by Preston, Ken
Gosling climbed to his feet. ‘I’m sorry to hear that.’ He held out his hand. ‘But if you change your mind, you know where to find me.’
‘I won’t change my mind,’ Coffin said, ignoring Gosling’s hand.
Gosling held his hand out a moment or two longer and then let it slowly drop to his side. ‘Right, come on then Stilts, I think we’ve outstayed our welcome.’
Coffin watched as the big fat man and his tiny companion walked away. Gosling seemed huge enough that he wouldn’t fit through the doorway into reception, but he did. Stilts, following behind, paused at the doorway and looked back at Coffin. His face remained as still as it had the whole conversation, his eyes dead, unreadable.
Coffin was on the point of asking the little man if there was a problem when Stilts abruptly turned and followed Gosling out of the door.
* * *
Shaw was in the car park round the back of Angellicit, sitting in the passenger seat of the Stig’s car. The Stig was in the driver’s seat, talking on his phone. Gilligan was standing behind the car, also on his phone. Gilligan had been sat in the back, but then when his mobile started buzzing he’d scrambled out of the car pretty quick.
Shaw didn’t like it. After their talk in the Punchline the other night, Gilligan had seemed preoccupied. Shaw had thought Gilligan would want to talk some more about the situation, about taking Joe out. But the Irishman hadn’t mentioned it since. Shaw was glad about that, to be honest. Him and the Stig, they’d decided that taking over the Mob right now probably wasn’t the best idea in the world. And since their visit to Scotland Shaw had begun to lose interest in the game anyway. Over and over he kept seeing Shocker’s kid on the floor, leaking blood.
Poor little bastard. It wasn’t right.
Shaw watched as Gosling and Stilts left Angellicit and got into a car. As the car doors were pulled open, the interior light came on. The yellow glow picked out someone sitting in the driver’s seat, but Shaw couldn’t make out who it was. Might have been the transvestite, what was his name?
Duchess Swallows, that was it.
Duchess and Stilts, the Bananarama reject and a Bernard Manning wannabe. They made for a freaky bunch. Scarier than the vampires in a way.
Or maybe not.
‘What do you think that fat bastard wanted?’ Gilligan said as he climbed back into the car.
‘Probably to talk about that job he was going on about,’ Shaw said.
‘What do you think?’ Gilligan said. ‘Do you think Joe will bite?’
‘Dunno,’ Shaw muttered.
The Stig finished his call and watched as Gosling’s car was driven away. ‘Was that Gosling?’
‘Yeah, the funniest comedian in the West Midlands,’ Shaw said.
‘In his own head, more like,’ Gilligan said.
‘Any luck?’ Shaw said to the Stig.
‘Nah, wherever Shanks Longworth is he’s hiding low, and I don’t blame him. He must be crapping his pants knowing that Joe’s after him.’
‘I dunno about that,’ Shaw said. ‘I never met the bastard but I’ve heard he’s a complete and utter psychopath. I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s out looking for Joe.’
‘Well, if that’s the case we need to keep our eyes peeled, don’t we?’ the Stig said.
The back door to the club opened and Stut walked outside, letting the door slam shut behind him. He walked over to the car, pulling on his trademark black leather jacket.
‘What’s happening?’ Shaw said, lowering his window.
‘Joe t-t-t-turned Gosling d-down,’ Stut said. ‘He’s in a stinking m-mood, he’s k-k-keeping the club cl-closed tonight.’
‘Bloody hell, the place is going to fold at this rate,’ Gilligan said. ‘Hasn’t the man got any idea of business?’
‘And you have, have you?’ the Stig said.
Gilligan leaned over the Stig’s seat from the back. ‘I know enough that you close your doors often enough, then business is going to go elsewhere.’
‘All right, Paddy, calm down,’ the Stig said.
‘You want to jump in the back?’ Shaw said to Stut. ‘We might as well go for a drink.’
Stut climbed in the car and sat down next to Gilligan in the back.
‘Is that Mitch I see over the other side of the road?’ the Stig said.
