Dead Heat (34 page)

Verner almost choked, but ordered one and a beer for himself. Cost: £15.

He watched the money disappear into a till.

Lifting his glass, he said, ‘Cheap at half the price. Cheers.'

‘Cheers to you.' Her red-lipsticked lips surrounded the top of the straw of her new drink and she drew some into her mouth. ‘Nice,' she said, eyeing him suggestively. ‘You want some action?'

Verner nodded. ‘Just a fuck.'

‘I'm sure I can accommodate that.'

‘How much?'

‘Two-fifty.' He did not even blink. ‘Half up front.'

‘What's your percentage?'

‘None of your business.'

‘OK at my hotel – the Radisson?'

‘Fine by me.'

When it was over, Verner lay spread-eagled and naked on the double bed in his hotel room. Aggie, as she told him she was called, started to get dressed. The whole sex act had taken just over four minutes, from the second she got hold of him, slid a ribbed condom on to his highly sensitive prick, to entry, to ejaculation. Short and sweet, but Verner did not care. It satisfied his needs. She had moaned and writhed in all the right places, told him she loved him, and that was OK with him. He loved her for about six seconds.

She pulled on her tiny knickers, not much more than a thong. Her eyes looked at his body. ‘You really needed that, didn't you?'

‘Yeah.'

‘I could stay the night, you know? You could recover and we could have a long fuck, a really good session. Only cost one-fifty more.'

‘No, thanks.'

‘OK.' She hooked her skimpy bra on, her eyes still on his wiry body. ‘Got a lot of bruises on you.' She bent down and placed a finger on a large bruise on his thigh. He winced. ‘Been beaten up?'

‘Something like that.'

‘And your arms – they look a mess, too.'

She got no response and could tell he did not want to do small talk. That was fine with her. She could go any way the client wanted: chatter or silence, brains or dumb. She was out to make money, offer a service and then leave.

‘You don't do drugs,' he said. He had been watching her all the time for the giveaway signs. There were none.

She shook her head. ‘Did once, don't now. Got a three-year-old kid to bring up. Clean as a whistle now. It fucks you up.'

‘Good for you.'

‘But I can get you something if you want.' She turned to him and curled her fingers around his penis, now limp and damp, and quite small. He removed her hand.

‘No thanks.'

‘Whatever,' she shrugged.

Verner sat up, watching her complete her dressing. ‘Is he waiting down in reception for you?'

‘Who?'

‘Your pimp.'

‘Not your business. I fuck, that's all you need to know.'

‘But he knows you're up here, doesn't he?'

‘Look, don't start getting all weird on me.' She eyed him suspiciously. ‘You've been a good client, OK. Time for me to go.' She eased herself finally into her tight, short, body-gripping dress, picked up her shoulder bag and trotted to the door.

As it closed behind her, Verner quickly scurried around the room, dressing fast. Then he was out, down the corridor, running down the stairs towards the reception area, easily beating the lift down which he knew Aggie would be using. He was on the ground floor twenty seconds before the lift doors opened. Aggie stepped regally out as though she owned the place.

Verner hid behind a wide pillar and watched her teeter on her high heels towards the revolving doors of the hotel. She stopped to light a cigarette, then picked her mobile phone out of her bag and made a quick call. Instead of leaving the hotel, she dropped into a leather sofa by the door, crossing her long legs, displaying her stocking tops, and bouncing her feet angrily. It would seem she had been told to wait.

Verner sat down too, out of her sight.

A few minutes later a smooth-looking black guy shouldered his way into the foyer.

Aggie stood to meet him. She handed over the wad of notes that Verner had given her. The black man counted them carefully there and then, not bothering about who might have been watching him. He smiled, nodded and gave Aggie a hard kiss on the lips, steering her out of the door – probably en route to her next assignation. On a poor night, Verner reckoned she would be earning her pimp at least two grand and taking less than ten per cent of it for herself. Slave labour.

