Chapter Seven

Angelo talked about souls. Something Mark hadn’t thought much about since Shane disappeared because he didn’t think he could afford to. What you were here for, where you came from, if you went anywhere when it was over, such thoughts had rattled around his head once, but he’d crushed them out, because there could never be any answers, not for him. His mother Julie had startled him a few months after Shane’s disappearance, by banging on about religion, she went from saying there couldn’t be a God, not after Shane, to talking about how the good were taken young. He’d worried about her, about the way her head was going, but then she stopped mentioning it. At least to him. As far as he could tell, God-squadders seemed to be making up for some loss, something that had been taken from them or that they didn’t have in the first place. Lonely people, crazy people, people looking to fill an emptiness. People like Julie.

Lena had always worn a small silver cross, only taking it off when photo shoots demanded it, but they hadn’t talked about it much. She told him once she wanted to believe in an afterlife that would be better, a heaven, but shared his cynicism. That was when he thought he knew her, knew who she was, and thought that they had a long future stretching before them.

‘Nine-fifty, mate.’

They were outside the pub. In this condition Stellachi could pick him off without ruffling his bottle-blond hair.

‘I said that’s nine-fifty,’ the driver said.

He probably thinks I’m an afternoon drunk, Mark thought. A moneyman on a liquid lunch. He gave the guy a ten and went into the Queen’s Head. Kelly was coming out of the toilet and walked straight into Mark.

‘Mr Richards. I wondered where you got to. There was an accident outside your place. Hit and run. I was comin’ out the bookies down the street, and seen the crowd. If you don’ know wha’s happened I got some bad news for you.’

Mark let him tell it. About his shock at seeing it was Tony. About how sorry he was, and how awful it must be for Lena. Then Mark told him he already knew. They sat down at the usual corner table and Kelly got some drinks. While Kelly got served Mark rubbed his shoes along the side of a chair but the freckles wouldn’t go away. They needed to be washed off. Kelly returned, and downed half his Guinness in one draught.

‘I’m glad you know about it, Mr Richards. I knocked the flat, got no answer. Does your woman know?’

‘Yes. The police got in touch with her. With us. She’s gone away, to be with the family.’

‘Oh, that’s good. You ain’t going, like?’

‘I got things to do.’

Mark wished he hadn’t said us. The word sounded so lost now. Kelly stared at Mark over the top of the glass.

‘Wha’s going on, Mr Richards?’

‘Hmm?’

‘You’re miles away. First you wanted that car, then I had to go into the flat for Christ knows why and now Lena’s brother is not long dead. You in deep shit or somein’?’

Deep shit is right, Mark thought. And I’ve just sunk further into it.

‘You’re asking questions again,’ Mark said.

‘I know, but, well, I don’ wanna be dragged into nothing messy. Been on my mind all weekend.’

So it was the weekend.

‘Spent all that money yet?’

‘No, not yet. Look, I’m grateful for that, like, you always been good to me, but I can’ handle nothing heavy mind.’

Mark smiled at the thought, and was amazed that he could. And it was a smile, even if it had to force itself onto his lips, not like that cold slit he’d seen on Stellachi’s face.

‘An’ there was something going on outside my place too,’ Kelly continued. Charlie McKee told me earlier. Blokes fighting, he said. Hard-looking bastards. Said one of them looked like you, but he couldn’t be sure.’

‘Best to be sure,’ Mark murmured. ‘Relax, Kelly, there’s nothing for you to worry about. I’ll be going away soon.’

‘What, for good, like?’

‘Maybe.’

Kelly was relieved but also disappointed. Mark had been a major source of beer money in the last two years, and maybe the closest thing on the street Kelly had for a friend. The Irishman took out his tobacco tin and shakily managed to make a roll-up. Like the tin this man was a relic of another age, Mark thought. Like the old men who’d littered the valley when he was a kid. Bench-ridden, or standing on the steps of their front doors, all smoking the same hand-made fags, trying to relieve the tedium of retirement without money. Chests wheezing, coughing up the phlegm of their working lives, their eyes always on the lookout for someone else’s action, something they could tie into and share, if only for a minute of two. Wistful watchers of the young. Other kids on the estate had always derided them, and worse, but Mark often stopped to talk, even on the way back from a job. They had no edge, no rivalry, ten minutes chat with the aged was like taking a warm bath. A tiny slice of security in his mean life.

‘How old are you, Kelly?’

‘Uh?’

‘How old?’

‘Oh, I dunno, ’bout fifty-four, five, I reckon.’

He looked at least ten years older. Mark had never given Kelly’s life any thought, past or present, but now he wondered. He knew so little about anyone apart from Julie.

How did it feel now that he was a killer? Not much different, but when he pulled the trigger to blow Agani away he did feel another emotion, not fear, guilt, or remorse – he’d long since conquered them – but a king size stab of fucking desolation that told him that this was the extreme act of a man on his own. Someone who no longer had anything to lose. Something akin to self pity welled up in him, and he had to crush it out quickly, kill it with more action, or it would paralyse him.

‘What was it like, where you came from, originally?’ Mark asked.

Kelly was pleased with the attention, but also suspicious. No one asked him questions like this.

