38. – Owden
BOB FOLLOWED Andy down a hallway decorated with garish colours and lurid patterns. He tried not to gag on the thick stench of recently cooked meat and old dog shit that hung in the air. He lifted a handkerchief to his nose and mouth and breathed through it.
They entered the living room and Andy indicated that Bob could sit on an electric blue sofa by the door. He did as he was told, because the place made him feel faint. It was a psychedelic mishmash of colours that resembled the painful comedown of a bad acid trip. Blue fleur-de-lis throbbed against Day-Glo yellow paper, and a bright green maze pattern pulsated across the red carpet.
Andy noticed that Bob was rubbing the bridge of his nose and looked pale and unwell. He cracked a smile. “You get used to it after a while.”
“Do you?”
He shrugged. “Wife, innit?”
“Is your wife Timothy Leary?”
Andy threw back his head and coarse laughter scraped out of him. “Just colour blind.”
“Are you sure it’s just colour that she’s blind to?”
Andy laughed again.
A handsome young man with a fashionable mop of thick black hair sat on the other side of the room in a matching armchair with his eyes fixed on the telly. He prodded a game control pad and filled the room with the rat-tat-tat sound of automatic weaponry.
Bob’s eyes went to the screen. Several soldiers flailed in the air as the young man pumped them full of bullets. The soldiers screamed. Bob looked at his host and sighed.
Sensing his irritation, Andy told the lad to leave.
The young man paused the game. “Dad, I’m playing.”
“No, boyo, you’re fucking off.”
“But I’m almost at the end of the level.”
“Tough.”
Andy’s son snarled and threw the controller at the ground.
“This is bullshit.”
He jumped off the chair and looked at his father with angry eyes. His nostrils flared and his mouth puckered until it resembled a little red rosebud. Bob noticed the way he puffed out his chest, showing off the impressive muscles beneath the tight white Tee. A ponce, just like his father had been, Bob thought. A little voice at the back of his head also wondered if the boy took his beatings the same way – he imagined that he did.
“Go an’ look after Jun,” Andy said, hitching a thumb over his shoulder.
Now the young man looked towards the hallway.
“Why?”
“Heard him yelp earlier.”
“And you didn’t think to check?”
“No, boyo. Thought I’d ask you to do it.”
“Fine,” the young man said and sighed. “Tired of sitting around this shithole anyways.”
“Then go do one.”
The young man huffed out of the room and cursed his way down the hallway. Then the back door slammed loud enough to register on the Richter scale. Ornaments around the living room rattled on their surfaces. Andy let out a long, sad sigh and sat where the boy had been.
“Kids, eh?”
“Not so young,” Bob replied.
“Well, not physically. But the missus has mollycoddled him from day one. He’s a vicious little bastard. A real criminal.”
“Like father, like son.”
Andy’s smiled bitterly. “I’s never vicious, Bob. Cunt, maybe, but nowt vicious about me.”
Bob sat forward in his seat. “I didn’t come here for a recap of the distant past.”
“No. You came for recent history,” Andy replied, turning off the TV with a remote.
“Which you seem to be a bit cagey on.”
Andy shook his head. “Not cagey at all.”
“Then you won’t mind sharing.”
“Nowt to share. Told you then what I’m telling you now. If Jimmy’s gambling again I dunno owt about it. He’s certainly not gambling wi’ me, anyways.”
“Owt on the grapevine?”
“No.”
“You’re certain?”
“I’m certain,” he said. “Far as I’m aware he’s clean. Besides, everybody knows you warned him to stay that way when you paid off his last debt.”
“No. I made Jimmy sell up to pay off his last debt.”
“Then you kneecapped the poor cunt he owed money to.”
“Because he tried to tempt Jimmy back again,” Bob replied. Within days of getting the money he was owed, and despite Bob’s warning, Chris Harris asked Jimmy to come to a high stakes game of Texas Hold ‘Em, knowing that he would be unable to restrain himself. “He’ll think twice about making such mistakes again, won’t he?”
