The Graft

by Martina Cole

  He had enjoyed taking it out on that girl; she was a slapper as far as he was concerned. His mate’s bird. No more and no less. He knew she would be on her mobile in nano-seconds, telling him all about the insult. Well, good luck to her. Des wouldn’t say a dicky-bird to Nick, but she would find that out soon enough.

  He looked at the barmaid then and shouted out, ‘What the fuck am I paying you for, Candice? Get me a bloody drink, will you!’

  Candice sighed. Taking down the brandy optic, she slammed it on the bar in front of him. Pushing a clean glass towards him, she said acidly, ‘Now you can pour your own drinks, can’t you?’

  Nick finally laughed then. He had always liked Candice, she was a tough little cookie.

  The woman walked towards her car slowly. The shopping bags she held were heavy and she stopped to change hands. The plastic Tesco carrier bags were digging into her palms. Her toddler was wandering off in all directions and she called to her affectionately.

  Gino watched her. She was slightly built with long dark hair. She looked exactly what she was, a nice respectable woman. He had been watching her for the last hour although she didn’t know that, being too preoccupied with her child and the shopping. She looked and acted like one of those people who always assume nothing bad can happen to them. It was a miracle but there were still people around like that in this day and age. It amazed Gino, even as young as he was. He had learned a long time ago that you trusted no one unless you knew them well, and even then you kept a sceptical eye out. She was just what he was looking for. She had pulled out money from the cash point before making her way to the car and he was pleased about that. Her cards he could sell on but there was no substitute for cash itself.

  He waited until she had opened the boot and dropped in the shopping bags before he made his move.

  As she opened the back door of her Renault Clio to put the child in its car seat he sneaked up behind her and pushed the blade of the knife into her side, just nicking the skin enough to make her feel it without actually hurting her.

  She still had her bag over her shoulder and he whispered in her ear, ‘Drop your bag and don’t look back at me. If I see you looking I’ll come back and do you and the baby, OK?’

  She nodded and dropped the bag from her shoulder immediately.

  The little girl was smiling quizzically, understanding suddenly that none of this was a game.

  ‘Pretty baby, lady, you want to watch out for her.’

  Gino picked up the bag slowly and then punched the woman in the side of the head for good measure. She fell into the car as he knew she would and he was off with the bag, sprinting out of the car park and into the warren of houses that made up his estate in seconds. He bolted to a piece of waste ground and then searched the bag eagerly. He was amazed at what people kept in their bags. The usual array of Tampax and birth control pills, headache tablets, lipsticks and baby wipes competed with letters and gas bills - all addressed to her, of course. Even a bank letter with her statement inside and a chequebook.

  Would people never learn?

  He had enough here to remortgage her house or open a moody bank account in her name.

  The purse inside the bag now held no secrets from him. It was jam packed with the usual female paraphernalia: photos of home and the kids. Her house looked really nice with a big garden and a wide-screen TV set in the corner of the lounge, up-to-the-minute DVD player - she might as well have put an advert out to get burgled. There were also her credit cards, debit cards, her Tesco clubcard, Boots loyalty card, even her membership to Blockbuster Video. Her whole life was in that one leather shoulder bag. And now it was his to do with as he pleased.

  Gino grinned as he took out the three hundred pounds in cash and removed the cards. Then he searched the side pockets of the bag. So many women slipped off their jewellery and placed it in their bag without a second’s thought. He was not disappointed. There was a small pair of gold earrings there together with a diamond tennis bracelet.

  A good haul. Gino was pleased with himself.

  As an afterthought he took the letters. Her address might be useful to whoever he sold the stuff to.

  Whistling, Gino left the waste ground. He had achieved his objective and was one happy little bunny.

  Tammy heard about the débâcle in the pub over a long lunch in Brentwood. They were celebrating her life getting back to normal, which meant she was picking up the bill as per usual.

  She basked in the pleasure of knowing that her husband was always faithful to her. He might chat up birds, have a joke at times, but basically he had no real interest in them. All her friends - and she used the term loosely - had trouble keeping their blokes indoors; she had trouble getting hers out of the house. Nick was happy these days to come home, slip off his shoes, eat his food and watch the box. All that poke and he never left the house now unless it was to earn more money, or get drunk. Not that she was knocking him for that.

  If only he would take her out occasionally. Unlike her mates whose husbands were out trumping anything with a pulse, her old man lived like a hermit. She guessed he had the occasional bat away from home, she wasn’t stupid, but in fairness to him he had never shoved her face in it like so many of his mates did with their wives.

  For that much at least she was grateful.

  Now he had knocked back Des’s bird Tammy was happier than she had been in ages. How people perceived her was important. Being seen to be in control was important. Her friends couldn’t understand how she kept Nick in his place because she was not a woman to be faithful herself. In fact, she spent her whole life on the chat up and everyone including Nick knew that.

