by Kane, Paul
‘Danny,’ began Dean. ‘What’s… what’s going on? I don’t understand what—’ The man standing only a few metres away now held up a hand to silence him. It was more effective than a punch in the face, because he knew if he uttered another word, he’d be on the receiving end of much worse. Danny then moved that hand, gesturing to the man on the other side of him that wasn’t Roberts.
‘I don’t believe you’ve met Mr Waterhouse, have you.’ He wasn’t looking for a reply, just stating a fact – the edge to Danny’s voice even sharper than his suit. ‘Mr Waterhouse, this is another associate of mine, Mr Ashby. He’s been in charge of the running of my casino here for some time.’
Mr Waterhouse – hair cropped short, like a military cut that had grown out some – nodded a hello, as if they were meeting at a dinner party.
‘Leastways he said his name was Ashby when we first met. I suspect, given his circumstances, that he might not have used his real name. Something you’ll probably be able to relate to, Mr Waterhouse… Now, we recently had a very interesting conversation, Mr Ashby with—’
‘Dean,’ he breathed, couldn’t help himself. ‘My name is Dean, you know that.’ Danny and Dean; best of buddies, like a sitcom or something. ‘That’s what you’ve always called me…’ There was a whine to his voice, a pleading quality he couldn’t control.
His boss shot him a sideways look, and he regretted having broken his silence. But all the man said in reply was: ‘I only call my friends by their first names, Mr Ashby. You know that.’
Dean hung his head, then shook it.
‘Now, as I was saying, we recently had a very interesting conversation with someone you know, Mr Ashby. A young lady of your acquaintance by the name of Victoria.’
Shit! thought Dean. But at least they were getting to the core of it, of why they were all here. It just depended how much they knew.
‘She was most forthcoming, wasn’t she Mr Waterhouse?’ The man with the glasses nodded.
Shit! thought Dean again. Shit, shit, shit and shit! Then he asked himself: Why? And not even he was sure what he meant by that. Why had she’d blabbed, perhaps? Why did she have to come along, exploding into his life? Why did he have to have a weakness for them, for the ladies? More specifically: why did he have to have a weakness for that particular one?
Victoria…Vicky. In spite of himself and what was happening to him, Dean’s mind flashed back to his first sighting of her, when Danny returned from a business trip and was showing her off at the casino – giving her the same tour he’d taken Dean on after they first met. She had flaming red hair, and had been poured into a green satin number with a deep V accentuating her cleavage: a very expensive necklace with a ruby hanging from it was nestling in the valley. Every now and again, Danny would lean in and whisper something, and she’d laugh. Dean hadn’t been introduced to Vicky that night, but he’d felt like he knew her just from the things Danny had said: about how she might be the one, about how she was the only girl who’d ever been able to keep up with him, in and out of the bedroom. The temper on her!
‘Fuck me, she’s amazing,’ he told Dean once. ‘Fiery, you know? Hot stuff!’ But then, inevitably, he’d witnessed the obsession with the woman peter out, as it had done with so many in the past. Watched Danny head off on business trips where there would be other women on tap, while Vicky was left behind to occupy herself as her lover cheated. It was during one of these trips that Dean had been given the task of helping Vicky occupy herself, taking her out shopping and maybe for a bite to eat. Dean had protested at first, he had too much to do at the casino, but apparently there was nobody else available and Danny had specifically requested it. Trusted him to do it.
The connection, the…spark had been there right from the moment their eyes met. They’d both felt it, but neither had commented – how could they? But then that day, going around town, followed by an Italian, it became apparent they had so much in common: not just the same taste in movies, music, but backgrounds (Vicky had been basically dragged up as well, by a single parent who hadn’t really given a shit). Soulmates, if you believed in that sort of thing. The kind of person you pictured yourself getting old with; pictured yourself dying with.
Oh, Vicky was ‘the one’ all right, just not Danny’s one. She was Dean’s.
