He waved his fat hands in annoyance.
‘You
look
like a teenage whore, dear. You look what you are. The eyes are already dead, you take drugs and your skin is greasy and gone to pot. Basically, love, I couldn’t give you away nowadays. Not for real money anyway. You’ll be doing blow jobs for a tenner within months.’
Janine was already doing blow jobs, but she charged fifteen quid - she still had some pride. She wasn’t going to admit it to him.
‘I’d look all right in a school uniform, like when I done them photos.’
Lucas raised his eyes to the ceiling and said through gritted teeth, ‘You are annoying me. You made your bed, love, you can lie in it all day now if you want. But our little partnership is finished.’
She knelt down before him.
‘Let me give you a good time, show you that I’m still the best at it. Still got the nous.’
He looked at her face. It was still smooth-skinned, but ageing daily. She had a greyness about her; her teeth looked off-colour from vomiting and speed, her heavy body coarse and unwelcoming.
Three more years and she would either be dead or dosed. That much was a fact.
‘Are you using condoms?’
She hesitated before answering and it told him all he needed to know.
‘You’ve learned nothing from me, have you?’
She licked her dry cracked lips and he saw the white ooze in the corners that told him she was speeding out of her head.
‘Please, Lucas, I don’t want to be alone.’
Her voice really did sound young now but it didn’t sway him. She was street fodder, he didn’t want her. But he might be able to make a few more quid out of her.
‘I know a pimp, a black bloke called Marcel, but I warn you - he’s a hard taskmaster. One side look and he’ll chiv you without a second’s thought.’
He saw her eyes light up and sighed inwardly. She was street all right. She wanted a protector, someone to work for. Someone to give her hard-earned cash to. Someone new to abuse her. And if he was hard then she could kid herself she’d had no choice in the matter, when all she had ever wanted to do was self-destruct.
It was laughable really.
But Marcel would like her well enough. He would see potential where Lucas only saw a disgusting piece of dirt.
Each to their own. And these two would be a match made in hell. Marcel liked roughing up the women, and Janine liked the fear associated with men like himself and Marcel. She thought it gave her an identity of some kind.
‘Give me the phone.’
Janine smiled happily and passed him his mobile. Lucas rang Marcel and did the deal.
‘He’ll pick you up in about an hour.’
Lucas pulled open his legs and grinned. ‘You can practise on me. Marcel is going to want a freebie and you’d better be at your fucking best, girl, or he won’t have you.’
She stared down at his flaccid member.
‘You’d better do a good job, love. I couldn’t raise a smile at the moment.’
‘Shall I get me tits out?’
He pulled her towards him by her hair.
‘Oh, no! It’s bad enough looking at your ugly fucking face.’
Golding and Kate stopped outside Lucas’s flat. Kate tried the door. It didn’t budge. Golding swung back his foot and kicked it in. The lock broke and the door hit the wall with a mighty crash.
They were down the hall and inside the lounge in seconds. What they saw there made them both stop in their tracks.
Golding’s voice was disgusted as he muttered, ‘For fuck’s sake!’
Janine looked at them from her position on the floor and Lucas was trying to cover his grotesque body with his dressing gown.
‘Who the fuck are you?’
He still had an air of command in his voice although he was visibly rattled. They looked like Filth, especially the woman. She was staring at the girl as if she had never seen a tom before.
‘Who am I? I am your worst enemy, Mr Browning, that’s who I am,’ said Kate. ‘What I want to know is the name of this obviously underage young person we saw giving you a blow job as we arrived on the scene.’
Janine could smell trouble. Serious trouble. She looked to Lucas for protection and saw that his face had gone a pale and sickly grey colour.
Somewhere, deep inside her, this fact pleased her no end.
‘Just get me up and help me get dressed.’
Patrick’s voice was loaded with menace but Willy stood his ground.
‘Will I fuck get you up! You are ill, mate, and you are going to rest. Boris ain’t going nowhere, he’ll keep.’
Patrick was half up from the bed already, and pain was visible on his face.
‘Look at you, like a fucking baby. Now get yourself back down and let me plump your pillows.’
