Chapter 53

"A bit muggy for a game of baseball," I cracked, flippantly.

They'd formed a ring of muscle and unpleasantness around me. They were waiting for something - perhaps my last prayer.

It was then that I saw Bruno, sauntering casually down the alley. His step appeared jaunty but his face was as expressionless as ever.

He cruised up to a point just outside his muscular cronies to say his piece.

"You caused me a lot of bother Barry. You've screwed me personally over the video, you've screwed my best earning prospect for years in your flat without paying me for the pleasure and there's no knowing what more you'll screw up if I don't bring your screwed up life to an end."

I decided attack ws the best defence.

"Screw you," I yelled. "You've no right to talk about Jennifer like that ..."

If I sounded brave, the truth was I was petrified. I was scared for myself but I was also scared to hear what he was saying about Jennifer. Unfortunately, his words made a dreadful sense of her late night excursions and the other men in her life.

I knew he was observing my reactions with relish. He knew that destroying Jennifer to me would hurt me even more than his hired baseball bats - perhaps ... certainly he wanted to see the pain.

"She's a common prostitute, Barry, and you fell for her. I've been grooming her for a while. She'll see some real top-class action. The sort of money that you could only dream of. Yet you are trying to come between her and her new career and in particular between the money she will make and me."

"So you're just a pimp," I yelled, hoping that somebody would hear me if I shouted loudly enough. It was a forlorn hope and I felt very lonely next to the garbage bins with my back pressed against the cold brick wall.

"I may be a pimp but I'm a very successful and wealthy one. I've screwed the love of your life and she's going to be screwing a whole load more rich men for money before she's finished. However, you won't need to worry about that because you'll be dead. And maybe I'll have her again to celebrate. I'll screw her when I want ... any way I want ... and whernshe's not with me, she'll be making me money with all the others. And when I'm having her, I'll imagine I'm screwing you in some grave somewhere with worms eating out your heart."

His voice had no inflection and he spoke quietly but the viciousness oozed from every syllable.

"I'll come back and haunt you," I moaned in desperation.

"Yeh, you do that," said Bruno. "You can watch me doing it with your blue-eyed slag any time you want. Knowing you're there will make it even more enjoyable."

"I suppose you're after Gerda as well aren't you?"

"She's got talent and she owes me, thanks to you. The clients are already lining up!"

As we snarled at each other, the musclemen were pushing me and prodding me with their baseball bats and driving me deeper into the alleyway. A fire escape ladder touched my head and I leapt up wrapping my hands around the railings pulling myself upwards. I've never been an athlete but adrenaline is a wonderful thing and I almost made it over the railings and onto the fire escape... but not quite.

Fingers like bands of steel wrapped around my ankles and hauled me down onto the floor. Dimly I realized that the guerrillas had started hitting me and I wondered why it was wet on the pavement beneath me. Whatever it was, the wetness was part of me and I was sure that it shouldn't be on the pavement.

In between the jolts of agony in my chest, my arms, my legs and everywhere else, I felt grateful for how remote it was all becoming. I wondered whether the man that had died before on Jennifer's doorstep had felt the same relief.

The pain had ceased now and the world was receding slowly into cotton wool. I had a strange feeling that there were arms around me, cradling me, rocking me. In my dream like state I could almost imagine it was Jennifer. I could smell her perfume and feel her softness. I could even hear her voice amid the shouting and the whistles and the sound of sirens. I tried not to focus on the blue light that was flashing somewhere in the corner of my vision. It made me feel scared. I'd heard about lights when people were dying and I didn't want to look.

Then I felt a sigh coming like wind whispering through the trees as evening falls - and the darkness overcame me.

Copyright of this site is Rob Hopcott's, 1999 - 2007, all rights reserved. Web site owners and other publishers may quote extracts from this story to add content to their site or publication provided the site or publication is lawful and the story is attributed to Rob Hopcott with copyright retained and a prominent link is provided to the story on this site. All characters in this story are fictitious and no reference is intended to any person living or otherwise.
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