Shafted (14 page)

‘You’ve
got
to be kidding me,’ Patrick snorted. ‘I didn’t even know he could
write
!’

‘Don’t be cheeky,’ Nora scolded, carrying the teas over to the table and placing Larry’s down in front of him. ‘Our Derek’s very smart. He’s the only one of you buggers who came out of school with certificates, anyhow.’

‘For
swimming
,’ Patrick reminded her scathingly. Rolling his eyes at Larry now, he pulled a chair out from under the table and sat down. ‘So what’s this show our kid’s entered himself for?’

‘It’s called
Gotcha!
’ Larry explained, wishing that Terri had chosen a better title because this one
still
sounded shit. ‘It’s just a regular type of game show, really. Contestants answer different categories of questions through three rounds, knocking each other out along the way until there’s only two left.’

‘Sounds just like your other show, that.’

‘Kind of, but there’s a twist at the end when the last two go head to head. Instead of just answering straight questions at that point, they have to convince their opponents that they know the answer even if they don’t. And the one who makes the other one fold is the winner.’

Mulling this over for a moment, Patrick said, ‘I’m sure I’ve seen something like that before with Ant and Dec. Sounds all right, though. And our Dex would be pretty good at it if it’s a case of blagging your way through, ’cos he can bullshit like no one on Earth, him.’

‘He’s certainly got the gift of the gab,’ Nora agreed, quickly adding for Larry’s benefit: ‘But he’s not malicious with it. He’s just a bit of a joker, that’s all.’

Exchanging a wry smirk with Molly, Patrick said, ‘When’s he on, then? ’Cos I’ll have to get all the lads round for a laugh.’

‘Actually, we’re filming it today,’ Larry told him. ‘But it won’t be shown over here just yet, because it’s only a pilot at this stage.’

‘A what?’

‘A kind of practice run – to see if it gets a good enough response to merit commissioning a full series,’ Larry explained. ‘It’ll only be broadcast in the States to start with,’ he went on, the disappointment in his voice genuine as he added, ‘Bit of a bummer for me, because I could really do with getting back on my feet over here. But it will be good for the contestants, because there’s a good chance they’ll get a fee for agreeing to let it be shown over there.’

‘You mean the jammy twat will get paid even if he doesn’t win?’

‘Absolutely.’

‘And what if he
does
win?’

‘Twenty grand, and – potentially – a Range Rover Sports with full body kit.’

‘No way!’ Patrick gasped. ‘Are you shitting me?’

Smiling, Larry said, ‘No, I’m not
shitting
you. We want the pilot to be as good as, if not better than the real show.’ Shaking his head when Nora offered him another cigarette, he took out his own pack and offered these round instead, saying, ‘We knew the contestants would be disappointed about not seeing themselves on TV over here, so we decided to throw in the car to soften the blow –
and
to make us look better, of course. You know what those Yanks are like for having to have everything bigger and better than anyone else. We’re pretty sure it’ll be a hit, though, because we’ve been careful to choose only big characters for the pilot – like your Derek.’

‘I wish
I
’d known about it,’ Patrick said disappointedly. ‘I’d be great on something like that, me. Any chance of getting me on instead of him, or what?’

Giving him a mock-regretful smile, Larry shook his head. ‘Sorry, not this time. But you can always apply for the proper show –
if
it gets commissioned.’

‘Oh, it’s bound to,’ Nora piped up confidently. ‘What, with you
and
our Dex on this pilot? It’ll be bloody marvellous.’

‘Mmm,’ Larry murmured, glancing pointedly at his watch. ‘Only if we can find him in the next hour and make sure he hasn’t changed his mind about appearing.’

‘Oh, bloody hell,’ Nora said, looking around for the phone. ‘I said I’d ring him, didn’t I? Got a head like a flaming sieve, me.’ Clicking her fingers at Molly now, she pointed at the phone on the ledge and told her to pass it over. Tapping in the number, she listened for a moment, then tutted loudly. ‘Switched off.’

‘Oh, dear,’ Larry said, as if he was really disappointed. ‘Be such a shame if he misses the deadline and loses out on the chance to win that twenty grand.’

‘
And
the car,’ Patrick reminded him.

‘He won’t go for it,’ Molly said quietly, startling Larry because he’d forgotten she was still here.

‘Don’t be thick,’ Patrick sneered. ‘’Course he will, or he wouldn’t have applied.’

