Breakers Read online

  He looked at her but didn’t take it. Remembered the touch of her skin, the bubbles of blood along the cut on her hand. The sound of her voice from the other room, swearing. He breathed in her scent, mingled with the smell of the car.

  ‘Don’t make a girl beg,’ she said. He saw something in her eyes, a flicker under the bravado, maybe it was a front to cover something deeper. Maybe she wasn’t as confident as she made out. ‘Don’t you want to see me again?’

  She put on a coy look and the vulnerability in her eyes was gone, back to confident Flick.

  He took the phone and typed his name and number. He used his real surname, why not? She wasn’t going to grass on him about the house, she would put herself in the shit too. And he did want to see her again. He handed the phone back and she looked at it.

  ‘Tyler Wallace,’ she said, as if weighing up the worth of his name. ‘If you’ve given me a fake number I’ll hunt you down and kill you.’

  She laughed too hard. He thought for a second she was going to press dial to check his phone rang in his pocket.

  ‘I’ll call you, Tyler Wallace.’

  ‘I hope you do.’

  He got out and closed the door. She revved away with a squeal of tyres and it felt like the whole thing had been a dream.

  11

  He got no grief for missing most of the morning. His lack of attendance was noted but turn-up rates were so low around here that anyone appearing for class was a triumph. They couldn’t punish him, he was old enough to leave anytime he wanted. The school roll plummeted as soon as kids turned sixteen, most of the boys leaving for apprenticeships or the army, or just to doss about. The armed forces were smart, they had regular recruitment drives around the poorest parts of the city, signed up plenty of fodder for the latest war in the Middle East. The girls all became trainee hairdressers or got temp jobs in nail bars and tanning salons. Stereotypes, sure, but when your horizons start narrowing on the day you’re born, when you don’t see anyone around you doing anything else, you go along with that crap. No one from here became an academic or a surgeon or a solicitor, those careers cost money.

  The school also knew they couldn’t give Tyler a detention because he had to pick up Bean. They knew all about his home life, social workers made sure of that. He and Bean were on the register, but there were hundreds in the same boat around here, far too many to tackle, and no one had the time or resources to help, swamped with paperwork and firefighting emergencies. It worked against Tyler that he kept himself and Bean going, that he did a decent job of raising the two of them, so they weren’t deemed a crisis.

  He imagined sitting in Will’s house with Flick, Bean doing cartwheels in the garden while he sipped on a nice middle-class drink, a G&T or Prosecco or some shit like that. Chin, chin. Bean stopping to scoop cookie-dough ice cream into her mouth in between leaps and stretches.

  It was afternoon interval when he found out.

  He was walking out of English, searching ‘Felicity’ and ‘Inveresk’ on his phone, when Connell grabbed him.

  ‘Did you hear?’

  Connell was thick as pigshit but had a good heart. He was tall and broad, probably weighed twice what Tyler did, but he didn’t have an aggressive bone in his body. His ears and cheeks were permanently red like he’d just come in from a snowball fight, and his school tie was always a mess.

  Tyler looked at him. ‘I don’t know, did I?’

  Connell leaned in and lowered his voice. ‘Some morons broke into Ryan Holt’s house last night, took a bunch of shit, stabbed his mum.’

  Tyler put his phone away. His heart was a stone and he felt sick, sweat sticky under his arms. ‘What?’

  Connell’s eyes were wide. ‘I know, right? The Holts.’

  ‘Shit.’

  ‘I wouldn’t want to be in their shoes right now. When Deke Holt catches them, they’re gonna get destroyed. Fucking tortured and shit. They’re gonna wish they were dead.’

  The Holts were Niddrie legends, the biggest crime family going back for decades. They used to run with the Young Niddrie Terror gang back in the eighties and had grown in power and reputation ever since. Deke was the head of the family, had gone semi-legit, ploughing drug money into property, but he’d done time back in the day for violent offences. His son Ryan was still kicking his heels in their year at school. Folk stayed out of his way because of his connections and because he had that thing in his eye, he wouldn’t stop if he got started. Tyler knew the Holt men by sight, but not Ryan’s mum.

