The Last Card

by Kolton Lee

‘In the car. I’ve got someone who wants to meet you.’

  As H assessed his agressor, deciding what to say, the back doors of the car opened and two large men stepped out. They didn’t look as though they meant to take ‘no’ for an answer.

  8.

  Nina sat in a corner of White Alan’s office. Since the other night when she’d heard about Alan raping – raping! – the night club owner things between the two of them had been … difficult. He’d told her he was feeling the pressure to maintain his business and for the first time since Alan and Nina had been a couple, she didn’t care. She had admitted to herself, finally, that this relationship was one she wanted out of. Worryingly, she had admitted this to Gavin and she didn’t know if Gavin was someone she could trust. But this didn’t worry her half as much as Alan’s apparently deteriorating mental state. He’d raped a man! He’d then insisted she go back to his place and share his bed with him.

  Nina was aware that she wasn’t a great singer but for a young girl who had grown up in the council estates of Stoke Newington she had paid her dues. She deserved a chance. It was Alan that had given her a chance and for that she would always be grateful. On the other hand they were both aware of what Alan gained from his ‘philanthropy’: Nina McGuire. And for Nina, that was a problem.

  As Nina sat absentmindedly staring out of a window, her troubles ran back and forth through her mind. She unwrapped a stick of nicotine chewing gum and popped it in her mouth. The thing about Alan was that despite the money and the power, it was never enough. What he couldn’t understand, and people like him never seemed to understand this, was that you can’t own people forever. Alan wanted her around so she had to sit here. That was the power he had over her. For now.

  Alan sat behind his desk, an elegantly-manicured fingernail digging inelegantly at a piece of spinach stuck between his teeth. Nina turned to look at him and stared as he absentmindedly switched between thumb and forefinger, twisting, straining and grimacing to remove the little strip of green. It was disgusting. She felt the two small, vertical lines appear in her forehead, just above her eyebrows.

  With his other hand Alan wrote in a ledger that sat in front of him. Alan worked hard, of that there was no doubt. He was ambitious and he was ruthless. Despite an unhealthy preoccupation with dental hygiene, in the early days Nina had liked him for all these reasons; she liked him because he had helped this struggling woman who was desperate to make a name for herself; she liked him because he adored her. But she only fell in love with him because, unlike the kind of men she grew up with. he could bend the world into the shape he wanted it to be. Things were so because he said they were so …

  Nina’s Irish immigrant father left the flat that she and her two younger sisters grew up in when she was seven. She was the oldest daughter and close to her father. But even at that age, Nina could tell that her parents were not suited to each other. They fought, they argued, they argued, they fought. Nina never knew what the problem was because once her father left, that was it, none of the family ever saw him again. And her mother, Jean, never spoke about him.

  When Nina turned thirteen and tentatively asked her mother about the big man that she remembered as her father, Jean had slapped her hard across the face and then promptly burst into tears. Dry-eyed but shocked, Nina had never mentioned her father again. The one thing she could remember about him however, and desperately held on to, happened one night after a particularly nasty row between her parents.

  Nina and Dymphna had climbed out of bed and sat on the top of the stairs, listening to the drama that was taking place below them. Maureen was just a baby at the time and was asleep in her cot. At some point Nina and Dymphna crept along the landing and climbed back into bed. Nina didn’t know if her parents had heard them or not but a short time later her father had opened their bedroom door and stood in the doorway. Nina and Dymphna were pretending to be asleep. After what seemed like an age Nina finally turned over to see if he was still there. He was. Seeing her move her father came into the room and sat down on the edge of the bed. He stroked Nina’s long, shiny hair. Nina had asked him what the matter was and her father had just looked at her. It was only then that she could see that her father was crying.

  Across the room Dymphna stopped pretending to be asleep across and slipped into bed beside Nina. At the sight of their father crying the two young girls hugged each other and their father and all three of them cried. Then her father said something that Nina had always remembered. His words had come back to her many times over the yars and were one reason why she was attracted to Alan.

