Jacqui Rose - Toxic

‘You ain’t doing yourself any favours, so just put the gun down, Eddie.’

‘And why should I do that? You turned me right over. Tell me Ma, were you in on it?’

She laughed nastily. ‘In on what?’

Exploding again and slurring his words from the copious amounts of whiskey he’d consumed, Eddie looked on the verge of tears. ‘On taking everything I had left in the world!’

With ease, Ma flicked the gun out of Eddie’s hand. ‘And that’s the big problem, ain’t it Eddie? You see I’ve been speaking to a couple of Reginald Reynolds’ men, and they told me none of them are working for you anymore. Not only that, but they told me how much you liked to run up debts in Reggie’s name. But now the fella’s brown bread, you are out on your own and people want their money, and you ain’t got it, have you? Which means you ain’t got our money either. We want our money, Eddie.’

Eddie went into his pocket, pulling out a flick knife. ‘What? Are you trying to mug me off? Your men lost me fucking lorry, so I ain’t paying you nothing.’

Johnny sneered at him. ‘That’s not how it works, and you know it. We still did the job. My men still brought the lorry across the Channel. There were still risks for us. We never did anything wrong on our end, and even before this happened, you were never straight with us.’

‘What am I, a fucking spirit level? I told you what you needed to know.’

Ma leant over the car seat again to squeeze Eddie’s shoulder, slightly too hard for his liking. ‘No, Eddie, you didn’t. You never told us you didn’t have any money. But now we’re telling you what you need to know. If we don’t get our money, Johnny here won’t be held responsible for his actions. Seventy-two hours Edward, and after that, those seagulls need to be fed.’

‘Alfie, you need to come and look at this.’

Alfie threw down the mucking out fork. ‘Janine, whatever it is you’ve got to say, got to show me or bleedin’ got to moan about, I don’t want to know. We have been shovelling shit for the past few hours, and we have not found one bag of coke, yet who knew that a dozen or so horses could shit so much, so to say I ain’t in the mood, is to put it fucking lightly.’

‘Suit yourself.’

‘What is that supposed to mean?’

‘It means, suit yourself.’

Furious, Alfie spun round to look at her, the usually perfectly coiffed hair flopping over her face in a sweaty, hot mess.

‘Fine, go on then. You win, Janine. Spit it out, tell me exactly what it is you have to say.’

Janine Jennings hid the biggest smile. ‘I think you might like it.’

Alfie let out a roar. ‘Just tell me!’

‘See it for yourself.’ Janine held up a small, clear plastic grip bag covered in steaming manure.

Alfie grinned. ‘You found the coke.’

‘No Alf, I ain’t. I found the diamonds.’

‘What? What are you talking about woman?’

‘Diamonds, Alfred. Lots and lots of shiny diamonds.’

Lola and Janine sat at the table opposite Vaughn and Alfie in the lavishly gold decorated dining room of Janine’s house. In the middle of the table sat several empty Chinese takeaway cartons along with a pile of small yet perfectly cut diamonds.

‘Do you think he knows?’

Drawing his eyes away from the table, Alfie glanced at Vaughn. ‘You mean Lloyd?’

‘Yeah. Do you reckon he knew it wasn’t coke, and just thought it was best to keep schtum?’

Picking out the last piece of chow mein from the side of one of the foil cartons, Alfie raised his eyebrows. ‘But why? He only offered us the gig because he had to and let’s face it, we would’ve taken anything.’

‘Maybe, but he didn’t know that.’

‘Come off it Vaughnie, we were desperate. He smelled it the minute I went to see him. I nearly begged the geezer. Nearly .’

‘So why not just be upfront with us?’

Alfie, still hungry, leaned across to Janine’s plate to pinch one of her pork balls. Managing to come away with only a hard slap to his hand, he pulled a face. ‘Cos there’s a big difference in jacking a lorry of coke and jacking a lorry of diamonds. Perhaps when I came along he was already looking for a couple of mugs who’d be willing to take the risk, but at the same time someone who’d do the job properly. And hey presto, we come along and don’t we just fit the bill.’

Vaughn nodded slowly as he thought about Lloyd. The geezer might be a prick, but he was a shrewd one. Nobody with any sense would agree to jack a lorry of diamonds on their own turf, it just wasn’t worth it, and Lloyd had known that, but as Alf had said, they’d been desperate and hadn’t bothered asking too many questions. They’d been slack. Too eager to get the money for Reenie Reynolds. To Lloyd it must’ve looked like they were a pair of puppy dogs begging for a fucking walk.

‘Get him on the phone, now! Tell him we want him to come around for a little chat. Let’s see what he has to say.’

Alfie looked at Vaughn dubiously. ‘You sure about this?’

‘No, Alf, I’m not, but what I am sure about is that nobody takes me for a mug.’

‘So what are you telling me?’ Lloyd Page stood with his henchmen in the well-manicured garden of Janine’s mansion as Alf sat next to Vaughn on the chocolate rattan garden chair.

‘Why don’t you just come and sit down.’

‘No ta, Alf. I prefer to stand. Make you nervous, does it?’

Alfie gave a cold laugh. ‘Why would it? I was just being polite to me elders, age catches up on us all, thought you’d fancy a pew. You know, rest yer bones.’

With his broad Yorkshire accent dangerously icy, Lloyd held Alfie’s stare. ‘I’ll wait till I’m dead and buried for that. Like to keep on me toes personally, Alf. Never know when you might have to do a runner … Anyhows, as nice as this chat is, let’s get down to the nitty-gritty, shall we? I’m still in the dark here. Why the urgent phone call?’

Vaughn glanced at Alfie. Even though they had the threat of the Peterson brothers to hang over Lloyd’s head, he would’ve felt so much better if Lloyd hadn’t brought his goons. But they’d come up against worse. Much worse. And like Alf had said, when they put their minds to it, they were still a force to be reckoned with.

Alfie was still on a buzz from jacking the lorry, he got that, but what he didn’t get was how he could be so calm about Franny. Even the name wound him up. He could feel the anger towards her running around his body. The woman had turned them over and the truth was, although he was pissed with Alfie, he hadn’t seen it coming either.

He’d known Franny and her father, Patrick Doyle, for many years, and he would’ve put his last pound on the fact that she wouldn’t have ripped him off. Problem was she took his last pound anyway. And it was like a razor blade slicing at his skin. She’d fucked it up big time for them, and they needed to salvage the situation before it was too late.

‘Christ!’ All eyes turned to look at Vaughn, who had without thinking, slammed down his fist on the table, knocking over the milky tea Lola had made him earlier, sending it flying.

Lloyd scanned him darkly. ‘Problem?’

‘No, mate. Just a pesky insect.’

‘You often do that?’

Vaughn glanced around, seeing the broken teacup on the floor. He shrugged his shoulders. ‘What can I say? I hate flies.’

Silence fell and the only noise was the distant hum of the cars on the bypass.

Lloyd pushed again. ‘So, come on then? What have you got for me?’

Vaughn, directing his anger at him, snapped, ‘That’s the fucking thing. We ain’t got anything for you. There wasn’t anything in the truck.’