  ‘Where was this?’ he said, trying to keep his voice level. His fists were damp with sweat in his pockets.

  ‘Somewhere up in Bruntsfield, I think.’

  ‘They don’t live around here anymore?’

  Connell looked at Tyler like his brain was loose. ‘Would you, if you had the money to leave?’

  ‘So why’s Ryan still at Castlemound?’

  Connell shrugged. ‘His gang’s here. It keeps him in touch with all the other bams.’

  Tyler thought about the sawn-off shotgun under the bed, remembered pointing it at himself in the mirror, the weight of it in his hands. He thought of the woman, the knife dropped by her side. He thought of the bag of stuff, the Holts’ stuff, still sitting in the living room back at his flat.

  He closed his eyes and tried to remember the piano music from Will’s house, tried to picture Flick standing in the middle of the room. But all he could see was Ryan Holt’s mum on the floor, swimming in blood.

  He swallowed. ‘Is his mum OK?’

  He wasn’t religious but he was praying hard to every god there was.

  ‘She’s in hospital,’ Connell said. ‘Critical but stable, whatever that means.’

  ‘Shit.’

  Connell looked at him. ‘Are you OK? You look a bit ill.’

  Tyler forced out a laugh that sounded wrong. ‘Didn’t sleep last night, that’s all.’

  Connell shook his head. ‘I wouldn’t want to be those cunts. They can’t have known it was the Holts’ place. Why the hell would you rob them? There’s going to be some serious payback when Deke finds who did it.’

  ‘How would he find them?’

  Connell frowned at the question. ‘They took her car for a start. He’ll put the word out and track it down. And they robbed loads of stuff from the house. That’ll start turning up. He’s probably got his boys putting the word out already. Folk will talk, they’re all scared shitless of Deke.’

  Tyler licked his lips, trying to work moisture into his mouth.

  ‘Are you sure you’re OK?’ Connell said.

  12

  Something lifted from him when he saw Bean’s face. She ran across the playground to him, offering up a tub of gooey slime, the latest craze, green and gloopy.

  Miss Kelvin smiled from the open door of her classroom and came out. They had an understanding, Tyler picked Bean up from school but sometimes he didn’t make it on time, depending if he had a study period last thing. If he didn’t, Bean hung around with her teacher, helping tidy up, playing by herself if Miss Kelvin had paperwork. They had an after-school club, but Tyler couldn’t pay. When he’d brought it up with Angela, she laughed. Miss Kelvin wasn’t supposed to do this, but she’d heard all about their home life from Bean. It helped that Bean wasn’t a pain in the arse.

  ‘Hello, Tyler,’ Miss Kelvin said.

  She was young, just out of teacher training – maybe why she cut Tyler some slack. A more experienced teacher might just have set them adrift. The management made noises about inclusivity and helping out families in poverty but the truth was the school could barely fork out for essential supplies, let alone anything else.

  ‘Hi, Miss Kelvin.’

  Bean was squidging her slime and grinning.

  ‘Go get your bag and coat,’ Tyler said.

  She gave him a quick hug and darted back into the classroom.

  ‘Make sure you’ve got everything,’ he called after her.

  He turned to the teacher. ‘Was she OK today?’
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  ‘Of course, as always.’ She was the same height as Tyler, her black hair in a short bob. ‘You know parents’ evening is coming up.’

  Tyler pursed his lips.

  ‘There’s a letter about it in her bag.’ Miss Kelvin studied him as he shuffled his feet. ‘How’s your mum?’

  He scratched his head. He realised what a cliché he was, the incommunicative teenager, but he couldn’t think what to say.

  ‘Is there a chance we’ll see her at parents’ evening?’

  ‘I can ask.’

  ‘That would be great.’

  There was a clatter from inside, Bean dropping her water bottle in the hurry to get her stuff together.

  ‘She had a lot of fun today with her new camera,’ Miss Kelvin said.

  Tyler thought about how to answer. ‘It was a present.’

  ‘She talks about you all the time. She’s besotted with you.’

  ‘She’s a good kid.’

