by J. D. Weston
“I thought I’d give you a chance,” replied Mackie.
Harvey straightened, dropped his arms to his sides and picked up his jacket.
“Where are you going?” asked Mackie, stepping over to block Harvey’s exit.
Harvey swung his jacket round in a wide arc. He caught the sleeve as the confused-looking Mackie turned to see what was happening.
But it was too late for him.
Harvey pulled the thick leather tight against Mackie’s neck, twisting it to tighten the grip and close off the boy’s airway. A sharp kick to the back of his legs dropped Mackie to his knees and both hands gripped the jacket, trying in vain to pull it from his throat.
Harvey slammed his knee into the back of his lungs, forcing the last remaining breath from Mackie’s body. Then, keeping his knee in place, he forced Mackie’s head back with the taught leather jacket fastened around his neck.
“That’s the last lesson you’ll ever learn, Mackie,” said Harvey, as he strengthened his grip. “Never give anyone a chance.”
He squeezed harder and watched as the boy’s face morphed through shades of red, from pink flesh tones to the deep, cherry colour of blood. Tiny spatters of saliva flew from Mackie’s lips with the last breaths his body would take. The battle-hardened boy whimpered as he succumbed to death.
It was a sound Harvey had heard too often. The brave face of masculinity was typically a facade, underneath which, in most men, a child lives and breathes, and when the cold hand of death approaches, the child cries out.
It wasn’t until Mackie’s lifeless hands released their grip on Harvey’s jacket and his body slumped to the cold, concrete floor that Harvey released the pressure. Water continued to rain down on Harvey, breaking the silence as the amplified and muffled voice of the MC came through the thick walls.
“And now, on behalf of the one and only, Mr Dixon, our guest fighter tonight and current champion, let’s hear it for Mackie.” The audience applauded once more as Mackie lay motionless at Harvey’s feet in a pool of cold and bloodied water.
Harvey hung his jacket on a hook fixed to the wall. He pulled off his soaking white t-shirt and hung it beside the jacket, then took three deep, long breaths before stepping out beneath the flickering light and through the double doors to where a sea of confused faces greeted him with wide eyes.
But above the heads of the confused, criminal faces, standing alone in the centre of the ring, one face stared at Harvey.
Harvey met Tyler’s gaze. They locked onto each other as the murmurs around them rose to a deafening hum of curses and taunts. But nothing could break Harvey’s focus. No crude curse or threatening taunt found its way to Harvey’s mind.
It was payback time for Julios and his son was ready to receive the payment.
16
On Your Knees
A murmur among the men below and all around Tyler grew into a hum of confused questions as each of the guests looked from Harvey to Del Dixon and back to Tyler, whose heart sank in the pit of his stomach. He backed into his corner to watch Harvey Stone pull himself to the edge of the ring and step through the ropes.
With outrage written all over his face, Del Dixon shook his head at Harvey, who ignored the gesture and began to roll his neck from side to side. He didn’t offer a menacing look or a threatening stare. Instead, Harvey simply nodded once at Tyler and prepared for the fight.
The hum of the crowd had worked itself to an excited buzz. New bets were being placed, cigars were lit and trays of champagne seemed to float across the tops of the grey, bald and shaved heads as if they were at the whim of a river that ran around the ring.
The ref took to the centre of the ring, held his hands in the air to silence the buzzing crowds, and cleared his throat.
He waved for both Harvey and Tyler to join him.
The fascinated crowd listened on with awe.
The ref looked between Harvey and Tyler as if he were delivering bad news.
“Tonight, one of you will die,” said the ref. His choice of words was designed more for the crowd’s amusement than as a warning to the fighters. “There’s no gloves and no rules except one. The last man standing wins.”
The crowd erupted into a frenzy of cheers and taunts aimed mainly at Harvey, the smaller of the two men.
“Lights please,” called the ref.
The lights dimmed all around, leaving the ring lit by two huge spotlights in the ceiling. The hum of the audience fell to a whisper and the ref ordered them both back to their corners.
