by Emmy Ellis
“Where’s the money?” Benny said, roughening up his voice.
His way of disguising it? Rebecca recognised it anyway, but then she would, given that she knew who he was. Would Tripper? Benny was a regular here, placing bets on the horses, hoping each time he’d double his money like he had once before; the huge winnings had funded his property developer business.
Tripper frowned, appearing stunned for a moment. He stared at Benny, maybe at his eyes. Had they given him away? They were a distinctive colour, the first thing, apart from his beard, anyone would pick up on. And as for that beard, part of it was on show. He should have sewn up the mouth hole, and Rebecca had almost mentioned it once upon a time, then kept it to herself. She wanted him caught. All of them caught so this would…just…stop.
“Benny Chadworth?” Tripper whispered.
“Fuck.” Benny curled his finger over the trigger. And pulled it.
Tripper flew backwards, the fronts of his white shirt turning red, his eyes widening, arms flung out to the sides, a scream trumpeting out of his gaping mouth along with a shower of claret. He landed on the floor in the other room, an office, beside a desk chair. Benny and the others entered, going to Plan B: What to do if a gun goes off—as if guns fired by themselves, no blame apportioned to whoever brandished it, a separation of self from the act.
Rebecca remained by the doorway—she was doing her job, which was to stay put and sound the alert regarding anyone who came in via the back. She stood side-on against the doorframe, her attention on the office, her ear cocked to the rear door.
Benny squatted beside Tripper. “What’s the safe combination?”
And it occurred to Rebecca then, what a waste of time this would have been had Tripper died. They didn’t have the means to carry a heavy safe to the stolen van, and this jaunt would have been for nothing. Death prior to info hadn’t featured in Plan C.
“Three…nine, seven…one,” Tripper rasped out, blood spray misting the air.
He clutched his belly, and Rebecca imagined the mess beneath that shirt, the peppered holes in the flesh, all those little lead slugs burrowed inside him, giving him untold pain.
Len moved to the safe and put the code in. A clunk, then the door swung open, and Rebecca swore they all let out a sigh of relief—no bolt cutters needed to snip fingers. He removed bundles of cash, so much of it, and placed them in his rucksack. Next came small plastic money bags full of coins, landing in heavy thuds, and he closed the safe and hauled the rucksack onto his back, the straps straining downwards by the weight.
“Just take it and go.” Tripper wheezed, gasped, hands splayed over his belly, perhaps his attempt at trying to hold all the blood inside him.
“Can’t do that,” Benny said. “You know who I am.”
“I won’t say anything, I swear. I’m insured. It’ll be okay.”
Benny stood and walked a few feet away. He glanced at Mum, asking a silent question, and she shook her head, jerking her shotgun towards Trev. Benny stared at him and nodded. Trev positioned his weapon more comfortably beneath his armpit and fired.
Rebecca turned away to stare through the broken hole in the glass of the back door, its spiky edges as sharp as her nerve endings. She wondered how Will was doing, whether he’d heard the shotgun blasts, and if it had scared him as much as it had shocked her. Len, Trev, and Mum walked past her, a ‘job well done’ air about them, heading for the exit, and Rebecca risked a glance into the office. Tripper’s head… She swallowed and waited for Benny, who stared at her, running his tongue over his lips. She didn’t look away, didn’t give him the satisfaction of knowing he got to her, how she knew he was thinking about sex with her even on a job. What was wrong with him?
He came towards her and brushed close, touching her crotch with a knuckle, continuing on as if he hadn’t. Taking the lead in the line, he walked out, his faithful cult crew following, and once again, Rebecca trailed last. A whistle trilled, the signal for Will to calmly walk away from his post, and then they were out of the yard, down the alley, and getting into the van. Anthony started the engine, Benny beside him, and in the back with Mum, Len, and Trev, Rebecca sat on the bench opposite them, waiting for her youngest brother. He climbed in, out of breath, perhaps running once he’d reached an alley that brought him out here, and he closed the door, sitting beside her.
