Jimmy sat on the kerb and took a few deep breaths; the world was finally coming back into focus, and he was grateful for that
much at least. ‘I really enjoyed tonight, Jonny, but I think the strippers had best be kept a secret if you know what I mean!’
‘Well, I won’t be broadcasting it to the nation, mate. Celeste is an easy-going girl, but she ain’t that easy going!’ Jonny lit a cigarette and pulled on it deeply before settling himself beside Jimmy on the dirty kerbside.
‘She’s a lovely girl, Celeste, you got a good one there, Jonny.’
‘I know that, wouldn’t be marrying her otherwise.’
Jimmy sighed heavily. ‘She’s kind is Celeste, very kind-hearted. My Gabriella loves her, which is just as well, because she spends more time with her than she does with her mother.’
Jonny could hear the bitterness in Jimmy’s voice, and felt ashamed for the man’s weakness. ‘Well, Jimmy Boy, that’s not really any of my business, is it?’
Jimmy shook his head; he appreciated Jonny’s tact, but the drink had taken its toll and he wanted to talk to someone.
Needed
to talk to someone, say it all out loud, and he knew that Jonny would listen and not hold it against him.
‘I know that, Jonny, but tonight I realised how much I’ve lost out on. You lot together, having a laugh, a few drinks. I miss that. Not that I ever did anything like tonight, but I used to meet the blokes after work in the West End, you know. Not any more, though, Cynthia has me on a bloody schedule. She knows my movements better than I do, plus I’m not running the firm, not even going upwards if truth be told. I haven’t got what it takes for the office politics. I congratulate men younger than me when they get promoted over my head. My kids live at their grandparents’ house. Not that
my
parents ever get a look in with the kids – they’ve never been allowed to see them. I just don’t know how this all happened to me. I don’t know how to make it all right.’
Jonny threw the cigarette into the road, and immediately lit another one. He was genuinely sorry for the man, even though he couldn’t help feeling that the situation was all of his own
making. Having been brought up by a woman who was like Cynthia, having seen the damage someone like her was capable of causing to the men who were unlucky enough to love them, he could understand the man’s predicament. And he had been on the receiving end of Cynthia himself, when he had been enamoured with her and her lush body for a while. But, unlike James Tailor, he had seen her for what she was before it was too late. His father’s example was always with him, and he knew that a big part of Celeste’s attraction was that she was the complete opposite to Cynthia. He knew that with her he wouldn’t have to fight for supremacy in the relationship; all he would have to do was love her and take care of her. That would be more than enough for her, and she would be loyal to him till her dying day.
‘Look, Jimmy, I know the score, but you have to sort this out yourself. You have to put your foot down, let her know who’s boss.’
Jimmy laughed then, and it was almost as if he really found the conversation hilarious. ‘Easier said than done, Jonny! She has this knack of saying things in such a way you have to believe she’s in the right. We are in so much debt, she spends money like it’s going out of fashion and, when we discuss it,
I
end up feeling like
I’m
the one who’s in the wrong. She convinces me that it’s not
her
getting us into the debt in the first place that’s the problem, but it’s
my
inability to pay said debts which is.’
Jonny knew exactly where Jimmy was coming from; he could write the script. ‘Well, Jimmy Boy, you either sort the debts out, though in my experience she’ll just run up more, or you put the foot on her neck and rein her in once and for all.’
Jimmy didn’t answer him.
Then Jonny said quietly, ‘There is a third option, Jimmy.’
Jimmy looked up. ‘What’s that, Jonny?’
‘You could do a bit of moonlighting. You’re good with other people’s money, and I could do with a creative accountant,
if you get my drift?’ As he said it, Jonny could have kicked himself. He blamed it on the whisky. Scotch always made him sentimental.
‘Really, Jonny, could I make decent money from it? I mean real money?’
