Dead Already

By Tim Adler

What if someone you accidentally killed came back to haunt you?

When the perfect crime results in the kidnap and murder of Megan, his only child, East End villain Mickey Speight is grief-stricken. But now, nearly thirty years later, Megan sends a message to her father, gone-to-ground in present-day Margate.

As the messages from his dead daughter keep coming, Mickey teams up with a young American female therapist to discover whether this really is a voice from beyond the grave, or if somebody has loomed out of Mickey's past wanting revenge. Someone is fingering Mickey's collar and Mickey doesn't like it.

Mickey realises that he must haunt the old East End boozers, betting shops and strip clubs of his youth if he's to find out what really happened to his daughter.

DEAD ALREADY is a psychological thriller that splices the ever-popular East End gangster genre with a ghost story; a cross between revenge thriller YOU WERE NEVER REALLY HERE and supernatural horror DON'T LOOK NOW.

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What the critics say

"Just brilliant ... the story is very good, but for me it was the final third that really gripped me. The twist was such a shock – even if you guessed one bit of it, the truth was much cleverer." Cookiebiscuit

"Addictive reading seems like a huge understatement ... the more of this book I read, the more I wanted to read and the quicker the pages seemed to turn. I couldn't bear to miss a single second of the story ... a very well deserved 5*" GingerBookGeek

"Intense, gripping ... a thrilling read" Once Upon a Time Book Blog

"I couldn't put it down ... highly recommended for anyone longing for an intriguing fast-paced novel that will keep you guessing until the bitter end" The Bookcosy Book Club

"A gripping thriller ... a cleverly plotted out story" Honestmamreader

"A scintillating mix of gangland crossed over with a supernatural thriller. ... a really captivating read that fired my imagination" Beyond the Books

"A compelling psychological read ... the tension slowly builds as the plot line unfolds leading to a poignant, satisfying conclusion." BooksBehindtheTitle

'Happy to recommend ... a bit of old school gangster mixed in with a modern crime mystery feel" Me and My Books

• Language: English
• Publisher: Caffeine Nights Publishing
• Release date: Apr 15, 2023
• ISBN: 9798215833476

Book preview

Published by Caffeine Nights Publishing 2020

Copyright © Tim Adler 2020

Tim Adler has asserted his rights under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1998 to be identified as the author of this work.

CONDITIONS OF SALE

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, scanning, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher.

This book has been sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead is purely coincidental.

Published in Great Britain by

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Also available as a paperback and audiobook

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Everything else by

Default, Luck and Accident

Books by Tim Adler

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The Lives of a Theatrical Dynasty

Hollywood and the Mob

Slow Bleed

Surrogate

Hold Still

Dead Already

Once again, for Kate

DEAD ALREADY

What if someone you accidentally killed came back to haunt you?

‘I went to look at my grave. It was a simple Latin cross, white.

Sometimes I smiled, as if I was dead already.’

Samuel Beckett, Molloy

Mickey

At the age of fifty-seven, Mickey Speight was too old to be clanking around in a suit of armour. A bleeding Sir Galahad, that’s what he was. Except his princess who needed rescuing was the mixed-race stripper sitting in his passenger seat and the dragon he knew he had to slay lay beyond his windscreen.

Chivalry might be dead but violence against women was one thing Mickey couldn’t stand. Kelis had shown him the black eye her so-called boyfriend had given her, which she now hid behind dark glasses. Now he was about to slay whatever monster was lurking inside the derelict-looking building.

Mickey, be careful babes. You don’t know him like I do, Kelis said.

You stay here and lock the door. I’m just going to give him a good slap.

Don’t hurt him, Mickey. He’s off his head when he does it. It’s the drugs make him crazy. He always says he’s sorry.

Yeah, until the next time. And there will be a next time, believe you and me, darlin’

Mickey stepped down from his Range Rover and closed its door with a satisfying thunk.

What was he doing, playing the good knight when really, he was just an old fool on horseback? Was this thin, shivering stripper really his Sancho Panza? Anyway, wasn’t this just what he’d been doing for the past thirty years, tilting at windmills, looking for somebody who was probably long dead?

Don’t think about it now, Mickey.

