by Jessie Keane
Tito was growing into a robust man now. Vittore, his mother’s little pet, was growing up fast too and showing signs of becoming a good businessman. Even Fabio, who had been a sickly sulky child – not exactly neglected but certainly not what Mama Bella wanted – was gaining strength as the Danieris surged forward, became established in their new environment.
But Bella still craved a daughter. Her sister had a girl – Serafina, who would later change her name to Sheila – but she had only sons. It broke her heart. Discreet enquiries by Astorre revealed that, as new immigrants, the Danieris would not be deemed suitable adoptive parents, and anyway they were in their forties now. They were simply too old.
‘I want a girl,’ sobbed Bella, clutching her chest when Astorre passed on the bad news.
He hated to see her pain; he still loved her, in his way.
So he decided. Bella wants a girl? She must have one.
46
Jay didn’t want to tell Vittore what he knew. He was familiar with the Danieri taste for shooting the messenger. But he had worked for the family – particularly for Vittore – for a lot of years, and if the crap really started flying and it was discovered he’d said nothing, then he’d be even deeper in the shit. So he had to speak up.
They were in the room over the club that had been Tito’s favourite – under Tito’s reign this room had been opulent, all chandeliers, deeply padded couches, gold leaf and tarts on tap, playfully inviting you to suck chocolate buttons off their nipples. Now it was called Vito’s and Vittore held sway. Things were plainer, less flamboyant, reflecting Vittore’s own sober nature. The whole tone of the club had changed since Tito had got himself rubbed out. Everything was more low-key. All greys and browns. Fucking dull, really. Whatever Tito’s faults – and they’d been many – at least he’d had a certain exuberant charm. Vittore had none. With Vittore, everything was business, everything was cost.
‘So what’s the problem, Jay?’ Vittore asked him, sitting down on one of the functional stone-coloured marl Habitat sofas and indicating that his employee should sit too.
Jay sat down. He was a tall man for an Italian, fortyish, his face deeply scarred purple down the left cheek by a knife attack back in his twenties. He was a good worker. Diligent. Dedicated to the family that had kept him in sharp suits and cannelloni for a long time.
‘It’s Fab,’ said Jay.
‘What about him?’
‘He’s been doing some moonlighting, working on his own.’
‘So?’ This wasn’t news. Vittore had always been aware that Fab had deals cooking outside the normal run of things. The normal run of things was the clubs, through which the family washed clean all the money that came in from other sources, criminal sources. It made him uneasy, but that was Fabio. He was crazy. You just had to accept that.
‘Bank jobs, drug stuff, you know,’ said Jay. ‘Other things too. More serious things.’
‘Such as?’
Jay looked uncomfortable.
‘Go on,’ Vittore prompted.
‘A guy I know had a shipment of coke snatched. He’s a straight man, sound. He asked Fab and his boys to get the cargo back for him.’
‘And did they?’ Vittore was frowning, wondering where all this was leading. Fabio should never have acted on any of this without first discussing it with him, gaining his permission – and where was his fucking cut of the proceeds? The boss always took a cut, and he was boss now, had the cheeky little cunt forgotten that?
‘They did, but Fabio stiffed him, boss. Took him for sixty per cent of the value of the entire load. Guy says he’s seriously out of pocket. He was going to pay them, pay them well, but he’s saying around town Fabio screwed him over royally.’
Vittore was silent, thinking. This was bad. If word of this spread and they got a reputation among the other firms for sharp practice, tempers would flare.
‘Maybe you could talk to him,’ suggested Jay. ‘I think he may be offloading the stuff around the clubs.’
‘Yeah. Maybe I will,’ said Vittore. ‘Meanwhile, keep an eye on him, will you? And report back to me.’
Vittore was thinking that his brother was a pain in the arse. He had enough on his plate already, what with Miller to sort out. He’d started on that, only a little thing, but every little thing felt good. He wouldn’t take just one big bite out of that cake, he would nibble at it, savour it.
I’ll tear the heart out of each and every one of you, he thought. And he would. He’d do it. Slowly. Inch by inch.