Finding John at the most prominent table, Tyler searched for answers, but received only an unsmiling nod of the head. John ran his finger across his throat then pointed to the ceiling.
“Are you ready?” asked the ref, as if Tyler’s distraction was holding up the fight.
He nodded.
The ref caught his eye one last time then glanced at Harvey. He brought his arm up then swung it down, issuing the command to fight. Then he stepped out of the way and climbed through the ropes. As the ref in a fight with no rules, his job was over.
Harvey stepped forwards and gestured for Tyler to come at him. But Tyler froze. It was his father’s only friend. He couldn’t fight him.
The murmur of the crowd grew in volume like a slowly approaching wave. But when Harvey landed the first punch, a jab to Tyler’s gut, the wave crashed and the crowd erupted.
In their eyes, the fight had begun. But in Tyler’s, he saw only one way out.
“Fight me,” said Harvey over his guard as he ducked and weaved and planted a series of jabs into Tyler’s ribs. “Don’t just stand there. Fight me.”
Harvey landed one more across Tyler’s jaw. It was a sweet punch that rocked Tyler from his daze. Something stirred inside him. A growl of distaste and the warmth of emotions.
“That’s it,” said Harvey as Tyler pushed himself out of the corner. “Control it.”
As if to make sure the beast was indeed waking, Harvey jabbed twice then landed a hook that grazed Tyler’s ear and enabled Tyler to grab hold of Harvey and bring him close.
“What’s going on?” he asked, “I thought-”
But Harvey delivered an uppercut to Tyler’s gut in the same spot as before. The punch caught Tyler off-guard and left him winded, so he moved away, and began to bounce from foot to foot.
“Get on with it,” shouted a bald man from the crowd. His thick London accent made the sentence sound as if it were all one word.
Raising his guard, Tyler moved in with a combination of his own. The final of the four punches caught Harvey square in the face and sent him back to the corner, where Tyler followed him and rained in blow after blow to Harvey’s stomach. Feigning fatigue, he leaned in close to Harvey.
“Fight me, Tyler,” said Harvey, and he shoved him away.
Before Tyler could recover, Harvey was back on him. A beer bottle skidded across the canvas as Harvey rained punches in from every angle, the last of which caught Tyler’s nose, causing the growl in the pit of his stomach to claw up to his chest.
“For your dad,” said Harvey, as he came in for another attack.
But the beast saw it coming. Tyler dodged to one side and coiled like a spring then landed a blow to Harvey’s face with the full weight of his body behind it, which sent Harvey to the floor.
“That’s more like it,” shouted one man who hung onto the ropes like he was a caged animal. “Get in there, son.”
But Tyler watched with his arms by his sides as Harvey stood and came back at him with a series of punches.
“Hit me,” shouted Harvey, and punched Tyler. “I said fucking hit me.” He punched Tyler again then waited for a reaction.
But none came.
“Come on, Tyler,” said Harvey, as he punched Tyler square in the gut. “Hit me.”
‘Control it.’
“Hit me,” shouted Harvey.
‘Use it.’
With his face up close to Tyler’s, Harvey leaned into him, resting his fatigued arms on the boy’s
shoulders.
“Kill me,” he whispered, then moved away to catch Tyler’s eye. He nodded. “Kill me for your dad. It’s all I have to give.”
Tyler stared down at the man he’d met only a few days earlier but what seemed like a lifetime ago. The last connection to his father was standing in front of him, coiling for a punch and then releasing.
The blow rocked Tyler back to his heels.
“Hit him, Tyler,” screamed John from the side of the ring. “Don’t just bleeding stand there.”
But Tyler couldn’t move.
“I said kill me, Tyler,” Harvey screamed in his face, and shoved him backwards. “Kill me, Tyler.” Harvey stood in front of him, opening up his guard, and planted his feet flat on the canvas floor. “Come on. Hit me. Just do it. Kill me, Tyler. Please.”