  Her father had said that some men are constantly at odds with the world and this was not a happy position to be in. When a man is faced with this situation he can really only do one of three things. He can either change what he believes and what he does so that he can fit in with the world; or he can drive himself so hard that he changes the world to believe what he believes. Or he can go mad trying to do either one of these things. Nina never knew what path her father chose, all she knew was that some time after this night, her father left home and never returned.

  Nina’s father was a distant man and this memory was his only legacy. It was a legacy that left her with a taste for troubled men; men who could clearly be identified as people who had chosen one of these paths. Alan was such a man.

  Alan had told Nina how he and his brother Paul started their business first as petty drug dealers, but had gone on to buy into nightclubs and provide ‘insurance’ for them; Alan told her about his love for the noble art of boxing and what it meant to him. Nina could see the passion in his eyes as he talked, about his businesses and the boxing, and she had fallen for his drive and energy. Here was a man out of step with the world, who had the drive and the will power to change the world to his way of being. Here was a man who had turned a tragic past in a poor, wretched, mining town into the triumph of owning a home in Hampstead village, a nightclub in one of the most exclusive areas of central London and a custom-built Rolls Royce. This was the man Nina had fallen for. But as she stared at him now, grimacing like a gargoyle, mindlessly pawing at the detritus between his teeth, all she could think about was him raping – raping! – a man who had crossed him.

  Nina unwrapped another stick of nicotine gum and turned away. She thought about how she could slip away and call her girlfriend, Maxine. Maxine was a receptionist for a law firm over on Baker Street and was one of her best friends. They often had lunch together.

  ‘Do you have to make that noise?’ Alan was scowling at her. ‘I’m trying to concentrate.’

  ‘What noise?’

  ‘With your mouth! I’ve seen camels chew with more finesse than you!’

  ‘They go out with a camel!’ Nina stomped her way to the office door. She stopped as a large stapler crashed against it.

  ‘Sit your arse down! You’re just like a bloody camel! How come you’ve always got the hump these days?!’

  Nina glared at him. She could feel the two small, vertical lines deepening in her forehead and the fact that she sensed their presence made them deepen even more.

  ‘I’m trying to run a business, here! And it’s bloody hard work! Can. You. Not. See?’

  Nina stomped back to her seat in the corner. As she sat someone knocked at the door.

  ‘Come in!’ Alan roared. The door opened a fraction and Gavin’s balding head poked in. ‘Well come in then, for fook sake, man!’ The door swung back and in stumbled a tallish black man with baby dreadlocks. Nina sat up. This looked interesting.

  The man was about six foot tall and built with the loose-limbed precision of an athlete; slim with long limbs. The short dreadlocks that sprouted from the top of his head crowned what would have been a smooth skinned, open, almost handsome chocolate-brown face, but for a heaviness that settled over his eyebrows. The man looked startled as he stumbled, held from behind. Watching him closely, Nina saw he had the posture and body language of a man not used to being pushed. Pinning his arms was one of what Nina called
Alan’s ‘Beefeaters’, his heavies.

  ‘Who the hell are you?! And what the fuck do you want with me?!’ The man’s tone was insolent. Nina guessed it had been a long time since anyone had spoken to Alan like that.

  Casually, Alan opened a drawer, pulled out a little tub of toothpicks, extracted one and began to pick at his teeth. He looked the black man up and down. The man stared back, waiting for an answer. Again Alan opened the drawer, this time pulling out a canister of breath-freshener. He sprayed two squirts in his mouth and replaced it in the drawer. He continued to delve into the recesses of his mouth for the remains of the day’s detritus. Finally he spoke.

  ‘So you’re the man with his hand in my pocket. Me sky rocket.’ Alan leant back in his chair, eyeing the man in front of him.

  ‘Listen up, bad man, I was just hanging on to what was mine.’

  Alan paused for a moment, taking this in. He pulled out the toothpick, examined a minute fragment of bacon skewered on the end of it, and sucked it off. He then nodded to one of the Beefeaters. The Beefeater stepped forward and slapped the black guy hard in the face. Nina winced and looked away. When she looked back she was surprised to see the man looking down at Alan, almost with pity. Gavin stood quietly by the door. There was a long silence.