‘Bastard!’ Gilligan hissed, leaning forward from the back seat again, so he could get a good look through the front windscreen. Mitch was standing beneath the glow of a street lamp. He was looking up and down the street, seemed unsure what he wanted to do. ‘That miserable fucking soldier boy has been following me around the last week or two, he has. What the fuck does he think he’s playing at?’
‘What makes you so special?’ the Stig said. ‘Could be he’s keeping an eye on all of us, scoping out Angellicit.’
‘And what the hell would he be doing that for?’
‘I bet it’s that reporter,’ Shaw said. ‘The one that was balling Joe before he blew her off. I bet she’s hired him, now that she can’t use Coffin as an excuse to hang around anymore.’
The Stig turned around and looked at Shaw. ‘Seriously?’
‘What?’
‘You’re telling me that Joe was shagging the reporter?’
‘Had to be didn’t he?’ Shaw said. ‘Why else would he keep her around?’
‘You think the kid’s his, as well?’ the Stig said.
Shaw shrugged. ‘Probably.’
‘I wouldn’t touch the dirty skank with a barge pole,’ Gilligan said.
Shaw and the Stig both twisted around in their seats and stared at Gilligan.
‘I think someone’s protesting a little too much,’ the Stig said.
‘Yeah,’ Shaw said. ‘You got the hots for her or something?’
‘No, she’s just on my case the whole fucking time, ever since I showed Joe that video she had of him killing Terry Wu.’
‘Nah, I don’t think that’s it,’ the Stig said, winking at Shaw. ‘You’ve got a boner for her, haven’t you? Want to take her back to yours and slip her one, right? And I can see why you might want to, she’s an attractive looking woman from what I’ve seen. Even when she was looking ready to pop a kid out, she was a looker.’
Gilligan kept his eyes on Mitch, who was walking away around the front of Angellicit and then out of sight.
‘You got it all wrong,’ Shaw said. ‘Look at him, it’s Mitch he wants to pork, can’t keep his eyes off him.’
‘Well, whatever the two lovebirds want to get up to is their business,’ the Stig said. ‘I hear it’s all legal now anyways.’
‘You two are a laugh a minute, you know that?’ Gilligan said. ‘Almost as funny as that fat bastard, Gosling.’
‘Oooh,’ the Stig said. ‘Someone’s a little touchy.’
‘Fuck you,’ Gilligan said. ‘Fuck the pair of you.’
The Stig laughed and started the engine up.
‘Let’s go get that drink,’ he said.
Shaw realised he had meant to ask Gilligan who he had been talking to on his mobile, but he had forgotten. He thought about asking him now, but decided he couldn’t be bothered.
It was probably nothing worth worrying about.
drunk
Coffin sat in the darkened club alone.
In his right hand he held a cigarette, the smoke curling upwards.
In his left he held an empty whisky glass, his hand almost engulfing it. On the table stood two bottles.
The Jack Daniels was now half empty. Coffin stared at it, thinking about pouring himself another slug.
Not sure if he wanted to.
The other bottle didn’t have a label.
But Coffin knew what it was called.
Del Maguaya Pechuea Mezcal.
Leola had found it behind the bar. Said it looked like someone had been drinking it, and recently too. She told him all about how it was made, how it was distilled three times with skulls and blood. She’d held that bottle in her hand and looked at it for a long ti
me, like maybe she wanted to twist the cork off and put the bottle to her mouth and upend it. Just swig that foul looking shit down in one go.
In the end she had simply put it back where she found it and turned to Coffin and said, ‘I heard it tastes rank.’
Coffin had been sitting alone in the club for an hour or two. He wasn’t sure how long, he’d lost all track of time.
When Gosling and his pet dwarf had left, Coffin had sent the others home too.
Stut had said, ‘Wh-wh-what about the cl-cl-club?’
Coffin had said, ‘The club’s closed tonight.’
Mort would have had a heart attack if he’d heard Coffin saying that. Angels, as it was named back when Mortimer Craggs owned it, never closed. Some nights there was barely anybody in here, the place was deserted except for some bare ass girl on the stage gyrating around a pole and trying not to look bored.
