The Faithless - Martina Cole [32]
Celeste loved her husband more than life itself, but she knew he wasn’t exactly kosher. In truth, she knew a lot more than he gave her credit for. She also understood what he was capable of, and that frightened her. Not for herself – he would never hurt her, of that she was sure. But he was capable of murder, she had no doubt about that at all.
She smoked the cigarette with shaking hands. Tonight was going to be a long one.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Jonny Parker was excited, but the excitement was tinged with worry. He might be a Face to be reckoned with, but he knew he was dealing with people who would never give him a second chance if he didn’t achieve his goal straight off. And the goal was to get what they had; he wanted every bit of it. He was legitimate enough to pass off his affluent lifestyle as above board. He also had a cache of fall guys who worked for him, unaware that if it went pear-shaped they would be the ones in the frame. That was the brainchild of his dear brother-in-law who, if it ever did go off, would be the first one nabbed by Lily Law. Jonny had enough safety features in place to keep himself out of stir. What he didn’t have, at least not one hundred per cent, was the guarantee that he wouldn’t be taken out before he achieved the more outrageous of his goals. But he was a planner and he was a plodder in many respects; he waited and he watched, and he thought through his business moves with precision. Still, you always had to allow for eventualities, such as the people you were dealing with being a bit fucked off that you were intending to wipe them out. That tended to give people the raging hump.
Jonny was respected for doing the majority of his dirty works himself; that was so people knew what they were dealing with. He never left a trail though, he was far too shrewd for that. But tonight was about some serious money, and meant having to cross some serious people. He was confident he could make the transition from supplier to managing director with no real trouble. If he took out the main men, he was laughing all the way to the bank.
It was the taking them out that was the tricky thing. Taking them out and making sure the people who worked for them understood the economics of the deal. After all, his education had taught him that as long as people earned, they would happily work for whoever provided that earn. They lived in a Thatcherite society; you give me a good wage, and I’ll swallow my knob and work for you instead. It was the way things worked now. It wasn’t the sixties any more, and the sooner people realised that, the better off they would all be. It was like living in a fucking bubble; the old values were all right in their day, but this was the eighties, and anyone with a sawn-off and a few quid could walk in anywhere and get a decent hearing. The days of gentlemen villains was long gone; they were banged up, and wouldn’t see the light of day until the fucking Jews returned to Zion, that’s how remote their release dates were. They had been put away for the duration, judges had taken it upon themselves to rid the country of some of its best earners. Legal earners at that; for all their skulduggery they had been proper earners as well – good, decent taxpayers. None of them had ever signed on the dole or asked for a fucking handout.
It was a new world, with a whole new set of rules and regulations; the old guard were gone and forgotten. This was really about the survival of the fittest, and Jonny Parker knew he was fitter than most. He was going to play them all at their own game, and they would understand that this was not a dress rehearsal, this was the real thing.
He had planned it down to the last detail, and all he had to do now was make sure it was executed with the minimum of fuss and the maximum of terror. Fear was the best way to ensure the complete devotion