Ruiz takes a sip of wine and a handful of cashews. Miranda has stopped talking and grown pensive, one tooth biting into her bottom lip.
‘You all right?’
She nods and starts telling him about her new parolee, Sami Macbeth, released after nearly three years in prison. Tells him the story of his sister going missing.
Ruiz is thinking runaway. This Nadia is probably having the time of her life. She’s found herself a boyfriend, doesn’t want to associate with a jailbird brother.
Miranda hands him a photograph - a prison mugshot that must have come from Macbeth’s file.
‘What was this guy in for?’
‘Possession of stolen goods.’
‘First timer.’
She nods.
‘What makes him think his sister is in trouble?’
Miranda tells him how Nadia abandoned her flat. She hasn’t turned up for work or at college. Isn’t answering her phone.
‘When was the last time he heard from her?’
‘A week ago.’
‘This Nadia have a boyfriend?’
‘According to Sami she had started seeing a guy called Toby Streak.’
Ruiz doesn’t know the name. ‘What does Streak have to say?’
‘Says that he and Nadia parted company. Last time he saw her she was with Tony Murphy.’
Now there’s a name that does ring a bell. Dozens of them, pealing from the rooftops.
Miranda senses as much.
‘It’s not good news, is it?’
Nothing about Murphy is good news, thinks Ruiz. ‘What do you want me to do?’
‘I thought you might ask around - make a few calls, you’re good at that sort of thing.’
‘What sort of thing?’
‘Finding girls.’
‘I’m a bit long in the tooth.’
‘As a favour,’ she says, rubbing her stockinged foot against his ankle. ‘I feel good about this guy. I don’t think he’s a bad egg. He wants to straighten himself out.’
Ruiz has to fight the urge not to run his hand up her leg to her thigh. After another glass of wine he’s beginning to settle in for the evening - something Miranda recognises.
‘Off you go, big man,’ she says.
‘Why?’
‘It’s Friday night. I’m going out,’ she says.
‘Who with?’
‘None of your business.’
She gives him a hug. Ruiz runs his hands down the small of her back and squeezes her backside.
‘What was that for?’ she purrs into his mouth.
‘Old time’s sake.’
‘Stop calling yourself old,’ she says.
‘It’s all right for you. You still look great.’
‘It just takes me twice as long to look half as good.’
Ruiz smells her hair and turns away, walking up the stairs, onto the street. How is it, he wonders, that something so soft can make him so hard.
13
When Sami was in Wormwood Scrubs he received a letter from a girl called Kate Tierney. Kate used to hang around the band - not like a groupie, but as part of the entourage.
She was dating the drummer, Shortie, a good-looking bastard who treated her like shit. What is it about drummers? Ringo Starr falls out of the ugly tree, hits every branch, yet still manages to pull birds like Patti Boyd and Barbara Bach, a Bond girl for fuck’s sake.
Sami used to lust after Kate from afar, or at least from the front of the stage. She was always upfront, in the mosh-pit, eyes closed, swaying to the music.
She was only eighteen when he first met her. When that particular band broke up, she drifted away. Over the next few years he bumped into her once or twice before losing touch.
Then Sami got sent down for a stretch. Three months in, he gets a letter from Kate Tierney. Perfumed. Little blue flowers around the border. Sami lay back in his cell and imagined the same little blue flowers on the edges of her knickers.
After that she wrote to him twice a week. Told him about her life. Her folks had been rich until her old man invested in junk bonds and blew the lot. Kate went from a private school in Surrey to a comprehensive in Hackney.
Sami had no idea why Kate decided to write to him. Maybe she felt sorry for him. Maybe she’d secretly fancied him for years. Maybe the reason was more fundamental and deep seated.
He asked her to send him a photograph. She sent one of her wearing a silk teddy, sitting astride a rocking horse. That’s when he realised it was about lust. He was now a bad boy. An outlaw. Some girls think they deserve guys like that.
Kate Tierney studied hotel management and got a job working at the Savoy. She started in reception and worked her way up to night manager.
Sami calls her at work. Tells her he needs somewhere to stay. He’s spent all afternoon and evening looking for Nadia. Visiting her friends, talking to her workmates. He’s not going back to the bail hostel.
