Page 21 of Fury
“V?” I recognised him now, the tattoos that covered his entire body, ending at his throat, as he batted me sideways and I nearly barrelled into the big fryer.
“Nice to see you too, Fury. What the fuck are you doing?”
“Dealing with intruders, you muppet. What are you doing here?”
I looked across at the exiled member of the Northern Kings and back to our new president, a quiet demand for answers.
“He’s here for a job,” Indie muttered, and I could see the hint of unease on his face.
“Who?”
“Emmie’s ex.”
“Mate, I would have done that for you. You shouldn’t have risked bringing V back.”
“It needs to be businesslike, clean. It needs to look like an unfortunate turn of events.”
“I could have made it clean.”
“I can’t take the chance Emmie finds out it’s come from me, Fury. I can’t have her knowing I’ve killed the father of her kids. And I couldn’t look those kids in the eyes knowing that I’d butchered their old man. However much he deserves it. This is a job for a professional.”
He looked back across at the man known as the Viking. The professional hit man who stood in our clubhouse. Indie was right, the Viking would be emotionless, clean and precise. There would be little interest from the police, and nothing left to tie it back to us. To the Police the Viking didn’t exist. He was a ghost, a spectre, the angel of death.
“You got any space left on that skin for anymore ink?” I asked him.
“Sure, I can fit a few more in. Just don’t tell Nat.” He smiled, conversely warm for the man he was, the best contract killer there is.
“Mate, I wouldn’t know where to find you. And no, I won’t ask.”
I knew better. Not that I would get an answer.
“You better scarper before anyone sees you,” I warned, knowing that shit would hit the fan if anyone else found him here.
The Viking grinned, like he relished the challenge of escaping nearly thirty members who had been ordered to kill him on sight if he ever breached the terms of his exile. Little did they know, this wasn’t the first time he’d been back in Kings’ territory, back in this very pub.
“Think about the funeral,” he said to Indie in a half code and our president merely nodded his head.
Then the tattooed man stepped out into the corridor, disappearing into the shadows.
“It’s a risk bringing the Viking back here,” I stated, my voice booming in the space of the kitchen.
Indie shook his head. “We’ve got bigger risks than V, Fury. He’d be an excellent weapon against what’s coming.”
Chapter Ten
I left the same time as everyone else that evening. The night already threatening, a sky full of clouds and rain that had not yet fallen, and that strange feeling of creeping blackness nipping at my face. It was nearly December, and the temperatures were declining, more noticeable here in the north. The fog rolling in off the river, making it colder still.
A taxi drew up to the curb, its engine purring as it waited for me to close up. Turning the key in the lock, I glanced through the glass doors, into the darkness of the reception and the shadows beyond, a sudden pang of fear, there and gone before I could do much else about it. But I wasn’t in there alone, and soon I’d at least have a security system to give me some safety, even if it was going to be installed by some leather wearing delinquent from a motorcycle club whose members had a nasty habit of coming to a sticky end.
I squeezed the laptop bag, the folder on the Kings safe inside, a niggling sensation of doubt and worry igniting at the back of my mind. Fury’s presence last night, and again today, the offer of cameras. It was all very convenient. As convenient as the manager who kept everything on paper, and a missing computer, and a black hole of money. None of it sat easy in my stomach. And now I had to head to my father’s, a man I barely knew other than some boardroom meetings and a few phone calls a year on special occasions. The need for a glass of wine was becoming stronger by the minute. The call of a cigarette loud.
The house was in the north of Newcastle, in a village bordered by green fields, with a driveway stupidly long. My German father was in his eighties. He should be in a bungalow or an apartment. But the mini mansion might as well have sat in the middle of a field, the lawns that surrounded it were as sprawling.
I waited outside the double oak doors, Julia taking an age to walk from one end of the huge property to another, but eventually the heavy lock ground in the frame and the door creaked open ominously.
My father was in his study, a fire burning in the old fireplace, crackling and popping as he sat under a blanket, surrounded by the men of the family, a mis-match of half-brothers watching me expectantly.
“Heidi,” my father’s voice, still heavy with his German accent, crackled like the fire. “Gut to see you. You have news?”