Grip - 14. Chapter 14

Max’s Dacha

Max looked up at the door as it creaked open on Jae wearing his coat and hat. He made to smile, but a distressed look on Jae’s face caused him to hesitate.

“We need to talk,” Jae said as he entered the small wooden house closing the door behind him and doffing his coat. He walked towards the settee that he’d been resident on much of the day, and paused before he instead selected one of the arm chairs.

He looked beaten, slumped like a marionette with all it’s strings cut. His arms draped over the sides of the chair and his chin resting on his chest. There was a palpable silence in the room, moving between them.

“What is it?” Max asked, apprehension finally getting the better of him.

Jae looked up, “you lied to me about that car.”

Max frowned as he came to sit down across from Jae, his elbows on his knees, he could already feel his heart begin to hammer in his chest.

“What?”

Jae remained slumped in the chair, his shoulders sagging, “you stole that car.”

“I didn’t steal that car,” Max said firmly.

“You’re a car thief,” Jae said stating fact.

“I was a car thief,” Max corrected. “And I was never caught, and never convicted…”

“That isn’t the point,” Jae said controlling his temper as he straightened up in his seat. “The point is you lied to me about the Arden. According to your Interpol file, you stole that car.”

“I won that car,” Max stated coldly. “I have the papers for it. It’s my car Jae.”

“Not according to them,” Jae said. “If the Militsiya catch you in that Jag, they will have all the grounds they need to arrest and extradite you back to England.”

“What are you asking me to do?” Max gritted his teeth.

“I am asking you to tell me the truth,” Jae said. “what’s the deal with this car theft thing?”

“I made the mistake of trusting someone I shouldn’t have trusted.” Max looked towards the fire, shaking his head. “And I got screwed for it.”

“You need to give me more than that, before I decide how I can help you.”

Max looked across the living room at the Korean, who was leaning forward expectantly, hopeful for something, anything to justify their friendship.

Max took a ragged breath, “Ok, you need to know then I’ll tell you what was going on.”

* * *

Two Months Prior

It would have to be a Jaguar, and a paddle shift at that. He always felt slower in one, less in control, and driving as fast as he was he needed every ounce of performance he could get out of the car.

He hit the brakes, the Arden XKR hydroplaning as it slid through the intersection, Max spinning the wheel and giving it some gas again as he accelerated down the steep hill heading for the safety of the quieter back roads. His hands gripping the wheel as his blue eyes darted up to the mirror, uttering a curse as he adjusted it so that he could actually see out of the back window.

Confident there was no one behind him he started to relax, the windshield wipers screeching their way across the windshield as he listened to the hammering of his heart and the steady roar of the engine.

It was always a rush, and he let the smile grace his lips as he slowed the car down, cutting off of Summerdown Road and up Green Street, rushing through a pedestrian crossing, grinning maniacally as he sent a little old lady running, waving her umbrella after him threateningly.

He instinctively glanced to his right as he rushed on, climbing the hill towards the old High Street. Over at his block of flats, before he swept on past them and up into the Vicarages, a cluster of roads and side streets that had been unimaginatively all named Vicarage something or other.

Max laughed as he turned onto Rectory Close, tucking the car into the drive way and pulling up to the garage he rented there just for such a situation. Hopping out and grabbing his windbreaker he walked out into the rain and checked to make sure no-one was paying him any attention as he jumped up and pulled the garage door closed. Grinning at the vanity plate of the car MISS D1, there was something really ironic about that.

He glanced again up and down the street, ignoring the rain that splashed down over his head matting his swept back black hair down over his head as he walked, taking the side entrance to Gildredge Park as a short cut back to his home.

It wasn’t much of a short cut; he just liked walking through the old manor house gardens, especially during the rain. He could calm down from the rush and just enjoy the refreshing feel of an English rainy afternoon. He’d missed them, he’d grown up abroad at his mom’s insistence, trying to round out his education and trying to get him out of the inevitable fate of most kids growing up in Eastbourne.

He was sure she just didn’t want him growing up to become another Chav in a town full of them. It had probably been the best thing for him since most of his friends had grown up into juvenile delinquents or worse, fathers.

