‘It’s time for his nap.’ Neville looked up to find the nanny hovering over him.
He checked her out, slowly, from head to toe. There was nothing remarkable about her except he’d swear that mousy-brown hair of hers didn’t look right.
‘How did this happen?’ He soothed the pad of his finger over the rash.
She smiled brightly at him. Neville noted only her lips spread the rest of her face remained frozen like ice. ‘Babies are delicate things and susceptible to all manner of ailments.’
She leaned down to take Natty, whose fussing increased no end. Neville’s big hand flashed out and she yelped as he grabbed her by her pretty blouse and yanked her close.
His hot breath and heated words smothered her face. ‘If it comes to my attention that you’ve been causing mischief to my grandson I’m going to make it my business to saw your hands very slowly from the ends of your arms.’
Abruptly he let her go and she stumbled back. Drawing in quick breaths she stammered, ‘I have never…ever…been treated in such a fashion ever in my life.’
‘Then why don’t you pack your gear and go?’
Her lips snapped shut. Thought as much, Neville sussed. He didn’t know what Little Miss Nanny was up, but as soon as his daughter came back he was going to tell her to fire the bitch.
But he never got the chance.
When Dee came back, Natty and his nanny long gone, the angry strain on her face made him get to his feet.
‘What’s up? Who was that on the blower?’
His daughter hesitated, then shoved her shoulders back. ‘Pinky and Styley. They know where the gold is.’
‘How did Pinky and Styley find it?’ Neville asked as Dee’s motor pulled up outside the boxing gym.
Her dad had been bombarding her with questions most of the way and she answered the same way she did now.
‘They didn’t say.’
Neville rubbed his jaw. ‘This better not be no fool’s errand coz I will knock their empty heads together.’
Dee had no doubt he would. They got out of the car and walked towards the entrance.
Suddenly Neville held back. ‘That’s odd. The lads always have some muscle on the door.’
Dee shrugged. ‘Probably don’t want any unnecessary eyes getting a gander at the gold if they have it.’
As soon as they entered Neville froze when he clocked the scene before him. ‘What the fucking fuck?’
Chairs were arranged in a circle with Babs, Tiff, Flo and Kieran sitting on one side and Pearl, Pinky and Styley on the other. In the middle of the circle was an empty chair.
The door banged forcefully behind them. Dee and Neville twisted around. They found a stone-faced Knox guarding the door with a sawn-off by her side.
Dee quietly told her newly discovered dad, ‘You need to park yourself in the chair in the middle.’
He did a double take at her as if she’d lost the bloody plot. ‘What the fuckurees are you going on with?’ He turned back to the others. ‘What’s going on here?’
He felt the barrel of Knox’s shooter in his back. ‘Do as you’re told mister. We don’t want no claret spilled here today.’
‘Are you in on whatever this is daughter?’ he asked Dee.
‘Let’s just say I’ve given Babs the benefit of the doubt.’
It hit him. ‘That wasn’t Pinky and Styley on your mobile before. They don’t know where the gold is at all.’
It was a highly-strung Pearl who shot out, ‘Give him ten out ten for having a brain.’ She slapped on her older sister voice. ‘Get your skin in that chair.’
Neville weighed up his options and seeing none he did as he was told. Dee took a seat next to her mum.
‘So, is someone going to tell me what this witches coven is all about? I’ve got a very important appointment with some business associates in an hour.’ The charming, confident Neville was back in play.
Babs spoke. ‘Funny you should mention your business associates coz we’ve got one of ‘em right here.’
Pearl placed two fingers at her lips and whistled. The back door opened and out walked a very nervous Fred.
Neville threw his head back and laughed to high heaven. ‘Does that look like someone I’d do business with? The guy doesn’t even look like he knows what day of the week it is.’
Pearl patted the seat next to her for Fred. Once he was sat down the circle was complete.
He looked at Neville, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down. ‘I didn’t tell ‘em, they sussed it out.’ His shoulder slumped. ‘To tell you the truth now that Vi’s gone I don’t care about the gold no more.’
Neville folded his arms and stubbornly tightened his lips.
