Die Tryin' (12 page)

Nick Black put his hands in the air in a desperate bid to halt the juggernaut, but it was no use. Tony just shoved him out the way like he wasn’t there.

And then rushed Marco.

‘Fucking say it again!’
Tony shouted.

He drew his arm back, his teeth bared in a sickening grimace of hate. Marco threw off his shades and slung them to the side, and now Nick Black saw something in Marco’s eyes for the first time since they met. Fear. Pure, unadulterated fear. The other night, he wasn’t scared of Tony, but now that he had seen this other…
thing
, it had triggered off all types of fear inside him good and proper. It hung around him like a bad fucking smell. And maybe that was what Tony had wanted all along since that night at the fair. Had wanted this prick to be scared of him, the way everyone else was. ’Cos he was
supposed
to be scared wasn’t he, Tone? That was what was
supposed
to happen. But, Marco had defied him, looked him in the eye and said
‘FUCK YOU!’

But not this time.

And Nick Black pitied the fool.

Tony let out a loud grunt just as he jumped towards Marco, and brought the bone down in a long arc.

Marco was rooted. Rooted by the fear that had suddenly enveloped him.

‘No, Tone!’ Nick Black shouted, his arm outstretched in a last desperate bid, but it was too late. There was a dull crack as the bone connected perfectly with Marco’s skull, smashing his shades to pieces.

And Tony didn’t stop there.

He quickly brought the bone round again in a hook motion, this time connecting with the side of Marco’s head. There was another loud crack and this time blood flew.

Marco hit the deck in a flash.

Nick Black put both his hands out in front of him now, as if he could somehow stop him, but when Tony lost it, he was simply unstoppable.

Tony jumped on top of Marco and started raining blows from above, shouting
‘Say it again!’
over and over with every swipe of the bone in his hand. It was like watching the ape during
The Dawn of Man
introduction to
2001: A Space Odyssey
.

Not that Tony, the uncultured prick, would even know what
2001: A Space Odyssey
was.

He brought the bone down again with a grunt and there was a dull, sickening thud.

Nick Black turned away to see Nick XR2 standing on the other side of the tomb, his head bowed, making his face shadow. He was just watching. Watching the scene unfold in front of him, probably realising that there was nothing he could do, and just accepting it, letting it play out.

Nick Black turned back round to see Tony still thumping away at Marco, whose body had become horrifyingly still and leaden.
‘Fucking say it again!’
Tony shouted.

‘Tony!’ Nick Black shouted in return, but Tony ignored him.

A sudden rush of anger took Nick Black over, and he leapt to his feet. With a roar, he rushed over to Tony and managed to grab his arm just as he was pulling it back, winding up for another blow. Tony howled and tried to throw him off, but Nick Black held on. He yanked and Tony came back with him, stripping him from Marco’s body like he was a piece of Velcro.

‘Enough, Tone!’
Nick Black shouted.
‘That’s enough!’

And this time he seemed to get through to him because Tony didn’t try and go back. Instead, he dropped the bone, bent over and grabbed his knees, his chest heaving.

Now that the chaos had subsided, Nick XR2 finally stepped forwards. He went and bent down next to Marco’s prone body.
‘Marco. Marco, wake up,’
he said, slapping him lightly on the face.

He put his ear next to his mouth.

After a second or two, he sat up and shook his head. ‘He-he ain’t breathing,’ he said.

‘Are you sure?’ Nick Black asked, anxious.

‘Yeah, yeah,’ Nick XR2 replied and then looked up at Nick Black with wide eyes. ‘He’s…
dead.’

*****

Taki nervously tapped his hands on his thighs.

They had been too long in there. Way too long. He glanced at his watch. It should have taken them five to eight minutes max; they had already been in there ten. This was supposed to be a slick operation that ran like clockwork: in-out, see ya later. The barrier man had already been to work on his engine twice. He had checked the oil, the water, the sparks. Luckily for them, he thought himself a bit of an expert mechanic and actually relished the opportunity to help out.

‘Well, you’re battery’s not leaking,’ he said from under the bonnet. ‘I really dunno what’s up with it.’

He stood upright and scratched his head. A car horn made him glance up and squint his eyes. A Mercedes had stopped in front of the barrier and was waiting for Taki to move so he could get past. The barrier man hopped up to his window, flipped the switch to raise the exit barrier. He then ushered the car under it before returning to Taki.