He walked in to the garage, which was full of cars, several of them raised up on platforms. Stompy thrash music played from a tinny speaker and the place smelled of baked-in grease. Somewhere out of sight a telephone rang uselessly.

He looked around the dirty walls, not quite seeing to the back of the cavern. A torn poster of a woman in a bikini advertising engine oil hung above a tyre propped up against one wall. This place had clearly seen better days.

The man he had come to see was crouched beneath the underside of a car spot welding. The flash and crackle of the welding machine was painful to watch, so Mickey had to look away. The pub landlord breathed in the smell of old diesel before he spoke. Here we go, he thought.

Oi, Buster Bloodvessel. You gonna answer that?

The mechanic stiffened as he took in what Mickey had just said. The man lifted up his visor and Mickey clocked how big he was for the first time. He also noticed his neck tattoo, an England flag with the initials EDL in gothic script. So, he was one of those fascist bastards.

See, Mickey had a thing about skinheads. His Uncle Benny had been one of those tough Jews who’d taken on the Blackshirts when they marched on the East End.

When Mickey was a punk, he used to go to gigs with his best mate Rainford, a rude boy from Brixton. They used to see bands together and what he remembered most was a lot of laughter, punks and rude boys in it together, until the skinheads came along and ruined everything.

‘Scuse me, what did you call me?

You heard, said Mickey flatly.

You need to show some respect, grandpa.

Mickey felt the old surge as he squared up to him. Despite the football shirt stretched over his belly, this fat-arse looked as if he could handle himself. Mickey noticed he hadn’t let go of the white-hot tip of the welding machine.

Respect is something you earn, fatty. While we’re about it, why don’t you show some respect to the ladies?

What you on about?

You know a friend of mine, Kelis.

That slag. Bit young for you, gramps. What about her?

Mickey sprang at him, twisting the mechanic’s arm behind his back in a vicious half-nelson. He hadn’t seen that coming. Most fights were decided by who got in first, that’s what Uncle Benny taught him — get the first punch in, then you’ll have won the fight.

He dragged the football hooligan out from under the raised-up car, trying to wrestle the welding machine away from him. Its cables got tangled beneath their feet as he banged the mechanic’s wrist down hard on a workbench lip, again and again, forcing him to drop the welder. It snaked dangerously along the table top. Both men grappled for it, but Mickey’s fingers got there first. He snatched it up and brought its searing tip close to the man’s cheek. Any closer and it would bubble and blister his skin and bore straight through to his eyeball.

Mickey leant in and whispered, What would your Nazi mates say if they knew you’d been shagging a bird like Kelis? Thought you’d have a taste of forbidden fruit, did ya? The darker the berry, the sweeter the juice, is that it?

The mechanic was struggling, and Mickey didn’t know how much longer he could hang on. The machine’s power cable was fully stretched, straining against the plug. He gave the man’s left arm another jerk upwards to show he meant business and the skinhead bellowed.

The glowing tip was now dangerously close to the man’s eyeball.

You know what they say in the Torah about an eye for an eye? You go near my girl again and I’ll take one of yours out. With an effing spoon.

I know who you are, he hissed. I got friends.

They’re not friends, they’re losers. The publican made a right angle with his thumb and index finger and pressed against his forehead. Just like you.

The mechanic made a guttural sound that came across somewhere between a snuffle and a whimper and Mickey knew that he’d broken him.

Mickey released the trigger and the welding gun clattered onto the garage floor. The mechanic was clinging on to the workbench for support. From behind, he looked as if he was blubbing his eyes out.

Mickey walked away, breathing heavily.

He sensed the skinhead coming up behind before he heard him. Instinctively, he grabbed whatever came to hand first — a long-handled wrench — swinging it blindly at where he guessed the head was.

The mechanic went down as surely as ten-pin bowling skittles. He rolled on the ground clutching his skull and Mickey dropped to his haunches.

That’s right, my name’s Mickey. You want some more of that, come and see me. The strip club on the parade. You can’t miss it. It’s called the St George. Happy hour is between five and seven. Bottoms up, eh?

His white Range Rover was still parked up on the other side of the street.

