Faces (28 page)

What he did know, though, was that his relationship with this young woman had been the cause of his son’s deep insecurity. He knew that his son’s biggest fear was another child arriving, a child that would be his in every way. Donald knew that would never happen; with all the women he had fucked over the years, if he had been firing live ammunition there would have been proof of it long before. The truth was, and he couldn’t tell Jamie this now, of course, was that he had long ago resigned himself to having his name live on through him. Through Jamie, through the same treacherous little fucker that he had given that name to so proudly all those years before. After all, he had lived the lie so long, it was stupid not to keep it up after he was dead. Now it seemed he would be dead long before his allotted time if his surrogate son had anything to do with it.

He heard a faint noise in the hallway and, assuming it was Deirdre’s cat coming through the flap in the front door, he lay back in the chair and feasted his eyes once more on the true love of his life.

It was only when the door burst open, and he saw Danny Boy and Michael bearing down on him like avenging angels, that he realised he had left it too long to do anything about any of it now. Danny Boy smiled that wide smile of his, the same smile that made him look for all the world like a normal healthy young man. Which just proved that looks could be deceiving all right.

Deirdre was now awake, and her frightened eyes were wide open, making her look like a demented smurf.

Donald realised then that he had been expecting this, which was why he had not been able to sleep, and he knew then that he had accepted his fate, welcomed it even in some ways. ‘So, what’s brought you here, Danny Boy? Your father has already been in and asked me to spare you if it all goes off. Begged for your life, he did, unlike my namesake who wants me taken out. I assume you haven’t spoken to your old man yet.’

Danny looked at the terrified girl and motioned for her to stay put. Then he dragged Donald Carlton out into the hallway by his clothes, the sheer force of his strength making the man’s feet leave deep drag-lines in the shag-pile carpet. And, with the smell of pine disinfectant in his nostrils, and the hysterical weeping of Deirdre in his ears, Danny Boy shot Donald Carlton in the face at point-blank range. The noise was not as loud as he had expected it to be, yet the blood was far more than he had anticipated. It was only when he realised that the man was still bleeding profusely because his heart was still beating, that he shot him once more, this time through the back of his head. Brains and bone were scattered everywhere, especially on Danny Boy’s trousers but, shrugging nonchalantly, he looked at the ashen-faced Michael and grinned happily. Then, licking his finger, he chalked an imaginary ‘one’ in the air before saying happily, ‘One down, and one to go.’

Michael pulled himself together and, going back into the bedroom, he looked at the weeping girl on the bed but, before he could say anything, Danny Boy was beside him and, dragging her by the hair out into the hallway, threw her onto the lifeless body of her lover and said loudly, ‘Go to your mum’s, or a mate’s, just fucking go. You ever open your fucking trap about tonight and I’ll hunt you down like a dog.’

He knew he wouldn’t have to repeat the words, there was no way she was ever going to open her mouth about the night’s events. And, even if she did, she wouldn’t live long enough to testify. He had given her a fucking result and, if she had any brains, she would realise that and act accordingly. She was local, she knew the score: trap shut, and she would be left in peace, a few quid would wing its way to her when the heat died down. She would learn to live with the situation. She wasn’t the first woman to be caught up in a personal vendetta and she certainly wouldn’t be the last. She was gone in minutes.

Michael and Danny Boy left the flat then, and Danny made a point of locking the front door behind them. Let Old Bill break in if they had to, he was certainly not going to make it easy for them. Now he had decided what he was going to do, he just wanted it all over. The adrenaline was coursing through his veins and he felt alive; extreme violence always gave him a rush, and he knew he enjoyed it far more than he should have done.

