Wild Fiction

A red double-decker Routemaster bus came roaring out of Piccadilly and into the Hyde Park Corner roundabout. Instinctively the author pulled hard right to avoid it. He felt a jolt as the rear end of his car caught on the front bumper of the bus. The back of the car slid sideways and he overcorrected to the right and then to the left as the rear end snaked across the middle of the road. There was a loud smash of shattering glass and tearing metal from behind him as the white van ploughed into the side of the bus. He regained control of the car and skidded to a stop, inches short of a blue Nissan Micra. He twisted in his seat and looked at the wreck. Steam was pouring from the front of the van and water ran out onto the road from the ruptured radiator. The men had jumped out of the van and were running in opposite directions. The big one ran towards Hyde Park and the other down Piccadilly. The lights ahead of him turned green but nobody moved. All heads were out of the windows as the drivers rubbernecked what was going on behind them. The author pushed his hand down on the horn and held it there until the traffic moved again. He turned into Belgravia and drove through the twisting streets until he had reached the back of Harrods.

Chapter 32

‘Nobody makes French toast the way The Boys That Bake do. Are you aware that they’ve just opened their seventeenth restaurant and it’s here in Epsom? They have this secret recipe they developed and nobody knows what it is. Everyday the owners themselves make the dough in their kitchen in Colchester and then it gets shipped to all the restaurants in the country so nobody except they know what goes into it,’ Rebecca said. She was right, bread from The Boys That Bake was the best in England.
They took a table in the middle of the café and covered it with rolls, croissants, jam and cups of coffee. Conrad had picked up a copy of the Daily Mail and had it open near the back. “Chelsea are playing this weekend,” he said.
“Against?” asked James.
“Please can we talk about something else?” Rebecca rolled her eyes towards the ceiling.
Conrad smiled back at her. “What do you want to talk about?”
“Anything,” Rebecca replied scanning the room for another topic of conversation. “That man over there. Let’s talk about him. Why would somebody wear army camouflage fatigues to come to a café? Is it a fashion statement?”