The next morning, I went into Archway with Steve. There was a message on the answering machine from the editor-in-chief of Pit Lane magazine. He was calling to let me know how disappointed he was in me over the reckless-driving charges. I called him back and spent forty minutes explaining myself, which went some way to smoothing the choppy waters between me and the man who’d recommended me for the driver shootout.
When I hung up, Steve appeared at the top of the stairs to the crow’s-nest. ‘You ready for this?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Then let’s go.’
Breakfast would have been nice.
We rode in Steve’s Capri. He drove through Old Windsor to pick up the M25. Passing the spot where I’d had the run-in on the Runnymede roundabout brought a sour taste to the back of my mouth.
I didn’t like how quiet Steve was. Normally, he’d be the voice of reason talking me through my problems. His hands were tight on the wheel and his knuckles shone white against his skin.
‘Where are we going?’
‘The east end. I want you to meet someone. We need to get a feel for Andrew Gates. He’s no angel and we need to know who we’re dealing with. I think this person can help us.’
‘Who is this person?’
Steve’s grip on the wheel tightened until the leather squeaked. ‘A loan shark.’
‘How do you know him?’
Steve said nothing.
I didn’t like how much this meeting was getting to him. ‘Steve?’
‘Money is always an issue in motor racing. You can never have enough even when you have a lot. Another ten thousand can change everything. When you don’t have enough, it’s like you’re starving and no one will give you the scraps off their plates. You’ll do anything to get that money. Racing drivers and team owners aren’t the best credit risks. Banks will only follow you so far down the rabbit hole. Family will go a little deeper. But everyone will stop short of supporting your dream. You’ll take the money from whoever is willing to give it.’
A dream was an optimist’s view of motor racing. There was no middle ground in this sport. It either granted your dreams or crushed you under its heel. I remember Steve once likening racing to a drug habit and habits needed dealers.
Steve had kept his gaze rigidly ahead to avoid looking me in the eye when he was telling me all this. I knew that he’d made sacrifices to keep my dad in the game and even greater sacrifices after his death to cover his debts, but I’d never asked him how he’d come up with the money.
‘Steve, did you go to this loan shark?’
‘Your dad died owing a lot of money to a lot of people. I used every penny your grandmother and I had and we were still short, so I sharked the rest. I never told your nan about it, but I did what had to be done. I wish circumstances had been different.’
Hearing Steve’s anguish tore me up. I thought I’d known the extents to which he’d gone after my parents died, but I was wrong.
‘It wasn’t hard to get the money. You’ll find loan sharks hanging around races, especially at the club level. There are a ton of drivers who need a grand quick.’
‘Do you still owe?’
‘No. I paid off this fucker years ago. Your dad’s debts are clear.’
For what he’d done, I didn’t think I could love my grandfather more.
We didn’t speak for the rest of the drive. Steve cut his way through London until we ended up in an upscale part of Limehouse. Thirty years ago, the whole area had been in decline as the docks closed, but subsequent redevelopment had saved the place. Steve stopped the Capri in front of a warehouse conversion overlooking the marina and we walked up to the entrance. He pressed a button on the intercom.
‘Yeah,’ a gruff voice grunted.
‘Steve Westlake for Eddie Stores.’
‘Top floor.’
A buzz was followed by the snap of the door unlocking.
Bare brick and a faux industrial-steel staircase greeted us. We climbed the stairs to the top floor. At the top, a man in his fifties grinned at us. To call him heavyset was an understatement. He was a rhino in a leather jacket. The three-quarter-length coat, stretched to the limit, creaked when he moved. He smacked of Limehouse’s past, not its rejuvenated present.
Neither man made any attempt to shake the other’s hand. No, these men weren’t friends.
‘It’s been a long time, Steve,’ Stores said with a grin. ‘I see you’re still driving that RS. Christ, I love that car. You wouldn’t sell it. I still have that Mark I RS2000 you restored for me.’
Stores leaned hard on the word restored. I guessed that meant something to Steve.
‘C’mon in.’
We went inside. The place had simple laminated flooring and plain white walls. The fifty-year-old office furniture looked dated against the space’s modern, clean lines.
Stores sat behind a long office desk. A computer took up one side while a tower of file trays took up the other. Instead of a phone, a neat line of six mobiles sat by his right hand. Front and centre on the desk sat a receipt spike. It was the old-fashioned kind with a wooden base and stiletto-like spike sticking out of it.
‘Take a seat, gents. Mi casa es su casa. I picked up a little bit of Spanish since I bought a villa in the Canaries in the nineties. It’s a gorgeous part of the world, but hot as fuck in the summer. It’s great for when this country goes through five months of winter. So is this your lad, Steve?’
Stores’ fake affability failed to win me over and didn’t put a scratch on the casehardened shell Steve had put up.
