Every Night I Dream of Hell

by Mackay, Malcolm

  ‘Adam?’ Marty said.

  ‘Yeah, Adam. He provided a girl to Barrett for the lure, and it’s been suggested that he’s bragging about being involved and knowing where Barrett and his crew are.’

  Didn’t take more than three seconds for Marty to put two and two together. We all used to think he was dumb, just a party boy with the women and little else. Got involved in a bunch of other businesses that he couldn’t make stick and went back to the women. But he was smart. Made his role in debt collection stick, managed to make himself the biggest debt collector in the city within a year. His failures had given him experience to learn from.

  ‘I know you think that if he was involved then I must know about it but that’s horseshit, if you don’t mind me saying,’ Marty said to him. There was this force in every word he spoke that let you know how pissed off he was.

  ‘You had no idea that your own twin brother was working with Barrett?’ Currie asked him. Keeping his tone conciliatory, like he wanted to believe.

  It was the tone Currie used that mattered, not what he said. Sounded like he already knew Marty didn’t know, like he had too much respect for Marty to believe anything else. Showed how far Marty had come in a short space of time that his brother’s stupidity couldn’t dent him. It’s become a cliché about Marty, how people are suddenly forced to respect his work. Marty’s brother was a twat but that still didn’t mean Marty was.

  ‘We might be twins but we’re not fucking Siamese twins. I don’t know everything he does, although I bloody wish I did. Fuck’s sake.’ He paused for a bit, glancing at me before he said anything. ‘Have you been round to see him yet?’

  Kevin knew what that was. That was Marty terrified that we’d already dealt with his brother before we came to confront him. Fearing that his brother was a splatter on a floor somewhere and that nothing he could do now would change that. That’s why he looked at me. But that wasn’t plausible. Not when there was still a chance that we might get something out of Marty first.

  This was a two-man conversation with an audience of six. Billy, Conn and Mikey sitting at the table, watching the back and forth. Me, Ronnie and Ben standing behind Kevin, literally and figuratively. Glancing occasionally at each other, making sure nobody was making any stupid moves, reaching into a pocket or anything like that. It needed to be tense to make sure Marty understood how serious this was. It was damaging though. It scratched at our unity.

  ‘We haven’t been anywhere near him,’ Kevin said, ‘but we’re on our way. Your brother has some very serious questions to answer.’

  ‘You’re too fucking right he does,’ Marty said, standing up behind the table, ‘and I’m going to ask them. The bastard. All of us, we’ll all go. He’ll be at the club at this hour.’

  ‘He is,’ I said. One phone call from Kevin in the car on the way over had confirmed that. Another of his unnamed contacts.

  Marty looked at Kevin, nodded, but you could see he was unnerved by how much we knew. He felt outgunned. He was hoping that him leading the questioning could make the questions a little less physical. Me saying that I knew where his brother was extinguished that hope.

  Marty was making a show of his decisiveness, putting on his jacket and getting ready to march down to his car and go round to see his brother. In the seconds he took to do it, I looked at Billy Patterson, made eye contact. I nodded, he nodded back, letting me know that he understood what was going to happen next. That was reassuring.

  There was no way Kevin wanted Marty going off on his own, or just going off with his own people around him. That would have given him the chance to warn his brother. I wanted to split the two parties up for the drive to the club. I wanted to be in the car with Marty. Billy seemed fine with that, willing to be one of the people who went with Kevin instead to force the split.

  We all traipsed down the stairs and out onto the street. It was lovely out there, in the late afternoon sun. Sort of place I’d have been happy to work if I was ever capable of holding down a desk job. The cars were parked on the street in front of the building. Turned out we were parked right up behind Marty’s.

  ‘We’ll just take the two cars,’ Kevin said casually.

  That was as much as he was going to say. Kevin wasn’t going to force Marty to get in the car with me, wasn’t going to give out any orders. So far everything was being done at Marty’s behest. He wanted to go talk to his brother so we were going to talk to his brother. His demand, his terms. That wasn’t going to change, not as long as he wanted the same things we did.