  No one could believe the way she got away with it. Only Tammy knew the price she had paid for her lifestyle and she would never tell anyone what that was.

  She nodded to the waiter for more wine, aware that she was giving them all food for thought and basking in their utter astonishment that Nick Leary didn’t feel the urge to play away. Tammy knew that jealousy was rife around the table and enjoyed the moment while it lasted. Sipping daintily at her white wine, she winked at the good-looking young waiter and was gratified to see her friends roll their eyes at the ceiling in amazement.

  They all wished Nick was theirs, while wondering if they could be woman enough to keep him as faithful as Tammy did.

  And that was exactly what she wanted them to think.

  In fact, Nick had not come near her in that way for years. He cuddled her, and he hugged her, and the other night they had fallen asleep together. She had felt his need for closeness and had responded to it. But the truth was, he had no sexual interest in her whatsoever. Thankfully, he had no interest in anyone else either.

  Impotence he called it, and it was that very thing that kept Tammy in gold cards and Mercedes sports. Kept her kids in private school and gave her licence to do whatever she wanted.

  But she would never let on to anyone.

  If he managed to get it up now and again with someone else as she suspected from the occasional absence on unspecified ‘business’ then that was OK as far as she was concerned. As long as it wasn’t serious, she couldn’t give the proverbial flying fuck. At least that was what she told herself.

  Tammy pushed the thoughts from her mind once more. Her biggest fear was that her husband would fall in love with someone else, one of his one-night stands. But Tammy being Tammy had already worked out a nice little earner for herself should that befall her and hers.

  Nick Leary would pay, and pay big-time.

  Her macho husband’s biggest fear was that his reluctance in the marital bed would be broadcast to the world, or more specifically, to their circle of friends. He had always had trouble keeping it up, as she so nicely put it, now he couldn’t even raise a smile as he so nicely put it.

  But she played the game, pretended that they were at it morning, noon and night, and even though she would shag a table leg if it bought her a drink, her friends all thought Nick didn’t know about her affairs and she ke
pt the pretence up. It was part of her street cred now and she knew that and she used it.

  Even though her husband had the reputation of a womaniser, she could honestly say that even in her most jealous rages she had never been able to find out anything concrete to throw at him. But that was Nick all over, if he was using brasses again, she would never know about it and, in a way, she respected him for that, even as the thought drove her mad.

  She had found a pack of condoms in his jacket pocket and it had thrown her whole world off-kilter. When she had confronted him, he had told her he was trying out brasses to see if he could sort himself out.

  Her jealousy, as usual, had got the better of her. That a nameless, faceless tart could get her leg over with her husband when she could not even raise his interest made her self-esteem hit the floor once more. It had taken an affair with a young guy who cleaned their pool to get her over that one.

  Yet her sensible side told her to be pleased that at least Nick wasn’t sleeping with someone he cared about, it wasn’t with an actual bird. Most of her friends’ husbands had birds that were an open secret. At least Nick had never humiliated her in that way. If he had a bird, she would have heard about it from one of her so-called friends. They would have enjoyed telling her about it.

  She had often been out with Nick and seen her friends’ husbands with their birds. Younger women, far beneath their wives in the food chain, but with full breasts and firm skin that no matter how much money you acquired you couldn’t emulate. They were all too stupid to see that they would be traded-in eventually for younger versions of themselves even if they gave the men kids, which was often the mistake their wives had made. A belly full of stretch marks and a crying baby turned them from sex objects to mother figures overnight. It was how their world worked, and even when the men hit their fifties there would always be someone new to step into the girlfriend’s shoes and, in some cases, even the flat they had lived in.

  This was why Tammy had made a point of knowing all there was to know about her husband’s businesses. She knew what Nick was worth down to his last penny, and his last euro. He had to be getting it from somewhere and he was most certainly not getting it from her, and if he ever surprised her with a twenty-to-one shot she would be ready and waiting to turn him over good and proper. As her old mum used to say, ‘don’t get mad get even.’ Hit a man in the pocket, it’s the only place, other than in his balls, where you can bring tears to his eyes.

  Well, he would lose his money and his nuts if he ever did the dirty on her and he knew it.

  Gary Proctor and her husband just worked, and that was it, according to Nick, but her name was not Gilly Hunt and she was not changing it now. If he took her for a cunt she would be ready and waiting for him and even though his bosom pal Gary Proctor was not exactly the answer to a maiden’s prayer, she knew there were birds out there who would gladly overlook that fact.

  She was watching out for herself, and it annoyed her that most women she knew did not make provisions for the rainy days that were bound to come. He could take everything she had, but she’d still have her pride and he was never going to take that from her.

