by A A Abbott
“No Snow Mountain or Starshine here, though,” Amy said, sipping a Cosmopolitan. “I’ll have to speak to your Tim.”
“I don’t suppose the bar’s exclusive enough,” Kat said, although looking at the hipster clientele and spotlit spirits bottles, she questioned herself.
Amy pulled a face. “It’s a super-smart venue,” she said. “Don’t forget, I’ve been marketing Snow Mountain for nearly a year now. There’s plenty of money here.” She gestured to the hipsters. “The bar staff could easily upsell to premium vodka and pricier cocktails.”
Kat looked at her in mock horror. “Not until I’ve bought the next round, Amy. I hear too much of this talk from Tim; he never switches off either when we go out. Anyway, Marty hasn’t got any Snow Mountain to sell at the moment, has he?”
It was Amy’s turn to look shocked. “How did you know?”
“How do you think?” Kat asked. “Actually, it wasn’t pillow talk. Tim didn’t tell me anything about that dirty little secret, but Marty did. Don’t forget, Marty’s my partner and investor in Starshine vodka. It’s thanks to him that I have a licence, premises, equipment and a brand. He didn’t hesitate to remind me of that when he asked me to make Snow Mountain for him.”
Amy gawped at her. “How can you? It comes from Bazakistan.”
“Exactly. And it’s a grain spirit, whereas Starshine is made from potatoes. But even without the snow-capped peaks, rolling fields and pure water of Bazakistan, I could produce a passable replica of Snow Mountain. I have my father’s talent for making vodka, and Marty knows it.”
“So?” Amy asked, her voice eager. “Will you do it?”
Kat shook her head. “No. Marty’s angry with me, but I can’t. My distillery is very small. I can’t supply all the quantities he needs, and I’d need time to experiment with the recipe anyway. I’d have to put my production of Starshine, and all my plans for it, on hold to resolve his supply issue. And how would he explain that Snow Mountain was coming from the West Midlands rather than the plains of Bazakistan?”
“He’d say it was my job to do that,” Amy replied. “And I could, if I had to. Something like: we’re modernising the brand and it’s time Snow Mountain joined the twenty-first century. Sounds plausible, doesn’t it? I’m the vodka marketing manager, after all. I wish Tim would remember it, too.”
Kat couldn’t hide her surprise at the news of workplace friction. “I thought you and Tim got on.”
Amy didn’t even have the grace to look embarrassed. “He’s always interfering, telling me what to do. I spent three years studying for a marketing degree, so I know what I’m talking about. Tim didn’t even go to uni.”
Amy must have had too many cocktails already. Perhaps they went to her head because she was so thin. Even if it was the Cosmopolitans talking, Kat couldn’t let the comment pass unchallenged. “Tim could have gone to university, but Marty made him join the business. He’ll own it one day, so it’s only natural he wants to stay involved.”
“There won’t be a business if Marty can’t sort out his Snow Mountain supply,” Amy said. “Erik’s worried he’ll have to stop his cancer research, because Marty can’t fund it anymore. I wish you hadn’t turned him down.”
Kat was beginning to regret it too. Marty hadn’t helped his cause by taking such a heavy-handed approach, but she could only guess how much pride it had cost him to ask. He’d as good as told her that his livelihood was in danger, and now Amy was saying it too. What would happen if he couldn’t afford to support her infant brand?
“I’ll get more drinks,” Amy said. “Same again?”
“Oh, absolutely,” Kat said. She really needed another. If Amy ended up legless, too bad.
She was still lost in thought, trying to work out who she could contact for finance apart from Marty, when Amy returned from the bar.
“House special this time,” Amy said. “It’s sparkling, like us. And this is Ben.”
The stranger brushed a floppy brown fringe out of his face. He looked to be in his mid-twenties, about their age. “Hi,” he said.
He had pleasant, open features, but there was something about his eyes that triggered a subconscious alert. Kat flashed a warning glance at Amy.
Disconcertingly, Ben noticed. He must have quick reactions. “Hey, I’m not hitting on you,” he said, his London accent friendly. “I literally bumped into your friend – to Amy – and the least I could do to say sorry was to buy you girls a drink.”
