Could be arthritis, says Ghost Zeb, rifling my repressed memories. Your father suffered from it. One of the reasons he drank.

So he said. Didn’t stop him beating on us.

The pick-up starts on the first turn of the key. I should bloody think so, all the money those steroid manufacturers spent on it. I yank the gear lever and floor the gas. The only thing between me and the open road is a key-coded gate that looks like it has enough square bars to contain even the Hilux.

Which is why I veer left and go through the flimsy wooden fence. Morons. I mean really, what kind of a tool organised their security? It only took one man and a mutt to reduce it to smithereens.

The last thing I see of the steroid house in my rear-view mirror is Bonzo, loping out of the back door with a hank of something in his jaws. Good dog, I think. Good dog.

CHAPTER 10

I try to stay focused on the drive back to Jersey, but the smooth ride is comforting and my mind begins to wander.

I keep saying that I’m not big on flashbacks, but whenever my mind blurs, the Lebanon is always there. Sky filled with streaking rockets, mangled shards of metal constantly raining from above. Everything was pockmarked by shrapnel. Everything. Mahogany-skinned old men on their stoops shooting the breeze like it was same-old same-old. Which it probably was.

I remember one French guy whose claim to fame was a dick the size of a baguette. This boast was put to the test one day when we came across a dog fight arena and . . .

Macey Barrett’s phone rings and I nearly jump out of my skin when the car automatically picks up its Bluetooth signal and transfers the call to the Toyota’s sound system.

‘Daniel?’

‘Holy Mary!’ I blurt, which is a pretty accurate impersonation of a Christian Brother I used to do back in the eighties. Still pops out every now and then in times of stress.

Faber’s laughter is distorted by the speaker. ‘For you, I’m Holy Mary, God, Jesus and the Easter Bunny all rolled into one.’

I recover myself a little. ‘Faber. How’s it hanging, Jaryd? Good day in court pointing the shit out of everything?’

Faber’s not laughing now. ‘I point for emphasis, that’s all.’

‘You point all the bloody time. It doesn’t mean anything you do it so much. It’s like a tic. I’m telling you, Faber, that’s why you never win anything at the tables.’

Silence for a moment. All I can hear is the discreet growl of the engine and the asphalt joins bumping under the wheels.

The heartbeat of the road.

Faber gets over his pointing sulk. ‘Have you got the product?’

‘Two barrels of it. I hope you have secure storage.’

‘Two fucking barrels? Where am I going to put two barrels?’