Truth Lies Waiting (Davy Johnson Series Book 1) (12 page)

All
I fuckin’ deserve.

I
try to find the words to tell him about MacIntyre’s murder spree but all I can
picture is Marcus playing aeroplanes with his son and I realise that I’ll never
have that life; It wasn’t mine as a child and now I’ll never have it because
Candy will think I’m a killer and she’s right. I am a killer. I’m like a
disease, a deadly infection killing everyone I touch. I don’t deserve to exist.

‘Marcus,’
I say again, quietly now, reaching out towards the gun. ‘I’m sorry, but I no
longer give a shit,’ My right hand is on the gun, my thumb is edging its way
towards Marcus’s index finger resting on the trigger. He is staring at me, the
way rubberneckers stare at the wreckage of an accident.

‘I’ve
had enough,’ I say simply, before squeezing the trigger.

I open my eyes to
see a man standing over me. He’s holding onto my wrist whilst looking at his
watch. The man is casually dressed, coloured jeans with a woollen jumper. His
hair is thinning on top and he wears small round glasses that have slipped down
his nose. He looks intelligent, the kind of person who doesn’t care about how
they look.

‘Fuck
are you?’ I ask, but my words feel slurred as though my tongue has swollen to
twice its size.

‘Ah!
Back in the land of the living then!’ He laughs as though he’s said something
funny before pulling a phone out of his pocket. ‘Excuse me,’ he says politely,
‘I just need to make a call.’

He
steps away from me and I realise I’m lying on a bed in a small room. The walls
are tiled floor to ceiling and the only light is provided by fluorescent strips
overhead. A narrow table runs the length of one wall and I make out a set of
scales, a camera and a saw. There is a table beside me with what looks like a
collection of metal knives and scissors laid out on display. The room smells of
disinfectant and something else quite unpleasant and I realise I must be in
hospital although I’ve never been to a ward that looks anything like this one.
I try to sit up but that makes me feel dizzy.

‘Whoa,
easy there.’ The man rushes over and places a hand on my shoulder, ‘better to
lie still a while longer.’ He explains, ‘Not uncommon after surgery to feel
nauseous.’

‘Wha-?’

The
man speaks into his phone hurriedly: ‘Soon as you can, Marcus.’

Marcus?
I remember setting off in Ken’s cab to ask Marcus for help. I remember ringing
the doorbell. I remember him going ballistic at me. The gun….

The
man puts his phone back into his pocket and gives me his full attention.

‘My
name is Donald. I performed a procedure this evening to remove a piece of torn
cartilage from your knee. It had become infected; you were quite delirious by
the time you got here.’

I
don’t understand. I remember grappling with Marcus for the gun, even pulling
the trigger.

‘But
what about the gunshot wound?’ I ask.

Donald’s
face is blank.

‘I
shot myself.’

‘No
gunshot wounds I’m pleased to say. Though the same can’t be said for all of Mr
Dreyton’s…
referrals
.’

‘Can
I sit up, please?’

Donald
looks confused, as though patient comfort is someone else’s remit only there’s
no one here he can delegate to. ‘Just a minute,’ he says, heading towards the
only door. ‘I’ll need to get you a wheelchair.’

Nothing
makes sense. I try to push myself up again but my hands slip and when I lift my
head I realise I’m not in a bed, I’m still on the operating table. My fingers run
over the cold metal beneath me and I remember being carried in, struggling, and
Donald’s face asking me if I was allergic to anaesthetic before scratching the
back of my hand then asking me to count backwards from ten. I look down at my
body just as Donald returns, pushing a wheelchair and looking very shifty.
‘Marcus is on his way.’ He informs me. ‘We need to get you ready for
departure.’

‘Why
am I still wearing my clothes?’ I ask reasonably, ‘I thought ye had to wear a
gown if ye were going for an operation. And why am I not back on the ward? Did
I wake up sooner than ye expected?’

Donald
clears his throat, ‘The bang to your head didn’t do any damage I see.’

I
raise my hand instinctively to my face. An image of Marcus’s dashboard looms
before me.

‘Ow.’
My nose feels as though someone has flattened it with a brick and when I run my
tongue along my front teeth they are jagged.

‘Marcus
asked me to treat you.’ Donald explains, ‘Life threatening injuries only.
You’ll have to get the cosmetic stuff done through the proper channels.’

He
helps me into a sitting position on the metal table and then down onto the
floor where he manoeuvres me into the wheelchair. My repaired knee is covered
in a dressing but there’s very little swelling compared to how it had ballooned
after MacIntyre had kicked it. Without warning, the last few days play out
before me as I remember what he’s done.

