Highbridge (3 page)

‘Oh, you think being seduced by the woman next door amounted to sex abuse, do you?'

‘It'd count now. Just a male fantasy then. But that's it, isn't it. It left me vulnerable. Conditioned. Well, it'd be groomed now. Susceptible to manipulated media images of sexuality.'

‘Spent all week looking at pin-ups in the mess room, more like.'

He turned and grinned. ‘Exactly. Only that lot can only dream. I've got the real thing.'

She laughed. She always did. Just as she always denied her own looks. Something Joey put down to his mother-in-law, which she would tacitly admit on the rare occasions he could get her to see how she had everything other women paid good money to achieve. A childhood spent learning to be self-deprecating. A childhood that led to a life of self-criticism. A childhood conditioned by the manipulations of a demanding mother.

Even when she had lived up to the expectations of doing well in her A-levels, her mother had criticised the fact that she only got one A while her friend got three. Because Natasha was brighter. Which she was, but suffered the irony of a proud mother suffocating her by being overdemanding. She had decided not even to try for university, opting instead for one of the new regional colleges of further education, where she studied graphic design. Her mother, being a nurse, had wanted Natasha to do better and become a doctor, although her father, on being told of her plans, was delighted, having always regretted becoming a quantity surveyor rather than an architect. He wanted someone to take up his lost spark of creativity.

Unfortunately, his untimely death from cancer meant he never lived to see her achieve her degree, and was probably also a reason why she took up with Joey. He was strong and supportive when she needed someone to fill the gaping hole in her life. She stayed with him because she got to lean on him, not his reputation. And discovered the man she then fell for. And he had been smitten from the moment she showed any interest.

Joe squeezed her thigh and looked across. Like him, she was buttoned up, head to toe against the cold. But instead of Screwfix work gear, an All Saints Fin jacket masked the heavy, but practical sweater and skirt, creating an almost androgynous shape. Only the waves of perfume and hair suggesting what may lie beneath. The deep brown hair she had passed on to Tanya, but because of which, she was always threatening to cut it short. The eyes. Also brown, but always bright, sharp and mischievous that pointed to her Irish ancestry. As did her tongue. Never short of an opinion on anything and everything, but usually correct, and an ability to talk to anyone, about anything, which was probably one of the main things Joey admired about her. He preferred to keep his opinions to himself and couldn't see the point of small talk, accepting that if it were not for Tasha, their social life would be extremely limited.

This train of thought looped back to his mother-in-law. ‘How's your mum been this week?' he turned and asked.

Natasha gave a weak, sad smile. ‘OK. Just OK. Sometimes she's as bright as she always was. Then …' She gave a sad shrug. ‘But it's only going to get worse. And I'm still learning to go with the flow, as the doctors said. Correcting her all the time only makes things worse.'

‘They sure she's losing it? My mum's always been scatty. And she's nursing people with dementia.'

That started to bring the smile back to Natasha's face, helped by Joey reaching across and stroking the back of her neck. ‘I love you, you know. Especially for coping when I'm not here to share the load.'

She didn't reply. She didn't really want appreciation. She wanted him home. But she didn't want to tell him that. They had made the decision for the future. So she just reached up and held his hand in acknowledgement.

This was something else her mother had drummed into her. Almost contrary to the self-deprecation. Independence. An independence that made her more than a mental match. He could quite easily have ended up on the wrong side of the law, if she hadn't been there to drag him back and keep at him to finish his electrical qualifications. She earned enough working at the local newspaper to allow him time to go on the training courses, until it was bought by a national group and things were rationalised. Which meant she was out of a job, but fortunately just when Joey started bringing in cash. She did the books during the first pregnancy, with Tanya, and had done so ever since, with a bit of coaching from her brother-in-law Sean. That developed into doing the design work for the garden centre promotional literature, which in turn led to a few other small contracts and from that she started selling cards and wall prints on Etsy.

