Body Blow

by Peter Cocks

  However, this house couldn’t have been less like Tommy Kelly’s period property back in London. It looked like everyone’s idea of a villain’s house. White walls, palm trees, glass and chrome everywhere. I tried to look straight ahead as I carried in trays of food, not wanting to appear inquisitive, yet incapable of stopping my eyes from darting left and right, wondering if I would catch sight of the man himself.

  It was still only nine in the morning, so I guessed the family was still in bed. Besides, we weren’t in the main part of the house. We were setting up outside, on the vast patio area and in the pool house. We put up circular gas burners for the paella pans and to cook the fish, which for the moment was kept in cold boxes that I stacked inside the pool house.

  It was impressive inside, in a flashy kind of way. The floor was made up of dark grey flagstones, cool underfoot, and the walls were lined with smooth wooden planks. A jukebox stood at one end, and near it a pool table. There was a big black-and-white photo of the Kray Twins on the wall and, hanging next to it, a pair of giant-sized red boxing gloves. At the other end of the room there was a steel-topped bar with a shelf above it, groaning with every known colourful cocktail ingredient, and there were optics filled with the usual stuff – gin, vodka, whisky and rum. There was beer on tap and fridges were stocked with bottles of different brands.

  The whole place felt like a cool American bar.

  I remembered where I was and why I was here, and slipped a small magnetic mic from my pocket and attached it to the underside of the bar. It may not have been the ideal position, but I knew from experience that you had to seize the moment. I didn’t know if I was ever coming back. I heard someone come in and quickly popped up from beneath the counter.

  Fortunately it was only Juana.

  “What are you doing?” she asked.

  “Trying to keep all this stuff cool,” I said.

  “As long as you’re not stealing drinks,” she retorted, and smiled.

  “I’m not a thief,” I protested.

  “Don’t even think about it,” she said. “These are pretty dangerous people.”

  “I know,” I said. Juana narrowed her eyes at me. “I mean … I’ve heard.

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  When he finally came out of the house, there was no doubt about which one was Patsy Kelly.

  Guests had started arriving at 12.30 p.m. and the lane outside Casa Pampas suddenly became clogged with Porsches, Ferraris and four-by-fours representing every luxury brand. The crowd was exactly what you’d imagine at a villain’s birthday party in the sun. There was an explosion of shirts that looked like splashes of coloured vomit. There were lightweight suits in pale and pastel shades. Feather-cut hair and highlights. Plenty of jewellery.

  And, as the joke goes, that was just the blokes.

  There were some local dignitaries, too: Spanish men with moustaches, slicked-back hair and shiny suits. Juana recognized one as the local mayor and another as a minor politician from Mijas.

  Of course there were a few heavies as well, bullet-bonced in white shirts and reeking of aftershave. The women were just as fragrant but their outfits more varied, jockeying for position as the lowest cut top, the highest split thigh, the most exposed back.

  In my experience, villains’ wives tend to fall into two categories: the faithful girls who have been with them and stayed loyal since way back when; and the second wives and girlfriends who tend to be twenty years younger than the gnarly old arms they’re hanging off. What both types have in common is that they make the effort. This lot were buffed, shined, manicured, pedicured and waxed to within an inch of their lives. Whatever they had was on show, whether backs, fronts, legs or teeth. They were like prize ponies, there to reinforce the status of their owners.

  Patsy Kelly’s girlfriend was at the top of the pile. She wore a dress split to the waist, showing brown, oiled, gym-toned legs that rippled like those of a thoroughbred. The back of the dress was scooped down to the cleft of her buttocks and the front looked as if two small bald blokes were trying to escape from it.

  My breath came in short bursts as I caught my first sight of Patsy Kelly. The family resemblance was clear: Patsy was a redder-headed, coarser-looking version of his elder brother. His skin was more tanned, the teeth bigger, whiter. His eyes were harder; not cold, but hooded and angry, darting around, checking on everyone and everything.