She clutched his hand, her other filled with the barrel of the shotgun, and her face grew hot beneath the balaclava, the heat of shame strong and wicked. They weren’t allowed to take them off yet. Next came the usual ritual, so Benny had informed her and Will earlier, of parking up somewhere remote, torching the van, then transferring to another stolen vehicle, setting fire to that, and on to a third and home.
Rebecca went through these motions with her mind on Tripper, how his lungs had stopped working, his chest no longer rising with the inflation of life. His face had been ruined, one of his eyes bugging from the internal lead-shot pressure, skin slashed with blood, giving the impression a knife had scored it. He had a wife, Mum had said, some ‘skinny-arsed slapper’ from her schooldays who liked to think she was a cut above now she’d gone up in the world. Tripper was a wealthy man—had been, his wife was the wealthy one now—and their house on Westlake Court was something Mum aspired to. Jealous, that was what she was, of anyone who had more than her, no matter that they’d worked hard for it.
They’d arrived home, balaclavas left behind in the second vehicle switch, toasted now, all traces of their skin and the condensation from their breath gone. The troop into the kitchen, again the single file, took Rebecca back to approaching the rear of Tripper’s shop. With her being last each time, she was more of a square peg than Will, who was trusted to be the lookout, one of the most important people on the team, but only because he was young and no one would suspect him. Rebecca was just window dressing, no particular role that one of the others couldn’t perform, and now she’d stand there in the kitchen, leaning against a cupboard, listening to the sordid recount of the night’s events, Will having something to contribute by relating what had gone on out the front, yet she’d add nothing, an observer who’d done sod all.
She hated this life, but it was all she knew. Would she ever leave it when she was old enough? Only one year until she was sixteen, and she could walk away. Would she have the courage? Somehow, she didn’t think she would. Fear kept her tethered. But she could dream, couldn’t she? She could imagine a life of freedom.
“Did you hear the shots?” Benny asked.
Will nodded. “They weren’t that loud, though. Could have been a car backfiring. No one was in the street at the time anyway.”
“How many people saw you?”
“Can’t say they saw me, like. They didn’t look at me when they walked by or nothing. Five in all. One went into the laundrette, the others into the pizza shop. Oh, and a pizza delivery bloke came out and got on his moped, but he drove up the street, not down past me.”
“The laundrette’s close to the bookies. Did that person act weird when the guns went off?”
“Nah, she had headphones on.”
“Seems like all is in order.” Benny lifted a bottle of whisky and shook it. The liquid sloshed about, creating a weird glugging noise. “Pass us some glasses, Beck. At least be useful doing that.”
She ignored his dig—what else had he expected her to do at the bookies?—and turned to get them out. She pushed them across the worktop, and Mum took them, put them on the table, the glasses clonking together. Benny poured up to halfway in each. They toasted one another, as if Rebecca and Will didn’t exist, but it didn’t hurt, she was used to it.
“Now to count the dosh. Give us that rucksack.” Benny waved his fingers impatiently at Len. “Get a fucking move on, son.”
Len handed it over, and Benny dumped it on the table, his greedy fingers drawing the zip across. Mum leant close, maybe to ensure he didn’t keep any back, and he glared at her.
“Give us some room, you nosy bint, bloody breathing down
my neck. What’s up with you?” He dug his hand inside and brought out the bundles of notes, then the coin bags. “Got a right haul here. You’ll have more than enough to buy those shitty flowers you like so much, Beck.”
While he counted it, she imagined Mrs Tripper finding out her husband was dead, shot and robbed, left on the floor—collateral damage, as Benny would call it. They had kids, a boy and a girl, one in Rebecca’s year at school, the other in Will’s. They wouldn’t be in on Monday, staying home to mourn their loss, and she couldn’t get her head around how that would feel. She hadn’t had a father—Benny didn’t count as one, and neither was he a role model—and if Mum died, Rebecca wouldn’t give a toss. The only one she could base any emotion on was Will. If he died, she’d be crushed.