  Miss Kelvin watched as Bean stumbled out of the classroom to join them. ‘You’re a good brother to her, Tyler.’

  He looked at Bean. ‘Sorted?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Come on, then.’

  He put his hand out and Bean took it. ‘What do you say to Miss Kelvin?’

  ‘Thank you, Miss Kelvin.’ Delivered sing-song, like a joke.

  ‘You’re very welcome, Bethany.’ She turned to Tyler. ‘Look after yourself.’

  They walked away, Tyler feeling Bean squeeze his hand as they went.

  ‘Snook!’ Bean ran over as soon as Tyler lowered her through the window. The dog was on her feet snuffling around her litter, pups falling over each other in comedy fashion. Snook’s tail thumped at the sound of Bean’s voice and she began licking the girl’s hands and face.

  ‘Good girl,’ Bean said as the pups came to see what all the fuss was about.

  They were cute but they would grow up quick, need feeding and walking. He wondered how Bean would cope with that. They couldn’t keep four dogs, and there was no guarantee they wouldn’t just wander off. Snook was semi-wild, one of plenty who ran around the waste ground south of the castle, scavenging for scraps. Tyler imagined what that was like, the freedom to roam, a whole world to explore. But the flip side was living on the edge of hunger and violence all the time, fights with other animals, cruelty from humans. He didn’t know if the trade-off was worth it.

  He refilled the water bowl and put it down next to the mattress. Snook had taken to crapping in the other corner of the room but the puppies still left a skittery mess around here. He tried to clean up as best he could using old newspaper. They needed to be toilet trained but he had no idea about that. And weren’t puppies supposed to get jabs of some kind?

  Bean was in the middle of a bundle of fur, giggling and laughing, lying down on the mattress and letting the pups tumble over her. He resisted the temptation to tell her not to get her uniform dirty, just stood watching her, smiling at her happiness. After a while the pups seemed to tire.

  ‘Think we should head home,’ he said.

  ‘Aw.’

  ‘The puppies look sleepy. And I’m hungry. Let’s get a snack.’

  There was an elaborate farewell between Bean and the dogs then they went along the road, the rumble from the building site accompanying them. Diggers hauled chunks of earth out of the ground, cranes swung large pipes through the air and placed them into ditches, lots of guys in hi-vis telling each other what to do.

  As they crossed the road to Greendykes House a woman got out of a Ford parked outside. She stretched and looked around, taking in the view, then pretended to spot Tyler and Bean, as if this was a coincidence.

  Detective Inspector Pearce. She was short and stocky, shoulder-length curly hair, white blouse and black skirt. She’d interviewed him a couple of times at the station on Duddingston Road West, once just a rounding-up of the usual suspects, the other time a serious fight at school between two girls in his class. Pearce had grown up in Niddrie and liked to let you know it, and while that gained some respect, the decision to join the force threw it out the window. She’d visited their flat before too, chats with Barry and Kelly, but she’d never managed to nail any Wallaces yet.

  She smiled as Tyler and Bean approached. ‘Tyler.’

  He lifted his chin in acknowledgement.

  She kept the smile painted on. ‘Can I come up for a wee chat?’

  Tyler thought of the bags of stolen stuff in the living room.

  ‘Not without a warrant.’

  ‘You know your rights.’

  ‘That’s a state education for you.’

  ‘I hear from your school that you’re pretty bright.’

  Tyler handed Bean his house keys. He didn’t want her listening in, but wasn’t sure what waited for her upstairs. Likewise with Pearce. He couldn’t invite her up but being seen talking to her out here wasn’t good for his health either.

  ‘Let yourself in,’ he said to Bean. ‘There’s crisps in the kitchen cupboard next to the kettle. I’ll be up in minute.’

  She was reluctant to go, eyeing up Pearce, but Tyler let go of her hand and waved her away, watched her go inside.

  ‘They grow up fast,’ Pearce said.

  ‘What do you want?’

  ‘I’m here to help.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Community policing, keeping you safe.’

  Tyler made to walk away. ‘If you’re not going to get to the point.’