  When it came to clothing, Patsy Kelly parted company with his brother completely. Tommy was all understated Savile Row suits and suede shoes. Patsy looked as if he might be doing a Las Vegas show: linen frock coat, frilly shirt and crocodile loafers. He had rings on at least four fingers; gold, with one flashing a large stone. Heavy gold chain dangled from his wrist and around his neck.

  There were murmurs of “Pats” and “Patsy” as he stepped out onto the patio. Handshakes and back slaps were exchanged and more champagne was poured.

  The thing about serving drinks is that no one is even looking at you. You might be invisible for all the thanks you get, and this crowd’s manners weren’t all that. Not that I minded; invisible was fine by me.

  The lunch was served from giant paella pans and people sat eating under umbrellas at café tables set around the pool. I poured more champagne, sangria and Rioja and the pitch of the conversation became louder and rowdier with each drink, almost drowning out the flamenco guitarists who were playing on the far side of the pool.

  I helped clear up and took the opportunity to slip inside the house, where the kitchen was open for washing up. I dumped a pile of plates in the dishwasher and considered. There was no one around except for one of our guys, washing up at the sink. I felt under the worktops and found an overhanging lip. I dug in my pocket and brought out a small bug, sticking it underneath, out of the way.

  Encouraged by my success and the quiet in the house, I ventured through into the open-plan lounge, which was furnished with leather furniture, thick rugs and big, tacky lights. I planted another behind the steel uprights of a bookshelf, then slipped through to the hallway.

  There were several doors off the hall and stairs up to the next level. I had half a mind to nip up the stairs, but I heard a toilet flush and one of the doors near me opened, leaving me frozen to the spot. Terry Gadd, the man with the blond mullet who I had seen at Jubarry’s, came out. He sniffed and pinched his nostrils, looking straight at me. He was followed by a woman; not the one I had seen him with before, but a brunette of even more generous proportions, also wiping her nose.

  “What you looking at, tinkle?” he asked. I was caught out.

  “Lo siento,” I said. “Lost.”

  “Kitchen’s that way.” He pointed at the door at the side of the hall and, feeling simultaneously stupid, guilty and terrified, I thanked him and went back outside.

  The dancing started at around six and I continued to pour drinks. Terry Gadd caught my eye once or twice and I looked away. I had been stupid drawing attention to myself like that.

  The band played “La Bamba” and people did that drunken jive thing, spinning around and laughing. The mayor and the politician sat together with their wives. They drank moderately, covering their glasses with a hand when offered, looking a little out of place. Others sat around, quietly sloshed, chatting and smoking.

  I think I was the only person to see the sniper.

  I was standing near Patsy Kelly, and being one of the few sober people left in the place I still had my wits about me. I don’t know why I was looking up, but something drew my eye to the roof. It was only as if a shadow had passed, but I kept my eye on the tiles and saw the movement again. As my eyes adjusted to the lowering sun coming from behind the roof, I saw it was the top of a head, and, pressed to it, the telescopic sights of a gun.

  And I could see where it was aimed.

  I would probably have saved myself and plenty of other people a lot of bother, had I just watched and let the planned course of events unfold.

  However, instinctively I shouted to Patsy to look out. He’d had
plenty to drink and was slow turning round, but I leapt over and pushed him as the gun went off – and a woman sitting at a table near the pool took the bullet destined for Patsy Kelly. The woman next to her shrieked as blood spouted from her friend and another shot ricocheted off the tiles around the pool. Suddenly screams went up from everywhere, the music stopped and men drew pistols and looked for the source of the gunfire.

  A second gunman appeared on the roof and, along with the first, sprayed bullets across the patio of Casa Pampas. People ran for cover inside the house and the pool-house bar while Terry Gadd and a couple of others shot randomly up at the roof. Patsy Kelly was well inside by the time the would-be assassins had skidded down the slates and away into the scrubland behind the house. When Terry Gadd scaled the back wall, they were long gone.

