by Limey Lady
‘I bet you miss her,’ Natalie said. ‘I had a boyfriend back in Chesterfield. I don't miss him much, but I really miss being close. Does that surprise and disappoint you?’
‘Er . . . I’m not sure how surprised I should be. I’m not too disappointed though. I did enjoy myself with Simone. I’m glad you enjoyed yourself with your boyfriend.’
‘
She was still staring up at him and this time he really was captivated.
‘
So,’ she said. ‘Now you know I'm a shameless cow, are you finally going to ask me out?’
Again, it would have been rude not to.
*****
The flat was above a row of shops, all in darkness at this hour. Jacko liked to think of it as his fortress. The doors and windows were barred and, although the possibility of police raids stopped him keeping a gun, he had a machete and two very wicked knives hidden in strategic places, just in case.
He was also widely known to be connected. Nobody in his right mind would try to take him on there. Even a nutter would think twice.
Tonight had been painfully slow for a Thursday. A few local firms still classed Thursday in Bingley as payday; usually it was the start of the weekend, but not tonight. Jacko had done a bit of business early on and sod all since nine. So fuck it. He had rung ahead for the usual vindaloo and chapattis, which he was going to wash down with San Miguel before getting stuck into online porn.
Humming to himself, he fumbled for the key to the downstairs door and let himself in, pressing the button that would give him light for thirty seconds; barely long enough to get him up the steps and into the safety of Fort Jackson.
They must have been waiting for him in Katherine the Junkie's flat. Jacko always tried not to look at Katherine's door if he could help it. As likely as not she would be there, peeping out behind the security chain, begging for “sweeties”, ready to trade with every part of her body.
This time he wished he had looked, although it probably wouldn’t have done any good. As he turned the key an enormous shadow loomed over him from behind. Before he could react the stairwell light went off, plunging him into darkness. Then something hard and very heavy sent him crashing into the unlocked door, bursting it open, spilling him inside.
Jacko tried to bounce back to his feet but was immediately kicked down again. His door slammed and then lights clicked on and he discovered he was sharing his living space with two strangers.
Well . . . not total strangers. He'd seen the smaller one about town a bit; he just didn't know his name. The larger one was seen about town a lot more; he was known as Kyle.
Or, more properly, Kyle Cassidy, Bouncer Slayer Extraordinaire.
‘For fuck's sake,’ said Jacko, not letting his degrading position on the floor faze him. ‘Don't you know I'm protected?’
‘Not from me,’ Kyle growled. ‘Where's your stash?’
‘I’m fucking protected. Get the fuck out of here!’
Jacko’s outburst didn’t have the desired effect. Kyle just laughed and told his sidekick to break out the “special blend”. This looked suspiciously like brown cocaine. The sidekick tipped two very generous lines onto Jacko’s ring-stained coffee table and told him to get snorting.
‘No way,’ Jacko shook his head. He didn’t like the words “special blend” at all. Trouble was he liked the handgun that had appeared in Kyle’s fist even less.
‘Get into it,’ Kyle said. ‘Or I’ll start blowing bits off you.’
Kyle had a reputation for not pissing about. More to the point, he wasn’t famous for letting himself be pissed about with. Trembling, Jacko got onto his knees and crawled towards the table. Those two uneven lines now seemed jumbo-sized, each of them much more than the amount he’d sell in a bag.
‘Listen,’ he said. ‘I don’t do this shit.’
‘Fuck me! You’ve got standards!’ Kyle laughed again and his sidekick joined in with a few Muttley-like sniggers. The laughter stopped as abruptly as it started.
‘Get . . . FUCKING . . . SNORTING!’
It was going to be messy without any sort of straw but Jacko daren’t object any more. Blocking off his left nostril, he breathed in as hard as he could. About half of the right-hand line shot up his nose.
Hell that’s strong; like it hasn’t been cut at all.
Or it’s something else altogether.
‘All of it,’ Kyle prompted.
Jacko had another snort at the first line then switched nostrils and had two goes at the second.
‘All of it,’ Kyle repeated. ‘Use your tongue. I don’t want to see anything left.’
The initial hit was quicker and harder than Jacko had expected.
(He’d lied when he’d said he didn’t do coke.)
It also wore off almost at once, leaving him mellow and not nearly so scared. If Kyle had expected him to suddenly spill his guts, it hadn’t worked.
‘I’m protected,’ he said mildly. ‘And there’s nothing to find, anyway.’
‘In that case you won’t mind us looking, will you?’
It was only a tiny flat, not designed to withstand a thorough ransacking. The slightly smaller intruder quickly found the weapons, cash and mugger-money drugs, which had been in Jacko’s bait box, with his old fishing tackle. Everything was tipped on the scuffed leather armchair for Kyle to inspect. He seemed particularly fascinated by the machete, almost gleefully testing its edge. Jacko found thar a bit worrying, when he came to consider his reputation.
‘I'm not thick,’ Kyle said with a grin that was even more alarming than his usual snarl. ‘I know you’ve got more gear. Where is it; under the floorboards? Are you going to tell me? Or am I supposed to beat it out of you?’
