This pattern seems to be working -> echotest.realise4.com/directory/item/brendan-cullen-appliance-repairs

There is catch however.
Since you are not using IDs in your slugs, you might not get 404 errors but if a same item has the same slug the first item that K2 finds will show up. Since there is no way for K2 to differentiate these two items, there is no way to avoid this bahviour?