Read Maura's Game for Free Online Page B

She also has the ability to suppress her feelings. She’ll be all right, I guarantee it.”
    Benny nodded, satisfied. But Roy kept his own counsel. He would wait and see. Although they were all pleased Terry was out of the picture, Maura certainly wasn’t. She had thought the sun shone out of Petherick’s arse and nothing any of them said was going to change that fact. This had started out as Maura giving him a hand to sort out a few bits and pieces. Now it was a full-scale war. Watching Benny acting like an extra in The Godfather could have been amusing if it hadn’t all been so deadly serious.
    Lana Smith was small and plump with melon-shaped breasts that not only defied gravity, they actually made her look fatter if that was possible. Since her baby had been born a few months previously she had piled on the weight.
    As she stepped out of her car to go into her local tanning salon she saw a slightly-built, curly-haired man smiling at her. Never one to be backward at coming forward she noted his brown eyes and cocky smile in a nanosecond. She noticed the knife a few beats later.
    It entered her stomach and ripped up through to her breastbone,
    leaving a gaping hole. As she stumbled off the kerb she felt the wetness of her blood as it pumped out of her body. The man was already driving away and the wing of his car clipped her shoulder, knocking her back on the pavement with a heavy thud.
    Her new baby Alicia slept contentedly in her car seat until the wail of the ambulances and police cars woke her and then she screamed endlessly, her little face red with anger and exertion.
    Maura listened in amazement as she was told of the deaths of two of the south east’s most hardened criminals’ women. She screwed up her eyes in disbelief.
    “Why would anyone think we would kill them? They’re wives, birds, civilians. What the fuck would hurting them gain us? They both had kids, for fuck’s sake.”
    Benny shrugged.
    “To gain us aggravation if we’re put in the frame.”
    Maura rolled her eyes to the ceiling in annoyance.
    “Fucking hell, Benny, that never even occurred to me. Give him a fucking paper hat!”
    The words stung and Benny as usual was on his dignity.
    “No need to be sarcastic, Maura…”
    She interrupted him.
    “Shut the fuck up, Benny. This is not the time or place for you and your fucking stupid little boy act, OK? This is serious grown-up shit. Lana’s old man Kenny could pick you up and squeeze you to death in the middle of Romford Market and not one person would admit to seeing a thing. He is heavy, and he is serious, and we have to sort this out soon else all the Armalites in the world won’t keep Smithy off our doorstep.”
    Maura’s words sobered everybody. Even Garry agreed they had a problem.
    “That is one heavy duty bastard, and now he has a motherless child to add to his annoyance. We’d better arrange a meet as soon as possible.”
    Benny was still sceptical. He blew breath from his mouth noisily in a final act of defiance.
    “Fuck him, we ain’t done nothing.”
    Garry turned on his nephew and said slowly, “Kenny Smith is one of the only people I am wary of. Now that should tell you to treat him with respect. He’s a decent bloke until he gets upset and then he’s a fucking maniac. He’s the guy everyone uses as a go-between for trouble. That’s what he does. He’s respected and liked, and he’s the man we were going to call on to liaise between us and Joliff. Only now we’re on his top ten shit list, at number one, we’ll have to find someone else to do the dirty work for us.”
    Maura rubbed her eyes with the palms of her hands, a sure sign she was upset.
    “We have to find out who’s putting our faces in the frame. Maybe Kenny can still help us with that, if I try the softly-softly approach. Garry, Roy and Lee I want you with me for back-up but let me talk to him on me own.”
    Garry nodded. Benny was more than aware he was out of the equation but didn’t make a direct