Little Men - The E Book (6 page)

Tony started getting agitated.

Sean had been working for Tony on and off for two years. They

Sean was only irritable today because he was anxious. The job Tony had just given him was far bigger than anything he

During the week, Sean usually drove around the UK picking up and dropping off packages of drugs for Tony. He would then take them to nightclubs or other clandestine drop-off points, sometimes collecting the money and taking it back to Tony.

At the weekend, Sean would sell his own stuff (which also came from Tony), and he had a regular customer base. Sean made a good living but it had risks. The constant threat of capture shredded his nerves and shortened his temper. He had a string of convictions for violence, caused mainly by his short fuse from
before
he became a drug dealer. Now he was constantly tetchy from the paranoia of the knowledge that, if caught, he would be straight back to prison, possibly for a very long stretch.

His home operation was relatively easy to administer. All the pills were kept at his girlfriend Shelley

Tony would usually call on Sunday or Monday with details of the following week

Sean had endured a difficult childhood. He never knew his real parents and was moved around various foster homes and families while he was growing up. He was an intelligent boy, but the disruption and lack of discipline meant he regularly skipped school, which made it difficult for him to learn. When he did attend he would get bored very easily and become disruptive, mainly to seek the attention he lacked from not having a proper family.

In adolescence, Sean became increasingly angry with his situation. He was bright enough to realise when he did go to school that other kids didn

With little to occupy his time, Sean got involved in crime. He would steal, and gained a reputation for violence. Physically, he became well-disposed to administer beatings from an early age. At fifteen he already had the frame of a man years older. His body became sinewy through lack of decent food, and during subsequent years he was able to pack on muscle by intense exercise, usually while he was in a prison or remand centre.

Now, at the age of twenty-five, he was an enormous hulk of a man, six feet two inches tall, with a chest in excess of fifty inches. He used steroids and worked out regularly to build the huge biceps which strained the extra large clothes he wore. Even putting aside Sean

His hair was shaved to a crew cut, but he sometimes left a strip on the top that gave an appearance resembling an old-style military private. His face bore the scars of numerous street and prison battles, it was clear to anyone who dared get close enough that Sean had been attacked with broken bottles and knives on several occasions.

Sean

Sean had numerous tattoos, several on his neck and face. Most were the names of women he

Sean paid little attention to fashion and style, choosing mainly to wear a Nike tracksuit, T-shirt and trainers most of the time. He usually donned a dark-coloured woolly hat or a cap when leaving his flat as he never knew when he may need to hide his face.

He would skulk around his estate trying not to draw attention to himself, and was curt and unfriendly with anyone that attempted to speak to him. His paranoia dictated that other people should never get too close. The only person he really trusted was Shelley, whom he

Sean had a very basic subterfuge for his life as a drug-runner and dealer. He drove a white car-derived van in which he kept tools. If questioned, he would say he was a freelance handyman and labourer, and the nature of his work often took him away from home for days at a time, with short notice. The boxes of tools and parts were heavy, which made them difficult to search, and Sean knew of numerous places to hide the different-sized bags of ecstasy tablets he was asked to transport.

He kept various items in the van if sleep were required, such as a blanket and pillow, but Sean rarely slept. He preferred to drive overnight, keeping constantly on the move to avoid arousing suspicion by parking his van somewhere. He would keep alert by taking amphetamines, often staying awake for days at a time. He regularly had to drive the length and breadth of the country, barely stopping other than to do the pickups. He would often arrive home totally wired on speed at completely random times of the day. Shelley always had a small amount of marijuana which he would smoke in order to sleep. His continually disrupted kip did nothing to improve his mood, and the drugs exacerbated his paranoia.

Sean rarely took the ecstasy he sold. He occasionally snorted cocaine, but found it to be less effective than speed to stay awake as it wore off so quickly.

