Bang: Memoirs of a Relationship Assassin Read Online Free PDF

Tokyo deal by Friday, I’ll have his balls skewered in satay sauce. And get me a double espresso!
    Oh, I wish.
    There was something about that particular dogshit-littered back-alley in Hackney that always made me feel like I was in a movie about the end of the world, and that Monday morning was no different. I kicked litter aside, my footsteps bouncing back at me off the crumbling brick walls. After the bomb. Last man on Earth. There wasn’t a double espresso for miles, and if there was, it was probably the religious artefact of a tribe of deformed bike-riding punk mutants or something…
    But a few places still showed signs of life. The large red-brick building I arrived at was owned by a printing firm. ‘Somebody-Or-Other and Sons, est. since 1892’, that kind of place. The ground floor was taken up with massive, black-iron printing presses that usually just sat there, silent, waiting for work. The days of paper were coming to an end, thanks to all the eBooks and iPods and aHoles these days. So the owners rented out the upper floors to small businesses. When I say small, I mean small. One-bloke-and-a-computer small.
    And up there, sad to say, is where you’ll find Assassin Towers.
    Second floor, third on the left. Stained carpet, peeling wallpaper, rusty door hinges, that weird mouldy smell. Classy. What this place needs, I thought, is a Miss Moneypenny, flirting outrageously with me the second I walk in.
    Instead what I got, rolling out like a peal of thunder, was a loud trumpeting fart.
    That’s my agent. You’re going to love him.
    Barry launched into a coughing fit as I walked in. Probably brought on by inhaling his own arse-burp. He got louder and louder, so bad he could only wave at me as he started turning purple. Don’t bother with the Heimlich Manoeuvre just yet, though… this happens all the time. He didn’t bother covering his mouth or anything, just hacked and spluttered right into the middle of the room with enough force to rupture a lesser man.
    But not a tough nut like Barry O’Nion.
    Yes, that’s his real name! It didn’t hit me at first, because of the way he said it. When he answers his mobile he growls “Oh-NY-on!” It was when he gave me his business card, back in the Old Days, that I realised I had a vegetable for an agent. I’ve no idea if it’s a common surname in Northern Ireland or not, but first time I saw it written down, I just wet myself laughing. Barry O’Nion – brings tears to your eyes.
    Barry was a stocky, tough-looking bloke in his late forties. Bullet head. Tiny sunken eyes. Forearms that really needed tattoos on them. The sort of guy who could easily have been a bouncer in his younger days. Except if he’d ever tried to throw somebody out, he’d probably end up tripping over them. He’s not exactly accident-prone, just all fingers and thumbs. Let’s just say that when he plays darts in the pub, the regulars know not to lean against the wall.
    The telephone on his desk rang. Barry hawked up a mouthful of phlegm and gobbed it in his wastepaper bin. A gurgling hack to clear his throat, then he snatched up the phone, dropped it with clunk, fumbled with it like it was made of jelly, then it was finally at his ear.
    “Infidelity Ltd,” he said smoothly. “Ah, Mr er, ‘Smith’ isn’t it? Yes we got your details, thanks very much. Yes, the photos of your wife came out well… just a shame she wasn’t actually having an affair with her colleague after all, but don’t worry, we can fix that for you…”
    As Barry talked, I took out my mobile phone and went over to a small cabinet on the wall. Inside were a dozen brand new SIM cards still in their packaging, dangling from hooks. I plucked the next one in line, texted the phone number on it to a few people, unwrapped it, inserted it into my phone. New number for me. New number for each mission. The old SIM card, with all the texts and voice messages from Amanda Bentley-Foster, clunked inside Barry’s bin, making him