Hope Road (23 page)

Pulls the door open.

“Hello, Lanny.”

L
anny takes it nice and steady, eyes on the road, the Land Cruiser rarely making it past third. From the passenger seat John watches as they follow what looks like a random route out of town, winding around tree-lined residential lanes in the dark until he’s not sure where he is. In the back are two young men, difficult to say how big. Big enough.

He tries to let the silence run on, give himself chance to think. But this is too weird.

“I thought you were in Malta,” he says in the end, looking at the dash in front of him and feeling stupid, as if he’s been caught playing truant from school and now they’re taking him home.

“I
was
,” says Lanny, staring straight ahead. “And now I’m here.”

Forty-five or thereabouts and he’s in good shape. Medium height, well groomed, yellow polo shirt and Chinos. Never done time, never been charged with anything. Lanny Bride is the exception that proves the rule.

“Freddy still in Millgarth?”

“Yep.”

“And you’re putting yourself about, like Miss fuckin’ Marple?”

Lanny’s breathing is a little wheezy and he’s straining to keep calm.

“Just trying to get him out,” says John.

“Question is, did he do it? ’Cos somebody did.”

“It’s not Freddy. You ever heard of a Ukrainian called Bilyk?”

“Course I fuckin’ have.”

“He’s working for you, is he?”

“Nah, not really. He approached me, needed some help setting up. I take a percentage, that’s all. Funny money was never my thing. Have you seen the notes he’s bringing across?”

John nods.

“Any good?”

“On the good side of average.”

“Eastern Europe,” Lanny says. “Loads of currency presses, state owned,
very
corrupt. Mainly euros but someone in the Ukraine fancied having a go at sterling.”

“And you told ’em to get Freddy involved, just in case things went wrong, turn the suspicion on the Rays.”

“Freddy’s a big boy. Nobody forced him. Plus, I didn’t know he was gonna get banged up for murder.”

“It wasn’t Freddy. What about Mike Pearce?”

Lanny snorts. “It’s Freddy they’ve got in the cells. Mike? You tell me. Loser with a violent record, was there when she died… He even told plod he messed with the video, the twat.”

“You heard that?”

“I’ve seen the video, mate. You think you’re the only one with friends in Millgarth?”

“And Fedir? The young one who gave Donna…”

The Land Cruiser lurches to a halt. Trees on both sides. Not a soul about.

“Like I said, I saw the fuckin’ video. Fedir got what he deserved.” His whole body is tense, but he says it with satisfaction, as if the knowledge pleases him deeply. “I’ve gotta know for sure who killed her, John. And you’re gonna fucking find out.”

Lanny squeezes his own hands together, then examines his fingers.

“Let me fill you in. The hotel, it’s useful to us,” he says, still looking at his fingers. “I’m not based here anymore. Sometimes we need a quiet place. Fuller needs the money. Everybody’s happy. I put Mike Pearce in there. He’s a lame brain, not the type that’s gonna be asking too many questions, dialling 999 the first sign of trouble.”

“Same as Sandy?”

“Took a university education to work that out, did it? Whatever you know, John, you’ve gotta tell me. I’m not messing about. If you know anything…”

“Ever met Freddy? You know him?”

“I knew Donna better.”

Lanny turns, looks at John for the first time. His eyes are bloodshot, but his expression is arrogant, defiant.

“All I want’s a name. You can leave the rest to us.”

“But I…”

“Just tell me.”

“I don’t
know
,” he says, hands pressed flat on his thighs. “And when I know anything for certain, I’m going to the police.”

“Jesus Christ. I know you’re shagging one, but do you have to act like one?”

“Your name won’t come up, I’ll guarantee that. It’ll be in everyone’s interest if the police sort this out,” John says.

Lanny inhales long and hard, trying to retain his patience, as if he’s speaking to a child.

“You’re right. No more police snooping around at the
Eurolodge
. Get it sorted out quickly. Yes, you’re right. Thing is, though, it’s not going to happen like that.” He reaches behind his back. “Whoever killed that girl won’t be going to jail, just like Fedir won’t be going back to Kiev.”

In his hand is a gun, small and stubby, as if it was made to measure. He rests the gun on his leg, the barrel pointing at John’s crotch.

