He envied Jimmy his marriage as he envied him his peace of mind.
The turkey was moist and the salad was crunchy, and as he watched Jackie trying to focus as she spoke to him he sighed inside. Even Little Freddie was good when he was with Maggie, and his girls worshipped her. She made sure their hair was perfect and that they knew how to dress for their builds, and she gave them a safe haven when Jackie’s drinking got too much for them.
As much as he was grateful for all that, his nature also made him resentful of her. Like his wife, inside he felt this couple showed up the uselessness of their existence together, and no one liked to be reminded of that.
‘Will you answer me, for fuck’s sake.’
Jackie was shouting at him now and he turned towards her and smiled. ‘I heard you the tenth time, Jackie. I told you this morning, if you had listened to me then, I had to go out and do a bit of business, all right?’
She was placated because he had spoken directly to her.
Little Freddie came in and he sat him on his lap and let him feed off his plate. He knew the boy only ate proper food if it was given to him in this manner.
His daughters were all watching a film and he could hear them laughing and chatting together. They would wait until he went in to see them. They were getting big girls now and he knew he had to keep an eye on them, especially his eldest. Kim was built like a thirty year old, and knew more than the brasses who worked for him. She was ripe for the picking, and he was determined that she would get a better crack at her life than they had. Maggie was taking her into the salon business with her once she finished her college course in health and beauty, which pleased him. She would still be in his orbit, and that was important to him.
Joseph started to tell a long convoluted story about when he was a young man and had got his first job. As he watched him spin the tale, Freddie finally relaxed. He would sit it out for a while, and then he and Jimmy would have to get going. But he could manage an hour or so with this lot.
He glanced at his mother. She was so lovely to him, and he worshipped her in his own way. But she depressed him. Her whole life was spent waiting to die, and it annoyed him. Life was for living and the worst life was worth fighting for. Even Jackie would go out kicking and screaming, he was sure of that much.
He was proud that his mother was still well groomed, but since his father’s death she had become as mad as a hatter. He knew it was only him and the kids that had kept her going. Her advice about Little Freddie had been to give him a good hiding, and he had a feeling she was right about that much at least.
Maddie saw him looking at her and she winked at him. She had always winked at him at Mass when he had been a kid and he had loved it, so he winked back. He saw Lena had noticed the gesture, and she smiled at him kindly.
He liked Lena. She was a nice old bird, and she looked out for his mum, which saved him a job. So if for no other reason than that he would have liked her anyway. But she was also a shrewd old bird and she helped keep Jackie together, which Jackie needed these days because, thanks to the drink, she was gradually unravelling at the seams.
If Jackie knew exactly what he and Jimmy were now involved in, she would go completely over the edge. Her biggest fear was of him getting another capture, even though he knew in other ways she would probably welcome it, just so she could be certain where he was of a night. He wondered if Maggie knew the half of it. Jimmy told her most things, but he had a feeling even Jimmy would think twice before discussing this lot with his wife.
If they worked this right it would be the pinnacle of their careers in skulduggery. It could also be the reason why they spent the remainder of their youth in a maximum security prison.
Maggie had washed up and put nearly everything away, with her mother happily helping her. She poured them both a large Scotch before saying, ‘Leave it now, Mum. I’ll finish unloading the dishwasher in the morning.’
‘It won’t take a sec, darling.’
Maggie let her mother do it, she knew she loved this part of the day. Lena enjoyed her houses even more than she did.
‘Oh, I love this place. Stay here for a while, love, it’s gorgeous.’
Maggie grinned. ‘We’ll give it a while, Mum, don’t worry.’
Lena sat down heavily on the stool opposite her daughter. She was so enthralled with this breakfast bar she felt she could sit there all day. Just looking around her at her daughter’s home, at her life, made her happy. If only Jackie could find that kind of peace she would finally feel she could relax and stop worrying about them all. But right now she had an agenda, and even though it was the last thing she wanted to bring into their conversation she did not know who else to turn to for advice.
So lighting yet another cigarette she said quietly, ‘Something’s got to be done about Jackie, you know that, don’t you?’
Maggie sighed then. She had been expecting this, it was a conversation they had frequently. ‘What do you suggest, then? She ain’t going to stop drinking, until she really wants to.’
Lena nodded in agreement. ‘Someone needs to talk to her about it . . .’
Maggie held up her hands in supplication. ‘Well, it ain’t going to be me this time. I’ve tried it before and she nearly ripped my head off. It’s an illness, Mum, and she doesn’t think she is ill.’
Lena had looked old lately, and as Maggie watched her sipping her Chivas Regal she saw the lines that had gathered around her eyes and her mouth. They made her look as if she was permanently unhappy, which she wasn’t. Considering the life she had been given, she was a relatively happy woman. It was Jackie who worried her, who gave her sleepless nights.
‘That child is out of his fucking tree,’ Lena said. ‘Did you hear about yesterday?’
Maggie shook her head. ‘What’s he done this time?’
She sounded bored. Little Freddie was always doing something, it was him, it was how he lived. He was his mother’s son, a drama queen. Not that she would ever say that out loud, of course.