She looked at her family one by one. Mum smiled wide, her eyes massive at the sight of the cash—she was probably rubbing her hands beneath the table. Len sipped his drink, at ease, just a normal night at home after work, like murder hadn’t been committed. Trev, he appeared tired, his face drawn. Did he feel bad for killing Tripper? He stared at a bag of coins being emptied onto the table, and a small smile appeared—him telling himself a death had been worth it because of all that money? The reward justified what he’d done? And how quickly he’d done it, not a moment of hesitation, as if he’d been waiting for the green light to pull the trigger for years, the act some form of prize, him being a proper gang member now. Anthony sipped his booze, grinning away.
Will had his head bent, and he seemed confused, eyebrows knitted as he worked something out. “Those shots. Were they to get that bloke to hand over the money then?”
The whole tale hadn’t been told yet, and he was in for a shock.
Benny laughed. “Nah, he recognised me, so I shot him in the guts. Trev finished him off.”
Will’s head snapped up. “What?”
“He’s dead, pal, are you deaf as well as stupid?” Benny carried on counting, not a care in the world. “You just remember that for the future. If you mess my plans up, shit hits the fan.”
“You’d kill me?” Will blinked, uncomprehending.
“I’d kill anyone who fucked me about.” He stared at Rebecca, a warning: Did he know she had plans to run?
Will turned to Mum, who nodded, a creepy smile on her spiteful-looking lips. How could she agree? How could she let this wanker shoot her child? There was something intrinsically wrong with that woman, she wasn’t wired right, the fundamental instinct to protect her kids missing, lost somewhere along the way if your name was Will or Rebecca.
Len and Trev? That was a different matter.
Chapter Eighteen
The past swirled inside Orchid’s head, reminding her exactly why she shouldn’t experience any remorse for what was about to happen. Mum wouldn’t care if Orchid and Will were tied to those chairs with rope, she wouldn’t step in and finally, finally show some feeling towards them—good feelings, maternal ones, not the spiteful sort she’d displayed all their lives. So why should Orchid waste any time on sorrow, on the need to protect her mother, when it wouldn’t be reciprocated if the tables were turned?
Mum had given the nod for Trev to kill Tripper, for fuck’s sake, heedless of the shit he’d get into if he got caught for it. Shouldn’t she have killed him herself so none of her kids had to? Wasn’t that what proper mothers would do? To be fair, proper mothers wouldn’t recruit her kids to be in a gang in the first place. And had Benny been testing Mum? He’d given her the opportunity to shoot that man, and she’d declined. How come Trev hadn’t seen the bad side to that, what she’d really been saying with her decision? He must have thought it was her way of showing him he was trusted, and he’d strutted around for months afterwards as if it had been an honour, an invisible ‘I’m proud of myself’ badge displayed on his puffed-up chest.
He hadn’t seen the truth.
“Why do you hate us so much?” Orchid asked Mum. If she had a reason, maybe she’d understand, maybe all those years of their mother’s malice would mean something. “What have we ever done to you to deserve that?”
Mum choked out a laugh, her eyes alight with…glee? She’d always been pleased when she held all the cards, her need for control paramount, although she conceded whenever Benny was around, her bossy status diminished in the shadow of his bullish ways. “You were born. You exist. Isn’t that enough of a reason?”
The glee remained, and Orchid felt sick. If she ever had a child, she’d never treat them as anything but precious.
“Why are we different to Len and Trev?” Will asked. “Why have us two always been the ones to suffer?”
Mum turned her narrowed gaze on him. It seemed him asking her that had thrown her into confusion. Orchid supposed it was because Mum had forgotten that Will wasn’t on her side but Orchid’s, that he’d been the one to tie her to the chair. Of course, she still hoped he was in with her and Benny, willing to help them take Orchid back to Birmingham to kill her.
Mum smoothed out her features, then they bunched into annoyance again. She must have remembered he’d switched his loyalty. “Why don’t you just shut your stupid fat mouth. You know, you’ve always been the one who wound me up the most. It’s your pathetic need to want me to be something I can’t.”
“What, like a good mother?” Orchid said, the sneer evident in her waspish voice.
