In his quieter moments he imagined putting Martin on his arse and burying his boots into his teeth. One day, Billy, one day, he kept promising himself.
His first impression was that Edinburgh was a city with too many Asians and weirdos, which meant he’d have to take some action, but all in good time – that would have to wait till he was established.
He pulled on the cigarette, sipped his scalding tea and as he felt the heating kick up, the shivers eased off and he relaxed. Christ I’m getting soft, he thought; when he was in the army he’d spent days out in the open on patrols in Afghanistan and never turned a hair.
He stood up and looked at his reflection in the mirror – the abs were still there but maybe the definition was starting to blur. Not bad, he thought, not bad at all, but I think we’ll need to get you a gym membership or you’ll lose it.
Nelson had inherited via his father’s genes a body that was tall and heavily built, which gave him a powerful shape that was all in proportion. His strenuous training in the regiment had hardened it all up into slabs of deep muscle, a physique he was proud of. His dense, coal-black hair was kept cropped short and the large oval eyes he’d inherited from his mother looked almost dark blue, with a hangdog drop round the outside edges. In addition, he seemed to carry an almost permanent grin, which was no reflection on his mood, just a fixture from the way he was formed in his mother’s womb. In the right circumstances, or with the opposite sex, it gave him a boyish charm, but in his business it could piss people off when they were trying to be serious and Billy looked like he was on the receiving end of a good joke.
It seemed like an age since they’d left Belfast and settled in Scotland’s capital city. Jackie Martin had been as good as his word and made sure they’d money enough to get somewhere to live and a start in the business. This hadn’t been done out of a generosity of spirit – it was purely a business loan that he wanted back at a high rate of interest once they were earning. The rents in the centre of town were out of their league for the time being so they’d settled for a flat in Wester Hailes on the south-west edge of the city, a huge concrete overflow built with the best of intentions in the seventies and recognised as an eyesore ever since. The concrete tower blocks and purpose-built flats had eased the congestion in the city, but it had a sizeable population with not much in the way of prospects and a crime problem that mushroomed round the drugs trade. The city fathers had given redevelopment a go in the nineties and had courageously pulled down some of the worst of the architectural offences. The problems remained though, and an increasing influx of immigrants added to an area that was a million miles away from the opportunities and wealth enjoyed round the centre of the old city and Georgian New Town.
The Ulstermen managed to rent a couple of flats near to each other, Nelson sharing with Andy Clark, who was the youngest and probably the least bother for him. Clark was still in awe of Nelson and hung on every word he said, and if he was told to fuck off to bed because Nelson needed peace, he fucked off to bed without being told a second time.
They’d played it low-key at the start, just showing up in the local boozers and using the tale that they were on a labouring job outside the city, acting the daft Belfast boys for the benefit of the Wester Hailes punters. There was always a bit of shyness from the locals when they mentioned Belfast as their hometown – the legacy of the Troubles still meant something even to people who’d never read a newspaper in their lives.
Once their faces were known and they’d bought a few rounds for people, they’d steadily built up a picture of who was doing what in the realm of low-level dope dealing and criminality. They’d eventually started buying a bit themselves for personal use, and the dealers saw them as good payers who never asked for tick – that always went down well because half their normal clientele were living from uncertain day to uncertain day. The local cowboys started taking an interest in the boys and felt it gave them a bit of ‘cred’ being seen leaning against the bars with men who hinted at Loyalist connections. They hadn’t realised till it was far too late just how wrong they were; they thought they were streetwise yet went sleepwalking into a fuck-load of problems courtesy of Billy Nelson and those nice Belfast boys.
Nelson had been patient, and it had worked a treat. They were becoming mates with most of the local lowlifes, and that would do for now. He knew there would be harder problems and men to deal with in time, but he’d planned his moves, and at the end of the day it would come down to willpower and the willingness to use force. He knew he had all that and more.
He noticed small white lumps floating about on the surface of his tea and screwed up his nose as though he’d never had anything like it. The curdled milk annoyed him, but given the shit he’d endured in the past, it was more a symptom of his erratic mood swings than of taste.
‘Andy, what the fuck is this?’ he bawled, even though Clark was still under the blankets, sleeping off the previous night. ‘Andy, I’m going to come through there and haul you on your arse!’
Nelson’s voice pierced the sleeping brain of the younger man and stabbed down into his subconscious, setting off an alarm – that same sense that catches the attention in a crowded room when someone mentions your name, like radar locking onto a hazard. He swam up to the surface of consciousness, knowing he had to react to the alert that had dragged him away from a dream that was already fading into oblivion.
He sat up too fast and worked the heels of his hands across his eyes.
‘Andy, one last time – will you get your lazy carcass through here?’
‘I’m coming, just give me a minute,’ he croaked through the closed bedroom door, his mouth feeling like a Brillo pad had been stapled to his tongue. He felt the quick stab of apprehension that hit him every time Nelson turned his attention towards him. He was a tough young man, only four years younger than his flatmate, and he could dish out violence with the best of them, including Nelson. His problem, however, was that his mother and father were just too closely related, and he was the product of a gene pool that had needed freshening for at least a couple of generations before he was born.