‘I'm protected,’ Jacko said yet again. ‘And you’ve got all there is to get. You’ll answer to Danny Painter if you don’t leave me alone.’
‘Oh my God, don’t say I’m up against the dreaded Danny Painter!’ Kyle laughed. ‘Hasn't anyone told you? Danny and Dwyer have had their day. They're only still around because of soft twats like you. I am the coming force round here. Get my drift?’
Jacko stayed where he was, on his knees on the threadbare carpet, and said nothing. This sort of situation wasn't supposed to arise. He did have Danny Painter's protection, but the real stash was mostly Painter's anyway. If he didn't get seriously mangled trying to save the stash, who was Painter going to be maddest with; the thief or the pusher?
More to the point, who was going to be closest at hand for Painter to be mad with?
‘Get the girl,’ Kyle said, picking up the pink and white striped takeaway carrier and sniffing inside.
*****
Katherine looked more spaced-out than ever, which was saying something.
‘Jacko wants a blowjob,’ Kyle told her. ‘This is your chance to earn more sweeties.’
‘Good by me,’ she said eagerly.
Kyle got a plate from a cupboard in the kitchenette part of the living space and opened the takeaway.
‘”IS YOUR NEIGHBOUR THE SHIPLEY SERIAL KILLER?”’ he quoted from a police flier inside the carrier. ‘What do you think Jacko? Got any suspicions?’
Jacko just shrugged.
‘No ideas?’ Kyle laughed. ‘I’ve a few, but you obviously don’t want to play. So let’s stick to business.’
He tipped the curry and side salad onto the plate before waving at Katherine.
‘Go on then. Earn your sweeties.’
Kyle walked back towards them as the girl shoved Jacko onto his back, rudely spooning vindaloo into his face.
‘Don’t resist,’ he said, speaking with his mouth full. ‘Not if you value your kneecaps.’
Jacko knew when he was on a loser. He shut his eyes and tried to pretend there wasn’t an audience while Katherine got on with it. Despite his best efforts he quickly grew hard. Maybe it was the coke, but her attentions felt sensational. There again, he’d always liked blowjobs and she’d obviously had lots of practice.
Two mi
nutes and he had a right boner. And, another minute or so after that, he couldn't hold off any longer.
‘He's cum,’ Katherine announced.
‘I hope you swallowed it,’ Kyle said through his last gobful of curry.
‘Of course I fuckin' swallowed it. Now, where are my sweeties?’
‘See that?’ Kyle pointed to the pile of mugger-money drug packets. ‘You can have it all, just so long as you do what I say for ten more minutes. Okay?’
The girl's eyes were madly spinning and whirling. It was obvious Kyle had just bought her heart and soul. When he told her to get sucking again she set to with a will. Kyle threw his dirty plate onto another, far from matching armchair then pulled the chapattis out of their paper packet and ate them dry. Jacko would have told him that wasn't the way it should be done, but he was too busy watching the machete, which Muttley had been waving over him all the while.
‘Okay,’ said Kyle. ‘Now I want you to bite him as hard as you can.’
It was agony. Jacko tried to kick and thump the girl away but the two large men held him down and she kept biting and biting like a dog at a stick.
‘Stop,’ Kyle said at last. Then, chuckling horribly: ‘Do you think you could chew his balls off?’
Katherine closed in to have a go and Jacko couldn't take any more. He blabbed everything then lay there, watching Kyle cuddle the girl while Muttley collected the rest of Painter's gear from his hidey-hole under the fridge.
There was something unspeakable about the sight of the ugly giant caressing the ravaged junkie. Kyle was stroking her hair and telling her she was a good girl, his beautiful, good girl. Jacko couldn't imagine a time when Katherine might have been beautiful. Her eyes had sunk back into her skull, her nose must have been broken ten times and half her teeth were gone . . . which was a good job really, because if she'd had a full set he might well have been missing a cock.
Kyle surveyed the vastly increased pile of sweeties and grinned.
‘Isn't this where you’re supposed to tell me that gear belongs to Danny Painter? That I will be dancing on the bottom of the ocean if I take it?’
‘That's between you and him,’ Jacko said as meekly as he could. ‘I'm out of it.’
‘Okay then,’ Kyle said pleasantly. ‘That concludes our first bit of business. There’s one more to sort out: the little matter of you giving one of my lads a slapping. Outside The Old White Horse last Saturday, if you don't remember.’
‘I never slapped anyone,’ Jacko said instinctively. Then he blinked. His head didn’t feel right. And he was trembling again. In fact he was shitting himself. All that mellowness was long gone.
‘Okay, so you shook him about a bit, then. Is it all flooding back?’
It was, but Jacko tried to deny it.
‘There was a kid trying to deal,’ he ad-libbed. ‘I told him he was on Painter's patch and he went away. That’s it, end of.’
‘That's not how he tells it. According to him, you used violence and robbery.’
‘I never did. He’s making it up. Probably ripping you off and blaming me.’