“What you gonna do, castrate me with a Luger?”

John hears the words coming out of his own mouth, can’t believe he’s saying them.

Lanny grins.

“That the nerves talking, is it, John?”

“You’re going dish out your own justice, simple as that?”

“Are you listening, lads? Little Johnny Ray getting all brave on me!”

Lanny’s laughing now, but it’s like he’s in pain, or losing his mind, as if he’s gonna break down and cry.

“Do you always pull the trigger yourself, Lanny?”

What the fuck are you saying, John?

Lanny stops laughing.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Just what it says. Do you send someone in, or do it yourself?”

Lanny’s head seems to nod in slow motion. But he looks puzzled.

This is the only time you’ll get a straight answer. Go on. Ask him. Now.

John feels his chest getting tight, tries to keep his voice steady: “What I asked was, do you normally pull the trigger yourself, or do you send someone else?”

Lanny pulls his head back, almost a double-take.

“Is this about Joe? Is that it? You’re asking me…”

“Well, it’s a thought, isn’t it? I never did find out. I mean, the guys he beat up and chucked out of those houses up in Harehills, they were working for you, I dunno exactly w…”

He doesn’t see it coming.

Feels the butt of the pistol smash into his head. Then again, just above the eye, three times. Then into his cheek, Lanny grunting with each blow. John’s eye is awash with warm blood and he can feel more of it tickling down his face.

Lanny pulls back, panting, one arm on the ceiling of the car as he takes aim and slams a foot into John’s side.

He’s winded, doubled up on the floor fighting for breath, his head against the door. Lanny comes in closer, punching the crown of his head and his ear, short stinging jabs, three, four, until all John can hear is the pumping of his own blood and the dull buzz of adrenalin and fear.

“I killed your fuckin’ brother, did I?”

Lanny’s on top of him now, one knee on the passenger seat, the other on John’s stomach. The gun is pushed so hard into his throat he gags.

Lanny’s voice is ragged, screaming. “You think that was me?”

His hands are shaking as he fumbles with the gun, turns it around, pushes it into John’s hand.

“Go on then.”

He wraps John’s fingers tight around the butt of the pistol and brings the barrel up until it touches his own lips, which are quivering and wet.

“So shoot me, you cunt. Go on. Do it.”

He can’t move. He can hardly breathe, Lanny’s knee pushing hard up into his stomach, all his weight on it. Tears roll down Lanny’s cheeks, one neat line on each side of his face.

They stare at each other like two kids. Frightened and vulnerable.

Then the tension drains from Lanny’s body. He hauls himself up and seems to hang there, breathing heavily, as if he’s not finished but he doesn’t have the energy to carry on.

“You know how many times he’d’ve been dead without me?” he says between breaths. “The stuff he used to do, idiot stuff, always looking for trouble.”

The waver has gone from his voice. He wipes the tears from his face, then takes the gun from John’s hand and pulls out the magazine, holding it so that John can see the copper bullets inside.

“You never knew Joe, not like I did.
I
was his fuckin’ brother. We grew up together, while you had your nose stuck in a book, all safe and warm at home with your mum. But things caught up with him.”

He grabs John by the jacket, hauls him up to a sitting position. With a thumb he eases the first bullet out of the magazine and puts it into John’s jacket pocket, using the lining to wipe the bullet clean.

“This one’s because of who you are. The next one goes through your skull. Now get out.”

John tries to reach behind him for the handle.

“Get the fuck out!”

The door flies open and Lanny kicks him out onto the pavement.

“Think you’ve got balls, eh? If I’d done that to Joe he’d’ve blown my fucking head off.”

John gets onto all fours, his body shaking, ready to puke.

“I’m not Joe,” he manages to croak, the salt-taste of blood in his mouth.

“You can say that again, my friend.”

He hears the Land Cruiser’s engine rumble into life.

“Another thing,” Lanny shouts out, holding the gun up, a look of uncontained madness in his bloodshot eyes, “there’s one in here for that copper girlfriend of yours. None of that eye-for-an-eye shit with me. I’ll pop as many as it fuckin’ takes. Just tell me who killed Donna.”

