Black Widow (8 page)

‘Mrs Carter?’ It was Tony, bursting through the door with a struggling blonde in tow. He looked at the girl still trying to get dressed, and the rumpled, white-faced man, and the gun in Annie’s hand. ‘You okay?’

The white-faced man ran a hand through his thinning blond hair. He looked balefully at Annie, then at Tony.

‘Are you telling me this is Max Carter’s missus?’ he demanded.

‘Who is this wanker?’ Annie asked Tony, indicating the man.

‘Club manager. Lou Morris.’

‘Will you get your effing hands
off me
, you great ape,’ snarled the blonde with Tony. Then she saw Annie and grew still.

Annie looked around at the assembled company. Five people in Max’s office. The last time that
had happened, someone had got themselves shot. She flicked the safety back on and pocketed the gun.

‘Can we all calm down?’ she said smoothly. She crossed the small room and threw open the window. Traffic roared outside and fumes billowed in, but it was better than the stink of stale sex and unwashed bodies.

‘You,’ she told the girl from the desk, who had gathered up her clothes and was now partly dressed. ‘You work here?’

The girl nodded. Bright blue eyes and straight brown hair. She looked terrified. ‘I’m a hostess.’

‘What’s you name?’

‘Roberta,’ she said.

‘Well, Roberta, you never do anything like this again in any of the Carter clubs, you got me?’

Roberta nodded.

A pound note fluttered to the floor and she stooped, blushing, to grab it.

Annie looked at her in disgust.

‘And don’t sell yourself so damned
cheap,’
she told the girl. ‘Go on, get out.’

Roberta hustled past Tony and the blonde.

Annie turned toward Lou and looked at him as if he’d just crawled out from under a rock.

‘You’re the manager here?’

‘That’s right,’ said Lou with bravado. ‘Jonjo Carter hired me last year.’

Annie nodded. ‘And I’m firing you this year. That’s sort of neat, don’t you think?’

‘Now wait.’ Lou looked outraged. ‘Just because I poked one of the girls over the desk?’

‘No, because I don’t like your face and I don’t like your attitude. Now—keys. You’re the manager; you’ve got keys, yes? Hand them over.’

Lou looked at Annie’s face. Then at Tony’s. The blonde was still, watching.

‘Ah, what the fuck, I hated the job anyway,’ snarled Lou, rummaging in his jacket pocket and slapping a bunch of keys into Annie’s waiting hand. ‘But you’re gonna be sorry you did this,’ he warned, pushing past her and past Tony and the blonde, and stamping off down the stairs.

‘See he goes straight off the premises, Tony,’ said Annie. ‘Don’t want him helping himself to the fixtures and fittings, do we?’

Tony pushed the blonde further into the room and followed Lou out through the door, shutting it firmly behind him. Annie shrugged off her coat and went around the desk and sat in Max’s high leather chair.

Right here was where she’d been shot. She looked at the wall behind the chair, where the bullet that had passed through her and had imbedded itself. The wall was smooth now, neatly repaired. No trace of that traumatic event remained. But there was still a safe in the corner. She looked at it.

A combination safe. She wondered what was in there, and if it was enough. She doubted it.

She turned back to the blonde and nodded to the chair on the other side of the desk.

‘Hiya, Jeanette. Take a seat. We need to have a chat.’

Jeanette looked sulky. She slumped down into the chair and stared at Annie mulishly.

‘You didn’t even say goodbye,’ said Annie coolly. ‘And I thought we were such good friends, too.’

‘You’re joking,’ snorted Jeanette.

‘That’s right,’ said Annie. ‘I am.’

‘So what do you want? I’m supposed to be on again in fifteen minutes.’

‘You’re not,’ said Annie.

‘Not what?’

‘You’re not on again in fifteen minutes. In fact, you’re not on again ever, not here.’

‘Oh come on!’ Jeanette burst out. ‘You can’t fire me too! I ain’t done nothing wrong and you know it. Listen,’ she whined, ‘I’m just keeping my head down and doing what I’m paid for, that’s all. I don’t want to know about your business, I don’t want to get involved.’

‘But you’re already involved,’ said Annie. ‘Remember? You’re involved because you were there, right there in Majorca, when it happened. I was out of it; they doped me. But they didn’t
dope you. So you were conscious all the way through. You saw what happened. And I need to know more about what you saw.’

‘I’ve already told you. Nothing.’

