The Life (40 page)

Peter was still reeling from the shock, but like each of them he focussed on his suspicions. He did not share his brother’s opinion that this was the work of someone with a higher
intelligence – he felt this was more on the level of wannabes. It was a botched attempt to take
him
out; according to the police forensics they had spoken to, it was basically amateur hour. Not a professional job as such, but perfectly adequate in the end. Like they couldn’t work that one out by themselves! Lena
was
dead. All the fucking money they had invested in the Filth over the years, and that was the only thing they could come up with – the bleeding obvious. Unbelievable. Fucking outrageous. Typical fucking Old Bill – clueless. As Daniel had remarked to them, they couldn’t find their own homes without a detailed map and fucking Sherpa Tenzing. Well, they were certainly aware now that they had to pull something out of the hat soon if they wanted to keep their earn. They had taken the money quick enough; but now they were expected to earn it they were acting like nervous schoolgirls on their first date. Frightened of their skulduggery being revealed, and finally having to do something for their keep, the Filth were acting far too uneasy for his liking.

Everyone in their orbit knew what had happened; it was only a matter of time before someone somewhere put two and two together, he was convinced of that. But, as he had remarked to Daniel, they were at the mercy of everyone who looked to them for their crust, and that meant there would always be someone who wanted that bit more; who wanted, ultimately, what
they
had. If he had died as planned, it would have left Daniel without his partner, his closest blood. And the next one to have been outed would obviously have been him.

So now they had their workforce looking for traitors, as well as sniffing round the different organisations they dealt with. Yet Peter still felt in his gut that this was the work of wannabes; those already at the top would have done a much cleaner job.

Billy was the only Allen brother they could locate, and he was even harder than Daniel would have given him credit for. He was acting as if he was there because he
chose
to be, not because he had been Tasered and forced physically into the blacked-out van. His arrogance was so overt, so blatant, as to be an insult in itself.

The boys were standing around, waiting to take their lead from Daniel, as he knew they would. They were good kids.

He could feel the old rage welling up inside him, and he welcomed it. Since Lena had died, he had once again felt it gradually building, hour by hour, until he was only hanging on by a thread. This man, unbeknownst to him, was exactly what he needed – an excuse to let off some steam.

‘Get the secateurs out of the drawer there, and tie him to the chair.’

Noel and Jamsie rushed to do what he asked. Danny poured them each a drink, listening with a half smile to the grunts and protestations of Billy Allen, as he was forced on to the metal typist chair, and bound tightly so he couldn’t move.

‘For fuck’s sake, Daniel! Surely you don’t think you can scare me.’ Billy was almost laughing in derision, as if they were fools and he was the only person there with even a speck of intelligence.

Billy Allen was a known hard man, and he prided himself on that fact. His enormous strength was everything to him – it defined him. He had the old-school loyalty as well – something else he felt was important to who he was, and how he was perceived by the people he dealt with. But he couldn’t prevent a note of trepidation creeping into his voice. It was strange how the threat of violence was always so much more intimidating than people imagined. Now that he was trussed up like a turkey, the younger Allen brother was finally becoming aware of how precarious his position was. He had assumed he could talk his way out of anything, and now it was sinking in that that was not the case.

Danny stood holding Billy’s hand flat against the metal arm of the chair as his father began to remove the first of the man’s fingers. Billy Allen steeled himself for the pain, his body tensed, the veins standing out on his forehead. But he was determined to stay silent, not beg as a lesser man would have done.

Outside Tania had seen the man being dragged from the van which had arrived earlier, and she had waited until the van had left the yard and her brothers had shut the gates, before she slipped out of the small night-watchman’s shed. Shivering with cold, she had crept over to the Portakabin, and positioned herself so she could watch what was going on. She saw Jamsie standing in the open doorway, and her other brothers spread around the small office; like them, she watched her father as he went to work. After long moments the man began to groan. Listening to his agony, she was shocked that she had no adverse reaction to what she was seeing.