Pearl said, ‘Fred’s explained it all. How you knew each other back in the day. How he used to do jobs for you. This time it was the other way round – he needed you to do a job for him—‘
Neville snapped over her, ‘Keep talking bare bollocks Pearl if it makes you feel good.‘
Pinky and Styley were on their feet bristling with rage.
Pinky took out and waved a wicked looking blade as he warned his great uncle, ‘you can chat to us any way you like coz you’re the bossman. But keep running your gob at our grams like that and we won’t need no shotgun to sort you fucking out. Got it?’
Kieran spread his hands to calm the situation down. ‘Put the knife away. Sit down.’ The brothers hesitated, but then did what he asked.
No one else saw but Pinky caught Flo’s eye and she caught his. She arched her brow, her way of telling him she approved of his coming to his grandmother’s defence.
Babs started speaking. ‘All this time Neville you’ve been playing your family against mine. Making sure we were at each other’s throats so we didn’t twig you had the gold all the time.’
He sneered, ‘Everyone is playing everyone darlin’, you should be old enough to know that.’
There! It was out in the open.
He carried on, ‘The people who succeed in this life are the ones who seize a business opportunity that comes their way.’
‘And, was I just part of that opportunity?’ Dee bit out. ‘I told Babs she was talking outta it when she got on the blower to me and insisted you were involved.’ She sneered, ‘The long, lost daughter who you could twist and turn any which way coz she was desperate to know her blood father?’
Pearl said softly, ‘A father should know his child, but Neville this is a bad way of doing it.’
The ‘so what’ expression on his face told her all Dee needed to know.
‘OK, so I threw a few lies out there about Babs and what went down when you were born,’ Neville admitted. ‘When the stakes are high you do what you do to reel in the prize. I looked after my sister’s kids when I had to.’ He ran his eye rudely over Pearl. ‘Don’t get me wrong, I don’t regret a minute of it, but I’m a lone wolf. Always have been, always will be.’
Dee leapt from her chair and rushed him. She walloped him a powerful one in the face. ‘That’s for my mum.’ She backhanded him across the mouth. ‘And that’s from me, you fucking, selfish low-life.’
All hell broke loose as Neville raised his hand to her. Everyone piled in trying to restore order. Even Knox.
And that’s why no one noticed the door open. Noticed the newcomer walk calmly and silently across the room.
It was Babs who clocked the newcomer first.
‘Little Bea? Babe what you doing here?’
The room fell silent as Little Bea carried on walking.
‘What’s this Babs?’ Neville scoffed, wiping the trickle of blood from his mouth where his daughter had belted him. ‘Getting your grandbabies to do your dirty work now?’ He ended on a snigger.
‘Bug. Off,’ she blasted at him. There was something awful about Jen’s daughter’s face she didn’t like. Still and stony, almost like she wasn’t really there.
Dee must’ve felt the same because she lunged for her niece but Little Bea danced out of her reach.
‘Sasha! Sasha!’ Babs bellowed her granddaughter’s real name.
But it was no use, the girl kept walking forward, her steps quickening until she reached Pinky and Styley. She stood between them.
‘Come to join the family reunion?’ Styley joked with confidence, chuckling.
His sarky patter stopped dead when Little Bea pulled something out of her pocket and held it up.
The hand grenade.
54
Little Bea looked like a schoolgirl who was about to do a ‘show and tell’ at school assembly. But this was one show the adults definitely didn’t want to see.
The whole room let out an appalled, collective gasp as she placed a finger in the pin. Babs could feel herself falling backwards with the shock. And she would’ve fallen if Flo hadn’t quickly rushed over to prop her up.
‘What is this?’ Neville growled.
Little Bea looked him square in the eye. And spoke for the first time since her mum’s shooting.
‘This, Mister Biggin, or as Nanna Babs calls you, That Fuck Face, is the grenade you and your nephews sent to her.’ Her gaze switched to her grandmother. ‘I disarmed it for you Nan. Took out the detonator.’ She said the last word slowly and carefully trying to pronounce it properly. ‘I know how to from one of my books. Then I found out where you’d hidden the grenade and put the detonator back in it. It was all easy peasy really.’
