The Cover Up Read online

  Holding his son’s arm out, Lev spied the red welt on Jay’s delicate skin. Speechless. Nauseous. Angry. Questioning. Crippled by guilt. There was not enough oxygen in that squalid lounge to service the array of emotions that coursed through Lev’s tired body.

  He reached out to hit Tiffany. His hand was stayed only by a swift calculation that Jay would remember his father hitting his mother. Not good. Tiffany must have sensed his reticence. She backed away, scrambling to her feet.

  ‘Aw, look at what you just did to Jay-Jay’s arm,’ she cooed. Clearly pissed and stoned, but the clarity of thought was there, all right.

  ‘What do you mean, what I just did? I didn’t do nowt! I’ve not been here, have I? You burned him, you evil cow!’

  ‘Ah, the social worker and my solicitor are going to love it when I tell them what Jay’s mean Daddy did to him with a ciggy.’

  ‘You stone-cold bitch. You wouldn’t!’

  ‘Who wouldn’t? Fucking watch me!’

  Chapter 27

  Conky

  ‘I know it’s here somewhere,’ he muttered to himself. Conky grunted as he sifted through the rain-sodden wreckage of the builders’ merchants yet again. His head still throbbed from where he had been knocked to the ground in Frank’s club. His heart ached, succumbing as it was to Sheila’s worsening frost. But mainly it was his back and legs that were giving him tremendous grief that morning. ‘Keep looking, Degsy! Maybe it’s been knocked under a pile of wood. It looks like a doll’s house has been smashed to smithereens with a wrecking ball, so it does.’

  Degsy stood in the freezing downpour, water dripping from the end of that nose that looked too big for his gaunt junkie’s face. Hand on hip. ‘Come on, man! You taking the piss? In this bleeding weather!’

  With the standing water seeping upwards into his black tailored trousers, making the hems cold and heavy, Conky took large strides over to his acolyte. He grabbed Degsy by the neck.

  ‘Are you questioning my authority, Derek? Is your fecking head cut?’ With his left hand, he pushed his Ray-Bans onto his forehead. They were a pain in the arse in any case in this torrential downpour. All drippy and steamed up.

  Staring steadfastly at his cheek, rather than his bulging thyroid eyes, Degsy’s reddening face was a picture of contrition. Conky released his grip, leaving the fool to run exploratory fingers over the places where it would later bruise. ‘Sorry, Conks.’ The rain had flattened his greasy hair, showing the threat of a bald pate within the next couple of years.

  Conky thought of his own artfully constructed hair-confection and felt a degree of sympathy at the sight of Degsy’s pink scalp. He softened his voice. Patted the eejit on the sodden shoulder awkwardly. ‘I need you to hoak through this mess again! My piece has to be here somewhere. I know I dropped it. We can’t afford for the kids from the local estate to be pissing about with a loaded SIG Sauer. And if the peelers find it …’

  As Conky bent over, poking at the flotsam and jetsam left behind by the firebomb with a length of timber, he screwed his eyes shut, trying to push the pain away. Should have got the head injury checked out, really. But had it not been for Degsy and Lev Bell stepping in at an opportune moment with a pump-action shotgun and an Uzi, Conky realised he would have left M1 House in a body bag – of that, he was certain. Perhaps the Loss Adjuster was losing his edge.

  ‘What’s the next move on the Brummies?’ Degsy shouted from the other side of the wreckage, as if reading his thoughts.

  Straightening himself up with an unpleasant cracking sound in his lower back, Conky belched quietly. ‘I don’t know. I need to speak to Sheila but she’s in and out at the moment, choosing city-centre premises for her and Gloria. And I’ve spent hours and hours pissing about with insurers for this shit-tip.’

  What he didn’t want to admit to Degsy was that the O’Briens were faced with a run on reliable staff that would make any attempt at open war a suicide mission.

  Stepping into a boomerang of soggy dog shit, he cursed aloud. ‘I don’t believe this. I bet Genghis Khan never trod in shite in his new Italian loafers. Two hundred quid these cost me in Selfridges.’ He examined the ruined soles. Felt the runny solution seep through the stitching to his socks. ‘God give me strength.’ He looked up at the leaden sky that rained without respite as though a disgruntled God was squeezing out a celestial sponge full of scummy water from the earth’s dirty washing. Sighing, he considered how poor a career choice being a gun for hire at his age had turned out to be. As a cocky young man, he had thought he’d be retired to the Costa del Sol or the South of France by now. Not picking through the wreckage of somebody else’s life in the rain, with lumbago, aching legs and a shitty shoe.

