by Bo Brennan
“You’ll like it.”
“I hate it. My ex had expensive tastes.” Gray pushed the glasses and ice bucket aside. “And I hate this place. Being here isn’t helping Priti. It’s a stupid idea. India’s lost her fucking mind.”
Colt glared at him. “Somewhere between Priti and this place India lost her fucking job. If you don’t like her apples, don’t shake her tree. We’re here for good reason, so relax. Look like you’re enjoying yourself.”
Gray took a deep breath and drew one ankle up across his knee, pulsing his foot to the relentless rhythm of the music.
“That’s more like it.” Colt returned his gaze to the club, scanning its scantily clad workers. “Pussy Galore. That’s her,” he said, tossing a bundle of fifty-pound notes on the table in front of Gray. “Smile and flash the cash. Get her over here, and then get her in a private back room.”
Gray’s hand hesitated on the money. “I’ve never paid for it in my life.”
Colt frowned. One way or another, everybody paid for it. “You’re screwing her for information, Gray. You don’t actually have to screw her.”
His expression changed from pissed to pained. “You do it. You know what you’re doing.”
After what Melody Fletcher had done to India? If Colt got her in a private room, he’d snap her fucking neck. “I can’t. You know I can’t,” he gritted out. “Her boyfriend’s called Malik. All you gotta do is find out who he is and where we can find him.”
“That’s . . .” Gray mechanically rose from his seat.
Colt tracked his hardening stare past Pussy Galore to the far edge of the raised stage, where another dancer was engaged in a heated exchange with a Pakistani man. As the man backhanded the dancer to the floor, Colt saw his familiar scarred face.
And Gray running.
Shit. Colt leapt from his seat, turning the table, agitated champagne cork blowing like a bomb as he sprinted across the club. He wasn’t the only one moving. Men seemed to crawl from every crack and crevice. When Colt reached him, Gray had Scarface in a headlock and the downed dancer on his back, screaming out his name. But it wasn’t ‘Malik’ she was screaming, she was screaming ‘Gray’.
Colt peeled her from his back as Scarface struggled free, disappearing behind a wall of thick red curtains. Gray batted at them, relentlessly seeking a door, but all his fists found was wall.
“Now you give a fuck?” the dancer in Colt’s grasp screamed. “We’re not together anymore, you cheating pig.”
Gray forgot the curtains and turned on her. “Who is he, Cara? Who the fuck is he?”
Woah. The expensive ex. Colt dropped her like a hot potato.
Big mistake.
She wasted no time lashing out with slaps that left bloody nail trails on Gray’s face and neck. He pinned her to the stage, fist raised in anger. “Go on, be a man for once. Hit me,” she goaded. “It won’t hurt as much as you calling out her name when you fucked me!”
A crowd closing in, Gray punched a hole through the stage right next to her head. “Tell me who he is!”
Her eyes widened. “My boss!”
Gone to the wire, Colt grabbed his shirt. “You’re done. We’re leaving.”
Gray raised his hands and stepped away, perfectly in control. “That fucker tried to kill me. We find him.”
“He’ll keep. Trust me.” Colt signalled their surroundings with darting eyes. “We need to go.”
Gray didn’t need warning twice. Seeing the sea of Asian faces, he headed swiftly for the door. The first white face they encountered was on a body the size of Beirut. A harsh, inhospitable man-mass standing between them and outside. Unfamiliar territory, even for Colt. He locked eyes with the doorman. Stepping aside, the man-mass said, “Cab rank, left. Pick white.”
Outnumbered and on dangerous ground, Colt didn’t hang around. He bundled Gray through the club door and left towards the taxi rank, scanning the faces behind the wheels as they closed in. Spotting old, white, and weary at the back of the waiting queue, he ushered Gray to it.
Gray patted his cheek and surveyed the blood on his hand. “I knew those nails were dangerous.”
Colt raised a brow. There were far more dangerous things in that club than his ex, and worse still waiting at home. “You’re still pretty,” he said. “Did you really get her name wrong?”
Gray nodded miserably. “Apparently so.”
