‘Well, that would require you fucking finding him first, wouldn’t it, Kenny?’

Kenny’s face reddened. Nathan had asked him to find that little prick, Kevin, weeks ago and he was still waiting. Nathan was aware he was in danger of getting drawn into yet another argument, and he needed everyone to move from the whole saga now. He tried to appear indifferent.

‘Don’t worry about it, Kenny. He’s a fucking nobody. I’ll take care of him myself – when I’ve got a spare half hour.’

Nathan had every intention of dealing with that little prick as soon as he could find him. But, now that he was free and clear, he felt like celebrating. Everything had worked out better than he could have imagined. There were a few whispers that he was involved, but not from anyone worth listening to. People assumed it was those who had it in for him, like Kevin, or those who didn’t want him running things, just trying to cause shit. And of course, as far as anyone else was concerned Nathan had been at home in bed with Grace when it happened anyway. No one was more shocked and outraged than he was that someone could butcher their beloved Tommy like that.

Tommy’s loyal soldiers were now Nathan’s loyal soldiers and he couldn’t help but smile at the irony of that. Nathan was the man who controlled it all. Nothing happened in Liverpool without Nathan’s say-so.

Walking out into the club, he ordered a round of drinks for the lads. They made a toast to Tommy, and it was understood that they had put the search for his murderer to bed.

A few hours later and Nathan was suitably off his face. He and the lads had attracted the usual type of women who liked to hang around with their kind. One of them honed in on Nathan, well aware of who he was – the power was a massive attraction for some of them. Her tits were far too big for the dress she was wearing and she wasn’t shy of rubbing them against him every chance she got. She was wearing the flimsiest dress he’d ever seen in his life; he wondered why she’d even bothered putting it on. He smiled at her while he pictured how good she would look bent over his desk in the very near future, with that dress around her ears. Taking a small bag of white powder out of her handbag, she sniffed a tiny amount from her finger.

‘Want some?’ she asked him.

Assuming it was Charlie, he snorted the entire contents of the bag.

She looked at him and laughed. ‘You’re crazy, I’ve never seen anyone do that much ket at once before.’