That afternoon, I met up with Mac and he chauffeured me to the Taff Green warehouse. Outside the warehouse, Nudger Nicholls and Harry ‘the Hat’ Pearson were loading sports equipment on to an articulated truck. The truck had European number plates and logos; although Naz despised our European cousins, clearly he was happy to trade with them.
Cassandra and the Rottweilers were in the glass-panelled office in the depths of the warehouse. She was feeding the dogs, which were chained to the wall.
While the Rottweilers consumed their raw meat, Cassandra disappeared into a cubicle to wash her hands. She glared at me, a look that screamed disdain, though she did offer Mac an appreciative glance.
Passing Cassandra on the way, Naz strolled out of the cubicle, his hands busy, adjusting his trousers. Apparently, he was human enough to answer a call of nature. Maybe one day he’d flush his words and attitude down the toilet as well, to a place where they belonged.
“What happened to you?” he asked, eyeing my bruises, offering a huge grin.
“None of your business,” I said.
Naz walked over to me, towered over me, glared at my bruises. “I would have paid good money to have seen that,” he laughed.
“I bet you would,” I said.
For the first time, Naz acknowledged Mac; he did so with a look of suspicion, coupled with conceit. His top lip curled into a snarl, his eyes narrowed. His posture said, ‘look at me; I’m hard, I’m mean’.
“He with you?” Naz asked, jerking a thumb over his shoulder towards Mac.
“Is that a problem?” I asked.
“He’s a poof,” Naz sneered. “You’re walking around with a poof; you like queers?”
“I like decent people,” I said.
“Queers ain’t decent.”
I smiled politely. “We kill what we fear and we fear what we don’t understand.”
“What?” Naz scowled.
“Just mumbling to myself,” I said.
Naz wandered into the warehouse. We followed without haste, without breaking sweat. Indeed, I felt calmer by the hour; the nightmares of the assault had faded; true, my nerve ends still jangled occasionally and my confidence wavered from time to time, but I felt more like my old self today; Samantha at ninety per cent.
“You want to buy some exercise equipment?” Naz asked. He nodded towards a punchbag then eased his hands into a pair of boxing gloves.
“I want to buy some information,” I said.
He grinned, “On Frankie Quinn?”
I nodded, “I reckon Brydon or Brandon murdered Frankie.”
Naz’s grin broadened. He thumped the punchbag, landed a vicious right hook. “So I’m in the clear,” he said.
“Maybe,” I said. “What did Frankie have on the Bishops?”
“How should I know?” Naz asked.
“Like to take a guess?”
“What’s it to me?” he asked, rolling his shoulders, hitting the punchbag with a series of right hooks and left uppercuts.
“If I get rid of Brydon and Brandon that will leave the way clear for you.”
“And that don’t bother you?” He paused, to catch his breath, to wipe the sweat from his brow.
“It bothers the hell out of me,” I conceded. “First, we get rid of the Bishops, then we get rid of you.”
Naz laughed. He pressed his sweat-stained boxing glove against the end of my nose. Strangely, the scent from the boxing glove was stimulating; it heightened my senses, enticed a basic, animal response; fight or flight: prepare for action.
“You’ll never get rid of me,” Naz snarled. “I’m your worst nightmare.”
“What did Frankie have on the Bishops?” I asked, ignoring his comment.
Once more, Naz thumped the punchbag, sent ripples up the supporting rope, to the rafters, made them groan. He glared at Mac. “You want me to talk in front of this poof?”
“His name is Mac,” I said. “And if you insult him again all deals are off.”
Naz paused. He steadied the punchbag, leaned against it, mopped his brow. Big with his mouth and displays of bravado, he was out of condition; dangerous in the short term, he’d wilt, if you could stay the course.
“Brydon and Brandon like the cinema,” Naz said.
“Your point?” I asked.
“They like to make home movies, especially Brandon.”
“Go on.”
“They like movies that don’t appear on TV or in the cinema. You know movies with a bit of this, a bit of that, a bit of torture.”
“They sell these movies?” I asked.
“Yeah. And their backers put them on the Internet, the secret Internet for perverts. He’s a pervert.” Naz glared at Mac, as though to underline his point. “You know what I’d like to do with perverts?” With a grin, Naz drew his right fist back then thumped the punchbag, his blow containing a mixture of aggression, anger and hate. “Imagine if that was him.”
The warehouse was quiet; Cassandra had disappeared; Naz’s minions were still busy, loading the articulated truck. So, Mac drew his Beretta from its holster, took careful aim at the rope dangling from the rafters and said, “Now let’s imagine that punchbag was you.” Mac fired one shot, which severed the rope, sent the punchbag crashing on to the floor. “It’s a wee point I make,” Mac smiled, “but I assume it’s a point well taken.”
And, with eloquence in our stride, we walked out of the warehouse.