Soho Angel

by Greg Keen

  ‘Who?

  ‘Quack who got struck off for writing snide prescriptions.’

  ‘How do you know?’ I asked.

  ‘Villiers told me,’ Farrelly said.

  ‘You went to see him?’

  ‘What option did I have after you ballsed everything up? If we didn’t have a straightener then chances were he’d have come after you.’

  A ‘straightener’ usually had only one outcome where Farrelly was concerned. As Jake Villiers was grinning from the pages of a celeb magazine, that clearly wasn’t the case in this instance.

  ‘What did you tell him?’ I asked.

  ‘That I sold you the shooter and any comeback was on me.’

  ‘Aren’t you worried?’

  Farrelly shook his head. ‘Ain’t nothing in it for him. Only reason he does anything is to keep what he’s got or get more of what he has.’

  ‘You came to a gentlemen’s agreement, then?’

  ‘I said that I’d have his knackers on toast if he came anywhere near you or me. He said that wouldn’t happen and we shook on it.’

  I believed Farrelly when he said that Jake only killed for profit. Jake probably believed that Farrelly would eat his knackers. The world was a safer place.

  ‘Although that means Jake gets away with killing Pauline Oakley,’ I said.

  ‘This time he does,’ was Farrelly’s verdict. ‘Jake’s got more front than Margate, but someone’ll fuck him over eventually. It just ain’t gonna be you.’

  A fox trotted into the middle of the road. It stared in the direction of Regent Street for a couple of moments, the streetlight making its eyes look like a pair of opals. Then it nosed the air and disappeared in the direction of Golden Square.

  ‘What happened to this bird, then?’ Farrelly asked.

  ‘Stephie? She broke up with Villiers before I went round.’

  ‘And you shot him anyway?’ Farrelly looked impressed.

  I opted not to confess that I’d pulled the trigger accidentally.

  ‘Back together?’ he asked.

  ‘Nope. I haven’t seen or heard from Stephie since I went into hospital.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Obviously she doesn’t give a shit.’

  Farrelly exhaled heavily. ‘You go after a dead bird so hard your nut explodes, but when it’s flesh and blood you chuck the towel in at the first hurdle.’

  It was neither the time nor the place to point out to Farrelly that he was mixing his sporting metaphors. ‘You may have a point,’ I said.

  ‘Get your feet off the fucking dashboard,’ he replied.

  In the run-up to my op, I stayed off the smokes, drank smoothies and ate my first-ever tofu fillet. I also left nine messages on Stephie’s phone, all of which she completely ignored. Bettina kept me in touch with how the book negotiations were progressing. The eventual amount was enough to keep me in alfalfa-shoot salads and beetroot zingers for life – assuming I was still around to eat them. DCI Shaheen called to say that the CPS had decided to prosecute Dean Allison for historic child abuse. Even if unsuccessful, the nature of the charge meant that everyone would vilify Dean and not just the JFA – who may, or may not, have given him a good kicking.

  It was late Friday afternoon when I pressed Odeerie’s intercom. Spring was in full flood. Not that it meant much to a man with less vitamin D in him than a coelacanth.

  ‘What d’you want?’ he asked.

  ‘Just fancied a chat.’

  ‘I am very busy, Kenny,’ the fat man said.

  ‘That’s a shame, because I’ve got a cheesecake from Maison Bertaux. But if you’re snowed under then I can always come round another time . . .’

  The lock buzzed open.

  While we demolished the cake, I filled Odeerie in on the news about Dean Allison. He wasn’t quite as jubilant as I’d been, but then he hadn’t met the guy face to face.

  ‘What about JJ Freeman?’ he asked. ‘Did he know anything about Dean and Emily?’

  ‘Don’t think so,’ I said. ‘JJ would have done something about it.’

  ‘Must be hard for him,’ the fat man said. ‘After all, Castor was his best mate when they were growing up. Ever think about going to see him?’

  As a matter of fact, I’d visited the Junction club two nights previously and sat at the bar. JJ had encored with ‘Crossfire Alley’, its piercing notes slashing through the gloom. It was a torch song for another place and another time.

  I’d left before JJ noticed I was there.

  ‘I’ll catch up with him eventually,’ I said. ‘Meanwhile there’s something I need to give you . . .’ I reached into my jacket and handed Odeerie a white envelope. He frowned, wiped his hands on a kitchen roll and opened it up.

  ‘What’s this?’

  ‘What does it look like?’

  ‘A cheque for a hundred and ten grand.’

  ‘That’s because it is a cheque for a hundred and ten grand.’

  Odeerie’s bushy eyebrows knitted together.

  ‘Only you can’t cash it,’ I said.

  ‘Kenny, are you okay?’

  ‘But you will be able to present it in a couple of weeks. Hopefully.’

  The fat man looked no less concerned.

  ‘It’s half the advance I got from agreeing to write a book about the search for Cas and Em.’ I took Odeerie through the discussions I’d had with Billingsgate. ‘And that’s just the publishing end. The movie rights won’t be sorted for a few months, although they’re already talking to Idris Elba about playing you.’

  ‘Seriously?’

  ‘Well, you never know. It all depends on me surviving the operation, though. If I can’t write the book then all bets are off.’

  ‘You haven’t changed your mind about coming back?’

