The Take

by Martina Cole

  In some ways she wished he was banged up again. When he had been away from her and away from everyone around him, it had been the only time she had felt he was wholly hers.

  He had loved her with letters and visits, though even then he had still had his birds visiting him as well. As the years had gone on, she had been his only constant and that had made her happy for a while.

  She had seen them off, all the girls who had loved bragging that their bloke was banged up, that he was a dangerous criminal, that he had a reputation. Of course, eventually nature will out and the girls had dropped away from him. Who could blame them? A banged-up bloke can’t keep you interested without taking you out, giving you sex and buying you things, which was all his birds had wanted deep down. They had exchanged his letters for a real live man who they could actually have physical contact with. He had loved her then, because he knew she was the only female company he was going to get.

  Then he had come home, and he had gone on his usual busman’s holiday trumping anything with a pulse and a pair of tits. And she had swallowed it all, until now. Now she had the added humiliation of Bethany Hutchins. Bethany, who had tits like lumps of warm cement and a reputation that made her sex life a who’s who of criminals from the local manor. Jackie closed her eyes tight in distress. She hated him when he did this to her, she knew he didn’t care a toss about her feelings, or the fact she had to see these people on a daily basis. Up the shops, in the pub, at friends’ flats and houses - this was a small community and he would fuck his way through it if she wasn’t careful, like he had before he went away. Even her mates weren’t off limits to him, as she had found out over the years.

  Yet for all his faults, real and imagined, if he knew she was pregnant and dropping pills he would kill her. She had learned many years ago that the best form of defence with Freddie was attack. So she put her coat on and, leaving the girls alone in bed, she walked from her house.

  Bethany Hutchins was about to get the shock of her little life.

  Maggie was upset but she had finally accepted her boyfriend’s haphazard loving. She knew he had a lot on his mind and she allowed for that. Jimmy would always love her for the way she understood his feelings without him having to explain himself over and over again.

  Jimmy adored her. He needed her, but his work was taking his life over because Freddie was so unstable. Jimmy for his part had a feeling that Freddie was going to piss all over their fireworks if they weren’t careful. He was off the rails, looking for fault with Clancy. In short he was after his pavement. He wanted all that Clancy had, and knowing his cousin like he did, he was going to get it whatever.

  Freddie was so dangerous, yet he was also in his own way astute. He knew how to tap into people’s fears, knew instinctively what scared them. Jimmy was his cousin’s number two. He loved being trusted so much, and he knew Freddie would do whatever was needed to keep them both in the manner they had become so accustomed to.

  Life was catching up with him even at his young age and he had the sense to see that. He also knew that whatever shit Freddie brought to their door he had to fight it with him side by side.

  That was the law of their world. But it didn’t mean he had to like it.

  Jeannie Hutchins was in her late forties but looked older, not that anyone would ever have said that to her face, of course. She had the deep-grooved skin of a woman who had smoked and drunk herself old before her time. Her hair was cut short and blow-dried into a halo around her head. Her heavy green eye shadow and liner made her look demented, her lipstick was Burnt Orange by Max Factor, a colour she had worn since the sixties. Her thin body was wiry looking and she could have the proverbial row when necessary.

  She wondered if she would have to defend herself this night because as usual her husband was nowhere to be seen. That could be a good thing, though she would have to wait and see the outcome before she decided that.

  When she had opened her front door and seen Jackie standing there, her heart had sunk down to her boots, even though she had been expecting her.

  Because in her day she had been Jackie. She also knew Jackie well and liked her. They were two of a kind, both had men who were villains, who were quite happy to walk all over them and who expected them to wait until they were released from prison. No matter what.

  Bethany had made a big mistake, and she had inadvertently upset her mother. Because Jeannie had been on the receiving end of women and girls like her youngest daughter all her married life, her Bethany was going to get the hiding of her life. It was long overdue, and she was quite happy to dish it out herself if Jackie was not up to the job. Jeannie felt that her daughter was on the slippery slope of becoming a villain’s bird and she knew it was hard enough being a villain’s wife, let alone being the number two in the equation.

  Now as she looked at herself twenty years earlier, her resolve was strengthened. ‘I’ve been expecting you, Jackie love.’

  This was not what Jackie had been expecting and she found herself smiling into the eyes of a kindred spirit.

  Inside the flat the smell was overpowering, Jeannie was a housework dodger and the place looked like a tip. In the small lounge a large colour TV took pride of place and even though it was sticky from children’s hand marks and covered in dogs’ hair it was still bright enough to light the whole room up. Bethany was sitting in a large Dralon chair and the look on her face was priceless to the two women.

  Jackie knew immediately that Jeannie was giving her daughter a lesson in life and secretly thanked whatever God had decided to smile on her this night.

  ‘Hello, Jackie.’

  Jackie grinned nastily. ‘Hello, Bethany, long time no see.’

  The atmosphere in the room was electric and Bethany was staring at her mother now as if she had never seen her before in her life. She was aware she had been served up to Jackie and the knowledge was terrifying her. That her own mother would take an outsider’s part was unheard of. They were a family and family stayed together no matter what happened.

