Bad Men (25 page)

"I just fucking shot somebody. And, in case you hadn't noticed, I got shot too."

"Get in the car, then. Stop standing in the middle of the road, bleeding."

"Lay the dog down."

"Consider
this
your good deed for the day."

"I'll fucking shoot you, May. Swear I will."

She turned her head, spotted the Range Rover, and headed towards it. "He's just a wee thing but he's getting heavy. Get the door for me."

Behind her, Wallace roared something.

She felt her back itch. A calculated risk. But she knew how to play him.

He charged after her, overtook her, his face red. "Why won't you fucking do what you're told?" he said.

Her armpits prickled with sweat. "Would you get the door, please?"

He grunted, slammed the gun down on the roof of the car and dented it. Stupid bastard. The he moved like a pit-bull was after him. "Fuck, fuck, fuck," he said, yanking the door open.

She laid Cutey-pie carefully on the back seat and said to him, "Hang in there, sweetheart." She climbed in after him.

Wallace said, "He's bleeding all over the seat."

"What about you?" she said. A thin line of dark blood had seeped out from the bandage, trickled down his arm, and was dripping off the end of his little finger.

"It's nothing." He shook his arm.

"We need to get him to a vet, Wallace."

Wallace slammed the door closed, bolted round to the driver's seat and sat behind the wheel, staring at her in the mirror. She looked away, stroked Cutey-pie's head. After a second, the engine purred into life. She rested Cutey-pie's head on her lap. It looked uncomfortable, though, cause he didn't have the longest neck in the world, so she lowered his head back onto the seat. God, she hoped he was going to be okay. She'd ask the vet what kind of dog he was, cause she had no idea. A terrier of some kind, yeah, but he was some kind of special breed, she was sure.

She stroked his cheek and he stuck out his tongue and licked her hand. Just once. Seemed to take a whole lot of effort.

There wasn't much blood. Wallace had been making a fuss. Just a bit from the back of Cutey-pie's head and the area just above his missing leg. He was going to be okay. If they got to the vet's in time. She was sure of that. "Can you go faster?"

"I'm not going anywhere with that dog."

"Then I'm getting out." She reached for the handle.

He glanced over his shoulder. "I'll shoot you."

"Then you won't get to show me whatever it is you want me to see."

Wallace stared at her. "May, I've a good mind to call your bluff."

She stared back at him. "I'm stepping out of the car with Cutey-pie in five seconds." She paused.

She opened her mouth again to start counting, but Wallace cut her off. "For fuck's sake," he said. He pulled away from the kerb. The car jumped forward in fits and starts, Wallace having difficulty with the gears. After a bit, he sussed it out, drove one-handed. "I don't know where I'm going, May."

"To the vet's."

"I know
that
. I just don't know where to find one."

"Well, there's bound to be one around here somewhere. Everybody's got a pit-bull or a Rottweiler or a Doberman. Joanne's brother's got a lizard. I ever tell you that?" She spotted a likely punter heading towards them. "Pull over and ask this biddy with the poodle."

"Why would she know?"

May had married a real thick dipshit. A real thick violent dipshit. She explained to him: "She's taking her dog for a walk. She must live round here. So she's probably taken it to see the vet at some point, yeah?"

Wallace's eyes held hers in the rear-view mirror. "Anybody ever tell you you're a cheeky little bitch?" he said.

"Yeah," she said. "My husband. All the time."

"Sounds like the kind of guy who knows what he's talking about."

No, he was a first-rate wanker. Jesus. She pressed her handbag closer to her, popped the clasp. If he didn't shut the fuck up and get to a vet's, she'd introduce his balls to Dirk. See how he liked that.

Or – Jacob could
do this.

He stepped back from the cupboard door and aimed the gun at the lock. Figured that if he shot it, he'd get out, call Flash on the land line, rescue May before Wallace did whatever he was going to do to her.

Please God.

No time to hang around asking Norrie why he'd done what he'd done. Not that Norrie would be able to tell him much.

Jacob dabbed his left eye with the heel of his hand. It came away wet. But he wasn't crying over Norrie's betrayal. No, he was crying because he was going to lose May. He knew it.

He had to hurry.

He pulled the trigger.

Big noise. So loud it made his eye sting. And it was still stinging. He couldn't see out of it. Kept blinking and all it did was make his vision worse. He dabbed it with his hand again and his hand came away red.

Felt himself start to panic. Knew he had to keep calm. Panic and he'd be no good to anybody.

Keep it together, Jacob.

Close the eye. Close it. It was no good anyway.

He tried, but it wouldn't stay shut. Something in it, and the eye wanted rid of it. Blinked some more. And something kept making him try to see out of it. Had to believe that it wasn't as bad as it felt.

He forced it shut and it stayed that way, sort of, the eyelid fluttering, but at least he was able to see out of the other one.

The lock had shattered. Wood and metal had splintered. And that was the problem. He must have got something in his eye.

He dropped the gun. It was useless now. No more bullets.

He pushed open the door, stepped into the hallway. He avoided looking in the mirror. Didn't want to see how bad his injury was. Not yet. Had to make a call first.

Focused with his good eye, hands shaking as he opened the address book and squinted to read Flash's number. He dialled.
For God's sake, answer, Flash.
Then he realised Flash was in a hospital. Probably have his phone turned off.

The phone rang three times and then Flash said, "What it is?"

