‘But what you’re saying is, if Davey comes back, and runs the crew, Blackbeard can’t establish himself here. Blackbeard needs a foothold first . . .’ said Shelby.

‘The crew lost faith in Davey the moment Forest came back. Blackbeard is dismantling Davey’s crew as we speak. It’s all over. Blackbeard has won.’

‘Why can’t another drug dealer just keep Blackbeard out?’

‘Davey kept Blackbeard out because he already had the infrastructure in place! The Business took generations to build up! The buyers, the inner circle, the logistics, the bribed police . . . which, by the way, Blackbeard will commandeer for himself.’

‘Okay, but what if we knew who Blackbeard was?’ said Shelby. ‘You said yesterday if we got close to him, we could take him down.’

‘I said you might be able to,’ he said. He couldn’t find his shirt. He ripped at the leaves of a nearby grapevine. He wanted to throw something. He swigged more of his fake vodka, and tried to will his mind to sober up. ‘But no one gets close to him, not without him finding out who you are and making you pay the price. The only way you could do it would be to find your way into his inner circle.’

He took another swig of whisky without thinking and put it back down.

‘Where’s my fucking shirt?’ said Mackerel.

‘No idea,’ said Shelby. ‘How does one get into Blackbeard’s inner circle?’

‘Become an important crew member,’ he said. ‘You’d have to be able to provide him with something.’

‘Like what? What would you provide him with?’

‘Shelby, are you sure you should be asking Mackerel?’ said Fiona, saying his name like it was an insult. ‘I’m not sure Mackerel would be able to provide anything to an important drug dealer like Blackbeard . . .’

He knew what they were doing, and it made him furious. He took another swig of whisky. Fuck them – if they wanted him to be drunk, he’d be drunk!

‘I was brought up in a world of manipulation. You think I don’t know what you’re doing? No matter how drunk you get me, you’re gonna have to work harder than that! Yes, I was a good drug dealer! And you wanna know why? Because I was always good with people. I could act professional, I knew how to run a business. I was actually pretty fucking articulate and presented like a normal fucking person.’

Fiona’s delicate snort set him into even more of a rage.