Free The Crime Trade by Simon Kernick Page A

lived-in kind of way, but her blue eyes were weary and she was too skinny for Stegs's liking. He wondered briefly whether she was on the pipe, then decided he honestly didn't care either way.
'How do I look?'
'Very nice.' The smile was now fixed on her face. 'You look very nice.'
He turned and gave her a vaguely dismissive glance. 'Really? I shouldn't do. I'm tired, pissed off, and my best mate got killed today. Some bastard blew his head off.'
The smile dropped a little at the sides even though she made a valiant effort to keep it there. Her expression suggested she didn't know whether he was joking or not. Stegs just looked at her with the same expression for a couple of seconds longer, then turned away.
Patrick came over. 'Everything all right here?' he asked. He looked at the girl. 'Do you want a drink?'
She glanced at Stegs, saw that he wasn't going to offer, and ordered a large vodka with ice. When she'd got her drink, she slipped off her stool and disappeared. Stegs took another huge gulp of his beer and lit a Marlboro Light.
'Did you hear about Pete?' asked Patrick as he poured a Murphys from the tap. 'Who?'
'Yer man, Pete. The one you used to come in here with back in the old days. Pete Moss.'
Pete the gun dealer. 'What about him?' Patrick left the three-quarters-full pint of Murphys to settle for a moment, and looked hard at Stegs. There was something innately distrustful in his expression. Stegs didn't react. He was used to that kind of look. 'He's dead.'
Stegs dragged on his cigarette. 'Shit. How did that happen?' 'The old C. Throat cancer. Died in Ford a few weeks back. I'm surprised you didn't hear.'
'I haven't seen him for a long time. I visited him a couple of times after he got sent down, but you know what it's like. You lose touch.'
'No way to die though, is it? Behind bars. The last four years of his life ruined. Another six months and he'd have been out.' He continued to look at Stegs as he spoke, with a greater intensity than he'd ever shown before, and Stegs wondered if he suspected him of having had something to do with it. Maybe he should have tried a bit harder to keep up with Pete's progress inside. Still, it was a bit late to worry about that now.
'That's always the way,' he said. 'There's no justice in this fucking world. Poor old Pete, I always liked him. Did you get to the funeral?'
Patrick shook his head and went back to pouring the rest of
the beer, having seemingly lost interest in the conversation. 'Nah, I didn't,' he replied eventually, and walked away with the pint.
They all fucked up in the end, thought Stegs. The small-time thieves, knifemen, the fences, the dealers, the thugs, all those who worked on the wrong side of the crime trade. They all thought they'd live for ever, breathing the ripe air of freedom, but it never worked like that. He'd always liked Pete, though. He'd been a laugh, a good bloke to be around. They'd had some good times together. Stegs tried not to picture him wasted and rasping in a prison hospital bed. Instead, he pictured a smiling Jack Brewster, the way he'd been before Frank Rentners had tattooed his back with a steam iron, and he remembered that Brewster too was now dead. Someone had garrotted him a few months back, then dumped his corpse in Mulgrave Pond in Woolwich, case unsolved.
They all fucked up in the end.
Stegs drained his drink and, catching Patrick's eye, ordered another one.
At 6.45 on the morning after the failure of Operation Surgical Strike, I was woken by the shrill bleeping of the alarm. Immediately, my thoughts went back to the events of the previous day and I wondered if we'd got hold of O'Brien. They then moved on to the woman lying next to me, which served to cheer me up a bit. Tina Boyd's a very attractive woman. I'm not bad-looking (honestly), but I can't help thinking she's a league or two above me. Still, if she wants to slum it, I'm not going to complain. I leant over and kissed the pale skin of her back; she groaned painfully, then