The Rule of Fear

by Luke Delaney

  ‘Fuck,’ he declared with satisfaction.

  ‘Where have you been?’ Kelly asked – now standing at his side.

  ‘I had to sort some shit out,’ he replied, blinking as the drugs took hold. ‘It’s done now. I thought I told you to stay at a friend’s or go shopping in the West End – out the way.’

  ‘I couldn’t,’ she told him. ‘I wasn’t in the mood. I was worried, Jack.’

  ‘About what?’ he asked as if nothing had happened.

  ‘You,’ she shook her head. ‘The Campbells. They’re not gonna just forget what you did to Josh. He’s not just one of their faces, he’s an actual Campbell – one of the brothers.’

  ‘Fuck the Campbells,’ he dismissed it. ‘They come back – they’ll get more of the same.’

  ‘Only next time there’ll be more of them and they’ll be ready.’

  ‘The Campbells are finished,’ he told her. ‘I’ve decided to expand. Push them out for good.’

  ‘How you gonna do that, Jack?’ Kelly asked, sounding a little dismayed.

  ‘One by one I’ll take every estate and every street in Canning Town and then maybe even beyond that,’ he explained – the cocaine rushing around his mind and making him irrational and unrealistic. ‘I’ll set myself up as an estates policing unit expert – persuade the senior management to let me set up and oversee units all over the borough – use the cops under me to take control of the streets. No one will get in my way.’

  ‘I’m not sure, Jack,’ she said, unconvinced by his drug-fuelled dream. ‘Maybe we should just get the hell out of here. You’ve still got your job – we don’t need this … this … dead place. Nothing good ever happens here, Jack.’

  ‘I’m not running from the Campbells,’ he told her through gritted teeth. ‘I’m not running from anyone.’

  ‘Why, Jack?’ Kelly pushed. ‘Nothing wrong with running – if it’s the right thing to do. If it’s for the best – for you and me.’

  ‘No more running,’ he told her. ‘I’m tired of running.’

  ‘I don’t understand,’ she admitted. ‘You’re not running from anything.’

  ‘Really?’ he asked, suddenly sounding tired and broken. ‘I’ve been running ever since I walked into that house – one way or another. I’ve been running from the nightmares, but they always find me. It’s time I stopped running.’

  A gentle knock on the door made both of them jump. ‘See who it is and get rid of them,’ he demanded.

  ‘What if it’s the Campbells?’ she whispered.

  ‘When the Campbells come back they won’t knock,’ he told her and nodded his head towards the door. Kelly peeked through the spyhole to see a man in his mid-twenties who looked vaguely familiar, although she didn’t know why. ‘Who is it?’ King asked quietly.

  ‘I don’t know,’ she answered. ‘I’ve never seen him before. Could be a cop?’

  ‘The same one as last time?’

  ‘No,’ she told him. ‘A different one.’

  ‘Shit,’ King cursed as he headed towards her and peeped through the fisheye lens. ‘Thank fuck,’ he declared, breaking into a smile, confusing Kelly even further before he unlocked the door and threw it wide open. ‘Scott,’ he welcomed his brother. ‘I knew you’d come through for me. Get inside, quick.’ Once Scott was in, King re-locked the doors and led his brother into the open-plan kitchen–diner.

  ‘Who’s this?’ Scott asked, nodding towards Kelly, his eyes squinting with distaste.

  ‘Kelly,’ King answered dismissively. ‘Kelly, this is my brother Scott.’

  ‘The one you called earlier?’ she asked.

  ‘Yeah,’ King confirmed hurriedly, eager to move on. ‘Well? Did you bring it?’

  ‘How old are you, Kelly?’ Scott ignored him – his eyes fixed on Kelly – her beauty and her youth equally undeniable.

  ‘Old enough,’ King answered. ‘For fuck’s sake, Scott – did you bring it?’

  ‘No,’ Scott told him. ‘Of course I didn’t fucking bring it. I’m not going to bring you a firearm. You think I’m insane?’

  ‘You lied to me,’ King accused him as his world seemed to be collapsing in on him – lied to by the only person he really trusted in the entire world – left defenceless and exposed to the unstoppable tide of the Campbells that was surely sweeping towards him. ‘You’ve fucked me.’