47
Joe Darke’s place was a big square executive-type house set in two acres of prime Chigwell real-estate. It had high walls and electronic gates, and an intercom to vet visitors.
‘You can come on up,’ said a high-pitched female voice when Rob climbed out of the car and pressed the button and said that Kit Miller was here to speak to Mr Joe Darke. There was a soft click, and the gates swung inwards.
Rob got back behind the driver’s seat, gave Kit a look and then drove on up the winding driveway flanked by purple rhododendrons. He stopped outside the front porch, which was porticoed, with faux Corinthian columns.
‘Some place,’ said Kit. ‘You met him before?’
‘No. I thought maybe you had.’
Kit shook his head. This was his uncle they’d come to visit, but Kit didn’t know him at all. He’d had another uncle once: Joe and Ruby’s eldest brother, Charlie; but Charlie was gone. He had cousins too. Joe and his wife Betsy had two kids, Nadine and Billy, about ten and eight years old. Ruby had told him Joe wasn’t in good health these days; apart from that, he knew nothing about these people. He didn’t particularly want to, either, but he was puzzled by the fact that Michael had been planning to visit Joe the night he died.
He had thought Michael kept him informed of his every move. As his right-hand man – just as Rob was now his – he expected to be put in the picture about any meetings or appointments, for the sake of security. But Michael hadn’t kept him informed. If he had, he might not be lying in the cold earth right now.
Rob rang the doorbell. A big-dog sort of bark started up in the hall, mingling with that same high-pitched female voice berating it.
‘Shut up, Prince. Shut up,’ the voice yelled, and then the door was opened and there was Betsy Darke, clinging on to the rhinestone-encrusted collar of a black-and-tan German shepherd who seemed intent on yanking her arm clean out of its socket; clearly, Prince wanted to eat whoever was standing on the step.
Both men thought that Betsy looked in pretty good shape, considering she was in her early fifties. Her blonde hair was cut in a bob and expertly streaked with strands of white, gold and subtle ivory, which flattered her mahogany tan. She was wearing a pink velour tracksuit and spangled trainers. Her hands, French-manicured to within an inch of their life, bristled with silver rings on every finger and both thumbs. There was the merest suggestion of crow’s feet around her pretty, avaricious blue eyes. She was a good-looking woman, but you could see from the first glance that she was a man-eating tart; her smile was too white, too big, her eyes too flirtatious.
‘Mrs Darke?’ asked Kit.
‘Oh, don’t you be so formal,’ said Betsy with a coquettish smile, fluttering her eyelashes at the pair of them like she wasn’t old enough to be both their mothers. ‘You’re Kit, Ruby’s boy? My God. Aren’t you the handsome one! We meet at last.’ Then her tone became one of iron command: ‘Prince, basket.’
Prince stopped lunging toward Rob and Kit, turned meek as a kitten and loped off across the hall.
‘You got him well trained,’ said Rob.
Yeah, and I hear you got your husband pretty well whipped too, thought Kit as they moved into the hall. Bet you had that poor bastard doctored a long time ago. He knew Ruby had no affection for Betsy, and he could see why: they were as unalike as it was possible for two women to be. Much as he despised her, he had to admit that Ruby had a quiet dignity about her; but Betsy was like her home – flashy and eager for attention.
‘Joe’s in the conservatory,’ said Betsy, leading the way, and they followed her jiggling arse across the cavernous hall and past where Prince lay, tongue lolling after all the excitement, in his basket.
They stepped out into the conservatory, which looked out through lush interior greenery onto even greener fields, with ponies grazing in a paddock, and a line of oaks some distance away; ah, the proceeds of all those dodgy deals clearly paid dividends.
Kit was shocked to see an elderly looking man, drawn and yellow-white in skin colour, wearing a dressing gown and pyjamas, with an oxygen mask over his face. Tubes led down to a red metal canister. Ruby had told him that Joe’s health wasn’t good, but he hadn’t expected this. His uncle was not yet sixty years old, yet he looked a hundred. The hands resting in his lap were like a mummy’s claws, the fingers on his right hand stained yellow from nicotine.