‘I
need to get out of here.’ I say quickly to Donald. ‘Before anyone else sees
me.’

Marcus
should never have brought me here. It’s too bloody risky. Cops are stationed in
the emergency ward twenty four hours a day, how the hell did we get passed
them?

‘What
about the other staff?’ I ask, ‘Can they be trusted not to say anything?’

‘There
is no one else.’ Donald informs me.

‘It’s
midnight.’ He adds, by way of explanation. ‘The next shift doesn’t start until
six am tomorrow.’

‘Oh.’

‘And
as for the other patients,’ he adds mysteriously, ‘they’ll not utter a word.’

‘How
can you be sure?’ I press.

‘Because,
young man, to use the common vernacular, they’re dead reliable.’

My
brow furrows in confusion.

‘You’re
in the mortuary.’ He explains.

Just
then the door bursts open and Devlin, Marcus’s right hand man swaggers in.

‘Misser
Drayton sen’ ‘im tanks.’ He drawls, handing a thick brown envelope to the
doctor. Donald accepts the package without counting its contents then points in
my direction.

‘He’ll
need his dressing changed in a couple of days …’ His voice trails off as he
realises he’s talking to someone who doesn’t give a shit.

Devlin
helps me to my feet and asks if I think I can make it on foot to the car which
is parked directly outside the entrance. The question is couched in a way that
means the right answer is yes, so I nod and suck in my breath each time I put
my weight on my bandaged leg. To be fair, the pain is nowhere near as bad as it
had been before, and I try to blank out Jude’s voice urging me to get proper
medical help. I wonder if there’ll be a time when it won’t hurt to think of her,
or whether I’ll be resigned to pretending she never existed because the
alternative hurts too much.

Marcus
is waiting in the back seat of the X5, sunglasses in place even at this hour. I
feel like I should raise my hand in greeting but decide against it, given the
last time we met we both wanted to blow my brains out. I follow Devlin around
the side of the vehicle; he climbs in to the driver’s seat and I climb into the
back. Barrington is in the front passenger seat but it’s like I don’t exist.
Immediately Devlin begins to drive and to be truthful I don’t even care where
they’re taking me. I imitate Marcus and turn my head towards the passenger
window like we’re tourists admiring the view. He says nothing, so I don’t. My
face is too raw to get on the wrong side of him again.

Several
seconds pass.

‘Yi
some sick fuck or what?’ Marcus demands, still looking out through the window.

I
turn to look at him. He’s wearing a designer suit with an open necked shirt. He
always dresses like he works for some hot shot legal firm but I suppose that’s
all part of how he divides his life: the sharp-suited gangster and the surf’s
out father of the year.

‘What
do ye mean?’ I ask.

Marcus
snaps his attention onto me, studying me like I’m stupid or playing him for
compliments. ‘Yi pull de trigger! Lucky for you it wasn’t loaded.’

‘Mebbe
that’s a matter of opinion.’ I shrug.

He
stares at me but it’s not like we’re in a stand-off, I think I genuinely
freaked him out yesterday. He’s used to people begging for their life, how can
you control someone if they no longer give a fuck? He hands me an early edition
copy of tomorrow’s Evening News. Another one of his contacts, I guess. Pictures
of Jude and the twins are on the front page beneath the thoughtless headline:
Working
girls slain by killer on the loose.
I throw the paper onto the seat between
us.

‘Fucksake!’
I explode. The paper’s telling its readers that there’s no need to be fearful -
only prozzies are dead so no real harm done.

The
photos are old too, blown up out of proportion and taken on camera phones when
they were crap. Their faces are blurred and the pictures taken when the women
were pissed or high as their eyes are dead and their smiles overdone. The
article is brief, no one cares when a prozzie is killed so there’s no need to
interview their friends; instead, a brief run-through of the investigation is
given: police are making house to house enquiries; anyone with information
should contact Crimestoppers.

I
look over at Marcus. ‘How..?’

‘Dey
work fe me.’ He said simply. ‘Or dey use to…’ This couldn’t be right. Jude had
been pimped out when she worked at the Fort but the police had raided that
place, arrested the Romanian gang running the scheme at the time. It made the
national news because a ring of sex traffickers had been arrested; underage
girls had been kept in the flats illegally, brought over from Eastern Europe to
service wealthy men too frightened to fiddle with their own kids. At the time
the police had milked the publicity, giving interviews on camera about the
year-long operation yet it had been no secret what was going on. The fact
they’d left those girls to be fucked twelve months longer than they needed to
just so they could build a case was sinful. Rumour was there were senior police
involved in the paedo ring, but make an allegation like that and you’re
treading on very thin ice. With the flats being torn down I thought it meant
Jude could work for herself but I see how naïve I was; the regular prozzies
were simply sold onto the highest bidder, like job lots in an auction.