‘Donegal. Nice place, if you like space and not many people, and if you’re not piss-poor, like. My lot were. Most of them got out in the old days, when the spuds rotted. I came over when I was a kid, working on the motorways. Loads of us done it. Lived in caravans, followed the work. Lived like gypsies we did. That’s when the drink really started. I had the money, see, and there was not much else to do. Not when you looked like me, anyway.’

‘Haven’t you ever gone back? Gone home?’

‘Nah. Been too long now. ‘Sides, there’s nothing for me there. The Kellys are strung out all over. I’m not in touch.’

‘Would you say your life’s been normal?’

It was Kelly’s turn to smile. He gulped the rest of his beer quickly and rubbed the back of his hand over his face.

‘There ain’t no normal life, Mr Richards. Ain’t you worked that one out? There’s just life. Look, what’s wrong, Mr Richards? You’ve never talked to me like this before.’

‘Make me a fag.’

‘You what?’

‘A roll -up.’

Kelly’s hands were trembling even more than usual. Mark knew he was making him nervous. Kelly was more used to caustic abuse, he could cope with that, it established his place in the world. He thought he was being set up for something, that Mark was drawing him into something dangerous. Maybe I am, Mark thought, just by being with him, but he needed the company, someone to hang onto while he came to terms with what had happened in the last few hours. And in the last few minutes he’d seen something different in Kelly, the hopeless derelict was still there, the life waster, but he sensed a spark of something else. Maybe even intelligence. Lots of stuff lay hidden under Kelly’s rancid surface, Mark could see that now. Finding your woman slaughtered and blowing someone away did wonders for perception.

Mark drew on the smoke. It was like coming back to an old friend. He sucked it in like a kid experimenting, letting it fill his lungs, sear his chest, and make his eyes water. His body recognised the old habit but did not welcome it. It was all he could do not to splutter out a cough. Not very impressive for a hardened killer. All the old habits were coming back. His time in London was being blown away fast. Perhaps Lena was a dream, his steady life here a dream, his new found non-violence and lack of vices just a thin veneer on the skin of the real man. The one inside who was talking to him now. Psycho Eyes. He took another drag and drew out a speck of tobacco onto his tongue and this time he didn’t splutter. The nerve liked it. It had another thing to work on and tapped out its approval. Kelly was still smiling.

‘Not used to it no more, Mr Richards?’

‘Can I come back to your place?’ Mark asked.

‘What, now like? Wa’ for?’

‘I need to get some rest. Don’t want to go back to the flat.’

‘This accident’s really got to you, haven’t it? I didn’t realise you was so close to the guy.’

Mark shrugged. He put a twenty into Kelly’s moving hand.

‘Give me your key and you stay here. Have a few more drinks.’

Kelly did what he was told.

Mark leant over Kelly as he got up.

‘There might be people asking for me, but you know how to keep your mouth shut.’

Kelly’s mood changed instantly, and he became a weasel again.

‘What, the old bill?’

‘I doubt it. No, you’ll know these if you see them.’

‘You can count on me, Mr Richards.’

Mark doubted that he could, not if Kelly really knew what was going on. He walked out of the dense atmosphere of the pub into a similar one in the street. The dregs of a long day were settling into the last of the heat. Cities at this time always felt coated with dust, and the collective tiredness of a few million souls. He knew he should be more vigilant, they knew about Kelly, they knew about the flat, but there was nothing he could do about it. He was too fucking tired and at least he’d taken them by surprise. Angelo had to report back to Amsterdam, that would be tricky, telling them their boss had been blown away in front of their eyes, by someone they had never heard of. At least they’d take him seriously from now on.

Kelly’s bed-sit stank, of him mainly, body odours laced with old booze, old tobacco, unwashed clothes, a going-nowhere-never-been-anywhere kind of smell that rang bells for Mark. He pushed the door to the shower room open; the place wasn’t big enough for a bath. The toilet was right next to it. He thought of trying to freshen up but thought again when he saw the lank shower curtain and the once white wall tiles, now multi-coloured with assorted stains. There was a cheap metal cross over the washbasin, rusting at its edges, and a cracked mirror seamed with dirt.

Mark sat down on the same chair he’d used before, looked out through the same jammed window and saw the same nothing in the street. They were probably cleaning the penthouse now. Putting Agani into something that would pass as a body bag. No one would have heard the gunshots, places that pricey had good soundproofing and incurious neighbours. It might be Dungeness for Agani too, sinking down to the bottom in his girlie gown. He might lie close to Lena, Mark hated the thought of that, but there was a kind of justice in it.

Mark was asleep in minutes, thinking of lost baby brothers, thinking of Lena that first time they met, when he went back to his grotty flat like an excited kid.

‘Wake up, Mr Richards.’

Something was tugging at his shoulder. Mark pushed himself up quickly, catching Kelly by the throat and smashing him against the wall.

‘Mr Richards, for fucksake! It’s me, Kelly.’