“Like everybody else, mate. No fucker’ll touch Raffin with a bargepole after what you did to Chris. Me knees are bad enough as it is without a double-dose of crippling.”
“So you’re saying he’s definitely not gambling?”
“Not at my games. Plus, Jimmy’s a fuckin’ nightmare. If people know the cunt’s playing they go out of their way not to attend. He’s box office poison. He can’t bluff for shit, has no fuckin’ strategy, winds up the other players, threatens to kill ‘em when he’s losing, threatens to kill those that run the games. An’ because the fucker’s got crazy ju-jitsu skills, or whatever fuckin’ chinky fighting style he uses, it takes about five bouncers to eject him when he’s playing up. Believe me, if Jimmy came knocking at me door, I’d tell him to do one.”
“And you’ve not heard owt at all?”
“You’re really worried, aren’t you?” Andy replied, barely able to hide his amusement. “About the only thing I’ve heard is that the Stanton boys shot up Bernie Burgess and his kid last night.”
A chill started at the base of Bob’s spine and worked its way up.
“What?”
“Yeah. The Filth found ‘em both in a car out over near The Border. The boy had taken three bullets. Bernie had his corneas scorched off by the muzzle flash and then got shot through his gun hand. They told the pigs that some fat coon carjacked ‘em. But one of me boy’s customers is an orderly at James Cook hospital, and he came over this morning to buy some skunk and mentioned that he overheard Bernie talking to his Missus that it was Eric Stanton that capped ‘em.”
The chill made its way into Bob’s veins and froze his blood.
The Stantons. Again.
Bob tried not to think about them, even though it was difficult, and kept his focus on the matter at hand. “I want you to ask around about Jimmy,” he said.
“Quid pro quo, Bob. I’m gonna hafta do a lot of asking around.”
“Go on.”
“A couple of pigs are poking their snouts in me truffle patch. Wanting kickbacks, bribes, an’ all manner of other sweeteners not to break up me games.”
“And you want them lads off your back?”
“Summat like that,” Andy said. “Scared off for good, mind you.”
“Consider it done.”
39. – Stanton
THE CASTLE wasn’t the kind of place that advertised its existence to outsiders. It would have barely been noticeable as a pub if not for a small, understated sign that hung above the door. From the front it looked just like a nice old house – sandstone brickwork, freshly painted sash windows, and Tuscan-style columns framing the front entrance – which meant that the sign was about the only thing keeping the place in business. It was situated on a narrow street a stone’s throw away from Durham Cathedral. There were dozens of other places we could have chosen to meet Piper’s box man, but this was one we figured a local would appreciate more than most.
The bar was dingy and narrow with low ceilings. Dark wood floors and wall panels further contributed to the somber feel. Long wood seats like church pews ran the length of each wall towards a tiny bar at the end of the room. Several small round tables were positioned in front of these pews on both sides of the room with a few stools dotted around them. Stephen McMaster sat on one of the pews reading a book. He looked up as we entered and nodded briefly. My brother sat on one of the stools opposite
while I ordered beers from a bulldog-faced woman at the bar.
“You the lads Piper was telling me about?” McMaster said as I placed the pints down and sat beside him. He must have been living in London for some time because his accent was barely noticeable. He was thin with a long, bony, heavily lined face and about twenty years older than he dressed, which was smart casual with jeans, trendy t-shirt and a smart blue jacket.
“Yeah. We weren’t expecting you this early,” I said.
“I like to be punctual,” he replied and smiled.
I checked the clock above the bar. “Beyond punctual if this is anything to go by.”
“Before mobile phones, if you said you were gonna be somewhere then you’d better be there and on time, otherwise you’d better try looking for a different line of work. Guess over time it just became a habit.”
“You work with anybody back in the day?”
“Alan, obviously, and I did a few jobs for Bob Owden.”
