Mark stared into her face, his eyes bright with malice. He stormed past her and Donna had to run to keep up as she followed him. But she was aware of the workmen’s laughter, and knew that this time it wasn’t directed at her.
Her heart was in her mouth at her own audacity, her daring. Mario had pointed out discrepancies in the invoicing, and explained everything to her as he saw it. There was an inordinate amount of ripping off going on at the different sites. Donna had told him she would sort it out. She was supposed to be looking out for her husband’s interests and she was determined that she would. It was this that gave her the courage needed to take on men like Mark Hancock. Also, the knowledge that Mario was ready to back her up whenever she needed it. In the last six weeks her life had been turned upside down, yet there was an up side too. She had actually started looking forward to getting out of bed.
Inside the office she smiled sweetly at Hancock, and was gratified to see he was looking decidedly worried.
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Chapter Four
Paddy Donovon was enormous, over eighteen stone, but as his height was nearer seven feet than six, he could carry it. His huge leonine head was covered in reddish curls, with a liberal sprinkling of grey. His beard was long, bushy, and also going grey. His eyes were slate-blue, steely, and surrounded by sandy lashes.
His hands were like shovels, his shoulders broad and muscular. He was nearly fifty-five years old. There was nothing anyone could tell Paddy about the running of a building site. He had come to England in the early 1950s, established himself in Kilburn, reared a family and lost his wife to cancer, all the while working on different sites around the country. The only thing in his life that had stayed the same was the Irish Post, even though he only bought it these days for the obituaries.
He had offered a tearful Donna his expertise along with Mario’s, and she had gratefully accepted. Now he told her exactly what to say, and what not to say on the sites. If the site manager didn’t give her what Paddy called ‘her due’, then Paddy would make it quite plain that they would answer to him. Mark Hancock was the first to find this out and now, seething with indignation, he was once more trying to pacify not only Donna Brunos, a bitch of a woman, but also Big Paddy Donovon, ex-fistfighter and champion of anyone smaller than him - which in Mark’s estimation took in ninety-five percent of the population.
‘The damp course is up, we’re starting the bricklaying in the next two days, the plasterers will be in afterwards. I don’t know what else I can tell you.’
‘How about where the money’s gone? Also who the fecking eejit was who ordered the cement.’
Mark felt himself come over faint. Paddy’s voice was low, but the menace in it was evident nonetheless.
Donna picked up a file to disguise the shaking of her hands. She fiddled with the papers inside while she waited for Hancock to answer.
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them ‘Look, Mr Hancock …’ Her voice was shaking along with her whole body and she swallowed deeply before going on. ‘My husband has handed over the running of all his businesses to me. I really need to have these questions answered. The fact that the cement has already been paid for, and that three hundred yards has gone astray, is obviously of paramount importance.’
Mark Hancock wiped a dirty hand across his face. ‘It’s the perk of the job normally that cement would go to another site, but as it didn’t, I sold it off myself.’
‘Huh!’ Paddy’s exclamation was like a gunshot in the small Portakabin. ‘If I know you, Hancock, you already had the buyer when you made the order. It’s the old story. When the cat’s away … Especially as this cat is away for a long stretch. Well, you listen to me, and you listen good, boy. I’m personally employed by this young lady to look out for her businesses and I intend to do just that. You get word around the sites that all the paperwork had better be in good shape or I’ll rip the head off the first bastard to try and do her down. Georgio gave us all jobs, even when we’d been in stir, and now you try and have her over. Well, the buck stops here and now. As for the plasterers … paying them up front! I’ve heard fairy stories in the Old Country with more credence than that one! But as the money’s been paid then they have to do the work, no matter whose pocket it comes out of. And believe me when I say I want that plastering to shine like glass, the job’s that good. So you’d better bring a good firm in. Now get out of me sight before I brain ye!’
Mark Hancock left the Portakabin as fast as his dignity would allow.
‘Thanks, Paddy. I don’t know what I’d do without you,’ Donna told him.
He grinned, showing surprisingly white teeth.
‘Listen, me little pickaheen, by the time I’ve finished educating you, you’d be able to run fecking Wimpey’s!’
Donna grinned back, but she wished desperately that she had as much faith in herself as Big Paddy did. Just talking to the likes of Mark Hancock terrified her, more so in case she forgot what Paddy had told her to say. But as the big fella had pointed out, if she wanted the men’s respect, the only way she would get it was to do the talking herself. He would back her up afterwards, but the men had to think she had a working knowledge of the sites.
