The Reckoning (Carter Brothers), page 11
Taking the warning on board, Moray returned Danny’s stare, not for the first time hoping the gut feeling that had been plaguing him was indeed wrong.
Maria had the hangover from hell. Her head was pounding and her stomach was churning, more out of worry than the amount of alcohol she’d consumed the previous evening. Despite wanting to curl up underneath her duvet and sleep the day and night away, she’d made an effort to pull on her sexiest dress, slap on some make-up and visit Danny at the club in the hope of clearing the air between them. She’d even apologise for throwing the wine glass at his head if need be.
Striding across the dance floor, she barely gave the staff the time of day as they prepared for the club’s reopening. And why should she? She wasn’t just an employee, she was Danny’s fiancée, and as soon as they were married, the club would become hers, or at least Danny’s share would belong to her once he and Moray were dead. The only fly in the ointment was Logan and Lexi, and if they thought they were going to get their hands on the club or the detached house in Hutton, then they had another think coming. They wouldn’t receive a penny from her, and she was looking forward to seeing the look on their faces when she told them as much.
The door to Danny’s office was ajar and, as she approached, Maria cocked her head to one side. She could hear a woman’s voice and, screwing up her face, her hackles rose. Maxine sprang to her mind, and it took all of her effort not to barge into the room and drag the woman out by her hair. No wonder Danny hadn’t bothered to contact her, he’d been too busy cosying up to the bitch he’d once been married to. Composing herself, she pushed away the rage that threatened to consume her and plastered what she hoped looked like a wide smile across her face, one that didn’t quite reach her hard eyes.
As she pushed open the door, the occupants turned their heads, the conversation coming to an abrupt halt. Instead of finding Maxine, to her surprise Maria came face to face with Stacey Carter, her brother-in-law Jimmy, and Moray. It did nothing to appease her anger. She barely even acknowledged the men as she looked Stacey up and down. Not only was Stacey beautiful, but she’d also been the wife of Danny’s friend Tommy. And the fact Stacey was having a cosy chat with her man was enough to make Maria want to claw her eyes out.
‘Am I interrupting something?’ she asked, her tone abrupt.
Leaning back in the chair, Danny wearily rubbed at his eyes, unable to erase from his memory the coldness of her words. He wasn’t so sure he could forgive or forget, even if he wanted to. ‘Nah,’ he said without any emotion in his voice, ‘we’re done here.’
Her smile unwavering, Maria couldn’t help but wonder if he was referring to their relationship; surely he wasn’t going to take offence and throw his dummy out of the pram all because she’d lobbed a wine glass at him?
The room fell into an awkward silence and, placing a coffee cup on the desk, it was Stacey who spoke first. ‘I suppose we should get off,’ she said, rising from the chair and slinging her handbag over her shoulder. ‘I’m sure you and Maria have a few things you’ll want to discuss in private.’
Maria’s smile froze and, as she heard Danny sigh, she had to dig her fingernails into the palm of her hand to stop herself from asking Stacey what the fuck she was referring to. Had Danny been confiding in the bitch about their relationship? Had he told her that they’d had a blazing row?
She stepped aside as Stacey, Jimmy and Moray passed her by, then, placing her hands on her hips, she snapped her hard stare back onto her fiancé, her back remaining rigid. ‘What’s she talking about?’ she screeched at the top of her lungs, unable to keep her temper under control any longer. ‘What things do we need to discuss?’
Danny’s eyes hardened. ‘Keep your voice down,’ he warned with a glance at the door.
Maria’s eyes ever so slightly widened. Stacey, the smug bitch, had been referring to something that she hadn’t been privy to and he had the front to tell her to quieten down, as though she was the one in the wrong. ‘Well, come on,’ she reiterated, ‘spit it fucking out. What the fuck did she mean by we have things to discuss?’
‘Hey, enough of that,’ Danny growled. ‘Stacey is a good friend of mine, and I won’t have you badmouthing her.’ Looking down at his desk, he swallowed hard. Ever since Tommy’s murder, he’d looked out for Stacey and, before meeting Maria, he would have liked nothing better than for him and Stacey to have become more than just friends. He’d definitely developed feelings for her over the years, only he’d been too scared to make his move, scared that if she rebuffed him, it would alter their relationship forever.