“The big man himself?”
“Aye.”
I took a long swig of beer and looked around. A couple of university students were sitting in the corner near the window, ignoring each other in favour of their mobile phones. In the other corner a lonely-looking man nursed a dying pint and scribbled on an open newspaper.
McMaster put down his half-finished drink with a thump. “Did Al tell you my price?”
I nodded. “Twenty five grand minimum, otherwise fifty per cent of the take for anything fifty gees and under.”
“And that’s non-negotiable.”
“Not a problem.”
McMaster grinned. “I’m impressed you know this place. Doesn’t exactly pick up much tourist trade. ”
“Worked with a couple of Durham lads, way back when,” I said. “A proper job, like. Meter reading, if you can believe it. They took me on a crawl up here. This place was one of the ones I remembered.”
McMaster nodded and supped his beer.
“So who we hitting?” he asked.
“You wouldn’t know him,” I replied.
“You’d be surprised,” he said. “Even though I don’t live here any more, I’m still pretty clued up on the local scene.”
“Eddie Miles.”
He nodded again. “Pimp and dealer, if I’m not mistaken.”
My curiosity was piqued. “You must have some contacts down there. Eddie’s not exactly a name.”
“Mark Kandinsky. You know him?”
I turned and looked at my brother who beamed back.
“Know him? We’ve worked with him.”
McMaster smiled. “Figured as much.”
“He’s mentioned us?”
“Not by name. Said in conversation that he’d worked with a couple of brothers who liked to take risks. When Al mentioned you and said you were brothers it got me thinking.”
“If you know we take risks then why’re you here?”
“Because Mark said you never took risks for small change. And Alan said you were solid, so that’s good enough for me.”
The lonely man had obviously performed euthanasia on his dying pint because he wandered up to the bar with the empty glass and replaced it with a full one. We kept our conversation informal while he was within listening distance. When he was gone, McMaster looked up from his drink.
“You know anything about the safe?”
“Two things.”
“Which are?”
“Fuck and all.”
McMaster gave me an ugly look.
“Look, I don’t even know if there is a safe,” I admitted, at which point the look got uglier and McMaster started shuffling in his seat. “But I do know that the cunt is sitting on five hundred grand of money that doesn’t belong to him.”
The shuffling stopped. He looked at me over the top of his pint, not blinking.
“Before you get any ideas, only a hundred of that is ours.”
“And the rest?”
“None of your concern.”
McMaster drained his glass and put it down. “And if he doesn’t have it?”
“On that remote possibility, we’ll put five grand in your arse pocket and send you home.”
Never one to share, my brother gave me a dose of evils. I ignored him and pointed at the safecracker’s empty. “It’s up to you. You can either have the same again, in which case you’re in, or you can refuse my offer, in which case you’re not and the door is the thing you go through on your way out.”
40. – Owden
WHEN BOB arrived at the office he had a couple of problems to deal with. Firstly, a local Councillor had taken issue with a block of flats that Owden Construction wanted to build. His concern wasn’t with the fact that it had prime views of the Transporter Bridge. The issue was that Bob had tried to bribe him. This offended the councillor’s delicate sensibility because he wasn’t that kind of person – he was worth so much more than the pathetic amount that Bob had offered.
Bob had two options for dealing with him: murder or blackmail.
With all the heat from the Stokesley Slaughterhouse, murder simply wasn’t in his best interests at that moment, even one that was made to appear accidental, so he’d have to go with blackmail. Rumour had it that this particular councillor’s kink was paying rent boys to drench him in piss.
But there was rumour, and then there was proving it.
Therein lay the problem.