As he walked out of the flats with Michael he saw a group of youths not much younger than them. They were scrutinising him and he looked back at them as if seeing them for the first time. They were scruffy, they were obviously on drugs and, to him, they were the lowest of the low. The fact that any one of them could have been him had he not had the strength of mind to make his mark on the world bothered him. It was a reminder of where he had come from, of what he was fighting against on a daily basis. His early start in life had pretty much guaranteed him a useless existence. He knew that better than anyone. His father had tried to make sure he had not had a chance of making anything of himself. Had made it plain that his life and his younger siblings’ lives were not worth anything to the man who had been the reason they were there in the first place. He had been conceived, like the others, without a thought for the consequences of the sexual act, and without any love whatsoever. He knew that these young men, with their skinheads, their Levis, and their officer boots had been conceived in exactly the same way. It was as if they had been born knowing they were worthless, that their lives were not precious to anybody, least of all themselves. That the futility of their existence was just further proof that they were nothing more than a celestial joke, only they were the recipients of that joke, having never meant to be in a position where they belonged anywhere.

Michael, who had already unlocked their car and was still reeling from the gun shots and Danny Boy’s complete easiness with death, swallowed down his fear of the person he loved more than anyone else in the world. He knew this night would make them or break them and, even though he didn’t really want any part of it, would have preferred to have stepped back and dissolved quietly once more into the obscurity he craved, he also knew he couldn’t do that. He had to see this thing through to the end, even though he wanted no part of any of it.

Danny Boy snarled at the boys, knowing they knew exactly who he was, and hating them for knowing who he was, for wanting to be like him, as if that was an option. They were the cannon fodder he would use when the need arose. But he forced his anger away, they had heard the shots and were streetwise enough to guess what had gone down, so he walked over to them and said in a friendly manner, ‘All right, boys, any chance of a fag?’

Michael watched as the young thugs searched through their pockets for cigarettes, all praying for the opportunity to be able to say that Danny Boy Cadogan had spent time in their company. Guaranteeing their loyalty and their silence.

If it hadn’t been so sad to see, it would have been laughable.

 

Ange was unable to sleep; her husband had gone out hours earlier and had not been near or by since. Usually this didn’t bother her, but as she suspected he had gone to see Donald Carlton she felt she had a genuine reason to worry for a change. Big Dan had gone to try and limit the damage that he might have caused with his careless chatter. It was her husband’s big trap that had seen to it that her son’s private dealings had somehow become common knowledge. Even though he had sworn to her that he had not talked to anyone of import, he had still not been able to resist talking about his son’s private and personals with people Danny Boy would have crossed the road to avoid. It was Danny Boy’s own fault; he had talked too much in front of his father, a man she had never once told anything of any import because he had what was known locally as a loose lip. Danny Boy, however, had not been able to resist rubbing in his new-found status, had enjoyed letting his father know how well he was doing, and how much he was earning. It was something she could understand to an extent; Danny Boy was still only a boy really and, as such, he was programmed to act like one. But, for someone who had carved such a unique niche in the world, she had been annoyed that he was willing to spoil it all just to make a point to a man he had already cowed years before.

She slipped from the bed and pulled on her dressing gown; it had a pretty floral design that made her look fatter than ever. Not that she was bothered about that fact, what she looked like was something she had stopped worrying about many years before. As she went to the kitchen she heard whispering. And, walking into her daughter’s bedroom she was stunned to see her daughter, her beautiful but ignorant daughter, sitting on her bed kissing a young man with a ponytail and a degenerate look in his eye. His leather jacket was thrown casually across the wicker chair she had painted white so lovingly many moons ago. And his trainers, as they called them now, were unlaced and lying on the pale pink carpet she had hoovered only that morning. Annie was half dressed, her shirt was open, and her jeans were lying in a crumpled heap on the bedspread beside her. It took Ange a few moments to understand fully what they had actually been doing when she had walked in on them, then it was the realisation of what was so obviously going on between them that sent her over the edge. Like she didn’t have enough on her plate with a murderer for a son, she now had to deal with a whore. Turning on the light, she looked at the daughter she had adored and, seeing her as she was at that moment, her mouth smeared with pink lipstick and her heavy breasts rising and falling from her earlier exertions, Ange lost any hope of curtailing the temper that she knew was legendary to most people in the world she inhabited. As she launched herself at her daughter the young man was already off the bed and pulling on his shoes. He was not a local boy; if he had been the knowledge that she was Danny Boy Cadogan’s little sister would have guaranteed his refusal to step inside her home, no matter what she might have offered him. The boy was watching the mother and daughter as they rolled around the bed, all hair and teeth, their language shocking even to him. As Ange punched her daughter as she would have punched a man, the boy practically ran from the room, leaving his new amour to sort it all out by herself.