  We did it as subtly as we could. Billy gravitated over to Kevin’s car and got in the back with him. I walked over to Marty’s car and got in the back beside him. He didn’t look thrilled to see me, but he didn’t say anything. Conn was already dropping into the driver’s seat of Marty’s car, Mikey getting into the passenger side. That left Ronnie and Ben no choice but to get in with Kevin and Billy. A three-to-one split.

  It was a good chance for Kevin to have a conversation with Billy Patterson. Billy was closer to Marty on a day-to-day basis than we were; he might have a few interesting answers. He was in a better position to confirm or deny Marty being involved with Barrett.

  ‘This info about Adam,’ Marty said to me. ‘You’re sure about it?’ Interesting that he correctly assumed I was the one who had found this info.

  ‘Sure as I can be. Only one way to be certain.’

  18

  Heavenly was a dump. It was cheap, it had a reputation as a place you could have a wild time, so it got people in the doors. But it was a dump. Could have been something special – the front looked like some classic theatre – if it wasn’t so grotty and badly maintained. We parked across the street and marched in, a conspicuous collection of mobile trouble.

  Marty went in first because nobody was more determined to lead the way than Marty. This wasn’t just about him confronting his brother; it was about him being seen to take this more seriously than anyone else on God’s green earth. Didn’t matter how outraged you were, Marty would have found a way of trumping you. Nobody was going to look more innocent than him. He stormed in, the rest of us having to up our pace to keep up.

  There were three people in the place and I recognized them all. They were a shabby wee combination of low-ranking criminality. Adam Jones was standing behind the bar. He was the manager of this place. That was his official job title anyway; what he told the taxman. The truth was that he ran private, after-hours parties from this place, something him and Marty had been doing for a while. He was also, apparently, edging his way into Marty’s business of renting out women that he assumed belonged to him. It was grim, what they did. Finding desperate women and pushing them into prostitution. Paid some with drugs alone. I don’t doubt some of the women made the decision for themselves, kept control of what they were doing. There were plenty who didn’t.

  There were two men sitting on the other side of the bar, closer to us. One of them was Aaron MacLennan, a tall, narrow guy with a mouth that took up most of his face. He was in his mid thirties, and he’d been around the business almost as long as I had. He was, not to be too technical, shite at everything. I’d never known him to make a good job of anything he’d done in the business, and I knew he’d been inside at least twice. If he was working for Adam Jones, then Adam Jones wasn’t running much of a racket.

  The other guy was Neil Fraser. A big lump of dumb muscle. He’d been stabbed the year before, if I remember my dates correctly. Not stabbed hard enough, because he was still polluting the city with his presence. He was a big guy, and that was where his skill ended. He was stupid. He was loud. He wasn’t a good fighter. He was short-tempered. He used to work for us, the Jamieson organization. When Jamieson went down, the unreliable were the first to hit the dole queue. Seemed like he was now plying his trade for Adam Jones. Intimidating wee girls for money. That was his level.

  We went in looking angry, and the eight of us could conjure up a pretty furious picture. Adam was trying to play it cool, with
the bar and his two mates acting as shield. Fraser looked as dopey as ever, like he didn’t understand. MacLennan knew. He looked like his rectum had exploded, now trying to shrink himself painfully into his bar stool.

  ‘Marty, what can I do for you?’ Adam said to his brother. Still trying to play it casual, but he wasn’t much of a player. He so desperately wanted to be lord of the manor. He looked at Neil Fraser and smiled a bit, and Fraser, being as sharp as a brick, smiled back.

  Marty was scowling. Now, days gone by I had seen Marty scowling and it looked petulant. He looked like a kid about to throw a tantrum. Not now. This scowl was dangerous. It was the sort of scowl that said he had seven men with him and Adam had two and fuck anyone who counted differently.

  He stood there, halfway between the entrance and the bar, looking at his brother. ‘Adrian Barrett, you provided a girl for him.’ Said it quiet, trying to keep his temper in check. Smart leaders don’t lose their temper.

  ‘Never met Adrian Barrett,’ Adam said, giving a wee glance sideways to MacLennan as though he was being the smartest guy in the world.