‘Trust me, mate. He wouldn’t dare make up shit like that.’
‘He has to be making it up. I never touched him. For fuck’s sake, I’ve got witnesses . . .’
‘So’s he,’ said Kyle. ‘And I believe them, not you.’
‘I’m protected,’ Jacko said, crying now. Not able to stop himself. And he was alarmed by the sudden, jerky shift in his emotions.
‘Enough. You’re guilty.’ Kyle did another of his unsettling grins. ‘Now I'm going to demonstrate the big difference between me and Danny Painter. When you think Danny Painter's protecting you, someone like me walks in, takes what he wants and fuck all happens. When I’m protecting you, this happens . . .’
Katherine was still snuggled against him, savouring her latest hit with her eyes dreamily closed. Kyle kissed her tenderly on the cheek then pulled the blade of Jacko's wickedest knife across her throat. The girl's eyes stayed dreamily shut and, at first, Jacko thought Kyle was making some sort of gesture. Then Katherine's head tilted to one side and a terrible, gaping slit appeared, bubbling blood. Kyle pushed her gently and she flopped and lay lifelessly on the floor.
Jacko felt acid water in his mouth and spewed and spewed until his stomach was raw. When he finally looked up again Kyle was still grinning.
‘Special blend makes things feel better . . . sharper . . . more real.’ Kyle laughed. ‘Wasn’t your blowjob great? It should have been. That shit doesn’t come cheap.’
The gaping slit in Katherine’s neck was like a magnet for Jacko’s eyes. He kept tearing them away but they kept drifting right back.
‘It works best after twenty minutes,’ Kyle went on. ‘And it keeps coming back in waves. It can last for hours. That’s why it’s so fucking expensive; because it keeps getting you up, like Viagra. And because it makes everything ten times stronger.’
Jacko didn’t feel ten times stronger. Ten times more afraid, more like.
‘Listen Kyle,’ he babbled, ‘Danny Painter . . .’
‘Danny Painter can fuck off. I’m telling you about my special blend. Then I’m going to give you a more practical demonstration. Like an experiment sort of thing. Is that all right?’
It wasn’t, but Jacko managed a miserable nod.
‘After taking special blend, a man’s cock is ten times more sensitive. So’s a whore’s snatch. I’ve tried that for myself, so I know it’s true. The cock bit, I mean. I only have the snatch bit by hearsay. The whore screamed ten times louder, so we can take that as true too. Okay?’
Jacko wondered if Katherine was the whore in question but didn’t ask.
‘My experiment involves pain, not sex.’ Kyle’s grin was broader than ever. He pointed at the junkie’s discarded body. ‘Two or three hours and that’ll be you. First though, we're going to play a little game.’
Chapter Twenty-Five
(Monday 22nd September 2008)
Sean used to spend all day, every day in the office at Kings Cars. Nowadays he’d taken up residence in The Kings Head. Pubs were more exciting than car lots, and they had beer. He did, however, drop by the old place once or twice a week, to keep ‘em all on their toes.
And just as well. Arriving unannounced this fine Monday afternoon, he found Pat and Donna huddled together over a magazine. Pat was seated and Donna was leaning towards him, her incredible tits resting on the table right under his nose. Fuck knew how he was concentrating on the magazine.
‘”HOW TO GIVE THE PERFECT BLOWJOB”,’ Sean said, easily reading the bold-type header upside down. ‘That's what's keeping the wheels of industry turning, is it?’
‘No,’ Donna said. ‘It's what I'm going to give Stanley tonight. Pat was just giving me tips on where I can improve.’
‘And Pat would know that, would he?’
‘Oh Sean, Donna gave him the full wide-eyed innocent routine, ‘how could you ask a married woman such a question?’ Then, noticing the clock, ‘Is it that time already? I have to go.’
‘It's only half three,’ Sean protested as she closed down her PC.
‘I've got an understanding boss,’ she replied brightly. ‘It's already been agreed.’
Sean turned to Pat. ‘What are you running here, McGuire; a holiday camp?’
‘Don't blame me. Joe organizes working hours.’
‘He does, does he? Where is he, anyhow?’
‘He organized himself a long weekend,’ Pat said, and they all laughed.
Donna went back to Pat's side and collected her magazine.
‘Better not leave this,’ she said to him. ‘We can't have you trying naughty things without me.’ Then, in a stage whisper: ‘We can practice the perfect scissors again tomorrow. I think I know where we’ve been going wrong.’
‘You have, haven't you?’ Sean said as soon as she’d gone.
‘I have what?’
‘Don't you fucking give me that; you know exactly what I mean.’
&n
bsp; ‘No I haven't,’ Pat said, trying not to grin.
‘Swear it on your mother's life.’
‘That's not fair.’
‘Come on, McGuire, I know you've been up her. A girl doesn't crawl over you like that unless she's ridden your cock. Confess.’
‘Oh, for Christ’s sake, Sean . . .’
‘Come on.’
‘Okay. But I haven't touched her since she got married. And that was ages ago.’