Thing was, Coffin was starting to think he knew how she felt. Being leader of the Slaughterhouse Mob wasn’t exactly as much fun as he had thought it might be. Only a few months in, and after he had declared that he was going to take the Mob back to its glory days, and Coffin was bored and restless.
More worryingly, the takings were down at all the clubs that the Slaughterhouse Mob owned and Coffin’s heart wasn’t in the protection racket anymore and he was thinking of closing that part of the operations down.
Then there was the huge pile of money that Craggs had left the Mob owing to various outfits, none of them legal and all willing to take the matter into their own hands if Coffin couldn’t pay back what was owed.
Coffin put the cigarette between his lips and picked up the Jack Daniels. He poured himself a generous serving. He had a buzz on already and maybe he would keep drinking until he fell unconscious.
It wasn’t just the Mob that was bringing him down, he knew that.
Hunting down and killing Shocker Stronach had been a big deal for Coffin. Shanks Longworth was next.
Coffin intended to pay them both back for kidnapping him and delivering him to that bastard Stone and his psycho wife.
Coffin took a deep pull on the cigarette and held it for a moment, letting the smoke scorch his lungs before releasing it.
Coffin downed the Jack Daniels in one and poured more into the glass.
If he drank enough tonight, he thought maybe he could blot out the image of the boy lying on the floor, blood leaking from his gunshot wounds.
Coffin, Gilligan, and the Stig, they hadn’t mentioned the boy once since that day. But Coffin saw him every day, every time he closed his eyes.
He regarded the Mezcal again.
Leola had said it was made in some shitty little village in Mexico and there was nowhere else in the world it could be bought. And yet there it had been, sitting behind the bar. Coffin knew Mort hadn’t bought it, which meant Guttman had acquired it during his brief stint as manager of Angellicit, alongside Steffanie.
Coffin picked up the bottle and turned it around, staring into the dark liquid.
Fucking vampires.
He downed the glass of Jack Daniels and slammed it on the table. He twisted the cork off the bottle of Mezcal.
Poured himself a shot. Stared at the dark liquid in the glass.
He’d got himself a proper buzz going on now.
He picked up the glass and downed the drink.
The Mezcal was thick and scummy in his mouth. It tasted of death and blood and rotting flesh and when he swallowed it, it crawled down his throat like a living thing. Coffin hit the table top with his fist and ground his teeth together, fighting his body’s reflexive urge to regurgitate the drink.
There, it was down and the need to vomit it back up was fading.
Coffin pushed the cork back into the bottle.
The room was spinning a little. He pushed the bottle away. Leola had been right, the stuff tasted like shit.
Coffin pulled a crumpled pack of cigarettes from his pocket, and a silver lighter. The lighter was the classic style, with the flip back top and the mechanism inside. Coffin flipped open the top and flicked the striker with his thumb. A long, yellow flame flowered from the lighter and Coffin lit his cigarette and snapped the top shut.
He put the lighter and the cigarette packet back in his pocket.
Standing up, Coffin had to steady himself with a hand on the table as the empty club swayed and tilted. What the fuck was wrong with him? He could drink more than this. It was that Mezcal, had to be.
He looked across at the stage.
Steffanie was there.
Naked.
Swaying to music that only she could hear. Hands on her hips, slowly running them up her torso and over her flat, perfect stomach. Over her breasts and up her neck, her fingers becoming entwined in her long hair. She pushed her hair up until it cascaded down her back and she arched her spine, jutting her chest out, one leg up on the tips of her toes, her knee bent.
It was her classic striptease pose. She held it whilst she gazed at Coffin.
‘Get the fuck out of my club,’ Coffin said, the cigarette wobbling up and down in his mouth as he spoke.
He blinked and she was gone.
Coffin rubbed his forehead with the back of his hand. Realised he was holding the open Jack Daniels bottle when some whisky slopped out and down his shirt. He pulled the cigarette out of his mouth and let it drop to the floor. He ground it out beneath his heel. He put the bottle to his lips and took a swig.
What the fuck was the matter with him?
He looked around the empty club. Place was full of fucking ghosts, that was the problem.
Coffin looked at the Jack Daniels bottle. It was empty. When had that happened? He placed the empty bottle on the table.