‘Joe, your visitors are here.’ Betsy gave them a look of sparkling, almost girlish enticement.
If she don’t try to touch up one or both of us before we’re out of here, I’m a bloody Dutchman, thought Kit.
Then Betsy turned a different look altogether on her husband. Impatient, irritable.
Joe Darke opened his eyes, pulled the oxygen mask away from his face. His voice was hoarse, his breathing laboured.
‘Kit Miller, uh? The boy who copped the whole effing gold mine.’ He smiled, revealing nicotine-stained teeth.
‘We’re sorry to trouble you when you’re ill,’ said Kit.
Betsy’s mouth twisted. ‘It’s emphysema, the doctors say. The bloody cigarettes – he never could leave the damned things alone. Been smoking since he was ten years old. It won’t get better.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that,’ said Kit, seeing the flash of hurt in the sick man’s eyes at this cold summary of the situation.
‘You boys want some tea? Coffee?’ asked Betsy, and the flirtatious manner was back again – the smile, the eyes, she was really working it.
‘Yeah. Coffee, thanks,’ said Kit, to get rid of her for five minutes.
‘Same for me,’ said Rob.
Betsy departed, with a provocative wiggle.
‘Sit down, sit down,’ said Joe, making shaky motions with one hand.
Kit and Rob sat. It was hot in the conservatory, moisture beading on the glass. A purple bougainvillea was coming into flower in one corner, a huge grapevine was sending tangling fronds out over the roof in the other. There was a lemon tree, sporting a couple of tiny green fruit. It was like a fucking jungle, foliage pressing in on all sides. You half-expected to see a puma or monkeys loitering among the shrubbery, not a sick and frail man with skin the colour of old parchment.
‘What did you mean by that?’ asked Kit. ‘The gold mine thing?’
‘Well, it’s the truth, ain’t it?’ Joe took a long, wheezing pull at the mask, then laid it down on his lap. ‘You did get the gold mine. You got it all.’
It was true that Michael had left everything he owned to Kit. But to have him back again . . . ah God, he would happily hand it over, lose the whole lot. How the hell could money compensate for the loss of Michael?
‘What if I did?’ asked Kit, wondering where this was leading.
Joe shrugged. ‘Just saying,’ he said.
‘Michael was planning to pay you a visit the day after he died,’ Rob chipped in.
‘He was. Yes. And he never arrived. So I phoned the restaurant, and then I heard the news. Sad, sad news.’ Joe coughed, lifted the mask and inhaled oxygen again.
‘You know what he was coming to see you about?’ asked Kit. ‘Only, I was his number one. And I wasn’t aware that he planned to come out here, I wasn’t aware that you did any sort of business together. I believe your only connection is your sister and my mother, Ruby, who was sort of Michael’s old lady.’
‘That, young man, is correct,’ said Joe. ‘I asked Michael to come out, because I had some information for him that I didn’t want to tell him over the phone.’
Kit frowned. ‘What was this information?’
Joe inhaled another hit from the bottle. ‘I’d had word from his son.’
Rob and Kit looked at each other. His what?
Joe was nodding his head.
‘You heard me right. Michael and his wife Sheila had a son: Gabriel.’
48
Betsy was back, bearing a tray with two steaming mugs of coffee and a plate of biscuits. She beamed at Kit and Rob, then gave a look of blank dislike to her husband.
‘There!’ she said, placing the coffees on a low table in front of them. ‘Help yourself to the biscuits. Can I get you anything else . . . ?’
‘Bets,’ said Joe.
‘Yes?’ She turned to him and there was that chameleon thing again, the fake charm dropping away to reveal the ugly heartfelt contempt.
‘Fuck off, for Christ’s sake,’ said Joe, and took another deep drag on his oxygen.
Betsy went red in the face.
‘We got things to discuss,’ said Joe. ‘So go in the kitchen and look at your fuckin’ brochures, will you? Work out how you’re going to spend the next few thousand I’ve sweated blood over, yeah?’