For a moment Mark didn’t know where he was. He could have been back in the valley, being woken up after a drinking session by Daniels, the one snotty mate he’d had back on the estate. Mark’s face was inches from Kelly’s and he saw the terror in the man’s eyes. Kelly carried around the smells of the bed-sit with him, only more concentrated. They didn’t mix well with Mark’s pounding head. He slackened his grip, then released him, smoothing down his winter overcoat as an afterthought, which frightened Kelly even more.

‘Jesus Christ,’ Kelly said, ‘jumpy or what? You frightened the crap outta me. Like I said down the pub, you’re not right, Mr Richards. Not right at all.’

‘What’s the time?’

‘’Bout half ’leven. You been asleep all this time?’

‘Must have been.’

If Angelo had come for him it would have been like killing a baby. Maybe this was what he wanted, maybe he didn’t care any more.

It was raining heavily. A summer storm had emptied the street as Mark watched water make rivulets in the gutters, washing down assorted crap to the drains, where most of it gathered in pyramids of paper and plastic. A couple of kids hurried past, the boy trying vainly to protect his girl against the sudden rain. He had his arm around her and a hand raised against the sky.

‘Why don’t you go home Mr Richards? You don’ wanna be staying in a dump like mine, specially at a time like this. If you take my advice you’d go and find that woman of …’

Mark stopped him with a raised hand. Kelly lurched away from him as sharply as he could manage.

‘Don’t worry, Kelly, you’re not going to get a slap. I’m not a monster, you know. I just don’t want to hear that right now.’

Kelly looked unconvinced and Mark was lying anyway. What he really wanted was to tell Kelly everything. He wanted to badly. It was crazy, but the need to unload was great. The confession thing that Lena had talked about. He understood it a little now.

‘Was anyone sniffing round for me,’ Mark asked, ‘in the pub?’

‘Nah, just the usual Saturday night traffic.’

Mark made a decision. He’d go back to Wales for a few days. Try to take stock, get his head into some sort of shape. Let them come for him there, if they wanted. Despite his years away he still knew it better than anywhere else, and it might give him an edge.

‘Can I stay here the rest of the night, Kelly? I’ll be off first thing.’

Kelly scratched his head.

‘Yeah, all right, I s’pose. You are in some kind of bother, ain’t you?’

‘Aye, some kind.’

‘You’re not gonna bring nothing down on me?’

‘It’s nothing for you to worry about.’

No, you’re just harbouring someone who’s involved in a murder feud with the Albanian mafia. Nothing to worry about at all, Kelly.

As long as Mark was gone early there wouldn’t be any comeback for Kelly – he wasn’t worth anyone bothering about, let alone killing. After Agani they would have to be careful. The sea off Dungeness might get crowded.

‘I’ll crash out then,’ Kelly said. ‘Had a few drinks, like.’

Kelly took off his heavy coat, letting free another wave of smells. He had a thin, multi-coloured sweater on, and it was threatening to come apart. Kelly slumped down onto his bed, without removing anything else, for which Mark was thankful. He was asleep in seconds and snoring shortly afterwards. Kelly looked like a baby wrapped in tatty clothes but for one crazy moment Mark envied him. His own rest came in small bursts, dropping into sleep for ten or fifteen minutes, then waking with a start and instantly checking the street, which was invariably deserted. He heard a siren one time, but it wasn’t close, it was someone else’s drama. As he watched the street lights make orange patterns on the wet tarmac he knew the hopelessness of his position. The need for revenge still burned strongly in him, and he would try to kill Stellachi if he could, but what then?

Mark dozed again and when he woke this time the glow outside was not so strong, as the sky lightened, and dawn was half an hour away. Grey streaks were already seeping into the edge of the sky, and the rain had stopped.

Making sure that Kelly was still dead to the world Mark checked his guns. Two empty chambers in the Smith and Wesson, a full magazine in the 9mm. Thinking of his mother and all that he had surrounded her with in the past, he knew it wasn’t a good idea to go down there. Yet he felt the need to see her, to reunite for maybe the last time the remnants of the Richards family. He was surprised how strongly he felt this.

Mark put both weapons into his holdall, stepped quietly past Kelly and went into his shower room where he dashed some water in his face. He didn’t use Kelly’s towel. Stubble was sprouting up everywhere but he couldn’t be bothered to shave. He began to wake up and wanted to clean his teeth but he’d forgotten to pack any toothpaste. No point looking for any in Kelly’s fetid empire. So he just pushed a wet brush around a few times. It was better than nothing. He needed to put every sense on full alert now, or he’d be out of this game very quickly. Surprise had been on his side, but it was gone now.

Mark checked his money. What he’d paid out to Kelly had already made a hole in it. There was some in the bank and he had a credit card he rarely used. That had always been Lena’s territory. He’d never even taken money from bank machines, there was too much native distrust for leaving a trail in him.

Kelly was catching flies, his open mouth revealing graveyard teeth in various shades of brown, and a tongue that was like a small pink snake moving amongst them. He’d probably wake up mid-morning, and get up midday. First thought would be a drink and a smoke, first action would be a drink and a smoke, and the same day would start up again. It had started up again for the last twenty years of this man’s life. Mark put another twenty under the Irishman’s chin and let himself out.