But
still.

‘I
never saw ye around the place.’ I tell him.

Marcus
shrugs. ‘Y’eva see me dealing?’ He asks.

I
see his point. Then, ‘So how did ye know we’re related?’

Marcus
laughs, ‘Yi juss tol’ me.’ he says, then, ‘Me knew she a frien’ a yi mudda’s.
From back in de day when she on de game too. When I ‘erd about de murders I
reckon I fin’ de reason yi wen’ loco yessaday.’ He moves his index finger in a
circular motion at the side of his head in the universal sign of a crazy
person.

‘I
was there.’ I say quietly.

Marcus
looks at me sharply. ‘Yi kill ‘em?’

‘No!
She was my fuckin’ aunt. They were my friends.’

Devlin
watches in the rear view mirror, awaiting his boss’s reaction.

‘I
saw it happen.’ I tell them, ‘I saw him kill her in front of my own fuckin’
eyes.’

‘Who?’

‘That
bastard cop! MacIntyre!’ I can feel my breathing going out of control once
more. ‘He’s going to pin it on me too. That’s why I came to ye, I need ye help
Marcus.’

‘Why
did he kill dem?’

‘Just
to show me that he could!’ I spit, ‘That he could get away with it and set me
up.’

Marcus
doesn’t look convinced.

‘
He’s
the sick fuck, Marcus!’ As if that explains everything.

I
know I need to give him more, I just don’t know if I can get my head around it
yet. I try to put the events in order in my mind, remembering to start at the
beginning.

I
tell him about the number of times I’ve been lifted by the police but Marcus’s
face and those of his cronies are blank and I remember that I’m talking to
black men. Being pulled over by a narky cop is a default setting; they are
subjected to this so regularly there must be a section in the policing manual
to train for it. I try again, this time telling them about the threats MacIntyre
had made and how he attacked Jude deliberately so that I’d run in and find him
with her. As I tell them how it happened I conjure up the image of her lying
broken on her bed and I have to blink several times to remove it.

‘I
might not have been there to see it but I know he killed Malkie too.’

Marcus
looks at me sharply. ‘Who’s Malkie?’

‘It
disnae matter.’ I shrug, but I feel guilty for how that sounds. ‘He was a
junkie

friend;
tried helping me out, s’all. Didn’t deserve tae be killed.’

‘An’
dis Babylon did it?’

I
hesitate, then nod. It was too much of a coincidence to be anyone else.

‘Look,’
I plead, ‘I need time so I can prove he did it.’

Marcus
nods at Devlin which must contain some hidden message as he steps out of the
car to make a call. I feel safer keeping Devlin in my eye line, so I watch him
as he walks around the vehicle, back towards the gate where I guess the signal
is better.

‘You
mustn’t kill him, Marcus.’ The words are out before I can stop them but that’s
the truth of it. Marcus will want MacIntyre dead for killing his girls and as
much as that would please me he can’t do it yet.

‘He’s
already told me he’s going to frame me for this, if he has his way I’m going to
go down for a long time.’ I search Marcus’s face for some level of understanding.
‘If anything happens to him before I prove my innocence then you might as well
throw away the key.’

Bent
coppers don’t work alone; MacIntyre’ll have his back covered by mates on the
job; mutual arse covering by comrades as bent as him and colleagues too
spineless or too close to retirement to rock the boat.

‘I
need your help, Marcus.’ I plead, ‘I need money and phones, somewhere to stay.
Let me have this time to clear my name, then he’s all yours.’ It hurts me to
say this, I want to be the one to avenge Jude’s death but I’m not a hardened
killer; I’m a wee neddy gobshite way out of his depth already.

The
car door opens; Devlin climbs in, pocketing his phone. He’s either got a copper
on the payroll or a hack that owes him favours for he nods in my direction as
he turns to update Marcus.

‘Him
tellin’ de trute boss. A bwoy was shot dis affernoon at a hostel. Him case
worker too. Babylon dem tink it drug related. Victim had been seen sellin’
gear.’

I
lower my eyes. I can feel Marcus’s glare bore into the top of my head.