7
Kieron Delaney stood shivering at the side of his brother Tory’s grave. Summer had given up for the day and was drenching the funeral party in cold rain. The weather suited their business here. His mum and dad were standing like statues beside him.
He stole a glance at them.
His mother was devastated, her white curls and floods of tears hidden by a thick black veil. His father seemed to be swaying on his feet, as if he would fall at any moment. Kieron was appalled to see how much weight his father Davey had lost. Suddenly, big strapping Davey Delaney, founder of the family firm, looked his age. Kieron saw his older brother Pat clutch at their dad’s arm to steady him.
‘Ashes to ashes, dust to dust,’ intoned the priest, dropping dirt on to the coffin in the hole.
He held the box out to Redmond, who took a handful and slung it in. Then Pat. Then Orla, who was tearless and composed. Then Kieron. Then their mum and dad.
Kieron tuned out the rest of it. He thought of Tory Delaney, his big brother, carrying him on his shoulders when he’d been tiny. He remembered the soft feel of Tory’s curly golden hair beneath his little fingers, remembered the booming Irish laugh of this man who was now nothing more than a corpse being buried in the dirt.
They’d drifted far apart over the years. Kieron was the youngest of Davey and Molly Delaney’s five children, and he had benefited from the family firm’s wealth without ever having to get involved in it.
He’d stuck his head in the sand and refused to acknowledge the sort of dodgy business his siblings were engaged in. He’d gone to art college and then had a year travelling. Ignorance was bliss. But in his guts he’d known that his dad had been into all sorts in his time, including a spell in Strangeways, and that Tory, Pat and Redmond had built the firm up from that base into what it was today.
He knew damned well his brothers were racketeers, thugs, criminals; he knew they ran girls and were into the ‘heavy game’, their term for armed robbery.
‘I wonder you bothered to show up,’ said Pat when it was over and they had moved away from the grave.
Kieron looked at Pat. There had always been a sting of animosity between them. Kieron thought Pat a stupid bully, and Pat thought Kieron a fairy. The two were never going to happily co-exist, so Kieron had been glad to get away from home and see the back of his thuggish older brother. But it was clear to see that nothing had changed between them despite time and distance.
A few years back, Kieron would have flown at Pat in a rage. Today, he merely smiled.
‘I’m here, aren’t I?’
‘Brought your sketch pad, did you?’ Pat sneered.
‘Padraig!’ said Molly sharply, coming up to them and touching Kieron’s arm.
‘It isn’t a crime to have a talent,’ said Kieron.
‘It’s a gift from God,’ said Molly, patting his arm. She looked back towards the grave where Davey her husband was still standing, supported by Redmond. ‘This is going to kill your father,’ she predicted with a tremble in her voice.
‘No it isn’t, Mum,’ said Orla, hurrying over and embracing her mother. ‘Dad’s a tough nut.’
A year away had given Kieron a new perspective. His sister Orla was a lovely young woman now, no more the freckly girl. Her red hair was long and sleek, and her green eyes were gorgeous. She was tall and slender, like Redmond her twin, and the black of mourning flattered her pale skin.
‘Tory was a tough nut too,’ said Molly. ‘And now look.’
The priest was striding back towards the vestry for his tea and biscuits. The crowds were dispersing and there were many sad faces.
Things would change now.
If Tory was no more, then who would take over the manor? The Carters were chipping away at them day by day. It would be down to Redmond, the eldest, to take over the firm, but for now no one could face that prospect. Everyone on the manor had respected Tory Delaney and they were all sick at heart to see him gone. The streets had been lined with bare bowed heads when the cortege drove through to go to the church. No one would be celebrating on the manor tonight.
Davey and Redmond joined the rest of the family.
‘I want to know who did this,’ said Redmond. Unlike big golden Tory, Redmond’s hair suited his name. It was red like his mother’s had once been, long ago. He had green eyes and pale lashes. He did not appear a man of action, but he looked sleek and elegant in his black coat and leather gloves.
Redmond hadn’t got into boxing like Tory and Pat, like their dad before them. Accountancy was his game, adding up figures and doing deals, and he was good at it, Pat had to admit that. Pat looked at his effete older brother and wondered if Redmond could ever hope to fill Tory’s shoes.
And then Pat wondered, not for the first time, if he could do the job better. Jaysus, he knew full well that he could.
‘We’ll find out who did it,’ said Pat.
The police seemed clueless about the shooting, or at least took pains to appear so. It was how the Bill always reacted to gang business. All the boys knew that the police’s attitude to a feud in the East End was, fair enough, so one of them’s dead, so what? Cut down the numbers a bit, that’s a good thing.
And there were plenty of coppers in the pay of the other major gangs, everyone knew that. Sometimes a blind eye was turned because the payment had been right. A fortnight on the Costas, a cash sum, all helped to obscure the vision of the boys in blue. That was just the way it was. You couldn’t rely on the police to do your work for you.
All this week the papers had been full of the news of this alleged ‘gangland killing’.
The public were enthralled.
The police didn’t give a fuck.
‘Let’s get home,’ said Molly from behind her veil. ‘I’m sick of this day. Kieron, you can show me all these paintings you’ve been doing and tell me all about your travels. Cheer me up a bit.’
Kieron nodded. Padraig looked at him daggers, but Orla was smiling at him. His big sis had often saved him from a beating from the pugnacious Pat. Kieron looked at Redmond, but those strange green eyes gave nothing away at all. Not grief. Not elation. If Tory had been hot-headed, Redmond was unfailingly controlled.
No, cold was more the word, thought Kieron, suppressing a shudder. Cold as fucking ice. That was Redmond.
8
The minute Annie got home from work, she knew something was wrong. Connie was sitting at the kitchen table alone, chain-smoking, an ashtray brimming with stubs in front of her. When Annie came into the kitchen Connie jumped to her feet and gave her youngest daughter a heavy slap around the face.
‘What the hell was that for?’ asked Annie, holding a hand to her stinging cheek and watching her mother as if she might go for the carving knife next. Annie’s eyes were watering with pain.
Connie waved her fag in Annie’s face, ash spilling down her tightly belted trench coat. Fucking English weather, she was tired and drenched through and now this.
‘You know what it’s for, you little slag,’ she yelled.
Annie was about to open her mouth to speak when she saw a suitcase at the foot of the stairs through the open hall door.
‘What’s going on?’ she asked, her heart racing.
‘What’s going on?’ sneered Connie. ‘What’s going on? Christ, you’ve got some front, I’ll say that for you.’
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ said Annie, beginning to shake with the shock of her mother’s attack.
‘Oh you don’t?’ Connie took a deep drag, sucked the nicotine right back into her lungs. Christ, if Connie Bailey
