Lock Man stepped into the mid-morning sun. He shoved his hand into the pocket of his black and silver dressing gown and pulled out the smokes.
He tapped out a fag as a neighbour came along, carrying a scraper and a plastic bag. He eyed her jeans and tight white top. He licked his lips as she bent down and scraped the cobble lock.
‘Bleeding weeds, eh?’ he said, putting the smoke to his damp lips.
The woman turned around, adjusting her position.
‘Yer better off just spraying them bad boys,’ he said, lighting up.
‘Oh, right. Thanks.’
He caught her face, scrunching ever so slightly as she noticed his dressing gown.
Snobby bitch.
All of them were round here, he thought. They had been that way since they moved in years back. He grabbed the cord and tied the knot tighter and enjoyed his smoke, giving his metallic blue Audi A7 Sportback an admiring look, but grimacing at his wife’s gleaming white Kia Sportage SUV parked up beside it.
He glanced at his watch. Inhaling a final drag he went to flick the butt between the cars, but stopped. He grumbled at the fucking annoyance of it all. He walked over to the little ceramic bowl Tina had placed behind one of the large flower pots and stubbed the butt out. Leaning back up, he smacked the top of his head off a hanging basket, sending it into a swing.
He grabbed the basket and brought it to a stop, water dripping onto him. Cursing, he squinted at the mess of colours – yellows, oranges and purples – suffocating the basket. It was bad enough, he thought, having two large flower pots on the outside of the sitting room window and two more at the front door. Then she goes and puts up bloody poncy hanging baskets. Right in the way of his top-spec CCTV system.
‘I don’t want people thinking we’re some sort of dodgy crime bosses with all them cameras,’ she’d said.
‘Too late for that, love,’ he’d told her.
He sensed a presence and looked through the bulletproof window into the sitting room. There was the slight frame of his missus, her arms folded across her chest. Whatever way the light was, all he could see was her pink lips and matching nails. He looked down at the poxy white sculpture of a reclining woman on the window sill. Tina had insisted on bringing the two of them with her to their new home. She’d put the other at their upstairs bedroom window. He’d told her the women in this area didn’t have them yokes in their windows. But she insisted.
Tina’s lips moved and she pointed a nail up to the basket, which, when he looked up, was ever so slightly at an angle.
He waved her off. ‘Yeah, yeah, the fucking flower basket. Jaysus.’
Lock Man was back out an hour later, sporting new tracksuit bottoms, a white Lacoste top and clutching a brown leather holdall. His top was a bit tight over his belly and his thighs chaffed as he swayed towards the Audi, dangling his keys. The car clicked smoothly and he lowered himself in. He pressed a button on the keys and the reinforced gates, which he got from a specialist firm in England and paid a truckload for, slid to the side.
Some ten minutes later, he purred his beauty into a spot in a secure, monitored car park. Anyone approaching his motor would be picked up on the cameras. And they’d have to get past the security first. He strolled the short distance to the Luas stop, throwing on his shades as the sun squeezed back out between the clouds.
He liked the Luas. It was good to keep his feet in the trenches, he told himself – and he got a buzz from the colour and madness on the Red Line. But more than that, the Luas was a handy way to shake off unwanted company. When the Luas got the lights, cars were left behind and he could sneak off at the next stop. Either that or he could exit the stops along the canal and take any of the various footbridges over to the other side. Or he could stay on as the Luas curved over the canal bridge, where no roads followed.
All in all, he reckoned, the garda would need at least three teams in place to cover most of their bases. And with all the austerity and axed budgets that wasn’t going to happen anytime soon. Even during the height of the Celtic Tiger the guards didn’t have the numbers or overtime to monitor every major criminal twenty-four/seven. And that was exactly what they needed to do, he told himself, as he was a proper slippery fucker.
Lock Man enjoyed his counter-surveillance stratagems, even if no one was watching him. He prided himself on not having a single charge to his name in ten years, not since his armed robbery days. Okay, the Criminal Assets Bureau busted his balls years ago, when he was more hands-on. They issued a tax demand and he made a settlement, which lobbed a chunk off the final bill. In effect, it legally laundered the rest of his cash.
He had stepped back from the game since. The CAB wouldn’t come knocking again, as long as he was careful. Which he was.
The Luas rattled down along the canal and over the bridge. Lock Man got out at the next stop and slipped into a BMW X6, parked up on a quiet road.
He looked over at Slammer, who nodded at him, but said nothing. Lock Man never discussed business in cars. Not that that was a problem for Slammer. Slammer was a hulk. He had small eyes, which skewed inwards, and big thick eyebrows. He had a dent in the side of his head, the result of a hammer attack when he was younger. Lucky to survive, but he did. Got his revenge, though. Lock Man couldn’t help but bring up the image. Slammer had entered his attacker’s gaff and jammed the man’s head against a doorframe. Then he slammed the door again and again until the head pulped. The nickname stuck after that.