It had freshened up outside, mugginess had been replaced by a cooling breeze and the sun was getting up, early morning yellow bright, but not yet too hot. Like Kelly, this time of day had been almost unknown to Mark when he was growing up, but he’d come to like it. Even if fresh starts had usually been lying bastards for him, he was not so far gone he couldn’t appreciate a sense of renewal. It was good to know that losing Lena, and killing Agani, had not taken this away completely. Even here, in the midst of eight million souls, he could think this, though Mark also knew this time of day was also a sham, for it hid all the punters, their mess, frustrations and rage. Nature had given the street a wash and brush up before people could get at it again.

Mark went out the back of Kelly’s place, where he could cut across several blocks for the next tube station. He took the first train that came in, and crossed the city to Paddington, where a just-on-duty and already pissed-off man sold him a ticket for Cardiff. One way.

He had almost an hour to wait. It was Sunday. If anyone was watching him he wasn’t aware of it. He hadn’t been to Paddington for a while. A lot of money had been spent on it. New metal was everywhere, the station’s guts had been replaced with aluminium structures, industrial style, he thought it was called, in an attempt to rid it of its old grimy look, though the roof was still the same. There was a sushi bar, not yet open, which made him think how times were changing. Times changed but not people. There were the usual weekend lost around, dossers, drunkards, people who had no reason to be here other than to shelter, and kill time.

Mark bought coffee and a roll, and a Sunday paper, the type that splashed tits and rubbish on its front. Lena would have been splashed here also if she’d been found. He imagined her cover shot, one of the best the agency could provide, good enough to interest the most jaded palette, men would eagerly turn to the additional pages inside, which would attempt to spin out her mysterious life in a few paragraphs. Shock, horror, and sex for wankers.

Mark sat in a corner that gave him the widest viewpoint while protecting his back. Gunslinger mentality. He thought about his killing of Agani. In his wild years he’d often thought what it would be like to take a life, and what it would do to the inside of his head. The answer was very little. There was just a sense of calm, of the inevitability of his action, even that it had been a natural thing to do. For Lena. He still couldn’t control himself, not when pushed past a certain point. He’d worked on his anger since being banged up, and when Lena came along he’d thought he’d got the better of it, but background will out. Mark knew it now, and was glad, for background would be needed. These bastards had killed Lena and made him a murderer. Nice work for one weekend, but they’d already paid a price. What did he have to lose now, maybe all his life he’d been heading towards this point.

Mark was jerked out of his thoughts. Kelly was approaching him, at least he thought it was Kelly, for a moment. No, just a look-alike. Another man who’d lived inside a bottle for years. Same wasted face, same stink of old booze, same shuffling gait. Running on empty.

‘Got a bit of change, mate?’ the man asked.

Mark looked at him suspiciously and checked everything in his vision.

‘Just for a cuppa tea, like.’

Mark felt for change and threw a pound coin towards him. His other hand was in his holdall, closing on the automatic. The man made a seal-like attempt to catch the pound, flailing his hands uselessly, but managed to put his foot on it to stop it rolling away. He had rivals in the station. Mark expected them to gather round him like pigeons as his train was announced.

‘Cheers, guv.’

Mark made his way towards the train. He wondered if he would ever see Kelly again. Suddenly there was a sense of loss. It would have been laughable a few days ago, but Lena had changed everything.

Mark looked through the paper. It was full of sex and death, he wondered if there was anything else in the world. It told of tragic, violent and hopeless lives, but Lena’s wasn’t there, nor Agani’s. He wondered how many others went unreported. All the underground tales of hoodlums buried in motorway concrete, in the sea, in the ground, seemed relevant now. This weekend told him it must be true. The country must be laced with its illicit dead.

Mark got on the train. There was no one sitting within ten seats of him. A few kids were down the other end, a woman with a baby, but that was it. Not many people wanted to head west this early today. He thought it safe to sleep, and did so fitfully, but alert to any movement or stop of the train, catching the odd patch of country in the corner of his eye. He wouldn’t stay with his mother for more than a few hours, it was too dangerous. With the network these people had, Julie might already be in danger anyway. Blowing Agani away had seen to that. The more Mark thought of this, of the problems of protecting her, of even telling her about this mess, the more the nerve tapped. He was about to bring down another incredible load of shit on her, no more his fault than the last, but it still flowed through him. The nerve flexed against the side of his head, he rubbed along it with his hand and it felt like a skipping rope. The pain it caused followed the rhythm of the train, flexing every few seconds. The baby of the woman a few seats down started to cry, as if in sympathy. The mother tried to comfort it but it was determined to wail. I know how you feel, kid, Mark thought.

*

It was always hard for Kelly to come back to the land of the living. Each morning, or afternoon, his body found it more of a struggle. It knew that it didn’t make sense any more, for living had become a grey line he crawled along, like a slug. Nothing too sharp, nothing too dull. Nothing too kind, nothing too human. Often nothing at all. Sometimes he wished life would let him go, before his organs packed up and a lifetime’s abuse started to really punish. At his lowest ebb he thought of doing it himself but still had too much of the old faith in him, and too much cowardice. He hadn’t been truly sober for twenty-five years but in rare moments of lucidity it amazed him how much his body had taken, and how tough his bony frame was. He was quite proud of his record in a way. Whenever he saw something in the papers about famous drunks he always related to them, feeling a kind of solidarity. When he could keep out the black dog of his depression Kelly became quite comfortable with his state, and shame and guilt vanished. Sometimes, when he came round, he’d think he was back in Donegal, under the big sky, where life was green and fresh, even hopeful, as he dreamed of crossing the water and making his fortune in the building trade. Coming home to buy a pub, his own watering hole, his badge of success in the community. Kelly’s Place. Maybe even meeting a girl. These half-sleep, half-waking thoughts of Donegal brought on a calm within. They made him feel like another drink.

