The Take (26 page)

She plastered a smile on her face and, turning the car around, she raced back home as fast as she could.

The Blacks were fuming. Freddie had made a point of causing a row and they were now at screaming point.

Freddie had always caused more fights than John Wayne, and now he had made sure that the chemist had come to them instead of coming to London. London, where the fucking gear was going to be made and distributed. According to Freddie, they were also going to be given first dibs on the best gear.

He was a wind-up and he'd been about to find out that they were not going to be mugged off, and what did they end up with?

Little Jimmy.

Now, they
liked
and
respected
Jimmy, but they
wanted
Freddie. They wanted a straightener with him, they wanted him off his home turf, and they wanted him without weapons, because everyone knew he was a weapons master.

They had also heard a rumour that he had taken out a poor working girl, and a working girl with his kiddie, no less. Even without the aggravation already between them, that on its own was enough for them to have a row with him.

He thought he was better than everyone around him, and he was also under the mistaken apprehension that they really had swallowed over the last lot. They were also aware that Freddie was on his last chance, not just with them, but with everyone he had ever come in contact with. The Blacks were decent men, with wives and girlfriends, and kids outside the marriage as well as inside. They took care of their dependants, which is more than they could say about that fucking wanker Jackson.

Word on the street was that even Ozzy had the pox with him. If that was so, then they would not only settle a large score, but get a few Brownie points into the bargain. This was a mission now. Both the brothers were up for it and if that meant taking on Jimmy then so be it. He was a nice lad and a hard lad, but he was also related to that piece of murdering scum. They were wary of Jimmy, however, because by all accounts he was right up Ozzy's arse. Ozzy might be gone but he would never be forgotten.

Looking up from the mess he'd created in the dressing room, Jimmy saw his wife's headlights hit the wall and smiled. He had hoped she would come back. He understood her anger, and he was sorry, but at the end of the day, work was work and he had to sort it all out. It was what he got paid for, what bought their houses and provided their way of life.

She was aware of that, and he knew she was upset because they had already made arrangements. But Ozzy was their employer, and he had to make sure everything went along according to plan with the minimum of fuss and the maximum of efficiency.

He heard Maggie walk into the house and run up the stairs, and he went to the bedroom itself. The dressing room looked like a bomb had dropped on it and he knew she would be angry with him over it.

She was standing there with that dear little face. Her blond hair looked immaculate as ever, and her make-up was not heavy but as always made her look healthy, made her look like the girl next door. The really good-looking and sexy girl next door.

'I am so sorry, babe.'

She knew he meant it.

'So am I, but I was so looking forward to tonight. I really wanted us to have a good one.'

'We will, babe, when I get back from Jockland.'

He was making her laugh, 'Jockland? That's a new one.'

He pulled her into his arms. 'The Blacks are up in arms and it's all because that useless cunt Freddie…' He didn't finish the sentence, he really didn't need to. 'He has wound them up from day one, and now I have to make a point of going there and sorting it all out.'

Maggie looked into his handsome face, saw his deep blue eyes and his dark-skinned handsomeness, and she wanted him like she had never wanted him before.

He kissed her hard on her lips. 'You know I don't want to go, and that if I had a choice I would be here with you, so please, babe, give me a break, eh? This is work, heart, just work and you know thanks to that cunt I am the only one that they listen to.'

She smiled then, a real smile. This was the man she loved, the only man she had ever loved. In her life there had never been anyone else she had ever wanted to be with. Even as a girl, when her friends had spent their time dreaming of pop stars, she had only ever been interested in her Jimmy.

He was everything she had ever wanted and everything she would ever need. As he pushed her on the bed she allowed him to take her as she had always allowed him to take her. Grateful that he wanted her, grateful that she had him in her life and grateful that he was as in love with her as she was with him.

She often wondered if he took a flier with other birds. She knew they stalked him, and why wouldn't they? He was a fucking god in more ways than one. But she pushed the thoughts from her head. What the heart didn't see…

'Sweetheart, we will have the most beautiful baby ever, right? A handsome lovely little baby and it will look just like you.'

'I love you so much, Jimmy.'

He grinned then and kissed her on her lips tenderly. 'You will never know what love is until you feel the love inside me, darling.'

Her heart was swelling up inside her chest with pride. He meant it and she knew he meant it. He was her love, her only love as she was his. He was like the Barry White record she adored. It was their record, they had danced their first dance to it in the youth club. He was her first, her last, her everything.

And he always would be, it was just the way they were. Without him she was nothing, she felt nothing. She was his, and he knew that better than she did.

Freddie was watching the clock, and Liselle wondered what he had going down. After all the years she had run the pub with Paul she could tell when someone was waiting for something to go down. It was a knack she had acquired.

She had watched bank robbers as they waited to go on the
off
, she had also seen murderers as they waited until their victim left. And more than a few murders had been conceived on these premises, not to mention perpetrated, she knew that better than anyone. She had lied to the filth enough times for her regulars.

This was a rough old pub, and now as she watched Freddie Jackson she knew that he was going to do something he was ashamed of. It was in the cut of his jib, a favoured saying of her father's. He was up to serious skulduggery. People like Freddie did not know any other kind.

Jackie tried her best, there was no doubt about that, but her kids were the biggest bastards in recorded history. Deep in her heart she hated them. They were such hard work.

Her house was far too hot as always. It was also very dirty, and it was extremely smelly. They had eaten fish and chips earlier and the house stank of vinegar and cheap cod. In addition, Little Freddie often urinated where he sat, and consequently every time the heating went on the smell was overpowering.

