The Cover Up: A gripping crime thriller for 2018

‘What did you say about rivals in Birmingham?’ A man’s voice.

Sheila looked over to the threshold of the kitchen and saw Lev leaning against the door frame with Jay on his hip. The child still had a bandaged head after the brain surgeon in Baltimore had removed his tumour. Size of an orange, Gloria had said. But now he was smiling and poking at the lightning bolt shaved into Lev’s stubbled scalp. His honey-coloured skin was lighter than Lev’s mixed-race-mocha, thanks to his white mother, Tiffany. But the little boy’s beautiful, symmetrical features and the promise of high cheekbones once the baby-chub had gone were surely down to his father. Small wonder that Mia Margulies had had the hots for Leviticus Bell, Sheila mused. ‘I’ve got trouble with Brummies and there’s an internal leak. You seen anything out of place at the cannabis farm?’

Lev nodded, advancing into the kitchen. Ignoring his mother, who was rummaging in a broom cupboard for something or other. Gazing suspiciously at the shotgun on the worktop. ‘That’s not loaded, is it? I can’t be having no guns in the house with my boy.’ Little Jay stretched out towards the weapon but Lev pulled him gently back to hold him close against his body. ‘Not for Jay-Jay,’ he told the child. ‘Dangerous.’

Sheila was touched by the fatherly love she could see in his concerned frown and ensuing smile. She wondered if Gloria had ever shown Lev that much affection. Couldn’t remember her having done so when she had brought him to her house as a boy during the school holidays. ‘It’s your mam’s. She’s your new boss.’ The smile slid from Lev’s face. ‘My manager. She’s going to whip those little pillocks into shape. And I’m expecting you to be behind her every step of the way. None of that Boddlington crap. Your loyalty now is to the O’Briens. And I’m watching you, Leviticus Bell.’

Scowling now, Lev yanked open a cupboard and took out some biscuits. Bit on one angrily and gave one to Jay to chew on. Slammed the cupboard door shut with some force. ‘I couldn’t work for Tariq and Jonny if I wanted, thanks to you and all the bullshit you stoked up.’

‘Need I remind you why your son’s on the mend?’ She knew it was a low comment but Sheila realised she was done for, the moment she allowed insubordination to creep in.

Lev blinked hard, a mouth full of biscuit. He chewed noisily, as if contemplating her sucker punch. Mouth open. Not so hot.

‘Degsy’s got a lad from Birmingham working in the weed farm,’ he said, shoving his tongue beneath his top lip.

‘You what?’

‘Yeah. Kevin. Brummie Kev. We both used to work for Scots Mavis, twocking cars for her cut-and-shut business. He’s been knocking around Manchester for years, has Kev. On and off, like.’

‘What’s he doing, working for me?’

Lev shrugged. ‘Ask Degsy. He’s the one give him a job. Said he was short-staffed after all what went on in the spring.’

Sheila narrowed her eyes. Took a step towards Lev and scrutinised his blemish-free face. ‘What’s he like, this Kevin? Do you trust him?’

Laughing, Lev threw his head back and closed his eyes. The thick cords of muscle in his neck bulged. ‘You’re having a laugh, aren’t you? He’s a fucking criminal. He’d steal the pennies off a dead man’s eyes! And he’s got no loyalty to you.’

‘You think he’s the grass?’

‘What do you think? You’re getting grief off some arsehole in Birmingham. Kev’s not called Brummie Kev for nowt and he’s a shifty little prick. Always was. He still owes us a tenner from 2007.’

‘How can I trust a word that comes out of your mouth?’ she asked.

‘I give up everything for you, didn’t I?’

‘Don’t come that shit. You gave up everything for money.’

Locking eyes, the two were caught in a silent battle of wills. Sheila could see that Lev had the same strength of character as his mother. But more than that … He had integrity.

There was a clatter from the broom cupboard, accompanied by a celebratory, ‘Da-daaaa!’ Gloria emerged, wheeling a tartan shopping wagon across the kitchen.

‘What the hell is that?’ Sheila asked, smiling with bemusement. ‘You going to Alty market for spuds? Or are you moving into Sunrise Rest Home?’