Well, if she kept this up, that’s exactly what she would have. Whether she wanted it or not!
Georgio listened, his whole body alert and tense. In the darkness, he
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could hear the irregular breathing of Timmy Lambert. He knew Timmy was awake. Georgio forced his breath to come out in regular small snores. His eyes were wide open as he tried to refine his night vision. Finally, after what seemed an age, he felt Timmy move in the bunk above him, then as he clenched his fists, was amazed to see a match flare as Timmy lit himself a roll-up.
‘You awake, Georgio?’
‘Well, I am now, Timmy.’
‘I think we should have a little chat.’
‘What about?’ Georgio’s voice was low now; he was on his guard.
Timmy slipped off the bunk and sat beside him, his big moon face visible as he pulled deeply on his match-thin roll-up. ‘Lewis is back on the Wing tomorrow, I heard the whisper. He’s only been on a laydown, twenty-eight days, that’s all. I also hear he’s after you, boyo, because of that robbery. Now there’s two camps in this dump. One is Lewis’s and the other is Lewis’s. Do you understand what I’m saying?’
Georgio didn’t answer. He wanted desperately to move his head away from the man’s breath, and the stench of his body odour.
The thingjs, I heard another little whisper that Wilson is for the out. Now there’s something not quite kosher going on here, and I’d love to know what it is.’
Georgio rubbed his eyes roughly with his fingers. ‘So would I, Timmy. All I know is, my face was put in the frame by Wilson. That slag tucked me up. Now Lewis is jumping on the bandwagon and all. Well, he don’t scare me, we go back a long time.’
Timmy laughed softly, the sound eerie in the dimness. ‘I don’t particularly like you, Brunos, but I have to admire you. If Lewis was after me, even I’d be worried.’
Georgio laughed again. ‘Even you? What’s that supposed to mean?’
Timmy’s voice lost its friendliness. ‘What that means, arsehole, is I know Lewis and I know his clout in here. He’s got most of the cons on A Wing up his khyber, and the majority of the screws. I know he got you striped up in the Scrubs. His arm’s long, Georgio, his temper’s short, and every year he does in here it’s getting shorter. That robbery had his stamp on it, and as you already said, you two go back a long way. Now it don’t take a contender for Mastermind to suss out you’ve been a naughty boy, and Lewis has found that out. While you’re in his bad books, you ain’t safe and your family ain’t safe. It also means I ain’t safe, because we share a peter, and if he decides to burn you out, then the chances are I get burned with you. So if you have any dealings with him, I want to know.’
Georgio could understand the man’s concern. In a small part of
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him he was terrified of what was going to happen, but he had a plan up his sleeve, and after tomorrow he would know whether or not it was going to work.
‘Listen, Timmy, I’m tired. I’ll see Lewis tomorrow, so stop fretting your ugly head over it. All right?’
Timmy wiped a hand across his face, the scraping of his stubble loud in the silent cell.
‘I’m fucking warning you, Georgio. I know you’re a heavyweight, I respect that. But at the end of the day, we’re all hard nuts in here, one way or another, even the nancies. A few years A-Grade soon sorts out the men from the boys, and let’s face it, you ain’t ever,done any bird before. So you keep me informed of what’s going on. If you go down the pan, boy, you ain’t taking me with you. Got that?’
Georgio turned over on his side. Tucking his hands under his head he said casually, ‘Loud and clear. Goodnight, Timmy.’
Timmy sat for a few seconds longer before returning to his bunk. Georgio heard the springs groan as the man’s huge bulk lay down above him.
Closing his eyes, he shuddered inwardly. He hadn’t slept properly in a month. The thought of Lewis scared him shitless. But tomorrow, if he played his cards right, everything could be hunky-dory.
For the first time in years, Georgio actually prayed.
Donna awoke to weak sunshine and a lifting of her spirits. If someone had told her a few months ago that she would enjoy doing Georgio’s job she would have laughed in their face. Yet, as she was his wife, and as everyone expected her to ‘see to’ things for him, she had felt pressured into taking everything on. Now she was glad she had. Even the paperwork for the building business was beginning to make sense to her. She needed guidance, she knew, but the day-to-day running was not as difficult as she had feared. In fact, once she had managed to sort through the offices, and had thrown out the rubbish, it was surprisingly straightforward.
When Georgio came home he would be so proud of her. She hugged this thought to herself.