  ‘Conks! Over here, man! I’ve only gone and found it.’

  Degsy sounded jubilant. Held a large black object in the air. Aimed it playfully at Conky.

  ‘Thank fuck for that,’ Conky said, catching Degsy on the jaw with the sights as he snatched the handgun from him. ‘Never point a loaded gun at a man, even in jest, you wee bollocks.’

  Conky stuck his index finger through the trigger guard and allowed the gun to hang only inches from his face. Squatted amid the mayhem, finally exhaling heavily with relief. Allowed himself a satisfied smile. ‘Hello, darling. Daddy’s missed you.’

  He was just about to check the magazine of bullets was unsullied, when he noticed Degsy’s face fall.

  ‘Mr McFadden. How good of you to drop by. Is that for me?’

  Standing, he turned around to see Ellis James behind him, hand held out expectantly. Shit, shit, shit. How could I have been so stupid? His headache suddenly changed up a gear, feeling like his skull was being gripped inside a vice.

  ‘What? This?’ He held the gun out to the dog-eared detective. Chuckled nervously. Come on. You’re the bloody Loss Adjuster for Christ’s sakes. Think, man! Think! ‘Aye. Take it. Young Derek and I were just assessing the damage, weren’t we, Derek?’ He looked to Degsy for a nod of approval. ‘You know, in a shitey area like this, you can expect all sorts of skulduggery going on after dark, so you can. So, we thought we’d better come over and check for signs of drug misuse and illicit love trysts in the wreckage. And lo and behold, I’m having a wee shufty for one of Mrs O’Brien’s earrings, which she lost in the explosion, and I find this bad boy. Who’da thunk it, eh?’ He slid his Ray-Bans over his eyes, the fogged, wet lenses making his nose tickle like he was going to sneeze. Ensuring he wiped the prints surreptitiously with his leather gloves, he pushed the gun into James’s hands, as though he were himself allergic to it. ‘Foul things, aren’t they? And the USA wonders why it has over twenty thousand deaths per year from firearms.’ He shuddered for effect.

  But Ellis James’s stony expression did not soften one iota. He took out his cuffs. Read Conky his rights.

  ‘What on earth are you arresting me for, Mr James?’ Jesus. This was not a turn he had expected the day to take, given he had already woken next to an empty space instead of Sheila’s warm, comely body – surely a zenith of crap in itself, worthy of the worst of days.

  ‘Do I really need to explain the illegalities of being copped with an unregistered firearm in your possession, Mr McFadden?’

  With his arms yanked painfully behind his back, Conky marched glumly to the detective’s car. Today, it smelled of Stilton that had passed its best and cheap antiperspirant, masking the musky tang of athlete’s foot and neglected BO.

  ‘Good God, man! Didn’t they teach you at school that cleanliness is next to godliness?’

  ‘I’m not a religious man, Mr McFadden, and you smell rather like dog shit to me.’

  Peering through the foggy rear windscreen of Ellis James’s car, Conky watched Degsy’s dumbfounded face disappear into the distance, until his head was just a pink blob atop an ill-considered lime green tracksuit.

  ‘What are you hoping to get out of me?’ Conky asked. ‘I demand to speak to my solicitor! You’ve placed me under unlawful arrest. You haven’t got a shred of hard evi
dence, tying me to some gun that was clearly dropped in among the wreckage by some local 50 Cent wannabe hardnut. Young Derek and I found used condoms! The place has been a convenient stage set for a modern recreation of Sodom and Gomorrah, so it has. Kids will be kids.’

  ‘On the contrary, Conky,’ James said, eyeing him through the rear-view mirror, ‘I’ve got an impressive array of evidence and witness statements against Mrs O’Brien and her minions – and that includes you, big boy …’ He winked. ‘Enough to launch a lovely new investigation. And this time, the good guys will win. No wriggling out of what I’ve got.’

  ‘Fancy yourself as some sort of James Bond figure, do you, detective? Stalking a respectable woman for weeks on end outside her own house? Building your pathetic wee case file? Your investigation will almost certainly fall to bits like that cheap shirt you’re wearing once Mrs O’Brien’s solicitors get a hold of whatever cock and bull prejudicial hearsay you’ve come across.’