Don’t ever make me do that again, he said, getting back in the car. Mickey suddenly felt immensely weary. It had been a long time since he’d been in a ruck.

Thanks, Mickey, said Kelis, touching his shoulder.

And don’t have it off with a married bloke again, especially not one who’s an effing fascist, he harrumphed.

Okay, Dad, said Kelis sarcastically.

None of your bloody cheek either.

Mickey leant across and riffled through the battered collection of CDs he kept in the glove compartment. Music was what he wanted. He needed to come down from what had just happened. He was still shaken by the ugly sound of the wrench making contact.

An echoey screech of tyres, the exciting whack-a-tack rhythm guitar and soft trombone of Prince Buster’s Al Capone filled the Range Rover.

He steered the car through the Badlands of Cliftonville.

In its heyday, this had been a wealthy area. He had seen diorama photographs of beaches packed with daytrippers, men standing about awkwardly in bathing long-johns and redoubtable women in cloche hats staring out from deck chairs. Today, those seafront hotels had become bed-and-breakfast hostels for the unemployed. The creeping gentrification of the rest of the town had not touched these streets. This was the England everybody forgot about, the coastal towns which voted Leave. In a sense, there were sticking two fingers up at everybody who’d already left.

You’re just an old Mod, teased Kelis.

She was right about that. The skins had been waiting for them the night they came out of a Rock Against Racism gig at Bethnal Green Working Men’s Club. They were attacked with a baseball bat and bicycle chains and the ringleader stomped on Rainford’s head in the gutter, snapping his jaw wide open. After that, Mickey decided to become a Mod. He remembered putting his leather jacket away, the one he’d so carefully written Sham 69 on, knowing he’d never wear it again.

He’d been with Rainford the moment he laid eyes on the woman who became his wife. They had gate-crashed some West Indian’s flat at a Ladbroke Grove house party. Linda was elbowing men out of the way on the dance floor, skanking to Skinhead Moonstomp. She’d been dressed like a skin, too — her head was shaved and feathered at the back and she wore a granddad shirt and tie-dyed jeans. His mouth went quite dry at the sight of her. She cocked her head, as if to ask, What’s the matter? and it was as if they were speaking a secret language. The moment he saw her, he knew he had to have her — even if it meant phoning up her boyfriend the next day and threatening to break his legs.

Despite himself, he flashed on the last time he saw her too.

Don’t go there, Mickey.

A burnt-out car sitting in a snowy field. Awful smell. Everything ebony black as if it would crumble to the touch. Her charred corpse sitting bolt upright in the passenger seat, grinning sightlessly through an empty windscreen. Moving around the back of the Datsun to the boot, knowing who was inside. Hands pulling him back, telling him not to do it. Shaking the police off, unlocking the boot.

For any parent, that had to be the very worst thing.

Because only Mickey knew why he deserved to be in hell.

Taybor

There was nothing like the smell of a crime scene. Blood hit you at the back of the throat, cloying and viscous, pooled round the old man’s head. Even in death he looked surprised at what had happened to him, his body curled in an attitude of obsequious humility — take pity, he seemed to be saying, look at what they’ve done to me. Half of his caved-in face stared up at the ceiling, his hair matted with gunk, while the rest lied buried in ooze.

Detective Chief Inspector June Taybor noticed the man’s rattled brown teeth, some of which were missing. The detective flashed on a moment of frenzied violence, the teenagers like rabid dogs snarling and biting as they forced this pensioner to the ground. The question was, which one of the youths downstairs had landed the fatal hammer blow?

There were three of them under arrest, sitting outside in a police van, sullen teenagers, each blaming the other. All this talk of respect, when what respect did they show him? Was it just one of them or did all three take turns kicking this old boy to death, until his face was the caved-in-mess before her?

The hammer lay on the carpet, and she imagined one of the teenagers dropping it as if it had been red hot, scalding him, the moment the fatal blow made contact.

What a mess, said Detective Inspector Gaines, echoing her thoughts.

Her deputy’s glance at the body was perfunctory and without pity, the professional acceptance of the facts of death. There were about a dozen murders each year in Kent. Most were as easy to solve as a child’s jigsaw puzzle. Usually it was either a family member or an estranged partner, enraged about his children being taken away from him.

