Shafted (15 page)

Taking it, Dex handed it to Molly to put into the fridge. Holding out his hand then, he said, ‘Cheers, mate. And any time you need a favour, you know where I am, yeah?’

Feeling the power of the other man vibrating through his body as they shook hands, Larry remembered Keeton’s warning about Dex becoming his new best friend and felt an overwhelming urge to run for his life before the Lewises sucked him any deeper into their murky little world.

Showing him out a few seconds later, Nora stepped out onto the path and pulled the door to behind her. Glancing back at the house to make sure that no one was spying, she took Larry’s arm and walked him to the gate, whispering, ‘How long have you got before he needs to be there, pet? Only I was thinking, it seems a shame for him to miss out just because he wasn’t ready. Specially after you went to all this trouble to fetch the car over for him, an’ that.’

‘It’s not a problem,’ Larry assured her, wishing she’d let go of his arm so that he could escape. ‘We start filming at two, but we’ll just rejig it so the stand-in takes his place.’

‘But I don’t want you to do that,’ Nora said, peering up at him. ‘I want my Dex to go in for it. I don’t care who entered him for it, and I know you said it won’t even get shown over here, but at least
I
’ll know he’s been on telly for something good, won’t I?’

Feeling bad for lying to her, Larry smiled down at Nora guiltily. She’d obviously had to adopt the hard-as-nails approach to survive amongst the scum who lived around her, but there was no denying how dedicated she was to her family. It saddened him that she was so desperate for at least
one
of them to make something of themselves.

‘Can you wait?’ she asked now, her eyes pleading with him. ‘If you’re not filming till two, you’ve got time to hang on here for another few minutes, haven’t you – give me a chance to work on him; see if I can’t make him change his mind.’

‘I don’t know,’ Larry murmured, biting his lip. ‘I really should be getting back.’

‘Please?’ Nora tightened her grip on his arm.

Feeling the sharpness of her gnarly old nails through his jacket, Larry winced. Nodding, he said, ‘Okay. I shouldn’t really, but I suppose I can wait ten minutes.’

Reaching up, Nora pinched his cheek and gave him a gummy grin. ‘Thanks, pet. I owe you one.’

Watching as she waddled back up the path, Larry opened the gate and strolled to the limo.

‘Well?’ Dave asked, peering at him in the rearview mirror when he slid onto the back seat. ‘Was he there?’

‘Not at first, but he came in the back way just after I went in,’ Larry told him, snatching one of the bottles of alcohol out of the rack and twisting the lid off. Taking a long swig, he grimaced when he realised it was brandy, not Scotch.

‘
And . . . ?
’ Dave persisted impatiently. ‘Did he go for it, or what?’

‘Not exactly,’ Larry admitted. Then, relaying what had happened about Dex not receiving the letters and saying he wasn’t interested, he said, ‘But his mum reckons she can persuade him to change his mind, so I said we’d give him ten minutes. That’s all right, isn’t it?’

‘I’d wait all fucking day if it meant getting my hands on that bastard,’ Dave snarled, glancing at the house now as he reached for the radio to let Inspector Keeton know what was happening.

Back inside the house, Hilda was busy telling Dex that she’d go in for that show if she were him, because he was guaranteed to win.

‘Oh aye?’ he sneered. ‘And who told you that, then? One of your spirit guides? Big Chief Knock-on-the-fucking-’ead!’

‘I seen it in the tea, smart-arse,’ she informed him tartly, changing her previous interpretation to fit the new situation. ‘Horses and chariots – gift-horses and cars. As God is me witness, you’ll regret turning your nose up at this chance, ’cos you’ll be losing out on a—’

‘Belt up, you!’ Nora snapped, coming back into the room just then. ‘I’ve listened to enough of your bloody shite to last me a lifetime.’

‘I’m only telling him what I saw,’ Hilda protested. ‘And you can’t deny it’s what I said, can you? And you can’t get much closer to the mark than that.’

Casting a scathing glance in Hilda’s direction, Dex said, ‘Can’t you tell her to sling it, Mam? She does me head in, coming round every bleedin’ day talking shit.’

‘Oi!’ Nora scolded, giving him a slap on the back of the head. ‘Don’t be so bloody rude, you. Do I complain about
your
mates?’

‘No, but
my
mates don’t talk to dead people or look like fucking clowns,’ Dex retorted, chuckling softly.