Chapter Five

Kyla Andretti looked at herself in the mirror. Not an unusual activity for her. She was in her bedroom in her parents house preparing to travel to the London studios of Slam! Television to begin rehearsals of the opening
scenes of
Sleeping With The Enemy.

As a teenager, Kyla had ordered her parents to fit six full-length mirrors to her wardrobe doors, and she usually got what she wanted. She would whine constantly to them that any less than six was simply not enough because it was no good putting clothes on and standing still, she needed to see what she looked like
as she walked.

As was fairly commonplace throughout her childhood, her parents capitulated and her father dutifully fitted the wall of mirrors exactly as requested.

It was moments like this, Kyla thought, that the mirrors came into their own. She needed to practise her walk as it was soon to be broadcast on national television. The opening show of
Sleeping With The Enemy
required the contestants to strut from a car to the door of the mansion that would be their home for the coming weeks. And simply
everyone
would be watching.

Kyla admired her reflection. She was
truly
stunning. Her father was Italian and her mother English and she had acquired the best genes from both. She was just under six-foot tall, but it wasn’t just her height that made her striking. Her skin was a dark olive colour and her hair jet black. Her big, brown eyes dominated her face. It was difficult for anyone to look away when she fixed them with her gaze. Her long, long eyelashes framed them perfectly.

She had the high cheekbones most models could only dream of, which gave her an air of superiority and mystery that meant most men went to pieces in her presence. And her mouth. Kyla had discovered that just parting her lips ever so slightly and moving her pink tongue over her brilliant white teeth would get most men eating out of her hand. Her lips were a wonderful deep-red colour and perfectly complemented her dark skin. She knew her smile could manipulate, and she regularly used it to get what she wanted. It could be warm and friendly when necessary, or hot and seductive. Even she was sometimes surprised by how far she could get just by looking at someone a certain way with her striking eyes and flashing them a sultry grin.

Then there was her body. She was blessed with the perfect proportions of any centrefold glamour model. Now, at the age of twenty-two, she had fully formed into the peak of physical beauty. There was barely an ounce of fat on her toned stomach, legs, arms and buttocks. Her breasts were large for someone with such a slender frame. Again Kyla understood the power her ample cleavage had over males when she dealt with them. She usually dressed with this in mind. She would wear flimsy, low-cut tops on even the coldest of days, coupled with a push-up bra, giving whoever she was speaking to a tantalising glimpse of lace straining under the significant weight of her bust. Today she carefully selected just such an ensemble, knowing the first people she would be in contact with would be the production staff at Slam! It would do no harm to do a little trademark flirting accompanied with some epic views of her fantastic tits.

As Kyla once again pouted and preened herself in the gigantic mirror, she ruminated over the past few years. It had been a roller-coaster ride.

She was living temporarily back with her parents near Dartford, and she had moved out and back in more times than she could remember. The house largely brought back painful memories for her, as it was usually a crisis that forced her back to retreat and pick up the pieces.

She had first discovered her power over men at school when she hit puberty. Physically she had quickly blossomed into the buxom beauty she was now, but also became a stroppy, spiteful and vindictive teenager. She was hated by other girls and fawned over by boys. She actually became rather lonely despite her outward demeanour of a confident, popular siren of a young woman who was going places.

She began having flings with men much older than herself, much to the chagrin of her parents and the boys in her year. She was quite an intelligent young woman and gained reasonable grades in her GCSEs, but at the age of sixteen education was of no interest to her whatsoever. She began a relationship with Sean Philips, a man three years her senior, who was well known in the area as a rather unsavoury character. Most people thought it was the danger and excitement that attracted this impressionable teenager to the local hoodlum. That and the desire to piss her parents off, those long-suffering folk who had cared for and nurtured her over the years and satisfied almost every whim of their demanding daughter.

Latterly Kyla realised her looks could help her gain entry to the most exclusive clubs and parties, where she instinctively gravitated to the richest young men (or at least those that
splashed
the most money). These fellows could almost always be relied upon to supply her with drinks all night, therefore she was used to leading a somewhat lavish lifestyle while others picked up the tab.

