irrelevant whether I’d be tempted or not, as no onewould ever be tempted by me?
    WEDNESDAY, 16 JUNE
    After we finish work, I find out why Greg wanted the list. He insists we wait around in the office until it’s almost dark, and then he says, ‘Here are the keys to the Gregmobile – you go and get in. Won’t be a minute.’
    Five minutes later, he reappears and dumps fifteen manila folders in my lap, together with a map and a torch. I get really worried. Is Greg’s Patrick Bateman exterior an unsubtle indicator that he is a menacing rapist who carries a chainsaw around? Should Max have been more concerned for my safety, and when will he notice that I’m missing? Will he notice that I am missing?
    ‘What’s number one on the map?’ says Greg, swerving wildly to avoid a cyclist.
    ‘What?’ I ask.
    ‘Map,’ says Greg. ‘On your lap. What’s number one?’
    I open the map, but can’t see what I’m doing, so then I start dropping files all over the place.
    ‘Torch,’ says Greg, and then, ‘F*ck’s sake!’
    I direct the torch at the map and find fifteen small, coloured dots affixed to various parts of East Lichford. These are cross-referenced to a list of numbers stuck at the side of the map. I cheer up – surely Greg wouldn’t have gone to all this trouble to rape someone (almost) old enough to be his mother?
    ‘Number one – Eleanor Road,’ I say. ‘Why?’
    ‘Find the file with number one on it,’ says Greg.
    I do as he says. The file is labelled ‘Edmund Beales’. Oh, Jesus Christ.
    ‘Gregory,’ I say, ‘I thought we were going for a drink. What the hell are we doing?’
    ‘Our DIY version of a CRB fn6 check,’ says Greg. ‘I am sick of waiting for a mad constituent to chop my head off with a samurai sword, so you and I are going to make a pre-emptive strike.’
    ‘Huh?’ is my considered response.
    ‘We are going to check out what little we actually know about the crazy f*ckers we have to deal with every day – without security – and see if any of it stacks up. We could get killed waiting nine months for the Criminal Records Bureau, and Special Branch only ever seem to notice the animal-rights loony tunes. First stop, the home of Edmund Beales.’
    THURSDAY, 17 JUNE
    I have a very bad hangover from the bottle of gin that Greg and I drank when we got back last night, after our narrow escape from the dog in Mr Beales’ garden, so I’m taking today off as a holiday.
    At lunchtime, I get an email from Greg who says:
    The carpenter is here, working away on the security improvements. He tells me that he hasn’t bothered to fit bulletproof glass to the new door he has just installed. The consequence for me, if anyone needs reminding, will simply be this.
    I open the attachment to find a video clip of JFK’s assassination.
    FRIDAY, 18 JUNE
    God, I’m so glad that Connie’s coming home from uni today for the summer holidays. I’ve had about as much testosterone-related craziness this week as I can take. Mainly from my lunatic son.
    I have to ask Greg to take over for the second half of this afternoon’s surgery, as Max and I have been called into school to see Josh’s tutor, Mr Bowen. When we arrive, we discover that Josh is furious that we’ve been contacted, and he doesn’t even calm down during the lengthy period we spend waiting outside the tutor’s office. He spends the entire time ranting, just like a mad constituent.
    ‘That bloody man’s got it in for me. He just picks on me – all the time . It doesn’t matter what anyone else is doing, it’s always, “Joshua Bennett. My office – now !” He’s just jealous