Maura's Game (3 page)

“Where’s Terry anyway? He should be here.”

Roy licked his lips before answering her.

“It was a car bomb, Mum. Meant for Maura. Terry copped it.”

Sarah screwed up her eyes as if unable to take this in.

“What? You mean, Terry’s dead?”

Roy nodded.

“Holy Mary, Mother of Christ! What has she caused this time?”

The blame was immediately placed at her daughter’s door and Roy felt the urge to fell his mother with one blow at the unfairness of her reaction.

“Wherever she is there’s death. Death and destruction. My poor boys

.. .”

Sarah’s voice trailed off as Roy walked quickly away from her. She felt sick with apprehension. This could mean only one thing: more skulduggery was afoot and Maura, as usual, was behind it all.

Where had she got her daughter from? Sarah had been plagued by Maura since she was old enough to join in her brothers’ nefarious activities. But whereas Sarah could swallow wrongdoing from them, she never could accept having a daughter of the same ilk. It was wrong, all wrong in a woman, and this was the upshot. Another pointless death.

Terry Petherick had been a decent man who had loved that blonde-haired whore she had delivered into the world with a passion. He’d been a policeman once, clean-living and good, and what he had seen in her daughter was beyond Sarah’s comprehension.

She walked over to her son and pulled him round to face her.

“Don’t you turn away from me, boy, when I’m talking to you.”

Roy shrugged her off none too gently and said in a low voice, “Aren’t you going to ask about your daughter? Your only daughter. Don’t you want to know how she is? If she’s alive, dead, maimed or what?”

Sarah shook her head.

“I’m not interested…”

Roy held up his hand for silence.

“Then piss off home, Mum. I’m sure you’ll learn all you need to know from Janine later.”

Sarah watched him walk away from her and felt a moment’s sadness. Maura had caused all this trouble in the family. Forcing everyone to take sides. Making them choose. She sat herself down in a scuffed plastic chair and placed her large leather bag on her lap.

She could wait to find out what was going on. She was good at waiting, Christ Himself knew; she had had enough practice over the years.

Five minutes later her grandson Benny walked past her as if she didn’t exist. She opened her bag, removed her olive-wood rosary and began to pray.

“Fucking old witch, she is! Her and me mother should be put down.”

Roy agreed with his son but an instinct as old as time took over.

“Don’t talk about my mother like that. Or your own, for that matter.”

Benny shrugged, temper getting the better of him.

“Listen, Dad, they’re a pair of vindictive old hags, you know it and I know it. All that “respect for your parents no matter what” went out with Noah’s fucking Ark! I can’t bear either of them and I’m sure me Aunt Maura don’t want them here. So let’s cut the crap and get to the point, eh? Who is the culprit and how do we retaliate?”

Looking at his son, Roy felt as if Michael were alive and kicking and looking out through Benny’s eyes. It was spooky, the similarities were so strong though his boy was heterosexual as far as he knew. But even the timbre of his voice was like Michael’s and this was what made him so appealing to people. He had the same arrogance Michael had had, and the same vindictiveness. Maura adored him and he adored her, much to the chagrin of Janine.

The doctor approached.

“How is she, Doc?”

“She’s conscious. Took a bad blow to the head, but nothing major. A few cuts and bruises. I can’t see any long-term damage. Not physical anyway.”

Roy felt his whole body relax.

“Thank fuck for that! Can we see her?”

“Five minutes only, I’m afraid.”

Benny hugged his father and Roy was reminded of just how strong and young his son was. He had the same quicksilver temperament as Michael, veering between raging anger and an almost puppy like euphoria in the space of seconds.

“What a touch, eh, Dad! What a fucking touch!”

It occurred to Roy that he wouldn’t be able to control this boy of his for much longer, and what would happen then he didn’t like to contemplate.

Maura looked terrible and Roy guessed she already knew about Terry’s death.

“All right, Maws?”

She closed her eyes and nodded.

Benny pulled up a chair. Taking her hand in his, he gently squeezed it.

“We’re here now. You’re safe.”

Maura smiled faintly.

