Payback - A Cape Town thriller Read Free Page A

familiar. But how? From when? From the old days when there’d been women by the night? As easy as the flow of beers.
    Matthew the drug dealer and Abdul Abdul the assassin shut up.
    ‘Sit down, Matthew,’ she said, ‘sit down and listen to me.’ He did, so did Abdul. ‘Here’s the deal. You lose the security. Centurion and the Americans both. You close down for a week. You speak nicely to Abdul and then we get you back up and running. Nothing different to before, just being done by other means.’
    Matthew gagged, suddenly off the boil, getting only the first part of the words out. ‘Ca-ca-ca,’ he went.
    Sheemina February waited. ‘You were saying?’
    ‘Ca-ca-ca.’
    She turned to Mace. ‘Perhaps you should advise him, Mr Advisor.’
    Mace uncrossed his legs, tipped back the plastic chair. The thing about Sheemina February, he reckoned, was her calm blue eyes in her olive face. Eyes from a Nordic ice land. Untroubled eyes. The sort of eyes you’d remember. Eyes that mocked. Like her smile. The purple of her lipstick against white teeth. Easy to be suckered, to believe she was the voice of reason.
    ‘So?’
    He let the chair drop forward. ‘What’s your percentage?’
    She exposed the tips of her teeth. ‘Mr Advisor, please. Matthew pays for our services. Nothing different to what he’s been doing except we’re cheaper. And we keep him clean. A major advantage.’ Mace got a full smile before she turned to Matthew Hartnell. ‘So, Matthew, what do you say?’
    Matthew said, ‘Ca-ca-Christ!’
    ‘Consider it,’ said Sheemina February, standing. ‘Talk about it with your advisor.’ She slid a card onto the desk. ‘Let me know this afternoon. Before close of business.’ A smile. ‘No call, I’ll take it you’ve declined the offer. Your choice. It’s a free country.’
    She snapped shut her briefcase, picked up her cellphone. The goon reached over and put the dope packets in his pocket.
    ‘Think hard about it, my friends,’ said Abdul Abdul, pressing his fangs into the flesh of his lower lip. ‘We are worried about you.’
    ‘Goodbye,’ said Sheemina February, and the goon squeezed past her and opened the door. He stepped into the corridor and she followed him. Abdul flicked his wrist to rattle his gold watch strap. He pointed the cellphone at Matthew, raised it to his lips, pretending to blow smoke from a barrel, then was gone without closing the door. Mace listened to the strike of Sheemina February’s heels along the corridor and down the stairs. He stood, shoved back the plastic chair and headed for the door. On his way out, paused. ‘My deal with Donald is to give you protection for two weeks. Let me know what you’re planning.’
    ‘Wha-what d’you think?’ Matthew said. His voice back now, the tremor still in his hands though. ‘You th-think I’m just gonna close up like she wa-wants? Fuck her. Ca-Christ, man, f-fuck her.’
    Mace shrugged. ‘You’re a drug dealer, Matthew. You run a club where it’s easier to score coke than Coca-Cola. More especially, you’re making my life difficult.’
    ‘So f-fuck off too.’
    ‘I would, except this is an obligation.’
    ‘Not to m-me.’
    Mace shook his head. ‘It’s an honour debt Matthew. Something you wouldn’t understand.’
    Matthew pulled a joint from deep in the bags of his jeans and held it to a Bic, drawing long on the smoke. After the exhale he coughed, said, ‘I-I-I don’t wa-want you, ch-china. I g-got pro- protection . Experienced people. El-electronic s-s-surveillance. Metal detectors. The-they’re not g-gonna drop a bomb on me.’
    ‘Dream on.’ Mace’s cellphone rang: Pylon’s name on the screen. While he thumbed him on, he kept at Matthew. ‘Another thing, if I don’t hear from you, your club four-fifteen is when we meet.’ With that was gone.
    ‘Let’s hear it,’ said Pylon in his ear. ‘We got a fabulous new client?’
    ‘A freebie.’
    Pylon groaned. ‘What’re you saying?’
    Mace told him right