‘He had been accused of touching that little girl across the road, that little Karen. You know who I mean, Sammy’s daughter.’
‘What do you mean, touching her?’ Maggie’s voice came out sharper than she had intended.
Lena was pink with embarrassment. ‘You know what I mean. What do I have to do, draw you a picture?’
Maggie swallowed hard. What her mother was saying was too outrageous even for that little sod. ‘I don’t believe it . . .’
Lena interrupted her. ‘Neither did I, but now I ain’t so sure. There is something radically wrong with that child.’
‘Oh, Mum, leave it out. He’s a little boy, a fucker, I admit, but he’s only seven.’
She didn’t want to believe it.
She was dismissing her mother’s words and Lena was aware of that. Looking down at the floor, she said, ‘One of his sisters saw him, and stopped it from going any further.’
Maggie sat back on her stool, and as the words penetrated her brain she felt as though someone had punched her in the tummy.
At her old house, Little Freddie had stayed over one night, when her neighbour was holding a party for her daughter, who was turning four. She had never got to the bottom of why the child was screaming but she had guessed it was something to do with her nephew. Everyone had gone home suddenly, all saying the same things. The kids were tired, they were whacked out. But in her heart she had known it had been something to do with Little Freddie. The neighbour, a pleasant woman with two kids and a nice home, had basically blanked her after that day. It had been nothing you could put your finger on - she had been OK, she said hello, asked how they were, gossiped on the drive - but Maggie had never been invited inside that house again.
When she had mentioned they were moving home, the poor woman had looked relieved, she would have sworn to that on a stack of Bibles. Maggie had assumed she had found out about Jimmy’s other businesses, which would not have been too far off the wall because he was a Face in the neighbourhood.
But now she wondered if it was something far more sinister.
‘Was anything done? Was he brought to book over it?’
Lena shook her head. ‘Jackie doesn’t know, at least I think she doesn’t. You know what she’s like, she wouldn’t believe it anyway, not about her golden boy. But it happened, and it was a serious assault. That’s what Kim said anyway, and she ain’t a spinner.’
‘He’s seven, for fuck’s sake. If he did do something bad, then he must have seen it somewhere, must be copying something he’s seen.’
Lena looked defeated, she was nearly in tears. She lit another cigarette from the butt of the previous one. This was the first time Maggie had realised that she was chain-smoking these days.
‘Have you seen the films he watches?’ Lena asked her. ‘Jackie doesn’t police him, no one does. He sits up all night watching videos, watching filth and violence. They let him do what the fuck he wants.’
Maggie was more than aware of that but she decided not to mention it. She was guilty of it herself. Little Freddie was a nightmare of a child and she had a feeling in her bones that what she had been told was true. Kimberley didn’t make things up, as her mother had pointed out. If she said it had happened, then it had happened.
She felt sick suddenly. This was something that she had never dreamed happened to people like them. But then Jackie was not like them, Jackie thought she was a law unto herself.
‘What’s Sammy said about it?’
Lena shrugged. ‘What can she say? Who in their right mind is going to accuse Freddie’s boy of noncing? But, as bad as this may sound, I believe it. I think he is more than capable of doing something like that.’
Maggie knew her mother would never say a thing like that unless she was absolutely sure there was truth in it.
She heard her father laughing with the girls in her lounge, where they were watching a film. The girls were all staying over, they usually did of a weekend. Jackie and Little Freddie were long gone, otherwise they would not be having this conversation.
She glanced at the clock and saw it was nearly midnight. She was not expecting Jimmy home for a while yet but at this moment she wanted him more than ever.
‘You know what we want, so why are you stronging it?’ Freddie was flexing his muscles, and everyone in the room was aware of that fact. But he was also dealing with his counterparts, Joey and Timmy Black. They were from Glasgow and they were hard men who had fought to get to the top of their game. They wanted a merger with London. Drugs were now their staple diet, so it was natural that they should merge with Ozzy’s crew.
Between them all they could become the biggest distributors in Europe. They had the money, the brains and the acumen. They also had a friend who, while on the run, had made contact with some very nice Russians who could smuggle in live rattlesnakes dressed as geisha girls and get away with it. In short they now owned most of the customs officers in the southeast ports.
It was a doddle really, but Ozzy and the Blacks knew that they would be more powerful if they became partners. Between them, they could sew the trade up. As it was, with so many different firms plying their trade at the one time, it was inevitable that they would eventually step on each other’s toes. When that happened, it would cause ructions and bad blood between the warring parties.
At the moment, the Scots had the second-largest handle on the drugs trade, since even though they had more heroin addicts per square foot than anywhere else in Great Britain, there was still a booming market for every other kind of narcotic. The coke and amphetamine market was mainly English. The Welsh were still dependent on magic mushrooms and LSD, while the Irish were more puffers, cannabis smokers. But the trade was changing rapidly, thanks to the club scene and a new drug from the States called ecstasy. PCP had never really taken off in the UK, mescaline had made a small inroad, but this new drug was everything anyone could want. And because everyone wanted in, these mergers were now becoming quite frequent across the European union.