Kate thinks about it. Puts him on hold. Sami can hear her talking in a posh voice to one of the guests, telling Mr Somersby to have a nice evening and enjoy the opera.
Then she’s back on the phone, whispering about the tradesman’s entrance in a side street near Embankment Gardens. He has to wait till ten. Call her when he’s outside.
Sami does as she says.
The fire door opens. Kate looks great. She’s dressed like an airline stewardess only sexier, in a black pencil skirt and a fitted black blazer. Armani. Her eyes are made up to look huge and her hair is piled up on her head, making her neck look even longer.
‘You can stay, but you have to be out by six,’ she whispers, waving him inside. The door shuts.
She takes him upstairs in a service lift. Unlocks a suite with a master key. The place is bigger than most of the houses Sami has lived in.
‘Don’t take anything from the mini-bar. I have to go. I’ll come see you later.’
Sami has a shower. He’s so whacked out he almost falls asleep under the water, which is spilling out of this big silver head the size of a dinner plate.
Afterwards, he puts on one of those soft white robes and crawls onto the bed. He needs to think. Needs to sleep. His eyes close. He dreams.
It’s about Kate Tierney and it’s not unlike a lot of the dreams he’s had about her in the past two and a bit years. She’s cupping his balls in her right hand and taking him in her mouth. She looks up his chest, into his eyes, and then rubs her tongue along the length of him, popping him into her mouth, sucking hard enough to almost bring him off. Just when he’s about to blow, she pinches him hard just below the head of his penis.
That’s when he wakes up and looks down. Sees her tousled blonde hair. She crawls up the bed, straddling his chest, rocking her hips back and forth.
She eases back, squats over him, takes him inside. He can see their reflection in the mirror. Sami looks twice to make sure it’s him. Surely he must be in heaven. He’s lying on Egyptian cotton sheets in one of the most expensive hotel suites in London, being screwed by a girl he’s fantasised about for more nights than he can remember. Kate Tierney. No longer a wet dream. A reality.
Later, as they’re lying in bed, they talk about old times, about the past couple of years. She wants to know all about prison, the nitty gritty, the violence, the gangs. Kate seems to get off on all those men being in the one place. Sexually frustrated men. Unfulfilled. Violent.
Sami doesn’t need much time to recover. Kate gets on all fours and says, ‘Show me how they do it in prison.’
Prison sex normally involves a left hand and a bartered copy of Big Jugs magazine but Sami thinks her version is a lot more interesting.
They cuddle afterwards. It’s nice. They know stuff about each other. Sami remembers the details of her letters. He knows about her brothers and her father losing his job and how they always spend Christmas in Scotland with relatives. She wrote about ordinary run-of-the-mill stuff, but Sami loved reading about it. It made him feel normal or at least that one day his life could be normal.
At six the next morning he’s out of the Savoy the way he came in, smelling of sex and tasting Kate on his lips. Sami buys a coffee from a kiosk near Embankment Tube. Sits on a bench in Victoria Gardens. Makes his plans for the day. The wind comes off the river and tugs at the coats of commuters leaving the station.
Tony Murphy denied any knowledge of Nadia, but he could have been lying. Toby Streak was too frightened to be telling lies. So what does he do next?
He takes a crumpled piece of paper from his pocket and smooths it on his knee. The name and number are written in pencil. Vincent Ruiz. Sounds foreign.
Sami looks at his watch. It’s gone seven. He flips open his phone and punches the number. Gets an answering machine.
‘Hello, ah, this is Sami Macbeth. You don’t know me. I’m, ah, looking for my sister, Nadia. Ms Wallace, my probation officer, said you might be able to help me. You can call me on this number … if you’re interested.’
Sami can’t think of anything else to say. He hangs up and buys another coffee. Contemplates a doughnut. Suddenly, his mobile beeps and he glances at the screen. It’s Nadia’s number. His heart flip-flops in his chest like a landed fish. Hot coffee spills over his fingertips. He opens the handset.
Two words and an address, that’s all she sends him.
Meet me, is the message. It’s not an explanation. Not an apology.
The address is in the East End. Sami hits redial. Waits. The number rings out. Why is she playing games with him?
