The Family Firm

Chapter 56

Freddie watched as Stella gawked at him, before she suddenly dashed to the chest of drawers, certainly armed with the knowledge that within the second compartment there was a Walther P99 hidden beneath a few folded pairs of trousers. Unfortunately, what Stella didn't realise is that Fred had already removed it and every other weapon from the premises. He knew she would be unarmed, and he knew she would know where to find all of her father's little hiding places. He just wanted to watch her squirm, like a rat trapped in a maze with only the promise of cheese that quite frankly didn't exist.

'You know . . . ' he began casually as if discussing the weather. He hadn't moved from the doorway. 'I always wanted a proper woman. You know, one what . . . knew the business, like. A woman I could work with, who I could trust. Because, that's what a relationship is built off of, innit. Trust.'

Stella, frantic now, was searching in the other drawers while Freddie continued talking, as if she wasn't even there.

'I wanted to make sure I could trust you, Stella,' he went on, nodding a few times. Inhaling deeply through his nose, as much as he could with his summer cold, he stepped forward, gently moving Jack's lifeless arm out of his way as he did so. 'Which, of course, was why I showed you me savings. I guess deep down I knew you was a thieving bitch. Which is a shame, really, because . . . I was stupid enough to think I might, y'know, actually love you one day. Maybe pop out a couple o' little'uns and all. Guess it were foolish, that. A fantasy.'

Stella, realising the direness of her situation, bolted towards the closet, but this, too, Fred knew would hold no weaponry. He allowed her to think she might somehow best him, instead continuing his monologue. 'But, I have to thank you, Stella,' he began, chuckling humourlessly. 'I mean, you really showed me that women just ain't meant to be trusted.

'Then again . . . I guess I always knew that.' Fred's face had lost all trace of mock mirth, and instead fell into something more serious. His eyes were going wild, as if he was drifting out of the moment once again. Despite this, he spoke calmly with a distinct clarity that belied the volcanic anger looming just beneath the surface.

'You see . . . me mum, she was a cunt just like you.' Freddie's lips flatted somewhat in disapproval, and he nodded a few times to himself. 'She left me Da when I was only a little boy. Me ex-wife . . . She didn't want me to see me daughter. Can you believe that? She wouldn't let me see my baby. And me step-mum, well, she's a different kettle of fish all together. Fucking nonce.' He looked at her then, his brows knitting slightly. 'I was only nine years old when she started touching me. Nine. How was I supposed to know what was normal and what weren't, eh? I was only little.'

Stella, between her panicked hyperventilating and exasperated breaths, suddenly clutched her breast and groaned, slipping onto her knees and pulling some of the contents of the closet she was rifling through with her. Freddie ignored this entirely, taking a seat on the corner of the bed near the dead man's legs. He wasn't even looking at her any more as he spoke.

'Franks is the only one I can trust. I know that now. Me and her, we're soul mates. I mean, we might be bruvver and sister, but . . . There's some bonds you just can't break. We was meant to be together. So, I mean, I have to thank you for making me realise that, don't I!'

Stella fought against the heaviness in her limbs to lift herself off the ground using the arm of a chair in the corner of the room, but she was only able to take a few more steps before stumbling towards the bedroom door. As soon as she escaped, she could see the light from the front door down the hall, and struggled towards it, reaching out weakly ahead of her.

'Fedya!'

Fred stood casually and drew his Glock 17 from the inside of his leather jacket, following her into the hallway. Without hesitation, he fired a single round into the back of her skull. Stella's body instantly fell face-first with a hard smack on the hardwood flooring, and slowly a pool of blood began forming around her head. Disinterested, he tucked the gun away and began humming along with the familiar chorus of "Only The Lonely" that began playing on the stereo.

Outside, Fyodor waited until he heard the gunshot before heading in, as he had been instructed to do. As much as he disliked Stella, he didn't want to see her topped. She had almost grown on him, after all that time. Of course, now she only served to remind him that he would never be worth enough in her father's eyes.

When he had come to London, he had been willing to do whatever it took to make a few pounds. He didn't think his ambitions were too high—he only wanted a good life for him and his Ninochka. Nina Ivanovna, his childhood love from Novosibirsk where they had grown up together. She was the only reason he continued working for these fucking English bastards. She told him she would live with him once he made a name for himself—and his Ninochka always wanted the best. She was funny like that.

He had been working for Jack for years now, and where had that gotten him? The man was a racist prick, he never let him advance anywhere, though he had been more loyal than any of those bastards he called his best men. Fyodor thought that by seducing Stella he might force Jack to respect him, but after all he had gone through, it had only proved him to mean even less in the man's eyes. Now he had nothing to show for all of his hard work, and the icing on the cake was that that bitch Stella had spend the past few months cunting off Freddie Evans!

Freddie was going to give him a real chance at becoming a hard man. He had told him that if he was to remain loyal to him, which he had, that he would allow him to help him run the overseas enterprises. That he would make more money than he had ever seen! This was the last step, taking care of Stella, before those dreams would be made a reality. Then Nina would be proud of him.

When he entered the house and closed the door securely behind him, Freddie was standing above Stella's body snorting a line of amphetamine off his hand.

'Where's the money?'

'In the boot. All accounted for.'

Fred nodded. 'Let's get them to the farm.'

Transporting Stella would have been simple enough, but Jack Collins was a different breed of animal. At over twenty stone, moving his body would prove to be a daunting task. So, Fred and Fyodor spent the better part of the morning and into the afternoon cutting the corpses into pieces, wrapping them, bagging them, and somehow relocating them to the farm Freddie had mentioned a number of times. If Fyodor remembered clearly, it was the same farm Stella had told him about where she had found his money.

It was nearing five by the time the two of them got to Polly's farm in rural Essex. Lenny had joined them for the endeavour, and had helped to transport the carefully-wrapped bags of human body parts down into basement where a large, empty, commercial chest freezer was waiting for them. When the red-faced Lena had asked what they were carrying, Polly had answered simply, 'One of their articulated lorries tipped over with a load of beef. Can't sell it.'

When they had packed it all away, they locked the freezer door with a steel padlock and headed out to the barn to replace the money. After Fyodor had put it all away under Fred's orders, Lenny shot him in the temple point-blank. Together, the two of them undressed the Russian's body, sliced him to pieces, and dumped his body in with the pigs, where twenty Berkshire hogs devoured him, flesh, bone, and all.

By the end of the night, their clothes had been burnt, the crime scenes cleaned, and all three cars had been destroyed in a scrapyard over in Grays owned by one of Freddie's cousins. Polly knew the score, and would continue to feed her pigs the "fresh meat" her nephew had provided. Lena would wonder, from time to time, why they never ate any of the beef in the basement, but was too shrewd to ask.

At the end of it all, Fred knew one thing, as he sat outside smoking with Lenny and picking dried blood out of the crescents of his fingernails by the orange light of his fag-end's glowing embers: the only woman he would ever trust was Frankie. After all, blood was thicker than water.

As if he had summoned her up, his mobile rang in his pocket, and as he answered it there on the landing, he heard Frankie's voice before he could even mutter so much as a greeting.

'Freddie, he's awake! Our baby's awake!'