Jonny realised he had just answered this man’s prayers. And ruined him into the bargain. ‘If you can hide a good percentage of my earnings and still make it all look legit, you’d be an asset, mate. But before you go making any quick decisions, remember that you’ll be breaking the law and if we ever get a capture you could go down for it. You’ll be expected to keep your trap shut, and do your time without a whimper to anyone, especially not the Filth. I work for some very heavy people, so think long and hard about what you’ll be getting involved in. Because if you step out of line, you’ll be wiped off the face of the earth. Family or no family connections, you fuck up and I’ll come after you meself.’ Jonny hoped this advice, delivered with a threat and a promise of trouble to come, would be the decider for Jimmy Tailor, and make him see that this wasn’t the life for someone like him.
Jimmy, though, saw this man as a saviour and saw the chance of a good earn doing what he was good at – working with money. Jimmy, in his desperation, believed that if he worked for Jonny Parker nothing bad could ever happen to him. After all, he would only be keeping the books, it wasn’t as if he would be a real part of the business. He conveniently forgot about the conversations he had heard earlier in the evening, chose to forget that those were the very people whose money he would be responsible for. All he could see was a way out of the enormous debt they were in, and the look on Cynthia’s face when she realised he had finally sorted it out.
‘Thanks, Jonny. But I don’t need to think about it. I’d be honoured to come and work for you. You won’t regret it, I’ll work my fingers to the bone . . . Twenty-four seven if needs be.’
Jonny held his hand up to stop the man’s excited chatter. It occurred to him that Jimmy was not exactly
au fait
with what the job actually entailed, and he also knew that he would have to test the man’s abilities before he gave him any kind of real money to work with. ‘Hang on a minute, Jimmy Boy. You have to keep the day job, mate, that will be your blind for the future. Mr Respectable and all that. You’ll do my number crunching in your spare time and keep it under your hat – don’t even tell Cynthia until it’s a done deal. I’ll take you on trial for two months to see if you can do the job how I want it done, and to see if you can handle what the job entails. That way we can both decide if it’s not what either of us want, OK?’
Jimmy nodded then as if he finally understood the situation, and Jonny Parker wondered how the fuck this idiot would cope with the stress that this new world he was becoming a part of would inevitably place on his rounded shoulders. But the damage was done now, and all Jonny could do was make sure he kept a beady eye on the situation.
As if he didn’t have enough to fucking do.
1988
Cynthia was beside herself with annoyance, but she held her temper as she had learned to do over the last couple of years. Seeing Celeste with her detached house and her flash little sports car was bad enough, but that contented smile that was always on her moon face was the real bugbear.
Cynthia had finally got herself and her family out of the house in Ilford – and she had made sure they made their money back on that place.
Not
that she had ever told anyone the long and the short of
that
story – even that prat James was still none the wiser where that was concerned. He wasn’t capable of understanding her logic. Also he was like all villains and, when all was said and done, he
was
now a villain, albeit a minor one. He believed you should never publicly break the law. It brought the Filth down on your head, and made them look at you a bit closer than you’d like. And, though they weren’t exactly rolling in it, they were in a much better financial position than they had thought they would be – all thanks to her, of course. That prick would have sold at a loss, and they would never have got out of the debt. But, seeing how they were now getting an extra few quid courtesy of Celeste’s husband, the high and mighty Jonny Parker, she had to watch herself these days and it was getting harder and harder to keep her opinions to herself.
Now, as they walked into the restaurant for another expensive
party, to celebrate yet another feather in Jonny Parker’s cap, Cynthia felt she could easily scream in utter frustration.
She caught a glimpse of herself in a mirror, confident she was easily the best-dressed and the best-looking woman in the place. That wasn’t difficult – the competition wasn’t exactly Crufts standard. She smiled at the simile. She could stop an articulated lorry in its tracks when she was wearing the right top and the right make-up. Yet she knew that to Jonny Parker she might just as well be invisible. He spoke to her, he was polite to her, but she knew that he didn’t see her in any way that meant anything.