  I shook my head. ‘If I get through okay I’m doing something else with my life. The book money should give me a good start.’

  ‘You’ll be fine, Kenny,’ Odeerie said. ‘Just one thing, though . . .’

  ‘What’s that?’ I asked.

  ‘Wouldn’t Denzel Washington be a better choice for me?’

  A couple of kids found Castor’s shotgun beside a railway track near Hastings. It provoked a huge police search and God knows how many column inches of media speculation. My best guess was that Castor had had a flight stash in case his cover was ever blown, and probably a fake passport or two as well. Photographs would begin to emerge online of a Caucasian guy who answered Castor’s description and was allegedly living on an Indian ashram or a Kenyan sugar plantation.

  Two days before my operation I’d fallen into a late-night doze when the intercom went. It was two in the morning. Although Farrelly had sorted Jake Villiers out, I put both security chains on the door and peered through the crack.

  ‘Don’t say a word,’ Stephie said. ‘Do not say a fucking word.’

  Our naked bodies told different stories. Stephie’s taut skin and sleek muscles were a tale of early-morning runs punctuated with Pilates sessions and a diet rich in protein and essential nutrients. Mine was a far less wholesome physical narrative. Not for the first time, I thanked God for the forgiveness of women. We were sharing the cigarette that I kept with a miniature of Monarch in my sock drawer in case of dire emergency. The last twenty minutes scarcely counted as that, but I’d made an exception.

  Stephie sent a jet of smoke towards the bedroom ceiling before handing the Marlboro back to my side of the bed.

  ‘Here we are again, then,’ I said.

  ‘Thought I told you not to say anything,’ she replied.

  ‘Yeah, but now that we’ve . . . Isn’t it okay?’

  ‘Not if you come out with shit like here we are again then it isn’t.’

  I took a final toke from the cigarette and extinguished it on the heel of one of my shoes. ‘So, why are you here?’ I asked.

  ‘Wasn’t that obvious?’

  ‘I meant why did you change your mind?’

  ‘About what?’

  ‘Marryin
g Jake.’

  Stephie took so long to answer that I thought she’d either decided not to or had fallen asleep.

  ‘Don’t try to make this anything other than it is, Kenny,’ she said.

  ‘Of course not. Er . . . What is it, exactly?’

  ‘A never-to-be-repeated trip down memory lane that I’m already beginning to regret.’ More silence. ‘Look, maybe what you said about how I felt about you and how I felt about Jake was true. Despite how much I sincerely wish it wasn’t.’

  ‘Then what’s stopping us from carrying on where we left off?’

  ‘I was gutted when you didn’t show up in Manchester. What have you ever done for me, Kenny? What have you ever put on the line?’

  Not a lot I could say.

  ‘Exactly! Sod all, that’s what.’ Stephie levered herself out of bed and started to dress. ‘Are you back working yet?’ she asked. ‘You and Odeerie must be flooded with stuff after all that publicity.’

  ‘Actually, I’ve decided to try something new.’

  ‘Like what?

  ‘I’m co-writing a book about the search for Emily and Castor.’

  ‘How long will that take?’

  ‘Six months or so. I haven’t started yet.’

  Stephie squinted at me suspiciously.

  ‘I’m going on a trip,’ I added.

  ‘Where to?’

  ‘Not sure.’

  Stephie pulled on her jeans. ‘Yeah, well, that’s probably not a bad idea. You need to get some decent rest after your operation and I’m glad you’re turning over a new leaf. It’s about bloody time. When d’you get back?’

  ‘Soon, hopefully.’

  ‘Okay, well, maybe we’ll have a drink when you are.’

  ‘I’d like that,’ I said.

  After Stephie left, I couldn’t get to sleep. I gave it up as a bad job around 4 a.m. and threw the living room curtains open. A cleaning van trundled past in the street below. A man took a piss in the doorway of the Yip Hing, two women ran past in day-glo Lycra tracksuits, and a helicopter hovered over Oxford Circus.

  Dawn would break in half an hour and another day would begin in earnest. All over Soho, people would be swindled, delighted, heartbroken, promoted, abused, bored, educated, appalled, diagnosed, bewildered and caught red-handed.

  Further afield, Pam Ridley would get out of bed and go to her first cleaning job of the day. Perhaps she would imagine what her daughter might be doing had Castor Greaves not introduced her to heroin and Chop Montague killed her. Davina Jackson would begin limbering up at City Stretch, Sweat Dog would load up his ink gun in Muswell Hill and DCI Shaheen would interview another suspect on Savile Row.

  Perhaps Castor had made it out of the country and this time really was living anonymously in some distant part of the world. However pointless life may seem, it’s still the only game in town.

  The sun had fully risen by the time the intercom buzzed. ‘Taxi for Kenny Gabriel to go to St Mick’s Hospital,’ my driver said.

  ‘On my way down,’ I told him.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Thanks to:

  Kiare – as always.

  Jack Butler and the Thomas & Mercer team.

  Veronique Baxter at David Higham Associates.

  Russel D McLean.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Photo © 2016 Kiare Ladner

  Born in Liverpool, Greg Keen got his first job in London’s Soho over twenty years ago and has worked there ever since; his fascination with the area made it a natural setting for his books. Soho Dead, the first in the Soho Series of urban-noir crime novels, won the CWA Debut Dagger in 2015. Greg lives in London.