  Gino stood in the small alleyway near his flats and waited for Big Ellie. As she walked towards him he smiled.

  ‘All right?’

  She nodded.

  Ellie was big, powerfully big, with arms like meat cleavers. But she had a lovely face that belied the nastiness underneath the make-up. She came from a large family noted mainly for their fighting skills and their belligerence. She scored drugs for people, never seeing herself as a dealer, but touched only alcohol herself. She saw drugs as a mug’s game. She also did little favours for people when she could. For money, of course.

  ‘You got it?’

  He handed her the three hundred pounds cash, which she counted quickly. Then she opened her fake Burberry bag and gave him a small plastic bank bag full of brown and a phone number written on a piece of paper.

  ‘You never got that number from me, right?’

  He nodded.

  ‘ ’Course not. What? So you think I’m stupid.’

  ‘My brother would kill me if he knew, so you can imagine what would happen to you, can’t you?’

  The threat was unmistakable and he nodded his agreement.

  Gino had had a good day. He had got one hundred and fifty for the cards and chequebook so he was still quids in. Now all he had to do was unload the jewellery and he would be laughing.

  ‘You got it then?’

  Jude’s face was so open and trusting it made Gino feel good. She took the bank bag from him and grinned.

  ‘Fucking hell! This is like Christmas, Gino.’

  He felt six feet taller from her admiration.

  ‘I’ll see you all right, Jude, don’t you worry.’

  It was an idle boast but it felt good. He would try and keep her sorted, it was the least he could do for his friend.

  ‘I got the number you wanted and all.’

  He saw the light leave her face. It was wiped clean of any expression; she had paled even more than usual if that were possible.

  ‘You’re joking?’

  He shook his head and passed it to her carefully. It was written on a scrap of newspaper and as she gazed at it she felt her heart lift. Mobile numbers changed, but land lines stayed the same.

  ‘Oh, you are good, Gino! Fucking good.’

  She placed a grubby hand to her mouth, as if stopping herself from saying something else. As Gino watched her he felt omnipotent.

  ‘Oh, Gino son, you don’t know what you’ve given me,’ she said eventually.

  He knew exactly what he had given her but he didn’t say that, of course, he just basked in her praise.

  When he produced the bottle of vodka Jude was speechless, but it showed him just how good you could feel helping out someone less fortunate than yourself.

  Chapter Six

  It was a crisp morning. Even though the house was warm the frost was still white on the roofs of the outhouses. Nick Leary had woken with the thought already uppermost in his head: Sonny Hatcher was being buried today.

  It was burning Nick up inside. No matter how much he drank or how long he slept he couldn’t rid himself of that thought. Seventeen and he was being buried today. A boy, only a boy. A stupid little thief but just a boy, a handsome one who should by rights have had his whole life ahead of him.

  Nick looked out of the bedroom window and watched the birds going about their business. Even in his troubled state he marvelled that this wonderful view was all his. And it was some view; field after field until finally in the distance you could see the estuary. It was beautiful, with no other habitation in the distance to spoil it. Of a night he would watch the lights of ships in the distance and wish he were on one of them. Today in an early-October frost the view from the window was like a Christmas card.

  Tammy breezed into the bedroom from the en-suite bathroom, all white towels and Versace perfume.

  ‘Morning!’

  She was chirpy and for some reason that annoyed Nick. He lay in bed and studied her. She was still a good-looking woman, he couldn’t take that away from her, and she could still make him laugh which had always been her greatest asset in his eyes - though she didn’t know that, of course. She thought it was her fascinating conversation and firm body.

  ‘It’s the funeral today.’

  He didn’t know why he had said it.

  Tammy shrugged her slim shoulders in bewilderment.

  ‘Yeah? And?’

  It was all over as far as she was concerned.

  ‘Look, Nick, you got to let this go, mate. It happened and nothing we say or do will change that.’ She shrugged. ‘You were looking out for your own. He should never have been here in our home in the first place. He should never have been out thieving.’

  She spoke it like a mantra, she’d said it so often. She wished she could make it all better for him but she knew she couldn’t. Nick was fighting this alone as he had f
ought everything he had overcome in his life.

  She came to the bed and sat beside him, slipping off the towel. Her huge breasts were probably enough to set most men’s blood racing to their loins. Unfortunately they didn’t do anything for Nick. Physically she had never done anything for him and the thought saddened Nick even as it maddened her. She never had. She had not been his type, if that was the right expression.

  Tammy caressed his thigh through the bedclothes.

  He thanked her for the thought if nothing else.

  He knew it wasn’t fair on her the way he was, but it was hard for him to focus on sex with her at the best of times. She always seemed like a bitch on heat. Eager . . . so eager. There was never any finesse to it. Straight sex, no kissing, that was his lovely Tams.