by Jessie Keane
Finally Bianca turned back to face him.
‘You think that Tito killed my real parents?’ she said quietly. ‘Then why don’t I remember? Why don’t I remember anything about . . .’ Into her mind came the image of Tito, her beloved Tito – and the blonde smiling woman, and a strong arm, a man’s arm, and the blade of grass, the bead of blood slipping down its edge. What did it all mean?
‘Maybe it was so bad that you blanked it,’ said Kit. ‘People do that sometimes. In wartime and when people have been through something terrible, I’ve heard that can happen. It’s like it’s so bad, their mind just can’t take it in.’
The blood slipping down the edge of the grass, staining green to brown . . .
‘So it was all lies? My whole life is nothing but a lie? You’re saying that they tricked me, deprived me of what I should have had, my own family, my real family, not them?’ asked Bianca.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Kit.
107
‘He’s late,’ said Vittore, sitting in the back of the car with Ruby beside him and Fabio on her other side. It was five minutes past midnight.
‘Maybe he won’t show up,’ said Fabio. That wouldn’t surprise him, Miller calling their bluff. He glanced at Ruby. Not a mark on her. Not yet. A shame, really. She was a good-looking woman and whether or not Miller played ball she was going to be dead meat within the hour.
They were in the abandoned skeleton of an old rope-making factory off a deserted side street in Clerkenwell. Miller had been told to bring Bianca there to exchange, or else . . .
Now Vittore was getting seriously annoyed. That fucking schifosa Miller. Vittore had six of his people spread out around the factory, all packing guns, all ready for the action to start should Miller try anything crafty. No way was that bastard getting his mother back alive. He would pay, all of them would pay for what he’d done. And once he had Bianca back, he would sort her out, make her toe the line. Make sure that she never again brought such shame upon the family name. She would be punished for her transgressions. And when he’d seen to all this, got even with Miller, dealt with Bianca, then he would address the Fabio problem. Fabio – the cheating conniving little cunt – had to go.
Fabio was twitching, snapping his fingers, humming under his breath, sweating and shooting anxious looks across at Vittore. He knew that Vittore planned on killing him. Maybe even tonight. After all, this exchange would make good cover. Fabio could find himself hit in ‘accidental’ crossfire; such a shame, Vittore would say, his little brother, how sad. But in reality, he would be pleased.
Between them, Ruby was silent, trying to make herself invisible. She stared ahead, drained of hope. Kit wouldn’t come for her. She knew that. They didn’t know it yet, but soon they would. And when they did, she knew they would kill her. Dump her body on her son’s doorstep, saying, Look, you bastard, this is your mother and she’s dead. We warned you and now look what you’ve made us do.
Her head jerked up. She could hear the rumble of an engine. She looked out through the windscreen to where the blue-white glare of the Danieris’ headlights were illuminating the grim interior of the empty factory; the rust-bitten metal supports, the wet gleam of moisture, sodden leaves and old beer cans on the concrete floor where they’d been washed in by the rain and wind over the years and never swept away, because no one ever came here.
There was another car crawling towards the car they sat in, its headlights sweeping around in a blinding arc. It came to a halt about twenty paces away, its engine still running. Ruby blinked, unable to see anything but the white tunnel cast by the glare of two clashing sets of headlights. Her heart was beating so hard and so fast that she thought she was going to faint.
Kit . . . ? Jesus, could it really be him?
‘Well not before fucking time!’ said Vittore.
Roughly he flung open the car door, grabbed Ruby by the arm and dragged her out after him.
108
Kit was in the back of the other car with Bianca; Rob was at the wheel with Fats riding shotgun. They watched the bulky shape of Vittore emerge, then Fabio and the two minders. Vittore was holding Ruby by the arm, pulling her along to the front of his car where the light washed over them both, turning them into black silhouettes. But Kit recognized the outline of his mother. She was tall like him, and slender. There was no mistaking her.