She’d vowed not to let Mum know how she felt, to reveal that remaining nugget of ‘Please, will you just love me, even a little bit?’ She’d tried so hard to bury it, but fuck, the way Mum had just spoken to Will was unnecessary, especially when he hadn’t been as successful in hiding his yearning to have a decent parent. He was who Orchid wanted Mum to care for, not herself, for the bitch to at least give him one small slither of love, but even strapped to a chair on the verge of death, she wasn’t budging.
Stubborn to the last.
“If you were proper children, maybe I could have given a shit,” Mum muttered. “If you weren’t born because of…” She shook her head, closing her eyes momentarily, and it was clear she spoke to herself in her head. “No, I won’t give you the satisfaction of knowing.”
“Knowing what?” Will asked, that umbilical cord link to her still there however much he said he hated her.
“Wouldn’t you like to know.” Mum smirked.
Orchid had had enough. As always, their mother was withholding something from them. Instead of love this time, it was information, and really, did they need to know what it was? They’d survived so far without it, and they could move on minus an answer to that riddle. What you didn’t know didn’t hurt you, and to be honest, she wanted this over. She moved to stand directly in front of Mum, Greg at her back.
Orchid aimed for the forehead. “I think I must have been about eight when I realised how much you don’t care. That Mrs Didders’ business, how you couldn’t give a toss that she’d died, that you’d knowingly sent your child to murder someone with crushed-up tablets. So long as you got a cut of her money, her being dead didn’t matter, and your child hating herself for being a killer didn’t matter.”
“Oh, piss off, you mardy tart. Like I care about your feelings.”
The sludge of hatred in Orchid’s gut swelled and, sod it, she was going in for the kill, to get some reaction, to know she’d unsettled her mother at least once, put her on the back foot. “I wonder if you ever admitted to Benny about that dog.”
Mum’s eyes widened. Orchid had her there. Mum hadn’t said a word, and she was still bothered, despite a gun pointing at her fucking head, about what Benny thought of her. Mum was in the same boat as them, brainwashed by him to do whatever he asked, having to keep secrets from him so he didn’t unleash his fury on her, and it seemed she was worried he’d find out what she’d done. Why did she care about some washed-up old dodger? What was the attraction? It had to be more than money. Stockholm Syndrome, was that it? Orchid was glad she’d never succumbed to it, not to the degree where she’d stayed at home like Len and Trev, and Will until recently. A
part of her had always longed to run, she’d just needed that final shove in order to do it, and her last job with the gang had been it.
“What are you two on about?” Benny stared at Mum, his posture rigid, like it was when he’d told them off as kids. “What fucking dog?”
Orchid had no allegiance to her mother, no desire to protect her, not anymore. “I stole this gold dog off Mrs Didders, an ornament. Solid all the way through. Ruby eyes, all real. Anthony took it to London and sold it, then he shared the money with Mum. Me and Will got some, too, and we were told to keep it quiet—from you. Granted, at the time, Mum had mentioned telling you, and it was Anthony who said no, but she went along with it.”
“You fucking trollop,” Benny said to Mum. “If I wasn’t tied to this chair, I’d—”
“That bedroom furniture she bought?” Orchid interrupted, unable to listen to him any longer. “Anthony’s yellow car? They didn’t save for them like they told you, it was cash from the dog. She lied to you, for years, kept that secret to herself. I bet you thought you had her properly under your thumb, didn’t you, but like me and Will, she kept a bit of herself back, she wasn’t fully in your control—and I bet that stings.”
Benny jerked his head to one side and butted Mum in the temple. She cried out, part rage, part hurt, and made to lift her trapped hand to hold the site of the pain, then, catching on that she couldn’t move, she gritted her teeth, tears falling. Orchid didn’t fool herself into thinking they were from remorse or getting caught after all this time, her secret spewed by her shitty little daughter. It was more likely because of the pain.
“You fucking whore,” Benny shouted. “Who the fuck gave you permission to do that?”
“Who gave you permission to take extra money from the jobs?” Mum threw back. “Don’t think I didn’t know.”
“I’m the brains behind it, so I’m entitled to more.”