Lawless (23 page)

‘Grievous.’

‘What?’

‘GBH. Grievous Bodily Harm.’

‘Oh God.’

‘Christ, Daise.’

‘I came straight back inside and phoned you.’

‘You did right.’ Rob was frowning. ‘Fuck’s sake, Daise, will you please stop pissing around and stay where you’re safest? We’ve got ourselves a situation here, you know that. You should have got Reg to drive you, you shouldn’t have come in on your own.’

‘Don’t talk to me like that,’ snapped Daisy, irritated because she knew he was right, she’d been stupid to do it.

‘I’ll talk to you any way I fucking-well like,’ said Rob. ‘Kit’s the guvnor and he says I have to keep you safe. So whether you like that or not, I’ll do that.’ He took a breath. ‘There was nobody hanging about the back entrance when I got here.’

‘Good.’ Daisy eyed him sulkily, stung by that rebuke. ‘I didn’t know Michael had a son.’

‘Neither did any of us, until Kit and me went to talk to Joe. Joe thinks this Gabriel is spitting blood over Kit getting the firm. And it sounds like Joe’s right. That’s fucking annoying, him trying to come in sideways, starting with you and Ruby. Come on, Daise. Let’s get you home.’

54

‘Boss?’ Scar-faced Jay put his head around the door of the office over Vito’s. Downstairs, the club was humming and someone was hammering out a bouncy song that was pounding the floorboards beneath Jay’s feet.

‘What?’ asked Vittore, who had been sitting behind his desk puffing on a thin cheroot and sipping a glass of wine from his own cellar, a very fine Chablis; he had a good palate and he appreciated things like that.

He’d been thinking about his brother and his wife and all that family shit, and trying not to. To distract himself, he had opened the bottle and then the post – just bills as usual. Then he’d tossed the letter-opener aside and begun leafing through the day’s paper; inflation was riding high at 21 per cent, the Russians had put two more cosmonauts into space to link up with the Salyut 4 space station and Sinatra had successfully sued the BBC over some programme that had linked him to the Mafia.

‘You are never gonna
believe
who’s downstairs in the club asking for a meet.’

Vittore sat up. ‘Who?’ he asked, stubbing out the cheroot in a red Murano glass ashtray, a gaudy remnant of Tito’s reign.

Jay told him.

‘You’re right,’ said Vittore, standing up. ‘I
don’t
believe it.’

What Kit was thinking was this: he would talk with Vittore, work out some sort of deal with the bastard if he could, have a proper sit-down. It grated on him, the thought of doing this; the Danieris were scum. But this whole thing was getting out of control. Simon’s death, and then Daisy being so badly scared . . . he didn’t want that. If Vittore had a problem, it was with
him
– not his family.

So he’d come over to Vito’s with Rob for backup, and he’d ignored his own misgivings.

The last time he’d been in this place, inside this building . . . he thought about it, then tried to shove it back out of his mind.

The last time . . .

Gilda, lying dead

Tito’s men, holding him down

And, ah shit, the pain, the God-awful pain

But that was then and this was now.
This
time, there was Rob to mind his back, and this time Tito was six feet under and he was dealing with Vittore, so maybe this could come out right. He’d caused all this crap, now it was down to him to sort it out.

‘There he is,’ said Rob, leaning in to Kit’s ear. ‘And this is a
bad
idea – did I already say that?’

Rob had said it at least a dozen times, but Kit wasn’t listening. The place was packed and the noise of the sound system was awesome. People danced, drank, crowded at the blue-lit bar. Beyond the bar was a roped-off stairway, and it was down these stairs that Vittore was now coming, with the tall knife-scarred man behind him. Vittore’s eyes were casting around in the dim lights and the flashing strobes.

He saw Kit. For a moment Vittore paused there; then he gestured for Kit to come over.

Once they were all upstairs in Vittore’s office and Jay had checked that neither of them was carrying, Jay shut the door and leaned against it. Rob stood off to one side. Vittore sat down behind his desk, and Kit took a seat opposite.

‘What you come here for?’ asked Vittore, eyeing Kit coldly.

‘To talk,’ said Kit.

‘So talk.’

‘I don’t like what’s happening,’ said Kit.

Vittore glanced up at Jay, back at Kit. ‘And what
is
happening?’ he asked.