So he’d been spared that fate, only…

He smiled pulling a cigarette out of his pocket and lighting it with his Zippo, flicking it shut and looking at the drizzling rain about him as he wandered through the wet gardens. When something’s in your blood you couldn’t just cheat fate by running away from it.

Take the XKR, an opportunistic win when the stupid driver had challenged him to a race. Not that Max minded, the spoiled kids loss was his gain, just as soon as he could get in touch with Derek.

He fumbled his cell phone out, puffing a few times on the cigarette before he hit speed dial and lifted the thin W880i to his ear, he hated how small it felt, but at least he wouldn’t loose it like he had the last one.

“Hey D.” he called, continuing to walk as he crossed the park. “Won you another one.”

The voice on the other end of the phone sounded stoned, “Won what Max?”

“I’ll tell you when I swing by yours in…” he tilted the phone around as he glanced at his watch, “’bout ten minutes.”

“Make it twenty,” and Max shook his head closing the phone as he put it away. Derek had a girl over, typical. Least he had enough sense to get rid of her before Max got there. Probably because Derek didn’t like people knowing how much time he actually spent with Max. That whole stupid secret friendship thing that Max wrote off as Derek being far too immature to stand up to his friends.

It wasn’t that Max had any real problems with Derek’s friends they just hated him. One part jealousy, mixed with two parts trouble, shaken not stirred and served with an olive. Max really couldn’t give a toss about Derek’s friends. They were preppy assholes, the upper end of lower class trying to pretend they were upper class snobs and not getting anywhere. Max didn’t have time for all that ‘keeping up appearances’ bullshit that they seemed to thrive on. He told it as it was, lied when he had to, and just had fun wherever.

Course there was the whole half-foreign thing, but it was the new millennium not the Victorian era, and people who had issues with ‘coons’ pretended they were cool with it to his face while bit behind his back about how dirty he was.

Screw ‘em. Max didn’t really care, he puffed on his cigarette, crossed the High Street again, watching cars and busses hissing past him through the rainy October afternoon. Splashing puddles up and around him soaking him even further, not that he cared about that either, he loved the rain.

Derek lived with Emily, pretty little chellist that lived at the top of a ramshackle house that had been converted to flats sometime in the industrious eighties. Of course Emily was a total bitch, hated Max’s guts, but at three in the afternoon, there was no way in hell she’d be home. Of course that explained why Derek had company.

He went up the back steps, a wrought iron fire escape that was especially treacherous in the rain. It swayed threateningly with each step as he climbed up to the top, pausing once he reached it to flick the butt of his cigarette butt over the rail, looking over the back parking lot of the local Sainsbury’s.

The door rattled open as a mousey looking girl squeaked as she came face to face with Max, her hair all disarrayed, still doing up her blouse as she ran past him down the steps and into the rain.

“You’re early.” Derek muttered from the doorway, stepping back to hold the door open for Max to come in. Bleary eyed he was wrapped in a comforter, just hiding his well developed chest and the long john underwear he always wore, apparently even during sex.

Max looked down the stairs at the retreating mouse, shook his head and entered the flat, “That wasn’t Emily… Sometimes I wonder about you.”

Derek shrugged, “You’re worse than I am.”

“Yeah, maybe, but I’m not engaged.” Max walked into Derek’s kitchen and set about making a pot of tea. Derek would never offer, but he would never turn down a cup himself. And as Derek padded off to get dressed Max added a couple of Typhoo bags to the pot and stood beside the kitchen window looking out over the rain.

“You said you got another?” Derek asked trudging back in suitably attired in jeans and a tee shirt.

“Arden AJ20 XKR,” Max said looking up, “new model, purrs like a kitten, you know me…”

“You’re an entrepreneur,” Derek remarked dryly leaning against the counter in the tiny kitchen, “When you see an opportunity you take it.”

“At five large a pop? Hells yeah,” Max pulled the kettle off of the stove and poured it into the pot, “So can Ronnie sell it, y’think?”

“XKR? Probably, you know what girls are like for that kind of shit. And five is fair, so long as I get to run it over to him.” Derek was firm on that; Max had never actually met Ronnie. But that was the way it had to be, Max would get the cars, Derek would act as the middleman and bring him his money. He didn’t much care past that. Beat dealing drugs where everything was so paranoid that you never quite knew what the hell was happening one deal to the next. This was quicker, simpler and worked.