‘Don’t be so quick to mock, Sheila,’ Gloria said. ‘This is the sheath for my righteous sword.’ She started to sing lines from some hymn or other that Sheila vaguely remembered from Paddy’s funeral. ‘Jerusalem’, maybe. ‘Bring me my bow of burning gold. Bring me my arrows of desire!’ Then, the words seemed to evade her. ‘La di di deee, da-dum-de-dum. Bring me my chariot of fire.’ She wheeled the shopping wagon round at speed and holstered the shotgun inside it with a flourish. ‘This is my chariot of fire, She.’ Rolling it back and forth, back and forth. Withdrawing the shotgun at speed and pointing it at the cooker.

‘Jesus, Mam,’ Lev cried. ‘Put it away! Not in front of Jay.’

Ignoring his protest, Gloria swung the shotgun over her shoulder, as though its mere presence had transformed her into Jules from Pulp Fiction. ‘Don’t be embarrassed by it on my behalf, young man.’ Clearly misunderstanding Lev’s complaint as a slur against the tartan atrocity. ‘This fine shopping wagon will save the rheumatism in your mother’s poor hands. Years of having my hands in water, that is! I’m crippled when it’s damp. And my back’s not up to much either.’

‘Pulp Friction,’ Lev muttered under his breath, as though he had read Sheila’s thoughts.

Chapter 10

Paddy

Staring at the flickering computer screen, Paddy considered what he might write next to Ellis James. He took a swig from his can of extra-strength lager, glad that he had managed to stave off another lunchtime hangover by continuing to drink steadily throughout the afternoon. Relieved that Brenda had taken pity on him and let him hang around at hers, where he could crank the heating up at her expense and raid her fridge. Kyle’s laptop was infinitely superior to the piece of shit he had at his place. Kyle’s bedroom was the only decent room in the dump, though the thirteen-year-old was way too old for the brightly coloured kiddy cars and trains that covered the wall, now partly concealed beneath posters of some dickhead band called Twenty-One Pilots.

Back to the screen. What to say today?

‘If you want to know where Maureen Kaplan keeps bent accounting records,’ he said out loud as he typed slowly with two fingers, ‘check out Bella’s Afro Hair Supplies in Crumpsall before end of month.’ He signed the email off as ‘Shadow Hunter’, using the moniker of one of those YouTubing twats that Kyle followed. Pressed send and slurped at the beer. Waited for the response. And waited.

Paddy pressed F5 repeatedly, wondering when the hell the berk of a detective would get back to him. He scratched at his groin. Maybe he ought to shower more regularly. Kenneth Wainwright’s shower in that tired two-up, two-down rental was shite. The water either came through scalding hot or freezing cold. The pressure was almost non-existent from the cheap electric shower rig-up that had been poorly screwed onto the tiled wall by the private landlord. Brenda’s was no better.

Showering. Who would have thought that one of the things he missed most about being a wealthy man was daily access to a good power shower in a clean bathroom?

But Paddy was jolted out of his musings on personal hygiene and poor man’s water pressure by the arrival of a response from his least favourite dogged detective.

Re: Maureen Kaplan tip-off

James, Ellis

To: Shadow Hunter ([e-mail])

Hi SH,

How do you know about Maureen Kaplan? Where are you getting your intel from? Can we meet? What can you tell me about Jonny Margulies and Tariq Khan?

Regards

E.J.

Paddy smiled at the screen. Ellis James was more than intrigued. He was well and truly on the hook, and Paddy would enjoy reeling him in slowly. All those years he’d spent trying to pull the thorn from his side that was the detective and his Rottweiler of a tax-inspecting sidekick, Ruth Darley, and now, here James was: the instrument of Paddy’s revenge.

‘Don’t worry where I got info from,’ he wrote. ‘It’s good.’

He contemplated his link to the outside world – Hank the Wank had had a busy week of it, installing hi-tech sound-recording equipment in the offices of Maureen Kaplan when she was out at meetings. His oldest school friend was proving to be the perfect choice for a spy. Loyal as they came. No criminal record. Blended in everywhere, because who gave a workman in overalls a second thought if he went about his business with a merry whistle and an air of confidence? Endlessly excited by the novelty of subterfuge, and inexperienced enough not to have a clue what his skills were really worth on the black market. So far, Hank was working for peanuts and considered it a small fortune. So far, Katrina was indulging Paddy in sticking him an extra few hundred here and there to assist his transition back to normal life.