Kelly was going through this routine, thinking that it was Sunday and that every day was Sunday for him, when Angelo appeared over him. One moment Kelly was blinking in the clear light of his homeland, next it was being blocked out and he was yanked up by a powerful hand.

‘Jesus and Mary, what’s goin’ on?’

‘You are Kelly. You know Mark Richards. Where is he now?’

Kelly instantly felt sick. Bile tasted of sour whisky as it rose from his gut and fear ran all over him like ants as his eyes focused on the big man leaning against the door. This one spat on his hands and smiled. Angelo pulled him from the bed and pushed him down on the chair. Play for time and act stupid. It had been his one defence in times like this, and there had been a few dangerous moments on the street over the years. Fuck it, he knew getting Mr Richards that car would mean trouble. Something hadn’t been right all weekend, but these guys weren’t the police. Never in a million years.

Angelo slapped him across the face, his hand hardly moved but it was enough to jerk his head back and make it reel. He felt like he’d been kicked by a horse, and a rotten tooth crumbled.

‘I can’t hear you, my friend,’ Angelo said, his voice barely above the level of a whisper.

‘Richards?’ Kelly answered, wiping the blood from his face with the back of his hand. Angelo had caught his nose, making his eyes water, and two thin streams of blood run down his face.

‘Kelly, Kelly, we are not going to be stupid, are we? You do things for him, we know. This weekend you done bigger things. Let him stay here. That’s okay, I understand. He’s your friend, eh? Friendship is good, no?’

Angelo nodded to the big man and turned Kelly’s head towards him.

‘He is my friend, but not nice like me. Not nice at all. He likes to hurt people, he’d like to hurt you right now.’

Angelo pressed close to Kelly. They were almost cheek to cheek.

‘Think of the pain. You are a small man, a thin man. He’ll break you up, piece by piece. He’ll start here.’

Angelo held Kelly’s scrawny arm in his hand, displaying it to the big man.

‘Yes, I know, you are frightened. I would also be frightened of him.’

No you wouldn’t, Kelly thought, you fucking wap bastard. You’ve never been frightened like I am now. He felt his bladder getting ready to empty and tried to stay as motionless as he could, but couldn’t keep the shake out of his body. His eyes continued to water, and he kept muttering oh Jesus. Like a prayer.

‘I’m gonna be sick,’ he muttered.

Angelo stepped away from him for a moment. Kelly was in a bad situation. He really didn’t know anything but they didn’t want to hear this. If he made something up they might know it was bullshit. These bastards were pros, like Mr Richards. He hated the Welshman now, for getting him into this, and he didn’t even know what the fuck this was. He couldn’t think, there was a ringing in his ears and by Christ he needed a drink. There was a half bottle of cheap whisky on table and some still left in a glass from last night. Kelly looked at it as if it was the Holy Grail. If he was a lizard he could snake out a tongue, just to get a taste.

‘Ah,’ Angelo sighed, ‘you’d like a drink, eh? Maybe later.’

Angelo beckoned to the big man, who spat on his hands and smiled. He stepped closer.

Mark woke as the train entered the Severn Tunnel. For a moment he thought it was night. He felt inside his holdall for the guns. His hand closed around the automatic, which fitted snugly into it, unlike the Smith and Wesson, which was not quite so well balanced. A good enough tool of destruction though, powerful, and to the point. He’d found that out in Agani’s flat. There’d be no trace of Agani now. They’d have taken him for a quick trip down to the Kent coast in the boot of a car, probably his own, then a short boat ride and an insignificant splash. Sinking down, his money and power over in the pull of a trigger. Mark wished now that he’d shot him in both knees and left him alive, that would have been more lasting.

He scanned his face in the train’s window. It was getting to be a habit. Did he look like a hunted man? Tick. A haunted man? Tick. A murderer? What did one of those look like? The smudges under his eyes were getting bigger, like dabs of dark blue face paint, and he could smell himself. He was in a great state to see his mother. That time with Lena had been his only trip back in five years. They hadn’t even managed a Christmas. Doubt crept in. Maybe it was better not to go there, just take off for the hills. Buy a few supplies and let them come to him. They would come.

Mark still missed the open places a stone’s throw from the house of his childhood. The hillsides were the closest things he had to security when growing up. They hid him, when things were tough, and were quiet and calm when he was boiling inside; they replaced people. If you are running, it was best to run in a land you knew. It would not be long before they were on his trail, but Angelo, Stellachi and anyone else they sent were city boys, they preferred concrete and cars. There was a flash of light as the train exited the tunnel. Wales, Mark thought, whatever that meant.