  One of Patsy’s heavies had taken a shot to the head and was lying in a pool of blood. I looked across the patio to where the first woman was lying, bleeding, across a table. She looked dead, her dress soaked black with the blood. There were two more bodies on the poolside: another woman, motionless, and a man, clutching his thigh and groaning. I looked around for Juana but could see her nowhere. I suddenly had a horrible premonition and crept out from under the roof to look in the pool.

  There was a body there and, to my instant relief, I realized that it wasn’t Juana, but a small boy in a black suit, his fedora hat floating beside him in the bloody water that curdled around his body.

  I dived in.

  TWENTY-NINE

  Donnie’s new shoes were pinching.

  He was seriously pissed off. The day before, he’d driven up to El Corte Inglés, the department store just outside Málaga, and bought himself a nice new pair of daisy roots. They were soft leather, like before – Spanish, but in the low light of a dark club they could be mistaken for Gucci. In the shop he’d thought they fitted like a glove, but today, after walking around in the heat, they were nipping his toes on one foot and rubbing the heel of the other into a blister.

  He’d really bought them so he’d have something new and smart to wear to the birthday party, but it wasn’t until he had phoned Terry Gadd the night before that he realized he wasn’t invited.

  “You may be back in,” Gadd had said, “but you’re staff, Don. Not family.”

  The rejection had hurt. The bottle of single malt he’d bought for Patsy was unwrapped and consumed. In England he had definitely been part of the family: a long-serving driver, hit man and minder, trusted enough to ferry Tommy Kelly’s wife and kids around. Trusted enough to murder anyone who got in the way.

  To be rejected by the younger brother was a big, dry slap in the face.

  By Saturday lunchtime, Donnie consoled himself by driving down to the beach and paddling his hot, sore feet in the surf. A couple of beers later, he was feeling marginally better and after a few more he began to feel human. Or as close as he ever got.

  By six in the evening he was rolling drunk, walking from bar to bar, propping up various counters and smoking, talking to anyone who dared communicate with a drunk who looked as if he could walk through brick walls. Donnie barely noticed the sirens that raced up into the hills as the sun began to set, stuck as he was in a drunken conversation with an English bloke in a bar.

  His tongue loosened by beer, vodka, wine, brandy and cocaine, Donnie found himself overcoming his dented pride by bragging.

  A lot of them did it down here, Donnie knew, bigging themselves up to make it sound like they were connected; blokes who boasted that they had worked with the Krays years back, as if that still gave them protection. If everyone who reckoned they’d played a part in the Brink’s-Mat gold bullion robbery had actually been there, there would have been about a thousand villains on the job. The Brink’s-Mat robbery of twenty-five million pounds’ worth of gold bars from Heathrow Airport, back in the 1980s, had certainly set a few up in business – but not even a tenth of those who claimed to be connected.

  Donnie had never mouthed off like that. He had never needed to, as he’d always been confident about his protected place in the Kelly firm. And the ruthlessness of the Kellys had never been in question, nor its bankrolling of jobs. The Kelly firm had been pivotal in making the Brink’s-Mat job come off but had never felt the need to boast. Now Donnie felt like a large turtle without its protective shell: needy, vulnerable and drunk.

  Bragging.

  He talked about keeping the Eastern Europeans at bay and whacking small-time Spanish dealers. He talked about protecting nightclubs back in the UK and running cocaine up the Channel.

  By the time the English bloke had bought him two more large vodkas, he was talking about the big Romanian and Russian names who had moved in, about how he was trusted by Patsy Kelly and how he even knew about an important prison move that was taking place in England.

  Donnie clumsily tapped his nose to emphasize the secrecy of the move. A secret now shared with the stranger and anyone else who was listening at the bar.

  The bloke hadn’t appeared particularly interested. In fact, Donnie barely remembered anything about him by the end of the evening, save for his nasal voice, unremarkable, unlined face and crinkly hair, and could hardly recall anything he’d told him. Couldn’t remember when and on what terms they’d parted.

  It was only when he was fumbling in the pocket of his jacket for his apartment key later that night that Donnie pulled out the creased photo the man had given him, asking if Donnie knew the bloke in the picture. Donnie couldn’t see straight and put the photo back in his pocket, where he forgot about it for some time to come.