Few cases went unsolved. There was only one she could remember. Whatever happened to little Megan Speight?

Taybor didn’t like her DI much. His face was round in a Billy Bunter-ish way and he wore piggy glasses. There was something porcine about him. Gaines was that fat boy who’d been bullied at school, the one who would spend the rest of his life abusing his position, taking it out on everyone else.

Gaines nodded down the hall to where an old woman sat with her hands folded primly. She was crying. An earnest-looking young woman dabbed her tears with a tissue.

Who’s that? Taybor asked.

Their social worker. She stopped by with some food when she saw the front door open. The old man was dead on the floor. His wife must have seen everything.

Taybor let the full horror of that sink in, watching your husband being stomped to death while trapped immobile in a wheelchair.

What do the neighbours say?

Gaines would shortly take over from her running the murder squad, although they didn’t really call it that these days. They’d already had an unofficial leaving party that left her with a monstrous two-day hangover and her brain sweating rivulets of blood. Taybor had begun packing up her belongings that morning in a cardboard box. She looked round her office and thought, forty years of service doesn’t amount to much. The first woman ever to become a DCI in Kent Police, having risen through the ranks. The waters close over your head very quickly, she thought. She doubted she would even be remembered within a few days.

Their buzzers rang with a pizza delivery about two hours ago. The old boy must have answered the phone. Pressing multiple buzzers at once and shouting pizza was an old trick they used themselves for gaining entry. There was shouting but there often is on a Friday night.

Forensics officers moved round the lounge in bulky white overalls. With their face masks and hoods they reminded Taybor of those fuzzy black-and-white TV images of astronauts on the moon she remembered as a teenager. They ignored the woman in the wheelchair, treating her as if she didn’t exist, let alone having just witnessed the murder of her husband. One of them picked the hammer up off the floor, delicately sealing it in an evidence bag, careful not to smudge any prints.

You poor bugger, she thought. Taybor pictured what probably happened: the husband getting shakily up to answer the door, then three sharp-eyed toughs pushing their way in, the pensioner crying as they stood over him, then one of them going too far and lashing out, the dreadful thock as the first hammer blow landed.

Gaines said, Each of them says it was the other one. They were wearing gloves, so there aren’t going to be any prints. Of course, one of them will crack in the end...

And who is going to represent you, Taybor wondered as she pondered the victim. Sometimes that’s how she thought of herself, a lawyer standing up in court, arguing for those who could not be heard. A tribune of the dead holding murderers to account.

She studied the family snapshots on the wall, concentrating on one photograph of what she guessed was the widow from when she was young — not exactly beautiful but handsome, her face brimming with hope. Had the woman in that photograph ever imagined it would come to this?

There was a commotion behind her and she turned to see paramedics lifting the old woman into a wheelchair.

Taybor asked, What’s wrong with her?

She had a massive stroke two years ago. Can’t speak and she can’t hear, the social worker replied, squeezing the old woman’s shoulder for comfort.

But she still has her sight, yes? Taybor said, giving the widow a brave little smile. If so, what she’d just witnessed didn’t bear thinking about.

The social worker shrugged as the paramedics manhandled their only witness into a wheelchair, lifting the old woman’s swollen ankles onto the footrest. The detective knew what heavy work that was, hoisting a dead weight. She caught herself sympathising. Is that how you think of the man you once loved? Her husband had been so handsome when they first met, all she wanted to do was sketch his face, like a Greek god.

This time last year, Geoff had still been at home. That beautiful face became ravaged. She would adjust his pillow, noticing how the chemo had turned his skin the colour of candle wax. The guttural sound Geoff made could have been anything, and she would help him sit up in bed to take his first pill.

The end came quickly.

What sort of God does that to one of his creations, thinking of those last days in hospital, and the complete absence of life the last time she saw him. Think of it as a blessing, the vicar offered as they emerged from his cremation. He hated what was happening to him. A blessing for whom, she wondered, seeing herself trapped in their Maidstone flat, her retirement stretching interminably on.

Taybor bent down. Apart from the shock of white hair, the widow’s wizened monkey face was completely hairless, yet Taybor was sure there was intelligence locked up behind those vatic blue eyes.

