Read The Damage (David Blake 2) for Free Online Page A

should have been getting on with stuff but I didn’t move. Instead I took a moment to look at my girl, to actually see her. She looked so lovely that, just for a moment, I completely forgot all of the doubts and negative thoughts that have been plaguing me lately. The sun was beginning to stream through the thin material of the linen curtains. In a little while it would wake her but, right now, it was putting colour in her face, painting her with its glow, making her seem even more young and beautiful than normal and that’s some achievement. I thought that I might just be with the most beautiful girl in the world.
    Glancing down at Sarah, seeing her there, looking so calm and peaceful and lovely, like the world could never harm her, I could hardly believe it was almost two years since I blew her father’s head off.

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    P eter Dean thought long and hard about who he could use to get at David Blake. He finally settled on Billy Warren, who may not have been the first choice of many, but Peter had his own reasons for selecting him to arrange the hit.
    Billy Warren was a slippery little fucker who’d been with Mahoney’s crew for more than a decade, starting out as a young thug stealing cars to order. As he grew older he started breaking into houses, taking everything that wasn’t too big to carry. If it looked like you were on holiday when Billy called round, he’d come back with a van and take your furniture – earning him the nickname ‘Pickfords’ which stuck, right up until the day he was finally caught. The lad did his bird in the right manner, head down, mentioning no names, like a proper, honest crook.
    ‘No, your honour I do not remember the name of the man I sold the stolen goods to. It was just some bloke I met down the pub. No, I do not have his address,’ Billy went on to deny there was any truth in the rumour that he was allowed to operate on his turf in return for a substantial kick-back to bent Police officers and further tribute money paid to an anonymous local crime lord, rumoured to be a certain Mister B. Mahoney of Gosforth, Newcastle. The judge quickly lost patience and Billy got three years, served two in Durham jail, then was released back into the community as a completely reformed man. As a reward for his loyalty, Billy was given the option of a career change by the aforementioned Mister B. Mahoney of Gosforth, Newcastle, who persuaded him that there was no real future in house breaking.
    ‘I’m offering you a new job, Billy, as “a vendor of class-A substances”,’ Bobby told him.
    Billy Warren’s face creased into a confused frown. ‘Eh?’ he said.
    ‘I want you to sell some Blow, Billy,’ Mahoney clarified, ‘because I think you’d be good at it.’
    And he was. It all went swimmingly at first. In fact for a few years Billy Warren enjoyed the good life. He never got nicked because half of the law tasked with putting him inside was already in Bobby Mahoney’s back pocket and though the other, more honest, half didn’t like what they saw, it didn’t mean they were going to shop their mates. Billy had never met a copper yet who wanted to put his colleagues inside for corruption.
    So life was sweet. Billy had enough to rent a decent flat, get the car he needed to impress the birds and more than enough cash to go out on the town with his mates whenever he wanted. That’s pretty much as good as it needs to be for a man in his early twenties but, over time, his outlook began to change. It’s amazing what you can get used to. Billy went from being a man who never had enough; enough money, enough food, enough booze, enough dope, to a man who had all of that and still wanted more. In fact Billy started to question whether he was really getting his fair share. A lot of money passed through his fingers. He was building up contacts, selling a lot of blow and it wasn’t just the coke that he was flogging. Billy could get you ketamine, meth amphetamine, crack,