While he seemed friendly, Kat still felt edgy.
Ben continued. “Seriously, I’m not out on the pull. I’ve been practising eSports at the café down the road and I came here to meet a friend. There he is now.”
Kat was about to say: good, because she and Amy both had boyfriends, and what were eSports anyway? The words died on her lips, as she turned her gaze towards the door.
She recognised Vince straight away. He was the barman in the illegal casino where she’d once, foolishly, worked for Shaun Halloran. Old before his time with his trimmed ginger beard and dandyish clothes, Vince had mixed cocktails and kept order. She was sure he had convictions for violence.
Was this a trap? Shaun wanted her dead. He’d followed her from London to Birmingham, and tried to shoot her. Even from a prison cell, he’d stalked her, sending poison pen letters. She thought she’d escaped by moving house, but somehow, Shaun must have tracked her down.
Her hand gripped her bag and she pulled her foot back, ready to stand and run.
Chapter 8.
Vince
“Ben, get outside now.” Vince Mowatt was in no mood for social niceties. It was bad enough having to work with Jon Halloran’s good-for-nothing elder brother. The last thing he’d expected to find was the lad nattering to Kat.
“Why?” Ben said, a bewildered look on his stupid, naïve face. He obeyed, though, leaving his unfinished pint and following Vince into Hoxton Square.
“That sly bitch put your father away,” Vince said.
Ben’s jaw dropped. “Amy?” he said. “Or the other one?”
“You didn’t even know her name?” Vince said, in disbelief. “That blonde bitch is Kat. She handed your dad over to the filth.”
Her evidence had sent Shaun Halloran to prison for life, and he wanted her blood. More than that, though, Shaun craved freedom. For this reason alone, Vince sought Ben’s company.
If Vince had been asked why he cared about the Hallorans, he would have said he was loyal to his friends. As a child, he’d wanted for nothing until his father, an armed robber, had died in a police shoot-out. Shaun Halloran was one of the few who had stood by Vince and his mother then, almost treating them as family. They’d been given work: shoplifting and cheque fraud for her, minding and drug-running for him.
Tall, muscular and gym-honed, Vince had mostly stayed under police radar except for a GBH conviction after an argument in a pub. He’d tried to keep his temper in check since then.
He’d never admit to anyone, especially Shaun, where his real allegiance lay: with Jonathan Halloran, only eighteen, who had calmly murdered a man in front of him.
Ben Halloran knew nothing of his younger brother’s business, or of Vince’s infatuation with him. The kind of nerd Vince avoided if possible, Ben was eager to kill zombies in his virtual universe, but he’d always shunned real life criminal activities. His parentage might have been called into question, had he not inherited the Halloran eyes, light blue and fringed with long lashes. Disturbingly like Jon’s, they stared in shock at Vince now.
“Keep it zipped, and keep away from her,” Vince warned.
“I wasn’t hitting on her,” Ben protested. “I hang out with girls who like eSports. It’s easier that way. I just got talking to the redhead, Amy, at the bar. There was time to kill while I waited for you.”
“Forget it,” Vince said, still convinced Ben had fancied his chances. He looked over his shoulder. No one had followed them. “Have you got your motor with you? Let’s go somewhere else. It’s beer o’clock.”
“We’ll go back to mine,” Ben said. “I’ve got beers in. Fancy playing GTA?”
Vince stopped bristling, even though he knew Ben would win. The lad always did. He was greased lightning on a games console. “Yeah, let’s go,” he said.
Ben’s black Golf GTi was parked nearby. It was a handsome car: a one-off edition fitted with red leather seats, manufactured specially as a competition prize. Ben drove expertly towards his flat just north of Oxford Street. Despite leaving the satnav switched off, he seemed to find all the backstreets through which traffic flowed freely. At no time did he exceed the speed limit, Vince noted.
Ben used a magnetic card to access the garage in the basement below the flats where he lived, a privately-built low-rise block constructed of chocolate-coloured bricks perhaps forty years before. The same card allowed him to enter a lift to the second floor.
