The Mammoth Book of Best British Mysteries 6

MONEY SHOT by Ray Banks

I’d thought about it.

Jesus forgive me, but I’d actually thought about it.

Mel Gibson in Lethal Weapon. Muzzle to the forehead, the temple, wedged between teeth. He’d lost his wife, same as me. Unlike Mel, though, my wife was still alive. At least I thought so. The flickering image of her on my telly kept her alive. That moan she’d make, hot breath in my ear as I beat myself into submission, the tears coming five seconds after I did.

Then I wanted to bite down on the barrel of a gun. Because there was no beauty left in the world once the semen started to dry.

My nights were spent like this. Too many to count, far too many to admit. I had a flatmate but I waited until he’d gone to bed. Daryl spent his days watching Trisha and old movies, smoking his weight in tack. Sometimes I’d join him for the movies, the old black and whites. Burt Lancaster shaking in his boots because The Killers were after him.

Daryl: “They don’t make ‘em like they used to.”

And then he’d stick Lethal Weapon in the video. A lot of people forget, he told me, that Mel Gibson is the lethal weapon of the title. He’s the nutcase. He’s crazy. Look at him jump off that building; watch him try and get the stubbly guy to shoot him. He’s fucking bat-shit. Look at him in his trailer with that gun. The hollow point bullet so he’d be sure to take the back of his skull clean off.

“You know why I don’t do it? The job. Doing the job…”

Daryl: “Franco Zeffirelli offered him Hamlet because of that scene.”

(Daryl was the one who got me the gun.)

Daryl: “You’re not gonna do this.”

Me: “You don’t know that.”

Daryl: “I know it. I know you. You’re not that fucking mental. You’re trying to draw a psycho pension.”

Like a movie. He even pointed. I even turned away. The light from the telly cast dark shadows over my eyes, I’m sure. I lit a cigarette while he puffed on the joint.

I heard someone say: “God hates me. That’s what it is.”

And I said: “Hate him right back. Works for me.”

Daryl said: “You talking to the telly again, mate?”

But I was already out the door.

I’d shaved my head. Did it as a ritual, like a monk. Had a Bernard Herrman accompaniment as I did it, watching the hair fall to the floor, my skull prominent in the stained mirror. I took a Bic to the rest, made sure I was clean by the time I’d finished. She wouldn’t recognize me; nobody would. I’d spent most of my life with curtains in front of my face; now I had nothing to hide behind. I ran a hand over my head. It felt weird. And cold.

Most cities in the world, they have a porn district. There was a hooker pub up on City Road before they turned it into a media watering hole, but there was no real porn district. We didn’t have pornographers in Newcastle. Something about the Geordie accent that put people off their wanking stride.

I caught the Metro into town, sat near the back. Fat girls on a night out further up the carriage, singing a song I’d never heard of. Not that I would’ve recognized it, anyway. There was the clink of WKD and Breezer bottles, the high-pitched squeals after a dirty joke. There were plenty of dirty jokes. I pretended not to notice them, but I was watching them all the same. Thinking all of them naked and gagged and going down on each other. Thinking if they refused, there really was a gun in my pocket and I wasn’t just pleased to see them. Screaming and lapping and shuddering all at the same time.

Fuck them.

I said we didn’t have pornographers in Newcastle. That wasn’t right. We did. They called themselves something different. They toted the monikers of “indie film producer”, “adult entertainment CEO” and “erotica entrepreneurs”. Like a turd covered in gold leaf.

I got headaches. Bad ones. Like when you have too much ice cream or milk and you have to close one eye if you’re going to get any relief. We all have bloody thoughts. Morality’s like some twisted fucking thing you never get to understand because no matter what you do, there’s always someone waving a pamphlet, denouncing you as an animal. There was always someone, thought they knew better than you, lived more than you, understood the ways of the world more than you. What did they understand? They understood fuck all, just meshed their experience into some kind of bullshit ethos. The parents who despised corporations, booking their kids into a McDonalds party because they were too fucking weak to say no, had no way of explaining it. Fighting for multi-culturalism and crossing the street when they saw a gang of pakis coming.

I loved curry. Loved the pakis. Hated what they did to me.

This bloke I was going to see, he was a paki. I think. He looked like a paki, dressed like a paki, but he could’ve been Turkish, Somalian, whatever the fuck refugees we were letting into the country this fucking week without the proper papers. That’s why they bombed us, I thought. They bombed us because they could. It was the same reason the big smiling clown kept poisoning the kids, making them fat and useless. Because we were too scared to stop them.

