The Drop

‘What?’

He couldn’t be serious. He didn’t really want me to do it, surely.

Tommy Gladwell pulled my arm up then he pressed the Makarov into my right hand and wrapped my fingers round the cold metal of the gun. Before he released it into my grasp, the Russian pressed his pistol harder against my head.

‘One move,’ he reminded me.

Gladwell stepped away and walked behind me. I was left holding the gun in my outstretched hand and it was pointing straight at Bobby. He was staring back at me, serious now. The laughter had stopped.

‘Do it,’ urged Gladwell, ‘shoot him and walk away.’

‘Fuck off,’ I managed, ‘you’ll kill me anyway.’ I was still holding the gun in my outstretched hand. I could feel the barrel of Vitaly’s gun pressing into my skull and sweat forming on my forehead.

‘No I won’t,’ he assured me, ‘do this thing and we are even. I’ll put you on a train to London. You have my word.’

‘Your word?’ I didn’t believe he could be serious.

‘You’re basically a civilian. You’re no threat to me. What the fuck are you going to do on your own – without Finney, without Mahoney, you’re nothing! But, like I said, you have to earn your life. You have one round. Use it on Mahoney and live. Try and use it on us and Vitaly will drop you where you stand. But I won’t wait all day son. In a moment I’ll start counting down from ten and when I finish, Vitaly will kill you anyway if you haven’t done what I’ve asked. Then he’ll kill Mahoney.’

This didn’t make any sense to me. None at all.

‘Then why get me to shoot him?’

‘Because I want to make you do it.’

‘Why?’

‘To prove that I can.’

‘What’s the point?’

‘Oh fuck this,’ he suddenly lost patience, ‘Vitaly… ’

Vitaly cocked his gun, ‘No!’ I shouted, quickly, ‘I’ll do it.’ I was just desperate to buy some time. That’s what I needed. Time, to think, Christ, I needed time to think.

‘Ten…’ said Gladwell.

‘Wait,’ I said, my hand shaking so badly there was a chance I’d miss, even from here. I lowered the gun just a little.

‘Nine… ’

‘Fucking do it,’ said Bobby suddenly. Those were the first words he’d spoken since I walked in the room. His voice sounded incredibly weary all of a sudden, like he was tired of the game.

‘Eight…’ I levelled the gun again, pointing it straight at him.

‘Good lad,’ said Bobby, ‘you’re doing me a favour,’ and he actually managed a grim smile of encouragement.

‘Seven… ’

‘Do it, they’ll do it anyway,’ Bobby was selling the idea to me.

‘Six…’

‘Get out of here, find Sarah, look after her,’ so that was his reason.

‘Oh, she’s being looked after,’ said Gladwell and the Russians laughed.

‘Five.’

I tried to squeeze the trigger but I couldn’t. I tried again but my arm shook. I knew I was crying now like a little girl, tears streaming down my cheeks, my face all snot and tears. I let my arm drop and the gun fell to my side. My head went down and all I could see was my shoes. Next to me Vitaly said something that sounded like he was swearing in his own language.

‘You stupid cunt,’ Bobby told me.

‘Four.’

I tried to raise my arm again but I couldn’t. I just wanted to lie down on the floor and let them shoot me so it would all be over.

‘Three…’

‘Do it you spineless fucking cunt! Do it!!’ Bobby was screaming at me now.

‘Two… ’ I raised the gun again and pointed it straight at Bobby’s head.

He grinned, ‘I’ll see you down in hell Tommy Gladwell you fat little queer!’

‘One.’

‘Do it,’ screamed Bobby, ‘fucking do it!’

So I did. I blew Bobby Mahoney’s brains out.

THIRTY

…

I couldn’t take my eyes off Bobby. I couldn’t tear them away from what I had just done. That’s why I hadn’t even realised what Tommy Gladwell had been doing while I was killing my boss. It was only when his extended arm slowly came round in a big arc towards me that I realised he was holding a mobile phone. ‘Smile son,’ he told me, ‘you’re on Candid fucking Camera,’ he handed the phone to Vitaly who put it in his inside jacket pocket, ‘nice phone Vitaly,’ he said and then he laughed. It was a big, gleeful, triumphant laugh because he knew he had won. I didn’t care about that just now. All I cared about was the fact that I had just shot Bobby Mahoney through the head – and Gladwell had filmed the whole thing on Vitaly’s mobile.

I took one last look at Bobby; his head forced back by the bullet, brain matter splattered all over the white wall behind him, then they took the empty gun from me and hauled me out of the room.

‘Leave a couple of your lads to deal with the bodies,’ Gladwell told Vitaly, ‘put them in the incinerator.’

The Russian just nodded without enthusiasm. Why did I keep getting the impression Tommy Gladwell didn’t really have a clue who he was dealing with? Six months down the line, with the city under their full control, it could just as easily be Gladwell who was staring down the barrel of a Makharov, on his way to the incinerator. I couldn’t imagine these guys wanting to play the hired hands for long. They looked too bloody sure of themselves. None of that really mattered though. One way or the other, I was history.

I didn’t expect for one minute that Tommy Gladwell would honour his promise and let me go, even when they didn’t shoot me straight away, even when I was taken from the building, bundled into the back of the Porsche Cayenne and driven away. I was vaguely aware that my car was gone but I didn’t care. I still expected Gladwell to order them to pull over somewhere quiet, drag me from the car, and shoot me in the face, just like they had done to Geordie Cartwright, Jerry Lemon, and Alex Northam; just like I had done to Bobby Mahoney. As we drove back into the city I still didn’t believe it. I couldn’t have done it. I hadn’t just murdered Bobby Mahoney in cold bloke. I wasn’t muscle, I wasn’t a gangster, not really, but now it seemed I was a murderer. How the fuck had that happened?

We were getting closer and closer to the bright lights of the city and I had to stop myself from actually believing they weren’t going to kill me. I tried not to even think about the possibility they might let me go because then, when they didn’t, it wouldn’t hurt me quite so much. I was numb, inside and out, and the quicker this hell ended then the better it would be. I played out the scene in my mind over and over; everything that was said before it happened, me firing the Makarov like I was doing it in a dream, the bullet hitting the target, smacking into Bobby’s head, jerking him back, jolting his body in the chair like it was a crash test dummy and all the blood that blew up out of the back of his skull, painting the wall behind him, sending dark red splashes out over the chipped, white plaster. Jesus Christ, what had I done?

I was vaguely aware of Gladwell in the car, wittering away to the two Russians or was it to me, or perhaps he was just talking to himself. He was like some excitable child on Christmas morning who had just found out Santa’s been and given him everything he ever wanted.