Maria gasped; she had a nasty feeling that her dreams of inheriting his considerable wealth were about to slip through her fingers. Turning on the waterworks, genuine tears slipped down her cheeks; she couldn’t lose her meal ticket, not now, not after all the hard work she’d put into snaring him. For months she’d put up with his drivel; even on a good day he bored her senseless. She liked a bit of excitement, thrived on it, in fact. Danny refused to even argue with her and couldn’t be drawn into a slanging match, despite how many times she’d tried, if only to get some kind of reaction out of him, and he called himself a hard man; he was more like a piece of limp lettuce. She heard him sigh and then the creak of leather as he pushed back the chair and got to his feet.
‘Come on,’ he said, holding her at arm’s length, ‘enough of this.’
Throwing her arms around him, Maria clung on for dear life, and as she wept on to his shoulder, she couldn’t help but notice that his own arms were slack, as though there was no meaning behind the hug. ‘I’m sorry,’ she choked out. ‘I should never have told you to get out.’
There was a long pause. ‘Yeah, so am I,’ Danny finally answered, and it was no lie, he was sorry, sorry that he’d ever involved himself with Maria.
Worry inched its way down the length of Maria’s spine. Something had shifted in him, she could feel it. The Danny she knew was caring, attentive and gullible, not forgetting boring. But this Danny was cold, hard and closed off. There and then, she decided she would need to up her game and get him down the aisle before he had the chance to give her the elbow. ‘I thought we could discuss the wedding plans?’ She sniffed. ‘I was thinking we could go abroad, someplace hot, somewhere intimate, just you and me.’
Danny screwed up his face and gave an irritated sigh. She had to be crazy if she thought he would even consider getting married while his daughter was still in hospital.
As he released his arms from around her, Maria’s heart began to beat faster and, looking up at him, her eyes shimmered with salty tears.
‘Right now isn’t a good time.’ He retreated back to his seat behind the desk and sat down. ‘Like I keep on telling you, I’ve got a lot on my plate.’
Anger bubbled within Maria and, swiping away the tears, her expression became hard. ‘Oh, I see,’ she spat, her temper bubbling over. ‘You’ve got the time to have a cosy chat with her’ – she jabbed her finger in the direction that Stacey had gone just moments earlier – ‘but you don’t have time for me, your fiancée.’
For a few moments, Danny just stared, unable to get his head around the change in Maria. Suddenly she felt like a stranger to him, and he questioned whether he’d ever really known her; after all, theirs had been a whirlwind romance, she’d reeled him in and, like a fool, he’d hung onto her every word. He’d once thought that she was a diamond, that despite the age difference between them, she was the one for him, the one he would grow old with. Now he wasn’t so sure who she even was any more. His children would always come first, and he had more than just an inkling that she wouldn’t be prepared to take that lying down. ‘Like I said, now isn’t a good time.’
Sucking in her bottom lip, Maria studied him, her eyes narrowed. ‘Then when is a good time?’
‘How long is a piece of string?’ Danny answered, spreading open his arms.
The blasé tone to his voice made Maria’s stomach sink with despair; she was losing him, she was sure of it. Gathering every ounce of self-respect that she could muster, she pulled herself up to her full height. ‘Well, maybe once you’ve figured out when will be a good time, you can give me a call.’
He nodded his head, then, picking up a pen, he studied a sheet of paper on the desk, the action coming across exactly how it was intended: dismissive.
Maria was halfway to the door when she paused and turned around. ‘I love you.’ It was a lie, of course, it was the money and the lifestyle she loved, not him.
With the pen poised in his hand, Danny looked up and gave the briefest of nods. He didn’t say it back, Maria noted, and as she raced out of the room, she fought down the urge to scream and to kick out at the walls. This was all Gerry’s fault. If he hadn’t changed the plan, then she would still have had enough time to work her magic on Danny. Her eyes became narrowed slits and, snaking her tongue across her teeth, she glanced back at the office, a smirk tugging at the corners of her lips. She wasn’t out of the game just yet; the fact she was sitting on the information her fiancé so desperately wanted might just be exactly what was needed to win him back.