Her relationship with Sean eventually broke down, not least because he was in and out of prison all the time as well as having to put up with Kyla’s wild partying. The two now hated each other, and it was a favourite topic of conversation among those that knew them both as to what had caused the animosity. No-one dared asked them directly, especially not Sean, who had been known to react violently to the merest mention of Kyla’s name.

As Kyla spent less and less time in her home town, her reputation there grew larger, especially among the young men with whom she was at school, and had nothing better to do than speculate what she was up to now. Conversations were fuelled by memories from their schooldays and the occasional titbit in the news or celebrity magazines.

Kyla’s most famous liaison had taken place about a year ago. After quitting yet another job, she had decided it would be a good idea to fly to Los Angeles to see if she could make a few ‘contacts’ in her quest for fame and fortune. As in London, she found her looks and sex appeal could get her audiences with high-ranking men in show business, but again they would often dismiss her as nothing more than a pretty face, usually after sleeping with her.

Kyla became increasingly frustrated by this, but failed to realise it was the way she behaved and presented herself that exacerbated her reputation. She became known in entertainment circles as a hanger-on, just another pretty girl desperate for fame for fame’s sake.

Then she met Jaik Marlon. At the time he was the hottest property in Hollywood, only twenty-three himself, and the toast of Tinseltown. He was the star of two high-grossing blockbusters and rapidly becoming a household name across the globe. It had happened so quickly that even Jaik himself was bemused by it. Not one to shy away from the adulation, he was a regular on the celebrity party circuit, often finding that drink and drugs were a way of coping with the new-found pressure he felt under. Naturally women flocked around him, and as a fit, healthy young man he found it difficult to say no to offers of sex from beautiful young females, especially when they handed it to him on a plate.

Of course it wasn’t long before Kyla cottoned on to the fact that Jaik and his entourage may be worth getting to know, especially as she was now on his home patch. It didn’t take a genius to work out which clubs he frequented on a Saturday night, and someone with Kyla’s talent for sniffing out celebrities had no trouble at all ‘bumping into’ him.

One thing Kyla was good at was seducing men. With most mortals, her looks alone were enough to get them into bed, but she had learnt that celebrities could be slightly more of a challenge. She had, however, honed her skills over the years and discovered that a little gentle ego massage would get her into the hotel suite of a young footballer or pop star without too much difficulty.

It was one such night in an LA nightclub that she’d found herself sipping Cristal champagne with Jaik, whispering softly in his ear. He was drunk and had had a few lines of coke, and it didn’t take too much persuading by Kyla, looking luscious as usual, to slip out of a back door together and into a waiting limousine.

Jaik Marlon was a big conquest even by Kyla’s standards. She had given him a good time, and used her usual tactic of being cold and stand-offish the next morning. This confused Jaik, as most women he slept with would be pestering him for days afterwards. He found that he couldn’t get Kyla out of his mind, and she deliberately made herself difficult to trace. When Jaik did eventually catch up with her at a party, she was outwardly cool but slowly made it clear she up was up for a repeat performance. This gave Jaik an impression that he had to work to seduce her, which he loved. Little did he know that it was a game Kyla had played many times before, albeit not with someone quite as huge as himself.

The couple began seeing each other regularly, and news of the fling eventually got into the papers. Most American journalists had a vague idea who Kyla was, due to her reputation as a hanger-on, but enjoyed running the ‘Jaik Marlon dates new mystery woman’ angle. The British press were less kind, painting her as a jumped-up slut who would sleep with anyone as long as they worked in show business.

The story, of course, was viewed with most interest in the Dartford area, where those that knew the Kyla of old became convinced that the devious little scrubber had struck gold at last.