  ‘I had to lie to you,’ Scott insisted, grabbing hold of him as King stood motionless, still in shock. ‘It was the only way I could be sure you’d meet me. You said you were in trouble?’ Scott waited for an answer, but King could neither move nor speak.

  ‘A local family,’ Kelly eventually answered for him. ‘A crime family called the Campbells. They’re heavy people – capable of most anything. Jack’s pissed them off.’

  ‘Then tell the police,’ Scott told them. ‘If he’s been going after a criminal family and they’re threatening him because of it, have them arrested.’

  ‘He’s not been going after them like that,’ Kelly explained. ‘He’s been moving in on their interests.’ Still Scott looked confused. ‘Taking over their business,’ Kelly spelt it out.

  ‘What?’ Scott asked in disbelief. ‘You’ve been what?’

  ‘It wasn’t supposed to happen like that,’ King tried to explain. ‘I was just trying to shake things up. It just went too far, that’s all.’

  ‘Then you need to hand yourself in,’ Scott told him. ‘Tell Internal Affairs everything.’

  ‘What,’ King shook his head, ‘and go to prison for dealing – for abduction and assault? I don’t think so. They’d lock me up for years. Do you know what happens to Old Bill inside? I’m not telling anyone anything.’

  ‘I’ll use all the influence I can to help you,’ Scott tried to convince him, ‘and so will Dad. He still has contacts. If we can establish you’re suffering from PTSD we can claim you weren’t responsible for your actions. Prison’s not a certainty.’

  ‘That’s not a risk I’m willing to take,’ King told him.

  ‘You don’t have a choice,’ replied Scott.

  ‘Yes I do,’ King insisted. ‘I take the Campbells on head to head. I wipe them out and take over this whole manor. I can get the manpower to do it – I just need you to bring me a gun.’

  ‘Jack,’ Scott tried to snap him back to reality. ‘I’m not going to bring you a gun. It’s not going to happen. Everything you say – it’s the drugs talking. That mark on your lip, I’ve seen it before – on my own men when they came home after tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. Not all of them could handle it. It’s crack, right? Jesus, Jack. I’ve seen that shit destroy good men faster than you’d believe. They’d have been better off with a bullet through the head. At least it would have been quick and painless. Instead they rotted away. Their minds went first, then their bodies – all sense of loyalty and morality lost. I saw men, who in Helmand would risk their lives for their fellow soldiers, come home happy to sell their own children if they could get more of that poison once they’d started using. You’re not thinking straight, Jack. You can’t with that crap in your system. Come home with me. Let’s get you cleaned up – then we can work out what we’re going to do.’

  ‘No,’ King insisted. ‘I’m not going anywhere. I’m not one of your squaddies you can play that caring officer shit with. I just needed you to get off your high horse for once in your life and get me a fucking gun, but you couldn’t even do that. You betrayed me, Scott. You let me down, just like everyone else did.’

  ‘The drugs are making you paranoid,’ Scott warned. ‘You don’t know what you’re saying.’

  ‘I know exactly what I’m saying,’ King sneered. ‘I don’t belong with you people any more. This is where I belong. I don’t want to go back to my old life. I couldn’t even if I wanted to – I know that now. Don’t you understand? I’ve come too far. There’s only prison and some pointless pretence of a life there for me now. I don’t want to live like you or Mum and Dad – each new day the same as the last. After a few years w
ith that mannequin of a fiancée of yours you’ll wish you died in Afghanistan instead of just being wounded.’

  No one spoke for a few seconds. ‘I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that,’ Scott managed to swallow his anger. ‘That’s the crack talking, not you.’

  ‘No,’ King raised his voice. ‘It’s the truth.’

  ‘Bullshit,’ Scott argued. ‘You were never the same after what happened to you. You needed help and you didn’t get it. It’s not your fault, Jack. It’s not your fault.’

  King sighed. ‘Just go, Scott. Go back to your life and leave me to live mine.’

  ‘If I go you’ll have no life,’ Scott told him.

  ‘Just go,’ King shouted at him.

  ‘Not without you,’ Scott answered, taking a step towards him. But King’s hand firing to the CS canister on his utility belt stopped him in his tracks.

  ‘I will,’ King warned him. ‘I swear I will, Scott. Just go and don’t come back.’

  ‘Don’t do this,’ Scott pleaded. ‘You’re my brother.’

  ‘Not any more,’ King said cruelly.

  ‘Then you’re lost,’ Scott told him.

