To Die For (23 page)

‘Did you ever dance?’ she said.

‘No.’

‘Why did you not dance? Did you want to dance? I think that a boxer would be a good dancer. Did you ever play football?’

Brenda used to say this kind of thing to me, ask me the same questions about what I’d done, what I’d wanted to do, to be.

And then I understood. I understood it all and I knew what the girl wanted from me. It was simple, really, and yet, for me, nearly impossible: she wanted me to tell her a story.

All that stuff about the goat, about her father’s farm, about her brother playing football, all that was her story. And all the time she was being subtle and I, dull as usual, didn’t catch it. The questions she kept asking were cues, and I kept missing them. I was supposed to tell her about my life, about how, as a boy, I’d played football and gone to dances with girls and been happy and normal. She wanted to live it, this normal life, for a moment, even if it was someone else’s life she was living.

Yes, she wanted me to tell her a story, something about me, just like Brenda always wanted. They were so much alike, those two. Sometimes, in the night or in the darkness, when I was alone and the shadows closed in and surrounded me, I’d think of Brenda and Kid, and I’d think of them as one person, and I’d think about how I’d failed Brenda.

‘I don’t care if you don’t mean it, Joe,’ Brenda had said. ‘I don’t care if you lie or pretend. Just tell me, promise me.’

‘When I was younger,’ I said, ‘I liked making things with wood. I could have been a carpenter. I still can. I could do a course. They do courses in all sorts of things.’

‘A carpenter,’ the girl said to the air. ‘They make tables and chairs.’

‘You could be a dancer. You could learn Scottish dancing.’

‘Would you make me a chair?’

‘Sure.’

‘Would you take me to dancing?’

‘Yeah.’

She got up slowly and walked over and put her arms around me. Her head rested against my shoulder. I sat there stiffly, not knowing what to do with my arms.

‘I am sorry for them,’ she said.

‘What?’

‘I am sorry for those men.’

I took her by her shoulder and turned her to face me.

‘Why?’

There was that look again, fear and something else. Not sadness, more than that. I’d seen it before in her. It had been there in the car the night she’d shot me. It had been there since, too, only I hadn’t been thinking about her, hadn’t paid attention to it.

She pulled away and ran from the room. I heard her bedroom door shut. I suppose I could have gone after her.

Wilkins, Thurber and Garner. Each of them had access to the contingency money in Cole’s casino. Each of them could have known what Cole had planned with Beckett. Each of them was in a good position to double-cross Cole and work with Beckett to take the money and set me up. One of them was the man I wanted, I was sure of it. One of them had killed Beckett and Walsh and Jenson, and taken the money for himself.

How was I going to find out which one it was? If I could get to each of them, I knew I could make them talk. Trouble was, I’d never be able to get near any of them, not with things the way they were. They’d all be careful at the moment.

So I couldn’t talk to them. But I could talk to someone else.

I found the road straight off and cruised past the house. It looked okay. I circled the block twice before parking my car along the street. It was dark and quiet. I hadn’t seen anyone sitting in the cars along the road or standing watching the house. I hadn’t seen anything prowling, lurking. I thought I was in the clear.

I was wearing the woollen ski hat and my heavy Crombie-type coat. I walked with my head bowed against the oncoming rain. To onlookers, I wouldn’t be easily identifiable. My hands were in the pockets of the coat. My right hand gripped the revolver.

When the door opened, I grabbed the side and pushed with all my weight. The chain had been on but my force and weight ripped it from the door frame. I heard a shocked gasp and a muffled cry and saw a figure stagger backwards. I pushed my way through the door, closed it behind me and pulled out the revolver.

It took a moment for Warren to understand what had happened. He saw the revolver and reached automatically for the telephone. I slapped it out of his hand and pushed him backwards. I stepped on the phone, crushing it.

‘Where’s your wife?’

‘You.’

‘Where is she?’

‘Up... upstairs.’

Mrs Warren called to her husband, asking him who was at the door. I pushed the gun into Warren’s ribs.

‘We’re going upstairs.’

Warren winced, but didn’t move.

‘She’s not well,’ he said.

‘I don’t care.’

‘She’s pregnant.’

‘Move.’

‘Please. What do you want?’

‘Move.’

‘Please don’t hurt her.’