Verner moved swiftly across the foyer. As Aggie and her pimp stepped on to the pavement outside the hotel, he was only feet behind them. An old, but beautifully maintained Ford Granada was parked on the kerb on the double yellows, a driver ready and waiting. Aggie opened the back door and glided in. The pimp went to the passenger door.

Verner was behind him.

‘I want to talk business,' he said to the man's back.

The black man rose slowly to his full height – six-three – and rotated slowly, his eyes wide at the gall of someone approaching him like this.

‘I don't do business.' He had a deep, booming voice with a Manchester accent, which even when spoken normally had the power to intimidate. He had a cut across the upper part of his left cheek that had been stitched badly. He was not a stranger to blades.

Verner held up his hands and stepped back. ‘I need something and I'm willing to pay for it. I'm a stranger in town and I need help.'

The black man towered over Verner. As well as being tall, he was wide and looked dangerous. In spite of that, Verner was not awed. He knew he could have taken him down within a second.

‘What is it you want, stranger?'

‘A gun.'

‘Fuck off,' he laughed loudly.

The pimp turned away and reached for the door handle.

‘I'll be in the Printer's Arms,' Verner said, giving him the name of a pub he'd seen on a dark side street off Deansgate. ‘I'll be in the bar until eleven. I mean what I say. I'm not a cop or anything. I'll pay good cash for the right one – a handgun, preferably a pistol. Five hundred for the right one.'

The pimp regarded him unsmiling. He blinked and got into the Granada. The car swished away into the night. Aggie craned her neck to look round through the back window. Verner waved. He knew he was in business.

As the name suggested, the Printer's Arms had once been the haunt of members of that profession, particularly in the days when Deansgate housed the massive regional offices of newspapers like the
Daily Mail
. It had been frequented by typesetters and journalists alike and was not unlike the pubs that once used to be found off Fleet Street during its heyday. It was small, crowded, noisy and friendly and still retained that atmosphere, although the clientele now frequenting it consisted mainly of the middle-aged denizens of Manchester who knew a good pub when they tasted one. Its media history was just that – history.

Verner struggled hard to find a place at the bar.

He ordered a pint of Guinness, very cold, very black and wonderful. He sipped it as he leaned on the bar.

The sex with Aggie had been a good relief for him. It was just what he had needed: quick and straight to the point.

Now what he needed was a gun. He wanted that to be quick and straight to the point, too. He knew Manchester's underworld was flooded with illegal firearms and that getting hold of one was easy, if you knew who to ask. Verner did not, but guessed that a pimp would know or would, in fact, be able to supply one. It had been a risk, but calculated.

A small man with a round, pock-marked face squirmed into the bar alongside him and ordered a short. He was mid to late thirties and Verner knew he was it.

He waited for the approach, sipping the Guinness, not taking any notice of the man. He had an urge to sink the drink in one, but held back. He had to have full control of his faculties and even one pint of the black stuff could be a deciding factor in business like this.

The small man sniffed his whisky. Without looking at Verner, his nose hovering over the rim of the glass, he said, ‘I hear you're looking.'

‘Depends what for,' Verner answered, knowing that the conversation would be in code, just in case they were being listened to by the cops.

‘What do you need?'

‘Something small, light, compact, reliable.' He could have been describing a condom. ‘And never used.'

‘Could be difficult. Secondhand is usual.'

‘I have the right amount.'

‘I might be able to find what you need.' He tossed his drink down the back of his throat and shivered as it hit the spot. He slammed his glass on the bar. ‘One for the road,' he told the barman. For the first time he looked at Verner, who saw that the guy's complexion was atrocious. He quickly drank the second whisky. ‘I'll be outside the door. Give me five minutes . . . Oh,' he checked himself, as though this was an afterthought, ‘show me the colour of it.'

Verner placed his pint down, opened his jacket and let the small man see the contents of his inside pocket.

‘Good enough,' he said and then was gone.

A moment later, Verner quit the bar too.

By the time he stepped outside, the gun dealer was nowhere to be seen, having vanished like a rat into the darkness. Yeah, vermin, Verner thought with a mental sneer. He disliked having to deal with such people, but necessity was driving him here. He dashed across Deansgate, dodging the traffic, and backed into the shadow of a shop doorway from where he could see the main door of the Printer's Arms.