With that the car’s motor roars and away it goes, passenger door still swinging open.

T
he River Aire curls around the lower reaches of the city, moving a little faster than you might expect, picking up sparks of light from windows on both sides. A dark ugly river, he’s always thought, something sinister about it, especially down here between the brewery and The Falls, where the old warehouses back right up to the water. This is where David Oluwale’s body was found, kicked to death by two Leeds coppers and thrown in the water like a dead dog.

“Are you sure you don’t want some ice for that?” she asks, joining him on the tiny steel balcony suspended above the river and handing him a glass of wine.

“I’m fine, thanks,” he says, running the tips of his fingers over the side of his face and finding the bruises tender but not too swollen, the cut above the eye crusty.

“Ah,
Único
. You know it?” he says, losing himself for a moment in the wine.

“Of course I do,” she says, already halfway down her glass. “One of the best wines in Spain.”

“In the world!” he says. “Here’s to
Vega Sicilia
.”

From inside the apartment comes the voice of Sade.

“You’ve put this on for my benefit, have you?”

“
Smooth Operator
? What, you think you’re
smooth
or something, do you?”

“No, no, I mean the eighties. As it happens, I’ve just had a couple of fairly awkward encounters with the past.”

“
Smooth operator
…” she says, smirking as she drinks her wine.

They look at the black water directly beneath them.

“Do you think Freddy persuaded her to give up working as an escort?” he says. “He sees her with those Ukrainians, hates it, kind of tries to rescue her? And she agrees? Does that make sense?”

“Go on…”

“She’d dropped all her other clients, and the Ukrainians were about to leave. Do you think she was just waiting to get paid, then start over with Freddy?”

“Yeah, it makes sense. It does. Freddy’s got a big heart. It’s the kind of thing he’d do. But that’s not the question, is it?”

She polishes off her wine in two medium sized gulps, then disappears inside.

“Here,” she says, reappearing with the bottle. She looks at his swollen cheek and forehead. “Are you gonna tell me how you got that?”

“Nope.”

“Okay. You need more of this,” she says, refilling his glass like a nurse administering medicine.

“What
is
the question then? About Freddy?”

She looks up the river as far as the bridge, where a bus is making its way slowly into town.

“What was Freddy doing with the Ukrainians in the first place?” she says. “That’s the question, isn’t it?”

He studies the wine, as if the answer might be there.

Minutes pass. The calm of the evening is punctuated by a car horn, the shouts of kids messing about on the bridge, the hiss of a bus’s brakes… For Donna Macken, growing up in a tower block not far from here, these would have been the sounds she knew. The sounds of her life. And now she’s dead.

He takes another gulp of
Único
, amused at how fast they’re getting through a hundred fifty quid’s worth of wine. Knocking it back like cheap Cabernet feels about right. Money is less important now, the struggle for it, the spending of it. Sod it. Everything is less important. He spoke to Henry Moran half an hour ago and there’s nothing new from Freddy, a toss-up between him getting his detention extended and a charge.

“There’s a handgun down there,” he says, letting her pour what remains of the wine into their glasses.

“Really?”

“Years ago, I heard Joe and Lanny Bride talking at the showroom one morning. The gun had gone off by accident during a job. Left a bullet in the woodwork. They had to get rid of the gun.” He takes a ten quid slurp. “Dad never used guns, but Joe did. What about your uncle Henrique?”

“That’s what he was in for.”

“In prison?”

“Armed robbery. 1974. He was young. After Franco died there was a general amnesty. He was out by ’77.”

“Lucky.”

“He never touched guns again.”

“Straight into the ceramic tile business?”

She laughs. “He was into all sorts of stuff. Construction mainly. Half the flats in Spain are built with stolen materials. Then there was illegal copying, cassettes, videos. I went to work for him after I graduated.”

“You graduated?”

“What, you think you’re the only one with an education? Madrid Business School.”

“Degree in business studies, then straight to work for a criminal…”

“Yep. The ceramics thing was a cover, like your dad’s place. But when I looked at the books, it was making him money.”

“Even better cover.”

“Just like you did with the showroom.”

“Well, it’s never gonna make me a millionaire.”