‘My ex-brother-in-law died,’ said Kit. Gloria Gaynor was vibrating the floorboards under their feet with ‘Never Can Say Goodbye’.

‘That’s very sad, I’m sorry,’ said Vittore.

‘Killed himself, that’s the story,’ said Kit.

‘Tragic,’ shrugged Vittore.

‘But see, I think it’s just that: a story. He was a stroppy little cunt, but one thing you could say in that fucker’s favour, he was always
up.
Never down. He had a good business, a family, everything to live for.’

‘Shit happens,’ said Vittore, nodding sympathetically.

‘Don’t it though. There was even a suicide note – nice touch.’

‘Nice in what way?’ asked Vittore.

‘Nice in the way that it made the picture complete. Man commits suicide, leaves note saying he can’t go on.’ Kit was eyeing Vittore without blinking. ‘Thing is, this was a little tit who could go on for England.
This
cunt would go on when everyone else had fallen by the wayside and gone down the pub for a beer. Giving up, giving in? Not an option for this fucker.’

Vittore sat back in his chair. ‘Surely you’re not suggesting there was something
suspicious
about this man’s death?’ he asked.

‘I’m not suggesting anything. I’m stating a fact. Simon Collins wouldn’t kill himself. Now on to Daisy, and you showing up with your boys when she goes to her ex-husband’s place to pay her respects, trying to frighten her – I’m really upset about this, Mr Danieri,
very
upset.’

‘Oh, you are?’ said Vittore.

Kit nodded. ‘I am. OK, so I may have stepped on your toes a little—’

‘A little?’ Vittore was smiling. ‘No. A
lot.
You offended me deeply, Mr Miller, turning up at my brother’s funeral like you did.’

‘I realize that. But we’re both reasonable men,
business
men. Let’s cool this down a bit, eh?’

‘Cool it down? When you behave as you do, when the rumours on the street are so strong about who was behind my beloved brother’s death? Have you
heard
those rumours, Mr Miller?’

Kit shook his head. ‘Tito had plenty of enemies.’

‘Yeah. He did. You were one of them, you made
that
obvious. So now I’m wondering, were you the one who took Tito from us, his family?’

‘Tito’s gone,’ said Kit. ‘My ex-brother-in-law is gone. These are sad times for
both
our families. But if that’s your view, then maybe we can say that we’re even. That enough’s enough.’

This time it was Vittore’s turn to shake his head. ‘No, Mr Miller.’

Kit stared at him. ‘No?’

‘Let’s wrap this up, shall we?’ Vittore stood up and leaned both hands, palms down, on the desk’s tooled leather surface. His eyes gleamed with fury and the thin veneer of civility dropped away like a discarded mask. ‘You shitting me, coming here? You think I give a fuck about anything you and your tribe are going through?
My
family concerns me.
Mine.
And you’ve insulted them and maybe worse, who knows? What I
do
know is that you’re a dead man walking.’

Kit stood up too. He leaned in on the other side of the desk. Smiled thinly.

‘I’m trying to be the bigger man here,’ he said.

‘You? You fucking
schifoso
!’ yelled Vittore suddenly.
‘Get the fuck out of my club!
’

‘Yeah. I will,’ said Kit, and snatched up the letter-opener and thumped it down, skewering Vittore’s hand to the desk.

55

‘Leave the bottle,’ Bianca told the barman over the heavy thrum of the music in Vito’s. Her friend Shula, who she’d known since school, was there with her at the bar for another night of fun, drink and dance. She was going to enjoy herself tonight if it bloody well killed her.

The barman poured champagne into two flutes, and left the bottle just like Bianca said. Shula was looking around, spying out the eye candy. Bianca couldn’t bring herself to bother. She grabbed the flute and drank down the bubbly, then poured another.

‘Steady with that,’ shouted Shula, leaning forward to make herself heard. ‘We got all night.’

Oh, and why didn’t that prospect fill her with excitement like it used to? Now the thought of an all-nighter was utterly bloody tedious and pointless.

Stop it, you miserable bitch,
Bianca told herself sternly.
Enjoy yourself.

She was determined to do that. She
would
do that.

‘Jesus, what happened to
him
?’ asked Shula, pointing out Donato further down the bar.

Bianca looked. All the boys called him Pizza Face now, and word was that Fabio had given him both a bad limp and a face-full of cigarette burns when he’d been stupid enough to bring him bad news. Nevertheless, gang loyalty ran deep. Donato was still here, still serving the family.