Joey was still looking at her with all this running through his mind. Brains and beauty. It didn't get much better. She could easily have won the last Rose Queen title, before it was hounded off the social calendar by the townies, just as much as his sister-in-law Sandra, Sean's wife, but Tasha never had any interest. Unlike Sandra, who still thought she held the title, which she did in a way, so appeared to dress the part. Joey sometimes thought it would be nice if Tasha dressed more girlie, but always ended up smiling. If she put herself out more she wouldn't do this for him. He ran his fingers over the armoured cloth that disguised the suspender clasp again, causing her to glance across with a knowing, wicked grin. She could turn it on when she wanted to. But only for them.

‘You'll have to control yourself tonight, though. Tanya's having a gathering.'

Joey groaned. ‘What happened to wanting her freedom and individuality? And staying out later than I say she can?'

‘Something to do with them all wanting to protect Becky from some bloke who's been pestering her.'

‘Oh great, not only babysitting but we're likely to have a bunch of blokes round on the sniff.'

‘Think it's a bit heavier than that. And anyway, thought you always wanted to know where she was.'

‘I can know without having her in the house on a Friday night. They must have figured that out by now. Alex and Ross go to their mates. Lucy goes to ballet. Tanya thinks she's sneaking off to the pub without me knowing. That's what Friday nights are about. It's taken quite a bit of logistics to get that organised.'

‘Calm down. Another few hours won't kill you. And as far as the kids are concerned we don't do sex. Urrghhhh. Gross.'

Joey smiled. Another of life's great truisms. And, unfortunately, more and more so as the kids got older. Kids really are life's natural contraceptives.

Breaking the chain. Yes, that would be the theme for tonight, Sean thought as he reached for his dress shirt. How we need to break the cycle of deprivation that leads people into petty crime and anti-social behaviour, that in turn condemns them to a life of missed opportunity and social prejudice. Once branded, how do you redeem yourself?

Yes, he'd talk about his own life, and perhaps that of his siblings. How they had come from the wrong side of town but had taken different paths. Both he and his younger brother Joe had passed the old eleven-plus and while he thrived at St Bede's, Joe didn't. Despite what Joe said about not hacking the academic bit, long disproved by breezing through his electrical qualifications, the truth, as Sean had included in his Best Man's speech at Joey's wedding, was that he dropped out because he was a randy sod and didn't fancy turning gay.

His sister Janey on the other hand, he had found out later in life, had pre-empted any such decisions by deliberately failing the eleven-plus so she wouldn't be separated from her friends. All of whom she stayed in touch with and all of whom turned up at the funeral. Who was really the brightest of them all?

Yes, Sean thought, his own life story, from college-pud, uni-geek and accountant to hippy garden centre owner has always gone down well at the charity dinners, especially since his sister Janey's senseless death. Tonight was about yet another anti-drugs initiative. How many had he been to? Better detection. Better prevention. Better education. Better medical help. Better counselling. He'd given up counting, but the emerging pattern was obvious. Whatever people tried, it didn't seem to work. Usually because of two things. Short-term thinking and independent action. Not thinking far enough ahead, and therefore not providing adequate funding, and trying to work in isolation. But there was never one reason for people getting into difficulties, so how could there be one solution?

Tonight, it was Stepping Stones. Or ‘stepping on stoneheads', as Joe called it, but in reality a charity that wanted to give ex-offenders somewhere to go. Where they could get help with their particular problems and avoid slipping back into the drug culture. Not to find an immediate answer, but to be guided towards people who might have one. Sean got it. Give them a stepping stone. A place they can gather their thoughts and get themselves together. To work out what to do next and not, as brother Joe was quick to point out, where to get their next score.

Sean knew that his brother was playing back popular sentiment, and within it a fundamental truth – most ex-offenders did reoffend – which was why tonight he would float a new idea. Instead of wasting time constantly trying to raise money, like tonight, to help the charity, so they could go on trying to persuade employers to take on ex-offenders, why not make it a statutory obligation? Part of the rehabilitation ethos of the judicial system. All local authorities must give ex-offenders a job on release. It was simple. If any organisation should have the capacity to handle ex-offenders, it should be the public services. But another great public truth stood in the way. Would any politician have the guts to do it? Probably not. Sean zipped up his trousers and fastened the waistband. Tighter than last time. When it came to diet, he too was a recidivist.