They hadn’t done anything about it at first, however; too dangerous. But when Dean couldn’t get her out of his head, when the aching, the burning for her was too much to bear, he’d called again at a time he knew Danny was away once more for the weekend. He’d driven her out to a hotel in Redmarket, booked in under a pseudonym and paid cash for the room; for what had been probably the most intense sexual experience in his life. As they’d both laid back on the bed, panting and sweating, they’d already been arranging the next time they could see each other… But they had to be careful, very careful – use burner phones to keep in touch, for example. Not one thing that could be traced back. They were playing with fire, after all.
They’d seen each other, what, maybe half a dozen times before the subject arose of the future. ‘He doesn’t love me, you know,’ Vicky had said to Dean. ‘Not like you do. He never could.’ There was truth in those words, but what they could do about it was anyone’s guess. You didn’t piss on Danny Fellows and get away with it. Maybe when he was done with her, when they finally split – and they would, Dean assured her; he’d seen this all before – then they might be able to pick up…after a reasonable gap. ‘He’d never let us be together, you know that as well as I do!’ Vicky had snapped, that famous temper of hers rearing its head.
There was a way, but it wasn’t until a couple more rendezvous had taken place that they began to contemplate actually doing it. They could take off together, sure, but the only way they’d be left alone would be if Danny Fellows thought they were dead.
‘Fake it, you mean?’ he’d asked, and Vicky had nodded.
‘Why not?’
Because the risks were enormous, that’s why. And he’d better be bloody well convinced they were both stone cold or he’d come after them. Vicky had suggested a car crash perhaps… But that was really as far as they’d got. Talk, just talk. Dean had even started to think about whether it was worth it at all, choosing to spend the rest of his life with fiery Vicky, potentially on the run, versus a cushy number here with Danny. Of course, that option wasn’t without its pitfalls either, but at least he knew where he stood with Danny. Or had done.
Vicky…bloody Vicky. He’d bet any money that at least some of this had come out in an argument, maybe even the one Dean had been hoping for where his boss had chucked her. His thoughts returned to the present, mainly because he was being addressed directly.
‘…think I wasn’t going to find out about it all? Christ, I’ve know about you and that bitch for a while.’
One, maybe even two or three steps ahead of Dean; he’d finally met his match. Had his boss even engineered this, to test his loyalty? No way – how could he have known the power of attraction between them? Unless…Vicky was on his payroll? Nobody was that good an actress, though, surely? He’d looked into her eyes as they’d made love – not had sex, nothing so trivial – and he’d seen it…hadn’t he?
He thought about saying: ‘She means nothing to me.’ But that would have been the biggest lie of all.
‘Oh, what a tale she had to tell – everything by the end of it. Mr Waterhouse here is very good at…getting people to open up, aren’t you?’ A tip of the head from Mr Waterhouse. ‘Was that what the trouble was in your previous place of employment, Mr Ashby? Was that connected with a woman?’
He shook his head. There’d been a woman all right – many women, but only one at the end. Only one he’d run out on, left without even saying goodbye. She’d been nothing like Vicky, mind. But what did Danny mean about Waterhouse? Just what had they done?
The answer to that question came when Danny took something out of his pocket, using his handkerchief to hold it. Then he’d cast it onto the ground before Dean,
so he could see it properly. The necklace with the ruby in it, Vicky’s favourite – the piece of jewellery she loved the most. It wasn’t just the ruby that was red, though, or dark maroon in this light; the chain was now too, splattered with…
Bloody Vicky.
Dean began to rise, though it wasn’t easy. ‘You son of a… What did you do to her?’ The words were out before he could keep them in check, an emotional reaction – and suddenly one of the men who’d grabbed him was by his side. He couldn’t tell which one, but he felt the blade of the huge knife under his chin, coaxing him to behave.
‘Easy there, Mr Ashby. Save your strength, you’re going to need it,’ said Danny, as cool as you like.
What for? Torture? Mr Waterhouse’s speciality? thought Dean.