Betsy turned on her heel, lips clenched. Rob stood up, quickly touched her arm.
‘You got a loo I can use, Mrs Darke?’
‘Sure,’ she said, and they went off into the main body of the house.
‘This is some place,’ they heard Rob say, and Betsy chattering in reply.
Joe turned his attention to Kit.
‘She’s cost me a fortune ever since the day I married her.’ He inhaled deeply from the mask, the moisture from his struggling breath misting the transparent plastic. ‘Now she’s having the kitchen refitted because she don’t like the colour of the units. She’s had the fucking fishpond moved four times. Every six months, regular as clockwork, we got decorators indoors doing something or other. It’s a pain in the fuckin’ arse.’
‘Joe . . . you said Michael had a son,’ said Kit.
Joe was nodding.
‘What’s the deal here then, Joe?’ Kit asked his uncle.
His uncle.
He’d never even met the man before. But this was his kin.
Some kin. Everyone said his late uncle Charlie was the one who’d cast him into a succession of care homes. He had only to think about it and he was back there. The bleak monotony of those places, the Christmases pasting together home-made garlands to hang around the stark hallways, the mealtimes when boiled cabbage was forced down his reluctant throat, the meagre accommodation, the cold, the rarely washed bedclothes, nights spent top-and-tailing because there weren’t enough beds to go round – a kid at one end of the bed, a kid at the other, someone’s cheesy feet stuck right under your nose all night. A fucking nightmare.
Charlie had been responsible for that. But surely Joe had known, too?
‘Gabe and me go back a long way,’ said Joe. His voice was growing hoarser, as if conversation exhausted him. ‘He was one of my boys, back in the day. He fell out with his mum and dad as a teenager, dunno why. Michael washed his hands of him. Being a bad lad was all he knew, so he came to my lads and said did I have something for him? As it happens, I did. But Gabe, poor Gabe . . .’ Joe heaved a sigh. ‘Gabe’s trouble, see, is money burns a hole in his pocket the minute he’s got it. I think he’s into drugs, probably got hooked on that crap inside. That can happen. He thinks the world owes him a living. It don’t.’
Kit was silent, taking it in as Rob rejoined them and sat down. Whatever this Gabe had done as a teenager, it must have been pretty damned bad to make his parents disown him.
‘He came out of the Scrubs about a week before Michael died,’ said Joe.
‘What was he in for?’ asked Rob, who’d overheard the last bit of this.
‘GBH.’
Kit gave his uncle a wry smile. ‘Got a bit of a temper, has he? And he phoned you.’ Had he phoned Michael too? Tried to make contact again, to repair the fractured relationship with his father? Michae
l hadn’t said a thing about any of this.
‘He wanted to know if I’d take him back on.’
‘And you said . . . ?’ Kit prompted. He wasn’t sure how he felt about all this; displaced, angry, disappointed. Michael hadn’t confided in him, and he should have.
Joe let out a loud hmph of disgust. ‘I said sod off out of it. I made it clear he’d done working for me. The boys didn’t like him, he was a jittery little fucker, off his head half the time. You know what I think? I think something happened to Gabe, something bad way back in his past. Anyway, I didn’t want him around. I was glad to be rid of him. He wasn’t happy about it, but fuck him.’
‘You got an address for him?’ asked Rob.
Joe shook his head, raised one quivering hand to his brow. He looked tired, thought Rob. Tired to death.
‘I didn’t ask for one. The boy’s trouble. And he’s money-hungry, he can never get enough of the stuff. You know the sort, they’re always scammin’ some poor bastard and thinking up stupid schemes, always grubbing around in the dirt for cash – but they never seem to have a pot to piss in?’ Joe’s eyes wandered to the open door into the house. Betsy’s radio was loudly playing Showaddywaddy’s ‘Three Steps to Heaven’ in the kitchen she was about to have remodelled, at Joe’s expense. ‘So I’m glad you called. I wanted to warn you he’s out. That’s the reason I asked Michael to come over, to tell him.’