14
Sami emerges from Whitechapel Underground and studies a map on the wall beside the ticket office. He played his first pub gig not far from here - in the basement of the White Hart, with a band called Raw Liver.
The venue was so small and PA so large, it was noisier than the Blitz according to the locals, who called the police and tried to have the gig stopped. That’s what young bands do - make bold statements, argued Sami. Raw Liver seemed to be saying, ‘We might not be as good as the Stones, but we’re louder.’
He walks the last half-mile to the address. The place looks like a fortress with barbed wire on the rooftops, metal shutters, broken windows and a graffiti paintjob.
Sami is feeling double uneasy. This reeks of a set-up. Why is Nadia’s mobile still turned off? He looks at the message again … tries to read between the words.
Most of the flats don’t have numbers. Some of them don’t have doors. Sami finds the right one by a process of elimination. Second floor, third one along, with a patched plywood door and ‘Fuck off’ scrawled across it.
Sami knocks. Nobody answers. He tries again and then calls through the remnants of the mailbox.
Someone is coming.
A black rasta opens the door, with beads clacking. Levi’s sit low on his hips and his tight-fitting red T-shirt has a picture of Bob Marley in full voice.
‘What’s up, mon?’ he asks.
‘I’m looking for Nadia.’
‘What took you so long? She been waiting,’ he says in a singsong voice.
‘Who are you?’
‘Puffa.’
Sami walks through the kitchen. The sink is overflowing with takeaway tins and garbage. No way Nadia is living in a place like this. There’s a chicken sticking out of the plughole. Why in fuck’s name did someone try to shove a chicken down the drain?
Next comes the lounge or maybe it’s a bedroom. The floor is littered with punctured cans, pipes, cones, tin foil, burnt spoons, needles, tourniquets, half-filled bottles of water and wedges of lemon. It’s a drug den, a crack house.
The room is dark. There are two bodies sleeping on bean-bags and two more curled up on a mattress. Sami listens to make sure they’re breathing. You got to be careful around junkies. They get paranoid. Psychotic.
Puffa has disappeared. He was here a moment ago. Sami moves along a corridor past another filthy room. Empty. Reeking. He opens the next door with his elbow. The smell hits him first. It’s like something died weeks ago and nobody bothered giving it a decent burial.
Puffa is near the window.
The curtains open. The brightness is like an explosion.
Sami spots the baseball bat but sees it too late. He tries to duck and the bat bounces off the top of his head. Pain explodes and his brain washes from one side of his skull to the other.
The next blow almost breaks across his back. He drops to his knees in a world of hurt and tries to crawl away but the bat keeps hitting him, bouncing off his neck, his shoulders, his lower back …
Sami is doubled over and vomiting. Fingers lace in his hair and slam his head forward onto a raised knee. His bottom lip bursts against his teeth. Blood leaks into his mouth.
He doesn’t want to fight. He doesn’t want to get up. He just wants the beating to stop.
Someone drags him up. Sits him in a chair. Hits him again. Sami’s head flies off at a different angle. The room goes dark. Drops away. Disappears.
Sometime later he sees a blurred light and the air swims for a moment before things come into focus. Nadia is curled at his feet, resting her head on his lap. She’s wearing only jeans and a bra.
Sami wants to stroke her hair but his arms are tied behind his back. Bound to a chair. Blood and saliva stain his shirt.
Nadia turns her head. ‘I’m so sorry, baby,’ she whispers, stroking his cheek. Weightless and brittle, her eyes are black rimmed and cavernous.
Sami’s mouth is taped. He can’t answer.
He scans the room, looking for a way out. It has a wardrobe, a soiled mattress and two armchairs worn thin by squirming arses. A dirty brown blanket lies curled on the floor. Everything is brown - brown walls, brown carpet, brown furniture.
The door opens. Nadia stands. She smiles at Puffa, who sways into the room like he’s on a catwalk. No way this emaciated crackhead beat Sami up. He must have had help.
Nadia becomes someone different. She wraps her arms around Puffa’s neck. Squeezes her thighs around his leg.
‘Have you got something for baby?’ she purrs. ‘Baby needs her medicine.’