  ‘You sound very confident for a man who hasn’t got a damned clue what he’s up against. In fact, you’re nothing but a big, clueless Northern Irish twat, Conky McFadden.’

  ‘I beg your pardon! That’s racist!’

  ‘Where’s Sheila O’Brien right now? C’mon, Conky. You can tell me. Where’s the luscious Mrs O’B?’

  ‘Choosing new office space for her cleaning company. And then, I believe there might be an appointment at the hairdresser’s. I’m lucky enough to be accompanying her to a charity function tonight. And I’ll thank you to refer to her with a little respect.’

  ‘Oh, yeah?’ Ellis James nodded. Pulled off the slip road for the turn-off that led to the Greater Manchester Police HQ. ‘And where does Tariq Khan fit into her hectic schedule? Eh?’

  Conky frowned. Processing that which was implicit. Tariq Khan. And Sheila? ‘I don’t understand.’

  Another wink in the rear-view mirror as he nosed the car out of a line of traffic. Cocky wee bastard. ‘You’re not the only one with guns, Conky. Have you seen Tariq Khan’s? His are brown. Not in bad shape for a man in his forties. And that Oxbridge-educated accent too. No wonder Sheila finds him irresistible.’

  Leaning forward, suppressing the urge to nut the impertinent fecker from behind, Conky willed himself to breathe. Don’t rise to his bait. Whatever he’s suggesting … it must be a misunderstanding or a bullshit concoction designed to get you to talk. ‘You wouldn’t be trying the old divide and rule tactic on me, would you, detective? Because I think you’ll find I’m too old and wise to fall for such rudimentary child psychology.’

  ‘Inseparable. That’s the word I’d use. I’d say they looked inseparable when I clocked them checking into a furnished apartment at the back of Piccadilly Station. All very sneaky. But I can report that they were holding hands.’ James was assessing him with those cold blue eyes.

  Turn the tables on the bastard. He’s just playing you. It’s nonsense. ‘I’ve been reading an interesting book called The Mandibles,’ Conky said, gazing out of the window at some rain-soaked trading estate that whizzed by. Trying to appear too cool for school and blithely disinterested in this non-gossip. ‘It’s about how a leading nation can fall apart when there’s a shortage of something – money, gold … confidence in the dollar. You get a run on anything, suddenly you end up with anarchy.’ He considered the shortage of trustworthy muscle sending the relative peace in Manchester spiralling into yet more turmoil. He raised an eyebrow, keeping his concerns to himself. ‘What happens when you good guys have rounded up all the bad guys, detective? Do you think that’s even possible? In the book I’m reading at the moment, the dollar is replaced by currency called the bancor. People find a way to trade. People come up with solutions to drought and shortage. Do you think if you expunge all illicit activity and all aspiring emperors from within this damp little basin, surrounded by its seven magnificent hills, that the city will hold together?’

  ‘Shut it, McFadden. You lot are going down for good.’

  ‘The streets will run red, Mr James. You deny free citizens of their recreational pursuits and poison of choice, there will be anarchy. A shortage of that which is in demand will usher in the end of days. You’re only expediting your own demise and the death of this great city. A city of twenty-four-hour party people.’

  ‘Are you threatening me, you windbag?’

  Conky grinned enigmatically, though his heart was slowly breaking. Could it be true? Sheila and Tariq? No. He didn’t believe it. Perhaps they had met to discuss the threat of Bancroft. That was infinitely more plausible. And now, as James’s car was pulling up in front of GMP HQ, he was faced by an even worse predicament.

  ‘I want my phone call,’ he said. If he dialled Sheila’s number, would he catch her breathless and excited in the midst of a tryst with that Boddlington bastard?

  ‘All in good time.’

  Inside, he was faced with the indignity of being booked in amongst a gaggle of wet-behind-the-ears lads, done for shoplifting in Ashton shopping centre. They stank of too much cheap deodorant and stale clothes. Trying too hard to impress the little slags who bunked school to trail in their wake, hoping for a handout of some cheap jewellery or fake Uggs. Their noise was drowned out by the lurid slurring of some old boozers who had been caught pissing in a bus shelter near to a nursery school, by all accounts. The drunks, god bless them, seemed harmless enough.

  ‘Jesus, look at this ’un, Jimmy. Roy Orbison.’ One of them swayed to and fro as his fingerprints were taken, pointing with his filthy free hand at Conky. He looked seventy, though he could have been as young as fifty. The booze had not been kind. ‘He’s got a neb on him like a pissing anteater.’