‘Look, son,’ he said. ‘I can’t leave you here any longer ’cos there’s people wanting to get through. We’ll have to push you to the side, and you’ll have to call the AA or RAC or summink.’

Taki sighed. ‘Okay, mate.’

There was nothing else he could say. He had done his bit. The plan’s time limit was always going to be dependent on just how patient the barrier man was, and they had actually lucked out on that score, because he had been pretty fucking generous with his time.

But even that wasn’t enough…

The barrier man closed up the bonnet and moved round to the back of the car, the mausoleum now in his eyesight. Taki gave it an anxious glance. Nothing stirred. He checked his phone. No calls. Charlie then caught his eye. He was sitting on a park bench, Snoop messing round somewhere behind him. He saw Taki staring at him and shrugged, his mouth turned downwards. He didn’t know what was going on either. Something was definitely up and Taki didn’t like it.

‘All right, steer while I push,’ the barrier man said from behind him.

Taki went and opened the driver’s door, grabbed the steering wheel, and started pushing along with the barrier man. Being a Mini, in no time they got it over to the side of the road, out of the way of the barriers and other cars. The barrier man dusted his hands and reached for another cigarette. He placed it between his lips.

‘Thanks, mate,’ Taki said as he closed the driver’s door.

The barrier man gave him a tired salute before trudging back to his position just outside the window, where he could see them coming out of the mausoleum if he happened to be looking that way at the right time.

If they ever come out…

Taki puffed his cheeks and stared at his phone, willing Nick Theodorou to ring. He looked up at the sky to see a big grey cloud hovering over his head, and then from that to the mausoleum, which was deadly quiet. He wondered what the hell they were doing in there.

He hoped to God that everything was all right.

*****

Nick Black marched over to Marco’s body, bent down, and started slapping his cheek, smearing blood across it.
‘Marco? Marco? Marco, wake up! Fucking wake up!’
he shouted, now slapping him hard. Marco didn’t flinch.

Nick Black put his fingers just below his Yin Yang tattoo to feel for a pulse. There was none.

‘He’s dead isn’t he?’ Nick XR2 asked. Nick Black grabbed his own mouth and chin with both hands and looked away, unable to respond. He could feel the anger rising inside him again. Tony, the selfish prick, had just given them a massive problem all for the sake of his fucking sister.

The self centred fuck!

Nick Black spun his head round to face Tony; he was just staring back at them both from his bent-over position, catching his breath. His eyes were dark, brooding.

‘What have you done, you fucking prick?’
Nick Black shouted at him.

‘You heard what he said,’ Tony replied between breaths.

His obvious lack of regret made Nick Black even angrier. ‘What did he say, Tone? WHAT THE FUCK DID HE SAY?’

He marched towards Tony.

Tony stood upright and glared down at him. ‘He talked shit about Maria,’ he replied in a calm voice. ‘I ain’t having that shit, you know that!’

‘WHAT SHIT DID HE SAY? WHAT FUCKING SHIT? WHATEVER IT WAS, IT AIN’T NO REASON TO KILL THE BLOKE! WHY THE FUCK DO YOU HAVE TO DO THIS SHIT EVERY TIME? WHY?’

‘What are you getting angry for,
re
?’ Tony asked. ‘You liked this prick?’

‘It ain’t about that, Tone, for God’s sake. It’s about you clubbing someone to death like a caveman for making a fucking joke about your sister!’

‘He disrespected
her
and
me
. Prick deserved it!’

‘Well, that’s all right then,’ Nick Black said sarcastically. ‘because you know what you are now, Tone?’

‘What?’

‘You’re a murderer!’ Nick Black grinned as he spoke, but he was in no laughing mood. Tony huffed and looked away, tonguing his bottom lip. ‘How does that feel?’ Nick Black asked him. ‘To be a stone cold murderer? Feel good? Get ya hard?’

Tony stared down at him darkly. ‘You think this prick was gonna just let us have all those jewels? Huh? Are you fucking naïve? He was gonna run away with the lot! I know pricks like this, believe me. Seen ’em come and go many a time. Liars.
Malakes
. The lot of ’em.’ He spat on the ground.

Nick Black shook his head and looked away, tired of Tony’s bullshit, exasperated by his fucked up logic. If he had to listen to him any longer, he might go completely insane. Instead, he stared down at Marco’s dead body with wide eyes, which made him reach up and grab big clumps of his own hair.
‘Shit! Ooooooh, shit!’
he said, forcing his words through clenched teeth. ‘What are we gonna do?’ he asked Nick XR2, who was still squatted over Marco’s prone body.