‘I don’t think he
did
apply,’ Molly persisted, looking at Nora now. ‘Come on, Nan . . . can
you
honestly see me dad sending off for something like that?’

‘Summat like what?’ Dex Lewis asked, striding in through the back door just then.

Stomach flipping at the sight of him, Larry swallowed hard and prayed that Nora and the others would protect him if Dex went for his throat. Because the man was absolutely enormous, with the broadest shoulders Larry had ever seen, and the thickest, most muscular thighs.

Standing behind his brother’s chair now, Dex peered down at Larry with dark, unreadable eyes. Giving an upward jerk of his chin after a moment, he said, ‘You who I think you are?’

‘Er, I don’t know,’ Larry replied, his face frozen in a grin as he made an effort to stop shaking. ‘Depends if you’re thinking along the lines of Brad Pitt or Leonardo Di Caprio. Common enough mistake, either way.’

Giving a tiny, crooked smile, Dex slid the hood down off his head, revealing a closely shaved map of battle-trophy scars. ‘What you doing round here, then?’

Laughing, because it was the first thing everybody had asked so far when they’d seen Larry, Nora got up and went to pour Dex a cup of tea, telling him over her shoulder, ‘He’s come to give you the surprise of your bloody life, that’s what. And if you didn’t keep switching your bloody phone off all the time, you’d have known, wouldn’t you, ’cos I’d have told you.’

‘Oh aye?’ Taking her vacated seat and helping himself to one of her cigarettes, Dex peered at Larry with curiosity. ‘What’s going on, then?’

‘You’ve been picked to go on that new show of his,’ Patrick blurted out before Larry had a chance to open his mouth. ‘Twenty grand and a kitted-out Range Rover Sports, and all you’ve got to do is blag some fucker that you know the answer to a question even if you don’t.’

‘I’ve been picked?’ Dex frowned suspiciously. ‘From what?’

‘From the application you sent in,’ Patrick reminded him, grinning as he added, ‘Bet you thought we wouldn’t find out, didn’t you, you crafty shite? Scared I’d go in for it an’ all and beat you, were you?’

His gaze still fixed on Larry, Dex pursed his lips and shook his head. ‘I didn’t enter for nothing.’

‘
Told
you,’ Molly declared, giving Nora a triumphant look. No one knew her dad better than she did – and she didn’t care
who
they thought they were.

Ignoring her, Nora said, ‘You sure, son? You don’t reckon you might have done it when you was a bit –’ pausing, she cast a surreptitious glance at Larry before adding ‘–
drunk
?’

Knowing full well that she meant stoned, Dex shook his head. You forgot a lot of shit when you caned as much weed as he did, but not something like this.

Flapping her hand, Nora said, ‘Oh, well, whatever. You liked his other show when you and me used to watch it, didn’t you?’

‘I only watched it with you ’cos you was sick and I was looking after you,’ Dex muttered, hoping that Larry didn’t get the impression that he was a fan, or anything, because that would be too fucking gay for words. ‘But I still didn’t enter myself for nothing.’Turning to Larry now, he said, ‘No offence, mate, but it ain’t my kind of thing.’

‘Are you off your
head
?’ Patrick piped up. ‘You could win twenty grand and a Range Rover
Sports
. Addy would bite our
hands
off for one of them! Shit, man, we could send it straight to the Dam without involving him, ’cos we wouldn’t even have to worry about the paperwork. We’d be minted.’

‘
We
?’ Turning his head slowly, Dex gave his brother one of the coldest stares Larry had ever seen. ‘I didn’t hear no mention of
your
name, so how comes you’re trying to claim a slice?’

‘I was only saying,’ Patrick muttered sulkily. ‘No need to bite me head off.’

Afraid that Dex would turn on him next, Larry almost jumped out of his skin when his mobile began to ring in his pocket. Hands shaking, he pulled it out and glanced at the screen. Seeing the name ‘Inky’, which told him that it was Inspector Keeton checking that everything was all right, he bit his lip then switched it off. He was having enough trouble keeping up the pretence without having to chat to a policeman in front of these people as well. He just hoped that Keeton didn’t take it as a sign of trouble and come rushing in, because Larry was sitting too close to Dex for comfort, and was bound to be first in the firing line if he kicked off.