God love the boy. "My eye," Jacob said, before realising that that's not what was important right now. "Wallace's got May," he said.

Flash swore. "Where are they?"

"I don't know. They've gone. He shot Norrie."

"Jesus. Is he okay?"

"I think he's dead. Or nearly."

"Shit. I'm sorry, Dad."

"I'm not."

"What?"

"Norrie shot Rodge. It wasn't Wallace. Norrie thought he was ... look, I'll tell you later. Go get your sister. Head for Wallace's."

"Jesus. You okay, Dad?"

"Never better, son." Jacob hung up, felt a giant hand squeeze his heart and keeled over on the floor.

Cutey-pie's chest
was barely moving. May bent her head to listen to his breathing. His tongue flopped out and touched her chin. She sat up, determined not to cry. Her emotions were all over the place. God, she felt like shit today. Couldn't have been a worse time for all this crap to be going down. How many more years of these frigging stomach pains? She couldn't wait for the change of life. After she'd had three kids. Two boys and a girl. That'd be cool. Joanne reckoned May should go on the pill. Safer. But also to make her periods more regular and less heavy, cause when they came, they fucking came. May wasn't sure she could trust Joanne's advice, though. Joanne had two kids already and she was three months younger than May. Anyway, kids was a touchy subject. And so was that fat tart, Joanne.

Wallace gave May that look in the mirror again. Like she was stupid or something. He knew how to make her feel small. Horse tosser.

"You know where we're going, then?" she said. The biddy had given them directions. Nearest vet's was some distance away, apparently. Wallace seemed to know where she meant. May didn't have a baldy.

Wallace said nothing.

May looked away. Didn't want to communicate with him, anyway, the murdering fuckwit. Well, Norrie wasn't dead when she'd left but the chances were that he would be before too long. Wallace really didn't give a shit sometimes. He was like some kind of psycho. Anyway, she wasn't going to talk to him. You didn't step into somebody's home guns blazing. It wasn't right. And he'd kidnapped her, which wasn't right either. And maybe he hadn't done things to Rodge or done things to Louis but it didn't bear thinking that she'd let that fucking animal inside her. Christ, she felt fucking filthy, and not in a good way.

She spoke to the dog, again. Keeping him relaxed. Daft, right, she knew, telling him not to worry, but what else were you supposed to say? Not as bad as talking to plants, eh? And she'd done that before. Had a spider plant that died very slowly over a couple of years. Probably wouldn't have lasted six months if she hadn't spoken to it. Anyway, she talked to Cutey-pie for a while, hoping her words would have the same life-prolonging effect they'd had on the plant. After a while she felt pressure build up behind her eyes, knew she'd lose it and start to bawl if she let so much as a single tear escape.

Thinking about plants, now. Like a useless fanny. Who was she trying to kid?

There was only so much she could do, wasn't there? She wasn't a bad person. Not really. If she was, it was Wallace who'd made her bad.

She stroked Cutey-pie, watching his eyes narrow, widen, narrow again. She wondered what it was that Wallace wanted her to see. He'd been pretty keen. Keen enough to force her out of the house at gunpoint, keen enough to shoot Norrie to get the fact he was serious across. Had to be something grotesque, then. It'd be something that was getting back at her in his own special way. Well, fuck him. No, she didn't want to think about that. Anyway, it was never like ...

Fuck, she was crying.

Tony Twelve-Inch. Not that she'd ever slept with him, but Joanne said Tony Twelve-Inch had shown it to her and that it was maybe nine inches but no more than that. May didn't believe her. Joanne liked nothing better than to lie about stuff to her friends. She probably hadn't even seen it at all. Why would Tony show it to her? She said she'd had to show him her tits to get him to unwrap it, but May couldn't imagine Tony wanting to see those walloping great fat puddings. But then, he was a bloke and blokes didn't seem too fussy.

Fuck's sake. Here she was thinking about Tony's tadger and Joanne's boobs and Cutey-pie was at death's door. From plants to Tony Twelve-Inch. What was going on in her stupid head? She was stressed. That's what it was. She'd had a bad fucking time of it recently, what with one thing after another. She apologised to Cutey-pie and bent over to kiss his nose. She talked to him. He liked that.

She was trembling all over. You'd think it was the middle of winter and she wasn't wearing any clothes. Cutey-pie would warm her up. But he was cold, too. His nose was freezing. She kept her head down, whispered in his ear.

When she felt the car start to slow down, she sat up again. The tyres crunched over gravel. She looked up, saw that they were in a churchyard. Place was surrounded by trees. No other cars in the driveway. The church was locked up. Big oak doors sealed tight. She'd never been here before.

Wallace winced as he pulled up on the handbrake. Then he turned off the engine. Caught her eyes in the mirror again. He looked pissed off.

This was bad. May didn't know why, exactly, but she knew. Something was wrong with him. They shouldn't be here. This clearly wasn't the vet's and it wasn't their old house. This was nowhere. A churchyard. Hidden from the road. Could be anywhere.

Had he planned all along to take her here? Was there something here he wanted to show her? There was nothing around but gravestones. Was that it? Had he dug a grave for her?

May's forehead felt as if somebody had slapped a cold cloth on it. Her bravado vanished, like it always did. She could only go so far. She craned her neck, scanning left, right, behind her. Heard the rumble of traffic. Not too far from the road, then, even though she couldn't see anything through the trees. She could run. She'd have to run. Back down the driveway. She tried the door handle. Door was locked.