Dead Of Winter (Willis/Carter #1)(96)

Digger greeted Carmichael from his armchair. He held up his glass as a salute. His eyes were watching Carmichael closely.

‘Welcome, Mr Hart. We were just talking about you. You came just in time. These are the club owners I told you about. Meet Sim, Amir. We were discussing our futures.’

‘Perfect timing then.’

Carmichael looked at the other men in the room: two young Turks and Tyrone with one of the girls. He recognized the young girl, Anna. She looked like she was barely conscious. Her head lolled back, her eyes half closed as she sat between the club owners. Tyrone was watching him nervously. He sat chopping up thick lines of coke on the tabletop, his nose dripping as he wiped it with his sleeve. Digger was watching Carmichael in between laughing at one of the Turks’ jokes. He was stroking the dog on his lap. The jokes were all at Digger’s expense. He knew they disliked him as much as he did them. They loved calling him paramy, which Carmichael knew was Turkish for cocksucker. The Turks followed Digger’s gaze towards Carmichael.

‘We were just discussing the loss of Sonny. These men own clubs in Leeds.’

Digger gave the faintest of knowing smiles, a tease, a secret shared that excluded them. He turned back to his guests and twitched his head in Carmichael’s direction: ‘Big man.’

Carmichael took his time as he removed his coat and hung it in the hallway; then he crossed the room towards them. As he got nearer he could see that Sim was too drunk to stop his eyes rolling round in his skull when he tried to focus. Amir sat back and tapped his finger slowly on the arm of his chair.

A new bottle of whisky arrived at the same time, via Jock. Carmichael spoke to Jock and the bottle was soon replaced by a fifty-year-old single malt.

‘Can’t have my homeland represented by a bottle of piss,’ Carmichael said. He leant forward and poured Amir and Digger a generous shot, handed it to them, and saluted them.

‘To Sonny.’ The dog jumped down.

Amir watched Carmichael closely as he raised his glass.

Digger gestured his way. ‘A little bird told me you took shipment, Hart . . .’ Tyrone stopped chopping and looked up. Carmichael took his time to turn his attention back to Digger who said: ‘Tyrone sings a tune for anyone who pays. Don’t you, Tyrone?’ The silence in the room was ended by a nervous snigger from Tyrone.

‘Sure. I took shipment.’

‘Where are they? Tyrone says they’re not at his place.’

‘Where I keep the girls is my business.’ Carmichael smiled.

Sim staggered to his feet with what looked like a supreme effort; he lurched in the direction of the bathroom and didn’t come back. Amir looked at Digger. Digger was smirking into his drink. His eyes twinkled in the gloom. Tyrone was trying to squirm his way out of the group. He went to stand up and move away from the table. Carmichael reached across a hand to push him back in the chair, all the while keeping his eyes on Digger. ‘I’ve got plenty of girls. No one else is going to get them for you. No one takes my girls without my say-so. I make the rules now.’

‘I didn’t ask to come here, bro,’ Tyrone whispered to Carmichael, half grimacing and half smiling as he did so.

Amir knocked back his drink. He stared at Carmichael.

‘Of course . . .’ Carmichael grinned as he poured out more drinks. ‘The first five will be on me . . . as a show of good faith.’

Amir grinned and crashed his glass against Carmichael’s. ‘You make good business, my friend.’

Another bottle later and Amir got unsteadily to his feet, pulling Anna up with him. He swayed as he walked back towards the doorway and then they heard him crash along the corridor. Carmichael heard him open a door to one of the rooms.

Digger looked across at Carmichael.

‘We have a lot to talk about, you and I?’

‘Do you think so?’

Digger was watching Carmichael in the gloom of the lounge with the sound of squeaking as Tyrone scraped a credit card along the table top and gathered the dust into a pile and continued chopping; the coke was so fine now it was evaporating as he breathed. It blew across the glass table. On the mantelpiece an antique clock in a glass dome kept time in the room. Carmichael heard Anna crying from another room.

Tyrone had stopped chopping and was watching Carmichael.

Digger raised his voice to be heard over Anna’s rhythmical cries that came with each thrust.

‘I am sorry you had a spot of bother earlier. It was a misunderstanding. That’s why I wanted you to come this evening to clear it up.’

‘It didn’t bother me. Buster was a bit upset though.’

Digger nodded, gently amused but still keeping his eyes on Carmichael.

‘Deano’s brains matched the size of head, I apologize.’

‘So you didn’t send him to kill me?’

‘Of course not.’

‘I would have.’

Tyrone’s eyes went back and forth from one man to another as if he were watching ping-pong.

Digger tutted and shook his head. ‘My new business partner? Of course not. I think we have a big future ahead of us.’

‘Not a past?’

Digger gave a small flutter of his right eye: a nervous habit that had stopped him progressing in the game of poker. He frowned and shook his head pretending not to understand what Carmichael could mean.

‘You recognize me, don’t you? We know one another from a long time ago.’