  ‘You met his right-hand man, Elliott Parker. You provided him with a girl to use. I hear you know where they’re staying. Tell me.’

  The smile on Adam’s face got a lot less sure of itself. He glanced at MacLennan and Fraser but they were now extremely busy looking at the floor. They knew that this wasn’t some brotherly confrontation; this was business. This was way beyond their pay scale, and it scared the crap out of the pair of them. A few sentences in and Adam didn’t have any backup left.

  ‘Why don’t you take a seat and we can talk about this?’ he said, after pausing for a few seconds. He looked across at the little tables and chairs on the other side of the dance floor against the back wall of the club.

  ‘Why don’t you tell me where the fuck they are?’ Marty said through tight lips. That temper was bubbling away.

  ‘I didn’t meet anyone called Parker,’ Adam said. ‘I provided girls for some people. That’s part of what I do, brother. None of them was called Parker. We can talk about who—’

  ‘Quit dicking around,’ Marty shouted at the top of his voice. The shout bounced around the empty dance floor. Everyone tensed a little. Mikey and Ronnie took a step forwards, ready for the fight that usually trotted along following a shout.

  Adam put a hand up like he wanted to say something, trying to take the edge off this. Anything he said at that point would have set Marty off. I saw it, and Kevin did too. That’s why Kevin took a few steps forwards, putting himself halfway between Marty and the bar. He was asserting control.

  ‘We know that you provided someone for Parker. We know that you’ve since told people that you know where they are. Tell us where they are, Adam; this doesn’t have to turn nasty.’

  Kevin Currie is an impressive man if you know who he is, what he does. By that I mean what he really does, the sort of risks he handles, the tough decisions he makes. If you don’t know, don’t understand the detail, then you might think he’s a soft little middle-aged man who sells knock-off DVDs and cigarettes. You might make a grave error. Adam Jones laughed at him. Stood behind the bar and snorted. Looked at Marty as though Marty was the only one he would deal with.

  As soon as he laughed, Kevin turned around. With his back to Adam, he nodded at me and Conn. That was our signal; we didn’t need to be told what happened next. Conn, Mikey and Ronnie moved quickly across to the bar, covering MacLennan and Fraser. They fenced them in, didn’t do anything else. Didn’t need to. Neither of them was going to try and fight back. Adam stood behind the bar, looking at them, waiting for them to do something. Waiting for someone to throw the first punch. He looked disappointed with his own two. Shows how dumb he was if he thought either of them was loyal enough to fight us on his behalf.

  Adam was watching this when he should have been watching me. I had hung back about half a second, let the other three get in front of me and take their positions. They provided a barrier between me and the bar, one that I could swing behind as I made my way towards Adam Jones. He saw me when it was too late to do anything; I was almost in front of him. He looked nervous, obviously thought about running, but tried standing his ground. Admirable tactic, if you’ve got what it takes to back it up. The bar between us wasn’t going to help him, and the sudden widening of his eyes when he realized he was my target told me he knew it. That was my reputation, leaping ahead of me and screaming my name.

  The one thing he did was look behind me, presumably at Marty. Just time for a glance across, where his twin was standing with Kevin, Ben and Billy. Perhaps hoping that Marty would say something. People always think that it’s just scare tactics, that the worst thing possible can’t possibly happen to them. If ever Marty was going to step in and make sure that the worst didn’t happen, that was the moment. But Marty stayed silent. He was the last person in the world that was going to step in and help Adam now.

  Move fast. Don’t give a person time to react. Try and do something they can’t possibly expect, so that you stun them, even just for a couple of seconds. Those couple of seconds, when they’re trying to work out what’s going on, are the couple of seconds where you take total control. I got to the bar and reached my arms right across it. He saw them coming, both arms shooting out towards him. He would have thought I was going for the front of his clothes to grab him, or even his throat. I wasn’t. I grabbed him by the ears. Didn’t have a great grip, but I didn’t need one; he was happy to do all the work for me. I yanked him towards me and he very nearly leapfrogged that bar. To the untrained eye it might look like I dragged him across, but I was just holding on. He leapt like a man scared of losing his ears.