Big Paddy had seen to it that she was given more than ‘her due’. Now on the sites she was treated with respect, even with awe. But that could be due to Paddy’s watchful presence, she admitted to herself.
Getting out of bed, she saw her reflection in the mirrored wardrobes. Holding her thick chestnut hair back from her face, she surveyed herself. She was thinner than ever since the trial, her
ribcage visible through her skin. Pulling back her narrow shoulders she sighed heavily. No amount of thrusting out would ever make her breasts look full. She was still a thirty AA cup, the same as she had been when she was fourteen. All her friends had blossomed, but not Donna. She had hoped that the advent of children would have given her at least a small cleavage. But it wasn’t to be. She liked her legs though, she had always liked them. They were long, slim, and nicely shaped. She looked good in shorts, though she rarely wore them. Georgio always said her breasts were lovely, juicy he had called them, and she had always blushed at this. His rough words had embarrassed her even as she had loved hearing them.
She wrapped her arms around herself in despair. If only things were as they had been … Georgio would be getting up now, coughing and spluttering his way to the bathroom, his long muscly body naked. She had always watched him dress, even when she was really tired she had watched him, drinking him in with her eyes. She had never once, in all the years with him, grown bored of looking at him. In fact, she had loved him more as the years had gone on.
She admitted to herself that he had taken her for granted, but that was men, apparently. Dolly said that her husband wouldn’t have noticed if she had fandangoed across the front room in the nude. Unless she had stood in front of the TV, then there would have been hell to pay.
Georgio, though, had always treated Donna with respect, had respected her feelings. Had never let her know when he was unfaithful. Though with the intuition of women, she had known, she had known immediately. It hadn’t happened that often over the years, but when it had it had grieved her. Hurt her deeply. Yet, in a funny way, she had understood why Georgio had done it. He was a man who needed people, needed adoration, and he was a man who got what he wanted. .
She had always thanked God for Georgio, thanked Him because He had seen fit to give him to her, little Donna Fenland. A nobody. Georgio had even stood by her when she had lost the babies, and she knew he had dearly wanted children. Being a mixture of Greek and Irish Catholic, it was a certainty he would want children. Yet he,had not discarded her in favour of a fertile woman, had never once brought the subject up, even when they had rowed. Which wasn’t often. She was scared to row with Georgio, scared to give him any excuse not to want her.
Now she was deprived of him as she had always feared she would be. But it was the police and the courts who had taken him away, not some large-breasted, blonde model type with hormones bursting out
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them of her every orifice. That had been Donna’s biggest fear all her married life. Yet she almost wished he had left her now; in a funny way, she wished he had gone off with another woman. That would be preferable to thinking of him stuck in that prison on the Isle of Wight. Her Georgio, her free agent. Georgio who had a boat, Georgio who always liked to travel, Georgio who walked across the fields every Sunday after his dinner because he liked being in the air, liked his freedom.
She bit back the tears, their hot saltiness making her cough. Walking to the mirrored wardrobes, she stared into her own face. The eyes were black-rimmed, but still a deep blue. Her cheekbones were prominent, more so now she had lost so much weight. Her lips were dry and cracked from where she cried in the night, and chewed on them to stem the heartwrenching sobs of loneliness. Leaning her forehead on the cool glass, she took a deep breath. Georgio would be home once his appeal was over with; he would be home. She said it over and over like a mantra. She had to believe that, she had to.
If she ever stopped believing it, she would take a length of rope and hang herself. It was no idle threat; it was the truth, a deep inalterable truth.
Without Georgio Brunos, she was nothing.
She was hanging on by a minute thread. If Georgio lost his appeal the thread would snap and with it her reason. Her earlier joy on waking was gone now. The thought of her husband’s pleasure in her work, in the businesses, gone also. Because if he didn’t come home, the businesses, the house, the cars, all they possessed, were nothing.
All she had ever wanted in her life was him.
Donald Lewis was fifty-two years old. He wasn’t a big man in stature, but what he lacked in size he made up for in reputation, and his reputation was one of the hardest. It had taken the Sweeney, the Flying Squad and the Serious Crime Squad eleven years of intensive work before they had brought him in. He was involved in every racket known to man, and a few that were as yet unknown to the police and public in general. He was an international villain, having seen the action over the Pond as a viable proposition before most of his contemporaries. He dealt in anything and everything, from women, to drugs, to boys, to guns. He was noted for his almost surgical cleanliness, and also his dry sense of humour. He liked young men, handsome young men, and his stint in Parkhurst had been likened to a busman’s holiday by the screws.