Luke was breaking fingers for the boss when we got the call. I was mostly watching him because that was his job and talking was my job and the talk had already been done.
‘I’ll get you the money,’ Mr Irving screamed.
‘When?’
‘Thursday!’
I looked over at Luke, a bullet-headed son of a gun that had seen too many Statham films and fancied himself an action star. Never mind Hollywood was a long way off, his shaved head was not sexy and he had the body of an indolent potato. He figured someone would discover his masculine pulchritude sooner or later. ‘Thursday good for you?’
Luke grunted. That was poetry from him.
‘I think the boss might find that acceptable.’ I dug the vibrating phone out of my pocket and answered. ‘Hey boss, he says—’
The boss cut me off. ‘Fiona’s on her way.’
‘The hell you say?’ I wasn’t one to doubt the boss, but I couldn’t quite take in the truth of the words all at once. You might as well have said Elvis was in town. If Elvis were back and gunning for the boss and anyone who stood in the way.
‘Yeah, it’s her—hell on wheels. I want a welcoming committee, chop chop.’
To say the boss was stingy with words would not have been an understatement, but few words were needed at a time like this. I put the phone back in my pocket. ‘Let’s go.’
Luke looked all disappointed like a kid who’d been promised a puppy for Christmas, then got a bunch of underwear and socks. That and he just liked breaking things. I think it was the sound. He was a bit of a connoisseur. Whether he preferred the snap of the bones or the shrieks of the business associates, it would be hard to say. He gave me the big cartoon sad eyes and opened his mouth to complain.
I knew what would stop him. ‘Fiona’s coming.’
He was all business after that, dropping Mr Irving to the floor where the man moaned and cried, then slipping his discarded jacket back onto his own gorilla shoulders. For the umpteenth time I wondered where they hell Luke bought his suits, but as usual it wasn’t the time to ask. ‘Let’s go.’
But turns out we were too late….
Read the rest at Near 2 the Knuckle!
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Graham Wynd 