  ‘I don’t know what you thought was yours but you were wrong. It was mine. Now you owe me five grand. It was three but for your fooking cheek I’m making it five. Have you got it?’

  ‘You’re out of your mind.’ Calm, untroubled. More silence.

  Alan again nodded to the Beefeater and he again slapped the black man in the face, harder this time.

  ‘Have you got my five grand?. It’s a simple question.’

  The man locked eyes with the Beefeater who had slapped him twice. He slowly turned his head back to Alan.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Surprise, surprise. Where the fook would you get five grand?’ Alan looked around at Gavin and his Beefeaters. This was their cue to smile. Gavin gave a polite grimace, the Beefeaters smiled broadly. Nina didn’t smile at all.

  ‘Seven days. I want you back here with my money, understood?’

  The man remained silent, staring down at Alan. From where Nina sat the man’s defiance, insolence, seemed obvious but Alan stared back at him thinking … what?

  After a moment Alan nodded again to the frisky Beefeater. Again, he used his open palm to slap the black man in the face, putting even more enthusiasm into it this time. Blood trickled from the black man’s mouth. It glowed hot from the three blows it had taken. Nina again winced, allowing herself a soft ‘no!’ this time. Alan looked at her but said nothing.

  ‘It’s just gone up to ten grand. Do you understand me now?’

  Nina spun round to look at Alan. He looked back at her, allowing himself a little smile. She realised he was playing with this man for her benefit.

  ‘Have you been eating onions?!’ This was the black guy. The question hung in the air. The little smile that gambled playfully on Alan’s lips had gone. In the silence the door knocked. Gavin poked his head outside for a moment.

  ‘It’s Dunstan.’

  Alan nodded and turned his attention back to the black guy.

  ‘You obviously don’t know who I am, do you?’

  Alan was all business now. While the Beefeaters seemed to find the meeting was going exactly to their liking, Nina was now sitting very still and very quiet. The explosion was coming. She looked over at Gavin. He too looked serious.

  ‘You now owe me fifteen grand.’ Alan paused. ‘I’m giving you seven days to get me my money and if you don’t I will have no hesitation in having you killed. Do you believe me?’

  Whether the man believed Alan or not Nina could see that he had his attention. It was in his eyes, the way he was staring at Alan, the way he licked his lips. His eyes drifted round the room and for a moment, he was looking directly at Nina. The two of them boring into each other. Suddenly Alan seemed to arrive at a decision.

  ‘Hold him tight.’

  The Beefeater holding the man’s arms held behind his back now gripped them more securely. The man struggled but there was nothing he could do. Alan rose from his seat and walked slowly round his desk, dropping his toothpick into the wastepaper basket. Sitting on the edge of his desk, he looked directly into the black man’s face. With his eyes locked to the man’s he held out his hand to the other Beefeater. Nina realised she was holding her breath.

  ‘Knife.’ The Beefeater looked around, puzzled. Alan slowly turned his gaze on to him. ‘Do you have a knife?’ Dry.

  ‘Er, no, boss, not with me.’

  Alan gave him a withering look and turned to the letter-opener on his desk. It had a long, thin, blunt blade. He picked it up.

  The man’s eyes were following Alan’s every movement. As Alan picked up the letter opener the man struggled, but the Beefeater’s grip was too strong. Alan stroked the flat of the blade along the man’s neck, then down his chest to the top of his jeans. He casually undid the belt and gently pulled the man’s trousers down to his knees. The man struggled more urgently, but the movement of his legs was restricted by his trousers. Alan pulled down his underpants.

  ‘What the fuck are you doing?!’ the man hissed. Nina stared, eyes on stalks, still holding her breath. Alan used the blade of the letter opener to ease the man’s penis to one side and stroked it along his scrotum. The man strained to twist his hips away but he was being held too tightly. Suddenly Alan sat back on the edge of his desk.

  ‘I could cut your foocking balls off, do you know that?’

  The man just stared at him, sweat on his brow, his breath coming in short bursts now.

  ‘Seven days. Okay?’