With a shake of his head, Colt put him in the back of the cab as though he was loading a suspect into a squad car. “Oh, brother. That’s just wrong.”
Gray frowned as Colt gave the driver his home address and the cab moved off. There was a cop shop not far from here, reinforcements aplenty, they were wasting time going back to Park Gate. “What you doing? Get your crew. That fucker will be –”
Colt gave him a sharp elbow to the ribs, glaring a silent warning as he jerked his head in the direction of the driver listening in.
The guy looked like Santa. He couldn’t be one of them. Could he? Gray wanted to grab his white beard and shake him for goodies. Instead he kept his mouth shut and his eyes fixed on the back of his head, wondering if white guys could be part of the network too.
Colt leaned between the two front seats, blocking Gray’s evil eye. “Busy night, mate?”
“So, so,” the cabbie said, watching Gray in the rear-view mirror.
Gray clenched his jaw and diverted his gaze to the window, watching the night pass by and the lights of Gunwharf fade, along with his chances of getting his hands on his attacker again tonight.
Flexing his aching hands, he glanced down at his bruised knuckles. The bastard who’d ended Charlie, Mrs Reynolds, and Priti’s sister’s life, and forced her to run for her own, was there, right fucking there . . . so was Cara.
Working. In that whorehouse. For him.
A woman he’d once loved so much he doubted if he’d ever get over, he now doubted if he ever knew.
The thought made him nauseous.
He rested his head back against the seat and closed his eyes as Colt continued small talk with the driver.
Colt. A cop built like a brick shithouse. They’d found their man, so why the hell wasn’t he chucking him in a cell right now, or flooding the area with police? He knew what these people were capable of. He knew why Priti was running, hiding. He’d received her sister’s foot in the fucking post.
Priti. She said they’d infiltrated the police.
Gray opened his eyes to stare suspiciously at Colt’s back as he calmly directed the cabbie down the dirt track to the houseboats.
“You sure this is right?” The driver nervously shifted in his seat, glancing over his shoulder at Gray. “I don’t want no trouble, fellas.”
“You won’t get any from us,” Colt said, reassuringly patting his shoulder. “You’ll come into a clearing in a second. You might want to stick your full beam on.”
“I know you, don’t I?” the driver said, flicking the lights and turning the track into a brilliant tunnel of ghostly white trees. “You’re that rugby player who used to captain England.”
“Not me, mate. I get that a lot mind. Thanks to him I’m forever saying sorry for disappointing people. Sorry.”
The cabbie laughed as the tyres bumped over uneven ground and emerged into the clearing where the houseboats rested. “And your mother never met his father, I suppose?”
“Swore it on a stack of bibles.” Colt pointed in the direction of India’s place. “Head for that little light. Be careful of the cones.”
Gray rubbed his eyes. This whole situation was making him paranoid. Colt was the last person he needed to worry about. Incorruptible, apolitical, and unapologetic about it all. And then the steady, smooth sound of gravel under the tyres changed to something else. Something crunchy and alien.
The taxi driver cussed, stopped the car and climbed out. Gray looked towards India’s place and nudged Colt. Under the glare of the full beam an unknown vehicle was parked behind theirs.
“Take it easy,” Colt said.
“I know who it is. It’s nothing to worry about.” He climbed from the back and pressed a fifty pound note into the cabbie’s hand. “Thanks, mate. We can walk from here. Aw shit.”
Gray climbed out behind him and kicked the pieces of broken glass into the hedgerow as the cabbie checked his tyres.
Colt kept his wallet open. “What’s the damage?”
“Nah, you’re all right, big fella,” the cabbie said, holding up his fifty and leaning into the car. “I’ll grab your change.”
“Keep it.” Colt glanced at Gray as he slipped his wallet into his pocket. “You might want to turn here. I got a feeling there’ll be more debris further up.”
“Cheers. Have a good night, fellas.” The cabbie smiled as he climbed behind the wheel, turned in a tight circle, and drove back up the track in search of civilisation.
“Why’d you tell her about the cameras?” Colt said, as they walked in darkness to India’s place.
Gray cringed as more glass crunched under his feet. “Sorry. Slip of the tongue.”