Everybody was peering at him when he glanced up again, curious to know why he’d ignored the call. Thinking on his feet, he shrugged, and said, ‘My producer. She’ll only be bugging me to see if I’ve had any luck with Derek, but she can wait till I get back to the studio. No point embarrassing myself having you guys hearing me get an ear-bashing.’ Grinning sheepishly now, he stood up. ‘Anyway, thanks for your hospitality, Mrs Lewis, but I’d best get moving.’ Then, smiling at the rest of them, ‘Nice meeting you all. And I’m sorry it didn’t work out, Derek, but you know where we are if you change your mind.’

‘Do I?’ Dex looked amused. ‘And how’s that, then? ’Cos I sure as hell ain’t psychic.’

Reminding him that the phone number was on the letters they’d sent him, Larry saw the blank look in his eyes and frowned. ‘Don’t tell me you didn’t get them? Christ, no wonder you didn’t know what I was talking about.’ Exhaling wearily now, he ran a hand through his hair. ‘We sent you the gold ticket to let you know that you were through, and then wrote twice after that asking you to confirm that you were coming. I can’t
believe
you didn’t get them. And here’s me, turning up with the car, expecting you to hop right in it and come to the studio with me.’

‘You know what?’ Dex said thoughtfully. ‘I
did
get something gold the other week, but I thought it was one of them “You’ve won the Dutch lottery” bollocks, so I binned it. Don’t remember getting any letters, though.’

‘Did they come in official envelopes?’ Nora asked Larry now. ‘Only, if they did, he’d have binned them an’ all, knowing him.’

‘I’m not sure,’ Larry admitted. ‘But I wish I’d thought to check, because I’m exactly the same. I got so many bloody solicitors’ letters and what-have-you when I was going through all that shit last year, I just stopped opening them in the end.’

‘We heard about that,’ Nora said sympathetically. ‘But we never believed none of it. Everyone likes a drink or two, but that don’t make them an alkie. And as for all that stuff with the lass, it was obvious what
she
was after from the start. But even if you
had
done something with her, she was old enough, so it was no one’s business but yours and hers.’

‘Christ,
I
’d have given it one if she was offering it up to me on a plate,’ Patrick chipped in with a dirty chuckle.‘I was more surprised that you
didn’t
, to tell you the truth.’

‘She wasn’t my type,’ Larry muttered, sickened by the lustful look in the other man’s eyes.‘Anyway, I got tons of stick from the pigs, threatening me with this, that and the other even though I’d been proved innocent, and I got so sick of it I stopped opening my letters – which isn’t the smartest thing I’ve ever done, because I’ve just had the biggest nightmare trying to sort out all the bills I ignored. I’ve got those bastards down at the police station to thank for that, and I wouldn’t mind but they made most of it up.’

‘You don’t need to tell us about the pigs,’ Patrick sneered. ‘We know all about them in this house—’

‘Maybe we do, but we don’t need to bore Larry with the details,’ Dex interrupted, giving Patrick a warning glare before he started blabbing all their personal dodgy business to the world and his wife. Turning to Larry now, he said, ‘One thing, though, mate . . . who gave you my name? And how did you know to come here looking for me?’

Shaking now, sure that Dex was about to rumble him and kick the teeth right out of his mouth – or worse – Larry frowned. ‘Well, I thought
you
did when you sent in the application form, but obviously not if you don’t know anything about it. Maybe one of your mates did it for a laugh?’ he suggested. ‘Shame they didn’t let you in on it, though, because the laugh would have been on them when you walked out with the money and the car. And, between you and me, I think you’d have stood a really good chance of winning. But if you don’t want to do it, you don’t want to do it, so I won’t try and persuade you.’

Giving Dex a disapproving glare, Nora got up and came around the table to Larry. Patting him on the arm, she said, ‘I am sorry, pet. I do hope we haven’t ruined it for you.’

‘’Course not,’ he assured her. ‘And it’s
me
who should be apologising – for turning up unannounced like this. You must think I’m a right pushy so-and-so.’

‘We most certainly do not!’ Nora protested earnestly. ‘I’ve bloody loved having you here – we all have. And it’s given them nosy buggers out there something to gossip about, an’ all.’ She jerked her thumb towards the door. ‘I’d have
paid
you to come round if I’d known what a fuss it’d cause. I’ll be like flaming royalty round here after this.’

Winking at her, Larry squeezed her hand and thanked her again. Then, picking up the champagne which had been sitting on the table the whole time, he handed it to Dex, saying, ‘This was for you – to celebrate you coming on the show. But I guess you might as well have it anyway – compensation for me bending your ear when you didn’t even know what I was talking about.’