‘You said there were four of them…’

‘Three, four…maybe more. I’m not sure.’ She shook her head, frowning. She pulled her red robe closer around her. ‘It was all so confusing. So fucking frightening. I’ve never been so scared in my life.’ She looked at Annie. ‘I thought they were going to
kill
me.’

There was a tap on the door. Tony poked his head around it.

‘He’s gone, Mrs Carter. Anything else?’

‘Yes, Tony. Close up, will you? Send all the punters home, and all the girls and the barmen—we’re closed until further notice.’ She tossed him the keys. ‘Lock up after, will you? Then get the locks changed. Pound to a penny Lou’s had a spare set cut, and we don’t want any unexpected visitors.’

Tony opened his mouth, then shut it again. The door closed and he was gone. A man of few words, Tony. Annie sort of liked that.

‘Now Jeanette,’ she said with a chilly smile, ‘tell me what happened while I was out of it.’

‘I already
told
you,’ moaned Jeanette.

‘There were four men? Five men? A fucking army? Come on, how many? You were
there.’

Jeanette nodded wearily. ‘Um, I dunno. Maybe
four, maybe three. Two big ones I think, and maybe one small.’

‘Small, what? Short?’

‘Short…um, slight, you know.’

‘Slight. What, like a jockey you mean? Short and skinny?’

‘Um, I don’t know. I was scared to death. I’m not sure.’

‘Which one slapped me with the chloroform?’

‘God, I dunno.’ Jeanette looked away.

‘Think.’

‘One of the bigger ones. First he…’ Jeanette’s face clouded and she fell silent.

‘What? Go on,’ said Annie.

Jeanette gulped and her eyes got teary.

‘Max had got out of the pool again. I saw him on the other side, he was towelling himself dry, then I saw one of the big ones come up behind him and hit him on the head. He never even saw it coming. He went down like a sack of shit. I was just starting to sit up, then there was another one on our side of the terrace and he slapped that pad on your face and Jonjo started to wake up and then this bloke just turned…’ Jeanette’s face crumpled…‘He just turned and shot Jonjo straight between the eyes.’

It was quiet in the office for long moments while Jeanette looked down at her lap. Tears spilled down her cheeks and dripped off her nose.

‘I know he wasn’t a good man,’ she sobbed. ‘I know he didn’t treat me too well, but they just wiped him out like he was nothing.’

Annie felt her blood run cold, felt despair seize her in its grip all over again. A deliberate, calculated hit. She stood up and closed the window, looking out at the rain, the people scurrying about, the cars moving slowly through the packed streets…all these people, with homes to go to, loved ones to see. And what did she have now?

Nothing.

Max was dead.

Layla was God knew where.

She gulped and felt like joining Jeanette and having a bloody good howl. Maybe it would make her feel better, who knew? But she was used to keeping her feelings inside. A loveless upbringing with a drunk of a mother had seen to that.

Dig deep and stand alone.

She hadn’t had to stand alone for some time. There had been Max, taking the weight, seeing to her comfort and security; but now he was gone. And she was going to have to learn to stand on her own two feet again—because what was the alternative? Sink into the abyss. Give up the fight.

No fucking way
, she thought.
Not while there’s still a chance for Layla.

She turned, leaned against the dusty window
frame. Jeanette had composed herself a little, she saw. Good.

‘So which one grabbed Layla?’ she asked.

Jeanette scrabbled around for a hankie. She found one in her pocket and honked her nose loudly. She blinked up, red-eyed, at Annie.

‘Look, it could have been the little one,’ she said. ‘I don’t know. I heard Layla singing that funny little French song she liked…’ Jeanette took a faltering breath. ‘Poor little cow. I heard her yell, then nothing. The one who’d shot Jonjo and drugged you told me to be quiet or I’d get a bullet too.’

‘What did he sound like?’

‘Um…British, I suppose.’

‘Oh come on, you can do better than that.’

‘I dunno.’

‘Irish? Was he Irish?’

‘Um…oh fuck it, how should I know? He could have been.’ Jeanette was squirming in her seat.

Then maybe he’s the one who phones me
, thought Annie.
Or maybe not.

‘Did he have any distinguishing marks? Describe his face.’

‘I didn’t
see
his face. He had a mask on, they all did. And gloves. They were covered right up; I couldn’t see anything of them. I saw the one on the other side of the pool grab Max under the arms and drag him off into the bushes, and the one on our side of the pool hauled Jonjo into the pool’

‘Strong man,’ said Annie. ‘Jonjo was pushing sixteen stone.’