“You’re making a habit of that.”
Gray felt his ripped cheek redden. “Does it matter if it wasn’t her real name?”
Colt laughed in the darkness. “Yeah, buddy. It matters. So, are you and Priti…?”
“Nooo. She’s been ‘cut’,” he murmured. “But it wasn’t like that. I was thinking about –”
Colt held up a hand. “I don’t want to know.”
“The fire. I was thinking about the fire at Cantilever Court. It was the day Charlie died. Cara came around and, well, you get the gist.”
“Could’ve been worse,” Colt said. “You could’ve let rip with ‘Mrs Reynolds’.”
Gray chuckled as they reached the spanking new beamer. “Nice. So, whose is it?”
“Nisha Fisher’s,” Colt said, leaning against it with his hands in his pockets.
Gray frowned. The name meant nothing to him. “Who’s that?”
“She’s here to help,” Colt said evenly. Gray raised his hands and shrugged, still none the wiser. Colt took a deep breath. “She’s from the Home Office Forced Marriage Unit, Gray. She’s here for Priti.”
Gray looked from Colt to India’s front door and back again. They’d set him up. The club was a ploy. They didn’t want ‘Malik’, they wanted him out of the way. Priti was terrified of the police, said they couldn’t be trusted. Seemed she was right. “You bastards.”
Chapter 64
With her spare tyre on the front wheel and the flat tucked safely in the beamer’s boot, Nisha Fisher left. Alone.
Colt stood at the kitchen sink scrubbing grease from his hands, the air so thick he could barely breathe. “You knew didn’t you.”
India tutted. “Course I didn’t. He stabbed Gray. Do you honestly think he’d be walking around if I knew he ran that club?”
Colt threw the hand towel across the kitchen. “Don’t play with me, India. I’m not in the mood for your fucking games.”
She looked away, chewing at her cheek. “Cara’s no good for him.”
“That’s not for you to decide. You humiliated him tonight. How could you hurt your own brother like that?”
“Don’t talk to me about hurt – I scraped him off the floor the last time the bitch rolled him.”
Colt stared at her. “And how many times has he done that for you?”
She set her jaw, eyes hardening. “I didn’t want him to run to her when he came home and found Priti gone.”
“But Priti’s not gone, is she? You’ve just pushed them together.”
“She’ll be gone on Monday,” India said. “Nisha’s offered her a great deal and the whole weekend to think it over. Gray might mope about it, but he’s not stupid, he’ll make her take it. It’s for the best.”
The whole weekend for Gray and Priti to get closer. Colt shook his head and sat down beside her at the breakfast bar. “Why couldn’t you just tell him where his ex worked, like a normal human being?”
“I tried,” she said. “He didn’t want to hear it.”
“You didn’t try hard enough.” Colt reached up and pulled a bottle of whiskey and a glass from the cupboard. “If you had, you’d have known exactly how over they are.”
India snatched the glass from his hand. “You can’t have a drink. We have to go and pick Malik up.”
“We can’t do anything until you get your story straight.” Colt pulled another glass from the cupboard and poured a hefty three fingers. “If Scarface is Malik, he’s got friends in high places, and even more friends in that club – and they’ve all seen Gray’s face.” He tilted the whiskey bottle in India’s direction. “Priti might be safe on Monday, but Gray might never be safe again.”
India swallowed hard and pushed her glass towards him. “What do you mean?”
“When you visited that club, how many white faces did you see?” She shrugged. “How many?” Colt pressed as he poured.
“The tank on the door.”
The man-mass. Colt raised a finger. “Who else?”
“All the dancers are white.”
“I’m talking about the punters.”
India’s eyes rolled up to the left as she recalled her visits. “A stag party, all white.”
“Who else?”
She tutted. “It was dark. I don’t remember.”
“India, you don’t forget.” Fragmented minds like hers never did, they just stuck things in brain folders and filed them away. “Think harder.”
She closed her eyes and Colt could almost hear the mental filing cabinets opening. When she started pointing, he knew she was back in the club, he even knew where she was sitting – beside the stage. In front of him and Gray.