He glanced at Bianca as Rob came and opened the door for him, mindful of his weak left arm. Kit got out, easing Bianca out beside him. He kept a tight grip on her with his right hand. Daisy had wanted to come too, but Kit had said no way. There would be too many bodies littering up the place as it was, without her adding to it. He’d given her another job to do.
Vittore and Ruby were at the front of the car now, standing ready. Vittore was smiling. He had the place well covered, and Miller was unarmed, the twat. None of Miller’s people would get out of here alive tonight, he promised himself that.
Kit and Bianca were ready too.
‘Send Bianca over!’ yelled Vittore, and his voice echoed around the place like a ghost-whisper. Send, send, send . . .
‘Ruby first!’ shouted back Kit.
‘On the count of three, we both let them go. OK?’ said Vittore.
’Kay, ’kay, ’kay . . .
‘OK!’ said Kit.
Rob watched his boss and thought, Fuck, he’s going to do it. It’s all going to be all right.
He’d had his doubts. But now, Kit was coming good.
‘One!’ shouted Vittore.
Kit tensed. Shot a quick look at Bianca.
‘Two!’
Rob, glancing all around, saw sudden movement at the far edge of the factory floor. What the f—?
‘Three!’
Vittore gave Ruby a shove forward, and she stumbled then straightened and started walking toward Kit. Kit let go of Bianca, and she started walking too. They had each taken three steps when Vittore took a gun out of his pocket and aimed it between Ruby’s shoulder blades.
Kit had already primed Bianca. If I yell ‘down’, hit the floor.
‘Down! Get down!’ Kit yelled, reaching inside the concealing sling on his left arm, and pulling out his gun.
Ruby flung herself onto the dirty wet concrete. Vittore’s shot nearly deafened her as it zinged over her head, narrowly missing her.
Bianca went down too, very fast.
Kit lifted the gun and shot Vittore straight between the eyes. A perfect plum-coloured hole appeared there, and blood streamed down over Vittore’s shocked face. He flew backwards, the force of the blast spinning him around. He lay across the bonnet like a stretched-out sacrifice. Both Vittore’s minders and Fabio dived for cover behind the open car doors.
A bullet whizzed past Kit’s ear like a buzzing insect and he turned.
‘Look out!’ shouted Rob, and took a shot at the shadowy figure running to their left. It let out a yell, and collapsed to the ground.
109
Fabio drew his gun and squatted behind the sparse cover of the car door and wondered what the hell was going on. Vittore had taken a shot to the head and was dead. Vittore was dead.
All Fabio cared about was making sure he didn’t end up the same way. He squinted into the darkness, wondering what could have happened to the six armed heavies they had dotted around the place. Where were they, off taking a piss or something?
He crawled up into the car, scooted over until he was behind the wheel. Peeked up through the windscreen and saw Vittore’s face right there against the glass, blood all over the place, saw his brother’s eyes staring back at him yet seeing nothing.
Jesus . . .
Shaking, he got his foot down onto the pedals and slammed the car into reverse. The big limo shot backwards, knocking over one of the other boys, spilling Vittore’s dead body off and onto the floor as Fabio spun the wheel. All the doors were open and swinging back and forth. He threw the car into first and floored the accelerator, knocking another man off his feet as he roared across the rubbish-strewn factory f
loor and out, free, into the night.
110
The tall Danieri heavy with the knife-scarred left cheek was laid out cursing and groaning on the factory floor where the car had hit him, but the other boy had got off more lightly and was crouching beside his dead boss, pulling out a gun, ready to come on all action hero.
‘Don’t bother,’ said Thomas Knox, moving out of the shadows and pushing the muzzle of his gun hard up against the Italian’s meaty head. He hauled the man to his feet.
‘Get rid of that,’ he ordered.
The Italian tossed his gun aside.
‘Hands on your head. Quickly.’
As Kit watched, people started emerging from the shadows. His own men, and some of Knox’s too, pushing in front of them six heavies with their hands on their heads: Vittore’s crew. They came into the headlights and saw their boss laid out there, dead. One of them went over to the moaning scar-face on the floor, helped him back to his feet. His leg was all askew, obviously broken, and as he came upright he let out a yell of pain.