Sometimes fear only gets you so far. Then you crawl out the other side angry as fuck.

And then you get a weapon.

Didn’t take too much persuading. Daryl got off on the idea of playing a Leo Getz (“You get it? Leo… gets!”) or Morgan Freeman in Shawshank, the kind of bloke, you want something, anything, he’s the bloke to go to. He’ll hunt it down, he’ll be your finder.

I mumbled: “This is a real badge, I’m a real cop, and this is a real fucking gun.”

And it was a weight against my rib cage, that recommissioned replica. Daryl knew this guy on the Leam Lane who sold them for a tonne apiece. I thought it was a bit steep at the time, but feeling the heft of the gun, I knew I’d spent wisely.

Daryl: “You want a proper pistol, you pay proper money. You want something to scare the fucker with, then you’re better off with a replica.”

Me: “I don’t want a fucking replica. I want a real one.”

Got off the Metro at Monument. I had to walk through the Saturday night orgies on the streets. Orca girls in tight tops that didn’t cover a thing. Screaming, screeching in the shadows, like a feeding frenzy. The low humping noise of a dozen blokes in that same check-shirt-gold-chain combo coming up the street. Red faced, stinking of alcohol, itching to slap some cunt because he’s looking at them fuckin’ funny, like he’s a fuckin’ poof or a fuckin’ nonce or something.

I kept my head down as I walked. Started towards the Bigg Market and the crowds got heavy, packed together. A sudden yell at my left and I saw this young lad get dragged out of a club across the ground. He was shirtless. The bouncer dragging him made sure he went over a pile of broken glass. Planted a fist in the lad’s throat.

“I TELT YEH NOT TO FUCKIN’ COME BACK, YA CUNT!”

Put my head down again, cradled the gun in my coat. The heavy throb of bass underfoot, I ducked into an alley, passed by All Saint’s Church, lit up. Fucking incongruous to have a church here. I crossed myself, pushed down to the Quayside. There was a God. He was away on business, but he’d come back.

What was it? The meek shall inherit. Aye. The meek and the armed.

Up towards City Road now, where the office buildings jostled for attention with the council flats. Building new student accommodation up here, another push to get the undesirables out. Ship ‘em off to the West End. Let ‘em breed like the fucking pigs they were, then shut ‘em in and drop the pellets.

A ratty woman with knock knees under a street light. She had a mobile pressed against her ear.

“I telt yeh yeh had to pick us up, didn’t I telt yeh… ya fuckin’ cunt, divven’t… divven’t LIE to us… yez’re a fuckin’ LIAR… a FUCKIN’ LIAR CUNT… how, me fuckin’ battery’s gannin’, it’s gannin’… pick us up… yer not at yer mam’s, I fuckin’ knaa yer not at yer mam’s… CUZ I PHONED YER FUCKIN’ MAM THAT’S HOW I FUCKIN’ KNAA… Aye… Aye… pick us up… pick us up… fuckin’… howeh, pick us up, ya cunt… me fuckin’ battery… PICK-US-UP.”

She pulled the phone from her ear and threw it against a partly-built wall. It smashed. She let out a noise like she’d been punched, started with: “Ahhhh, nooooo.”

I passed her and she spun my way.

Her: “How, yeh gorra tab, mate?”

I shook my head.

Her: “Howeh, yeh got any spare change, like?”

She got in my way.

I smiled at her, showed her all my teeth. Nodded like I was going to give her something, like I was reaching for my wallet. Should’ve seen her eyes light up at that. Like, fuckin’ hell, he’s gonna givvus fuckin’ NOTES.

I showed her the gun.

Took her a moment to realize what it was, still matching my smile.

When I clicked the barrel against her rotting teeth, her eyes took on the sheen of the newly-weeping. And I opened my mouth wide in a silent scream, felt my jaw click with the effort.

Hers wasn’t silent.

But I let her run. It was funny. A heel snapped off and she almost went pocked arse over sagging tit. I laughed.

Just another cracked skeleton in this fucked up town, disappearing into the night.

And then I walked some more, made sure to replace the gun under my armpit. I knew I could draw easily now. Something that’d bugged me up till now. Because I needed to be swift when the time came.

God, my wife. Why was she my wife?

Hair: Blonde.

Eyes: Blue.

Same as an angel. Same as an angel was supposed to look.