Now Jackie sat at home and watched her daughters as they watched their favourite movie,
Pretty Woman
, and she felt like screaming. Why did they love a film about a prostitute? She felt at times that they were mocking her, that they knew what their father had done. Especially Kim, who would look into her mother's eyes and bring her shoulders up to her head in an innocent yet knowing way. Jackie drank her drink quickly. This was all she needed, this lot reminding her of how shit her life was.

Sometimes she wondered why she bothered with any of it. Little Freddie was off his shopping trolley, and it took all her wits to keep him out of care. The girls had no real interest in her whatsoever, and she knew that when they were old enough they would be off. Out of it, and who could blame them?

They would rather be at Maggie's, anyway. They loved it there, thought the house was
cool
, thought it was the best place in the world. Anyone would think Maggie was their mother the way they carried on about her. About her salons and her clothes and her fucking regular tanning sessions. Who the fuck did this lot think they were?

She
was their mother,
she
was the one who had given birth to them,
she
was the one who had brought them up. When Freddie had been banged up, she had done everything she could for them all.

But did they thank her for it? Did they fuck. They were the most ungrateful bastards ever to walk the earth, and she had given birth to them all.

Little Freddie spat at her as he walked past to go and get himself some sweets from the kitchen. He often spat at her, he spat at everyone and thought it was funny. But when her hand shot out and slapped him hard across his buttocks he yelped out loud and then, as always, when he was hurting, he attacked her.

Pulling her hair and spitting and screaming at her, calling her names.

In the end she punched him with all her might in the tummy and winded him. He crumpled to the floor, and just once, for the first time ever, he shut the fuck up.

She finally felt the sense of victory he usually felt when he pushed her to the limit of her patience.

His next attack knocked her on to her back and it took all the girls to drag him off his mother.

And the worst of it all was, they were laughing at him as always.

The house was quiet, and Maggie lay in the bath, luxuriating in the absolute happiness she was feeling.

She was glad she had not stayed at her mother's house. Even though the house felt far too big for her when she was alone, she was so glad she had come back to her husband. She knew
husband
was not a word the women used these days, it was almost a derogatory term, but she was proud that Jimmy was hers, glad he was her husband, her old man, her bit of all right, as her mum would say.

She sipped her wine and lit herself a cigarette, and as she pulled on it she felt the fluttering inside her that she often felt when she remembered making love with Jimmy. It felt like she was going over a steep hill in her Merc, that exciting feel of his hands on her. His tongue, his heavy body on top of hers as he brought her to climax.

She closed her eyes and pulled once more on her cigarette. She had Barry White on the player in her bedroom. His deep baritone was sneaking into her en suite and she was thinking of her Jimmy and his lovemaking when she felt a hand touch her shoulder.

Her eyes flew open and she dropped the cigarette on to her chest. Sitting up in pain and terror, she looked into the laughing face of Freddie Jackson.

'All right, Mags?'

He was grinning at her, and she was astonished to see that he was undressed.

She felt the bile in her stomach rise up as he licked his lips slowly and then, laughing once more, he said, 'What's the matter, sweetheart, you all tired out?'

She felt vulnerable, frightened and worse than anything she felt the utter loneliness of a woman who knew she was completely alone, and completely at someone else's mercy

She sank under the bubbles, ashamed of him seeing her naked, ashamed that she had not protected herself enough and ashamed because she had known in her heart that this day would come and now it was here she wasn't sure she had the strength to fight him off.

And the fact she had not asked him what he was doing there or what he wanted told him all he needed to know.

'Please, Freddie, go home, leave me alone…'

'Oh fuck off, Maggie, you want this as much as I do, and you've made me wait. I ain't waiting any longer.' Then he dragged her from the bath by her hair, lifting her up as if she was nothing, a featherweight.

She screamed, knowing her screams were a waste of time. No one was going to hear her, that was the downside of large, well-built houses. She could feel her feet dragging across the floor, and she was twisting and turning, trying to get free from his grip.

But as she squirmed he was laughing harder and harder, and when he threw her on the bed, the bed she had lovingly made not two hours earlier after the lovemaking with her Jimmy, she was still trying to cover herself up, cover her nakedness, cover her perfectly toned and very attractive body. That only her husband had ever had access to.

He was pushing his knee between her legs, opening them, and she was really crying now, sobbing and begging him to stop and leave her alone before it all went too far.

'Ah, what's the matter, then? You telling me you don't want a bit of cock?'

She could smell him, he stank and she knew instinctively that he had been with someone else already. He had the stink of a dirty woman on him, and she knew it was a deliberate ploy, he wanted her to feel like nothing, and he had achieved his objective.

As he entered her, the burning sensation was like nothing she had ever felt before, it was like he was using an object. The hardness of him, the stench of him, was overpowering. He was above her, and as he tried to kiss her she kept pulling her face away, until he grabbed her hard by the chin and then he kissed her and forced his tongue into her mouth. It tasted horrible, of beer and brandy and dope. His spit was thick from the cocaine and it clung to her lips, making her gag.

It was so invasive she started to retch and she knew he was finding it all hilarious, she knew he could not see what was wrong with her. To him this was just a quick fuck, a way to teach her a lesson. And he had planned it so he could use her and then walk away, knowing she could never tell her husband. Daren't tell her husband, daren't tell anyone.

As he started to pummel into her, she could feel his arms tensing as he got ready to ejaculate, and she tried to force him off her, but he held her down and he talked filth into her ears as she felt the hot wetness of him inside her. She felt his rancid breath and, as his sweat mingled with her tears, she felt him shudder to a halt.

He lay on top of her, he was panting and he was also making sure she could not move away from him just yet.

Never in her life had she felt so disgusted or so used.

'You needed that, didn't you?'

She could hear the laughter in his voice, could hear the triumph, and the complete and utter satisfaction as he kissed her on the tip of her nose before he spoke once again.