  I woke up looking straight at her beautiful face. A mass of dark curls spread across the covers and long, black lashes stayed firmly shut. Where her face was pressed against the pillow, her lips were pushed out into a pout and I leant over and kissed them. Her eyes flickered and I kissed her again. Her eyes opened.

  She looked surprised to see me for an instant, then appeared to remember and her face relaxed into a smile.

  The day before had turned into a bit of a bun fight, to say the least. I had finally found Juana at the end of the day, trembling and traumatized after the bloodbath she had witnessed at Patsy Kelly’s poolside.

  I had hauled the kid out of the pool and pumped the water out of his chest, not even realizing, as I saved him, that he was Patsy Kelly’s son. Helping Kelly dodge the bullet and rescuing his son and heir, I felt I was becoming a bit of an unwitting patron saint to this family who had dogged my life for the past year and more.

  The kid had honked up some pool water and jerked back to life, breathing in rasping spasms. I’d taken his little suit jacket off and found that his arm had been merely nicked by a bullet. There was a lot of blood, but the wound was superficial. In fact, once he was out of danger, I was sure that in time both he and his father would be proud of his first wound.

  There had been a lot of screaming, shouting and confusion, and after half an hour a couple of ambulances had snaked their way up from the town. At the final count there were several walking wounded, a few more serious casualties and two bodies: the English woman who had caught Patsy’s bullet in the throat, and Ricky Barker, one of Patsy’s minders. Both dead as doornails. One of the more seriously injured was Barry, who had taken two or three bullets in his lower abdomen and bellowed and roared with pain. They were pouring brandy down his neck as his light grey slacks darkened with blood and his wrinkled face paled with the loss of it. He eventually passed out and was stretchered away, closely followed by a wailing Julie. No one else seemed too bothered about him. Patsy and son were safe.

  The Spanish police put in an appearance and made some perfunctory notes, looking vacantly at the roof where the assailants had escaped. Really, they must have known that this sort of crime was out of their league. It was the kind of incident that would be settled by the involved parties, not by a couple of Spanish plods.

  We started to clear up the catering stuff and filled the vans while Patsy Kelly and his family licked their wounds indoors. Terr
y Gadd saw us off the premises, assuring Carlos, who was shaking like a leaf, that we’d still get paid. Juana and I dumped the empty platters and crates back at Jubarry’s and locked up, with no appetite to keep it open any later.

  We walked into town, away from the port and into the backstreets, where we both felt a little more secure. We held hands on the way, needing each other’s company. We stopped in a quiet tapas bar down an alley, shared a carafe of red wine and picked at some olives. The place smelt of wood smoke, and a guy picked out quiet flamenco on his guitar, drowned out by the football that the patron was watching at the bar.

  We went back to the flat, clung to each other for a feeling of security. We held each other tight, then tighter still, then we kissed and pulled each other’s clothes off. Eventually we slept a bit and woke up late morning.

  “This town is getting worse,” Juana said. I got out of bed and drew back the curtains, letting in midday light. “It has always been bad, but now it is becoming a battlefield.”

  She told me about her wayward father and his drug problem, and how her mother had struggled to support her. I was certainly able to relate to that. I told her as much as I could about my situation. I felt I knew her already; we felt familiar and easy talking together. We just clicked. We got on to the subject of mothers and how protective they can be. Juana seemed to be as protective of her mother as her mother was of her. She said her mother always seemed to go for the wrong men.

  “And you?”

  “I choose carefully,” she said. She rolled back and stretched, pushing the sheet away unselfconsciously, displaying her long brown body.

  “So why me?” I asked, part probing, part looking for flattery.

  “I feel comfortable with you,” she said. “And I don’t think you’re as dumb as you act.”

  I laughed. I put my hand on the flat of her stomach and felt the rise and fall of her breath. She rolled towards me and put her hand on my waist, then let it trail down to the scar on my stomach.