by Ray Banks
She’s in the shower, she’s asleep, she’s knocked to the floor, gagged and bound and screaming for help in a dark flat.
Shut up, man.
So I buzz again, because it might just be that she can’t hear it. And because it’s something else to do. I’m out of ideas.
Why wouldn’t she be there? Unless someone got to her.
The guy in the black leather jacket, maybe. He’s not a copper. He could be working for Morris, but then why would Morris check up on me?
I walk round to the carpark. Stokes’ Escort isn’t there. No lights in any of the windows, so either Stokes has found out and done something stupid, or he’s managed to persuade her to do another bunk.
If that’s the case, then I’m back to the drawing board. Even worse, they’re going to be looking out for me, and they know what I look like, the pair of them. Christ, Alison, why’d you have to go and piss me around? I mean, she knows what’s at stake here and it’s certainly not a chunk of stolen money.
I should have kept my mouth shut. I shouldn’t have gone up there; I shouldn’t have talked to her. She’s still a bloody kid, and she’s not about to trust one of Morris’ goons over her own boyfriend, even if he is a prize prick. If I was any kind of detective, I’d have known that. But I had to play Sir Galahad.
Bollocks to the job. I’ve had enough. Let Mo handle it from here on out. I’ll get the scally on the phone, let him know the situation. As far as I’m concerned, I’m finished with it. I’m gone. Their fucked-up little family, their problem.
I start to cross the grass, hit pavement. I’ll ring Mo from the car, then drive home. There’s nothing more I can do here.
And if he wants to get hard with me, I’ll remind him that I have dirt to dish. Let’s see how Morris reacts when he finds out his son’s been keeping it in the family.
Somewhere, there’s the sound of an engine. I don’t hear it properly until I’m in the middle of the road. Then this horrible grating sound rises above the rain and I have to cock my head to figure out where it’s coming from. It gets louder, closer. I narrow my eyes, peer up the road.
Definite movement.
And then two headlights blaze up like a couple of fiery white eyes. Roaring, the engine gunned for all it’s worth.
I’m stuck. Caught and frozen in the glare, thinking daft thoughts like wasn’t this the beginning of Randall amp; Hopkirk (Deceased)! And, fuck me, but tyres do squeal. I thought it was just the movies.
Too scared to move, too scared to stay put.
A small car with a grinding engine. Bearing down on me.
Fucking aiming for me.
The whole world shudders to a halt.
It’s a full car. I can make out passengers, silhouetted.
I should jump. I should get out of the way.
And I try, just as a sudden wind whips around my legs. It feels like someone kicked me in the ribs. Twist up onto the bonnet. Clatter over the roof, and I’m thinking, hey, I’m going to be fine. It hurts like a bastard, but the impact didn’t kill me, so I’m fine. I’m going to be I tumble off the roof of the car, slam off the boot and hit the tarmac with the top of my head.
The world goes grey for a second, but I’m brought back by the pain. I let out the breath I’ve been holding with a whine.
Open my eyes to see nothing but the black of the road. Blink as much as I can, but I can’t shake the blur.
I let myself go limp on the road. A fuzzy mental check and I don’t think anything’s broken, just battered. My head’s bleeding, though. Something warm and sticky is gumming up my eyes.
My tooth throbs.
That little fucker just can’t give it up for a second.
FORTY
I don’t think about where I am. I don’t think about what just happened. All I think about is whether I need to change my boxers. When I move my leg, the skin stings with urine.
So yeah, I do. So much for Nan’s advice.
I want to sleep, but I know I can’t. More advice from Nan, that one. You go to sleep after a knock to the head, you’ll end up in a coma. And I’ve got to stay alive. I concentrate on my breathing, try to keep it from slowing. My head spins. I’ve got blood on my tongue and the smell of my own piss makes me want to heave.
“I think I got him.’ A whining voice. I know it from somewhere. I keep my eyes half-closed, playing possum.
Like there’s anything else I can do.
‘Good.’ Man, I know that voice too, but my brain’s so fogged up I can’t make any connections. ‘Get him in the back of the car.’
