by Emmy Ellis
He snatched at her wrist to stop her putting her outfit back on. “No, not those. Jeans and a baggy top. You’re mine now, and slutty clothes aren’t suitable until the occasion calls for it.”
She hid a frown, didn’t say, “Fuck you, Aaron!”, a sense of unease creeping up her spine, and rather than argue, she picked the closest things she had that matched what he wanted. Truth be told, she preferred this sort of thing, but on her terms, not someone else’s.
So why had she obeyed him then?
Fuck’s sake. I can’t make head nor tail of my own feelings.
She followed him out of her flat, asking herself why she was even doing it when he’d been so weird, and he gripped her around the waist possessively, as if sex meant she was tethered to him now, owned by him. Panic fluttered beneath her breastbone, and they walked up the streets to the van outside Flamingos, neither of them saying a word, doubt gnawing at her.
Clean eating out of the window, he ordered a large kebab for himself and her some cheesy curry chips, commenting again she’d get fat if she kept eating them, said with a laugh attached, his smile not reaching his eyes. So he did have a problem with weight. She was lucky to have a fast metabolism anyway, and she rarely gained any pounds, but if it was so important to him, what her figure looked like, he could keep it to himself.
I shouldn’t be with a fat-shamer. Why did I come out here with him? Why didn’t I tell him to go and do one?
They sat on a stone wall to eat, all hunger gone from Julie now, just the urge to run away from him, get to her flat, and lock herself in. But she was being stupid, wasn’t she? He hadn’t done anything drastically wrong, just that the sex hadn’t been what she’d imagined all this time, and what he’d said after was a bit strange, plus the fat thing.
That was all.
He spent the weekend at hers, seeming to watch her every move, and several times she felt hemmed in, unable to breathe. He washed it all away with silly stories, pinning her to the bed with tickles, and making her some of that chicken and rice he banged on about so much. It was bland, super boring, but she made the right appreciative noises.
She was acting, pretending, all the while planning how she could get rid of him, put some space between them so she could think. Swinging from feeling uncertain around him to being desperate for him to set her off giggling was wreaking havoc on her nerves.
She’d speak to Gail on Monday.
Early on Sunday, he said he had a surprise for her. “Come on, get dressed up, put a bit of slap on. Not a lot, though, less is more when you’re with me.”
She found herself asking, “What sort of dressed up?” then could have kicked herself afterwards. She’d allowed him to choose.
How quickly that had happened. Was it because Mum was gone and she had no other family left? Was she anxious to belong, even if it wasn’t right? Did she want someone to love her, no matter what?
“Nice jeans, and a blouse or something,” he said. “But no showing your tits.”
She sifted through her wardrobe and slipped some clothes on. He watched her, nodding his approval, a sly smile tugging at his mouth. She didn’t like it when he did that, it unsettled her. He’d spent the weekend naked, parading around her flat without shame, and now put on his outfit from Friday night at Flamingos. There was the tang of booze and kebab about them, that bloody awful lingering garlic, and she wrinkled her nose.
“What’s the matter?” His forehead ruffled, and he clamped his lips shut, assessing her and probably finding her lacking.
What should she say? Tell the truth? Or lie? “Nothing.”
“Make sure you never bullshit me, Julie,” he said.
Uneasy, she followed him from the flat, and they got the bus outside by the bench. It was the number twenty-four, which went to the other side of the estate. He dinged the bell at the end of Hornchurch Street, taking her by the wrist and dragging her down the aisle to the doors. She itched to tell him he was hurting her but remained silent. He probably hadn’t meant to be so rough.
They got off, and he linked arms with her, pinning her close.
“Now, best behaviour,” he said.
“God, where are you taking me?”
He smiled, his eyes hooded. “To Sunday dinner. With my family.”
What? He’d said The Flag was his local. This street was nowhere near that pub.
What the hell was going on?