Ecstasy was a feel-good, high-inducing dance drug, and although it was expensive and currently hard to come by, they knew that soon it would be everywhere. This was the money-making time, when they could charge the earth for it. They needed to hunt down anyone with a factory and bring them on side.
This needed to be well planned and well thought-out. Then they could all distribute it wisely and make sure it was only peddled by their people. It was in reality no different to a large organisation wanting to bring in a new product. It would be advertised and talked about, and then all the different retailers would eventually want to stock it.
This merger was about to bring in more money in one go than anything ever before. It was Mickey Mouse money, Monopoly money. It would be in huge quantities and it would all be in cash.
The only bugbear was that Freddie and Joey had bad blood between them. They had both been banged up in Parkhurst and they had fallen out over contraband. Freddie had run the tobacco and alcohol for Ozzy, and when Joey Black had arrived, with a body full of tats and the Glaswegian head-butt, it had caused them to go head to head.
Freddie had won hands down and Joey had always given him the credit for it, but that did not mean that he did not want a rematch at some time to reestablish what he felt was his rightful position. He had swallowed his knob in prison, you had to, and he had also known that he could not ask for any kind of replay because it was all done and dusted as far as everyone was concerned.
In prison he had been able if not to forget, at least to put it out of his mind. On the street, however, he knew it was discussed and talked about. For his own peace of mind, and to make sure that people still saw him as the undisputed king of his world, he needed to take Freddie out.
This would be difficult because they needed each other at this moment in time, and so although their meeting was fraught with undercurrents and hidden agendas, it would all be put aside in the pursuit of money.
But once the money started rolling in, the borders had been opened, and they had become legends in their own rights, there would still be the little matter of Joey Black and Freddie Jackson.
The clever money was on Freddie, but the outsiders were of the opinion that maybe he might be the better bet. Unlike Freddie, Joey had something to prove.
‘Are you sure this is not going to get you a capture, Jimmy?’ She asked this every time, and he smiled at her concern. She really was looking out for him and he loved her for that.
‘Look, Mag, anything I undertake has a risk and we’ve always known that, right? This is no different, except we will be settled at last, we will never have to do a hand’s turn again unless we want to. Just relax, if I did get a lump you’d be all right.’
She smiled at him as she always did. He needed to feel she was behind him, and she wasn’t. Not really and she never had been. But this was her Jimmy, and she wouldn’t go against him and what he wanted to do. He thrived on his work, he was always careful, and he was always honest with her. She knew that if Freddie knew just how much he told her he would panic. But Jimmy trusted her and he had good reason to. She would never, ever do anything to harm him or their life.
‘Can anyone connect you to the factories?’
It was a fair question and one he had been expecting. ‘Nah, to be honest the Blacks will take care of that side of it once we have established the trade runs. Our main interest at the moment is getting the stuff out to the distributors. So stop worrying, woman, it’s all under control.’
This was her cue to let it go. He had that inflection in his voice which told her he had said enough now, and wanted the subject changed. She knew him so well.
He was pouring himself a glass of cold milk, and she watched him as he glanced around the spotlessly clean kitchen. ‘The girls in bed?’
She nodded.
‘And that mad little fucker’s gone home, I trust.’
She grinned, then remembered what her mother had said about him. She decided not to mention anything just yet.
‘Did you hear
the latest about him?’ Jimmy asked.
Maggie shook her head and tried to look innocent. ‘No, what?’
‘According to Freddie, who thinks it’s hilarious, the child, if he can be called that, has been dumping outside people’s houses. If they try and tell him off, he drops his kecks and dumps on their doorsteps.’
Maggie shook her head sadly. ‘He is out of control, Jimmy. I think he should be put away.’
Jimmy shrugged and finished his milk. ‘That might be closer than anyone thinks.’
She frowned. ‘What do you mean?’
‘According to Freddie, the social workers want him to go to a special unit. It’s for troubled kids and although he would be the youngest one there I think even Fred sees that something has got to be done.’
Maggie didn’t say anything, though she hoped the boy did go away. If what she had heard was true the sooner he got professional help the better. But she also knew Jackie would never countenance it.
‘Is me mum still getting her hair done tomorrow?’
Maggie yawned slightly. It had been a long day. ‘She’s popping over in the morning.’
Since the day they married, and Freddie Senior topped himself, Jimmy’s father rarely had anything to do with his son. He never visited them, and no one ever mentioned it.
Jimmy nodded and rinsed his glass under the cold water tap. He didn’t look bothered but she had a feeling he was. He would choose Freddie over anyone, except maybe her.
Though sometimes she even wondered about that.
Freddie was in bed with Stephanie. She was a good-hearted whore and he liked her. She was as thick as two short planks and her sense of humour was childish, but they had a rapport and best of all she never asked him for anything, ever.
If he turned up he turned up, if he kept away for months she never batted an eyelid in his direction. While Pat had worked out of the Ilford house he had kept away from her. Now, though, she was back on his list of things to do and she loved it.
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