Heavy Duty Trouble (The Brethren Trilogy) (21 page)

‘Down the end to the kitchen,’ he said
pleasantly,
nodding the direction from beside me while I waited as he deadlocked the thick hardwood door and slid the seriously solid security bolts to behind us, ‘I’ll get the coffee on.’

‘This is Jonquil,’ he said
,
as he pushed open the door and led me in, ‘my other half. This is Iain
,
love, the
bloke
I was telling you about.’

I
’d not really thought about Wibble’s partner or what
s
he’d be like.
Given what had been going on
when I’d been around the club last yea
r, the wives and girlfriends we
re
n’t
really
about
so I’d not had the chance to meet any of the
m. Which was a pity if Jonquil w
as anything to go by. She
was
quite
simply stunning.
Absolutely-bone-fide-no-arguments-drop-dead-gorgeous.
Slim, with long blond
e
hair framing her elfin features as she smiled at me and said
,
‘Oh, hi there.’

‘
Hi,
’
I said
, inadequately
.

‘And this is Benji, off school for the day with the sniffles, isn’t that right Benji?’ Wibble continued
, introducing me to a mop-
haired
boy
who must have been
six
or so
who was sitting at a kitchen table strewn with pots of paint, brushes and sheets of paper, many of which appeared to be pictures of green dragons.

‘
Say hello Benji
,’
he said
.

‘Hello mister,’ said Benji as his dad ruffled his hair, before going back to colouring in his next dragon picture.

‘Hello Benji
,
’ I said as he
proceeded to
ignore me completely.

Wibble just shrugged and smiled in a universal
parental
gesture for ‘kids eh?’

‘Do you want to talk in here?’ Jonquil asked
him
, ‘I can take
Benji
into the front room if you like?’

‘No that’s OK,
’ he said,
‘
he can stay where he is. I was just going to make us a brew and then we can sit in there.’

‘I’ll make it if you want,’ she said, ‘you go on through.’

‘Is that OK?’ he asked.

‘Yes of course it’s
all right
,’ she said picking up the kettle and turning to the sink. ‘What would you like? Tea? Coffee?’

Wibble looked at me
in enquiry
.

‘Coffee please,’ I said.

‘I’ll have the same.’

‘No problem,’ she smiled as she clicked the kettle back into its base and flipped it on, ‘I’ll bring it through in a minute
when
it’s done.’

‘Thanks love,’ Wibble said
,
and led me back out.

*

We sat on a pair of comfy sofas arranged at right angles
facing a large screen TV, below which were
the usual
range of
techie
boxes, satellite, DVD,
and
games consoles. After the normal family hallway and normal family kitchen it came as no surprise to find that apart from the presence of a few framed photographs involving large tattooed men on some of the shelves, it was a normal family front room with books and DVDs stacked up beside the TV and children’s toys and plastic dinosaurs sort of more or less packed into a box in one corner.

Wibble picked up a
Barbie doll
from where it
had been abandoned in a state of undress
on the sofa to give me space to sit down and tossed it accurately into the box with the other toys.

‘
Not his then I assume?
’
I asked
,
as he sat down on the other
sofa.

‘No,’ he laughed, ‘
That’s
Sam
’s
, she’s
seven
.
’

‘Just the two?’

‘Oh yeah,’ he said, ‘believe me, that’s plenty.’

‘So, how’s it going?’ I asked
carefully
,
as we settled into our seats, not fully able to trust my feelings after the events of the night before
.

Wibble was out
,
but he was tagged
he
confirmed
, hoisting up the leg of his jeans to show me the grey/black cuff bearing a blank faced moulded disc containing the transmitter
.
The bracelet on his ankle
talked to a box plugged into the wall, which
meant that he couldn’t move beyond the boundaries the judge had set for him
,
and
which when you boiled it down
,
amounted to house arrest until the date of the trial.

Worse still were his bail cond
itions. L
iving at home he could cope with, but a curfew and
the
no association clause
were a complete pain in the arse.

‘So you can’t see any of the guys?’ I asked.

‘Nope
,
it’s
not worth the risk.
Not and get caught
anyway
. It would be straight back inside if it happened.’

‘
You must be doing your nut
, surely
?
’
I asked.

‘
I think I could get a little stir crazy after a while
,’ he agreed,
‘
but hey it has to be better than life as a lounge lizard right?
’

‘Well, if that’s the alternative, I guess it has to be,’ I nodded.

Just then the door began to open and Wibble le
a
pt to his feet to help.

‘
Thanks love
,’
said Jonquil
,
as she entered bearing a tray with a c
ouple of mugs, a full cafeti
è
re and matching milk j
u
g and sugar bowl.