Chapter Eight
George and Greg had other work on apart from Rosie’s little delight. It was a leftover from when Ronald Cardigan had been shot. While the two other people who’d helped Harry Findley and Mickey Rook out had only done so on a low level, and George had been inclined to leave them be, he’d since made the decision to act anyway. They’d still been participants to a degree.
Loose ends. Never good to leave them hanging.
Someone had loaned Harry and Mickey a safe house in the sticks, plus another let them use the flat from where Harry had shot Cardigan. They had to be made aware they couldn’t do shit like that and get away with it. Mainly, keeping quiet, not letting Cardigan know what was going on before the hit.
If you had info, you fucking well passed it on.
As was usual, George preferred the waiting game, leaving time between the crime and the justice, giving whoever was on their radar the false illusion they were safe. They’d realise they weren’t when George and his twin arrived on their bloody doorsteps.
People liked to talk once they thought they weren’t in trouble, and months ago, someone known to Harry had repeated the whispers of who’d loaned the safe house and the flat. Two different people by all accounts, and both would have a visit this blustery Wednesday morning.
George drove their fake black cab towards the safe house. Steve Moreland his name was, the bloke who owned it. He rented it out to people who wanted a few days away from home. Hardly a holiday destination, but with the fields and surrounding trees, the picturesque setting, folks could imagine they were farther away from their postcode than they actually were.
A change was as good as a rest, wasn’t it, and George fancied a change, although he hadn’t let Greg in on that yet. Greg would tell him no, that he couldn’t do what he wanted, and George sometimes got tired of playing by the rules.
He’d be bending one today.
According to their source, Steve Moreland was at the house to repair a window blind that had fallen down, a renter apparently a bit exuberant with the old cord, tugging at it and wrenching the blind from its moorings.
Some people didn’t have any respect for someone else’s property. Some people didn’t have any respect for the way things worked on The Cardigan Estate either.
The building came into view on the stretch of road empty of traffic, a cottage, tall trees behind it, their branches waving in a hefty gust of wind. White-painted bricks made up the façade, and the open black shutters gave it an old-fashioned feel. A house really, done up to look like a cottage.
“Got to have a bob or two to own this,” Greg said.
“Yeah. He’s got a few properties so probably makes a packet on rents. His wife will inherit the lot, I should imagine. Lucky woman.”
“Are we doing anything regarding the bloke who let us know about this fella and the flat owner?”
“Nah, he only got wind of it after the fact. He let us know as soon as, what with him being on holiday at Her Majesty’s pleasure. We just happened to keep that information to ourselves for a bit, that’s all.”
Greg nodded. “Glad you said that, about leaving him be.”
“Were you testing whether I was about to go apeshit on him?”
“Might have been.”
“If he was in the nick, not much he could have done, was there. It’s not like he knew our phone number, is it, and besides, if a lag’s asking to phone leaders from prison, who knows if those calls are recorded. He did the right thing in waiting until he came out.”
George parked on the drive beside a small red van and got out. The wind
pushed at his face, threatening to shove him over, and it reminded him of their father’s hand over his mouth. He shrugged that memory off. That bastard of a man didn’t deserve any thought time, although in George’s more manic episodes, he crept in, whispering his foul words.
A fella was at a top window, arms raised, hands probably on the blind, and looked down. His beard could do with a trim. It was wiry and unkempt.
“He can’t say he didn’t see us,” George muttered. “While one of our blokes collects his protection payments, he’s still got to know who we are.”
“If he doesn’t answer, we break in, simple as that.”
“I thought the same.”
“We usually do when you’re not off on one.”
“Fuck off.”
They laughed.
Greg beside him, George walked to the front door and stood inside an open-fronted porch, shielded from the weather. He knocked.
A minute or so passed, and the quizzical-looking fella opened up. “Yep?”
Did he recognise them? There weren’t many beefy twins around these parts.
“We need a word,” Greg said.
“Shit.” Moreland stepped back to let them in, scrubbing a hand over his face bush, the hairs rasping against his skin.