Stood about five foot eight in heels. Had a walk to her that made the trousers tight.

She was my wife. I was bound to think that. But everyone thought that. Could turn a bender straight, make a dyke out of a cocklover. But she was an angel, too. You couldn’t look at her and not see that. She wasn’t about the fucking sex. That wasn’t her. She was about love. Beauty.

And look what he did to her. Look what he made her into.

I found the place easily enough. Been by here enough times to know this was his office. I’d phoned ahead to make sure he was in, too. When I pressed the buzzer on the intercom, a gruff voice answered:

“What?”

“Here to see Harry Grace.”

“He expecting you?”

“I phoned.”

“Right.”

The buzzer sounded again. I went in. Couldn’t see much in the corridor. Might’ve been the giant with the square head blocking out the strip light. Looked like a huge clone of Tor Johnson.

Big Tor: “Go upstairs.”

Me: “Right.”

I went upstairs. Knocked on the door to his office. It smelled bad in here, like aftershave from the seventies.

A voice from inside: “Come in.”

I did.

Set the scene, make it plausible. A huge office, like the entire top floor of the building. Like someone took an entire safari park and buckshot the fucking lot across the walls. Leopard print, tiger stripes, that dull yellow fur of the lion, the black and white zebra. The lot. Scatter cushions and a fucking glitter ball hanging from the ceiling. Along the walls posters of straight-to-video releases: Airtight Bitch; Hot Fudge Sunday; Lesbos Lactation. Bean bags. Somewhere a stereo plays classical music, throwing my synapses out of whack.

Silvia Saint sitting on a bean bag in a yellow bikini. Except it wasn’t Silvia Saint. It was an older version of Silvia Saint. Covered in downy blonde fluff. Looked closer and her fingernails were filed to points. Something wrong with her eyes, and they were cat contact lenses. Blonde hair scooped back to reveal two pointed ears and when she opened her kewpie mouth to hiss at me, she had fangs.

“Easy, Kitty.”

Coming from the end of the office, waaay down there. A massive desk, shining. Covered in leather. The man liked his animals. Loved skinning them, making them into decorations. Flash on Ed Gein and understand the whole fucking room.

“You come to audition?”

Every inch the erotic entrepreneur. Cypriot, I thought. Something not English, anyway, but he had a plummy accent that sounded like he’d learned the language from Charles Hawtrey. Had a belly on him, straining at his dress shirt. A Nehru jacket hanging on a stand behind him. Big cuffs, bigger cuff links catching the light and throwing it in my face.

Me: “No, I’ve not come to audition.”

Him: “You sure? You look like the type.”

“What’s the type?”

“You.”

Kitty hissed some more. Heard the rustle of the bean bag. Wanted to put that gun in her fucking face and pull the trigger. Wound up? Aye. Wound up like a fucking spring.

Me, squinting, my best Clint: “I’ve come about Liz Fairbride.”

Him: “Who the fuck’s Liz Fairbride? And what you packing there, son?”

“You what?”

“What you got? You able to rise on cue?”

“I’m not auditioning. Liz Fairbride.”

“I don’t know her.”

“You know her.”

“I don’t.”

Kitty growled.

Me: “Put a leash on your pussy.”

Him: “Kitty. Stay put, love.”

Harold Grace, all fifty-seven years of him, pulled himself around his desk and knocked on a cabinet. As he opened the top, music played and his face illuminated. He pulled out a crystal decanter filled with something yellow. “You want a drink?”

I shook my head.

“Amber Raines.”

He poured himself a drink and turned. Said: “What?”

“Amber Raines. You made her change her name.”

“Amber Raines.” He sipped his drink. His lip retreated up his gums as he swallowed. “I know Amber Raines. She’s the pisser.”

I started unzipping my jacket.

“She was a good little actress. You sure you don’t want to audition?”

“Getting comfortable. Go on.”

“She was a good actress. Wasn’t pretty enough to be a star, but she had talent in the watersports. Give as well as receive. She got off on it.”

“No, she didn’t.”

“Nice tits. Nipples like tent pegs.”

Kitty growled some more, ended it with a loud hiss.

Grace: “You like Kitty?”

Me: “No.”

Another drink, another show of teeth. “Kitty’s a star. Feral Pink. Big market for it. Kinkier the better. Some men… Some men like their women hirsute. That’s all real, all that hair on her. She grows it herself. I don’t go for the fake stuff. Like my movies, they’re all real tits. None of the silicone shite. Can’t stand it. So you’re a fan of Amber Raines?”