He slept again until the train pulled into Cardiff. Half-hour naps might be the norm from now on, but at least he was used to this. It had often been necessary on the agency jobs, watching people like a thief in the night, and cat-napping in between. Mark trod cautiously around the station, it wasn’t possible anyone would be here yet, but thinking the impossible might keep him alive. All was quiet. Tail end of summer traffic and not much else. He got another coffee and a sandwich and was filling up with caffeine and bread. It was a pity it was a Sunday. He needed to buy stuff, hillside stuff, clothes, food, maybe a tent. What he was wearing would have to do.

Mark delayed going to his mother’s place for a while. She’d always had the ability to see right into him and he wasn’t quite ready. Two young coppers walked past. It was true about the shaving, Mark thought, and I’m now old enough to think it. They walked just feet away from the guns. For a moment he wanted them to ask what was in the holdall. It would be the spot check of their lives and his problems would be over for the next twenty years. Nah, he’d rather go out with his boots on rather than be banged up, that would be a slow death of thousands of weeks. He’d learnt that as a young offender. The policemen walked away from him without another glance and Mark exited the station. He went to the nearest taxi.

His mother was five miles away, on the edge of Cardiff, and the sea. Mark walked around a bit before he relocated her flat, one of a block of ten. It had a good view of the channel. Even on a sunny day it looked like grey sludge, but the sky was high and free. He ran a hand through his hair as he rang the bell and stood back with the most upbeat look he could conjure up. A man answered.

It was not what Mark had expected. It hadn’t occurred to him that Julie would ever meet anyone again, but at least this chap was in a different class from his many runtish uncles of the old days. They eyed each other suspiciously. The guy was in his early fifties, about the same height as Mark and had kept himself fit. Mark saw the edge of a tattoo on his T-shirted right arm. Three feathers. Probably ex-army.

‘We’re not interested in religion,’ the man said.

‘I’m not selling God, mate. I’m Mark, Julie’s …’

‘Good God, what are you doing here?’

Julie appeared, pushing the man to one side.

‘Thought I’d come down.’

Julie gave him that age-old look that told him she knew everything, even if she didn’t. There was more than a moment’s silence.

‘You better come in then. Why didn’t you phone?’

‘Wanted to surprise you.’

‘Well, you done that. Oh, Carl, this is Mark, my son.’

Mark stuck out a reluctant hand and it was taken by one equally reluctant.

‘How do,’ Carl said.

‘All right.’

‘Give your mother a hug, then.’

They held each other briefly. He’d forgotten how light Julie was, like a young girl in his arms.

He knew his mother would be seething inside, he’d intruded on her new life, without any warning, and on a Sunday, which would mean something was up. He wondered how much Carl knew of the Richards past. Not much if Julie been sensible. She had a new life, so why not a new man. He’d hated the endless succession of hopeless wasters when he was a lad, none of them interested in him, and some too handy with their fists. Until he got too big. This Carl was nothing like any them, he looked more a doer than a taker. Perhaps he came with the new territory.

‘How have you come down?’ Julie asked.

‘Train. I had a taxi here.’

‘Just you?’

‘Looks like.’

Carl didn’t like this. He’d be the type to say don’t talk to your mother like that, if Mark had been fifteen years younger.

‘Do you want something to eat?’ Julie said.

Now that the shock was wearing off, his mother was glad to see him. She fussed with her hair, and pushed him towards the sofa. They’d obviously been in bed when he’d knocked.

‘Sit there, I’ll get you a coffee to start.’

Great. He was turning into caffeine city. From the sofa Mark could see through the window to the coastline and the town that curved away from it. Terraced roofs were catching the sun and flashing the sea a silver salute. His mother had found a nice spot. Mark put the holdall between his feet and could feel the guns through the canvas.

‘Sorry just to barge in like this,’ Mark said, ‘spur of the moment type of thing.’

Whatever he’d planned to tell Julie was now knocked off course, but after the last few days, this came as no surprise. His whole life had been knocked off course.

Carl picked up a Sunday paper and pretended to ignore him but Mark knew he was watching him over the top of the paper, checking him out and wondering if his presence would change things. He got up and went into the kitchen. Carl thought of saying something but kept the paper in front of his face.

‘Why didn’t you tell me you were coming down?’ Julie whispered, pushing the kitchen door shut.

‘How long’s this guy been around?’

‘Not too long. You’re not going to stick your oar in, are you?’

‘No, why should I? We’ve moved on from stuff like that now, Mam – haven’t we?’

‘I bloody hope so. What’s wrong, Mark?’

‘What?’

‘What’s going on? I know something is. As soon as I saw you at the door.’

The thought of telling her, with her new bloke yards away, was not on. Carl had made up his mind for him.

‘Nah, everything’s cool. Just fancied a short break, that’s all.’

‘It’s awkward now. Carl is stopping.’

‘Oh, I didn’t mean here. I thought I’d hire a car, have a drive around, that type of stuff.’

‘There is something up. You’ve finished with that Lena, haven’t you?’

‘Nothing ever gets past you, Mam. Okay, yes, I have. Just the other day. It’s over.’

‘I never thought that was meant to be.’