The threshold led directly into a cosy living room, the modern furniture at odds with the exterior. George had expected more of an old-lady feel, chintz curtains and flowered sofas, but Moreland must favour IKEA. Logs had been set in the fireplace, ready for the next renter, a black poker set standing to the right on the slate hearth. A box of firelighters lay on the other side, the end open, white blocks peeking out.
George wouldn’t mind having this as a bolthole himself.
He slid some gloves on while Moreland closed the door, his back to them.
The man faced them and smiled. “If it’s about Harry—”
“It is.” George smiled in return, although he wasn’t feeling it. What he was feeling was bloody murderous. “What did you know at the time he stayed here with Mickey?”
Moreland shrugged, obviously going down the ‘I’m innocent’ route. “That they had to get away for a bit. Hide.”
“Because?”
“I don’t know anything else, I swear.” Moreland held up both hands, his palms dry, the skin flaky. He wasn’t a modern chap then, using moisturiser, wasn’t into manscaping. Well, the beard showed that.
“See, I don’t believe that.” George itched to slap the bloke about. “You’re in the know regarding The Cardigan Estate, a well-informed man, so word has it. How could you not put two and two together? Harry and Mickey rent this place, stayed here for a good while, then oh, Cardigan’s dead. Amazing coincidence, that.”
Moreland sighed in an ‘I’m caught out’ way. “All right. I realised it afterwards.” He walked over and rested a hand on the rough-wood mantel, his fingertips a hair’s breadth from knocking into a clear vase with dried roses in it, the petals milky-tea-beige with dark crusty edges.
“How long afterwards?”
“Like, as soon as Cardigan was down—or news of it had spread anyway.” Moreland winced. That was so the wrong answer if he wanted to get out of this alive.
The fact he wasn’t going to was neither here nor there.
George kept a lid on his temper. “That’s been yonks, mate. And you didn’t think to come to us? Or Sam? I mean, Cardigan’s right-hand man was who you should have contacted really, and once he’d died, it was us you needed to get hold of.”
“I didn’t want anything to do with it.” Moreland’s lips wobbled, a slither of wet teeth on show, too much saliva in his lying prick mouth. “For fuck’s sake, I just let them stay here—they paid like anyone else, nothing weird going on there. When I heard Cardigan had been shot, I told Harry he wasn’t to speak to me again, I didn’t want to know.”
“But as a resident of the estate, someone protected by Cardigan—and now us, because I’m not mistaken in saying you pay us for the privilege—you had a duty to open your gob.” George clenched his teeth and fists.
“I…”
“All that time, and you never said a word. All that time we’ve had your back, and this is how you treat us. Deary me.”
“Fuck.” Moreland sank onto a chair covered in brown tweed-like material, a lime-green scatter cushion to one side putting him on a slant. “I’m sorry, I thought…”
“What did you think? That because we didn’t approach you until now we didn’t know? We’ve dealt with everyone to do with that bollocks bar you and some other fella. Harry, Mickey, Sid bastard Dempsey, the pub owner.”
“Dealt with…”
“Sorted.”
“Christ Almighty…”
George waited for a heartbeat, then, “Do you have kids?”
Moreland’s panic displayed itself—wide eyes, his mouth flapping. “Oh God, please don’t go after them. They’re only six and eight.”
“We wouldn’t dream of it.” George beamed. “I was just going to say they’ll miss you.”
He grabbed the poker off the stand and brought it down on Moreland’s head. The man’s scream wouldn’t be heard around here, so it was pointless him shouting “Help!” after he’d finished wailing like some tortured pleb. A dent in his skull filled with blood. George raised the poker and stabbed it into Moreland’s gaping north and south, and it was better than using cricket stumps on that posh bloke recently, when he’d shoved them into his eyes. The end of the poker went through the back of the chair, pinning Moreland in place. Blood, lots of it, spilling over his bottom lip, and the gurgled moans of the cottage owner gave George a massive thrill.