‘Fuck that. I’m not sitting next to him.’
‘Stick him in the fuckin’ boot, man.’
A pair of market trainers come into view. Pumas with a mucky red stripe. Old jeans swim into focus, the kind that look pre-distressed. Whoever knocked me over is a ponce.
Hands grab me under the arms, pull me up with my feet dragging in front of me. My head lolls forward. One of my leg buckles and I hope it isn’t broken. My back screams and I want to scream with it.
‘C’mon, man, hold him straight. Don’t dance with the fucker.’
A breeze dries the blood on my face. I can feel it start to crust up. It itches.
‘I’m not dancing with the fucker, but if you’d take some of the fuckin’ weight…’
I hear the boot being opened, feel myself turned. I keep my eyes closed now, but I can see light through my eyelids. They dump me head first into the boot. I crumple, double up and someone pushes my foot so it’s twisted against my leg. Then the boot lid comes down with a thump.
No use in kicking up a fuss, not yet. Give myself a chance to heal first, get my head straight. Difficult to do when it feels like I’ve been pushed arseways through a woodchipper.
I can hear muffled sounds outside the car. They’re talking, arguing.
I recognised those voices, but I still can’t place them.
Fuck. Think, Cal.
Can’t. Too tired.
Then I pass out.
Coach class.
I open my eyes to darkness, feel a jolt and think I’ve gone blind. Then I remember where I am. The boot vibrates under me, jiggling me about. So we’re moving, which means they meant to hit me, as if I didn’t know that already.
When I try to move, I can’t. Pressed up by the back seats, there’s a weight holding me to the floor of the boot. Someone’s sitting in the back seat, and he’s a heavy bugger. That makes three in the car, at least. From the flash in the dark, I thought I could make out more, but it could have been the shock and the light.
I run my tongue over my throbbing tooth. It throbs harder, but it keeps me awake.
So that’s three. At least. Maybe a couple more. Which means I’m fucked.
My knees knock together, my gut pitches, my spine feels out of whack. The boot has filled up with the smell of me and it’s almost unbearable, the stench of urine and fear high in my nostrils.
God, I’ve got to try and think straight here. Okay, at the most, there’s five guys in this car, not counting me. That’s five guys who pose a threat. More than likely, there’s three. Unless the driver didn’t get out after they ran me down.
Fuck. Concentrate.
That weak voice, he’s my first point of call if this gets nasty. When this gets nasty. I’ll be able to connect that voice to a build, no bother. And if I know him, and I recognise the voice, it’ll give me the extra fire I need to kick the cunt in the jewels. Because I’m not about to wade into big bloke and hope the rest of them go running scared. I do that, the big bloke’ll just stomp on my neck while the rest of them wade in.
So nah, go for the weakling, aim a swing at that big fucking mouth.
Feels like my gums are on fire. Want to go back to sleep.
Want to pass out.
I poke the tooth.
Keep thinking, Cal. This is important. Keep awake, son.
Okay, so Stokes finds out about my visit to Alison. He gets scared and stupid, reckons the best thing to do wou
ld be to take me out of the equation. Fair enough, but how did he find out about me?
He smelled a rat at the casino. Placed me by the Mane accent I never knew I had. Another time I should have kept my mouth shut. But then he talked to me first. What was I supposed to do? Another punter could have told him. The guy with his flies open. Or Pauline could have spilled something to keep him at the other casino. But I know who it was.
It’s as clear as crystal who grassed me.
Georgie.
He tipped off Stokes. Just like he tipped me off, playing both sides to see who’d pay him more. Or maybe he did it because I Stood him up.
And that weak voice, that’s George. A high-pitched version of him, anyway. A George scared out of his mind. And it would make sense that he was driving too. “I think I got him.’
That’s about right. This car’s too small for Stokes’ Escort. If it had been Stokes behind the wheel, I get the feeling I wouldn’t be breathing now.
It was George.
He sets me up, tells Stokes. Stokes goes home, talks to Alison. And guess who just paid her a visit? But then, why would she mention that? I’m missing something.
