had to register to say that I’ve moved back down here.’
‘Taxi!’ Junior shouted, waving his arm and making a battered Nissan pull up to the curve.
‘You must be loaded,’ James said, as they clambered on to the tartan seat cover in the back.
‘Buses are for peasants,’ Junior grinned. ‘You wait half an hour and it turns up full of old biddies and screaming kids.’
James shook his head as they pulled away inside the car. ‘I guess your rich daddy left you with a few bucks.’
Junior shook his head. ‘Ma gives me pocket money. But I’ve gotta duck and weave to make anything real, you know?’
‘What’s your scam?’
‘Anything I think I can get away with,’ Junior grinned. ‘Buy a bit of this, sell a bit of that and then snort the profit!’
James shook his head. ‘You still doing coke?’
‘What do you think I was up to in that toilet?’ Junior smirked. ‘There’s no way I could get through forty-five minutes with that egghead parole officer without putting a couple of lines up my sniffer.’
James noticed that the driver seemed shocked by their conversation. Junior banged on the headrest.
‘Concentrate on the road and mind your own business,’ he yelled arrogantly, before turning back to James. ‘I can’t believe I’ve caught up to you. Where have you been? What happened to your foster parents and all that?’
‘Ewart and Zara kicked me out in the end,’ James said. ‘I was bunking off and stuff. Ended up running away to Scotland with my cousin Bruce and getting nicked trying to rob a cigarette machine.’
‘Cigarette machine,’ Junior tutted. ‘That’s so low rent! And you’re living at the Zoo? What’s that place like?’
‘Major shithole,’ James shrugged. ‘Only got there last night and we’ve already got a war with two tossers who tried to rob us.’
‘What were they, girl guides or brownies?’ Junior snickered.
‘They were huge, as a matter of fact,’ James said. ‘So what about you? Are you still boxing?’
‘Nah. I went to this kickboxing place for a while, but then I got sent down.’
‘What about your folks? Is your dad OK in prison?’
‘I go visit every month, but he’s miserable. I mean, you’re locked up twenty-four seven so what can you expect?’
‘And your brother and sisters?’ James asked.
‘Ringo’s at university, giving our mum an orgasm every time he gets top grades. April’s at school. She’s no fun any more; all she’s interested in is GCSEs and straight-laced boyfriends. And my little sister Erin got a scholarship to some fancy boarding school. Turns out she’s a genius.’
‘So is April still shaggable?’ James teased.
‘You’d better keep your hands off my twin this time,’ Junior grinned. ‘Not that she’ll go anywhere near you. She was completely pissed off when you blanked her letters.’
‘You never know with birds though,’ James grinned back. ‘I might take another shot.’
‘No chance,’ Junior said. ‘So anyway, I’ve got some beers, a little bit of coke and a big bag of weed. So how about we catch up on old times, while ingesting massive quantities of booze and drugs?’
James had read Junior’s file and knew that he had a drug problem, but the reality was still a shock.
‘I’ll take you up on a few beers,’ James said, ‘but the other stuff’s not really my cup of tea.’
Junior looked offended. ‘Oh well, more for me then.’
‘Haven’t you got to go to school?’
‘Nah,’ Junior said. ‘Well, yeah actually, but I hate it. I’ll just tell ’em I was sick or something. GCSEs are such toss anyway. I messed up all my coursework and … Oh, who gives a shit?’
James wanted to get Bruce involved in the mission as quickly as possible. ‘Listen,’ he said, as the cab took a corner slightly too fast. ‘We just moved into the Zoo and my cousin’s all on his lonesome. Do you mind if I call up and invite him over?’
‘Course not,’ Junior said. ‘The more the merrier.’
*
Keith Moore had been in prison for more than two years, but his ex-wife Julie lived comfortably off the carefully laundered proceeds of his extinct drug empire. She’d recently moved into a seven-bedroom detached house with three acres and an indoor pool. She drove a convertible Mercedes and her life revolved around hair, nails, tanning and the gym.
‘Junior!’ she screamed, as she dumped her car keys and tennis racket on the kitchen cabinet and caught a nose full of burnt plastic. ‘Junior, get your arse down here right now.’
Julie looked in horror at orange juice spilled over the floor and dirty plates piled up