Sharks - Matt Rogers (classic books for 11 year olds txt) 📗

Then Teddy composed himself and said, ‘I think I’ve finally realised that one day Vince is going to kill me.’

Out of sight, Slater clenched his right fist as hard as he could.

King noticed. ‘You thinking the same thing?’

‘What’s that?’ Slater said, then saw King’s knuckles white on the wheel.

King said, ‘I think it’s about time Vince ran into someone who can hit back.’

Slater nodded.

Teddy said, ‘Whatever you’re going to do, please, leave me out of it. And don’t talk like that in front of Lyla. She’ll think you’re gangsters, no better than the men we owe money.’

‘Lyla’s your wife?’

‘Yes.’

‘Where’s she from?’

‘The U.K., same as me,’ Teddy said. ‘I’ve never loved anyone else and I never will. I could see it in both your eyes before — you thought I was full of shit when I told you she was sticking with me. But she is. We work shit jobs and we make shit money but we have each other.’

Sappy as hell, but Slater felt his stomach twist.

This old man had something unconditional, something pure. If he lost that, he was already in the grave. Slater hoped for Teddy’s sake that Lyla was telling him the truth.

Teddy said, ‘One question.’

King said, ‘Shoot.’

‘You said Walcott was financing something in America? That’s news to me.’

‘How much do you know about him?’

Teddy paused, thought it over. ‘Nothing, really. I know he’s a big shot here. I didn’t think he had a global presence.’

‘That makes sense,’ King said. ‘In the big picture it wasn’t a huge operation we busted.’

‘Operation? What’s that mean?’

King hesitated.

Slater thought, He’s in deep. No point holding back.

‘Sex trafficking,’ Slater said. ‘A judge in Vegas was in cahoots with an ex-sheriff to sell underage girls to old men for an awful lot of money. Walcott bankrolled it, and made huge profits from it as a result.’

Teddy didn’t speak. Slater didn’t need to turn around to know the old man’s jaw was loose.

He said, ‘And you took that money from Dylan and fed it straight back to him at his own casino. How does that feel?’

King shot him a dark look.

Slater shrugged it off.

Because he understood addicts better.

When they need a wake up call, they need to be woken up.

With a sledgehammer instead of a feather.

Teddy said, ‘Jesus.’

‘Now your life savings are out there funding something just as deplorable instead of giving you and Lyla peace and security.’

King said, ‘That’s enough.’

Slater ignored him again.

Twisted in his seat to stare directly at Teddy.

‘So I’ll ask you one final time, Teddy,’ Slater said. ‘We fix this, is it going to happen again?’

Teddy looked like the thought of borrowing more money from Dylan Walcott might make him vomit.

He shook his head.

It was all he was able to do.

Slater nodded, satisfied. ‘There we go.’

Turned around to find King firing a death stare at him that could melt steel.

Slater brushed it off. ‘Don’t pretend like you know how to treat an addict.’

‘And you do?’

‘Takes one to know one.’ He threw a glance over his shoulder and winked at Teddy.

Teddy looked out the window, mighty uncomfortable.

Then he said, ‘Make a left and we’re here.’

Now two miles inland, King turned off Coral Road into quiet suburbia — a sign labelled the neighbourhood “Sunrise Park.” The homes ranged from spectacular mansions to shoddy rundown duplexes falling apart at the seams. Teddy Barrow’s residence fell somewhere in the middle, inching toward the lower end. He navigated through the dormant streets and pointed out a one-storey plain house in a small lot. The roof tiles were orange, the exterior walls were cream, and what little lawn they had was maintained to perfection.

A first look revealed nothing else.

King parked on the street, they all got out, and Teddy led them to the door.

‘Lyla takes great pride in our home,’ he said, his hand frozen on the doorknob. ‘If the hurricane had taken it, I don’t know if she would have survived the grief. I know you two aren’t exactly masters of politeness, but please don’t offend her.’

King said, ‘Of course not.’

He opened the door and let them through.

35

Alexis took the diary out of his hand, but didn’t take her eyes off him.

She wanted desperately to flip through the pages, get a clue as to what it was for, but the fact remained that the Bahamian was twice as big, twice as strong, and twice as mean as she was. Just because she’d learned how to fight didn’t mean she’d fundamentally forgotten the genetic differences between men and women. If he had so much as got his hands on her when she missed the first shot, it would’ve been game over. She shuddered at the prospect.

She said, ‘Tell me what this is.’

‘Mista Ricci’ll kill me.’

‘If you don’t cooperate, Vince will be the least of your problems.’

‘If I dun what?’ He didn’t know the word.

‘Just start talking,’ she said. ‘And don’t stop until you’ve told me everything.’

She feared the labourer she couldn’t see, somewhere behind her in the dark. She was pretty sure she’d knocked him senseless with the kick to the face, if not outright killed him by snapping his neck, but there was always the inkling of doubt. She forced it aside. It didn’t serve her any good to be paranoid.

And she was succeeding with the guy she could see.

He started babbling. ‘Mista Ricci got told ta whack one of his buddies, Eric Moretti. Ya know, one of Mista Walcott’s guys. They all Mista Walcott’s guys, Mista Ricci included. So one of Mista Ricci’s — what’s tha word — coworkers, that’s it … well, the fool was kickin’ up some trouble. I dunno what. Mista Ricci didn’t wanna be the one to do it … you know, cause they was buddies and all. And Mista Ricci sometimes get us to do some runnin’ for him. Runnin’ this, runnin’ that … all over the island. He knows we good peoples. So he comes to us and he say, “You two wanna make some real good coin?” Anyway, we do this