‘What, after seeing her just the once?’

Julie shrugged, ‘Just a feeling. It’s difficult when a woman is that good-looking. Most men would be always looking over their shoulder.’

She was about to spoon sugar into his coffee.

‘Don’t take that no more. Just as it comes.’

‘God, you have changed. Well, I’d like to say you’re looking good but you look like you’ve been clubbing all weekend.’

In the past it was Julie who’d always looked like she’d been out on the tiles, though it was usually just life taking its toll on her face. Their long grind on little money and even less opportunity. Julie looked good today, better than Mark could ever remember. She must be close to fifty now but her face had lost some of its tiredness and her blue eyes had regained a little sparkle. Maybe she was dealing with Shane at last, maybe this Carl fella was good for her.

‘Where did you meet him?’ Mark jerked a thumb towards the door.

‘In a pub in town a few months ago. I was going to tell you, next time you phoned. Carl’s all right. He’s a builder, got a small business. He’s on his own now, like me, so I thought, why not? And no, he doesn’t know nothing about the wonderful Richards family.’

‘Well, you’re looking good on it.’

‘Thanks.’

‘I don’ think you’ll ever do anything normal,’ Julie muttered. ‘You turn up, disappear, turn up again, like you always did. The Richards family is good at disappearances. It’s okay, I’m not going to start. And I don’ want Carl to know neither. It doesn’t help, talking about it.’

‘Good at disappearances, Mam, not very good at normal. That could be our family motto.’

‘Aye, you got that right.’

‘So, you met Carl in a pub, eh?’

‘I thought I might try returning to the land of the living, ’specially now that I’m working. I went with some of the girls from the factory. They were girls too, I was old enough to be their mother.’

‘Moved in a bit quick, hasn’t he?’

‘Ah, now that sounds like the old Mark. Carl’s had a messy divorce and needed to get away from his old place for a while. Besides, I’ve decided life is all about speed. For people like us, anyway. I’ll make you a breakfast. I got plenty of stuff in. Carl eats like you used to. Go back in the lounge, we shouldn’t be whispering in here.’

Mark went in and stood by the window. The sky was taking on a deeper blue, with just a few clouds scudding away over the Somerset coast. Carl rustled his paper. He’ll start to check me out any second, Mark thought, but maybe it’s better that he’s here. I can’t tell Julie anything now.

‘Living in London?’ Carl said.

‘Aye. For a few years now.’

‘Like it?’

‘It’s all right. It’s where the work is.’

‘What work’s that then?’

‘Bits and pieces. Bit of investigation work, bodyguard stuff.’

‘Well, you got the frame for it. I used to be pretty fit myself.’

It’s all right, mate, you don’t have to fight me for my mother. Mark might have said this out loud a few years back. Before Lena. It would always be before Lena and after Lena from now on. BL and AL.

Mark sat in the chair opposite Carl. He wanted to shut his eyes but Lena lay behind them. On that bloody bed, in the boot of the Lexus, dropping into the black sea. He knew what would be happening to her body now and detested the knowledge.

‘You look done in, mate,’ Carl said.

‘Been doing a lot of work. That’s why I’m down. To have a few days off.’

‘Oh.’

Carl studied his paper again and they sat in silence until Julie called them into the kitchen and the small table there.

‘Two breakfasts ready.’

Mark ate everything in front of him. It amazed him how he could. How instinct took over when the brain had been fried as well as the crispy bacon on his plate. He didn’t want it to be Sunday. He wouldn’t be able to get a car and couldn’t stay here now. Perhaps it would be better to take a train up to the valleys and find a B & B, if there were any left up there.

‘I got a good idea,’ Julie said. ‘Since you’ve turned up like this, why don’t we all go for a run in Carl’s car, get a spot of lunch.’

Both men glared at their plates.

‘We could have a few drinks. You an’ Carl can get to know each other.’

She nudged Carl in the ribs. ‘You can’t drink much, mind, you’re driving. I’m going to have a shower and get ready.’

‘You’re ex-army, aren’t you,’ Mark said. He nodded at Carl’s arm.

‘Yip, career soldier me. Made sergeant.’

‘Mam said you were a builder.’

‘Went into it after. Done all right, too.’

He’s been in Ireland, in the Falklands, he’s the right age, Mark thought. Pity he was getting on a bit, he might have been useful if Angelo showed up. Christ, get a grip, Mark. What you thinking of, shooting it out with deputy Carl from your mother’s flat, the last act of a proven madman.

‘You working now?’ Mark asked.

‘Got a new job starting next week. Don’t worry, I’m not sponging off Julie.’

Carl’s face reddened as he said this, and he jabbed hard at his bacon.

Time rushed back twenty years, when Mark had hidden upstairs in their two-bedroomed shoebox of a house while some new uncle played tricks with Julie’s head, trying to close his ears to the wild drunken shouting that cut through thin walls like a knife. Sometimes they played tricks with her body   don’ you dare hit me you bastard   then that dull, vicious sound of blows that he could still hear in his mind. As Carl waited for his response Mark saw himself sticking his head under a pillow to deaden the noise, wanting to be older, a man who would come rushing downstairs to protect his mother, not a ten-year-old kid who sometimes ran out the back of the house in fear and desperation, over the busted fence and onto the hillside, where he’d hide out on a dark night. Coming back hours later to Julie’s marked-up face.