I shook my head.

“I didn’t know her real name was Liz, like.”

Keep talking.

He kept talking.

“Blast from the past, Amber Raines. Christ, what is she now? Like forty or something? But she was fucking good and a good fuck, know what I mean? What, you like the vintage shite? I got plenty of classic stuff for you. Thinking about-”

– thinking about pulling the gun now-

“- a line of retro-movies. You got all this coverage of Deep Throat and Debbie Does Dallas, people get these movies thinking they’re gonna be real-”

– DEAD real DEAD-

“- hardcore stuff and it’s all tits and arse, know what I mean?”

YOU KILLED HER

Me, softly: “You killed her.”

Harold Grace stood there with his glass halfway up to his lips. A pause, then he drank. More teeth, this time bared like a wild animal.

Him: “Who are you?”

Wanting him to know.

Telling him now.

Me: “I’m her husband.”

He spluttered. Laughed. HA HA HA. You’re joking, mate. You’re out of your mind. I didn’t know Amber had a fucking HUSBAND. She got a husband, Kitty? You hear that? And Kitty made a noise like a cat laughing, a weird choo-choo-huff sound. And you’re her husband. What are you, fucking twenty or something? And you’re her hus-

First shot cracked like a bullwhip, like Indy Jones’ whip, WAP.

Caught Grace in the whisky glass, smashed it, stuck him in that round belly. Blood in the hand that held the glass, blood flowering thick and fast on his dress shirt. Him wondering what the fuck just happened.

Second shot in the eye, right from across the room. WAP.

Didn’t snap his head back like I thought it would. Harold Grace standing there, mouth hanging open, tongue rested on his bottom set of capped teeth.

Then he dropped.

And Kitty went wild. The rustle from the bean bag gave her away, but I didn’t turn too quick – still wanted to marvel in that one dead eye looking at me – and she sank those filed teeth into my leg. Pain shook me back to the present, stench of piss in the air. The warm feeling of blood on my ankle. I looked down. There was Kitty. Screeching. I pressed the gun to her scalp and pulled the trigger. More warmth against my leg, but it wasn’t my blood this time.

I kicked her crumbled head away, hobbled to the door as Tor Johnson threw it open and filled up the doorway. His eyes wide and bulbous, I stuck the gun in his nose and pulled the trigger. Muffled, but still loud.

Tor’s head did snap back.

Fucking glorious. Finally.

I climbed over his body and took the stairs two at a time, both hands on the walls to throw myself down. Landed heavily at the bottom. On the bad ankle. Yelled. Partly out of pain, partly out of release.

Lunged my way down to the Quayside, hugging my open jacket around the gun. There was blood on me and I couldn’t run, but I saw a cab and pushed a slapper out of the way to get to it. Her face turned in on itself and she grew a forked tongue, but I made the driver pull away before she could slam on the side of the cab.

Pulling away in a big car with lots of windows. Hearing the sounds of the night. Looking out of the side window like it was Jurassic Park.

“The point is… you’re alive when they start to eat you…”

“You what, mate?”

“Nothing.”

You’re not her husband. How old are you?

Doesn’t matter. I’m her husband.

She must be forty by now.

Well out of it. She’s dead.

You killed her, Grace. You made her into this fucking beast.

And you made me into the same kind.

Just fucking shut up.

I paid the cab with some notes and some change that I managed to scrape out of my jacket. He saw the gun, I’m sure. I didn’t care. He dropped me three streets away from my flat. I limped the rest of the way. Rain started to fall. It felt cold and good against my shaved head. Cleansing.

I got into the flat, bumped into Daryl.

Daryl: “You did it?”

Me: “Aye.”

Daryl: “You’re not trying to draw a psycho pension. You really are crazy.”

I nodded and limped through to the living room. Daryl said he was going to bed. I didn’t answer him.

Just went over to the video and put on a movie. One of Liz Fairbride’s early works. My wife. That blonde angel, moaning just for me. And I wasn’t old enough to be her husband, but maybe back then I would’ve been. I put the gun on the floor, sat cross-legged. Something white against the black blood.

Kitty’s tooth.

I pulled out the canine and turned it in my fingers as my wife breathed. The slap of flesh against flesh, getting quicker now.

Then I flicked the tooth to one side, unzipped my combat trousers and wept silently as both me and my wife came together.

That was love. That was beauty even after the semen dried.