  ‘Only to you,’ he pushed the knife in further. ‘Get out, Scott.’

  Scott stood still and silent for a long time – his eyes moving from his brother’s to the CS canister his hand still rested on. Finally he spoke. ‘This isn’t over. I won’t give up on you.’ Slowly he headed towards the front door hoping King would change his mind and accept his help, but he said nothing – watching him unblinkingly. Scott turned the locks and opened the door, calling back to King. ‘I’ll keep coming back,’ he said, ‘until you have no choice but to accept my help.’

  ‘Don’t come back,’ King warned him. ‘There’s nothing here for you.’ Scott nodded once and stepped through the door. ‘Lock it,’ he told Kelly who moved quickly to do as he’d said. Once the door was secure he allowed the tension in his body and mind to try and find a release. ‘Fuck,’ he cursed – the act of swearing giving him some sort of small relief, but not enough. He pulled the bag of cocaine from under his body armour and again tipped a small pile onto the kitchen table, although this time he hurriedly turned it into a straight line with his fingertips before inhaling entirely through one nostril – swearing as he bolted upright. ‘Fuck.’

  ‘Take it easy,’ Kelly warned him. ‘You’re getting too wired. You won’t be able to think straight.’

  ‘I’m fine,’ he assured her as he sniffed repeatedly and wiped the powder from the end of his nose onto the back of his hand before licking it clean – its bitterness making him wince. The sound of his mobile phone ringing saved him from any more discussion. The caller ID told him it was Davey Brown. ‘Davey,’ he answered it as he tried to clear the stinging saliva from the back of his throat.

  ‘Where the fuck are you?’ Brown demanded.

  ‘On the estate,’ King answered. ‘Why? Is there a problem?’

  ‘I’ve had the Duty Inspector banging on the door wanting to know if one of us took off with one of his team’s motors from the yard. Wouldn’t happen to be you by any chance?’

  ‘What did you tell him?’

  ‘I told him fuck all,’ Brown said. ‘Denied all knowledge.’

  ‘Good,’ King replied. ‘Keep it that way.’

  ‘Aye,’ Brown moved on, ‘but that’s not the only problem. Marino’s been going crazy trying to get hold of you. Says he needs to find you before they do. Who the fuck are they?’

  ‘Don’t worry about it,’ King told him. ‘I’ve already taken care of that. Marino’s just trying to trip us up – get us to turn on each other or something. We just need to stay solid and we’ll be fine – better than fine.’

  ‘What you talking about?’

  ‘Just do as I tell you and you’ll see,’ King assured him, ‘and get hold of Danny and Knight too – make sure they keep their mouths shut. Understand?’

  ‘Aye,’ Brown agreed, sounding concerned. ‘I understand.’

  ‘Once you’ve found them,’ King told him, ‘I want you all to get down to the estate and meet me here – Millander Walk.’

  ‘OK,’ Brown played along. ‘We’ll be there.’

  King hung up without replying and reached for the bag of cocaine still on the table before Kelly stopped him. ‘You’ve had enough,’ she warned him. ‘Do any more and your brain’ll explode.’

  ‘I need something,’ he complained.

  ‘Fine,’ she agreed. ‘I’ll make us a joint. It’ll help bring you down. Sit,’ she ordered pointing at the sofa. He did as he was told, unclipping his body armour and utility belt as he did so, letting them fall to the floor. Kelly dug out the box she kept her stash in from its hiding place and took it over to where he sat, kneeling on the floor next to him while she expertly prepared a large joint – lighting it without ceremony, taking one drag before passing it to King. ‘Here,’ she told him. ‘This’ll make you feel better.’ She watched him inhale deeply – making the end of the joint glow bright red and crackle like a camp fire as he swallowed the smoke into the depths of his lungs, his pursed lips drawing her attention to the burn mark Scott had mentioned. Kelly had seen enough crack-heads in her own life to recognize the signs when she saw them, but she hadn’t yet found the right moment to challenge him about it and still hoped he’d burnt himself smoking a joint down to the roach instead. She waited for King’s body to slump as he relaxed before asking.

  ‘Is he right?’ she challenged him. ‘Is the burn on your lip from a crack-pipe?’

  Instinctively his hand came up to his mouth and touched his lip. ‘I’ve done it a couple of times,’ he lied. ‘Nothing I can’t handle.’