‘No problem. Didn’t think you were,’ Mark said.

‘All right, then. I wouldn’t want us to get off on the wrong foot. I like your mother, she’s got a bit about her. I know she’s had a hard life. She hasn’t said much but I’m not stupid.’

‘I wouldn’t want her life to be hard any more,’ Mark said quietly.

‘Point taken. How’d you get so big, anyway? Julie’s only a little dot.’

‘Old man maybe.’

‘No contact?’

‘Person unknown.’

‘We got that in common then. That’s why I went in the army. As soon as I could. All my mates were into that sixties stuff, but I shaved my head and got into guns. It helped a bit because I used to get bloody frustrated ‘bout everything. Would have got into trouble if I’d I hung around the estate.’

You’re singing my song, mate, Mark thought. I did hang around, and made my own trouble. Strange that Julie should take up with someone not unlike himself. Or maybe not so strange.

‘You two having a nice chat,’ Julie said.

‘Can I use the shower, Mam?’ Mark asked. ‘It was a bit of a rush, catching the first train down.’

‘I can see that. I didn’t like to say. You could do with a shave too.’

Mark took the holdall with him. He showered, then shaved, looking at the face of a murderer. He’d finally got there. It was the eyes that were different, they’d always been hard, inward-looking, brooking no interference, but there was another quality there now. He didn’t have the words to explain it, but he knew that they had changed, even as he stared at himself they seemed to be looking elsewhere. Looking at too much knowledge. It had taken him a long time to learn not to think back too much, Lena had helped him with this, but now all that forward movement was lost. Lena, then Agani, had told him the truth about his life, and its past. Maybe her loss was an overdue punishment for losing Shane.

Mark started to think about Stellachi. The man’s image was fixed in his mind now, and he wondered if Stellachi would be doing the same with him. His face in that Rome photograph was gaunt, the smile a joke, the eyes button-dead. There was no excess weight on him, his body would be bone hard, heart and brain the same, and he would have enjoyed his work with Lena. Why else do it? But it had got Agani killed, other people in the organisation wouldn’t like that. Stellachi would be under pressure, as much as a man like that ever could be. Mark would be hunted down, and Stellachi would have others to call on besides Angelo and the big man. Let them come, Mark thought, as he shaved off the last of his dark bristles. Let them all come, for I’m also hunting them. He knew that, in the end, it would come down to him and Stellachi. A matter of need for each of them. Maybe Stellachi would have another look round the flat, he’d have lots of images to study. Mark was glad he’d taken the one of him and Lena.

‘Have you gone to sleep in there?’ Julie rapped on the door. ‘Come on, the day’s half over already.’

She was excited, Mark realised. This was the first time he’d been anywhere with her and another man. At the age of thirty. The thought of Carl as another uncle brought the hint of a smile to his lips, though his face was dark, tired, and set in determination. Tight lines stretched from his eyes, and he’d managed to cut his chin. Killers might already be on their way from London, and he was about to go for a trip with his mother and her boyfriend. To the seaside.

Julie led the way and Mark blinked in the sunlight. There were plenty of people about, and he tried to check everyone out without Julie noticing it. Carl glanced at him a few times. His car was parked at the back of the flats. It was an old Merc, a geriatric version of the one Tony had. It was even the same colour, if you looked closely through the dirt.

‘Bought this off an hairdresser,’ Carl said. ‘It’s like me, old, but goes well.’

‘Plenty of room in it,’ Julie said, ‘where do you want to go, Mark? Carl don’t mind, do you, Carl?’

You poor bastard, Carl, feet under the table with Julie, a nice Sunday, and I show up. And he knows something is going on. Something more than the end of a relationship. I’m looking around like he did on the streets of Belfast.

‘Wherever,’ Mark said.

‘How about down to the Gower, we went there last weekend, didn’ we, Carl? I’d never been before. Can you believe it?’

Course I can, Mam. We never went anywhere, remember. I didn’t make one school trip. Being banged up in Portland was my first real trip, in the back of a police van, looking through the bars at my first close-up view of the sea.

Mark had glimpsed the sea from the tops of the local hills, like some peasant from another time who never left the village. That grey sliver of channel that looked like molten lead in the sun had been part of his landscape, a vital but unknown part.

Julie was living a little, grabbing at a tiny slice of life that had mostly been denied her – and he was putting it in danger. This was one reason to be glad Carl was with her, that she might gain a little happiness was another. Mark told himself that Angelo and the others would not want any trouble here. Carl would make it awkward for them, and they had nothing to gain from it. He kept telling himself this.

As Mark sat in the back of the car like a kid, the image of Stellachi knocking on Julie’s door was a powerful one. The bogeyman calling, if ever there was one. He ran his hand over the worn leather of the seat and let himself drift into an uneasy sleep. Before he shut his eyes he caught Julie’s, looking at him in the vanity mirror, and, for once, they weren’t full of questions, or pain.

She gave him a shy smile, and thought she had a family back.