By the time the money runs out, Paddy thought, staring at the blinking cursor, I’ll have ruined the lot of them scheming bastards. He rubbed his hands together. Then, Kenneth Wainwright can shove it up his sad, dole-ite arse, because Paddy Big-Bollocks is coming back, baby!

With his index fingers hovering over the keyboard, Paddy contemplated what else to feed the detective with.

‘Did you know the Boddlingtons have brothels on Trafford Street and Grove Close in Sweeney Hall?’ He clicked send.

The main focus for Paddy’s anger was, of course, Sheila, since the lousy cow had sought to end him. Beyond that, he would not rest until Leviticus Bell was dead. Memories of that fateful poolside scene where he’d been sliced open and left for dead only months earlier were blurry, but he was certain that Lev Bell’s face had been hiding beneath a false beard and those stupid bloody sidelocks – an imitation Shylock, coming for his pound of flesh, trying to pin it on Asaf Smolensky. Very damned clever. Not clever enough to dupe him – the mighty Paddy O’Brien, however. But the Boddlingtons …? Why the hell should they evade the strong arm of the law? It would be easier to take his empire back with the enemy already weakened.

Waiting for Ellis James to respond, he jumped when a thin voice behind him said, ‘What the fuck you doing in my room on my laptop?’

Paddy turned around to find Kyle standing over him. A thin streak of piss with a sour expression on his malnourished face. The kid reeked of poverty – stale hand-me-down clothes that were too big on him; a whiff of unwashed boy, lard, school sports-hall changing rooms and the pervasive smell of mildew from living in a permanently damp Victorian terrace. Paddy hated the smell because he remembered smelling exactly like it as a child.

‘Your Mam said I could,’ Paddy lied, irritated that he had been caught in the act.

‘Well, you can’t. It’s mine and I’ve got private stuff on there.’

Kyle reached out to snatch the laptop away but Paddy swung it out of his reach. ‘Easy, tiger.’

‘Give it back, Ken! It’s mine! Mam bought it for me as a treat when my dad—’

‘How long you been stood there?’ He eyed the boy warily, keeping a firm grip on the laptop but snapping the lid shut. What had he seen?

‘Long enough,’ Kyle said, scratching at the florid rash of spots on his forehead.

The kid looked nothing like his mother. His eyes were small and too close together. Paddy found it odd that there were no photos of the father around the house whatsoever, as if he had never existed. Perhaps Brenda had never forgiven him for simply disappearing one day. But with a creep of a son like Kyle, who could blame the guy?

‘I was googling my ailments,’ Paddy said, pre-empting any confrontation. Who knew how much the kid had seen? ‘And they’re confidential, right? None of your fucking business, nosey hole.’ Had Paddy been thinking aloud while his back had been turned to the doorway? Conky used to frequently pull him up for that sort of thing. It would be no good if Kyle had worked out he’d been talking to a cop. The kid didn’t seem entirely daft. Unlike his dimbo of a mother. ‘Shouldn’t you be at school?’

Kyle’s gaze was unwavering. His attentions were focused on the laptop. With a jolt of realisation, it was clear to Paddy that the kid wasn’t suspicious of him at all! He had something to hide. And there was only one thing thirteen-year-old lads might be doing on a computer that they didn’t want a grown-up to know about.

‘I won’t tell her,’ Paddy said. ‘About the porn, I mean.’

Suddenly, the kid’s stern face cracked, offering Paddy a wry, knowing smile. Was this the start of some kind of truce? Was Kyle going to stop being a miserable little sod just because Paddy was poking his mother?

‘Ta,’ Kyle simply said, pulling the sleeves of his hoodie over his bony hands. That half-smile had turned to a grin, lighting up his cadaverous ugly face. Maybe the kid was relieved.