Adopting a martyred air – secretly loving that her friend had defended her against her precious son – Hilda said, ‘Don’t mind him, Nora, love. If he don’t want to know that the tea’s urging him towards riches, that’s his business.’

Sharing a piss-taking smirk with Patrick, Dex said, ‘So, what’s this week’s lottery numbers, then, Hilda? Only if the tea wants me to be rich, I might as well go straight for the biggie, eh?’

‘It doesn’t work like that,
actually
,’ Hilda informed him primly. ‘I’m not meant to know things like that, because my gift is to help others, not to bring me personal gain.’

‘Who said I was gonna
share
it with you?’ Dex snorted, finishing his tea and shoving his cup towards her. ‘Go on . . . knock yourself out.’

‘Mock if you must,’ Hilda said wearily, pushing the cup back across the table to him. ‘But I know what I saw, and it’s your lookout if you want to ignore it.’

‘You wanna watch yourself,’ Patrick told her. ‘They
drown
people like you.’

Laughing, Dex said, ‘Yeah, but usually at birth, not this close to death.’

‘Pack it in,’ Nora muttered, superstitiously crossing herself because she was actually a few years older than Hilda and was terrified by the thought of dying any time soon.

Sparking the single-skin spliff he’d rolled while she was showing Larry out, Dex sat back in his seat and peered up at his mother with a questioning smile on his lips.

‘What?’ Frowning, Nora turned a full circle, like a dog seeking its own tail. ‘What you looking at me like that for?’

‘Just wondering how come it took you so long to see Logan out, that’s all. Sure you weren’t setting up a date with him?’

‘Don’t be so bloody soft!’ she snapped, giving him a clip round the ear.

Chuckling softly, Dex leaned back in his chair and blew smoke rings into the air, aiming them at the fire alarm to see if he could set it off and really wind her up. She had a razor blade for a tongue, his mother, but she was a soft-hearted old bird when it came to her boys, and he’d always been her favourite.

Temper dissolving as suddenly as it had come on, Nora reached for a cigarette, wondering how to bring Dex round to the idea of going on Larry’s show while making him think it had been his own decision. Gazing off into the distance now, she said, ‘Aw, but he’s a lovely lad, though, isn’t he? Beautiful skin, and
gorgeous
hair. Did you see it how shiny it was? Proper expensive cut an’ all, that was.’

‘Behave,’ Dex snorted. ‘Why am I gonna be checking out another bloke’s fucking hair?’

‘I wasn’t talking to
you
, I was talking to our Molly and Hilda,’ Nora informed him, using her free hand to sweep the bits of tobacco and weed that he and Patrick had spilled on the table onto the floor. ‘Anyway, I don’t see what you’ve got to be so sarcastic about. I notice you didn’t object to him giving you that champagne, did you? And he didn’t have to, you know – not after you went and wrecked his chances of sorting his life out. All he wanted was for you to help him out,’ she went on, sighing heavily now. ‘But you couldn’t do that for him, could you, you selfish sod? No. You’ve got to send him away with a flea in his ear – snatching the bottle out of his hand on his way out the door!’

Looking up at her, Dex shook his head and said, ‘You don’t half talk crap sometimes, Mam. He’s lucky he’s
got
another show after the way he fucked up his last one.’

‘That weren’t his fault, as you well know,’ Nora countered defensively. ‘And don’t tell me you’ve never done nothing wrong, ’cos I’ll eat me bloody frying pan if you’re trying to deny all the stunts
you
’ve pulled over the years.’

‘Make us a bacon butty first, though, eh?’ Dex shot back, grinning now. ‘Me belly feels like me throat’s been cut.’

‘Should’ve thought about that when you was busy turning your nose up at twenty grand,’ Nora muttered, folding her arms. ‘You could have hired yourself a maid to make your sodding butties with that, couldn’t you?’

‘Got three of them already,’ Dex quipped, winking at Molly.

‘Don’t be including
me
in that,’ Molly grunted, snapping out of her daydreams and pocketing the lighter that Larry had given her in case her dad spotted it and took it off her. ‘I’m no man’s slave, me.’

‘Get her,’ Nora sniped. ‘Anyone would think she was someone special.’

‘She is,’ Dex said proudly. ‘And let me catch any cunt treating her any different when she starts dating, and they’ll soon know about it.’

