Michael began lifting back the plastic sheeting to look in cupboards around the room, Dee continued to explain. ‘You going to write down the names and everything you know about the men who killed Owen. Then at the bottom, I want your signature.’
Aaron looked worried as Michael found an airmail pad and a pen inside a bureau and passed them to Major Dee.
‘If that got out I’d be a dead man,’ Aaron whispered.
‘As long as you’re loyal to me, you have no problem,’ Dee said, but nobody believed that for a second.
29. VENGEANCE
Major Dee hadn’t become boss of the Slasher Boys without some guile and cunning. But his defining characteristic – some said his Achilles heel – was his capacity for swift and completely ruthless violence.
Most people starting a war with a man regarded as one of the cleverest criminals in the country might have sat down and put some thought in. But Dee was angry that Sasha had made him look foolish, and while the Mad Dogs were a small crew, Dee was all too aware that they had informants everywhere. He reckoned the only way to ensure complete surprise was to attack immediately.
Once they’d ditched Aaron, Michael and Colin took part in a mass ring-round of Major Dee’s most trusted associates. Within an hour a meeting was taking place in a private room above the Green Pepper, and by the time the sun had dropped, Michael was part of a posse, with four vehicles gathered in an empty lot behind a fried chicken shop and a car wash.
The lead car was a dilapidated Range Rover with huge bull bars over the headlamps. The eighteen-man crew was tooled up with everything from baseball bats to machetes and the pride of Major Dee’s gun collection, a Skorpion ultra-compact machine gun.
Dee was paranoid about traitors and made it clear that he didn’t want anyone ringing out on their mobile phones. Michael managed to sneak into the filthy bathroom at the chicken joint and text Maureen Evans to say that something big was going down, but Dee had given no clue about the target. The only sure thing was that people would get seriously hurt.
*
The Mad Dogs’ first team were three-nil up, which made Sasha Thompson happy enough to embrace sweaty players as they headed into the clubhouse at half-time. Bruce was playing away with the under-fifteens, but James and Junior had turned out to train for the Sunday league side.
The first team and the various Mad Dogs youth teams took their football seriously, playing in competitive leagues with proper kits, three paid officials and an FA qualified coach. In contrast, the two Sunday sides played in a local pub league. Their yellow kit was shabby because the first team got a couple of years’ wear out of it first, and Thursday night training was usually nothing more than a couple of warm-up laps and a kick-about.
The youngest Sunday players were James’ age, whilst the oldest were flabby-legged men with rose-tinted memories of the first team behind them. James was no fan of playing in the cold, but once he’d accepted that he was going to end up muddy, he had a pretty good time of it. He was fit enough to side-step all but one of the crazy tackles and fast enough – at least in such mediocre company – to look like a half-decent footballer.
On the other hand, Junior was a disgrace. James had sparred in the ring with Junior when they were both twelve. He’d been shorter than James, but Junior had been lightning quick and even with gloves on you knew all about it when he hit you. But the intervening three years had seen James continue combat training while regularly running and lifting weights. Junior had developed a taste for cigs and a tidy cocaine habit, and the only time he ran anywhere was when the cops were on his back. Junior was still young enough to look OK, but he struggled to keep up with the ball and a sixty-metre run down the wing left him doubled over, hacking phlegm on to the ground between his boots.
As the Sunday team headed into the changing room for their half-time break, James was called inside the clubhouse to speak with Sasha. This meant he didn’t get a chance to check his mobile in his kit bag, where he would have picked up a voicemail telling him to call Maureen urgently.
*
James felt edgy as he ditched his muddy boots