‘Oh yeah?’ McGregor looked sideways at him. ‘You noticed that, too, did you?’

And if Abbott felt bad, throwing Marky to the wolves like that then, well, he didn’t feel that bad. He was getting close now, he felt. Close to what, he wasn’t sure. Just close.

Chapter 22

CHAPTER 22

They made a couple more stops at terraced houses where the clientele were virtual carbon copies of their first stop. Scrotal kids playing at being gangsters, handing over their money, feeling like proper bad men.

‘This next one has been coming up short,’ said McGregor. ‘If I give you the nod, break one of the guy’s fingers.’

Inside, McGregor did the count, decided it was light and sure enough, he gestured towards Abbott. ‘My friend, Mr Flyte here, needs to give you a message from Mr Doyle.’

The guy whimpered and squealed. Abbott kept his feelings hidden, accepted the trembling hand that was offered and took the little finger.

‘Wait.’ The kid was sweating, shaking. ‘You told me to let you know if the Polish prozzie came. She’s been in here, Mr McGregor. She came buying.’

McGregor nodded approvingly. ‘Well done. A bit late, mind. But well done.’

The kid looked hopeful of a reprieve, but McGregor shook his head.

‘Please,’ said the kid quickly, sweating hard now, his hands slick with it. ‘It won’t happen again, Mr McGregor. I promise it won’t happen again.’

‘No, pal, it won’t happen again,’ said McGregor ruefully and nodded at Abbott.

Abbott grasped the guy’s wrist with his left hand, tensed on the little finger with his right. He reminded himself that this was a guy who made money off the back of human misery. He told himself that carrying out the punishment might deter him for the future.

Perhaps he was even doing the kid a favour.

He broke the finger.

The kid was still screaming as they left the house without another word.

‘Excellent, pal,’ said McGregor when they were settled back in the car. ‘I don’t have the stomach for that kind of work myself.’

Abbott looked out of the window.

***

Their next stop took them to a tatty block of flats and right to the top. Abbott, to his shame, knew a prostitute’s flat when he saw one, and he was seeing one now. She sat in the front room, dressed for work, a young Polish girl, not more than twenty-two but old enough to be married with a kid of five or six. He also knew a junkie when he saw one. Two junkies, to be exact. There was a husband on the scene. A jittery guy who loitered, speaking only briefly in Polish.

This, then, was ‘the Polish prozzie’.