For a moment, I didn’t move, didn’t speak. ‘Don’t hurt her’, he’d said. Not, ‘don’t hurt me’ or ‘us’. I put the gun away, grabbed Warren by the shoulder, spun him round and pushed him towards the stairs.

She was sitting on the edge of the bed, tugging out hair curlers. When she saw her husband walk through the door, she began to say something. She stopped when she saw me. Her face fell, all emotion wiped from it. She stood and lunged forward.

‘Sarah.’

Warren reached out, tried to hold her, but she scrambled past him, batting him out of the way and was into me before I knew it. It was an attack like I’d never known. It was desperate and hungry and total. She scraped her nails across my face, both sides, again and again, trying to gouge my eyes out. I lifted my right up and blocked that side, but my left arm was still useless and she was drawing blood. She panted and made a weird moaning sound, and her face was vicious and terrifying. It wasn’t human, it was animal. Warren stood in the centre of the room, still and useless, staring at his wife. He could’ve run. He could’ve done lots of things, but he just stood and stared. The rush of fury was staggering. With my right hand, I grabbed the woman by her blouse and pulled her forward. She lurched towards me and I shook her hard. She lost her balance enough to stop the frenzy for a moment. I couldn’t do much with my left, but I could do enough with my right to make up for it. I should’ve whacked her, knocked her out. I didn’t need a mad woman to deal with. I put my hand around her throat, just beneath her jaw, and squeezed. She went pale, looking into my eyes. She tried to knock my arm away. Warren backed away from us, finding a corner to hide in. I knew I shouldn’t fuck about. I knew I shouldn’t leave loose ends. I knew I should smack her down and have done with it. I held her tightly. She was fighting for her life now, a strange rasping sound coming from her mouth, her hands clawing at my arm. She was a pregnant woman. If I squeezed too hard, she’d lose consciousness. Fine. Just a small adjustment and I’d hit the pressure points and she’d be out. She might miscarry or something. So what? What was that to me? I’d killed already and was tied into that, if the police ever got me.

All I have to do is squeeze, I told myself. Squeeze. Wasn’t that what Paget had said, his gun to my head? ‘I’m good at squeezing.’ Squeeze and she’s out of it and I can get to the bottom of all this shit.

She clawed at me and her eyes bulged and watered, and her mouth made movements. She was trying to talk to me, tell me something.

Do it, my mind said.

I can’t, it echoed back.

I let go. She staggered back on weak legs, coughing, gasping for air.

‘Don’t do that again,’ I said.

She collapsed on to the edge of the bed. She sat for a moment and looked at the carpet. Her chest heaved and her face was streaked with tears, but she was oddly calm. She lifted a hand slowly to her hair, touched a curler and took it out. She reached down and picked up a brush. I stared at her. Warren stared at her. She took another curler out of her hair and slowly brushed it down.

I turned to Warren.

‘I won’t hurt you. I just want some answers. Then I’ll go. Understand?’

Warren stared at his wife, stared at me.

‘Please...’

‘I’m not going to fucking hurt you,’ I said. I was shaking. ‘Okay?’

Sweat trickled down my forehead. Blood trickled down my cheeks. Warren was looking at me like I was unrecognizable, like I wasn’t human.

‘It was a set-up,’ I managed to say. ‘The robbery. Cole ordered it.’

He wasn’t listening. He was watching his wife. She brushed her hair and gazed into a space between here and nowhere.

‘It’s the baby,’ Warren said. He wasn’t talking to me. He wasn’t talking to anyone.

‘Cole ordered the job,’ I said. ‘You understand?’

‘Cole?’

‘Your boss.’

‘Ordered it?’

‘Yeah.’

‘I don’t...’

‘I was hired by a man called Beckett. He was hired by Cole.’

‘I don’t understand.’

She carried on brushing her hair. He kept looking at her, watching a car wreck he was passing.

‘It was an inside job,’ I said. ‘You were a decoy. Cole used you to make it look like a legit robbery.’

My words didn’t mean anything to him. He didn’t care. I took him by the arm and led him from the bedroom. On the landing, I squared him so that he faced me, and backed him up against the wall.

‘Listen to me. I need answers. Give them to me and I’ll go. I won’t hurt you. I won’t hurt your wife.’

‘You won’t hurt us.’

‘No.’