  Wait until she told her dad about all this!

  As Jeannie put the kettle on she heard the first sound of fist on skin. It was hard not to interfere but she knew one day her daughter would thank her for this night. At least she hoped so anyway.

  Her granny used to say if you lay down with dogs you got up with fleas. Well, her daughter’s fleas had well and truly come to bite her.

  She could hear the screaming and crying as the kettle boiled.

  ‘You took your fucking time!’

  Freddie was not as annoyed as Jimmy had thought he would be, in fact he looked euphoric. He also looked sober, though he was just about to snort a line of amphetamine off the counter.

  He automatically cut one for his little cousin.

  Paul and Liselle were grinning and as Jimmy was handed a drink they filled him in on the night’s excitement.

  As Jimmy listened, the smile on his face got more and more frozen because the Clancy family might not be as amenable as they all seemed to think about Siddy’s injuries. He kept this to himself, though, because he knew that there would be no reasoning with Freddie while he was like this.

  In truth there was no reasoning with him at any time.

  But Jimmy needed to think, to digest the information and to gather up a plan of attack in case they might need one.

  As he listened to Paul explaining to Freddie what he was going to do the next day, however, his heart got lighter by the second.

  ‘Me and Liselle visit him every month and bring him up to spec, see, Freddie. We knew that Siddy was having him over like, but there wasn’t much we could do without proof.’

  Paul poured them all another drink as he continued. ‘But it’s the houses we need the help with and I reckon you’ll have to take them over as well. Liselle won’t let me near the brasses, as you can imagine.’

  The three men laughed, much to the chagrin of Liselle who was too sensible to let them know that her husband was about two inches from having his bal
ls removed without any kind of anaesthetic.

  Freddie knew nothing about the houses, but this did not show on his face. He was already wondering how much he could earn from it all. He had never seen himself as a ponce, though he had been called it more than once during the course of his life. He knew all about it though, he had picked up a lot on his sojourn inside.

  ‘Tell Ozzy to put me cousin down as a visitor. He ain’t ever had a capture and that will take the onus off you and the wife. Ozzy can deal directly with him then, can’t he?’

  This suited Paul right down to the ground. He hated being the go-between and he was always frightened it would all come on top, which would leave Liselle and his kids without any back up. The problem with skulduggery was that there was always someone waiting in the wings for all your glory, and he was in truth just a bread-and-butter Face. He liked to know there was someone higher up the food chain to take the flak. That person was now Freddie Jackson and Paul was thrilled about that fact. He had been in on Freddie’s first foray into leadership and he would subsequently never forget it.

  He liked Freddie as well, in his own way, and he knew Freddie was mad enough to keep most of the pretenders off his turf.

  For Paul it was a win-win situation.

  Later, after Siddy’s brothers had been to the hospital they returned to the pub to see what they could salvage from the situation with Freddie Jackson. Their jobs were OK for the moment but they knew they had the hard wait until Ozzy decided what their fates should be.

  In fairness to Freddie, Siddy had by all accounts asked for what he had received and they were not about to rock anyone’s boat, least of all their own. At the end of the day, no one knew Siddy like they did and so they had an understanding of the trouble that could help them salvage, if nothing else, their reputations.

  They were nervous but friendly and Freddie could not fault them.

  Dawn had broken before any of them thought about going home.

  Jeannie was lying across Bethany, trying to stop her husband Alex from killing her. She had already stood by and seen her daughter take one hammering, and she was not about to let her take another.

  ‘She is only young, he swept her off her feet, you know what Jackson’s like . . . He’d shag a fence if it was all that was available.’

  She was trying now to push her husband towards the bedroom door.

  ‘Jackson is now Ozzy’s main dealer and this mad bitch has caused murders with his wife,’ he shouted. ‘He took out Siddy. Fucking Siddy, my mate, my old mucker is shitting it over that cunt and now I hear my daughter is his main squeeze.’

  Alex was losing his anger now as she knew he would, so she carried on pushing him out of the room as gently as she could. Providing he couldn’t see Bethany his rage would subside, although hearing it being replaced by fear in her husband’s voice meant she was getting scared too.

  ‘I stood by and let Bethany get a slap from his fat wife, it is sorted. Now all she needs is you after her and all. She has learned a valuable lesson, so let it go for fuck’s sake.’

  ‘Paul was willing to shoot fucking Siddy rather than have any hag off Freddie Jackson, do you understand what that means, woman? I work for Siddy! So where does that leave me?’

  Jeannie didn’t know but she was too shrewd to say that.

  ‘It leaves you where you were before, running your scams until you are told different. Now when you see Freddie you act nice, you congratulate him on his promotion and you keep your trap shut and you hope against hope that he ain’t a one for holding grudges.’

  Her husband was nodding now, but she could almost taste his fear and it was communicating itself to everyone in the house. Even the music that was normally a constant source of irritation seemed to have stopped.