‘I am warning you, Willy. I want up and I mean to get up.’ Even as he spoke he was lying back down. His head felt as if a steel band was crushing it. His whole body was drenched in sweat.
‘Don’t you understand what I’m telling you? That Russian ponce has been round Kate’s house. Let himself in and as good as threatened her. He wants her on board with him, the saucy cunt!’
Patrick’s voice was menacing once more and Willy knew he had to do something.
‘Get your arse back in that bed, Patrick Kelly, or I swear I will chin you - and I mean it.’
Patrick heard the concern in his old friend’s voice and sighed once more.
‘I have to sort this out once and for all, Willy. I can’t have him taking the piss like this. It was bad enough when the bastard shot me.
Me
- Patrick Kelly. Fucking lunatic he is. Well, I might have swallowed me knob on that one for a while but I can’t let this go. No way can I let this go. If I swallow this, the next thing I know he’ll be pushing me over so he can get in me bed and have a kip. I have to give him the hard word.’
‘And you will, Patrick. But not until you are able. You’ve had a big shock to the noggin and you ain’t capable of crushing a grape at the moment, let alone taking him on and all that entails. In a few days you might be able to get up and scout around, but until then you are staying put.’
Patrick knew his friend was right, but he also knew that something had to be done and fast. He knew exactly what Boris was after and that Kate would have to give in if she wanted to carry on living. Boris Stravinski was a bully boy for all his good looks and educated patter. He might dress like a male model, he might look like a male model, but he was street through and through and that was what was scaring Patrick.
Kate wouldn’t have any option but to do what Stravinski wanted. No option whatsoever. But he knew that she wouldn’t see it like that. She would think she could refuse - and then she would find out what the Russian was capable of.
Kate knew Boris had had him shot, but she was still naive enough to think that her very femaleness would stop the Russian from doing anything to her. Also, she was essentially a good person and wouldn’t misuse her knowledge for anyone. Even Patrick had received short shrift when he had asked her to look on the police computer for him.
No, Patrick knew he had to take that Russian fucker out, and he had to do it soon.
Willy seemed to read his mind and said gently, ‘You can’t help anyone in the state you’re in. Even you have to admit that much. Leave it for a while, a few days at least, then we can sort it out once and for all. Kate is OK. I know that for a fact. Ben’s mate Everton who was here at the hospital is watching her.’
What Willy didn’t say was that he had a feeling Everton had been sabotaged by the Russians. That would be too much information at the moment.
He saw Patrick’s gratification and grinned.
‘You got a lot of mates, Pat. More than you seem to realise. Benny himself was tailing her for a while so stop worrying. He helped her with Joey and Jacky and he’s a good bloke as you know.’
‘I owe him a hefty fucking drink by the sounds of it, Willy.’
‘All in good time, Patrick. You get a bit of Sooty. If you don’t take care you could end up a raspberry ripple and that’s the last thing you want.’
Patrick realised that what Willy was saying was true. But it was still hard to know that he had placed Kate in so much danger. Without him she would never have come to the notice of the Russian. If anything happened to her he would never forgive himself.
‘Kate’s a sensible girl, Pat. Bear that in mind. This will keep for a few days. Get some sleep and get your fucking head together, for Christ’s sakes.’ Willy looked at his watch. ‘I have to go, Maureen will have my balls if I don’t get me arse in gear.’
Patrick grinned. ‘It must be love.’
Willy shrugged, his huge bulk looking out of place in the dainty hospital room. ‘It is, I reckon. Gonna marry it, Pat. I’ve made up me mind.’
Patrick was amazed and it showed on his face.
Willy smiled in embarrassment. His large moonlike face was tinged pink. Even his neck was flushed.
‘She’s a good one, Patrick, and you don’t meet many of them at our age. She’s been round the turf a few times but she’s all the better for that, mate. I never wanted a wilting virgin, know what I’m saying? Her youngest boy could do with a firm hand and all. Got a lot of potential, Duane has. Going to buy her a nice drum, the whole kit and caboodle really.’
Patrick grasped his friend’s hand and squeezed it. ‘I’m pleased for you, Willy, I really am.’