Nevertheless, he was a good-looking boy, his blonde hair and blue eyes suggesting some Nordic blood had seeped into his Scottish ancestors. In common with Nelson, his looks gave the impression of a gentle soul, but as his mother had whispered many times to her sisters and mother, ‘The boy isn’t quite right.’ He struggled to think for himself or make any rational decisions, especially under pressure. He would follow the pack, and why they were doing what they did wasn’t something he worried about.
He couldn’t feel afraid in the same way the other boys did either – and certainly not where violence was concerned. He really wasn’t quite sure what fear meant when he heard the other boys speaking about it and only understood it in relation to rejection from those he cared about.
Clark tended to channel his energy through other people, but they were few and far between. He had no siblings, and through his lonely childhood the focus of his attention had been his mother – certainly not the bastard of a father who’d nearly killed her on one occasion through his love of the bottle. His father’s fists had put an end to the chance of his mother ever giving him a brother or sister, and with nothing to admire or aspire to in his family it was the hard men who drew his attention. They were his role models – the tough bastards in the paramilitaries who tended to spot his strengths and weaknesses, exploiting them both at the same time.
Women on the other hand were a mystery to Andy Clark, and all he’d experienced was the occasional drunken fumbling when the boys had managed to pick a team of females as pissed and daft as they were. More than a few Belfast girls had tried to build bridges with the nice-looking boy belonging to Mrs Clark, but they’d soon realised they were talking to themselves and that his mother’s assessment of his mental state hadn’t been far off the mark.
Nelson was something else though, and Clark had looked up to him when they were boys – but when he came back from the
fighting in Afghanistan it was as if a movie star had walked into his life. Clark didn’t know much, but he knew his films, and any night he was on his own he made for the stalls in the local cinemas to watch his idols. Sylvester Stallone was a standout, and Bruce Willis and big Arnie weren’t that far behind for him when it came to pure acting talent. He was a slow reader but loved to pore over his cinema magazines the way most of his friends tended to study their well-worn editions of Razzle. His mother used to watch him at night as he silently mouthed the words in the magazine as he read and had bitten her lip frequently at the shame of bearing such a good-looking but idiotic son.
As far as Clark was concerned, Billy Nelson was the centre of his universe, and whatever Billy wanted Billy would get. When Nelson had picked him for a flatmate, Clark had believed it was Nelson’s vote of confidence and confirmed him as his trusted lieutenant. The truth was that Nelson thought Clark was a useful and potentially violent fucker with less than three brain cells that actually worked on their own. He knew the angelic looks could fool people and, as a bonus, living with Clark meant he had a stooge and manservant who allowed Nelson to sit on his arse and click his fingers when he needed anything done.
Despite what the young man thought, Nelson didn’t give a fuck about him and described him to the rest of the team as his own personal Baldrick. Dougie Fisher had listened to it one day after a few beers and whispered in Rob McLean’s ear, ‘If Andy ever hears that he’ll go over the edge and put Billy in Accident and Emergency – and that’s only if he fuckin’ survives.’
Clark padded through to find Nelson sitting with his feet up watching Jeremy Kyle with the sound down. ‘What’s up, Billy?’ he asked.
‘What’s up? The milk’s fuckin’ rancid and that’s your job.’
Clark looked upset but he knew that when Nelson was dealing with a hangover it was always better just to let him be. ‘I’ll go and get some, Billy. It’s no problem.’
‘Hurry it up and pay attention to your job in future. If you can’t get the fuckin’ milk right, how are you going to manage anything else? Fuckin’ twat.’
That hurt him. Hurt him in a way that only happened with someone close. He walked out onto the street with his face set, determined to try and do better for his friend.
6
The time came for Nelson to make his first move. They were all up for it and getting bored with acting as straight pegs – they wanted to make their mark and earn a bit of respect. They’d identified a number of local dealers in the Wester Hailes area who would be given a couple of options. Nelson looked round the team and grinned. ‘The first option is cooperate with us, buy our gear and pay tax on it, and the second option is there is no fuckin’ option.’
The boys nodded and felt the trembling rush of adrenalin working up their systems, the thought of a bit of violence going down a treat.
Dougie Fisher smiled. ‘I haven’t laid my hands on anyone in weeks. I was afraid I might be turning into a nice person.’
Nelson slapped him on the back and they belly laughed at the thought of bringing down some pain on the local dealers. Then Nelson opened a cupboard in the hallway that seemed to be jammed up with crap. He struggled to take out an ironing board and a hoover that had rarely been used before pulling out the rest of the dross and unscrewing a wooden panel at the back of the cupboard.
‘Jackie Martin sent over some tools for us if there’s any heavy action in future,’ he told them. ‘We shouldn’t need them at the moment, but they’re available if required, boys.’ He pulled out the worn holdall and opened it up. ‘You all know how to use these and there’s ammo enough if we need it.’
