Crooks - A London Gangsters Tale | COMPLETED

Chapter Nine

And as he drove away from the meeting point in the middle of nowhere, Wayne's thoughts drifted back in time, to his childhood. There weren't many happy memories, especially if his father was part of them, but there were some.

When he was a kid, he had lived with his parents in a fairly prosperous part of London. Fitting in with the posh knobs was never going to be easy for a lad like him, but there was one kid he had always got on with – Rob Linley, Max's son. They were the same age and used to play footy on the communal green. Wayne was always the better player. Even in those days he knew how to worm his way past a keeper and then pelt the ball right square into the back of the net. Rob was bigger and slower. Wayne was no stringbean himself, but Rob had a kind of cumbersome quality to him that meant he would never be a great athlete. He lacked the dexterity for the beautiful game.

Of course, that didn't matter. In many ways, Wayne thought, Rob had more in common with David than he himself did. It was as if Rob were David's son, and Wayne just an accident of birth. A changeling. At school, Rob was the clever one. Not clever in an obvious way (he failed just about every exam he ever took, same as Wayne) but he had a kind of instinct that told everyone – even the teachers who dished out the detentions – that he was destined for great things. And they weren't wrong. Rob was now a powerful businessman in David's empire, while Wayne was a broken, retired footballer with no prospects.

While Wayne Carter managed to cut himself off from the real world by dedicating all his efforts to enhancing his football skills, constantly learning and refining, Rob Linley was more outgoing. Not that Wayne was shy or anything like that, but Rob had a way with people. Silver-tongued devil. More often than not, Wayne had found himself in his friend's shadow. Not that there was ever any bitterness between them. Wayne was used to being in his father's shadow. Throughout most of his adolescence, he had been accustomed to being the "sidekick." The butt of Rob's jokes. Because Wayne had his football – that was the one thing that he was good at while Rob was unequivocally not.

In some ways, they were like brothers. They bickered like brothers, anyway. Wayne had his big sister, too, but he and her were never that close, especially since she married that twat that worked for his father, Jason Keller. But perhaps it was really because she was her mother's daughter, while Wayne was – in spite of his best efforts – his father's son. They just had nothing in common. So most of Wayne's free time, whenever he was not on the football pitch, was spent with Rob Linley.

Only later did Wayne realise that even this friendship had, to some degree, been choreographed by his dad. Max Linley was David's confidant, after all. It was only natural for the two men's sons to become best friends.

Over time, the relationship between the two young men had cooled and, eventually, soured. Predictably enough, there was a woman at the bottom of it all.

But nothing so transient as romance could come between Max and David. In the world of football, Max Linley was widely known as the power behind David Carter's throne. David was the figurehead, but Max was his confidant and his most trusted advisor. And while David had forced Wayne into a career as a professional sportsman, Max seemed to have groomed his son to take over the much-vaunted position as the éminence grise in Carter's criminal empire.

During the days after his meeting with Mikhail Popov, Wayne spent a lot of time on his own, thinking. Brooding. Thinking about all the people who had done him wrong over the years. David Carter's name was at the top of the list, that was for sure. But Rob Linley was up there too.

*

Mikhail Popov, once again at his chess board and ruminating over a particularly audacious offensive by his opponent (whom he had never met face to face), was somewhat startled by the ringing of the telephone at his elbow. He was not accustomed to receiving calls without prior warning. Everyone on his staff knew better than to put a call through to him directly, without screening it first. And this was a call to his direct office line. Most irregular. Mikhail picked up the receiver and said: "Yes?"