  Bethany was quiet as she listened, wishing with all her heart that she had not drunk so much and that she had not been so welcome in her father’s local pub where she had been taken on a daily basis since a babe in arms. Where she had been petted over after cutting her first tooth and where her holy communion had been held in the back bar. She was too comfortable there, even she had come to realise that.

  But that was all academic now, that trouble was over, and new trouble had come to take its place.

  Such was her life since she had been a small child.

  Maggie and Jackie were holding hands.

  Jackie had miscarried her baby at four o’clock that morning, and now she was back in the fold with her family and her husband.

  No one had mentioned anything to Freddie about her drinking or her drug taking and he had been magnanimous with his wife as he had not been around when the accident had happened. She had slipped down the stairs and that had caused it all.

  It had been a five-month foetus and he had been shocked that she had been so far gone. It had also been a male child, and this had affected Freddie more than he would have thought possible.

  He had heard through the grapevine about his wife’s visit to Bethany and because he put the blame down to himself he was being especially attentive towards her. He felt responsible inasmuch as he had fucked the girl in question. His wife’s interference had frightened her away, which had actually done him a favour.

  Now Jackie was at home with her sister, pale and wan, determined to diet and also determined to give Freddie another baby, a son.

  She knew he wanted a son so badly that if she produced one she would be safe. Safer than she was now anyway.

  He was virile, he was a slag and he would give a baby out to anyone who opened her legs and was pleasing on the eye. And that was something she could not take. The only thing she had going for her was that she was the mother of his children and he loved those kids. A boy would be the icing on the cake, and she was willing to use whatever she could to keep him beside her.

  Maggie smiled as she placed another mug of tea beside her sister. ‘Can I get you anything, mate?’

  Jackie grinned, happy they were back on an even keel once more. ‘Light me a fag would you, babe, and then maybe make me a salad sandwich, eh?’

  Maggie nodded. She had not long made her a stack of bacon rolls. ‘Still on your diet, then!’

  They laughed together, they knew each other better than anyone would ever know them and they were once more happy with that situation.

  The upset and row was forgotten.

  Until the next time.

  Freddie looked around the house in Ilford and could not believe his eyes.

  Wall-to-wall birds, all shapes, all sizes and all for the taking. Black ones, blonde ones, Chinese ones, even Asian ones. He felt as if he had died and woken up in pussy heaven.

  They sat about the large lounge in various states of undress, leaving nothing to the imagination. And they were all looking at him expectantly, all watching him warily, all waiting to see who he put the moves on first. As usual his reputation with the ladies had preceded him. And the best thing was he didn’t even have to buy them a drink.

  Well, their question was easily answered: the tall blonde with the cheap home perm but a pair of Bristols that looked so large they should have had their own passports. She had nice teeth, too. He was funny like that, could never knob a bird with, as he put it, rusty railings. He was always telling anyone who would listen that personal hygiene of the North and South was a requisite for his amours.

  As he grinned at Stephanie Treacher and she beamed back, he felt the first stirring of interest inside his pants.

  Then a tall woman with short blond hair, piercing green eyes and a deep husky voice walked into the room. ‘You must be Freddie?’

  He looked her over as he did all women, and said jauntily, ‘And you are?’

  She smiled then, a wide, white-toothed, even smile that he was quick to notice didn’t reach her eyes.

  ‘Your boss, darling. I am Ozzy’s sister Patricia. Follow me through to the office.’ As she walked out of the door he noticed the girls were all smiling at him, not with him but at him. He had heard about this woman but he h
ad never seen her before, and she had the same rep as a lot of the men he dealt with. Fair but hard was the general consensus.

  It suddenly occurred to him that she really was his boss.

  Pat, as she was known, had a long lean body, almost boyish, and incredibly long legs. She also walked with shoulders back and the air of someone who knew what they were about. As he followed her he glanced around the room at all the girls, and the look told them they could wait.

  Stephanie raised her eyebrows in a friendly fashion and he winked at her. Confident she was on his list of things to do, she went back to filing her nails. She had scratched a customer earlier and he had not been best pleased. As a school teacher the man was worried about his wife’s reaction to a scratch that ran the length of his back, a scratch he would never had experienced if he had not grabbed her by the hair and nearly choked her with his idea of oral sex.

  The men that came into this place had watched one too many films, and Deep Throat had a lot to answer for. The men really thought that all women could swallow that much cock without gagging. And she had been gasping for breath, had been nearly collapsing with agony, and he had acted as if she had deliberately caused him trouble.

  Consequently she now felt that if she could pass an afternoon with Freddie Jackson now and again, then it might make the job a bit more bearable.

  Chapter Four

  ‘All right, Ozzy?’

  Jimmy felt the iron grip of Ozzy. No matter how often he shook this man’s hand he was always amazed at the sheer strength inside it.

  Ozzy grinned, or at least his crinkled-up face expressed the fact he was smiling, but it was so hard to tell. He had to be one of the ugliest cons ever from his bald head, that was scarred from his youthful career of bare-knuckle boxing, to his overweight body that was solid as a rock despite making him look sluggish and heavy.