“Booth,” she said, pointing left to his stereo. “Smart shoes, white socks, black trousers, band of brown skin in between.” Her arm shifted behind her. “Booth. Hairy fat fingers, brown.” Then her right arm came up and his fireplace became a booth. “Leather sandals, brown toes.” A shift to the door revealed a brown hand on a white thigh. When she opened her eyes, she was frowning. “Every booth was occupied by an Asian. Is that normal for a titty bar?”
Colt slowly shook his head. “Not one that I’ve ever been to.”
Chapter 65
Saturday, 17th March
Camber Docks, Portsmouth
The call came exactly thirty minutes after Colt set off for work, India almost didn’t answer. Her boss, DCI Firman, kept it short, sharp and snappy.
“Meet me at Camber Docks,” he said, without so much as a greeting.
“When?” India asked.
“Now,” he said, and promptly hung up.
After that she almost didn’t bother. But she was on her way now, leaving Gray and Priti with a cabinet full of shotguns and a drawer full of cartridges for defence. This had better be good.
As she drove into the docks she spotted his car down by the last of the fishing trawlers offloading their early morning catch, and pulled into the bay beside him. A blast of frigid sea air, heavy with salt, hit her as she stepped from her car into his.
“Thanks for coming,” he said, handing her a polystyrene cup.
India grunted as she took it. “I almost didn’t.”
His tongue worked his mouth, too much to expect it was dislodging an apology. “Where’s Gray Davies?” he said.
With a yawn, India removed the cup’s plastic lid, allowing coffee aroma and steam to mist the windscreen. “In bed if he’s got any sense,” she mumbled. “Why? You need your smoke detectors checking or has Sangrin run out of scapegoats to grill?”
Firman started the ignition and sat silently as the heaters cleared the windscreen. India didn’t like the stifling sense of foreboding the heat added to his silence. “See that,” he eventually said, pointing across the water to Gunwharf Quays.
India craned her neck to see the assembled police cars and fluorescent jackets, combing the shore in meticulous search lines, and looked back questioningly to her boss.
“They’re lookin
g for a murder weapon,” he said. “More specifically, the one they think Gray beat a man to death with sometime between one and two this morning.”
India spluttered on her coffee. The hot liquid spilled onto her lap, scalding her thighs as she tried not to choke.
Firman turned his head to glare at her. “You know anything about that?”
“Do I fuck,” she spat, wiping her mouth and chin with the cuff of her coat as she regained her composure. “You know Gray. He’s as soft as shit. He wouldn’t hurt a fly. Anyway, he was with me this morning. And Colt,” she hastily added, knowing she wouldn’t be classed as independent. “Ask him, he’ll back him up.”
“Someone’s talking to Colt right now,” Firman said, studying her intently. “He was present last night when Gray had an altercation with the dead man . . . in a lap dancing club of all fucking places. Melody Fletcher’s place of work.”
India’s eyes widened. “He had an altercation with Scarface,” she said. “Is he dead?”
“I wondered when you’d ask who,” Firman said.
“I don’t give a shit who,” India snapped. “Because A) I know it wasn’t Gray, and B) I’m not a copper anymore. You saw to that.”
Firman slammed his hand against the dashboard. “You’re suspended. You’re a copper until I tell you otherwise or cart you off in cuffs. And that might be sooner than you fucking think, lady.”
“Look, the bloke stabbed him and sent him a head but –”
Firman cut her off. “Yeah. Doug Henderson filled me in. Thanks for that.”
India swallowed hard and looked away. The disappointment in his eyes and tone still stung.
“The fact the dead man was banging Gray’s ex makes a pretty compelling motive for murder, especially when they’ve just had a very public punch up, don’t you think?”
“What?” India jerked her head up and frowned. “No, she wasn’t. She was trying to get back with Gray. She’s been all over him like a bitch on heat lately.”
“Wise up!” Firman snarled. “She’s been rinsing him for information. Wildcatz has been raided. Cara’s in custody. The NCA have been grilling her for hours. How’d you think they got Gray’s address and the girl’s name and hospital ward in the first fucking place?”