Page 114 of Playing By Ear

“It’s a delicate situation,” she said. “Look, I’m on my⁠—”

“Delicate?” The memory of Tony Coyle singing “Jimmy Mack” in front of dozens of people—in front of Perry—made Jamie want to hurl the phone into the road. “I nearly lamped that arsehole with my guitar. What happened to family and non-coms being off-limits?”

“Tony must think you’re involved with the firm now.”

“Even if I was, my partner’s not, and Coyle showing up when Perry’s there—twice—feels like an attack. So fucking deal with it.”

He hung up, for the first time in his life feeling he would kill to protect someone.

In the business side of the house, he bounded up the stairs without a glance at the workers in the ground-floor suite.

He swept into his father’s office with a perfunctory knock on the half-open door. Martin jerked upright, but not before Jamie saw him slumped asleep, his face resting on his fist. Layla, of course, was wide awake, in a Sphinx-like sentry pose beside the desk.

“It happened again,” Jamie said.

Martin squinted at him. His cheek still bore knuckle imprints from his nap. He motioned to the office chair in front of his desk. “What’s this about?”

Jamie’s fury begged him to pace and wave his arms, but Layla might have seen it as a threat. So he sat down hard in the chair. “Tony Coyle. Showed up yesterday while I was busking. While—” He hesitated on the brink of mentioning Perry. But it was riskier not to bring him up. Perry needed the family’s protection. “While my boyfriend was there.”

Martin raised his eyebrows. “I was wondering when you were gonnae admit he exists.”

Of course he knew. Jamie hadn’t exactly hidden his frequent treks to Perry’s flat. Anyone following him “for security purposes” would work it out in an instant.

“Does he know about me?” Martin asked.

“Not yet, but soon. It’s not right to keep the secret when there might be a threat.”

“You’re in nae danger, neither of you. I’ll see to it. Just keep your head down, okay? Nae more busking.”

“Wh-what?” Jamie spluttered. “That’s my job.”

“A temporary hiatus until I get things sorted.”

Things would never be sorted, not before or after Martin left this world. Things had a way of unsorting themselves. “April is the driest month in Glasgow. If I don’t work in April, I cannae get by the rest of the year.”

“Pah.” His father waved a dismissive hand. “Just let me know how much you need.”

Fuck that. “I have never taken money from this family, and I never will. This family is the—no, you are the reason I don’t have a music career.” He pointed at his father. “You are the reason I turn away managers and agents, you are the reason I never audition for Britain’s Got Talent, and you are the reason I barely promote myself. I do one thing with my music to scrape together a living, and now you want to take that from me?”

“I want to protect you.”

“You want to protect yourself and your money. That’s all you’ve ever loved.”

“Oi!” His father rose to his feet to loom over him. “Don’t you dare say that. If I didn’t love you, I would’ve never let you go.”

“‘Let me go’? I sprinted away from you. And I would do it again in a heartbeat, if you weren’t—if you weren’t⁠—”

“Dying? Aye, that’s what I am. Why can no one say it? I’m fucking dying. I’m on the way oot, down the pan, circling the drain. Past my expiry date.”

“Dad, stop.”

“Soon I’ll be worm food, rotting in hell.” He took a set of keys from his pocket and unlocked a desk drawer. “Shooting the crow. Popping my clogs. Meeting my Waterloo.”

“Come on, I didn’t⁠—”

Jamie’s breath stopped. His father was pulling a gun from the drawer.

“Think I don’t love you, eh?” Martin hoisted the weapon. “I’ll prove it right now.”