“Thanks, Benny. Any idea who it was?”

“Has to be that ponce from Shoreditch, don’t it?”

Benny’s voice was loud and Maura winced. He lowered his tone.

“No one else it can be, is there?”

He looked from Maura to his father who shook his head.

“It’s not Jimmy Milano, he’s straight as a die. Maura gave him an in a while ago.”

Benny looked crushed.

“Thanks for telling me.”

The bitterness in his voice was not lost on any of them. Benny had been assigned to lean heavily on Milano when he first surfaced in East London. But as it turned out he’d had a good protector who was also one of the Ryans’ best lieutenants. Milano was no threat. Unlike his older relatives he was strictly small-time, in his thinking as well as his criminal tendencies.

“I meant to tell you, Benny, but with everything…”

Roy’s voice trailed off.

“Is there anything else I don’t know about?”

Benny was on the defensive as usual. It was his biggest failing and they all knew it.

“We’ve had hag from all over the show lately, Benny. What we need now is to eliminate our suspects.”

“Fucking right and all. Eliminate is just the word for what I intend to do to the cunts!”

Maura closed her eyes wearily.

“Will you stop saying that word, Benny? It irritates me.”

“All right, Maura, don’t get out of your shopping trolley.”

He was very much on his dignity and Maura, feeling suddenly sorry for him, said gently, “What are the police saying?”

“I can’t gather much yet. Our blokes at the Met are going to call us later this afternoon with the general SP.” Roy looked at his son as he spoke.

“You put blokes out and about, OK? See what they can…”

Benny interrupted him.

“Already done, Dad. Abul sorted it on the way here.”

Roy nodded.

“Anything else you want done, Maws?”

She shook her head carefully and lay back on the pillows.

“Just get me moved to a private hospital as soon as possible before the papers descend on us and anyone else decides to have a pop.”

“It’s done, Maws. We’ll be back later, OK?”

As they walked from the room she called out, “And keep me mother away. I can’t cope with her at the moment.”

When they shut the door she lay back and remembered the events of the day. The fight. Terry leaving like he did. The last sight of him, smiling at her through the windscreen of her car as he turned the ignition key and was blown apart by the bomb that had been meant for her.

Now he was gone, really gone, and the pain and the guilt would stay with her the rest of her life. No time to grieve, though. Open war had just been declared and she had to sift through all the shit and try and make some sense of it all.

She swallowed down the tears. Time to pick herself up and get on with the job in hand. Let personal feelings wait.

It was what Maura Ryan had done all her life.

Garry Ryan was like a raving lunatic and his girlfriend Anita, a beautiful girl with a weight problem and a nervous twitch, watched warily as he went through his phone book. Writing down names, he muttered under his breath. When he was like this he frightened the life out of her.

He looked up at her with deep blue eyes.

“Make me a cup of tea, Nita, and get me a flight to London. Now.”

She nodded.

“Am I coming, Gal?”

She was nervous as usual when she spoke directly to him.

He sighed.

“Do you want to come?”

It was a fair question and he asked her nicely, which for him was a first. She didn’t want to leave Marbella. She loved it here, especially without him. But she answered him promptly.

“Course I do, darlinV Garry chuckled and this scared her even more.

“No, you don’t. You don’t even like me. You just like the kudos, Anita. Look that word up in the dictionary when I leave, OK?”

She nodded, relieved that she didn’t have to go with him.

“Then pack your stuff and fuck off.”

She blinked a few times before she said sadly, “But where will I go?”

Garry was fed up with the conversation now and said dismissively, “How the fuck do I know, Nita? You’ll find somewhere, your type always do.”

She burst into tears.

“You rotten bastard! Why do you treat me like this!”

He stood up. Standing in front of her, he placed one hand gently under her chin. He tilted her face up and kissed her lightly on the lips.

“Because I can, silly. Now, make me tea and book me flight, there’s a good girl.”

He saw the stark confusion in her eyes and felt a moment’s sorrow for her. But he despised her too because no matter what he did or said she still hung around.