I could see his eyes clear. I eased him towards the stairs and followed him down. I said, ‘Do you know a man called Thurber? John Thurber.’

‘No.’

‘Think.’

‘I’ve never heard of him.’

‘Tell me about Pat Garner.’

‘Pat? What about him? What’s he got to do with it all?’

‘He’s the manager, isn’t he? Was he working the night of the casino job?’

We had reached the downstairs hall. I moved him into the lounge and sat him on the sofa. I pulled a chair up and sat opposite.

‘I...’

‘Was Garner there that night? Think.’

‘No. He was off.’

‘Why?’

Warren shook his head.

‘My wife,’ he said.

‘Listen to me. Your wife’s fine. I won’t touch her again. I won’t touch either of you. You won’t ever see me again once you give me some answers. Someone inside your casino gave the robbers information. Now, why wasn’t Garner there?’

‘Just a normal night off. That’s all. He wouldn’t have had anything to do with the robbery.’

‘How do you know?’

‘He wouldn’t.’

‘How do you know?’

‘He used to make sure nothing untoward happened in the casino. He was honest. He cleaned it up. He wouldn’t have been involved in anything illegal.’

‘What do you mean, cleaned it up?’

‘Look,’ he said, ‘I’m not saying Mr Cole had anything to do with it. You understand?’

‘Fine. Cole’s a saint. Tell me about what went on before Garner cleaned it up.’

‘Some of the tables were rigged.’

‘Who ran it back then? Before Garner.’

‘Man called Wilkins.’

‘Wilkins? He was the manager?’

‘Yeah.’

That didn’t make sense. What was Wilkins doing running a casino?

‘When?’

‘When was he manager? Uh, four years ago. Five, I think.’

‘And now he’s Cole’s second in command, right?’

‘I wouldn’t know exactly.’

‘Was Wilkins there that night?’

Warren thought for a moment.

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘He was. He came in sometimes to hang out. He was there that night.’

‘Could he get to the money the security van was supposed to pick up?’

‘Yes. He could.’

Was that the reason Wilkins had decided to manage the casino, to set up Cole? That couldn’t be it. Wilkins had been manager way back.

‘Did Wilkins ever skim?’

‘Oh, no. I’m pretty sure about that. I would’ve known. We knew we were taking too much from the customers, with the rigging, and we were told to keep quiet. Well, I’m not going to make waves, you know, so I turned a blind eye. We all did. When Garner took over, it was a relief. I’m not a dishonest man. Mr Garner knew that if we were caught, we’d lose our licence, and he didn’t think it was worth it.’

‘So, Wilkins screwed the punters, but not Cole?’

‘Yes.’

I thought about that for a moment. A bent casino. That was nothing new. The Sportsman had been bent, and I knew Vic Dunham used his place to clean money, and to take in drugs cash. The smart bastard even paid tax on it.

I had to know why Wilkins would be a casino manager. He had to have had an angle.

‘What else did they do there?’

‘When Wilkins was boss?’

‘Yes.’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Drugs? Laundering?’

‘No, no. Nothing like that. Look, I didn’t know about any of that, all right? They just ripped off the customers. Bent tables, plants in poker games, deals with some of the women, watered-down champagne. That sort of thing. Nothing very serious, and they never went too far. The public never got suspicious. We used electromagnets on the tables, small things like that. No one at the tables ever knew. We fixed the dealing shoes – cutting back on picture cards – and some of the slots...’

Warren rambled on for a while, but I wasn’t listening any more. My mind was trying to make connections, stuttering from one thing to another, and there was a mix of thoughts.

Something was connecting, though. Something way back.

Warren had stopped talking and was looking at me, and his face was white. He edged back in his seat. He said, ‘Jesus.’

It was dark at four in the afternoon, and raining. It was summer, or supposed to be, and I probably thought ‘fucking country’ or something like that.

There were a handful of customers in the cafe, all at tables, all by themselves. The strip lighting gave everything a washed-out greenish look. Everyone looked sick.

There was the fat woman behind the till and the young waitress in front, leaning back against the counter, staring at her feet. When I walked in, the fat lady saw me and said, ‘Coming up.’

I took a seat by the window. The young waitress ambled over with a pot of coffee, her shoulders sagging with the weight of the hour, her feet making sticking sounds on the lino. She half nodded to me and put a mug on to the tabletop and spilled warm coffee into it.