Peter Bailey told his son Petey about the capture of Billy Allen as they were sitting together in his BMW 6 Series, driving quickly towards the scrapyard. Peter was glad his brother had refused to unload the yard now; he’d been absolutely right – he had always said they would need its privacy one day.

‘From what Danny’s said, the man is a fucking phenomenon. You have to give credit where it’s due – my brother has taken off every finger on his right hand, but he still won’t fucking say a dicky bird. He is threatening them with all sorts.’

Petey could hear the genuine admiration in his father’s voice, and he knew he had to say something. ‘Why have they dragged him in, though? Who grassed him up?’

He saw his father shrug as he answered carefully, ‘I don’t know yet. All I do know is my brother heard a whisper, and now he wants me there. My guess is Daniel would really much rather sort this himself – it is
his
wife who’s dead, after all. But, by the same token, he also knows that I was the intended target. As if any of us are ever going to forget that.’

Petey nodded absently. The fear was growing inside him; he had been less than honest about his dealings, with his greed as usual taking precedence over his common sense. The Allens could easily cause him untold trouble, and the enormity of that
fact was finally hitting him. He was thieving off his own – in more ways than one. He was only too aware of his father’s opinion about what he saw as weakness of any kind; his father, who in reality should not even still be here, who should be dead, would see his actions as tantamount to mutiny.

‘Like a fucking bull, that Billy Allen! I remember years ago he was jumped by about six geezers, and they each said afterwards that they had never had a fight like it in their lives. They battered him in the end, but he made sure they fucking worked for it.’

They were approaching the scrapyard, and Petey felt sick with apprehension. As they waited for the gates to be opened, he saw his father glance at him; he sensed his dad was picking up on his nerves.

Once they were parked up, he had to force himself to walk towards the Portakabin. It was raining hard and, as he followed his father through the maze of man-made iron walls, he was impressed by his uncle’s planning. If they were raided right this second, the Filth would have no idea whatsoever how to negotiate this place. It was like a rabbit warren, and the scrap was used as its main defence. It was brilliant how his uncle had thought it out.

As they approached the offices, Petey could hear the animal grunting of Billy Allen and, as they walked up the steps, they saw Noel Bailey in the doorway. He was smiling at them, as if this was just a normal visit between family.

Inside, the place was running blood, and the stench of sweat, blood and urine was overpowering in the confines of the small room. Billy Allen was clearly on his last legs and Petey felt the relief wash over him.

Billy was lying back in the typist chair; one hand was no more than a bloody stump, and his fingers, along with his thumb, were strewn all over the floor by his feet. His right eye was gone
– Peter Bailey guessed it had been removed by his brother, probably with one of the teaspoons he usually used when making them a cup of tea. Billy looked like something from a Wes Craven movie, but he was unwilling to admit defeat. He was still fighting it, as he lapsed in and out of consciousness. The amount of blood he had lost would have killed any other normal person by now.

Daniel Bailey looked at his brother and shook his head in a gesture of denial, but Peter could see that he was impressed despite everything that was going on. Billy Allen was intent on playing the hard man, right until the bitter end.

‘We’ll get nothing from him, Pete. I think he’s almost enjoying this – the mad bastard – proving how hard he is.’

Peter knew the man had to be in mortal agony; his brother, when he got started, would have gone for the maximum of pain, especially as this was so personal to him.

Danny said loudly, ‘We need that cunt Terrence. I’ve got everyone out looking for him. Now he
is
a fucking Grade-A coward. He wouldn’t last a minute, not like this fucking maniac.’

Peter sighed in agreement. ‘I take it he ain’t said nothing?’

Daniel shook his head in consternation. ‘Not a fucking word – forced a few screams out of him, though.’

His brother laughed. ‘No brain, no fucking pain! How many times have we heard that one, eh?’

Daniel nodded. Then he went to his desk and picked up the small blowtorch. ‘Take his shoes and socks off.’