‘You see,’ his boss continued, turning and talking to the man in question, ‘our Mr Ashby here is a bit of gambler. That’s how he came to be involved in the casino; in fact he won the position in a late night game of cards. Do you remember that, Mr Ashby?’
Dean couldn’t even nod, it would have slit his throat. He’d always been good with cards, the thinking ahead thing again in practice – that and taking risks. So he’d won, in spite of Danny’s cheating… Danny didn’t play fair. ‘You did all right, kid,’ he’d told Dean that night. ‘I’m impressed.’
‘I took a gamble on him. A simple game of chance… And that’s what I’m going to offer you tonight, Mr Ashby.’ He gestured for the blade to be lowered; Dean looked to the side and saw that it had been Milburn holding the Bowie; a further gesture and the knife was cutting through the tie that held Dean’s wrists together. ‘Relax. Victoria is still alive, I assure you…for now.’
Dean reached out and picked up the necklace, held it in his hands for a moment. Then he looked to the side and saw that beyond Milburn, Crouch was rooting around inside the van – bringing out pistols, machine guns, one of which he handed to a waiting Haggard.
‘Did you ever see that movie… now what was it called, Target something?’ Danny shook his head. ‘Doesn’t matter. It had Van Damme in it anyway, he was being chased. It’s always stuck with me. Anyway, the game is this: You will run, and my men will hunt you,’ Danny Fellows explained; it didn’t sound like much of a game to Dean. ‘If you get to the other side of Graffitiland, or make it to the morning, you get to be with Victoria forever. That’s right, I’ll let you be together – and I promise I won’t come looking for you. I’ll even throw in the money you were planning on stealing, casino takings for the month wasn’t it?’ Vicky had floated something along those lines, but again nothing had been firmed up yet; they’d run out of time. ‘Or the equivalent anyway. That sound fair?’
‘Only if I get one of those, too,’ said Dean, nodding towards the weaponry being handed out. Crouch was even strapping on a belt that had grenades attached to it, for Heaven’s sake!
Danny clapped, laughing for the first time tonight. ‘Oh, Mr Ashby, you do amuse me. Is the fox armed when the dogs come for it, when they rip it to shreds? Is the fucking bird armed when you blow it out of the sky with a shotgun? The relationship now is, them: predators…’ He pointed at his men tooling up, then at Dean. ‘You: prey. Get it?’
‘And if I refuse to run?’
Danny looked at him as if he couldn’t believe the question had been asked.
Dean shook his head. ‘I really wish there was some way I could… I’m sorry,’ he said as sincerely as he could.
‘I’m not. You’ve taught me a valuable lesson, Mr Ashby – that I’m not as good a judge of character as I thought. That I need to be on my guard more than I have been. Otherwise…’ It was Danny who shook his head now. ‘You’ve got a twenty minute head start, I suggest you get going.’
Dean took one last look at his old boss, at the men who would be coming after him. Then he tucked the necklace in his pocket, turned, and began to run into the wilds of Graffitiland.
* * *
The first thing Dean did once he’d waded through that long grass, checking his watch all the time as he did so – glancing back over his shoulder to see if the men who’d be following him had set off – was try and find a weapon himself. He’d need one, whatever he decided to do. And he hadn’t worked out what was for the best yet, just running to reach the other side of this Godforsaken place – to civilisation, if you could call it that – or hole up somewhere and hope that Fellows’ men didn’t find him.
No one to blame but yourself, he told himself as he ran. He’d made those choices, knowing what the consequences were – and still he didn’t think it would come to this. Thought the risk, the gamble of being with Vicky would be worthwhile. But there was still a chance of coming through this; Danny Fellows was a man of his word, and if he said that getting to the other side or evading those guys (don’t even think about the guns, the grenades) until dawn was all – all? – he needed to do, then that was that.
‘Shit!’ Dean said out loud this time, looking about him in the dimness of the few streetlights still working in this part of the city. He stooped to pick up a piece of discarded wood, tapping it against the palm of his hand; it promptly broke in two, only as strong as balsa really – rotted through. ‘Shit,’ he repeated, under his breath.
