Martina Cole - Close

'Relax, for fuck's sake! You're like an old woman.'

'Fucking relax? You have the audacity to tell me to relax?'

Dennis had his usual petulant look; he had a temper and it was not easily kept under control. He had always kicked off at the slightest tiling; he saw insults where none were forthcoming and he heard conversations that had never taken place. He was a lairy fucker and he was getting harder and harder to control.

'No one can get a fucking foot on the front line and that is what's giving me the fucking hump. Spider and his brother have sewn it all up.'

Dave sipped his coffee in silence and waited for the rant to continue as he knew it would. This had been a daily occurrence since Dennis had tried to shift some speed in south London; he had sold enough for a small profit, but he had not sold enough for his liking. He had also been warned off; in a nice way, with respect, but to be warned off was something that had never happened to any of them in living memory. They were the ones who did the warning and they were not about to step back and watch others get a serious graft without them even having a touch. It had caused a lot of upset and a lot of bad feeling towards Patrick Brodie, who was being seen more and more as a traitor by his own workforce.

Dennis was stalking round the room. His broad shoulders were stiff with the anger he was feeling and his moonface was screwed up with hatred and humiliation.

'To add insult to fucking injury, Dave, that black cunt and his cohorts are dealing all over the show. They are in every nook and cranny; the pavement stinks of them, so where does that leave us? Fucking Brodie is all right, ain't he? He is in league with them, he fucking owns them. He is raking it in, but what about us, Dave? I was told to fuck off last night, as if I was a fucking ice-cream, a cunt. I was told that Ilford and Barking were no-go areas because that lot were already dealing out of Celebrities nightclub in Forest Gate.' Dennis shook his head in bewilderment.

'We have nowhere to peddle anything. They've sewn up the Lacy Lady, Room at the Top and the fucking Tavern. Lautrec's is already part of their domain and Southend is sewn up tighter than a nun's crack. It's everywhere we go; Raquel's in Basildon, the fucking Roxy, the Vortex, Dingwall's in Camden. There is not a pub or a club left that we can call our own, from the Old Rose to the Dean Swift, and that even includes The Green Man, my watering-hole. They have Callie Road, the fucking main pubs, the fucking docks and all the poxy local boozers. They are like fucking leeches taking the food out of my kid's mouth.' He spat into the fireplace for maximum effect.

'We have got fuck all left, their boys are even selling speed in the fucking Beehive on Brixton Road and they are, by nature, puffers. The West End and Islington are overrun with that smooth-talking ponce's fucking minions and I ain't swallowing no more. We either have a touch or we take it over once and for all.'

'Will you fucking calm down?'

'Calm down? You want me to calm down? Who are you, the fucking yoga king of East London? Up yours, Dave. I want this fucking sorted, and I want it sorted soon. Spider and his brother are riding around in fucking flash cars with all sorts of fucking weapons. They are kinging it up like they own the fucking show and we are expected to just fucking tug our forelocks and not say a word? We can't even shift anything in Manchester, Liverpool or fucking Scotland. We have been frozen out, fucked off like recalcitrant school boys and all you can say is calm down? Are you stuck up Brodie's arse or what?'

Dave didn't answer, it was pointless, but he was digesting the information. He knew that he was going to have to sort this out sooner rather than later, because his brothers were on his case now. Drugs, speed in particular, was big business and they had invested a lot of money into it. The problem was that Pat was not only a good mate but he was also their biggest rival and, short of selling to him personally at a loss, they were in right lumber. Pat wasn't going to pay over the odds for the gear and who could blame him?

But he was out of order to assume that they wouldn't want a bite of what was a fucking lucrative business. Just because they had not bothered with it in the beginning did not mean they were going to walk away from an earner now the product was in such high demand. If Spider had stuck to his own turf, none of this would have happened. Everyone could have had a bite, and everyone would have been happy.

Dave chose to ignore the fact that Pat Brodie was running the show and that anything outside south London was his domain. He conveniently forgot that Pat had offered them an in many times and they had been too busy chasing the dollar in other areas. He also chose to disregard the warnings that Pat had given him in a very gentle but firm way; they were free to pursue their dealings as long as it didn't encroach on any existing businesses he had already put in place. Basically, he had insinuated that they had missed the boat and it was too late now to start complaining about it.

But, as Dennis had pointed out, if they were dealing out of all the nightclubs and they had a monopoly, then a talk was definitely in order. He was aware that most of the little firms could only deal because they had Pat's permission to do so and that they were only answerable to Spider, who was universally acknowledged as Pat's front man where the Persian Rugs were concerned. This, of course, was the bugbear where his brothers were concerned.

They were feeling left out, feeling that they were being overlooked, insulted even. The boys were men and, like all up-and-coming youngsters, they were ripe for an excuse to flex their muscles, to make their mark. They were greedy little fuckers, and they were dangerous because of that. The only reason they had been given such a ride over the last couple of years was because of Patrick Brodie, but they were not intelligent enough to suss that out and he was not about to mention that fact just yet. Dennis was their spokesman, the only one with the guts to come into his home and air his grievances. The others would follow, he knew, but only when they were assured they would have a friendly reception.

They were conveniently forgetting all the graft they had because of Pat, all the money they were raking in with him on other businesses. The speed was making them greedy; the money to be earned was astronomical and naturally they wanted in on it. The groundwork had been done, as it had always been done for them, though they couldn't see that of course. They were heavies, no more and no less, and their egos were bigger than King Kong's cock, but they were adamant they were not going to take 'no' for an answer.

Dave was starting to see his brother's point of view; that they were being treated like second-class citizens and that they would be better off without Brodie.

He was honest enough, at times, to admit to himself that Pat had overtaken him; he saw an opportunity and he went for it, taking Dave and his brothers along with him. It irked Dave at times because he not only wanted to have the respect Brodie commanded; he also wanted to be seen as a vital link in the criminal chain that ruled London.

The fact that people were relaxed enough to tell his brothers that they were not going to deal with them, thank you very much, because they were already being served up by Spider, was another reminder that they were, and always would be, only foot soldiers to Brodie. This was a melon-scratcher all right, and he needed to think about it long and hard before he did anything of any substance. Once something like this was put into words and thereby into the public domain, there was no going back. He needed to seriously consider their options and the best way to approach the problem in hand.