‘There’s nothing we can do,’ he replied coldly. ‘Dump him in the tomb and let’s go.’

‘Do what?’ Nick Black asked incredulously.

‘You got a better idea?’

‘Yeah, let’s just get the fuck out of here.’

Nick XR2 coolly shook his head. ‘If we leave him here, he’ll start to rot, someone will smell him, then they’ll open up the door, find him, and then Old Bill will start a murder investigation.’

‘Oh, for fuck’s sake,’
Nick Black groaned in realisation, and then gave Tony a sharp, stern look.

‘That thing looks pretty airtight, so hopefully it’ll hold the stink he lets off once he rots,’ Nick XR2 added.

‘What if someone opens it up one day?’ Nick Black asked.

‘It’s a risk we’ll have to take,’ Nick XR2 replied, shaking his head.

Nick Black growled. ‘You see the shit you’ve got us into, Tone?’ he said, speaking down to him.

‘His fault, not mine,’ Tony replied in a stern voice, pointing at Marco first, then thumbing his own chest. Nick Black ignored him and turned back to Nick XR2 who was pushing buttons on his phone again.

‘Charlie?’ he said into it once he was done.

‘What’s taking so long?’
Charlie’s anxious voice came through on the loud speaker.

Nick XR2 scratched his forehead. ‘We hit a…
snag.’

‘Snag? What do you mean snag? What kind of snag? What’s going on? What’s a snag?’

‘You better come in here. We need your help.’

‘Need my help? Why? What’s happened?’

‘Just fucking get in here, Charlie!’ Nick XR2 snapped, for a second betraying his usually cool demeanour.

‘All right, but you should know that Taki’s engine trouble has been sorted.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Exactly that, re. The guard got pissed off once other people wanted to get in, and they’ve pushed his car over to the side.’

‘Fucking great!’ Nick Black said, slapping his thighs in frustration. ‘We should be out of here, now we’re stuck!’

Nick XR2 hushed him. ‘First things first. We gotta clean up here, then worry about
him
outside.’

‘Clean up what?’
Charlie asked.

‘Nothing.’

‘What do you mean clean—’

‘I said nothing!’ Nick XR2 snapped. ‘Just get your arse in here pronto, okay?’

‘Okay, okay.’

‘And make sure no one sees you!’ Nick XR2 ended the call and replaced his phone in his pocket. ‘Grab the bling,’ he then ordered.

Tony and Nick Black glared at one another as they went to work. Tony bent down and picked up the bloody bone he killed Marco with and casually slung it back into the tomb. Nick Black grabbed the holdall of jewels Marco was clutching when Tony attacked him, picking up any that had spilled out when he fell.

Nick XR2 got to his feet and looked inside the tomb. ‘There’s plenty of room in there,’ he said. ‘We should be okay.’

Tony was fishing out the final jewels, chains, and bracelets, while Nick Black scooped up any that had fallen on the ground. They all acted in complete silence, the tension between them thicker than London smog.

The door then swung open and Charlie dived in, causing Nick Black to almost jump out of his skin.

Charlie’s eyes were wide and anxious. ‘Is everyone all right?’ he asked, looking round him as he closed the door.

‘Did anyone see you?’ Nick XR2 asked in return.

‘Nah, nah,’ Charlie said, shaking his head. ‘I made sure he was looking away when I came in.’

‘You sure, Charlie?’ Nick XR2 asked sternly.

‘Yeah, yeah. Relax…’

‘What did you do with Snoop?’

‘I tied his lead to the park bench, he’s all right.’

Charlie looked round, and Nick Black could see him counting heads in his mind. XR2, Tony, Nick Black,
Mar—

Charlie’s eyes flicked downwards and locked onto Marco’s body.
‘What happened to him?’
he exclaimed, pointing at him.

‘Tony happened, that’s what,’ Nick Black answered in a peeved voice, giving Tony a dirty look as he zipped up the bulging holdall.

Tony tutted and looked away.

‘You… you
killed
him?’ Charlie asked.

‘Clubbed him to death with that fucking femur!’ Nick Black added matter-of-factly, pointing at the bloody bone lying in the tomb.

Charlie stared incredulously at Tony.
‘Why
?’ he asked in an almost breathless voice.