No Peace For The Wicked

Chapter 9

Lottie Grossman sat at her kitchen table shelling peas into a bowl. Across from her sat Gary, and alongside him John Mitcheson, listening on a mobile phone. He ended the call and switched off.

“That was McManus,” he told the woman. “A woman’s been asking questions about Cook and Page. She has a male partner in tow. They’re probably journalists. Weren’t Cook and Page once connected with the two dead men on the coast?” Mitcheson had done his homework, checking all the way back through his client’s history. Even with clients, it paid to know who you were dealing with. And against his better judgement, Lottie Grossman had turned out to have a history which was pretty unsavoury.

“I know perfectly well who they are,” Lottie replied. “So what?” She continued shelling the peas, her varnished fingernails ripping into the pods with vicious efficiency.

“Because you wanted us to watch anyone who could prove to be a link to the past,” Mitcheson pointed out. “People you didn’t want talking to the press… or anyone else. If someone’s found these two men, they might find others.”

“There are no others. Forget them. They’re old men.”

“How much do they know?”

“They don’t. And they can’t talk. If they do, it’s rubbish and nobody listens.” She plucked a piece of broken pod out of the bowl and tossed it aside, the movement oddly birdlike. It bounced off the table and landed on the floor, and she looked pointedly at Gary, who reached down and retrieved it.

“So we ignore whoever’s digging around?” Mitcheson persisted. He found her lack of concern puzzling. He’d been hired to do a job of work, to ensure her security, she had said. Yet she seemed oddly unconcerned about obvious loose ends.

She dropped the pod she was working on and glanced at Gary. “Leave us a moment, would you, dear?”

When the door was closed she turned to Mitcheson and stared at him, a faint pulse beating under one eye.

“My husband, Mr Mitcheson,” she said with quiet venom, “would have your eyes out for taking that tone of voice with me. Especially in front of another employee.” The pulse beat a little faster. “I suggest you remember that. Do you understand me?”

Mitcheson stared back at her and wondered why he was taking this. He felt almost ashamed of himself. “My apologies,” he murmured bluntly. “It won’t happen again.”

Lottie reached up and patted his cheek, her fingernails stopping at the corner of one eye. Mitcheson wanted to slap her hand away but restrained himself. She’d probably break like a twig — and he needed this job for a while yet. If it meant taking some shit from this woman until something better came along, then he could do it.

“Very well,” she said quietly. “We won’t mention it again. Don’t worry about Cook and Page. They’re unimportant. In any case, McManus knows what to do about them. I suggest you deal with the people doing the investigating. They’re much more of a threat.”

He stared at her. McManus had already checked on the woman’s background, and given Mitcheson the address of a man working with her. “What are you suggesting?”

“Simple. Get your men to warn them off. We don’t want them becoming a nuisance, do we?”

He wondered who the investigators were working for. Tabloid hacks, probably, sniffing around for links to the dead men. Someone must have been trawling through the files and making connections.

“Tonight would be good,” she added pointedly. “I want it stopped. Now.” She turned back to the table and began to hum as she busied herself again with the bowl of peas.

Mitcheson slowly exhaled and left the kitchen, punching numbers into his mobile. His men weren’t far away. It shouldn’t take them long to deliver the message.

Frank Palmer looked up from his computer screen and rubbed at his face. It was dark outside and he hadn’t realised it was so late. He needed something to eat and a breath of fresh air. Jobs were proving hard to find at the moment and competition was tough, and staring at his screen for hours on end trying to drum up some interest was fast losing its attraction. Maybe this work with Riley Gavin would be what he needed to get himself going.

He glanced up as a faint noise echoed up the stairway. A few cars were still drifting by, but the evening rush home had died down, leaving only late workers like himself in the local shops and offices as darkness settled. He knew he was alone in the building. Yet a faint rush of cold air was circling around his feet.

Somebody had coming up the stairs, moving lightly and fast.

Before Palmer could rise, a shadow moved across the glass panel of his office door. Then the handle turned and the door flew back with a crash, the glass shattering under the impact and showering across the floor.

Two men moved swiftly into the room and stood close to his desk. The manoeuvre was smooth and well-rehearsed. Professional. Both were in their mid- thirties, dressed in jeans and bomber jackets and, Palmer noted with a chill, both were carrying baseball bats. The larger of the two men placed the tip of his bat on the monitor immediately in front of Palmer. The area around the widest part of the bat was chipped and dented, and he doubted it had ever been used for baseball.

“Don’t get up,” the man said quietly. “We’re not stopping. Are you Frank Palmer?”

Palmer counted to three before nodding. There was no point in denying it; if they knew their business, and he guessed they did, they had known who he was before busting into the building. It wasn’t the first time he’d had visitors bearing a message; it kind of went with the territory. He didn’t like the look of the baseball bats, though. This wasn’t an angry husband, client or partner, but hinted at something heavier. He searched his mind, wondering who he’d upset recently, at the same time wondering if there was a way he could get out of whatever bother these two were going to rain down on him.

The spokesman nodded back. “Thought so. Don’t worry, Frank — you don’t know us, so forget reviewing your files. We don’t exist.” He indicated his companion. “We have a message for you, and it would be kind of easy if you watched and listened, but didn’t try to interrupt.” He glanced at his companion. “First of all, though, my friend Howie here will offer a brief demonstration of intent.” He smiled and stepped to one side, a parody of a demonstrator showing an eager public how something worked.

At his nod, the second man stepped forward and, with a lift of his shoulders, swung his baseball bat and brought it crashing down on the computer monitor. The casing shattered under the massive blow, and the screen burst out in one piece, hitting Palmer on the shoulder. Bits of wiring and electronic components flew in all directions under repeated blows, until the computer was a mangled heap on the desk, the floor littered with debris.

The first man pointed to the filing cabinet. This, too, suffered the same fate, bits of wood and chipboard skidding off across the room as Howie hurled himself into his work, drawers flying open and spilling their contents across the floor.

Palmer sat and watched, powerless to intervene with the first man standing over him, ready to stop him. He waited until the attack had ended.

“Thank you, Howie,” the spokesman said politely. “Now, Frank, please listen. If you don’t, he’ll do to you what he’s just done to your office.” He smiled coldly and hefted his baseball bat onto his shoulder. “The message is, you and your pretty friend would be well advised to forget anything about the unfortunate deaths of John McKee and Bertrand Cage. If you persist, Howie and I will come back and… well, I don’t need to repeat myself, do I?” He lifted his eyebrows, waiting for an acknowledgment of the message.

“Do I get to hear who the message is from?” Palmer asked finally.

The man shook his head. “No. You don’t. Let’s call it a well-wisher. Message understood? Good.” He turned and walked towards the door. “Come on, Howie, let’s leave Frank to do the dusting, shall we?”

As they crunched through the remains of the door panel, the man paused and looked back. His eyes were cold and deadly serious, all parody now gone. “You don’t want us to come back, Frank, you really don’t. Nor does your lady friend.”