Mrs Smith, my name is Chief Inspector June Taybor of Kent Police. I can only imagine what you’re going through. We’ve arrested the youths who did this. You will get justice, you mark my words.

Was that really true? By the time you’d gone through months of paperwork for the CPS, the slightest flaw in the evidence could collapse the case. Yet they kept cutting overtime, so there were never enough hours to get the paperwork ready.

Where are you taking her? Gaines interrupted.

To Queen Elizabeth for the night, said the social worker. While we contact her relatives.

Just a moment, Taybor said. There’s something I want to try.

Her raincoat flapping around her, Taybor clattered down the piss-stinking tower block stairwell. It felt good to have her old adrenalin back. Of course, what she was about to do would be argued over in court, but frankly, with just a week to go, what did she really care? For once, she was going to jump start the process. As long as it brought justice, that was the important thing.

The suspects were being held in a blacked-out mini-van, and Taybor asked the sergeant if she could interview them one by one.

Her clothes felt like tissue paper in this cold, but the teenager inside the van just wore a tee shirt and a thin hoodie. They carried knives to give themselves status because they had none. Really, none of these lads ever stood a chance. All the retiring detective felt for them was infinite pity.

Do you have a cigarette? she asked the sergeant, who passed one across from a crumpled packet. Taybor lit it, breathed in and passed it through the mesh to the boy, who inhaled gratefully.

How old are you, Dean? she asked.

Seventeen.

You’re just a kid. Burglary, you might go to juvenile prison. More likely, you’ll be let off with a suspended sentence. But murder...that’ll be with you for the rest of your life. Any job you apply for. Anything you do, it’ll be there, a ball and chain dragging you down. She leant further in. I know you didn’t kill the old man upstairs. The others did. So, let me help.

A spark flew up into the night air as the teenager took another drag. What’s in it for you? he said.

A sense of justice. Of righting wrongs. I represent the dead.

He thought for a moment. What do my bruvs say?

They’re family, so they’ll protect each other. They blame you. But I don’t believe them. You’re no killer.

For the first time, the boy looked nervous. I told you, it all happened so quick. The old man, he just ran into the hammer.

All I want to do is take your photograph, said Taybor gently. Will you let me do that?

Taybor used her smartphone to take a snap of the boy.

She went through the same thing with the other two. Being older, they were surlier and less cooperative. The ringleader spat on the van floor when Taybor offered to help. What would happen to these boys when they grew up, once life had beaten it out of them? Working in a supermarket if they were lucky. Or knifed in the street for Gaines and his boys to find.

Upstairs the old woman still sat in her wheelchair looking blank — you wouldn’t have thought she had just witnessed the murder of her husband.

Mrs Smith, Taybor began, crouching beside one wheel. I am sorry to put you through this, but I believe you understand everything I’m saying. Blink twice to say yes.

The moment gathered round them like a drop of water about to fall. It swelled until Taybor didn’t think she could hold on any longer.

The old woman blinked twice. Distinctly.

Taybor exhaled slowly. Good. Now, I’m going to ask you some questions. Blink twice if you’re comfortable with that.

Another double blink.

Did you witness what happened to your husband?

Two blinks.

Could you identify his murderer?

Same thing again.

Taybor brought out her phone. I want to show you some photographs, she said.

Mickey

Kelis, his best girl, stretched out against the pole twerking for the few customers. She ground against the pole, cupped her silicone boobs and mimed licking them, all the while keeping eye contact. Lovely dark skin. She really was very good.

Megan, his three-year-old, sat on the other side of the horseshoe-shaped bar. She chewed a coloured pencil and studied her colouring-in book, a glass of fizzy orange in front of her. My God, he loved this little princess. He gave her a quick smile before going back to his football results.

Of course, you know she’s not really there, don’t you? You’re just projecting, that’s what your therapist says.

Because three-year-old children do not come back from the dead.

The St George could be any East End pub with thumping house music and brick walls, while the chandeliers gave it a vaguely Las Vegas feel. There was even a pool table out back — classy like. Except for the pretty girls wandering around in tiny black underwear, you could have been in any seaside boozer. It still felt awkward though. No