Predictably, the fling only lasted a few weeks as some of the harsher English headlines filtered back to Jaik, and he got the distinct impression that she’d been using him. He remembered conversations he’d had with Kyla when it had seemed like all she’d wanted to talk about was his work and the contacts he had used to break into acting, and could he take her to see casting directors? She didn’t seem to understand you needed talent to act, and he had attended expensive stage schools from the age of eleven. He quickly saw Kyla for what she was and dropped her like a hot brick.

The break-up hit Kyla harder than she thought it would. Jaik Marlon was in another league, and she was getting more attention than ever before. She had thought that finally she was getting somewhere in her quest for fame and her desire to be loved by complete strangers. Suddenly he wouldn’t return her calls. She tried to confront him in a bar, but was ushered away by his bodyguards. She found herself barred from his favourite restaurants, places where they’d previously enjoyed quiet meals together.

Kyla had no choice but to accept that another relationship was over. She tried to hang on in America, and followed up the few leads she’d got from Jaik. There was little interest. She couldn’t accept what other people seemed to know – she had no talent apart from her looks, and there were thousands like her in Hollywood.

With her money all but used up, she had little choice but to pack her things and return forlornly to her parents in the UK. It was a pattern they’d seen many times before. She would disappear for months on end, usually with a man, get up to all sorts, then return with her tail between her legs, usually owing money and expecting them to sort it out.

This time, of course, they’d known exactly where she’d been due to the fact she’d been in the papers – who, incidentally, had completely lost interest in her once they knew the relationship with Jaik was over for good.

Kyla half hoped there’d be a journalist or two waiting for her at Heathrow trying to get the dirt on the relationship with Jaik, but there were none. The media had long since moved on to other things. So it was a very forlorn and pathetic Kyla who had accepted the offer of a lift home from her father, and had once again moved into her old bedroom in the large detached house in Kent.

As she lay in bed crying one evening, shortly after she’d got back, she noticed through her tears an advert to appear on the next series of
Sleeping With The Enemy.
She knew the show well. Everyone talked about it. It took all of her steely resolve to write down the application details, such was the state of depression she found herself in. She received an application form in the post and, with little else to do and with time on her hands, filled it in and sent it off. Even though her confidence had reached rock-bottom she knew she at least had a
chance
with this. She knew she could sing as well as act.

Lucy Adams sat anxiously in her dressing room as stylists fiddled with her hair and touched her make-up. It was thirty minutes before the live launch of
Sleeping With The Enemy,
and the Slam!
production team were making their final preparations.

Lucy had presented the last two series and worked on numerous other popular programmes, but it didn’t stop her getting nervous before a live broadcast to the nation with some eleven million people estimated to tune in. She had memorised the names of the ten contestants and ran through them once again out loud.

“Sonia, Aleisha, Mercedes, Debi, Tracey, Sarina, Leanne, Kyla, Siobhan and…Stacey.” For some reason Lucy had a slight mental block on the last one. She put the problem out of her mind and tried to focus completely on the task ahead. She breathed deeply, a routine a colleague had shown her a few years ago. It took the edge off her nerves.

“It’s time to go, Luce.” It was the director, Toby Jenkins, putting his head around the door and calmly prompting everyone into action. They had been rehearsing all day and it was tiring, but adrenalin suddenly kicked in and Lucy hurriedly checked her appearance for a final time before walking from her dressing room into the cold night air and the outdoor studio. A loud burst of applause and cheering greeted her from the assembled crowd. Slam! had discovered a live audience worked very well for
Sleeping With The Enemy
, especially on the opening night.

Lucy was in her element now. She loved playing to the crowd. Her nerves were forgotten as she ran through her sound-checks, deliberately speaking in different voices which the crowd found highly amusing as strange resonances echoed around the set. Then it was suddenly time to go live.

“Welcome…” Lucy shrilled at the top of her voice, struggling to make herself heard above the noise of the crowd. “Welcome to series three of
Sleeping With The Enemy
!
It’s gonna be the best yet!”