He let the poker go, bent over, and stared at the mess he’d made.
Bloody handsome.
“Enough,” Greg said.
“I wasn’t going to do anything else.” George peered closer at Moreland, fascinated by thick trickles of red moving down his chin and onto his neck. “He’ll be dead in a few. Breathing’s a bit faint, look.”
“I don’t need to look.” Greg sighed. “Why didn’t you wait until we got him to the warehouse? There’s a sodding mess to get cleaned up now, and we’ll have to ring Clarke.”
George grinned. “Fancied doing something different, didn’t I. Clarke needs to earn some of that money we pay him, so we’ll leave Moreland right where he is and phone the copper to give him fair warning.”
“Forensics, George.”
“We’ll get our cleaners in first. Now shut your boat race and let’s get to the next one.”
In the car, Greg dealt with the cleaners and Clarke, messaging them, and George drove to the block of flats, reliving the murder over and over.
He parked around the rear. It brought back memories of when they’d caught Harry after he’d killed Cardigan. There were so many of them, memories. No wonder he went a tad loopy from time to time.
Greg’s phone belted out a message tone, and he brought the texts up on screen. “I let Clarke know we were in the taxi so he can head off anyone who noticed it. The cleaners are on the way, and Clarke’s just said: Fucking hell, how am I meant to have heard about this?”
George laughed. “I love winding that bloke up. Tell him he got an anonymous phone call or one of his narks rang him. Blimey, he hasn’t got the sense he was born with.”
Greg sent the message. “Come on, I want this over and done with.”
They exited the taxi, and George led the way into the communal foyer. He knocked on the correct door. Lenny Porter used it for storing his drugs, but whether he’d be in was anyone’s guess.
As luck would have it, the door opened a few inches, the smell of weed seeping out. A face filled the gap. Squirrely, a pointed nose. Brown hair dangling in greasy strips. What was supposed to pass as a goatee hung around thin lips.
“Christ,” Lenny said.
“Yeah, we are a bit Messiah-like, but as you can see, we’re not him,” George said.
Lenny laughed. “You’re funny.”
“Yo
u probably won’t think so in a minute.” George pushed the door.
Lenny stumbled backwards into the pigsty with its mess everywhere and dust coating the surfaces. “What’s this all about?”
Greg pointed to the smeared window Harry had used to shoot from. “That.”
Lenny frowned. “A window?”
Stupid bastard. “One that was opened so a gun could poke through.”
“Oh. Cardigan.” Lenny backed into a corner.
Bit of a silly thing to do, considering.
“Yeah, Cardigan, or more importantly, Harry.” George stepped closer. “We heard you let him use this flat.”
Lenny paled. “So? I didn’t know what he wanted it for, did I?”
“But it seems you do now, so why, with Harry and Mickey out of the picture”—George wouldn’t admit they were dead by Debbie’s hand—“didn’t you inform us of it?”
“I didn’t think it mattered. When he asked to use it, I was none the wiser.”
“It’s the knowing after that’s pissing us off,” Greg said. “You know the rules.”
“Bloody hell, give me a break, will you?”
George laughed. “We could give you just a break—legs, arms, kneecaps, I’m not fussy—but I’ve decided we should have all loose ends tied up, not to mention the fact we can’t trust you anymore. Who’s to say in the future whether you choose to keep this sort of shit to yourself?”
He punched Lenny’s temple, and the man went down, out of it.
“Too easy,” George said. “How disappointing.” He winked at Greg. “Still, there’s always playtime with him in the warehouse.”
Chapter Nine
Someone knocked at Rosie’s flat door. She’d been dozing, attempting to get into a proper sleep, wanting to shut the recent events out, but they were lingering, and every time she reached the point of dropping off, his face popped into her head. The neighbour. His bulging eyes and that lump on his temple. Her hands around his neck. Thumbs pressing a prominent Adam’s apple. His words floating on the air. The taste of his cock in her mouth.