The common areas of the building were spotless. Vince was irritated, although unsurprised, to see Ben’s flat cluttered with piles of computer magazines and unwashed dishes. In his own cramped bedsit, above a bookie in Tottenham, he couldn’t rest unless his possessions were clean and ordered.
“You need to tidy this heap up,” he told Ben. “Now.”
Ben looked mutinous. “Are you threatening me?” he complained, stretching to his full stature.
They were the same height, but not evenly matched. Ben was skinny. The only muscles he’d developed were those required for a keyboard.
“I can’t make plans in a pigsty,” Vince snapped.
“Your problem,” Ben said. “Have a beer and chill.”
Tempted to take a swing at him, Vince remembered just in time that he needed to keep Ben on-side. Huffing, he gathered dirty mugs and plates from the lounge and piled them in the kitchen sink.
“There’s a dishwasher,” Ben grumbled.
“I suppose it’ll be full,” Vince said, seeing his words realised as he opened the machine. “Here, can you at least put these away?”
Ben had an expensive flat; his rent must be ten times what Vince was paying. How could he live like this?
With the dishwasher reloaded, Vince helped himself to a fridge-cold can of lager. “Stella? That’ll have to do,” he said. “Let’s get down to business.” He lounged on the brown leather sofa, freshly cleared of detritus. In front of him was the imposing screen, half the height of the room, on which they had played Grand Theft Auto with Jon only a couple of months before.
Ben misunderstood. “Here,” he said, handing over a games controller.
“Later,” Vince snapped. “I want to talk about your dad. You saw him last week, right?”
“Yes. I visited him in Belmarsh.” The Halloran eyes were serious.
“He’s had enough of prison,” Vince said.
Ben nodded. “Dad asked me to help,” he said slowly.
“You will, won’t you?” Vince asked, suddenly anxious. He needed Ben’s cash, and perhaps his computer skills too.
“I’ll do whatever it takes,” Ben said. “Each time I see him, he looks older and more stressed. Belmarsh is no place for a man of his age. Next year, he’ll be fifty.”
Vince relaxed at this proof that Ben’s blood was thicker than water. “What did he want from you?”
“Only money.” Ben looked away. “He said now Jon’s inside too, the rest is down to you. Transport, passports, the lot.”
“Does he have a plan yet?”
“That’s the only piece missing.”
Chapter 9.
Shaun
Increasingly, Shaun Halloran dreaded Sunday afternoons. The morning was pleasant enough: he was released from his prison wing cleaning duties, and met his fellow wing bosses in the Boardroom, or the chapel, to use its official name.
His son, Jon, was by far the youngest of the group. Pushing fifty, and looking it now that his No 3 cut had greyed, Shaun was the oldest. Still, at least he’d kept his teeth and hair. Many lags didn’t. Shaun’s cellmate, Sidey Carr, more than a decade younger, had a bald spot on his head and a gap in his grin.
Sidey, another churchgoer, sang hymns with the rest of the congregation as Belmarsh’s alpha males agreed an increase in the price of recreational drugs. Availability was reduced after a determined effort by the authorities to search as many cells as possible. Shaun had been tipped off, so his supply line was unscathed; the price hike suited him well.
Lunch was acceptable too. The servers curried favour with an extra helping of chicken, which Shaun relished even though the roast meat was merely cheap, greasy drumsticks.
Once the door banged shut at noon, however, the hours stretched ahead, long and boring. The lags would be locked in their cells until the following morning. There were no prison officers around to take inmates to the gym, or supervise an evening association period: the wing was short-staffed again.
Staring at the unappetising sandwich he was expected to eat later, Shaun rolled a cigarette and sat on his bunk. He would have done Sidey the courtesy of standing by an open window had his cellmate been a non-smoker, but luckily, the other man liked his burn too.
Sidey, about to switch on the TV, stared at him, removing his own tobacco pouch from a trouser pocket. “Time for a post-luncheon cigar.”
The skimpy roll-up was as far removed from a fat Cuban number as Shaun could imagine. Sidey disposed of it in a few deep drags. “Would you read a letter for me, Al?” he asked.
Just as Graeme Carr answered to Sidey, Shaun had his own nickname in Belmarsh: the East London abbreviation of Halloran. “Hand it over,” he told Sidey.