“I tell you what, if you’re really good I’ll let you stay on here for a week until you find somewhere else. I can’t be any fairer than that, can I?”

She walked away from him, utter dejection in her whole stance. An hour later he was on his way to the airport with not even a passing thought for Anita, his companion of two years. Such was the mindset of Garry Ryan.

On the plane he planned his revenge on whoever was responsible for trying to off his sister Maura and ultimately his whole family, because it wouldn’t stop there, he was quite sure. Whoever they were they had better be good runners because when he got back to Blighty and sorted himself out there were going to be murders committed.

Garry Ryan was looking forward to it.

Sandra Joliff was tall, with silicone breasts, a sun bed tan and startling white teeth. Her blonde hair was streaked to within an inch of its life and cut so it hung in a shaggy sexy mess around her face.

She felt like shit. She had been on it all night and her kidneys were aching from too much cocaine and too much vodka. Her skin was grey under the tan and she wanted a shower and a cup of tea as soon as possible.

She had to visit her husband the next day and needed to look good for the visit. She knew he was proud of her and didn’t want to let him down. He was all right, old Vic. He knew the score with her and they’d built a life together around their personal foibles.

As she pulled onto her drive a car hooted from behind her and a dark-haired man stuck up his finger. She did the same back.

Tosser!”

She knew she had cut him up as she pulled across the road but was too tired to care. Stepping out of the car, she surveyed the drive. The gardener had been and the front of the house looked immaculate. She never ceased to be amazed at how she lived, thanks to Vic. Originally from a council flat in Woodford Green, Sandra now lived like a queen. Her two little girls went to private school and she had a BMW 330 and money coming out of her ears. It was her lucky day when Vic took a shine to her, bless him. He had taken her from her old life and transported her to this new one without a second’s thought.

She opened the door to her five-bed roomed detached house in Emerson Park and turned off the burglar alarm. As she walked through to the kitchen she saw her Doberman Kelly lying in the middle of the floor.

There was blood coming from the dog’s mouth and ears, and its body was twitching. She knelt beside the animal and stroked its head.

“All right, Kelly. What happened to you, love?”

Her voice was low and comforting. The dog placed its nose in Sandra’s hand and whined gently. Nearby there was a lump of bloody meat. Instinctively she knew Kelly had been poisoned.

As she stood up she felt a presence and turned to see a man standing behind her. He was big and heavyset, smartly dressed though in designer gear. She automatically clocked him as she did all men and rated him on a one to ten scale. This geezer was a four but she put that down to the ski mask he wore. He smiled widely, displaying perfect white caps through the slit in his mask.

“Who the fucking hell are you, and what the fuck are you doing in my kitchen?”

He could see the bravado in her face and admired her for it. He looked her over appreciatively and she felt a moment’s disgust as it occurred to her that he might want to rape her. Well, he could have a good fucking try.

She squared her shoulders and balanced herself on her stiletto heels.

“Sandra?”

His voice was low and pleasant with a slight accent.

She frowned.

“Who wants to fucking know?”

She was still on her dignity and determined he wouldn’t see the fear she was feeling inside.

“Do you know who I am? Who my old man is? He finds out about this and there’ll be fucking murders, mate.”

He smiled.

“I was counting on that, Sandra. It’s why I’m here.”

She screwed up her face in consternation.

“You what? What you on about, you fucking nutter!”

The dog whimpered again and she automatically looked down.

“All right, Kelly. I’ll get a vet in a minute, baby, as soon as this dickhead leaves the house.”

She looked at the man again.

“You don’t know what you’re getting involved in here, mate. I warn you, my old man is heavy duty and this will piss him off big time.”

The man opened his coat and she saw the sawn-off shotgun. Her blue eyes widened as she realised what he was about to do. She made a run for the back door; its glass shattered as the first blast caught her in the lower legs. As she hit the floor the man stood over her and laughed.

She was writhing on the floor; her legs felt like they were on fire.

“What you doing to me! Take what you want, mate, take me watch, anything… but, please, I have two little girls…”

She was sobbing in pain and shock.

“Sorry, love, nothing personal.”