Babs couldn’t even speak as the worse terror she’d ever known gripped her.
When Pinky started to move Little Bea calmly cautioned, ‘Don’t move.’
No one did.
The little girl carried on. It was scary how she spoke with adult confidence not like a young girl at all. ‘Know what this is?’ No one dared respond. ‘In one of my books it says it’s a military grade grenade. M67 or baseball grenade because of its shape. Mainly used by the American army—‘
Dee cut in slowly, ‘Babes, I want you to put it down. Then walk towards me.’
Little Bea didn’t blink as she continued. ‘It has has loads of this B type of explosive stuff. Did you know that it can be thrown 30 to 35 metres by a soldier?’
Babs was sobbing wildly. ‘Please Sasha—‘
‘But I won’t be throwing it. I’m going to stand here until these two cunts tell me why they shot my mum. Nanna Babs, I’m sorry you got scared like coz I weren’t talking, but I needed to watch and listen to find out who were the per…per…’ She licked her lips and tried again. ‘Perpetrators. That’s what my books call bad people. That’s what a good detective does – watches and listens. Examines the evidence.’
Pinky made a move to grab her.
‘No!’ Everyone screamed out as they dunked for cover.
Little Bea jumped out of his reach. Pinky tumbled unceremoniously to the floor.
All of a sudden she burst into tears, her shoulders shaking and shuddering. ‘I don’t understand why you would do that to my mum?’
Her chest heaved as each rapid breath rasped out, her small face scrunched up. ‘No one thought I could hear a thing, but I could. My dad…bashing up my mum. That’s why I started reading those crime books, so I’d know what to do if anyone dared thump her one again.’
Her wet gaze flew wildly to Pinky and Styley as her small chest rose and fell with emotion. ‘If she dies she’ll never read me a story again. She’ll never have another G&T, though I think the booze is bad for her. She’ll never tell Missus Brown to fucking keep her kids in line.’ Her voice twisted into open anguish. ‘She’ll never kiss me goodnight.’
Everyone slowly straightened up, but it was Flo who took a step forward. ‘I know exactly how you’re feeling.’ She spoke in a voice for grown ups, not little girls.
Little Bea shook her head. ‘No you don’t. You’re mum ain’t in the ozzie.’
Flo took another step. ‘But my dad died—‘
‘He deserved that,’ Little Bea spat with venom. ‘He tried to strangle Nanna Babs.’
Another step. ‘Yeah, I know. That don’t mean I don’t miss him.’ One more step. ‘Don’t miss the way he’d throw his head back and laugh like a drunken sailor.’ One more. ‘Don’t miss the way he’d teach me to palm cards so I could cheat when I played.’
Little Bea’s lips trembled. ‘But they should pay for what they’ve done.’
Flo clucked her tongue. ‘’Course they should. A right pair of wankers and morons and prats all rolled into one.’ Her voice took on a soft edge as she finally stood in front of her niece. ‘If you pull that thing you’ll be going right along with them. And what’s that gonna do to your Nanna Babs, eh? What about your mum when she wakes up?’
Flo held her palm out as someone’s phone went off.
Little Bea rolled her lips around thinking hard. Then she placed the grenade in her Aunt Flo’s hand.
Flo carefully placed it on the floor and then wrapped Little Bea in a tight embrace.
Pinky yelled, ‘That little gal needs some licks.’
‘Oh yeah?’ Flo shot back. ‘I’d like to see you try, you pink bastard.’
Pearl piped up, ‘She’s got a point. That’s what happens when you send dangerous things to people instead of cake.’
‘Will you all shut up,’ Babs yelled.
Only then did they realise she was on her mobile. She gave the call her full attention and nodded. Then she cut the call and clutched the mobile so hard her knuckles turned white.
‘That was the ozzie.’
Babs was crying hard in the hospital room. There were tears in Dee, Flo and Tiff’s eyes too. They stood around Jen’s hospital bed.