Shaun didn’t despise Sidey for his illiteracy; it was common enough in this place, possibly because it limited career options so much. Unable to read, Sidey Carr had worked as a scaffolder, then a cat burglar. It meant he could choose shorter hours and better weather. Sadly, he’d probably need a new job when he was released: his skinny frame was filling out thanks to Belmarsh’s menu.
There were just two pages, written with a blue ballpoint in a childish, rounded hand. It was clear enough. “It’s from your Tara,” Shaun said.
Sidey nodded. “My eldest,” he said. “Nineteen.”
“I thought you were only thirty-six,” Shaun said. True, Sidey hadn’t aged well. Not only was his dark hair thinning, but his skin was leathery under the gaudy tattoos that decorated it.
“We started young,” Sidey told him.
“Well, let’s see what she’s up to,” Shaun said, making a pretence of enthusiasm. “Dear Dad, I hope you are well. Look out for me on TV on Sunday, because there’s a programme about vodka and they shot film of me mixing cocktails.”
“She works in the West End,” Sidey said with pride. “One of those exclusive gentlemen’s clubs.”
Shaun raised a quizzical eyebrow. In his book, a gentlemen’s club meant lap-dancing. “Sunday’s today,” he said, somewhat unnecessarily. “We might have missed it. She doesn’t say what time, or channel, or anything.”
“I’ll try all of them,” Sidey said, switching on the small television set for which they paid a pound a week from their paltry prison wages.
“Okay, I’ll read the rest of it,” Shaun said. “My word.” He whistled.
“What?” Sidey asked, mid-channel change.
“You didn’t say Tara batted for the other side. She’s got a new partner, Danielle. Sounds like a nice girl.” Shaun sniggered.
Sidey looked sheepish. “I didn’t think she’d put in her life story,” he said. “Anyway, so what? Your Jon’s gay and all.”
Shaun’s eyes narrowed. He felt heat rise, almost catching in his throat. “What are you talking about?” he spluttered.
“Everyone knows,” Sidey said. “I can’t remember who told me. It was on the out, not here. Lesley Mowatt probably said.”
“How is Lesley the expert on my son’s sex life?” Shaun asked. He couldn’t think when Vince’s mother would have seen Jon recently, anyway.
Shaun felt sick. “Her Vince is bent as a three bob watch,” he sa
id. “That’s her problem, but I won’t have her spreading lies about my lad. She’d better wind her neck in, and that goes for you too. And if you hear a sniff from anyone else, get them to tell me to my face.”
“Why does it matter?” Sidey asked, adding, “Smell the coffee, Al. Jon and Vince lived together.”
“They shared a flat, not a bed,” Shaun said. “Jon had a girlfriend, although she was a skaghead. He dumped her, and not before time. Anyway, who do you think you’re talking to?”
Sidey looked away, sulking. He fiddled with the television. Ten minutes passed before he seemed to remember his place in the pecking order. “Would you like a cuppa, Al?”
Shaun accepted his tribute, a black instant coffee, with a curt nod. He had a thumping headache, but none of the quack’s aspirin was left. Sipping the hot drink, he tried to ignore the images that were torturing him. He wouldn’t see Jon again for a week, on their next trip to the chapel. Then he’d know. He’d merely have to look into his son’s eyes.
The coffee set him on edge even more, not that he’d drop a hint of it to Sidey. He couldn’t show weakness. Instead, he busied his fingers with another roll-up. Smoking eased the pain coursing through his temples, giving him space to think. He couldn’t afford to go crazy, or turn to drugs like his customers; he had to focus on his escape plan. For that, he needed Vince. His lip curled as he imagined what he’d do to Vince once the young man’s usefulness was past.
If only he hadn’t ended up inside in the first place. He’d still have the mansion in Wanstead, the criminal empire, the luxury of time to guide Jon in his personal life and train him in the business. Ben was a lost cause, but Jon would have been a worthy successor to his father.
Instead, Jon had been reduced to living above a chicken shop with Vince, and taking risks in his quest to spring Shaun from Fortress Belmarsh. Now Jon was inside too. It was all Kat’s fault: she’d begun the trail that had led to Shaun’s arrest.