A few legitimate customers came and went.

Fifty metres down Deansgate, a car stopped and the pockmarked man who had just been in the bar got out. He leaned back into the car and conversed with the driver before slamming the door shut. The car set off, then turned down by the Printer's Arms, disappearing up the poorly lit side street. It was being driven by Aggie's pimp.

The small man walked to the door of the pub.

Verner walked back across the road, coming up behind the small man, who was no wiser that he had been across the road, watching.

‘This way.' He indicated to Verner that he should follow him down the side street.

‘Can I trust you?'

The small man sniggered, but said nothing.

Verner followed. Within metres, the brightness of Deansgate had been replaced by the dark of the narrow street, the sound of vehicular and pedestrian traffic just a background murmur.

He led Verner to a small car park at the rear of what could have been an office building. There was one car on it, the one Verner had seen drop the small man off a few minutes earlier, the one driven by Aggie's pimp. Verner's senses were acute. He could sniff the danger in the air and was ready for anything, supremely confident of his abilities, no matter what might come his way.

‘Stop here,' the small man said. He took a small torch out of his pocket and flashed it a couple of times, then said, ‘Come on.' He walked towards three huge metallic dustbins on wheels on the car park, pushed right up to the building. They were due to be emptied soon. The smell said that.

As they approached the bins, the black pimp, together with another man, a white one, stepped out and revealed themselves.

Verner took stock of the situation.

‘I thought you might be able to help me,' he said to the pimp.

The black man's wide smile flashed in the darkness and Verner almost giggled at the stereotype.

‘What have you got?'

‘Come over here, back here.' The black man took a pace backwards and to one side. He also had a torch in his hand, which he flashed down to the ground. There was a large piece of oily rag spread out, once part of a blanket, with two pistols on it and four magazines. Verner recognized the makes and models immediately.

One was a mass-produced Eastern Bloc monstrosity, the other a reasonable-looking Glock.

‘How clean are they?'

‘Does it really matter?'

‘To me it does. How reliable are they?'

‘Sold as seen,' said the black man.

Verner felt the presence of the other two men who had quietly moved round to be behind him.

‘Ammunition?'

‘Two spare magazines with each. Forty-five rounds in total.'

‘How much?'

‘The Glock is five hundred; the other is two.'

‘Not cheap.'

‘I guess a man like you needs a gun,' said the pimp, ‘and would be prepared to pay whatever the cost.'

Verner nodded, knowing full well he would not be paying a penny for either gun. Had it been a straightforward, trustworthy transaction, he would have bartered and gladly paid, but he instinctively knew this was going to turn sour. ‘But you're wrong, actually, the gun isn't for me. I need to make a call to my boss, just for the nod.' He already had his mobile phone in his hand, one bullet left in it.

‘I don't think that'll be necessary,' the pimp said. He nodded to his compatriots.

Suddenly Verner's arms were pinned to his side by one of the men behind him. Not the small guy, because he came around the front and yanked open Verner's jacket.

Verner let it happen, still holding the mobile phone in his hand.

‘Just chill, pal,' he was told by the small man with the complexion like the face of the moon, ‘and it'll soon be over.' His hand went into the inside pocket which Verner had shown him contained the money. Except now there was a bar of soap in it with razor blades stuck into it. The small man's hand grasped what he thought was going to be a wad of cash. He screamed and pulled his hand away, blood dripping.

Verner stamped his heel down the shin of the man holding him and finished the movement by smashing his heel down hard on the man's toes. He dug his right elbow back into his ribs, then his hand shot up and he stabbed the antenna of the mobile hard into the man's eye. He shook the man off, who staggered backwards, holding his injured face.

‘Jesus, Jesus,' the small man yelped, nursing his lacerated hand between his knees, just in the exact position Verner needed him. He grabbed the back of his head and pounded his face down on to an upcoming knee, bursting his nose beautifully.