Work The Angles by David Mayer

Chris Calder feels that life as an underpaid theatre technician is going nowhere. Ex-con Tony O’Brien makes him a proposition: they will steal £200,000, drugs money which O’Brien’s employer, Jimmy McIntire, an old-school villain, regularly delivers to the suburban home of a crooked accountant. Looking the house over, O’Brien crosses swords with Jack Conway, the accountant’s bodyguard, also plans to steal the next money drop.

Chris’s night out with O’Brien and drinking buddy, Rich, ends with O’Brien pulling a gun on hapless associate, Joe, outside a pub. O’Brien then learns that he is to be replaced as McIntire’s driver. The robbery must take place before the money moves elsewhere, but it seems Rich has walked off with the gun. They attempt to buy a replacement, but instead have to drive to the accountant’s house armed only with a convincing but harmless deactivated gun, Chris unaware that bodyguard Conway may be lying in wait.

During the robbery, O’Brien and Conway clash and Felix the accountant is killed by a stray shot. Chris suspects that O’Brien, now armed with Conway’s gun, intends to kill him in order to remove a witness to Felix’s killing. Chris is unarmed, but realises where Rich has put the gun. When they arrive at O’Brien’s flat, Chris retrieves the gun and shoots O’Brien dead.

Chris plans a new life with the proceeds of the robbery, although fearful of arrest and troubled by remorse over O’Brien’s death. Felix’s bodyguard Jack Conway’s pursuit of information about the robbery leads him to Chris. Seeing him depositing a bundle of cash in a night safe convinces Conway that Chris is his quarry. A crooked private investigator is also on Chris’s trail, employed by Jimmy McIntire, who wants his money and retribution.

Hoping to rip off McIntire’s next drug consignment, Rob Ellis, an ambitious small-time criminal, spies on McIntire’s meeting with Ernesto Calda, local businessman and cocaine cartel overlord, at a private party in a Colombian restaurant. Ellis falls for Cristina, who he discovers is Calda’s daughter.

Ellis finds himself caught between McIntire and Calda when the Colombians latest cocaine shipment is seized in a customs raid. Suspicious that McIntire might be an informant, Calda persuades McIntire to use one of his men as his personal driver. Calda’s henchman palms the job off to Rob Ellis, now courting Cristina. Ellis agrees, reporting on McIntire’s movements to Calda’s organisation.

Chris, anxious that, Joe, O’Brien’s associate might suspect him, goes into hiding, unsuccessfully pursued by Jack Conway. Conway suggests that Joe arranges a meeting to attempt to blackmail Chris. Conway lies in wait outside, hoping to follow Chris to the money, but is fooled into pursuing Joe instead. Chris leaves the meeting, observed by the private investigator and O’Brien’s drinking buddy, Rich, who confirms that he saw Chris with O’Brien the night before the robbery.

Chris is seized by McIntire and his men and bundled, along with the stolen money, into a car driven by Rob Ellis. They find themselves in a trap, their car boxed in on a narrow side street. Gunmen, under orders from Calda, execute McIntire, suspected police informant, then leave with accomplice Rob Ellis.

Unscathed but dazed, Chris flees scene as the police arrive, realizing too late that he has left the money inside the car. Walking on with a sense of unreality, he reflects on what has happened.