“Money tomorrow then?” Max asked casually pouring himself a cup and waggled the pot at Derek who nodded.

“Tomorrow, just make it earlier. You know Emily gets home at five.” Derek pulled milk out of the small under counter fridge and mixed it into his tea.

“Fuck her,” Max replied taking the milk, “I’m not tip toeing around her just cause she’s your girlfriend mate.”

Derek shrugged, “She’s not as bad as you think. You just don’t know her.”

“She doesn’t want to know me,” Max scratched his nose as he put the milk away, “What was it she said, I’ll get you into trouble?”

“You do.” Derek replied with a smirk.

“Actually mate,” Max stood up again and recovered his tea, “You’re the one that got me started on all this shit…”

The two friends fell into silence for a bit, drinking tea as they shared a bit of company in out of the rain.

Goes in flashback

“How’s your love life?” Derek said cutting Max off by going for the one topic he knew Max couldn’t resist switching too.

“Lugnut’s being… thick.” Max sighed as he sipped his tea. Lug nut was his latest ‘project’ the supposedly straight homophobic brother of one of his old mates. Tall and a little goofy looking he kinda reminded Max of Frankenstein. ‘Course he looked nothing like a big green reanimated monster, but that didn’t stop Max from thinking of him as Lugnut.

“Still not putting out?” Derek observed, “Why is it, mate, you always seem to go for the straight ones?”

“Conversion process,” Max responded automatically, “Besides you know the local gay scene…”

Derek shuddered remembering their legendary sojourns to the local gay bar filled with dirty old men licking their lips and leering over the young boys that were obviously too young to be in a pub let alone do half the things the dirty old codgers had in mind for them.

It wasn’t a town to be twenty-something and gay. Any one with any sense escaped the scene and went to Brighton or London, returning for the obligatory Christmases with the folks every December. Problem was Max didn’t like London, though he did routinely make the drive to Brighton when he could be bothered. That typically left him trying to seduce the unsuspecting straight boys around him, not to much avail, though the only one who really knew that was Derek. Max was, typically, too lazy to put the effort into the kind of long term planning it took to successfully convert a boy to the wonder of boy-on-boy action.

“Wanna…?” Derek nodded to the bedroom.

Derek always made that offer, and part of Max wondered why he always turned it down. It was not like Derek was un-attractive. Most of the people that hung out with him found him attractive, just Max didn’t. He was too much at times, sleeping Derek would be exactly that, a quick shag in the bedroom. While Max readily admitted that he had his fair share of quick shags in his time. Like the boy pushing shopping carts out of the rain glancing at him, or the guy that worked the bar at the local pub. There was something a little off about Derek’s offers, something that made Max wary of him. Common sense probably.

Max looked up, and across to the room, and fired off the same reply he had done every time Derek had offered, “Nah mate, I should get going.”

Derek shrugged, “If you ever change your mind.”

Max set his cup back into the sink and pushed off from the counter, returning to the back door, “See you tomorrow.”

“Cheers.” Derek nodded, closing the door behind him as Max descended again into the rain heading for his flat.

He knew the back streets of Old Town like the back of his hand. He could find his way blind folded and so he really didn’t bother paying much attention as he cut through the churchyard, feeling the rain once more and loving it.

He thrived there, on the back streets. He wasn’t one of Derek’s friends that made their lives in the downtown core, working in the retail shops, or the Andale Centre, toiling their lives away to earn a little bit of money just to trickle it away shopping for things they didn’t really need. He also wasn’t a sub-urban boy, fed on the hypocritical bull that if he went to school he’d get a good job.

Money came, money went. And as long as he was fed and had a roof over his head he didn’t care…

He didn’t care seemed to be his mantra. He’d be twenty-one in a couple of weeks and he just didn’t care. He was getting cash the next day, but he didn’t care. Maybe that was the real reason people didn’t like him, that no matter how hard they worked, bitched, begged or borrowed they still couldn’t keep up with him. They saw a spoiled guy with money always in his pocket, well dressed doing the kinds of things they only dreamt about doing. Living his life and showing his middle finger to conformity.