Fifteen minutes later, the BMW cruised into the Canal Plaza car park. The driver stayed with the car. Lock Man, Slammer and a helper got out and walked across the ‘Plaza’. Large banners partially covered the facades on two sides. But they had loosened over the years and now flapped dejectedly at the edges, revealing rusting metal and naked concrete boxes.
The third side of the Plaza was The Sanctuary, the so-called ‘anchor’ tenant. Apart from a Chinese takeaway it was the only fucking tenant, Lock Man grinned to himself.
He nearly skipped when he saw Sorcha totter behind the front doors.
Her head cocked slightly as the door pulled back.
‘My favourite customers. How are you today?’ she said, with her beaming smile.
Lock Man always laughed at her attempt to cloak her strong Dublin accent with a gushing D4 voice. She stood there, a folder clasped in her arms, long curly blonde hair and a tight pink dress and yellow heels.
Those platform heels triggered a momentary fantasy of her straddling him.
‘Alright, Sorcs,’ he said. ‘Story?’
He knew she didn’t like him calling her Sorcs. That’s why he enjoyed saying it so much.
‘Good, yeah,’ she said, swinging her body slightly, showing him her curves. ‘You using the pool today or the gym, boys?’
God he loved the way she said ‘boys’, her lips all pouty and red.
‘The steam room, Sorcs. Sure, yer welcome to join us.’
He watched her mouth creak into a nervous smile.
‘Your, ah, your friend is in there,’ she said. ‘I’ll make sure you’re not disturbed.’
She walked behind the reception counter. He stared at her as she leaned over the desk. He rubbed his tongue against his teeth. God, he’d love to ram it into her.
He inhaled deeply and motioned the others to the changing rooms. The helper stayed at the door.
The pool was empty, save for a dad and his kid. No lifeguards. He’d thought pools needed lifeguards. But when he was checking out this place he’d looked into it. They didn’t. He thought that fucking odd, but was grateful. Fewer observers. The leisure centre was also suffering, which meant it was usually quiet, particularly during the week. He gave Sorca a fat wad of hundred euro notes to cover all his associates well enough for privacy and discretion. He slipped her extra for not fixing the cameras.
Ghost was in the steam room. Lock Man liked that. He hated being kept waiting. Slammer sat by the door. Everyone wore a towel with nothing underneath. That was his rule. Though looking at the jangle of tattooed bones that was Ghost, he often thought twice.
‘Story with the goods?’ Lock Man asked Slammer, adjusting his weight and freeing his balls from between his legs.
‘Day after tomorrow,’ he said.
‘Storage?’
‘A new lock-up that Ghost sourced. Being rented by a furniture guy whose son owes us.’
Lock Man nodded. Slammer and Ghost knew what they were doing, he reassured himself. He was glad he was able to step back from all that years ago. But he had to keep a tight control of everyone in his click. If he didn’t, what fucking use was he?
‘Any more news from those Provo fuckers?’
‘Don’t worry about them, boss,’ Ghost said. ‘We’ll teach them a lesson when our toys arrive.’
Lock Man pushed a sheet of sweat away from his chest. There was something about the RCAD crowd that niggled him. They hadn’t looked for a cut of profits like the other republican pretenders. He could handle those pricks. But this outfit was different. They were driven by something else. Egos. Grievances. Beliefs maybe. They had a few older heads in there. He hadn’t seen their likes since the mid-nineties.
‘Don’t underestimate this crowd,’ he said, pointing at Ghost. ‘That would be a mistake.’
Slammer gave a slight nod.
‘Just so ya know,’ Ghost said, ‘they are putting up posters and doing graffiti, advertising themselves and trying to get people to join their fucking cause.’
Lock Man bristled.
‘We can’t have that go unchecked,’ he said. ‘Makes us look weak. I’m sure Cracko and yerself can handle that.’
Ghost nodded.
‘We’ll meet next Monday, after the delivery,’ Lock Man said. ‘Who ya going to use?’
‘I’ll have Jobs and Shop on it,’ Ghost said.
‘Give them this number,’ Slammer said, and repeated it a couple of times. ‘We’ll have something on standby in case they need to get out of dodge quick.’
‘Alright,’ Lock Man said, making himself more comfortable, ‘anything else?’
‘No, boss,’ Ghost replied, standing up.
‘I didn’t say to leave.’
Ghost sat back down.
‘What happened to that woman wasn’t in the programme notes,’ Lock Man said.
‘No, boss,’ Ghost said. ‘It was an accident. She wasn’t getting the hint, so we tried something else.’
‘And it went pear-shaped. I hear some cop bitch is sniffing around.’
‘She won’t find anything,’ Ghost said. ‘The boy wore gloves. And there are no cameras where that woman lives.’
But this is messy, Lock Man thought. Grand, Ghost using kids to run drugs and scout. But for threats. Too risky. After years of building a tight ship, the last thing he needed was a fucking leak. Just as well he had his own bitch in the cop shop.