‘Dunno,’ she said, uninterested.

‘Dance?’ suggested Shula.

‘Not yet,’ said Bianca, and caught the exasperation in Shula’s eyes. She knew she was being a pain in the arse, but somehow she couldn’t seem to stop. She downed the second glass of champagne. It didn’t cheer her up, though. She poured another and brought it to her lips.

Then she froze.

There was a commotion on the stairs near the far end of the bar. Men were coming down, practically wrestling each other down the stairs – a big chunky blond bloke and Jay, her brother’s right-hand man, shouting and screaming, and . . .

‘Hey! Watch it!’ said Shula as Bianca’s hand twitched in shock, spilling champagne over Shula’s lap.

It was Tony Mobley. Jay had managed to grab him halfway down the stairs and they were yelling at each other. The blond one ran up a couple of steps and punched Jay in the head. Jay fell, and then Tony and the blond came on down and walked through the surging unconcerned crowds to the front of the club.

Bianca jumped to her feet. ‘Tony!’ she shouted.

He walked on; didn’t hear her.

‘Fuck’s sake . . .’ Bianca was hurrying after the two men now, going out to the front of the club, looking at the doormen. Damn it, he was
gone.

‘Well,
that
was bloody clever,’ said Rob as he and Kit hurried back to the car. ‘Talk, you said. Cool things down, you said.’

‘Shut up,’ said Kit. All right, he’d lost it. He
knew
he’d lost it, he didn’t need that pointing out to him. But there was something about that ugly, self-satisfied smirk on Vittore’s face that had made him want to wipe it off.

Well, he’d done that.

Not very bloody clever at all. Rob was right.

Instead of rejoining Shula at the bar, Bianca made her way up to the office. Inside she found a scene of chaos: Vittore was behind the desk, his face ashen, clutching a bloody handkerchief to his left hand. He was cursing in Italian. Pizza-faced Donato had come up to see what was occurring, and Jay was standing over Vittore, saying they’d better get him to the hospital, get that cleaned up.

‘What’s going on?’ she asked. ‘What happened to your hand?’

‘Fucker Miller put the paper knife through it,’ said Vittore, grimacing with pain.

Bianca’s mouth was working but no sound was coming out. She looked at the newspaper on the desk, the paper knife, the smear of blood there. Then she thought,
Tony was up here.

‘I saw two men go through the bar. Jay came down the stairs with them. I think I know one of them, Tony Mobley . . .’

‘You’re mistaken,’ said Vittore through clenched teeth. He staggered to his feet, cradling his injured hand. ‘Kit Miller was here with one of his crew.’

Bianca frowned. This was bad news. Tony could be one of Kit Miller’s mob. This was terrible news.

‘That big blond guy, that’s Kit Miller?’ she asked.

Jay was staring at her. ‘No. Miller’s the dark one.’ He shifted his attention back to his boss. ‘Come on, let’s get you sorted out,’ he said.

They pushed past Bianca. She stood there in the office after they’d gone, frozen and filled with horror and not wanting to believe it as the truth hit her like a runaway truck.

Miller’s the dark one.

But she’d seen
Tony Mobley.
She hadn’t been mistaken. That was him.

Only it wasn’t him. He must have lied to her, given her a false name. Because he was Kit Miller. Her family’s arch enemy.

He was the one who had turned up at Tito’s funeral, after she’d gone home, and laughed at her beloved brother’s death. A lot of people were saying he was the one who killed Tito in the first place.

Bianca felt the strength go out of her legs. She slumped forward, supporting herself against the desk. The world was spinning and her head hummed with the shock of it. She couldn’t begin to believe it, but . . . if Tony
was
Kit Miller, had he targeted her deliberately? Had this all been part of his feud with her family, that he would screw the sister, maybe laugh about it among his friends, tell them he had
fucked
Bianca Danieri, fed her all sorts of bullshit, given her a false name, fooled her completely?

Because if Tony
was
Kit Miller, that’s what he’d done.

Bianca’s stomach turned over at the thought.

He’d done the very worst thing he could – made her fall in love with him. Made her believe his poisonous lies.

It was a nightmare, but it was true.

The man she had fallen in love with was Kit Miller.

Tony Mobley didn’t even
exist.