So here I am, rattling about like the last Pringle in the tube, coming up with theories left, right and centre. But then, when you’re trapped in the boot of a car that knocked the shit out of you, you tend to take stock. Alison, George, Stokes, Mo, Morris, even Donna. The whole lot of them, whirling around my head and it’s difficult to stop them colliding with insane conclusions. I’ve been stitched up, I’m in pain. I can’t think straight and all I want to do is go to sleep. Because I know the worst is just around the corner. I know as soon as this car stops, I’m going to be dragged out of this car and get a kicking I won’t be able to crawl away from.
I can take a beating with the best of them. I’ve proved that since I started pretending to be a PI. But I like to have a good reason to get knocked about. I do something drunk and stupid, that’s fine. I pick a fight with the wrong lad, that’s also fine. That’s a lesson learned and chalk it up to bad decisionmaking on my part.
But this? A car ploughs into me and I get bundled off somewhere remote, cloak-and-dagger style, it doesn’t fit with me. It’s too serious, too fucking life-threatening. It’s not something I’ve experienced, and the thought of it becoming a reality makes my bowels loose.
I’ll be buggered if I shit myself too. I clench.
The engine growls, the rumble under me slowing to a dull vibration. I can hear the click of the indicator light.
We’re pulling in somewhere.
This is it. I tell myself to buckle up.
FORTY-ONE
The first punch lands heavy against my cheek, the second fires up a ball of pain where I think my nose used to be.
I hit the road in a heap, hands in my armpits, legs curled under me, dead to the world.
It’s cold out here, the middle of nowhere. Some motorway, surrounded by black trees and all the life sucked out of the scene by the cars that whoosh by. It’s hardly private, but who’s going to stop when they’re going sixty. And it affords these guys a convenient hard-shoulder burial if they need it.
My right eye is closing up. Through the slit, I can make out three of them. One of them is Stokes. I recognised his voice as soon as I could fit it to a figure. One of the others is George, I know it. The third is a mystery to me, but he’s doing most of the grunt work and he’s got power in his fists.
I try to sit up. Another blow to the head makes me reconsider. And fuck, I can’t see again. It hurts, but doesn’t add too much. If this big guy knew how to beat the shit out of someone, to keep the pain going, he’d be dangerous. As it stands, he’s just here to batter me into submission, which shouldn’t take too long.
I cough up blood and spit. Christ, I’d kill for a cigarette. A passing car throws a light over George. He’s skinnier than I remember. I smile at him as best I can, say, ‘You’re fuckin’ dead, mate.’ But it comes out like gawfaggagekmay…
He gets the point. His face creases up and he pushes the big guy out of the way, launches a weak right at my head. It connects with my scalp, but it hurts him more than it hurts me. He takes a step back, a pained expression on his face. He blows on his knuckles, eyes sparking at me from the shadows.
‘Salford, eh?’ says Stokes.
I turn my head to the sound of his voice, but I can’t look up. I concentrate on the sparkling tarmac. A light rain is falling. It’s the only thing keeping me conscious.
‘What d’you wanna do with him?’ A Geordie voice. Must be the big guy. Sounds like a big guy, but not the voice of a muscleman. More like he’s having trouble breathing. If I can keep him battering me, maybe he’ll have a heart attack or something.
Jesus, get your head together.
‘Fuckin’ Salford,’ says Stokes. ‘Not what I expected, like.
Has to be said. I expected Mo.’
I jerk my head up and grin at him. I can taste blood in my mouth and my lips are wet. I must be a right looker.
‘You like that?’
I keep grinning.
‘You think that’s funny?’
I push bloody spittle through my teeth and shake my head slowly. Fuck am I doing? Slap-happy, punch-drunk, that oneway ticket to Palookaville checked and stamped. Whatever it is, it’s messed up my coordination.
Stokes steps forward and crouches down in front of me.
Streaming headlights carve clarity in his face. I can make out a deep scratch on his cheek, a bruise swelling his bottom lip. He reaches into his jacket and I automatically flinch.
He smiles. Getting off at playing the hard man.
When his hand emerges from his jacket pocket, it’s holding my mobile.
