Dirty Bad Savage(14)
I had a date to arrange.
Chapter Four
Callum
“Got any more for me?” I whispered into the mobile, hiding my face from passers-by. “Need the work.”
Jack Willis took his time answering, smoking a big fat joint, no doubt. “Not till next week. Next delivery’s Tuesday.”
I sighed. “Throw me some rope, Jack. Anything bigger?”
“I thought you weren’t in the game for bigger parcels?”
Desperate times. “I could do one or two.”
I heard him rustling papers. “Maybe next week, we can talk then. Best I can do.”
Too late. Much too late. “Any chance of an advance, Jack, I wouldn’t ask...”
“You know I don’t do advances, kid. Sets a bad precedent.”
“Yeah, yeah, I know.”
I hung up, almost out of phone credit and feeling like a first class prick.
I’d made best part of two hundred quid the last few days, running myself ragged delivering packages across the city. Two hundred quid that could feed me and Casey like kings, but no. It was all for the Stoney’s pocket. All that work and still it weren’t enough.
Vick had scraped a couple of quid together, selling old toys on eBay, but we were still over a hundred short. Finding a hundred quid over the weekend wouldn’t be easy. Not without robbing. Saturday morning, less than two days to go and out of options. We had nothing to pawn, nothing left to sell, no place left to turn.
Maybe the Stoneys would settle for two hundred, but I doubted it. They weren’t the generous type. They’d take the two and give Vick a black eye for her trouble, probably even worse for me. Couldn’t do deliveries with busted kneecaps, nor find food for Casey.
Vick had been crying every night. Sobbing on my shoulder like a little girl. Guilty, she said, but she needn’t have been. It weren’t her fault. She didn’t ask for this life, where the money’s too short to make ends meet, and we’re all on a treadmill to nowhere.
The cash burned a hole in my pocket as we walked on past the butchers. What I’d give to buy a decent fucking steak. One for me, one for Vick and one for Case. Hell, we could do with it. I was still fit, but I was losing muscle, bulking up with extra layers so people didn’t notice. They’d be on me like hyenas, some of them, if they thought they could take me.
My phone started ringing. I could hardly bear to look, hardly bear to break the bad news to Vick.
A number I didn’t recognise. I’m wary of those, but I had no more credit to listen to voicemail, and maybe it was about some work.
“Yeah?”
A pause at the other end. A bit of a cough. “Callum Jackson?”
“Who’s asking?”
“It’s Sophie Harding. I rescued your dog.”
Knock me down with a fucking feather. “I’m taking care of her.”
“No, um, that wasn’t why I called. Well, it is, but it’s not.”
“Why call then, estate manager?”
Maybe she’d seen my street art, seen the message I left for her. It felt stupid now.
“I need someone for a job. A one-off. I thought maybe you...”
I tried to hold back the relief, disappointment hurts like a bastard when you get your hopes up too high. “What the hell can someone like you want from someone like me?”
A pause. “It’s a little... personal. I need someone tonight, someone who knows how to keep their mouth shut. Just for a few hours. Are you free?”
“What for?” I said, wary.
“I’m meeting someone, at a hotel. I need a man around, to keep an eye on things.”
“Security, like? I can do security.”
She sounded like she was smiling. “I thought you might be the man for the job.”
“How much you paying?” I wanted to say I owed her one, clear that debt from my tab, but I needed the money too bad.
“One fifty? Cash? Is that enough?”
“One hundred and fifty quid?! What you want me to do? Mess someone up?”
“No!” she snapped. “Of course not!” I liked her voice, all posh like. Flustered.
“I’ll do whatever you want for a hundred and fifty quid.”
I weren’t joking, either. I made a note of the address. A hotel in Kensington. Seven sharp.
And then I bought that fucking steak.
***
Callum
I skulked around the edge of Kensington Gardens. This place wasn’t for me. Posh white buildings with posh white steps and all their posh fucking plants outside. Posh people inside too, no fucking doubt about that. I smoked a roll-up and kept my eye on the street, waiting for Sophie Harding to show up. She arrived ten minutes early and hung around the front of the hotel opposite. She didn’t look like the woman I’d pinned by the garages. She was all made up, her hair all shiny and curled under her chin. More make-up on, too. Red lipstick, but not like the hookers round by East Veil. She looked good. Proper classy. Looked like she was planning on staying, judging by the suitcase she was pulling on wheels. She pulled her coat tight, looking back the way she came. Looking for me.