She was trying now to push her husband towards the bedroom door.
'Jackson is now Ozzy's main dealer and this mad bitch has caused murders with his wife,' he shouted. 'He took out Siddy. Fucking Siddy, my mate, my old mucker is shitting it over that cunt and now I hear my daughter is his main squeeze.'
Alex was losing his anger now as she knew he would, so she carried on pushing him out of the room as gently as she could. Providing he couldn't see Bethany his rage would subside, although hearing it being replaced by fear in her husband's voice meant she was getting scared too.
'I stood by and let Bethany get a slap from his fat wife, it is sorted. Now all she needs is you after her and all. She has learned a valuable lesson, so let it go for fuck's sake.'
'Paul was willing to shoot fucking Siddy rather than have any hag off Freddie Jackson, do you understand what that means, woman? I work for Siddy! So where does that leave me?'
Jeannie didn't know but she was too shrewd to say that.
'It leaves you where you were before, running your scams until you are told different. Now when you see Freddie you act nice, you congratulate him on his promotion and you keep your trap shut and you hope against hope that he ain't a one for holding grudges.'
Her husband was nodding now, but she could almost taste his fear and it was communicating itself to everyone in the house. Even the music that was normally a constant source of irritation seemed to have stopped.
Bethany was quiet as she listened, wishing with all her heart that she had not drunk so much and that she had not been so welcome in her father's local pub where she had been taken on a daily basis since a babe in arms. Where she had been petted over after cutting her first tooth and where her holy communion had been held in the back bar. She was too comfortable there, even she had come to realise that.
But that was all academic now, that trouble was over, and new trouble had come to take its place.
Such was her life since she had been a small child.
Maggie and Jackie were holding hands.
Jackie had miscarried her baby at four o'clock that morning, and now she was back in the fold with her family and her husband.
No one had mentioned anything to Freddie about her drinking or her drug taking and he had been magnanimous with his wife as he had not been around when the accident had happened. She had slipped down the stairs and that had caused it all.
It had been a five-month foetus and he had been shocked that she had been so far gone. It had also been a male child, and this had affected Freddie more than he would have thought possible.
He had heard through the grapevine about his wife's visit to Bethany and because he put the blame down to himself he was being especially attentive towards her. He felt responsible inasmuch as he had fucked the girl in question. His wife's interference had frightened her away, which had actually done him a favour.
Now Jackie was at home with her sister, pale and wan, determined to diet and also determined to give Freddie another baby, a son.
She knew he wanted a son so badly that if she produced one she would be safe. Safer than she was now anyway.
He was virile, he was a slag and he would give a baby out to anyone who opened her legs and was pleasing on the eye. And that was something she could not take. The only thing she had going for her was that she was the mother of his children and he loved those kids. A boy would be the icing on the cake, and she was willing to use whatever she could to keep him beside her.
Maggie smiled as she placed another mug of tea beside her sister. 'Can I get you anything, mate?'
Jackie grinned, happy they were back on an even keel once more. 'Light me a fag would you, babe, and then maybe make me a salad sandwich, eh?'
Maggie nodded. She had not long made her a stack of bacon rolls. 'Still on your diet, then!'
They laughed together, they knew each other better than anyone would ever know them and they were once more happy with that situation.
The upset and row was forgotten.
Until the next time.
Freddie looked around the house in Ilford and could not believe his eyes.
Wall-to-wall birds, all shapes, all sizes and all for the taking. Black ones, blonde ones, Chinese ones, even Asian ones. He felt as if he had died and woken up in pussy heaven.
They sat about the large lounge in various states of undress, leaving nothing to the imagination. And they were all looking at him expectantly, all watching him warily, all waiting to see who he put the moves on first. As usual his reputation with the ladies had preceded him. And the best thing was he didn't even have to buy them a drink.
Well, their question was easily answered: the tall blonde with the cheap home perm but a pair of Bristols that looked so large they should have had their own passports. She had nice teeth, too. He was funny like that, could never knob a bird with, as he put it, rusty railings. He was always telling anyone who would listen that personal hygiene of the North and South was a requisite for his amours.
As he grinned at Stephanie Treacher and she beamed back, he felt the first stirring of interest inside his pants.
Then a tall woman with short blond hair, piercing green eyes and a deep husky voice walked into the room. 'You must be Freddie?'
He looked her over as he did all women, and said jauntily, 'And you are?'
She smiled then, a wide, white-toothed, even smile that he was quick to notice didn't reach her eyes.
'Your boss, darling. I am Ozzy's sister Patricia. Follow me through to the office.' As she walked out of the door he noticed the girls were all smiling at him, not with him but at him. He had heard about this woman but he had never seen her before, and she had the same rep as a lot of the men he dealt with. Fair but hard was the general consensus.
It suddenly occurred to him that she really was his boss.
Pat, as she was known, had a long lean body, almost boyish, and incredibly long legs. She also walked with shoulders back and the air of someone who knew what they were about. As he followed her he glanced around the room at all the girls, and the look told them they could wait.
Stephanie raised her eyebrows in a friendly fashion and he winked at her. Confident she was on his list of things to do, she went back to filing her nails. She had scratched a customer earlier and he had not been best pleased. As a school teacher the man was worried about his wife's reaction to a scratch that ran the length of his back, a scratch he would never had experienced if he had not grabbed her by the hair and nearly choked her with his idea of oral sex.
The men that came into this place had watched one too many films, and Deep Throat had a lot to answer for. The men really thought that all women could swallow that much cock without gagging. And she had been gasping for breath, had been nearly collapsing with agony, and he had acted as if she had deliberately caused him trouble.
Consequently she now felt that if she could pass an afternoon with Freddie Jackson now and again, then it might make the job a bit more bearable.
Chapter Four
'All right, Ozzy?'
Jimmy felt the iron grip of Ozzy. No matter how often he shook this man's hand he was always amazed at the sheer strength inside it.
Ozzy grinned, or at least his crinkled-up face expressed the fact he was smiling, but it was so hard to tell. He had to be one of the ugliest cons ever from his bald head, that was scarred from his youthful career of bare-knuckle boxing, to his overweight body that was solid as a rock despite making him look sluggish and heavy.
But it was his voice that Jimmy loved, it was deep brown, like syrup, and it was a voice that was made for a good-looking singer, or a man of refinement. Not the lump of meat that sat in front of him.