He was red again, but smiling, showing crooked white teeth.
‘She makes me laugh, Pat, makes me feel good about meself. I like the feel of her lying beside me. She makes me feel special. She’s a good cook and all, I can’t deny that’s part of the attraction. But after all these years, Pat, I need someone for meself. I realised that when the Russian had me. I knew she’d be worried out of her mind and it was nice, if that makes sense.’
Patrick nodded. ‘I know what you mean, mate.’
‘ ’Course you do. I shared Mandy and Renée with you for years, didn’t I? And you was a good mate to let me do that, Patrick. The best. You are family to me, mate. Fucking real family.’
Patrick, in his weakened state, felt a strong urge to cry at the big man’s loyalty and friendship. He was feeling emotional a lot lately. But Willy had tears in his eyes, too, and that made Patrick feel better.
‘Right pair of fucking tarts we’re turning into in our old age, Pat. I reckon it’s time to retire, don’t you, and live off the fruits of our rather dodgy labours?’
‘That’s if I don’t get me collar felt, of course.’
Willy shook his head. ‘We’ve got out of worse than this, boy. You’ll be OK. I have that feeling.’
They looked at one another, the friendship of years acknowledged, their total trust in and care of one another evident.
‘You have been a good mate, Willy. The best.’
He shrugged. ‘You ain’t been too bad yourself.’
They were laughing again. Patrick knew that theirs was the perfect friendship. At this moment in time that was important to him. More important than he had ever realised.
‘I took a few flowers over to Mandy’s grave today, Patrick. Pink roses for her cheeks. She was a good-looking girl. Maureen scrubbed the stone and give it a polish, like. I told her Mandy was the nearest thing to a daughter I’d ever had. She understood that. She
understands
me. She’s a good woman, Pat. The best.’
But Patrick couldn’t answer him. The tears were choking him.
Golding was smoking a cigarette and Lucas watched him warily.
‘What do you want?’ he growled.
‘We want the truth, mate,’ Kate told him. ‘We want to know who the distributor of your videos really is. You see, I am Patrick Kelly’s better half - emphasis on the “better” there - and you have given me a right royal fucking off, you and Suzy Harrington. So I thought a personal visit was called for.’
She laughed nastily. ‘Basically, it’s a case of you tell me what I want to hear or you’ll be in serious trouble. Am I making myself clear?’
Golding was grinning, listening to Kate’s talk. She had it off pat and he was impressed despite himself.
Lucas wiped a furry tongue over yellowing teeth. ‘As crystal. But what can I tell you?’
Kate was as surprised as Lucas and Janine when Golding’s foot shot out and connected heavily with Browning’s face. The fat man’s head rocked back and hit the seat he was sitting in, hard. His nose split and his teeth were hanging in his mouth by threads. He looked like something from a horror film.
Janine screamed out in fear.
Golding leaned forward and said with deadly emphasis, ‘You are already winding me up. Now if you want games I can play games, you fat piece of crap. I’ll have you screaming with no one to help you, because we are the Old Bill and we are also very pissed off. So you can see our quandary, can’t you?’
Lucas was in mortal fear now. A bully, he was terrified of any pain he wasn’t inflicting.
Kate suppressed her own shock and tried to look nonchalant. She knew that Golding was only doing what Patrick would have done but this knowledge didn’t make her feel any better. Instead she knelt down and started looking through the pile of videos on the floor. She placed one in the machine and turned it on.
A young girl of about thirteen was smiling nervously at the camera. She was underdeveloped, her narrow ribcage evident, and the painted face looked garish and frightening on her.
A man came into focus. He was in his fifties, big-bellied and naked with a leer on his ugly unshaven face.
‘Friends of yours, are they?’ Golding’s voice was low and his face was set like stone.
Lucas was trying to talk through the broken teeth in his mouth.
‘Please, I beg of you, I’ll tell you what you want to know. But calm down, I can’t function when I’m nervous.’
Janine watched him begging and felt a thrill of satisfaction. Kate pushed her from the room.
‘Go away and don’t come back unless you want me to nick you, little lady.’