NO DOGS NO IRISH - CHAPTER 2

When we get back home they're all engaged in some obnoxious debate while setting up for the grand opening of The Hellfire Club. The club is our legitimate venture, a goth/burlesque club that we can then use as a cover for whatever else we may be doing that lands on the less then legitimate side. Cillian, if you can imagine a scrawny nerdy type sat with a laptop and Tommy, a grizzly and scarred up war veteran is up a ladder fixing the lights. Tommy's a miserable, hateful old bastard but he's loyal. He served in the original IRA; broke out of Kilmainham jail on the day Dev, Collins and the boys were due to be executed. They're debating the Jamaicans and they're "marital practises."

"That's disgusting. You're telling me they just gather up some group of young ones off the street, get them absolutely off their heads on this special brew premium wacky backy rigged up on the Pires then they all roll around and he takes turns riding them all? That's disgusting!"

"Is it? It sounds alright to me. Remember Hugh Hefner? He spent his twilight years surrounded by a group of women who could have passed for his grandchildren. At our age ye take what ye can get. That usually means trying to get drunk enough to ride some decrepit old thing with a gash that smells like a dish cloth."

There was an awkward silence for a second while we all struggled with that visual. When I tell people about him they think I'm exaggerating. I thought I'd break the silence with a joke.

"All the same though, don't know how I'd feel about being an orgy baby."

Tara appeared from the back rooms, escorting two confused girls out who were swearing that they "don't usually do this." She shut the door behind them and joined the debate.

"Oh I know love. You'll be grand, bye….A what? "

"Most people are able to take solace in the fact that the two people who created them at least liked each other for a little while. These lads were conceived in a big sweaty orgy. That's got to fuck with your self-esteem a little bit. Though given how much of a tramp you are it would make sense."

"Fuck off Damien!"

I love that bit in the movies where they type the guy's name out across the screen like it's on a typewriter. I'll hold on to that suggestion for the big screen adaptation, but back to the situation at hand. Tara noticed Shane staring at her from across the room. Shane's a little bit younger than Tommy, but no less of a mean and nasty bastard. A great guy to have around in war, the trouble is in between wars you end up wondering what you did to deserve him. Think Jayne from Firefly meets Tig from Sons of Anarchy.

"You better not let my daddy catch you staring, Uncle Shane."

"Oh sorry love, I can't help it. It's just such a shame we lost such a lovely piece to the rug munchers."

Right on queue Dad appears. He loves to make an entrance in the suit, cloak and cane. Just as Shane stepped off the ladder where he was fixing the lights dad pulled his sword and levelled it just under his chin.

"How many times am I going to have to tell you to leave my daughter alone?? You were at her christening for god's sake."

Shane just looked him in his eyes and sniggered. Dad wasn't impressed.

"I'm warning you."

The stare down continued for a moment before Shane decided wisely to back up, albeit slightly reluctantly.

"Alright, fine. Now can you put the blade away please?"

Dad left it there for a moment regardless. Shane is the one of the only people apart from my mother I've ever heard call Dad by his name.

"Luke."

I stood up, preparing to get between them.

"Look at it this way, when we open I'll have some new distractions."

Shane was of course talking about the entertainment, the group of heavily tattooed dancers on stage practising for tonight. Even Dad's eyes lingered for a minute. He turned on Tara then, who was crawling up the bar like a cat at the Bartenders, who for one reason or another were transfixed.

"TARA!!"

She froze like a cat then turned on the same baby of the family bullshit routine she always does where she comes off all sweet and adorable. Sweet and adorable my hundred year old undead arse!

"I told you before leave Shane alone, dirty old prick doesn't know any better but you do! What are we Welsh?"

"Dad I was only joking!"

"TARA!"

"Fine..."

She waved to the bartenders and got off the bar. Their collective exhale of release nearly sent the whole counter of glasses flying.

"Alright, everything is on for tonight's opening. Tommy and Shane are going to go and collect the booze from the Jamaicans. "

The two old guys groaned about going to see the Jamaicans. Dad turned his attention to Cillian. Cillian proved useful once he got a couple of degrees on computers and programming and all that bollox.

"And you. How are my passports coming along?"

"Pretty well, the prints are near perfect."

"Good work, lad. For a fuckin geek you're proving semi useful."

He turned in my direction. Fuck sake here we go.

"Damien go with them, make sure things stay professional A steady source of revenue will keep the cops and the skinheads off our backs for a little bit. Apparently the only other place in the world they make Guinness is Jamaica, wouldn't ye know. "

Cillian spoke up, trying to be funny.

"So rather than get it from Dublin, an hour away we have to get it from them."

I think he had Dad caught out, but you'd never tell by his stone expression.

"It's good for relations. Now shut up."

Cillian shrewdly put his hands up and went back to work. Dad explained this whole Goth club thing to me before; he reckons the Brits will be pleased if we give the goths and the freaks somewhere to go. In this brave new Nationalist Britain they feel a lot more comfortable when everybody looks the same, and that extends beyond race to include those of the pierced and alternative persuasion.

"Da, come and have a look at this."

Tara pointed out at a line of JCBS and builders gathering outside. Some fat ugly wanker with a megaphone stood on top of one of the JCBS.

"ATTENTION!! BY ORDER OF THE LORD MAYOR OF LONDON YOU HAVE BEEN HEREBY GIVEN 24 HOURS NOTICE TO VACATE THE PREMISES. IT IS TO BE TORN DOWN TO MAKE WAY FOR A HOME FOR UNDERPRIVILEGED CHILDREN WHO WERE ORPHANED BY WOLF AND VAMPIRE ATTACKS. HAVE A NICE FUCKING DAY."

"Da what do we do?"

"Relax. You heard him, 24 hours. Right now we do nothing."

Dad looked to be pretty serious so I got up and left in a hurry. See our family history is kind of funny, I happen to have a different Mother to Dorian and Tara. She was a human woman who died a long time ago. Tara's story is actually somehow more complicated. She spent most of her formative years in England and as a result, has an English accent which obviously my Dad hates. Every time she opens her mouth it's a reminder of what happened.

Years and years ago before Dad was even turned the house got broken into by British soldiers. Bunch of scum bags, anybody they suspected of involvement in the troubles they'd ship their kids off to England "for the good of the child". So in storms this group of Brits, hold everybody at gun point and they drag Tara outside. When my Dad got turned his sole purpose was finding Tara. It took about 20 years for Dad to finally track down what orphanage she was put in and he was over to London in the bowels of some British Naval ship. He waited till the old creep who ran the place left and went in to her room. She almost didn't recognise him at first but once she did the decision was easy. Once he turned her the first on the list was the old creep that ran the orphanage. The way dad tells it she threw the door open and stood there for a minute to let him get a good old look at who was about to kill him. Then she went in and by the sounds of it she ripped him into so many pieces they could have used a leaf blower to pick him up. You humans only get a superficial sense of release from revenge but us, we feel better. We are after all, cold blooded.

Unfortunately over the years she revealed a few lasting effects of that time; mainly dreadful dating choices. This takes us to present day, and the English ponse she used to sneak in and out through the tunnels. Apparently Mum caught them once. I don't know exactly what she said to him, and I can understand at the time why she didn't tell us about it. The boy would have got ripped limb from limb.