Fats and Rob went over to where the man that Rob had shot lay. He was sprawled out, clutching at his bloody ankle, snarling and writhing like a rabid dog.
‘Gabe bloody Ward,’ breathed Rob, staring down at him.
Gabe looked up at him and spat.
‘That’s not nice,’ said Rob, and kicked him hard in the ribs.
Gabe howled.
They were still unsure whether Gabe had killed Michael Ward – his own father – but if he was, then maybe it would serve the scum right if he had to go on living with the guilt of it for the rest of his drug-laden days.
‘Get up,’ snapped Rob.
Fats grabbed the back of Gabe’s jacket and threw him onto his feet.
‘Bastard!’ yelled Gabe, sobbing with pain and trying to keep his weight off the injured ankle.
‘Walk,’ commanded Rob, and shoved him hard. ‘Go on. Fuck off out of it.’
Gabe fell down again, then crawled. Fats came after him at a run and Gabe whimpered with fear and scrambled to his feet. He limped away.
‘I ever see that backstabbing bastard again, that’s it,’ said Rob. ‘He’s dead.’
‘Do it now,’ urged Fats.
Rob looked speculatively at Gabe’s retreating back. Pictured the drug dens and the grasping women and the pimps beating him up and the general fucking miserable seedy hopelessness of the life that Gabe would live. It was no more than he deserved. A quick end? Nah. That would be too good for the likes of him. And if anyone should have the honour of finishing the little waster, it should be Kit. And maybe he’d do it, too – one day. But not right now. It could wait.
111
Kit was helping Bianca to her feet.
‘You all right?’ he asked, pulling her upright.
‘Yes . . .’ She was staring at the dead form of her brother Vittore. Only he wasn’t her brother at all. And if he’d got her back . . . he would have punished her. Maybe even killed her when she defied him – and she would have.
‘God, Mama is going to be . . .’ She couldn’t finish the words. She was shaking too much.
Mama had lost her favourite, and she would be beyond grief, beyond consolation. Bianca hated the thought of Mama’s pain – but then she thought of all that Kit had told her. Her real mother was lying in an unmarked grave somewhere, murdered by Tito. Mama Bella had stolen her from that woman, snatched her true mother’s happiness away without a care, claimed it selfishly for her own.
Rob and Fats came over to where they were standing.
‘Look after her,’ Kit said to Rob, who nodded and took Bianca’s arm.
They watched as Kit went to where Ruby was sitting on the ground. Thomas Knox was standing over her.
‘She OK?’ Kit asked him.
‘I’m fine,’ said Ruby. She felt so choked up she could barely get the words out.
He’d come for her.
She couldn’t believe it, but he had. Her son, the son she had never thought would return her love, had come here to save her.
‘She’s a bit shaken up,’ said Thomas. He looked at Ruby for long moments, then at Kit. ‘You can take it from here?’ he asked.
‘Thanks. Yeah,’ said Kit, and held out his good hand.
Thomas shook it, briefly. Then he turned and merged into the darkness. Minutes later he was gone, taking his men with him.
‘Come on,’ said Kit, and gently got Ruby back to her feet. ‘You OK?’
‘I’m fine,’ she said, and now, seeing the concern for her right there in his eyes, she was fine, she really was. At last.
112
Fabio found Mama in the kitchen as usual. A real Italian mama, his old mother was, always cooking up the ricotta ravioli, the cozze gratinate e fagiolini, the cestini di patate con salsiccia e casizolu.
Now here she was, and he had to compose himself, break the bad news to her. He had to compose himself not because he was grief-stricken but because he felt like laughing out loud. This was delicious, this was as good as Mama’s food, this thing he had to tell her.
Her favourite boy was dead.
And funnier than that, better than that, was the fact that all that she had left of her family now was him. Fabio, the one who had always been such a disappointment to her, the one she had always pushed away, the one who should have been the girl, but wasn’t. Years and years he had endured the fact that his mother tolerated him, that she’d never loved him. She had loved big, ebullient Tito. She had adored that dull dead bastard Vittore. And Bianca! Oh, how she had fawned over that little cow, who was in fact a traitor to her own family, to the Danieris, preferring to get herself fucked by Miller than be true to her own kin.