Tutting softly, Nora shook her head.
When
she starts dating, indeed. For a man who claimed to be so smart, his eyes and ears were shut tight when it came to that girl. But if he didn’t open them quick-smart, Molly was going to end up just like her whore of a mother – and God only knew what Dex would do then, because he couldn’t put
her
in hospital like he had Jane, that was for sure. Not that Jane didn’t deserve it, though, for grassing him up to the coppers like that, and all because she’d caught him in bed with another lass. Some women were just too damn precious for their own good. Couldn’t accept that they weren’t the entire universe with jam on, and freaked out when their man fancied a change of menu. But Jane had messed with the wrong one trying to put their Derek on a short leash – and messed with him even worse by throwing her hand in with the pigs over him. And dropping her knickers for his so-called mate the minute his cell door banged shut behind him had been her biggest mistake of all – the treacherous slut.

‘Don’t you reckon he should go in for it, Mam?’ Patrick asked suddenly, interrupting her thoughts – and earning himself a rare pat on the head from her for unwittingly helping her out.

Adopting a weary expression now, Nora sighed and flapped her hands, saying, ‘Aye, I do, son. But it’s his decision, not ours, and he don’t want to do it.’

‘Yeah, but look at all that money he’s missing out on,’ Patrick persisted. ‘If it was me, I’d go for it like a shot.’

‘Specially when you know he’s gonna win,’ Hilda interjected, getting dirty looks from everyone for interfering in family business.

‘I don’t want to do it,’ Dex told them – slowly, to make sure they got the point. ‘In case you’ve forgotten, I’m on the run – so how smart is it going to look if I go and splash me face all over the telly? The pigs would be all over me like a rash.’

‘But no one would even see you over here,’ Nora pointed out. ‘It’s a pilot, and it’s only being shown in America.’

‘She’s right,’ Patrick affirmed, telling his brother exactly what Larry had told them before he’d come in. ‘So, there’s no danger of you getting nabbed because of it,’ he concluded. ‘And you won’t just get the money and the car – you’ll get paid for going on the show, an’ all.’

‘You sure about that?’ Dex asked, frowning thoughtfully. ‘The last time I saw Logan, he was live on that crap charity thing. I thought this would be the same.’

‘No, it’s definitely not being shown here,’ Nora told him, reaffirming what Patrick had said.‘That’s what he told us – isn’t it, Molly?’

Shrugging when her dad looked at her, Molly said, ‘That’s what he said, yeah. But I didn’t think you’d go for something like that, Dad. Not exactly
cool
, is it?’

‘Who cares about cool?’ Patrick sneered. ‘No one’s gonna see you, and just think what we can do with that kind of money, man. If you win, we export the car and pocket the money along with the twenty grand. Lose, we just find out where the winner lives and do the fucker over. It’s a total win-win situation.’

‘I don’t know,’ Dex murmured, relighting his spliff.

Refusing to let it go if there was even the slightest chance of making his brother change his mind, Patrick said, ‘Come on, Dex . . . this is the best chance we’re ever gonna get to make some serious money and get ourselves out of this shit-hole. Even if it’s only a month in Spain, or something, I don’t care. I just want to be able to pay off my debts and chill for a bit. And you can have your tattoos lasered off so you’ll be less recognisable next time you get pulled.’

‘I’m not
gonna
get pulled, and the tats are going nowhere,’ Dex snapped.

‘You should invest in a nice toupee,’ Hilda told him. ‘I know you lads say you like it short, but that’s just an excuse because you’re going thin, isn’t it? You’ll look like that man off the telly soon, if you’re not careful – him what has that daft bit combed over the top what lifts up in the wind.’

‘Don’t talk to my dad like that,’ Molly snapped indignantly. ‘If anyone needs a new wig, it’s
you
, ’cos you’ve probably got all sorts living in that mess of yours.’

Wanting to keep Dex’s mind on the subject at hand, Nora told Molly to button it, then said, ‘What d’y’ reckon, son?’

Shrugging, he said, ‘Our Pat should do it instead, seeing as you all think it’s such a good idea.’

‘They won’t let me or I would,’ Patrick told him, his eyes showing how much he’d have loved to do exactly that. ‘It’s you or nothing, our kid. You’re the only one who can give me mam a better life – and God knows she deserves it after all the shit she’s put up with off us over the years.’

Frowning at him, Nora said, ‘All right, no need to lay it on so thick.’ Then, back to Dex: ‘Your decision, son, but you’d make me
that
proud if you did it, you really would.’