‘He’s my grandson.’
‘Your boy died, didn’t he? I remember now. That’s how we met – it was over your boy.’
Steve was a statue.
‘What’s your name, son?’
‘Aidy,’ I answered.
‘You follow in the family business?’
‘I race.’
‘Good for you. I like legacies.’
‘I’m sure you’re busy, Eddie. We just have a few questions for you,’ Steve said.
Stores’ smile remained in place, but his gaze hardened.
‘You want to know about Andrew Gates. Is that right?’ Stores said to me.
‘Yeah.’
‘Why?’
‘We’ve got our reasons,’ Steve said, ‘and we’d like those reasons to remain private.’
Stores dropped the weight of his gaze on Steve. Steve’s lack of reaction seemed to satisfy him and he nodded to himself. ‘Understood. I can’t say I like the prick, so nothing leaves this room. You have my word on it.’
‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘Andrew Gates was in your line of work, wasn’t he?’
Stores’ grin intensified until he exposed two rows of expensive dentistry that looked out of place on his melon-sized head. ‘I like your tact, son, but we don’t need to be polite. I’m a loan shark, and so was Andrew. We got started at the same time, back in the early eighties. With two-plus million unemployed, it was a good time to be in the lending business.’
‘He moved into the property business, though,’ I said.
‘Kind of. Andy got lucky in eighty-nine when his dad pegged out. His old man didn’t approve of what he did, but he left him a share of the house. Eighty-nine was at the end of the Thatcher boom years when house prices were at their peak. He bought out his mum, sold the house and used the cash to stick a zero on the end of the amounts he sharked.’
It was interesting that, to Stores, a death constituted luck.
‘From there, Andy started lending to small businesses and as the interest payment grew, he took slices of the businesses, usually in the form of property. Before these fuckers knew what was happening, Andy owned the whole shooting match, leaving them out in the cold. That’s how he got into the property business. Not my kind of thing, though. Property is like shifting sand. One minute it’s up, the next, it’s down. I stick with money. That doesn’t change. I like to keep things on a smaller and more personal level. Don’t I, Steve?’
The jibe bounced off Steve, but I saw the cracks appearing. A vein at his temple pulsed. It was time to end this before it hurt Steve any more than it had already.
‘So Andrew doesn’t shark anymore?’
‘I wouldn’t say that. When you conduct your business with a baseball bat over a few hundred, you’re a loan shark. When you use lawyers for a couple of million, you’re a corporate raider. It’s all about the packaging.’
It was an interesting philosophical outlook. ‘What about business ventures? Does Andrew have any sidelines?’
‘Like what?’
‘I don’t know – drugs, illegal exports, prostitution. You tell me.’
At this point, I was open to anything that would explain what was going on.
‘He’s a money man, son, not Don-fucking-Corleone. Andy is like me. He likes things simple and without complication. He stuck to sharking. I know he didn’t like drugs. He once hammered one of his blokes who did a little dealing on the side.’
‘Do you know who?’
‘Nah.’
‘What about enemies?’
‘When you’ve fucked over as many people as Andy and I have, all you have are enemies.’
Stores shot me a wink. I couldn’t make out if his bravado was an act to make Steve squirm or if he honestly thought he was a loveable rogue.
‘Someone killed Andrew’s brother two weeks ago. Do you think that could be in retaliation for something he did?’
‘You’ve seen too many movies, Aidy. We don’t cut the noses off our debtor’s faces to spite our own. Dead clients don’t pay. We only provide motivation.’ Stores picked up the dangerous-looking receipt spike.
Steve went rigid.
‘I’m old fashioned. All my money has a hole in it because I make my punters put it on this nail. And when they don’t pay, I make them put something else on the nail.’
Stores bounced his palm on the top of the spike.
Steve jumped up from his chair. ‘Thanks for your time, Eddie. I think we’ve got everything we need.’
I chased after Steve. When he reached for the doorknob, I saw the scar that marred the palm of his left hand. The pencil-wide disfigurement had been there for as long as I could remember. Steve yanked the door open and was gone.
Stores belted out an ugly laugh. He rounded his desk and sidled up to me.
‘Today’s been a bit of a revelation for you, hasn’t it, son?’
‘Yeah and you’ve had your fun.’
Stores slapped me on the back. It felt like a shovel striking my spine. ‘You’ve got balls, just like Steve.’
I bit back the urge to tell Stores to go fuck himself. I was here for something bigger than a petty thug. ‘You liked your cash on the nail trick. What was Andy’s way of keeping his punters in line for failure to pay?
‘Knives. Andrew liked to cut his delinquent payers.’ Stores drew a line across his forearm with his finger. ‘He’d cut you every time you were late. He called them stripes. Only bad payers earned their stripes.’
I knew where I’d seen those stripes.