  He was whimpering, sliding across the top of the bar and dropping heavily onto his knees on the other side. I had to lean down to hold on, gripping the ears as tight as I could. Don’t stop. Don’t give him a second to think about what’s happening. Don’t let him fight back. I glanced sideways as I started to pull him across the floor. Marty was watching, a grim look on his face, Kevin and Ben staying expressionless beside him. Billy had moved back to the door, making sure nobody came in to break up the party. Adam was still on his knees, trying to get up. He was shuffling and stumbling in the direction I was leading, trying to get up. He stumbled and I pulled at him, my grip slipping from one of his ears. He shouted something but I didn’t care what, I wasn’t going to stop. Keep dragging. Keep a hold of those ears. Never give him a chance.

  We’d gone ten, fifteen feet, him whining beside me as I leant down and dragged him. Aiming for the tables and chairs where he had suggested talking when we first came in. He was going to get his chat, and his location of choice. Just wasn’t going to make the journey the way he had intended. I stopped at the first table; no point making more work for myself than I needed to. I lifted him up and he wasn’t expecting it; I could feel his ears stretch and strain. The boy screamed, loud and frightened. If nothing that had happened before then had told his two pals that he wasn’t in charge here any more, that did it. That one scream, terrified and weak.

  He was up on his feet, whether he realized it or not. His eyes were shut when I shoved him into the chair. He went down harder than I expected, eyes still shut. The chair rocked back a little when he hit it, not nearly far enough to tip over. Didn’t matter to him. He had lost all sense. Ears burning, eyes watering and shut, he didn’t know what was happening. He must have thought he was going to tip backwards because he suddenly lurched forwards, trying to protect himself. Both hands reached out, flat onto the table, making sure he was secure. He grabbed the edge of the table with one hand, like that was the protection he needed.

  No security. Never let them settle. Keep them uncertain. I placed my feet and punched him hard in the mouth. Aiming for the mouth, making sure that he had another part of his head to worry about. Knocked him sideways off the chair. Adam landed hard on his side with a gasp, a little blood coming quickly onto his lips. His eyes were shut, like he was happy to just lie
there. Playing dead maybe. Seen people doing it before, pretending to be unconscious in the hope of buying time. I wasn’t selling. There was a pain in my right hand but I ignored it. Doesn’t matter how many skulls you hit, there’s still a little shoot of pain. I took a step towards him and bent down, grabbing him by the shoulders of his shirt and lifting him up. He wasn’t heavy, and he didn’t resist. I shoved him back into the chair where he sat lifeless, head tilted forwards, mouth shut. Waiting for the next terrible thing to happen to him. Assuming that something even worse was coming and knowing there was nothing he could do to stop it. He was beaten. He was ready to be questioned.

  No one said anything. I stood silently and waited for whoever wanted to ask some questions to come forward. Adam sat in the chair, trying to pull himself together. His eyes were still shut. He started to open them but they were watery and I don’t think he was seeing much. His hands were in his lap. He raised one to his mouth, touched the blood. No teeth came away. He put them up to his ears and, to his obvious surprise and relief, found they were exactly where he had left them. He rubbed them and blinked heavily, trying to clear his eyes. Still silence around us, nobody stepping forward to take the lead from me.

  I looked over my shoulder, a way of hurrying the rest of them along. Adam was about to remember where he was and what was happening to him, and that was going to make him harder to question. Ronnie, Conn and Mikey were still standing by the bar, babysitting Fraser and MacLennan. Everything that had gone on and those two hadn’t moved a fucking inch. Told me everything about that pair. I could do anything to their supposed pal and they wouldn’t even raise a voice, let alone a challenge. Nobody would expect them to start a fight when they were so significantly outnumbered, but they hadn’t even suggested backing off a little. They weren’t even looking at Adam. They were looking down at the floor. Ashamed of themselves. Kevin and Ben hadn’t moved. Billy was still over by the door. Marty had. He’d come just a little closer.