  Pearce stood across his path. ‘Busy last night?’

  Tyler stepped back. ‘No.’

  ‘What were you up to?’

  ‘Stayed in, watched telly.’

  ‘Can anyone confirm that?’

  Tyler shook his head. ‘Bean was asleep. Mum was crashed out.’

  There was something on Pearce’s face, something he didn’t like. Sympathy. It was the same look he got from everyone when they found out what his home life was like. Teachers, social workers, police, all with good intentions, showering him with condescending applause for coping. Fuck that.

  ‘Have you heard?’ Pearce said.

  Tyler gave her a blank look.

  Pearce sighed. ‘A woman was almost killed in a burglary last night. On St Margaret’s Road. Know it?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Just down from Bruntsfield Links. Nice part of town.’

  Tyler glanced up at the tower block, wondered how many pairs of eyes were on them, whether Barry or Kelly were at the window.

  Pearce looked at the unmarked police car. Tyler saw a second officer in the passenger seat. They always went in pairs, but why hadn’t he got out of the car with Pearce? Made this unofficial, no corroboration, so anything he said was between the two of them. The car was a grey Ford Focus, chosen to blend in, the same tactic Barry used for the robberies. But you could still spot a cop car from a mile away. For a start it had two aerials. The cops flattened down the second one, they knew it was obvious, but you could still see it. And there was something strange with the number plates too – they had a different supplier so the ‘S’ was oddly square, like a backward ‘Z’, and the ‘R’s were weird too.

  Pearce turned back to him. ‘Her name was Monica Holt, ring any bells?’

  MH 100 on the Audi.

  ‘No.’ Despite himself, he pictured the look on her face as he left the house.

  ‘Deke Holt’s wife.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘I know you know all about the Holts.’

  ‘If you say so.’

  He wondered if she was awake in hospital. If she would be able to pick him out of a line-up. She’d seen more of Barry and Kelly, but he had locked eyes with her as she lay on the floor.

  ‘She’s in a bad way,’ Pearce said, as if reading his thoughts. ‘But she’ll pull through. Still unconscious but she’ll wake up, and I’m sure she’ll be able to help us with our inquiries.’

  It seemed unlikely Monica Holt would talk, Deke would want to handle it himself. But Tyler couldn’t be sure,
this was different from the usual turf bullshit that flared up every now and then. This was trespassing in a man’s home, attacking his wife. They were in a situation now that Tyler knew nothing about, all bets were off.

  ‘I hope she gets better soon,’ Tyler said, and he meant it.

  Pearce stared at him. She knew, of course, but she couldn’t prove anything. Or maybe she didn’t know, maybe she was more stupid than she seemed. But she wouldn’t be here if she hadn’t already heard something about the Wallaces being out last night.

  ‘Look, you’re a good kid.’ She gazed up at the block towering over them, then at the building site. ‘You do really well with that wee sister of yours, considering the situation at home.’

  He scuffed his trainer on the ground.

  ‘I know you’re not a bad person, Tyler, everyone tells me that. But you’re mixed up in something serious now. This is not like lifting a laptop from Costa, this is the big league. This is breaking and entering, armed robbery, attempted murder.’ She sighed. ‘And the Holts. Really? Did Barry pick this fight deliberately? If so, he’s suicidal. If it was an accident, well that’s unlucky up to a point. But the knife?’

  She leaned in, her voice softer.

  ‘I know Barry is a maniac, you know Barry is a maniac. In the past maybe he could protect you. But he can’t protect you from this, do you understand? He’s going to lose one way or the other. Either the Holts get him or we do. Are you going to go down with him?’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  ‘Think about what will happen to Bethany.’

  There was kindness in her eyes, but a hardness too. She was about the same age as Tyler’s mum, maybe they went to school together. He wondered what she thought of Angela, if that came into play. Everything came into play in a place like this, the ghosts of people’s childhoods haunted your every step in a community this interconnected.

  ‘Think about what’ll happen to your little sister if you’re not around. Who’ll get her to school? Who will make her tea and get her into the bath? Who’ll stop her making the same mistakes as her mum?’