‘You have to break from tradition, see, Luke. Tradition encourages traditional thinking that leads to risk aversion and then inertia.' Matt was also still musing as he prepared to slip out on the daily coffee run. The one operational luxury they permitted themselves.

‘And this is more of you trying to manage my PTSD and steer me away from my particular problem, and grief, is it? Engage me in the more general scenario relating to the global drugs trade?'

‘Yep. But it's not just drugs, is it? It's like all crime. Or conflict. Or corruption. Like when we went over to Basra. Round 'em up. Explain that there's a better way to make a buck than turning over the neighbours. And if, or when, they didn't embrace democracy, hand out a good smacking. If we do it over there, why don't we do it here?'

‘Which, I think, is why we are here,' Luke said. ‘How far do you reckon that is?'

Matt brought the spotting scope up to his eye. ‘Twelve hundred. Downhill. No wind. Back soon.' He pulled off his waterproofs and slid out of the hide.

The Barrett is generally considered an anti-material weapon with an effective range of 1800 metres but a maximum range of around 6800 metres, although at that distance it was more for harassment than accuracy. At 1800 metres its job was to stop vehicles by punching a hole in an engine block. But that took a bit of time as the fluids leaked and the engine seized. Unless you got lucky and took out a steering rod or ball joint. Every sniper knew that the best way to stop a vehicle was to kill the driver. For that Luke would have preferred an Accuracy International L115A3, but at 1200 metres a No. 1 Sniper, like Luke, could use the Barrett to kill the fat lump he now had centred in his scope. It did not have to be a precise head shot and he could also do it with much less remorse than he had when shooting at the Taliban. At least, he thought, they were fighting for something they believed in, no matter what you made of it, but as far as Luke was concerned, the guy running the chippy was nothing. A parasite feeding on the community. A canker or cancer to be taken out. Maybe not tonight. As tonight was about the explosive force the Barrett could deliver. The shock and awe of blowing things apart. One night, though. Soon. Perhaps tomorrow.

‘His face, though.' Carol was scanning the pizza across the self-service till. ‘He probably thought it was Buffy Croft, the Hoodie Slayer or something.'

Becky laughed, then reverted to default anxiety. ‘But, what if he'd been like that loser with the knife the other week, Tan?'

‘As if. That 'tard was Barry Lupton's little brother. He probably hasn't even got hairs between his legs yet.'

‘Probably about all he's got down there,' said Carol. ‘We can't have this one.' She was reading the ingredients on the pizza box. ‘The chicken's reconstituted.'

‘How do you know?' asked Becky, taking the box from her.

‘It says “made from” not “made with”. If it's “from” that means it's mushed up bits pressed into a shape. If it's “with” it means whole pieces.' She headed off into the shelving maze.

Becky waited for her to disappear between Meals and Soups before she turned back to Tanya. ‘What do you really think? About Huz?'

‘Do you really want to know?'

‘I'm asking.'

‘I know, but do you really want to know the answer? Or do you just want reassurance that Carol's got one of her things going about him? Did you put this Cookie Dough in?'

‘You sound just like my mum.'

‘Did you?'

‘Er, yeah. Sorry. It's just that …'

‘What, missing your Pharaoh and need some comfort food?'

‘I'll put it back.'

‘No way. It means I can keep my Cookies 'n' Cream.'

‘You didn't answer my question.'

‘You didn't answer mine.'

‘You sure you really want to know?'

‘Well, yeah.'

‘OK. He's creepy.'

Tanya was right. It wasn't exactly the response Becky was hoping for.

‘Is she in all night then?' Joey finally asked, as the Q7 came across the old Victorian swing bridge into Highbridge. He had been sitting brooding, trying to figure out how to salvage something of his planned evening. He'd been thinking it through since Wednesday when she told him both the boys were going to be going on sleepovers. With Lucy out at ballet, for the first time in God only knew when they would have the house to themselves for most of the evening. They usually only had an hour by the time they got back from the station, before he had to start his regular Friday night taxi collection service. Stay by the corner. Don't speak. Just drive. He knew the drill.