Assassin Read Online Free PDF Page B

turned his frustration towards the sport. He trained harder than ever, he fought with a ferocity that even he had not realized he possessed; it was like a purging, a cleansing of his soul and if part of that catharsis meant he was sometimes on the receiving end of beatings then so be it. He channelled his fury into boxing and it paid off. He reached the finals of the ABA Lightweight Division when he was nineteen and turned professional the year after that.
    Jim returned from the army after his three year spell, his own demons exorcised and, for a time, the two of them saw little of one another. Ray's professional career brought in a steady wage but then came the setback which was to finish him in the ring.
    He could still remember the fight. The other lad was overweight, ponderous in his movements. It seemed to Ray that he had no heart for the right. Carter had caught him with a powerful uppercut while the lad had been flat-footed. He'd dropped like a stone, his eyes glazed, almost opaque even as he hit the canvas. A doctor had leapt into the ring and Carter could remember being pulled away while efforts were made to revive his opponent.
    He'd died in the ring. A massive brain haemorrhage.
    Carter had never been back in a ring since.
    Jim was out of the army. Ray had left the ring.
    Then came Frank Harrison.
    At the time he only owned a pub in Camden Town and two strip joints in the West End but he was expanding. He needed people. 'People with know-how and ambition' as he liked to put it, although Carter, having seen some of the men who worked for Harrison, was under the impression that sadism and psychosis were also useful qualifications.
    So, in just eight years, Carter had risen from the post of nightclub bouncer to that of personal bodyguard.
    He and his brother together. Just as it had been in the past.
    It would no longer be so and that realization brought more
    tears.
    He gritted his teeth and closed his eyes as if shutting out the light would shut out the pain.
    It didn't.
     

 
     
     
     
Five
     
    Frank Harrison dug his hand in the ice bucket and brought out three or four dripping cubes. He dropped them into the crystal tumbler then half-filled it with Jack Daniels, swallowing a large measure of the fiery liquid.
    'I tell you,' he rasped, turning to face his guest. 'This is well out of order. I go out for a quiet meal and some mad sod tries to kill me. Fuck knows how much it's going to cost me to get my restaurant repaired and redecorated.' He downed more of the amber fluid and began pacing back and forth across the spacious lounge of the flat. Every now and then he would pause and look out of the large double windows that opened out onto a balcony which gave him a view of Holland Park.
    'Who the hell would do it?' he said, not really expecting an answer. 'And why? For years there's been peace and now this. Somebody getting too fucking ambitious no doubt. So, one of my best men is killed, another one wounded. Thank God Tina wasn't hurt.' He turned to face the person who sat on the leather sofa. 'I'm telling you, some bastard is going to pay for this. If I let it pass then anyone will think they can walk over me and I'm not having that.'
    He turned back to the window, gazing out over the darkened park. Trees swayed in the wind, spectral fingers that had lost many of their leaves rattled beneath the balcony.
    'I'd just like to know why,' Harrison continued. 'I haven't stepped on anybody's toes, none of my interests conflict with any of the other organisations in London. Unless it's one I don't know about.' He finished what was left in his glass and poured himself another, his anger boiling up again as he rounded on the solitary figure who cradled a glass of brandy in his lap.
    'Put the word out on the street,' Harrison said. 'I want to know who was behind that attack. I'll pay for the information if necessary and, before you say anything, I'll take care of who's behind it my own way, right?'
    The figure