The bag held two dull grey Uzi machine pistols – a gun that had become an icon around the world and a fashionable ‘must have’ for upmarket drugs gangs. In the world of fiction the word Uzi had a special resonance. Even Arnie’s Terminator had favoured the weapon, and his order for an ‘Uzi 9 millimetre’ had made the weapon immortal. The Loyalist ranks were full of men trained in the heavy-engineering workshops of Belfast, and replicating the weapon had been a major success for them. In fact, to the surprise of observers and their enemies, they’d produced a weapon that was at least as good as – and in many cases better than – the original.
‘If we need to use these fuckers it’ll be pressed up against the man’s skull. We don’t need them for a gunfight at the O.K. Corral.’ He smiled and nodded at his team, who looked ecstatic – they were in business at last. ‘I think Jackie had too many anyway. The greedy bastard kept back more than his share when they were supposed to be decommissioned in the peace deal.’
He closed the bag and stashed it back behind the false wall.
‘Okay, boys, let’s go and spread some good old-fashioned Belfast sunshine on our new pals here.’
Banjo Rodgers came out of his near coma with a start that jarred his pulse up to 175 beats a minute. He wasn’t drunk or hungover, but it took him a couple of minutes to make sense of being awake. It came back like Post-it notes being fed through a letter box. The gradual realisation of who and what he was drip-fed into his brain.
‘For fuck’s sake,’ he mumbled as his vision cleared enough to see that he was still in the same shithole he’d been in when he’d stuck the needle in his arm. He looked across the room and saw his lady still knocked out and half hanging over the edge of her chair. Her mouth was open, her eyes not quite closed and a line of saliva was being drawn down onto the manky carpet by the force of gravity. Banjo loved her though, and she was all he had to love.
He pushed himself up and waited a few seconds until he was sure his balance had clicked back into place before leaning over her and running his hand through her hair.
‘Maggie, you alright there, honey?’ He pulled her up into a sitting position and felt her move. It calmed him, as it did every time they went through the same script where he was convinced this would be the day she would be stone cold and booked into the exit lounge at the crematorium. She’d overdosed a couple of times already, and both of them knew it was only a matter of time before shit happened. To be fair they’d cut down on the gear and only hit a bit extra at the weekends. This was their weekend and their idea of time off from dealing.
Banjo had inherited his moniker from his father, who just couldn’t avoid a fight and won about seventy-five per cent of his duels. In his own often-repeated words he ‘just loved to “banjo” some bastard after a few beers’. The twenty-five per cent he lost eventually reduced him to a wreck and the humiliation of shadow-boxing non-existent opponents after the pubs shut. He ended up barred from them all, including the dives where the landlords got pissed off with someone who had one drink then talked to the wall for the rest of the evening.
Young Banjo had eventually buried his unmourned father when he was still only seventeen years old and, given his mother had run out well before his death, was then all on his own. He’d failed at everything he’d tried after that. In an early career move he’d had a go at breaking into shops, but he was such a clumsy bastard he invariably made so much noise that the residents buried in the local cemetery would have heard him. After some prison time he’d decided to step up his game and joined a gang of incompetents who’d tried to rob a post office, then ran out of fuel during the escape. He did four years for that then wisely took the decision that he needed another line of work. That was how he’d become a very low-level drug dealer. Prison had taught him everything he needed to know about the trade, and although he’d developed a habit of his own, he controlled it as best he could. Despite his efforts, however, the years had still taken their toll on his physical state, and in his early thirties he looked like he’d lived another fifteen years but not worn well even then.
Banjo’s big plus was that he was somewhat of a rarity: he got on with just about everyone, never ripped anyone off, and paid his suppliers on time and in full. That was probably just as well given that he was supplied by the Flemings from Leith, and Danny Fleming was his linkman. Cut young Danny in half
and the word bastard was printed the length of his body.
The Flemings were one hundred per cent mental, and they made enough in profits to be delighted when someone ripped the piss and gave them the excuse to hand out a bit of physical education, as Danny liked to call low-level torture. Banjo always kept the right side of them and dealt just enough to keep him in the essentials of life plus a bit of clean gear for himself – and Maggie when she came into his life.
Maggie Smith was somewhere in the same age group as Banjo, and despite her lifestyle looked nearer her years. She’d been working the streets at Leith when she started buying her supply from Banjo, who’d taken a shine to her, and given that he could pay his bills and was rarely in a fit state to bother her physically, it seemed like the best deal she could get in this life. He’d been kind to her and she’d started to like him as the first man who’d never taken from her – and that included her father.
She still worked the street, but only when Banjo could come down with her. She’d been badly shaken up when the serial killer Thomas Barclay had attacked some of the other girls at the same time she’d been working punters. She knew a couple of the victims and in fact had been friendly with Pauline Johansson, who’d barely survived one of the attacks and had looked after Maggie a couple of times when she was down on her luck. What had happened to Pauline had spooked her, and she still saw Barclay in her dreams.
Banjo didn’t mind going down to Leith with her – he quite enjoyed getting out occasionally if it helped her keep safe. As shit lives went, Maggie and Banjo got by as long as they had each other.
Evidence of Death Page 5