Jeanette nodded. ‘He lifted him like a fireman, you know? The fireman’s lift thing, over his shoulder, and dumped him in the pool.’

Sixteen stones, dead weight. It would take a very strong man indeed to lift that.

So what do I have?
thought Annie.
One small and slender. One big and exceptionally strong. One big and unknown, but he must move like a cat to get up close enough to do Max, because Max was sharp and fast, all instinct and movement and power
…

Or he had been, anyway. When he was alive.

That made it three people, not four. But so what? Where did knowing that get her?

Annie turned back to the window and stared up above the rooftops to grey depressing skies. There was no hope, and she had to admit it.

But she couldn’t.

‘Okay Jeanette, you can go,’ she said, not looking round.

Annie heard the door close. Then she looked again at the safe in the corner. It had a combination lock, and she didn’t know the code. She wondered who did. Then she let out a sigh, dropped her head on to her chest and closed her eyes in despair.

It was all going according to plan. Phil Fibbert had got the boat sorted and they were going to move after dark. Vita had calmed the fuck down after the hood incident: everything was good to go.

Danny was pleased.

He sat out in the late afternoon sun on the terrace and felt that he had everything nicely under control. And then he heard the normally quiet Phil (fucking
boring
, actually) kicking off at Vita in the kitchen, and soon Vita was screaming and yelling so loud that he had to rouse himself and go and see what the
fuck
was going on now.

‘What the hell?’ he demanded when he got into the cool, dark kitchen.

Phil just stood there, arms folded.
Man could bore for Britain
, thought Danny irritably.

Vita was silent, looking surly.

‘Look,’ said Phil, indicating the stuff on the table.

There was a bag of groceries. Rolls and fruit and stuff poking out of the top.

Danny frowned.

There was a woman who came in to bring their food, Marietta. They were renting this place in the winding back alleys of Palma from Marietta’s husband, Julio, and the deal was, Marietta—who did not speak a word of English, and that was part of the master plan too—came in and cleaned every day, and brought provisions at 9.30 in the morning. So what was all this
new
stuff doing on the table at three in the afternoon?

Also on the table was a fuchsia-pink bag from one of the boutiques. Peeping out from this bag was a pair of Nubuck Majorcan sandals—you saw them everywhere in the shops here, in all colours of the rainbow. These were a bright, clear turquoise—Vita’s favourite colour. She often wore it.

‘Look, it’s no big deal,’ said Vita hurriedly, seeing the direction of Danny’s eyes. ‘I was going stir-crazy cooped up in this place. I got fed up just sitting here painting all day, so I went and got some more food in, and I looked in the shops and went to the flea market on Villalonga, and I had a walk down to the harbour.’

Danny went straight across and slapped her, hard.

Vita reeled back, clutching her cheek.

‘Listen, you silly cow, we
stick to the plan.
Remember the plan? You’re getting right up my nose, you really are. The plan is, we stay here. We don’t go out flashing the cash about. We don’t want no one knowing we’re here except Marietta and Julio, and to them we’re just tourists, that’s all. Marietta brings in the food, she cleans, she fucks off. We don’t ever let her go out in the garden, just in case you were going to invite her out on to the terrace for tea and effing cakes, you got that? Oh—and every time you go near the girl you
put your fucking hood on.’

‘All right, I hear you,’ mumbled Vita.

‘Good. And you.’ He turned, glaring, to Phil. ‘Don’t kick off at my sister, you got that? If you got anything to say, you say it to me.’

‘Sure,’ said Phil moodily, shrugging and putting his hands in his pockets.
Sure thing, Blondie
, he thought.
Blow it out your arse, Blondie. You fucking maniac.

‘You got the boat sorted? Everything okay?’

‘Yeah, it’s lined up for eleven,’ said Phil, thinking that he for one would be absolutely fucking
delighted
when they got back to England, got their money, and went their separate ways. He could not
wait
to see the back of this crazy pair.

‘Okay, we’ll clear up at ten and be out of here and down at the harbour by a quarter to eleven—and by the way, Vee, we will be wearing our hoods when we fetch the girl, okay? Then we’ll
give her a good dose of stuff, blindfold her, and get her on board the boat and that’ll be that, okay?’

Vita nodded, one hand nursing her reddened cheek.

‘I said
okay?’
repeated Danny.

‘Okay,’ she said.