“Tyler, you’ve got three seconds before I go upstairs and open your mum up, sunshine. I’ll cut her bleeding heart out and bring it down here for you to see,” said John.
The beast climbed into Tyler’s mind.
“Kill me,” said Harvey, his anguished face pleading with Tyler as he shoved him across the ring.
“Three,” called John. “I’ll cut her from top to bottom, sunshine.”
The beast took a deep breath.
“Come on. For your dad, Tyler. I’m open,” said Harvey.
“Two. Tyler, this is your last chance,” said John, and from the corner of his eye, Tyler caught the glint of a blade being pulled from John’s jacket.
The beast rolled its neck from side to side. Tyler’s huge frame coiled like a snake with his massive fist clenched tight.
Harvey dropped to his knees and held his arms out wide, inviting Tyler to attack him.
“Just do it. Just finish me, Tyler,” screamed Harvey.
“One.”
The sound of the automatic gunfire that shredded the ceiling and rained broken glass down on the crowd cut through the tension like a hot knife through butter. The excited audience of hardened men and trophy wives dropped to the floor with a crash of broken champagne flutes and sought refuge behind anything solid. Tables were dragged to the floor and the sea of heads that had gazed up at Harvey became a tangled mass of arms and legs, as men covered their wives from danger.
The gunfire stopped.
Harvey, who was kneeling in the centre of the ring with Tyler lying flat on the floor beside him, looked out at the door to the staircase. Five men, black as the night, took confident steps across broken glass into the room. They strode in formation with the largest and ugliest at the front and his men behind him in a V-shape.
He let loose another short burst of gunfire and the last of the lights blew out.
Harvey didn’t move an inch.
One of the men with a shaved head who had spoken to Dixon earlier raised a handgun above the toppled table he was hiding behind. He fired off three rounds, all of which found the rear wall.
One of the intruders stepped out of formation, strode across the floor and opened up on the mass of people hiding behind the tables. The gunfire fell silent again, leaving the grunts of dying men and the whimpers of injured and dying women to fill the space.
“Any more brave men in here?” said the lead man.
The room fell silent.
“I didn’t think so,” he said. His voice was deep like a bass, and his accent was London through and through. “How about you?” He kicked out at a fat, bald man who lay across his wife on the floor in a protective pose, which gave way as he scrambled away from her and the man’s boots. “No brave men in here then?” said the man, as he raised the automatic weapon and tucked his elbow into his side to take the weight.
“How about you, fella?” he said, as his eyes landed on Harvey. “Feeling brave tonight?”
“You’ve got no idea, mate,” replied Harvey.
“Is that supposed to be funny?” said the man, as his four men joined him by the side of the ring. “What are you, some kind of tough guy?”
Harvey didn’t reply.
The man looked down at Tyler on the canvas and then back at Harvey.
“Who’s winning?” he asked.
“You’re the one with the gun,” said Harvey. “I’d say you’re winning for the time being.”
The intruder gazed up at Harvey and cocked his head with what appeared to be fascination.
“I’m looking for Del Dixon,” he said at last. “Where can I find him?”
Harvey didn’t reply.
“For a man with a smart mouth, you don’t say much, do you?”
“Do I look like an information kiosk? Why don’t you ask a few of the guests? I’m sure they’d be only too happy to oblige,” replied Harvey.
Beyond the shoulders of the men, a single figure crawled towards the doorway.
The man talking to Harvey snapped around to his friends. His long thick dreadlocks trailed the movement of his head and swung around to his front.
“Find him,” he ordered. “If anyone lies, shoot them.”
The comment raised a few gasps and murmurs from the crowd on the floor all around the ring.
“Silence,” the man shouted, and let a three-round burst pepper the ceiling. “Del Dixon, where are you?”
“He’s by the-” called a woman, who was quickly silenced by her husband.
The man focused on the voice in the dark and trod across the broken glass to where he found her, wrestling her husband’s hand from her mouth. “If they want Del, they can have him,” she snapped at her husband. “Then they can get out of here and leave us alone.”