  Conky smiled. ‘That’s right, sir. God was generous in the nose department with my family. You know what they say about men with big noses.’ He wrinkled his nose, causing his Ray-Bans to shimmy halfway down.

  The drunken feckers started talking about the craic and the hard stuff. The same tropes Conky had heard a million times before. Calling him big feller, like the second-generation pseuds they were. But they provided a welcome foil for the anxiety that was building up inside him, gathering pace like an avalanche that would consume him entirely if he wasn’t careful. He hated getting arrested. The bird he had done with Paddy O’Brien was enough to last him a lifetime. Day after day, cooped up in a confined space with somebody else’s farts and opinions. Trapped: his imagination the only space where he was truly free to roam. An hour a day of walking around the yard in the drizzle didn’t count. Within the confines of his handcuffs, Conky clenched his fists repeatedly, digging his nails into his palms until it hurt. Control yourself. Channel Genghis. Give these bastards in here the cold face, Temujin.

  ‘Okay. Make your call,’ Ellis James finally said, treating Conky to a full-on yellow-toothed smile that put Conky in mind of his father’s dentures, grinning overnight from the jam jar on the corner of the bath. The shabby little prick even raised his arm to slap Conky on the back, but seemed to think better of it when Conky growled at him.

  Ringing, ringing. Six rings in, and Sheila still hadn’t picked up. The sensation of his heart collapsing in on itself like an imploding star made Conky feel like someone had punctured the battery that fuelled his soul, draining him until he was flat. Devoid of any light or sparkle. Powerless.

  ‘Hiya. It’s Sheila. I’m busy. Leave a message!’

  He opened his mouth to answer the jaunty voice on the end of the phone, but realised it was merely her voicemail recording. Sheila O’Brien was otherwise engaged – he shuddered to ponder how - and Conky didn’t want to waste his call.

  Who else was there? Paddy was dead. Degsy was a pillock of the highest order and not to be trusted. Gloria was laid up. Lev … He still wasn’t sure about Lev. His only remaining options were Frank or Katrina. The idiot savant or Sister Benedicta. He hadn’t spoken to Katrina since Paddy’s funeral. For someone who had been all over the biblical scenes of family grief like a paschal outbreak of boils, she had been strangely quiet ever s
ince. In fact, judging by Sheila’s sour expression whenever Katrina was mentioned in conversation, he suspected the two women had engaged in some kind of territorial conflict. An O’Brien women’s pissing competition. But still. Katrina was a grown-up where Frank would tremble like jelly at a kids’ party if tasked with the responsibility of instructing the solicitor.

  The phone connected, with a well-meaning Irishwoman on the other end.

  ‘Holy Trinity Nursing Home, can I help you?’ The sound of companionable laughter in the background and a dementia-stricken resident wailing in desperation over Jeremy Kyle on the TV or pie for lunch, no doubt.

  ‘Can you put me through to Sister Benedicta, please? It’s urgent.’

  There was a delay; Conky was forced to listen to some ecclesiastical hold music. He remembered Paddy’s last days in the overly floral and brightly coloured room – a grim but functional place, just along from the convent’s chapel. Jesus. What a place to end your days in. The choir in the recording continued to insist otherwise. All Hosanna this and Hosanna that. Then the heavenly vibe was rent apart by Katrina’s sharp, clipped, no-nonsense voice.

  ‘Conky. What in heaven’s name do you want?’

  ‘I’m in trouble, Katrina. If I’m honest, we’re all in trouble. And I need your help.’

  Chapter 28

  Youssuf

  ‘Checking out, sir?’ the girl asked, treating him to a disingenuous smile with lipstick on her teeth.

  ‘I’m surprised I haven’t already,’ he said, chuckling to himself as he considered the close shave he’d had on the Victoria line escalator upon arrival in London.

  With Dreadlocks only steps above him, Youssuf had been certain that he was going to be caught yet again by that thug and manhandled back up to street level and into some van or else pushed beneath a tube train and killed. Reaching the bottom of the seemingly never-ending tube escalator, he’d escaped the clutches of his dreadlocked pursuer by pushing past a group of shrieking Italian school children. He had spotted the sign to loop back up to the District and Circle lines and had headed for it, hoping to become lost in the crowd, which had stood six people deep along the platform, waiting for the train whose arrival had been heralded by a warm wind and sense of stiff competition as to who would succeed in boarding an already packed carriage.