Headed to the rear of the club.
Took the stairs carefully.
At his office, Mort’s old office, he paused at the closed the door. The office doubled as his bedroom too. Since coming back to the club he hadn’t been able to return home. Hadn’t even wanted to sleep anywhere else at all. Every night he bunked down on the sofa, tossing and turning all night trying to get comfortable because the damn thing was too small. He could have slept in one of the fuck rooms, but the water beds would have made him queasy.
Besides, sleeping in the office, not having a proper bedroom to go to bed in, it felt right somehow.
Like he wasn’t intending to stick around for too much longer.
Coffin opened the door.
He felt it immediately. Something was wrong, something was different.
He took a step inside. Another one.
Movement. A rush of air.
Coffin stepped sideways. A blur of motion, another rush of air and something whistled past Coffin’s shoulder.
The man stepped back and lifted his sword from where it had struck the floor. He held the sword before him in a double handed grip, the double-edged blade pointing straight up. He was wearing a black, loose fitting outfit, resembling a karate uniform.
He scowled at Coffin. His shaved scalp and face was tattooed with Oriental letters and dragons.
‘What the hell is this, Halloween?’ Coffin said.
The man said nothing. He raised his sword and stepped forward, lunging into a crouch as he swung the blade down in a swift arc. Coffin jumped back out of the way and stumbled when his legs hit a barrier. It was the sofa and he sat down on it, the sword swooshing past him and slicing open the cushion. The stuffing burst free from the slash.
Coffin half rolled, half fell onto the floor. The room was spinning, bile rising in the back of his throat, and he imagined this was how it must feel to be seasick.
The man stepped forward, raising his sword once more. Coffin kicked out at his legs, but his attacker easily stepped to one side, driving the sword down hard as he dodged Coffin’s kick. Coffin rolled and the sword nicked his shirt, drawing blood on his shoulder.
Coffin kicked out again with both feet, this time connecting. The man stumbled and dropped to one knee. Coffin scrambled out of the w
ay, his movements clumsy and a little sluggish. Behind the settee he saw an electrical cord running up to a bookshelf. On the shelf was a lamp, the base of which was a figurine of a naked woman, painted gold like Jill Masterson in Goldfinger.
Coffin had never liked that lamp.
He pulled the lamp from the shelf as the warrior leaped over the sofa, swinging his sword. Coffin smashed the bulb and the pendant off the top of the figurine’s head and thrust it at his attacker. The live electrical wires connected with the man’s chest. With a loud crack, as though somebody had just flicked a giant whip, and a brilliant flash of light Coffin’s attacker jerked away and hit the floor.
Grabbing the back of the sofa, Coffin dragged himself upright. He had to hold on tight as the room tilted. The floor seemed to be balanced on top of a giant ball and every move Coffin made sent it wobbling precariously.
The man propped himself up on his elbows, the confusion clearing from his face. Coffin needed to shock him again, quick. Put him out of action for good. He jabbed the figurine at his attacker, but it pulled up short without making contact.
Coffin looked back. The cord was too short.
‘Shit,’ Coffin grunted.
The assassin was climbing to his feet and looking for his sword. Coffin saw it, the other side of the sofa. He lunged for it but sprawled drunkenly over the back of the sofa and rolled onto the floor. His attacker wasn’t faring too much better, still recovering from the electric shock.
Coffin grabbed the sword handle and hauled himself back up on his feet. The man was on his feet now, too. Coffin swung the sword at him, but he misjudged its weight. It felt unbalanced and unwieldy in his hands. The sword swung wildly out of his control and twisted from his grip, landing on the floor with a heavy thud and skidding across the office.
Coffin’s attacker smashed across the side of his head in an open handed karate chop.
Coffin hit the floor hard. Fireworks exploded inside his head. Brightly coloured flashes of lights, shooting stars, loud bangs and fizzing, spinning wheels.
‘Get up, you fucker,’ Coffin told himself, his voice slurred.
The warrior punched him in the face using the heel of his hand, whipping Coffin’s head to back. More explosions, and pain this time, even through the numbing effect of the whisky.