‘That’s
great
love
,’ said Wibble taking the tray from her and setting it down on the coffee table in front of us.

‘Yes
,
thanks for that,’ I nodded.

‘Oh that’s OK,’ she smiled, and turn
ed
to Wibble, ‘I’ll be with
Benji
in the kitchen
so
if you want anything else just yell
.
’

Then
sh
e shu
t the door behind her
and
left us to it.

*

‘
Jonquil
’s an unusual name,’ I said, as Wibble sorted out
the coffee
.

‘Yeah, her
parents were into some hippy shit
. They all lived in a camper van
out
in the arse end of Wales for a while when she was a kid.’

‘So how did you two meet?’

‘She was a
model at a photo shoot
,’ he said
,
smiling to himself,
‘
S
ome advertiser
decided they
wanted
a bunch of
scary bikers for some shit and
so we got invited to come and have our photos taken. It was good money for fuck all work and sounded like a bit of a laugh so we though
t
why the hell not, and well,
there she was.
’

‘I a
sked her if she fancied a drink afterwards and she said only if she could have a ride on the bike and well
,
he
re
we are. How many sugars do you want?’

*

‘
So,
’ he said, settling back into his chair, his mug of coffee cradled in his hands,
‘
Bung tells me you’ve got some issues
?’

Issues?

Issues? I was at a loss for words for a moment.

‘
Christ Wibble, that’s one way of putting it,’ I said at last when I could speak again.

‘So,’ he said calmly, ‘let’s have them then. What’s bothering you?’

*

‘Well h
ow do you expect me to feel?
’ I was saying,
‘
Getting hooked up with you guys has completely
screwed
my life. I’ve been on the run
ever since
hiding out for a murder I didn’t commit, and the
n just when I think I’m out of it at least,
Bung shows up and I’m right back in this secret squirrel shit again.’

It was something I’d been burning to say for days now, but instead of
self-
righteous anger, all it sounded like was a pathetic whine.

‘I mean we had a deal, you’ve broken it, end of.’

‘Yeah I know,’ said Wibble calmly.

‘You know?’ I demanded, ‘That’s it? You know?’

He shrugged. ‘Hey I’m sorry. It’s not the way I meant it to work out but that’s the way it is. It’s
not our fault and it’s n
othing personal, it’s just business, and it’s business that affects you just as much as it affects me.’

‘Not your fault? How
the hell
d’you
work that one out?’

‘Hey don’t blame us. It wasn’t down to us
that you got involved was it?
’

‘So who was it down to then?’

‘You weren’t our choice
. Y
ou were that copper’s choice, blame him. Christ
,
you ought to be thanking me for sorting him out for you. And anyway,’ he continued, ‘you’ve only got yourself to blame really. No one asked you to come round talking to Damage. You wanted to see, you wanted to get a taste, get a thrill, get close.
You chose this mate, so there’s no whing
e
ing your way out of it now.’

And d
eep down
,
I had to acknowledge, if only to myself, that he had a point there. Oh
,
I could bullshit about just being a journalist. About just following the story, but it wasn’t just that was it? As a journalist I could have filed any story I wanted to
. A
fter all, at the time that I’d first got involved with Damage, The Brethren weren’t even big crime
news
. But nevertheless I’d decided to follow him up, to interview him, to start the process of getting involved
,
which had eventually and seemingly inevitably led me here.

Christ
,
there were times when you looked back at your life and wondered just what innocent, even accidental choices you had made that led you to the exact point
you were
now at.

No,
the reality
wa
s,
Wibble was right. I had known that associating with the club could be dangerous
. E
ven without their public image, I’d been a biker for enough years to see
one-percenter
clubs occasionally at
rallies, gigs and
events and to get a feel for what they could be like,
even from way back when
as a teenager I’d read the books and bought my copies of
Easyriders
as and when I could find it.

There was a fascination in that, and so when the chance presented itself, or rather once I’d had the chance to create an opportunity through work to find an excuse
to
make contact, it was like an irresistible temptation
. It was
something guilty, that I knew I should really refuse, but some
how
I just couldn’t help myself. I had to do it, I had to arrange to meet Damage, I had been drawn to the club like a moth to a flame.

And
so in truth,
it was difficult to really blame anyone else when I got my wings burnt.

*

‘
So why am I here then
,
Wibble
?’
I asked,
at last,
putting my coffee mug down on the tray
to cool for a moment
.
‘
You’re out, Charlie’s out, but given what’s gone down, I’m g
u
essing that the talking’s over between
the two of
you
for now.
I me
a
n you’ve broadly declared war haven’t you? So why do you need me?
’