Ah, for fuck’s sake…
‘You know Mo’s number off by heart, do you, Innes?’
My head falls forward.
‘Lad like you,’ he says, ‘a fuck-up scally like you, I don’t think you’ve written it down, have you? Nah, what you did was just stick it on your mobile and leave it at that.’
I shake my head, bring up some blood-laced lung butter and let it fly full in his face. He recoils, stands and kicks me in the throat. I drop back, end up sprawled on the tarmac, staring through a haemorrhage at a moonless sky. Choking.
I can’t breathe. Trying to cough, but my vision starts closing in.
I roll onto my side. Stokes plants another size eleven in my gut. I spew onto the road, tears searing the cuts around my eyes. I try to blink, but it hurts too much. Coughing, spluttering air out of my lungs, bile burning the back of my throat.
Stokes drops my mobile in front of my face, makes sure I’m paying attention. Then he brings his foot down on it. I flinch hard, my body jerking. Once cracks the fascia, twice kills the display. The third smashes the mobile to pieces. He grinds his heel on the plastic then leans over. I feel the wet slap of gob hit my cheek. ‘Tou-fuckin’-che,’ he says.
I want to weep. He’s right. I just saved Mo’s number onto the mobile and left it. There are other ways of getting it again, but that would be admitting failure. And Stokes must know I didn’t call Mo yet. Which means something that I didn’t want to admit to myself.
Alison’s the one that fucked me over.
Another volley of kicks, and I’m on my back. I keep wanting to draw my knees up over my stomach, but I don’t have the strength.
‘What d’you wanna do with him?’ The big guy. Yeah, answer him, tell him. Let’s get this over and done with.
‘We kill him, he’ll be out of the picture,’ says George.
Thanks, mate. You’ll get yours.
‘We kill him, we’ll have to deal with his body.’
‘Howeh, Rob, he’s fucked up. Might as well follow through. What’s to deal with? We dump him in a fuckin’ ditch and call it a night.’
‘It’s too risky. People know he’s up here,’ says Stokes.
‘Aye, but we’ll be gone.’
“I’ll be gone, George.’
> ‘He’s grassed you right up,’ says George.
‘Nah,’ says Stokes. ‘He hasn’t told Mo where I am. Least that’s what Alison says.’
‘Who gives a fuck? Better safe than sorry.’
‘Take it down a notch, Georgie. You’re beginning to sound like a proper psycho. Far as I’m concerned, this isn’t worth the bother.’
‘And I’m saying better safe than – ‘
‘How about you shut up, George? You’re not the bloke Morris wants. You’re a fuckin’ tourist, so hang onto yourself.’
My lips start flapping. In my mind I’m calling George all the bastards under the sun, but it comes out as a gurgling wheeze. George doesn’t like it. He kicks me hard. I roll over onto my other side, curl up into a ball. Shut the world out, try to keep breathing.
Best to keep my mouth shut. Let them sort this out.
Stokes says, ‘We’ll dump him in a ditch. By the time he makes it back to Newcastle, we’ll be long gone.’ He leans close to me. ‘You hear that, Innes? Long fucking gone. You messed up, son. You dropped the ball.’
I can’t see him anymore.
‘Pick him up,’ says Stokes.
‘Fuck that, I’m not touching him.’
‘George, don’t make me tell you twice, mate.’
I feel hands under me again, feel the sky get that little bit closer before my head falls to my chest. The world starts spinning and I have to blink to keep myself from throwing up again. I’m upright, looking down now. I notice my shoelaces are untied. Wondering how the fuck that happened. My ankle turns, a stabbing pain at the top of my foot. Then I drop face forward into a ditch by the side of the road. The mud is cool against my face. If I close my eyes, I can pretend it’s my bed.
Footsteps disappearing, the sound of the engine.
They’re not going to kill me, but they’ve left me for dead.
Small mercies.
I wait for the engine sound to fade away. All that’s left are the sounds of passing cars and my own whistling breath. It’s cold out here, getting colder all the time. I should make a move, but I don’t want to. Not yet. Enjoy the rest.