The second issue was that a security guard at RoSec, Bob’s security firm, had decided to jack in his job after only two days and nobody could find a replacement. Apparently the bloke had got a bit lairy with someone walking around Wynyard and taken a blow to the nuts as a consequence. Replacing him wasn’t the problem – any imbecile with a pulse and couple of working brain cells could do it – he would get one of his bouncers to fill in until somebody could be hired. The problem was that the description of the bloke who punched him sounded suspiciously like Eric Stanton, and that he had apparently claimed he’d just left Rose Bennett’s home before the violence started. If that was the case, it blew Rose’s story out of the water. Why would either of the Stantons visit the home of somebody they’d just slashed? It made no sense, unless they hadn’t slashed her in the first place. Maybe they were trying to work out a way of getting her ex-husband’s money to her? Or maybe Eric was delivering it? Still, if Eric had delivered the cash, why hadn’t he already left town, why had he shot up Bernie and his son?
None of it made any sense.
Every time Bob thought he’d worked out the names of those he could blame for the Stokesley Slaughterhouse, something came along and made him doubt his judgement.
Andy Pandy’s police problem had been relatively simple in comparison. Bob had paid an officer in his employ to fit up one of the detectives. All it had taken were some sachets of Class-A slipped into the man’s car and locker and a discreet phone call to his immediate superiors. Even if the man didn’t lose his job he would be suspended for months while he fought the case. And by the time he got back behind his desk he would have forgotten all about his interest in Andy’s little business venture. Now, Andy just had to repay the kindness…
The phone rang. Bob picked it up.
“How’s me pig problem?” Andy asked.
“One of them piggies has just been packed off to the market. Reckon the other lad’ll pull his head in,” Bob replied. “How’re things at your end?”
“Interesting.”
Bob sat upright and took a deep breath. “Go on.”
“Asked around the usual suspects and got the usual answers: No fucker’s seen him and they wouldn’t let him play even if they did. So, then I started in on the unusual suspects and that’s where it all got interesting – rumours, counter-rumours, all that kinda shite. Then I heard from a gadgie I know who plays all over the country that Jimmy’s been laying down his cards in Leeds.”
Bob let out an exasperated sigh. “Great.”
“You don’t know the half of it. He’s in the hole for fifty grand—”
/> “What?”
“—To some very serious characters—”
“Oh, no.”
“—Who pretty much own him now.”
Bob sat back in the chair and squeezed the phone until his fingers began to hurt.
“Define own?”
“They’ve got him doing hits to pay back what he owes.”
Bob tilted his head back and rubbed at his eyes until spots danced. Whenever he thought that it couldn’t get any worse, it did. Much, much worse.
“How does your mate know all this?”
“Des was there the night Jimmy lost his shirt,” Andy said. “He saw it all go down. They took Jimmy apart. They saw he was weak and played him. He was too fuckin’ stupid to see that he was being played. He just dug himself deeper and deeper into the hole. By the time the game was finished he was down fifty kay with no way to pay. Des made his excuses and left at that point – said he didn’t wanna be around to watch the bloodshed. Thing is, he went back to Leeds a coupla weeks later for a big meet and bumped into one of the fellas from that game. Des asked about Jimmy on the downlow and the fella started laughing, saying that they had the poor bastard doing hits at five grand a pop to pay back his debt. He’d already started, apparently. Iced some Jamaican over in Chapeltown. It made the papers – well, the local ones – but Jimmy obviously covered his tracks well ‘cause the pigs are chasing shadows. Not that anybody’s gonna be looking too hard – it’s not like they give a shit about black on black killings.”
“You know the name of the lad he killed?”
“Des didn’t say, but he said he spoke to the fella about three months ago. Try doing an Internet search, or summat, murder in Chapeltown and all that. If he’s right it should be there.”
------
It didn’t take long for Bob to find the article on the website of the Yorkshire Evening Post.
A twenty-seven-year-old man, with serious criminal tendencies, had been found in his home with a bullet in the brain stem. The police suspected that the victim knew his attacker because there was no sign of forced entry and no sign of a struggle. They were currently pursuing leads, but they suspected that it was an internal squabble.
The Glasgow Grin (A Stanton Brothers thriller) Page 16