‘Can you stop with the boo-hooing,’ Jen rasped in a small voice. Her throat hurt like heck. ‘You’d thing I’d kicked the bloody bucket.’
Her daughters were all smiles and joy as they held her hand tightly either side of her bed.
Babs leaned forward and kissed her middle child on the forehead. She smoothed Jen’s hair gently away from her cheek. ‘I have missed you something chronic. I thought…’ She couldn’t say the rest of the words because they were too awful to contemplate.
‘Mum, it’s alright,’ Jen soothed. ‘The quack said my legs are in working order and I’ll probably be home in a couple of weeks.’ She looked around at her family. ‘I’ve gotta take it easy though so I’ll need all of you to give me and the girls a helping hand.’
‘In a heartbeat,’ Tiff announced.
‘I’ll drop and collect the girls from school,’ Flo added.
‘And my little princesses can stay at mine anytime,’ Dee offered.
Jen gave each of them a grateful, but tired look. ‘So what’s been going on since I’ve been in here?’ She gazed at her girls. ‘You two been behaving yourself?’
No one spoke. In fact everyone tried to avoid her eyes.
Alarmed, Jen tried to sit up. ‘What the bollocks has been going on here?’
Once they got outside Dee threw her car keys to Tiff. ‘Me and mum will catch up with you two in a mo.’
Tiff and Flo headed off arguing loudly about who was going to drive Dee’s motor, not that she’d said either of them was up for the job.
In the cooling air she turned to Babs. They stood stiffly avoiding eye contact for a time.
Dee broke the silence. ‘Mum, I’m really sorry about —‘
Babs didn’t allow her to finish. ‘You’ve got nish to be sorry about. That bloody Neville was always a master manipulator.’
Dee looked like her heart was about to shatter. ‘But I believed what he told me all too quickly. I should’ve trusted you.’
Her mum vigorously shook her head. ‘Every kid wants to get to know their dad, so it was understandable that you’d swallowed every last one of his lies.’ Babs pulled in a deep breath. ‘I don’t blame you. I only wish he could’ve been the old man you deserved.’
Then they were in each other’s arms, hugging each other tight, their troubles behind them.
‘Promise me one thing,’ Babs whispered in her daughter’s ear.
; ‘Anything.’
Tears prickled behind Babs’ eyes. ‘Whatever might happen in the future, you’ll never call me Babs again. Will always call me mum.’
55
As soon as she got home Dee headed for John’s whiskey collection in the snooker room cum bar. She poured a large Iron Dram, the name John had given to the really strong stuff and knocked it back in one. Dee shook her head as it burned a hot path down her throat and made her eyes water. Just what a girl needed after the shocking Miller-Campbell-Hennessy clash that had almost exploded in their faces. Till the day she died she’d never forget seeing that grenade in Little Bea’s hand. And the words that Pearl had softly spoken:
‘A father should know his child.’
Alright, so Neville didn’t want to really know her, had only been using her to divert everyone away from the gold, but that didn’t mean that Kieran was stringing her along. What if he did really want to know Natty? Was it right that she keep them apart? Dee knew deep inside the pain that it caused never knowing one of your blood parents and even when they turned out to be a full-time, selfish, me-me-me wanker like Neville at least she’d clapped eyes on him. Could point him out in a crowd instead of blindly walking past him in the street without knowing they shared the same blood.
She slammed her glass down. No! She couldn’t do that to John. Couldn’t have people laughing and nudge-nudge-wink-wink-winking at him for not having the juice to create a child and a missus who’d opened her legs to all-comers. Not that that’s what she’d done, but those who got their rocks off on behind the fence chat loved to make up their own stories. And poor John not able to defend himself from the grave. He’d become a laughing stock and she wasn’t having that, no bloody way.
Dee let out a long, noisy sigh as she wearily left the room. Tonight she just wanted to lie on the bed, her little man cuddled to her breast, close her eyes and leave any other troubles until tomorrow.
But when she looked in his cot he wasn’t there. Dee rushed off to Miriam’s room. Empty.
Blood Secrets_A gripping crime thriller with killer twists Page 31