  The black guy gave a dry, cracked, swallow but made no other movement. Alan smiled. He turned away, then turned back, fast, grabbed the man’s ear, dug the letter opener into the lobe and yanked it down. The man let out a scream of pain.

  ‘Get him out. Bring Dunstan in.’

  Nina drew breath. She watched as the black man’s screams were quickly choked back, held in through clenched teeth. Alan walked quickly back round his desk and sat down. Gavin, also looking visibly shaken, opened the door while the Beefeaters shuffled the black man out. Alan was finished with the black man, his point was made. He pulled a tissue from a box on his desk and wiped the tip of the letter opener. He looked at Nina as he tossed the blood spotted tissue into the wastepaper basket. It nestled alongside a tangle of discarded toothpicks.

  ‘You see?! Now you see what I have to deal with?’ He said it as though Nina had no idea why he was so busy and what he was preoccupied with. In a way he was right. She was no longer absentmindedly chewing her gum.

  She sat very quiet and still as Dunstan entered. Dunstan was a black teenager from Hackney. He was dressed in the ubiquitous urban uniform: the latest Michael Jordan Air basketball shoes, jeans so baggy the crotch hung just above his knees, and an oversized white sweatshirt with the hood poking out of a black, shiny, blouson jacket. Emblazoned on the back of the jacket were the letters NYU. His hair stood upright like an Angela Davis afro and, in a parody of a wedding hat, a dark, wooden afro comb poked out of the back.

  Nina had seen Dunstan twice before, once when he came to the office to meet Alan and once in passing in Hackney’s Mare Street. On both occasions Dunstan walked as though he had the world at his feet. He didn’t walk, he strolled with a loping gait, high stepping as though one foot was about an inch shorter than the other. It wasn’t a limp, it was a kind of ambling cool; swinging the shorter leg round as he took each step. Although Nina’d seen this before, Dunstan’s street walk was so pronounced she felt sure he must have practised it at home.

  Dunstan must have heard black guy’s scream of pain because as they passed in the doorway, he entered the office without his usual swagger. He carried a briefcase, and if Nina hadn’t know better she would have thought it held his homework. He looked around warily, looked at Nina, looked at Gavin. Then he pulled up a chair and wi
th the briefcase at his feet, he looked up at Alan. There was a moment’s pause, and he began.

  ‘It’s about Paul, Alan, you know’t I mean? ’E hasn’t got your management skills, guy.’ Dunstan’s voice was high and whiny.

  ‘Yes? And?’ Alan stared back at the boy in front of him.

  ‘I don’t know what it is! De man’s just gone power mad.’

  Nina could see that Dunstan was beginning to relax as he realised that Alan was at least hearing him out.

  ‘’E’s orderin’ guys about, e’s movin’ people around that I’ve placed, ’e’s even dissing some of de boys down on de street! In front of deir own soldiers, you know’t I mean?

  ‘I know you left ’im in charge when you moved,’ Dunstan continued ‘but dat was to over-see. I’m de one running t’ings out dere, you get me? I know how to handle de boys. ’E’s making me look bad, Alan, you know’t I mean?’

  ‘But the goods are still selling?’

  ‘Yeah, everyt’ing’s cris’, cook and curry, but I can’t talk to Paul, you get me? ’E’s crazy! De man can’t leave de product alone, de geezer’s always high. You gotta talk to ’im or somefen, you know’t I mean!’

  ‘Something? And what would you suggest?’

  Nina knew from the tone in Alan’s voice that Dunstan would be wise to tread carefully here. Unfortunately, Dunstan did not.

  ‘Well ’e’s your brovver, you know’t I mean? Is you left ’im in charge. But I’d slap ’im into shape if it were down to me, you get me!’

  At this point Nina sensed that the youth had already said too much but the loquacious Dunstan blundered on.

  ‘And dere’s anovver fing. I didn’t wanna bring dis up but cozza de way Paul’s been acting, some of de boys have been thinking; dey t’ink you’re taking liberties, you’re taking too much out of de …’

  ‘Fook all of you wogs and niggers!’ It was here. The storm that Nina had anticipated had arrived. ‘Me and Paul are running things, who the fook do you think you’re dealing with?!’