‘Mama . . .’ Fabio said gravely, while inside he could feel laughter bubbling up, almost overwhelming him. He was about to deliver the worst news of this woman’s entire life, and he felt overwhelmed with sheer joy because at last, at last, he’d won. ‘Mama, I have bad news. Terrible news – I’m sorry.’
Bella’s face froze. She sank down into a chair, clutched at the table as if to steady herself.
‘What is it?’ she asked, wide-eyed. ‘Oh, Fabby, what’s happened?’
‘I am afraid that Vittore is dead,’ said Fabio, thinking of screwing Maria, who he firmly believed was dead, bricked up in the cellar now – and thank Christ he hadn’t gone the same way.
And then he simply couldn’t help himself. The laughter exploded out of him as if suppressed for a whole lifetime. He laughed until his sides ached, while his mother sat there and stared at him in abject shock and horror. Presently he staggered to his feet, left the room, went out into the cold night and got back into the car, still laughing, feeling lighter than he had in years.
He drove to the club – once called Tito’s, then Vito’s. First thing tomorrow he was going to have a new sign put up proclaiming it Fabio’s. He parked, went inside. Ignoring the hostesses and the patrons he made his way upstairs to the room where once Tito’s sex palace had been installed, and then Vittore’s dull little room of beiges and browns and ochres. Dull, dull, dull!
Fabio swiped the mustard-coloured cushions off the Habitat sofa and onto the floor. He was still laughing, he couldn’t stop laughing. It was over, it was all over at last. Everything was his now. He went to the drinks tray and poured himself a triple whisky, then moved into the centre of the room and shouted it out loud.
‘All hail King Fabio!’
And then he raised his glass in a toast to himself, the survivor, the least likely to succeed. And look, just look at what had happened: he’d done it, walked past two graves to do it. Three, counting poor stupid Maria. Just look at the huge favour Miller had done him tonight; he ought to go over there and kiss that fucker.
‘To me!’ he roared out happily, and he drank the whisky down in one gigantic hit.
113
‘You think Fabio’s going to come up against us again?’ Rob asked Kit as they sat in Kit’s living room.
Rob didn’t like loose
ends. Vittore was done for, but there was still Fabio. And Gabe. Rob couldn’t help wondering whether he’d been right in thinking the guy was such a loser that the worst punishment would be to let him live. He only hoped he wouldn’t have cause to regret the decision to let him go.
‘Why should Fabio bother?’ asked Kit. He had the sling off now, his left arm was getting stronger. ‘Bianca says he always hated Vittore and despised her, what should he care if she’s out of the family fold and Vittore’s dead as toast?’
‘Never did like that little tit,’ said Rob.
‘Let it go,’ said Kit.
There’d been pieces in the paper about gangland violence, shots heard late at night and a businessman called Vittore Danieri and some of his employees had vanished, seemingly without trace.
‘How’s your mum doing?’ asked Rob.
Kit glanced at his watch. ‘I’m just off to see her. Come if you want.’
Rob shook his head.
‘Daisy’s with her,’ said Kit.
‘Dunno.’ Over these past weeks Rob had felt himself getting on far too well with Daisy. Maybe it was time to step back from that. She was a posh bolshy cow, there was no doubt about that. She’d always want to be in charge.
‘Ah, come on.’
‘What are you two deliberating about?’ asked Bianca, coming in from the hall and sitting down next to Kit.
Rob watched them, thinking what a striking couple they made. Bianca so pale, Kit dark like his mum. Kit kissed her cheek, grabbed her hand and held on.
‘Rob’s scared of Daisy,’ he told her, sending a smile up at his number one man.
‘Scared? In what way?’ Bianca looked puzzled. There were big dark shadows under her eyes and a strained thinness to her lips. Rob thought that the news about the Danieris, the stark facts about her real family, the knowledge that it was Kit who had finished Tito – all that had eaten into her and was hurting her still.