  ‘Nobody can handle crack,’ she warned him. ‘No one comes back from it. Get off that shit now, Jack – before it eats you alive.’

  He looked into her eyes – as black as fresh drops of blood in the moonlight. She should have been experimenting with make-up and dreaming of teenage boys. Instead she was making joints for a corrupted cop and lecturing him on the all-consuming dangers of crack cocaine. ‘OK,’ he told her and meant it. ‘If that’s what you want.’

  ‘Good,’ she smiled, taking the joint back from him and inhaling more gently and calmly than he – blowing the smoke slowly from her red lips into a long, thin, white stream towards the ceiling before handing the joint back to King who took a long drag, holding the smoke in his lungs for as long as he could. His eyes become irresistibly heavy as Kelly stroked his skin and began to make soft sounds like gentle waves breaking on a sandy beach as if she was calming an infant.

  ‘Sleep,’ she told him. ‘You need to sleep.’

  He could deny her hypnotic demands no longer. Everything in his vision suddenly went blank and the soft sounds of Kelly’s soothing faded to nothing as dreams quickly swept into his unconscious mind and dragged him deep into their world.

  King woke abruptly from a dream involving suffocating and overheating to find Kelly lying across his chest fast asleep. He touched his own face and realized he was soaked in sweat – the rapid thumping of his heart telling him something was wrong, but he didn’t know what. He rolled her off his chest and inadvertently woke her at the same time. He did up his trousers and leapt to his feet as Kelly yawned and stretched like a ballerina.

  ‘You should sleep some more,’ she told him, but he wasn’t listening as he tried to focus on his wristwatch.

  ‘Fuck,’ he declared angrily. ‘I’ve been asleep for almost two hours.’

  ‘You needed it,’ she reminded him.

  ‘I can’t afford to sleep,’ he argued. ‘Not right now. Fuck,’ he cursed again. ‘Anything could have happened in the last couple of hours. I need to get back to the station and find out what’s going on. I’m going to get cleaned up and take a piss. Make me a sandwich or something, will you? I need to eat,’ he told her and headed for the stairs, leaving his body armour and utility belt on the floor where he’d dropped it earlier.

  ‘Cheese all right?’ she asked. ‘
I ain’t got a lot in.’

  ‘Fine,’ he answered over his shoulder and climbed the stairs slowly, feeling the effects of the fading drugs, stress and lack of sleep on his creaking body. He made it to the bathroom and urinated dark yellow water that stung as it escaped – warning him he was dehydrated. He zipped himself up, wincing slightly, and stepped over to the sink, turning the tap and filling it to the brim with cold water before burying his face in it. Water spilled over the edge and splashed on the floor as he submerged even deeper, the cold liquid covering and filling his ears, bringing a sense of peace and tranquility – escape – until a sound like the distant rumbling of thunder made him surface long before he needed to for air, the speed of his action throwing droplets high onto the walls and ceiling. He wiped the water from his face in an almost panic – as if it was a barrier between him and senses he needed to remove.

  Satisfied he’d imagined it, he pushed his wet hair back with his hands and stared at the image of himself in the mirror. His appearance shocked him, as if each hour was ageing him by years, his skin pale and waxy, his eyes hollow and sunken and his lips colourless and cracked. ‘Fuck,’ he cursed himself a second before the rumbling noise returned. He hadn’t imagined it – it was real – someone hammering on the front door. The sound had previously been distorted by the water he’d buried himself in, but was now as clear as the danger he sensed.

  He flew from the bathroom, the warning he was ready to shout to Kelly already formed in his mouth, but as he burst into the upstairs hallway he realized it was too late. Kelly opened the door only slightly, believing the thin door chain would keep her safe, but the second she did so the door exploded inwards – knocking her backwards and to the floor as the two men strode into the maisonette – their handguns clearly visible.

  ‘Shit,’ King whispered to himself. He flattened himself against the wall and spied on the scene unfolding in front of him downstairs. Even from his position and with everything seeming to move on fast-forward, he recognized the two men from the many and varied mugshots and surveillance photographs he’d seen pinned to walls or circulated in intelligence bulletins. It was Callum, the youngest of the Campbell brothers, he saw lift Kelly from the floor before slapping her so hard with the back of his hand that held the gun that she spun through three hundred and sixty degrees before crashing back to the floor – her lips instantly split and bleeding, her face stricken with terror.