She, on the other hand, was always conscious of his presence; and he had just that – presence. It was no wonder he was doing so well in his chosen field – men as well as women were drawn to him. He was charismatic, dangerous and he knew the score better than the people around him. It was the one thing she could never get out of James, because no matter how much she kicked off, no matter how much she created, he would not, under any circumstances, tell her the extent of Jonny’s businesses. In fact, he told her absolutely nothing. He was another one getting too big for his boots; since he had started working full time for Jonny he was getting far too clever for his own good.
Cynthia sat at the table beside her sister, aware that she looked much better than her, and the knowledge was like a balm. She saw a lot of the men giving her the once over on the quiet. She was wearing a plain black silk dress that had looked like a rag until she slipped it on, and then it hugged her ample curves in such a way it was almost obscene. But that was the whole point of it; she acted as if she had no idea of the way she looked, and she enjoyed the way the women reacted to her even more than the men. She knew they all envied her – two kids and she still looked better than any of them. She smiled tightly as her sister poured them both a glass of white wine.
‘What do you think of Jonny’s restaurant, Cynth? It’s lovely, ain’t it? Really upmarket.’
Cynthia nodded and forced herself to answer her sister. ‘Beautiful, Celeste, really smart.’
Celeste knew that her sister was putting on an act, but she didn’t mind; after all, this was preferable to her causing murders, and Cynthia was more than capable of doing just that. To Cynthia, a good fight was all in a day’s work, and it was wearing at times. Celeste was a great believer in a quiet life. She could never understand her sister’s need to make everything a drama. She had a mouth on her, and she knew how to say things so they were not just hurtful, but also seemed to hold a modicum of truth. That was how she justified what she said. She was a hard taskmaster – she could destroy a person’s reputation with her insinuations.
She was vocal in her opinions on how kids should be brought up, and how women should act as mothers and wives, even though she never bothered with her own kids. She had an opinion on everything and everyone, yet she couldn’t see herself clearly or how people perceived her. If Cynthia only knew how disliked she was by both women and men, she would be genuinely surprised – not that she had ever cared what women thought of her, Celeste knew. But she was aware that her sister assumed every man she encountered found her as fascinating as she herself did. She loved herself all right, and it was a shame that love didn’t extend to the other people in her life. Maybe then she would be a happier person. Still, Celeste was shrewd enough to keep those thoughts to herself; she knew that everyone liked her because she didn’t express the majority of the thoughts that came into her mind. She had learned very young that it brought you nothing but grief.
Cynthia, on the other hand, saw it as her God-given right to tell it like it is in a vicious and demeaning way. Cynthia didn’t care if someone took it badly; she loved upsetting people, loved
the negative vibe she created wherever she went. But it left a bad taste in everyone’s mouth, and Cynthia was now basically
persona non grata
with just about everyone in her orbit.
‘I wouldn’t eat here if you weren’t my sister, to be honest. It’s a bit ostentatious for my liking.’
Celeste replied amiably, as always, ‘Well, people seem to like it, Cynth, so I think we’ll do all right.’
Celeste smiled as she spoke, and Cynthia felt the rage at her sister being the beneficiary of all this money and kudos. As the wife of a man of means she would always be afforded a great deal of respect, and it was that respect Cynthia wanted more than anything else. It was that respect that would have afforded her the life she felt she deserved, the life she should have demanded. But all she’d been given was boredom, a firm belief in the power of a good insurance policy and hope for an early death for the fucker she’d lumbered herself with. If it was left to her, James would have a massive heart attack and she could start all over again. Properly this time, and with the hindsight she wished she’d had at the outset.
‘Well, Celeste, people always want what’s new and different, although it soon wears thin. Still, in fairness, he’s done a good job.’
The naked envy was evident and Celeste felt a deep sadness for this sister of hers who, if she would only relax and stop wanting the impossible, could enjoy her life like everyone else. Celeste smiled once more and suddenly hugged her sister to her. She said happily, ‘Thanks, Cynth. If you like it then it must be good!’