Joey Mann was fast on his way to losing his patience. After spending most of the day driving around the streets, not to mention several circuits of Harts Lane estate, without any positive sightings of Skinny, he was all but ready to unleash his temper on anyone. He wasn’t even sure if the little runt lived on the estate; all he knew for certain was that this was where the bastard had launched himself over the wall and given him and Carlos the slip.
As the sky began to darken, he tapped his thumb impatiently on the steering wheel and clicked his tongue against the roof of his mouth. ‘Try him again,’ he barked out.
‘He’s not gonna answer.’ Carlos lifted his mobile phone to his ear. Yet again, the call rang off and he raised his eyebrows. ‘The little fucker has gone to ground,’ he grumbled.
Joey sighed in agreement and, starting the ignition, he was about to swerve the car away from the kerb when he glanced up at the rear-view mirror. ‘Fuck me,’ he said, slamming his foot on the brake, causing Carlos to throw his hands on to the dashboard to save himself, ‘look who it is – it’s hop along fucking Cassidy.’
In the passenger seat, the cream leather creaked under Carlos’s weight as he shifted his large frame to peer out of the rear window.
Leaning heavily on crutches, Skinny hobbled slowly along the pavement towards them, the heavy plaster cast encasing his broken ankle that ran from his foot to just below his knee hindering his progress.
‘I think it’s safe to say he won’t be jumping over any walls today,’ Carlos said with a wink as he threw open the car door.
As he eased open his own door and climbed out, Joey laughed even harder.
Skinny’s heart was pounding hard and fast and, spotting Christos and Mann climbing out of the car, he attempted to turn around in the hope that they hadn’t spotted him. With the heavy plaster cast and crutches slowing him down, he cursed under his breath. He’d barely managed to hobble further than a few feet away when a punch to the back of his head sent him sprawling heavily to the floor.
‘Your pal has caused us a lot of aggro.’ Shaking the tension out of his fist, Joey towered over him. ‘And now someone’s gonna have to pay for his fuck-up.’
Skinny’s eyes were wide and terror-stricken as he looked up at the two men. ‘It ain’t nothing to do with me,’ he protested, sitting up and rubbing the back of his head. ‘I didn’t even want to buy the gun.’
‘Do I look like I give a flying fuck?’ Joey snarled, giving the plaster cast a swift kick. ‘We had a fucking deal.’
Skinny howled with pain. Bringing his knee up to his chest, he clutched the cracked cast between his hands, tears streaming down his face. ‘It wasn’t my deal, man,’ he screamed.
Joey laughed. ‘Is this cunt for real?’ he asked, hauling Skinny to his feet by the front of his t-shirt.
Carlos gave a nonchalant shrug. Grasping Skinny by the back of his neck, he shoved him several feet forward in the direction of where they had left the car.
‘Come on, man,’ Skinny cried out as they unlocked the car boot, ‘I haven’t done anything.’
‘Not my problem,’ Carlos answered, swinging out his meaty fist.
As the punch connected with the side of his face, Skinny’s legs buckled and, before he could drop unceremoniously to the floor, they bundled him into the boot. The stench of petrol hit Skinny’s nostrils instantly, stinging his eyes and making his chest wheeze. ‘Stop,’ he screamed as the boot was slammed down, muffling his cries for help.
‘What shall we do about them?’ Giving the crutches Skinny had been using a glance, Carlos raised his eyebrows.
‘Leave them where they are’ – Joey shrugged – ‘it’s not like he’s gonna need them where he’s going, is it?’ he said with a twisted grin.
‘Yeah, you’re right.’ Carlos laughed, kicking the crutches across the pavement.
11
Giorgio Christos’s eyes were almost bulging out of his head and his skin had turned ashen as he unlocked the door to the restaurant and watched helplessly as between them Carlos and Joey dragged a clearly terrified Skinny over the threshold. The fact Skinny hadn’t walked in of his own free will was more than enough to alert Giorgio to the fact that he was only there under duress.
‘Why have you brought him here?’ Giorgio demanded.
‘What did you expect us to do with him?’ Carlos snapped back. ‘We could hardly take him back to Gerry’s place, could we?’
