In the distance, I can hear kids screaming. Writing their names in the air with sparklers and looting industrial estates for pallets to use as kindling. Hell on earth to commemorate a traitor.

It's enough to give a guy a thirst. I spit blood at the street and turn back towards the bar.

TWO

Settled in at a corner table, a pint of Stella in front of me. I managed to salvage a few cigarettes from a wet pack of Embassy and I've got one of them on the go. The rest are pulped, a stodgy mess of wet paper and tobacco. The cigarette tastes like toilet water, but I still smoke it.

My shoulder still hurts, but not as much as my mouth.

I should've known better than to meet the client here. He didn't tell me his name on the phone, but he had that urgent tone I took to mean he needed help. Course, at the time, I didn't know what kind of help he had in mind.

Sip my pint, wash the beer around my mouth. The bugger took a good swing at my tooth. I poke around with the tip of my tongue. One of the molars towards the back waggles in the gum. I poke too hard and it starts throbbing. Another drink to numb the pain.

If he'd been a client, I would've charged him extra to get that fixed. And normally he would've paid it. But then normal clients don't take a swing at me. They get me to snoop on their beloved wife or follow their kids to see what they do nights. That's what clients want, a personal spy who doesn't judge. But business is slow, almost dead. That's why I came here. I must be losing my mind.

A plump blonde with black roots leans over the bar, giving the landlord an unhealthy dose of cleavage. She grabs a clear drink and spots me looking at her. I look away, but it's too late. She wanders over, her legs crossing as she walks. She probably thinks it looks sexy. It just looks like she's pissed.

I drain half my pint as she slumps onto the seat next to me. She takes a moment to adjust her dress, a black number that probably looked good when she was twenty pounds lighter, but which now clings to her like shit on a blanket. She fumbles with a pack of menthols, puts one between her red lips and lights it with a pink disposable. A few puffs, then she sets the cigarette in my ashtray. The filter's scarlet where her lips touched it: her lipstick, or her gums are bleeding.

'My husband's a bastard,' she says. Shifts her position so I'm pinned in the corner. She takes a drink from her glass. The smell of gin is heavy on her breath when she speaks. 'He's playing around on me.'

I don't say anything.

I know you,' she says.

'You know me.' Plenty people know me. Most of the time, I don't want to know them. But there you go; can't have it all. 'Who am I, then?'

'You work for Morris Tiernan.'

My tooth pricks at the gum. I cover it with my tongue for a second to kill the ache. Then I take a drink to get rid of the blood in my mouth. 'I don't work for him.'

Her eyebrows arch. I thought you did.'

'I was working, Tiernan got involved. Doesn't mean I work for him.'

'Oh, right.' She closes one eye. Trying to wink, but she looks like she's having a stroke. 'I understand.'

Somewhere in the pub, a jukebox wails out a country standard. Stand by your cheatin' man, even though he beats the shit out of you and the dog. I don't want to be here much longer. As long as it takes to finish this pint, then I'm off.

'He's a fucker,' she says.

I follow her gaze to the landlord. He's a stocky guy, shirtsleeves rolled up to the elbow revealing two muscular and hairy forearms. From here I can make out blue tattoos, faded over time.

'That him?' I say.

'That's him.'

The knot in his jaw, the way he looks at his customers. Yeah, the guy's a fucker. But it's got nothing to do with me.

'There's always marriage counseling,' I say.

'Too late for that.' She turns to me. The light catches her face, and she looks drunker than I thought. No different to the rest of the wannabe divorcees who've accosted me since I got out of prison. Heavy round the hips, sagging up top. Lines around the mouth like the first strikes of a chisel against rotting wood. A sultry look that may have worked at one time, but has grown sickly with overuse. These women, they must smell Strangeways on me like a cheap aftershave. The prospect of rough trade, or something far worse.

She looks me dead in the eyes, says, 'How much would something cost, d'you think?'

'Something?'

'Something to happen to him.'

'I don't follow,' I say. But it's pretty obvious what she's after. Sometimes it's just a case of making them say it.

'Course you do.'

I smile, but I don't mean it. I look back at the landlord. He's fiddling with the till. 'I don't think you've got the money, love.'

'I can get the money.'

'And that's not the kind of thing I do.'

'Then what do you do?' she says. She squints at me, smoke from her cigarette swirling up into her eyes.

'What's your name?'

'Brenda.'

'Well, Brenda, you shouldn't be asking strangers to do over your husband. It isn't nice. Now, I never met the guy, but he looks like a proper shithead. And I feel for you, I really do. But knocking him off isn't going to solve anything, no matter how much you've had to drink.'

'I'm not — '

'Yeah, you are. Tell you what, you sober up and you still feel the same way, you give me a call, alright? We'll look at some less drastic options that don't involve GBH.' I write my name and office number down on a beer mat, slide it across the table to her. 'Don't get yourself worked up for nowt. God knows I'm cheap enough, so you have a think about it and get back to me.'

I down the rest of my pint and get to my feet.

Brenda looks up at me. Her eyes are watery, her mouth twisted. 'You need to help me,' she says.

'And I will. Just give me a call, okay?'

She thinks about it, stares at the beer mat. Then she grinds out her cigarette. Her hand is trembling.

'You okay?' I say.

'Fuck off,' she says.

She lights another cigarette as I move away from the table. Staring at the glass in front of her. It's all fun and games when she's playing with the idea of killing her husband. But once morality kicks in, she's deflated. Daft cow. Telling me to fuck off. It's her right, but I don't have to like it.

I pass by the bar. Brenda's husband gives me the evil eye. I give him one straight back.

Time I left, anyway. The whole night's been a bust.

THREE

'Mo, fuck's the matter with you?' said Baz.

I looked up. He were in the middle of summat, but I'd not catched it. He were looking at us, his eyes wide like I were supposed to say summat. He were a fat fuckin' bastard, were Baz. Big shoulders and a belly like a fuckin' toddler hanging off him. Didn't help that he always had his T-shirt tucked right in his trackie bottoms.

'You what?' I said.

'I were telling you summat, Mo. Rossie, he went and fucked a brasser up Cheetham Hill.'

'Uh.'

'Sharone,' he said. 'You know Sharone?'

'She's a fuckin' crack whore. I seen her with fuckin' Columbo, man. He selled her fuckin' rocks.'

'Aye,' said Baz. 'And Rossie did it.'

'Fuck's sake. He wants to get himself to the clinic.'

'Call him Johnny Nob-Rot, man.'

'Fuck off.'

'G’an, call him Johnny Nob-Rot.'

'You call him Johnny Nob-Rot. I'll call him Rossie Skank- fucker.'

Baz lapped that up and the vallies kicked in. I smiled. Didn't laugh, mind. Because even with the vallies, I still didn't feel like it. Not after the news I just had. I downed the rest of me pint and pulled on Baz. 'C'mon.'

'I still got a half here.'

'Fuck it. I'm off.'

Which meant he were giving us a ride. Baz swallowed what he could and we went. I got Baz to drive us over to the Wheatsheaf. He started on with pissing and moaning, but when he clocked the look in my eyes, he said nowt. Baz might've been a big bloke, but he knew when I were serious as fuckin' cancer.