Jamsie did as he was told, and Petey stood with his cousins, watching the scene with mounting trepidation; even
he
could see the man was beyond help, unable to even keep his remaining eye focused on anything or anyone around him. No one there had any kind of care or interest in the pain he was experiencing, except to see how it might benefit them. Petey saw his family
and the Life in stunning clarity then; he was a fool not to have realised the truth before now. He saw his father slip his coat off and fold it up neatly, before carefully walking through the blood and placing it in the other office. Then he walked back towards his brother and, taking out a lighter, he ignited the flame, before lighting himself a large Cuban cigar.

Danny and Davey lifted up the man’s right foot, and Petey watched as his uncle adjusted the flame, and then held it an inch away from the man’s sole.

The scream was horrendous. Laughing nastily, his uncle said loudly, ‘I ain’t letting you go quietly, you cunt. Tell me what I want to know and I’ll finish you now. Quick and clean.’

Billy Allen was barely conscious, but he still managed to spit out, ‘Fuck you, Bailey.’

The smell of burning skin was overwhelming, and Petey felt the food he had eaten a few hours earlier attempting to make its way back out into the world at large. It took every ounce of willpower to stop himself throwing up all over the place. He saw his cousin Danny watching him intently, well aware of what was ailing him; he felt a spark of shame at this obvious weakness on his part. He knew that in the Life it was kill or be killed – you had to be able to do whatever was required to keep not only yourself but your family safe. He had never believed that he was this feeble, though he had always recognised, deep down, that he wasn’t as comfortable as his cousins with the more violent aspects of their work. Oh, he could hold his end up, he could do what was necessary, but he had always been a great believer in delegating the less savoury tasks to other people. He was fine with administering a good hiding, teaching someone a lesson, but torture – that was a different thing altogether. Now he saw why his father and his uncle were so revered, respected by so many people. They had no such qualms, and neither did his
cousins by the looks of it. He lit a cigarette, more as an excuse to look away from the bloodied mess that had once been Billy Allen, than because he actually wanted a smoke.

Daniel Bailey took the man’s pulse and, shaking his head in annoyance, he said loudly, ‘He ain’t going to last much longer.’

He took a glass of lager from his youngest son and, throwing it in Billy’s face, he waited patiently for the man to come round. It took a few minutes before Billy Allen opened his eye. He looked horrendous, but he glanced at each of them. He tried to laugh, but the laugh became a hacking cough, and he was suddenly spewing blood everywhere.

The boys moved away instinctively, but Danny caught a spray of it across his face. His brothers laughed then at his obvious horror; jumping up quickly he picked up an old rag from the top of one of the filing cabinets and, wiping his face, he said in disgust, ‘That’s all I needed! Fucking wanker! He did that on purpose!’

Peter Bailey looked at his brother and said quietly, ‘He’s dying, Daniel. He won’t last much longer.’

Daniel nodded in agreement. ‘Sling him in the boot of the black Sierra out the back; it’s next in line for crushing. He will be in a two-by-two metal coffin first thing tomorrow morning.’

‘His brother must realise he’s gone on the missing list by now. Strange no one’s fucking located him yet, don’t you think, Dad?’

Daniel looked at his eldest son. ‘Delroy’s got the whole firm on the case. We’ll find him, don’t you worry.’

Peter blew his cigar smoke out noisily. They could hear the rattle as Billy Allen fought to take in his last few breaths.

‘He thinks he has beaten us – thinks that he’s died a fucking hero’s death! How thick can he be? The fact he wouldn’t talk tells us that he knows more than is healthy. Why put yourself
through that?’ Jamsie was genuinely astonished at the man’s stupidity.

Daniel sighed. ‘He died knowing he never grassed no one up and, in many ways, son, he did die a hero’s death – not to us maybe, but to him, and to whoever he was protecting. One thing we know now, though: if the Allen brothers weren’t the main instigators of the trouble, they definitely know who is. They were in on it.’

Peter Bailey saw the logic in his brother’s words. ‘Well, let’s just hope we find his brother sooner rather than later, before he has a chance to tell whoever he’s rolling with that the game is almost up. Though the fact we are hunting the Allens down will be enough to alert whoever they are in league with.’