In truth, Paddy wouldn’t have the first idea on how to check someone’s browser history, but he wasn’t about to tell the little dipshit that. ‘Sling your hook, son, while I finish up here. Okay?’ He held his can of lager out to the boy. ‘You wanna swig? Is that what you’re waiting for?’

Shaking his head, Kyle sloped off back downstairs, still wearing a lopsided smile as though he was the only one in on some big secret. Creepy little smartarse.

Opening the laptop’s lid, Paddy refreshed the screen to see if Ellis James had responded. Sure enough, he had.

Re: Maureen Kaplan tip-off

James, Ellis

To: Shadow Hunter ([e-mail])

Have you got addresses for those brothels and also the place in Crumpsall? We’ll treat this information very seriously. I’d really like to meet you face-to-face, Shadow Hunter. Can I take you for lunch? I want to get to know you and let you know how GMP can help you, if you’d like to testify against the O’Brien crew or the Boddlington Gang.

Regards

E.J.

PS: What do you know about the main criminal firm in Birmingham? Have you ever heard of Nigel Bancroft before? If so, what can you tell me about him? I’ve attached a photo.

Paddy clicked on the attachment and studied what looked like a professionally shot corporate portrait of Bancroft. With his blow-dried hair and bone-white teeth, he put Paddy in mind of some male model off a Just for Men hair-dye packet. He’d heard of him, all right, but the ponce had never dared set foot in Manchester while Paddy had been king. If Ellis James was trying to pump him for information on Bancroft, that meant Sheila – and possibly the Boddlingtons too – were getting the heat. With Paddy gone, why wouldn’t a man like Bancroft have a pop at annexing a destabilised Manchester as Midland turf? It was the sort of stunt Paddy would certainly have pulled. A calculated business risk, well worth taking.

He thought about the prospect of that dozy show pony, Sheila, trying to defend herself against the likes of Nigel Bancroft: organised, established, semi-legal and experienced as hell. Threw back his head and laughed so hard, he began to wheeze.

‘What a bleeding joke!’

Sheila was just a woman. If the Brummies were after the O’Brien empire, she didn’t stand a hope in hell. Maybe Bancroft would do the job of bringing down his treacherous widow for him.

Chapter 11

Sheila

Sheila was surprised that her breath wasn’t steaming on the air in the office perched high above the warehouse floor of the cannabis farm. Despite the hot, moist, tropical climes artificially created in the vast industrial area below to keep the crops lush, she shivered in that claustrophobic crow’s nest of a room. The stiletto boots she had pulled on before leaving the car were causing her feet to spasm. Or maybe she was just tense as hell at the prospect of what was to come.

‘I don’t think this is a good idea,’ Conky said, perched on the dated 1970s desk that still bore the splintered bullet-holes from the Boddlingtons’ attack back in the spring. He removed his glasses with a flourish and fixed Gloria with The Eyes. ‘You don’t have any experience of dealing with these eejits. Colin Chang just about managed because he had the technical nous. But you’re an ex-cleaner, not a pharmacist, so you haven’t even got that, have you? Having a gun in your shopping trolley won’t give you any of the gravitas needed to run the O’Brien business interests.’

‘Who says?’ Gloria asked, folding her arms tightly across her chest. Bitterness audible in her clipped consonants. ‘I manage over a hundred women. And you could do with one of our girls in here. Look at the state of it! Has this place ever seen a duster?’

Conky sighed, rubbing The Eyes like a despairing parent. He looked to Sheila for support, but Sheila focused on Lev, who was rolling Jay’s pushchair to and fro along the wrinkled, threadbare old office carpet.

Seize control before Conky steam-rollers over you, Sheila O’Brien, she counselled herself. Draw your sodding boundaries. ‘Gloria’s taking over from that prick, Degsy, and that’s my final decision.’ Sheila turned back to her lover and noticed the dejected expression on his craggy face. Right then, Conky put her in mind of a chastised dog. ‘I want him demoted so he’s just running errands. I’m not having him mismanaging staff, leaving us open to attack and losing me money because he can’t organise a piss-up at a brewery. We either pull him into line or he gets booted out on his arse completely.’ She turned to Gloria. ‘That’s your first task, Glo.’

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