Puffa grins with a gob full of gold.
‘First you got to dance for me, princess. Show me how much you want it.’
Nadia hesitates. ‘Don’t make me do it now.’
‘What’s wrong?’
‘Not in front of my brother.’
Puffa shakes his head. His dreadlocks swing. ‘How bad you want to ride the dragon?’
‘Please.’
‘Come on, princess, just one dance. Show Sami how much you love the dragon.’
Nadia is about to cry. She pleads with him again.
‘First you dance,’ he says.
And she does, holding her arms above her head, rolling her hips in long slow circles. Her eyes are closed. Tears of shame glisten on her cheeks.
Puffa isn’t watching her. He’s looking at Sami. He pushes his face close.
‘Do you know what crack is, mon?’ He holds up a small yellow stone between his thumb and forefinger. ‘It’s the devil’s sputum.’
Sami can feel his face burning and his skin crawling. He wants to cry. He wants to go home. He doesn’t want to play anymore. Puffa sits cross-legged in front of Sami, so he can watch what he’s doing. Nadia is watching too, as she dances. Pale. Beautiful. Ugly.
Puffa burns a cigarette and collects the ash, putting it in a makeshift pipe fashioned from a mini whisky bottle, chewing gum, a rubber band and foil. He flattens the ash in the pipe and nestles the crack on top.
He signals Nadia. She drops to her knees like a dog begging for food or waiting for a scrap to fall from the table. She’s hooked. Taken. Spoken for.
Sami wants to yell at her. He raises his feet a few inches from the floor and stamps them down, making the chair jump.
Nadia turns. Sami pleads with his eyes.
‘I need to do this,’ she says.
Sami stamps his feet again.
Puffa laughs. ‘She doesn’t love you any more, mon. She loves the rock. She loves the rockman.’
/> Sami tries to launch himself out of the chair. The bindings hold him back.
‘Cool it bro, you got to chill,’ says Puffa, as he holds the pipe towards Nadia and turns the lighter upside down. A bubbling crackling sound fills the room and smoke as white as cotton wool is trapped in the glass.
Nadia inhales. Her cheeks puff out. Her eyes shut. Her head lolls back. She tries to hold the smoke in her mouth and then swallow it bit by bit, holding it in her lungs for a minute or more until it seems as though she might pass out if she doesn’t exhale.
Nadia looks at Sami and smiles. It’s not her normal, beautiful, radiant smile. It’s a chemical reaction. Opiate-induced. Her pupils are dilated. Her hands are twitching. She’s blissful. Ecstatic. She’s gone now. In another place.
Puffa chuckles. ‘Don’t she just love the dragon.’
Sami’s head is spinning. The pain makes it hard to frame questions, let alone answers. He can see the pulse beating in Nadia’s neck and the flaring of her nostrils.
She’s started to come down. It’s not like falling off a cliff. It’s like the walls of paradise are nothing but stucco façades and behind them lie ugliness, anxiety, despair …
‘The devil does it every time,’ says Puffa. ‘He tricks you. Makes you believe you’re in heaven, but when you’ve signed up, when you’ve taken the pledge, when you’ve hocked your soul, he shows you the gates of hell and says, “Don’t believe the brochures, mon”.’
Nadia is clawing at the skin on her forearms and whimpering like a frightened child in the biggest, darkest haunted house imaginable.
Sami looks at Puffa. Pleads with his eyes. He has to give her something. Make her better.
Puffa takes a tablet from his pocket. ‘It’s Valium,’ he explains. ‘It will help her come down.’
Puffa peels the wrapper off a chocolate bar and takes a bite. His eyes have a liquid sheen as he looks at Nadia proudly, as though his work here is done.
After ten minutes, she’s calm.
‘I need another pipe,’ she says.
‘Ain’t got no more rock.’
‘But I need some, baby.’
‘Maybe I dropped some on the floor.’
Nadia doesn’t hesitate. She’s on all fours, looking for crumbs of crack on the stained rug or between the floorboards, trying to force the wooden planks apart with her fingernails. She’s not Sami’s sister any more. Not the one he remembers. She’s a ghost. She’s a crack whore.
Bombproof Page 7
