Page 66 of Fury
“I don’t fucking know. A reset or something. We need to get you somewhere safe. Somewhere where no one knows where you’ll be. At least until we can get this sorted.”
“And how long’s that going to be?”
“As long as it takes me to get a confession.”
“From Gordon?”
“Who else?”
“And how you going to do that?”
“I can be very persuasive. Come on, pack your stuff. I need you to check out.”
*****
“The Dog on the Tyne?” I asked, looking at the signage again, and the mass of bikes still filling the carpark. “Have they not gone home yet?”
“Nah. They’ll still be drinking. Biker funerals, huh? They once used to take days. Day after day of all-night sessions and a few hours of sleep wherever we dropped. Now, though, we’ve either got jobs or families to get home to. Come on.”
Fury jumped out of the truck, moving round to my side of the vehicle and helping me out before grabbing the case I’d hurriedly jammed all my belongings into. The music still bounded out of the building, the disco ball hanging in the ceiling scattering neon lights everywhere, bodies jostling in the dark. We moved to the back of the pub, to the men hustled around the bar, and the man with the grey hair looked up at us.
“Indie, I need a room for a while.” Fury tipped his head towards me and then back at the club’s president.
“The big room is full of the usual reprobates, mate. You can take Ste’s old room.”
“That’ll do.”
Indie didn’t once ask why. Didn’t once look at me as if he judged me. It was just matter of fact. Fury asked for a room. Indie told him which to use. No questions asked.
“Come on.” Fury pulled at my arm. “Let’s get you settled.”
I let him tug me forward, through the door beside the bar, where they’d all burst from earlier, and up the stairs at the back. The decoration was old, the wallpaper faded by the sun, squares almost burnt into it where pictures had once hung. Fury pulled me to the right, pushing through a door just off the landing.
It was a big room, a king-sized bed. The décor was the same, dated and worn, liked we’d stepped back a few decades. But it didn’t matter. It hadn’t been ransacked. And downstairs, anyone who wanted me would need to get through a bar full of bikers. I was probably the safest I had ever been.
“I’m sorry. It’s not the Hamptons, or a suite like you’re used to. But you couldn’t be safer.”
“I know, Fury. Thank you.”
He stood in front of me, and I smiled, wanting to break some of the tension.
“We never got room service,” he shrugged. “Want to see if those fuckers left us anything to eat?”
I nodded, my stomach rumbling in answer.
“Don’t suppose I can get a drink too. I could really use a gin.”
We sat side beside each other on a steel work bench, picking at food we’d piled on a plate between us.
“This stuff’s really great.”
“My mam made it all. Best fucking cook in the north east that one is. She loves cooking for us all. Every single one of us are family to her. She would have been a wonderful grandmother.”
“There aren’t any grandchildren?”
Fury shook his head. “There’s only three of us left. My older and younger brothers died, along with my Da years ago. Jacob fucked off to join the police and wiped his hands of us. And Jazz, she’s a wildcard. I can’t ever see her settling down and having kids. She jumps from job to job, place to place, boyfriend to boyfriend. None of us know where she’ll pop up next. It was good to see her yesterday, but mam said she’s taken off again.”
“Yesterday?”