The hot muzzle of the automatic grazed her rosy cheek. She winced and pulled away.
“Where?” said the man.
“By the door,” the woman replied with regret in her voice. Harvey caught the shine of her husband’s bald head as he shook it from side to side in dismay.
Beside the door, two of the intruders hauled Del Dixon to his feet and dragged him by his armpits through the tangle of limbs. They heaved him onto the canvas where he rolled to the centre away from their hands and stood beside Harvey, eying the men with caution as each one of them moved to guard one side of the ring.
There was no escape.
“If anyone tries to run anyway,” the lead man announced, “there’s an automatic rifle waiting to say hello at the top of those stairs. For the time being, this fight is over. All bets are off.”
He climbed up onto the canvas and ducked beneath the rope, then circled Del Dixon as a lion might orbit its prey.
“You all might be wondering what my brothers and I are doing here. What is it we want? So I’ll tell you.”
He towered over Del Dixon, placed one big hand on the smaller man’s shoulder, and looked out at the crowd.
“Up until two days ago, my brothers and I had one more brother, our youngest sibling. He chose not to work in the family business and we didn’t see him often. But we loved him nonetheless.” He nodded at one of his brothers who slid a small fuel can beneath the rope onto the canvas. “Two days ago, Del Dixon killed him in an attempt to win this fight.”
Murmurs and whispers started to grow as the crowd began to see the outcome.
“Silence,” the lead man said. “The next person to speak or move will be shot.”
The room once more fell silent and the lead man turned to Harvey.
“You, grab that can.”
Harvey got to his feet and collected the fuel can.
The lead man nodded at Del Dixon. There was no instruction necessary. Del Dixon’s angry face turned to horror as the smell of the fuel hit him and reality set in. Harvey soaked Dixon’s clothes and hair, and paid special attention to Dixon’s feet, making sure his leather shoes were saturated. It was a trick he’d learned from Julios to ensure the victim couldn’t run away.
“No,” said Dixon. “Stop. It wasn’t me.”
“You look like you’ve done this before,” said the lead man, ignoring Dixon. He held out a lighter in his steady hand and gazed at Harvey with wonder.
Taking the lighter and crouching at Dixon’s feet, Harvey looked up to enjoy the final expression of terror on Dixon’s face.
“It wasn’t me,” said Dixon. “Don’t do this. It wasn’t me or my men.”
“Any last requests?” said the man. “Is there anything you want the world to know?”
Dixon was breathing hard, the fumes accelerating his hyperventilation. He stared up at the intruder who loomed over him.
“I’m going to come back and bleeding haunt you.”
“Not if my brother haunts you first,” said the man, and nodded at Harvey.
Harvey sparked the lighter.
17
The Beast is Born
The rush of flames igniting Dixon’s agonised body sent the man into a blind frenzy. He bounced from the ropes as he tried to escape the ring and fell backwards, writhing and screaming.
But the scene was too much for the hardened crowd. As if it were coordinated, men emerged from the tables they hid behind, wielding handguns, and all hell broke loose. Harvey dove to the floor, covering Tyler as the lead man’s body was peppered with shots from all angles until his knees buckled and he fell forwards onto Dixon.
Harvey rolled, pulling Tyler with him until they dropped from the ring and landed beside the still-twitching body of one of the brothers.
Automatic gunfire from the far side of the ring, along with many single handgun shots, sang out in the darkness. Only the burst of muzzle flash and the flames of Dixon’s charred and squirming body lit the scene.
Flashes of muzzle fire near the stairwell blocked the exit. With one hand holding Tyler down, Harvey reached into the ring, grabbed the fuel can and began tearing a strip of clothing from the body of the dead yardie brother.
In near darkness, he knotted the strip of material, soaked it in fuel, and then stuffed it into the fuel can, wedging the knot tight into the hole.
“Get ready, Tyler,” he said, as he lit the end of the rag, reached back and launched the can at the wall beside the stairwell. Flames burst from the wall as the plastic can split and burning fuel sprayed out in all directions.