He looked back, up and over the sea of grass, saw that the area next to the van was empty. That the men had probably set off, though he couldn’t see them. Wait…there they were, going up the path towards that bridge – obviously braver than him. They’d head him off if he didn’t get a move on. Dean abandoned the idea of a club for now, making for the first of the disused buildings ahead – thinking that there might be scope either to cut through or find somewhere to hide. Trying to think ahead, though his mind was racing faster than his feet, his heart pounding away in his chest.
Dean couldn’t find a door, so he resorted to climbing up and smashing through one of the windows – the job had already been half done for him – taking off his jacket and using that to clear the glass. He shushed it as it shattered, not because he was worried about attracting undue attention (those maniacs behind him obviously didn’t give a shit, with their guns), but because he was frightened of giving his position away. His trousers caught on the ragged edges as he fell through, ripping up the side, and he swore again.
There was even less light in here, but he could just make out a set of stairs ahead of him and a corridor leading through what he guessed must once have been some sort of office. This whole area was a testament to a decline in Granfield’s fortunes a while back, before even the recession had hit home – certainly before the more modern parts of the city began springing up. When he got to the stairs, they looked about as strong as that wood had been outside, otherwise he might have thought about hiding up there – but did he really want to cut himself off from the ground level?
Best to push on through the building, he decided, though that proved harder than it sounded. One corridor fed into another, and soon it was blacker than ever. He wished now that he hadn’t given up smoking a couple of years ago, because then he’d still have his lighter – they’d taken away his mobile or he could have used his torch app. It was as he made his way through to what he thought must be the centre of the building – he didn’t really have a clue and was becoming more and more disorientated by the minute – that he saw a faint glow ahead of him.
Cautiously, Dean crept towards it, turning a corner and taking a peek. There, against a background of more pictures and words on the walls (one declared ‘It’s Always Darkest Before the Dawn’), huddled up in what looked like a sleeping bag besides the remnants of a fire, was a figure. Empty cans of lager and vodka bottles were strewn over the floor where this person (man, woman…it was difficult to tell) had made their bed, perhaps as some kind of early warning system, but more likely because they’d drunk themselves into oblivion. Dean couldn’t say he blamed them. Still, he’d swap places in a second right now, because nobody was after this bum, nobody was coming with machine guns to riddle them with—
He
suddenly had an idea – what if he was to trade place with this person? Offer them what he had, his clothes, money… Then he realised that his clothes were probably in a worse state than the tramp’s at that moment, and what money he’d had on him was in the wallet they’d taken back at the casino. An IOU then? Get serious. They’d probably figure him for this person anyway, and at least want to look at his face – then they’d pump him full of bullets without a moment’s hesitation.
Could still use the tramp, though. What this person had was of value to Dean, if it wasn’t to them. Wood that was alight, a bottle he could smash and use as a weapon at close range. Might not be that bloody huge knife, but he’d seen as much damage done with one of those in his time in pubs and clubs. Would have been on the receiving end himself on a couple of occasions, if it hadn’t been for thinking ahead. Dean moved forwards as quietly as he could, bending and reaching out for one of those bottles…
The tramp wasn’t as out of it was he thought, however, and stirred, rose up – squinting to see Dean. ‘Wasssatt?’ slurred the individual, still of indeterminate sex. As Dean grabbed the bottle, the derelict was crawling towards him, lunging for him – perhaps thinking he was trying to steal the precious alcohol, not that there was any left inside.
‘Get back… Get off me, I don’t want to hurt you.’
‘Wasssdoing?’ came the reply, and the tramp made another attempt to grab Dean. He hefted the bundle of rags backwards, probably a little harder than was necessary – and it fell back, hitting its head against the wall where a butterfly had been spray painted. The figure slumped down and didn’t move. Dean swore again, sighed, but went over and felt at the neck for a pulse. There it was, strong and steady; he hadn’t killed the tramp at least. Then he stepped back and gathered up a piece of wood which was still lit at the tip.