‘But this is my home,’ Giorgio argued, ‘what if Rosita or, God forbid, one of my girls come down and find him here?’
‘Then I suggest you make sure that they don’t come down,’ Joey growled as he barged past Giorgio and made his way towards the kitchen situated at the back of the premises.
‘I told you that I didn’t want trouble brought to my door,’ Giorgio said over his shoulder as he headed for the door that led to the accommodation above the restaurant where he and his family lived. ‘You told me that the plan was fool proof, that nothing would come back to us,’ he said, sliding across the heavy bolt, preventing his wife or daughters from entering the restaurant.
‘Are you still whining?’ Emerging from the kitchen with a meat cleaver and a boning knife clutched in his fists, Joey smirked. ‘I thought you were meant to be a Christos. Here, Carlos,’ he called out with a hint of humour in his voice, ‘are you sure that you and soppy bollocks over here are actually related?’
Giorgio’s skin paled even more and he turned his attention to the weapons Joey was brandishing. ‘What are you going to do with those?’ he gasped.
‘What do you think we’re gonna do with them?’ Rolling his eyes, Joey waved the boning knife in Skinny’s direction. ‘We didn’t bring the little fucker here to teach him how to skin a fish, did we?’
Cold sweat began to pool underneath Giorgio’s armpits. ‘I don’t like this,’ he said, looking from the weapons to Skinny. ‘You promised me, Carlos, you gave me your word that there’d be no trouble.’
‘Fucking hell,’ Joey huffed, throwing his arms up into the air, ‘were you actually there when your uncles went to war with Garner and McKay or were you hiding behind your mother’s apron strings, shitting your pants?’
‘I was there,’ Giorgio spat back. In fact, he’d lost count of the number of times since then that he’d awoken in the middle of the night, bathed in sweat and gasping for air, as the faces of those he’d helped to execute flashed before his eyes.
‘Well, grow a fucking backbone, then,’ Joey growled. ‘This ponce,’ he said, pointing the meat cleaver towards Skinny, ‘has had his last fucking day on earth.’
From his position on the floor, Skinny watched the men warily, more aware than ever of the vast size difference between them. ‘This is a joke, right,’ he pleaded with them, ‘you’re just pissing about, trying to scare me?’
‘Does it look like this a joke, you little prick?’ Carlos answered, taking the boning knife Joey handed to him and pointing it in Skinny’s direction.
As he got to his knees, Skinny’s blood ran cold. ‘Come on, man.’ Holding on to a chair with difficulty, he pulled himself to a standing position, his panicked gaze darting frantically around the restaurant, looking for an escape route. ‘This is nothing to do with me, I didn’t make the deal with you.’
‘Yeah, yeah, we’ve heard it all before. It wasn’t me,’ Joey mocked in a sing-song voice. With relative ease, he shoved Skinny back to the floor and kicked out, feeling nothing but satisfaction as his heavy boot connected with Skinny’s ribs. Turning the meat cleaver over in his fist, he held it up to the light, as though inspecting it for watermarks. ‘You and that stupid bastard Aaron have ruined our plans, and all thanks to you and your fuck-up, Garner now knows there’s a price on his head, and that,’ he snarled, ‘is going to cause us untold fucking grief.’
A loud banging on the restaurant door made all four men turn.
‘Who’s that?’ Panic was clearly audible in Giorgio’s voice and his eyes were as wide as saucers. ‘Is it the police?’ he asked, clutching at his chest and backing slightly away.
As he and Joey shared an apprehensive glance, Carlos held his breath as he peered through the wooden slatted window blinds. Had they been seen dragging Skinny into the restaurant, had someone called the Old Bill?
‘It’s Gerry,’ he said, rolling his eyes, ‘you need to get a grip, cuz, and fast,’ he warned his cousin, ‘before you end up bringing us all fucking down.’
As he entered the restaurant, Gerry looked around him and nodded his head, somewhat impressed. ‘Good work, lads’ – he grinned – ‘what has this skinny little bastard had to say for himself?’
As he looked up at the men holding him captive, Skinny continued to whimper. ‘I haven’t done anything,’ he pleaded with them.