He saw a rather plain looking dark haired guy that didn’t want to grow up. Like the errant freckles that stayed on his nose, refusing to change as he grew older. Bored.

The Police car out the front of his block of flats had him spin on his heels and hurry away. Making a quick dash for the sanctuary of the far side of the street. He’d keep walking head for the Rec and while away a few hours there and maybe the old bill would piss off and leave him alone.

“Evening Max,” the Police officer stepped around the corner ahead of him.

Max sagged his shoulders, “Got tired chasing after real criminals you decided to harass me again?”

“A Jaguar XKR belonging to someone decidedly better off than you are, seems to have gone missing.” The Officer said with a smirk.

“Really? How careless of the owner.” Max replied pulling to a halt, seething, the little shit had reneged on the bet. At least Max still had the car’s papers, “So Sergeant Allston, let me guess, I’m going to have to come down to the station to answer a few questions.”

“Well done,” The dark haired young policeman nodded under his cap, gesturing to the Police car across the road, “You win the grand prize, a ride in a Police car.”

“Lucky me.” Max responded climbing into the car and looking up at the PS Allston, “I guess it won’t help that I have an alibi?”

“Hopefully not,” Allston flagged down his partner and gestured triumphantly to her that he had apprehended their suspect, and Max tipped off a cheery wave to her as well. Sitting back into the backseat of the small car. At least he didn’t’ have to worry about dinner. The advantage to being detained for questioning just before tea.

* * *

Present Day

The clock was ticking ever closer to some obscene hour. The darkness thick amidst the snow beyond the window.

Max was standing at the stove reheating some beef stroganoff he’d kept in the fridge, as he paused in his explanation. Jae had moved to the breakfast bar, listening intently as Max related what had happened.

“So Derek was the guy that sold your cars, took a cut and gave you the rest,” Jae contemplated this. “Isn’t five thousand a bit low for a car theft?”

“I didn’t know it at the time, but he was selling the cars to Ronnie for ten grand, and pocketing half the proceeds.” Max stirred the pot, and scratched the stubble on his jaw. “But what I didn’t know at the time was that he’d selling me out to the Police. The pressure from his friends to do something about ‘that half-coon bastard’ was becoming too great for the magnanimous Derek to handle.”

“Petty social politics,” Jae commented.

“Seems so small to me, but for him it was everything he had. Plus it was a chance to pocket a whole ten K to himself. The problem was, he’d underestimated how much evidence the Police actually had.”

“What do you mean?” Jae asked.

“They needed the car to prove I was the thief. And since no one knew where the garage was… the police had no choice but to let me go.” Max sighed as he stirred the pot. “You can imagine Derek’s reaction when I turned up free and clear.”

“So what then?”

“He set me up,” Max said. “He told me where I could go and meet Ronnie, should have been my first clue, I should have just listened to my gut, but I got greedy.”

Max dished out two bowls of stroganoff and came around to sit beside Jae at the breakfast bar. “I was stupid to trust this guy, the Police were waiting for a chance to nail me. And I stupidly walked right into it.”

“Why didn’t you ditch the Arden?”

“It’s my car,” Max said firmly. “And as you put it, they have to catch me in it to put me away, right? I ran to Dover hit the continent and just kept on driving. That’s why I am here, I got a visa… and hey-dee-ho.”

“They’re ready to catch you, Max,” Jae warned. “You can’t race tomorrow night. It’s too risky.”

“I can’t back out now,” Max said firmly. “It’s a quarter of a million in cash. That’s a fresh start somewhere new…”

“So that’s it, you run this last race and then you’re gone, just like that?” Jae lip twisted in a look of disgust, it was an expression so very Asian and yet so very him.

“I wasn’t planning on just leaving without saying good bye,” Max insisted.

“Look, there’s more going on here than you know,” Jae said quietly. “We’re all neck deep in a big pile of shit, brah. The only way any of us is getting out of this, is if we stick together.”

“What are you talking about?” Max looked puzzled.

“I can’t tell you yet,” Jae said, tucking into his stroganoff. “Just give me some time to think it through.”