Annie was already crying and the mascara she had layered on so thickly was burning her eyes out. She stopped fighting her mother then, she knew she was out of order, but she also knew this was something that was going to happen again and again. She hated the way she was kept locked up like an animal. Hated having to account for every second away from the bosom of her family. Loathed her mother who, she was sure, only curtailed her because she was jealous of her youth and her popularity. Ian Peck might not have been the answer to a maiden’s prayers, but he had made her feel like any other teenage girl with his kisses and his false promises.

‘Fuck off, Mum, and leave me alone.’

She was attempting to disengage her mother’s hands from her hair. She knew that a lot of it had been ripped out in the mêlée. She was also aware that her lip was bleeding and, as she tried to sit herself up, she was surprised at her mother’s sudden retreat. Standing in the doorway Ange turned and looked at her daughter and it seemed to her that, for the first time ever, she could see the girl for what she really was.

‘You whore . . . Is that what you go to the night classes for, is it? To learn whoring. You even talk like one now as well.’ She was almost spitting out the words in her anger. Her heart was hammering so hard inside her chest she really thought she was going to have a heart attack.

‘You fucking bitch of hell, that you’d bring that scum into my home, the home I clean and polish so you’ll have a nice place to live, the home I try and keep
safe
for you, so you’ll never know the power of fear. And what do you do, eh, you sully everything with your fucking whoring . . .’

She once more launched herself at her daughter, the blows flying fast, and with all the strength she could muster behind each one. She concentrated on her daughter’s face and shoulders, determined to leave her mark on her. Make sure the girl remembered this night as vividly as she knew she always would.

As Ange felt her fists sinking into her daughter’s soft flesh she was aware of a hatred that was so intense she could almost taste it. Seeing her girl, her baby, with her jeans off and her top wide open displaying her breasts, while that little bastard took what he wanted, his cock hanging out of his trousers and her daughter’s hand caressing it, would never leave her. She would be reminded of it every time she looked at her daughter, no matter if Annie took to wearing a yashmak. That terrible image was now burned onto her memory and it had removed every other picture she possessed of her young daughter’s life. It was not only the fact she had brought a boy into her home, into her bedroom, it was more that she knew now that her daughter, her baby, was not a good girl; she knew instinctively that her daughter had done this before. She knew, as sure as anything, that this girl was happy to be touched and used by the likes of that young man. A greasy-haired stranger who had seen her precious daughter as nothing more than a filthy interlude in his quest for sexual favours and easy gratification. Her daughter’s complete ease with her state of undress told her mother that she had done this kind of thing many times in the past. It took a long time before young women felt confident about showing off their bodies and, as far as she was concerned, only whores were comfortable stripping off for complete strangers. Ange finally felt her anger wane and stopped the brutal attack that had left her daughter bloody and bruised. She stared at Annie as if she had never seen her before in her life then, shaking her head slowly, she hawked deep in her throat and gobbed into the face of the daughter she had once revered and adored.

Lying on the bed, the spittle running down her cheekbone and the blood seeping into the cotton sheets, Annie cried like she had not cried in years. Unmoved by her daughter’s sobs, Ange left the room quietly, shutting the door gently behind her. It was a symbolic act: she had shut her daughter out of her life already; never again would she look at her without seeing that grubby boy’s erect penis, and her daughter’s overflowing brassiere. She would always see the cheapness of the child she had tried desperately to keep innocent, keep pure. Had tried so hard to keep her away from the hurt of men like her father, and the knowledge of what they were capable of.