Dirty Game (25 page)

Annie had made two decisions. Now she was settled into the apartment, she felt stronger and more able to start setting her life straight.

One, she was going to deter Kieron from being a fucking nuisance and hanging around her like a lovesick hound. You didn’t mix it with Max Carter like Kieron had and carry on getting away with it. When Max snapped – and Annie knew he would – Kieron would be in deep shit. And she didn’t want another death on her conscience.

Her second decision was that she would try even harder to build bridges with her sister. She knew it wouldn’t be easy, but however long it bloody took or however tough the going got, she was determined to bring Ruthie back to her. The thing with her and Max was over. Now, surely, there could be forgiveness and reconciliation. Feeling apprehensive, she phoned Queenie’s place across
town and was both pleased and nervous when Ruthie picked the phone up.

‘Oh. It’s you,’ said Ruthie when Annie announced herself.

Not a great start, but Annie pressed on. ‘I thought I’d call and see how you are.’

‘That’s good of you,’ said Ruthie with sarcasm.

‘I want us to be friends again, Ruthie,’ said Annie. ‘I know I did a horrible thing to you. I was young and stupid and jealous of the attention you got.’

It was only one and a half years since Ruthie and Max had married, but Annie felt she had aged ten years in that short time. She had been forced to grow up fast, and she could see clearly now how bad her behaviour had been.

‘Ruthie, I can’t begin to say how sorry I am. But all that’s over now. I’ve made a new start with my life, and …’

‘And you want to wipe the slate clean,’ said Ruthie.

‘Yes. Exactly.’

‘I want to do the same,’ said Ruthie.

‘Oh? Well … good.’

‘I want to forget I ever knew you, you cheating whore. And I will.’

‘Ruthie,’ said Annie desperately, ‘it’s over with me and Max. You’ve got to believe that.’

‘Oh, I think I do. He told me the same thing,
you see,’ said Ruthie. ‘So maybe between you there might be a hint of the truth in there. He’s taken the Surrey house off the market. It’s a bit bloody inconvenient, to be honest. I’ve packed up so much, now I’ve got to get it all out of the boxes again. But never mind. Max says I can redecorate the place, chuck the damned boxes away if I want, start all over again.’

‘That’s good,’ said Annie cautiously.

‘Yes, it is. He’s taken Miss Arnott back too. We’re thinking about a second honeymoon. Max wants to try again.’

Annie felt sick. To her horror she felt her eyes fill with tears. Oh sure, it was over. But if all this was true, if this wasn’t just Ruthie trying to hurt her the only way she knew how, then it was hurtful. She couldn’t help how she felt, even though she wished she could.

‘He told me he talked to you at that Kieron Delaney’s art exhibition,’ went on Ruthie. ‘He said you agreed between you that it was over.’

Which they had, Annie supposed. All true. But her heart felt like a lump of lead in her chest. She wondered if this was Max’s way of getting his revenge. He knew that sooner or later she’d hear about this from someone if not from Ruthie herself. And he knew it would hurt her.

‘Yes, that’s right,’ she forced herself to say.

‘So the way’s clear for me and Max to make a
go of our marriage,’ said Ruthie. ‘So I have to say thank you, Annie. Thanks to you for finally giving up trying to steal my husband. It’s taken you long enough.’

‘I know that what I did was unforgivable,’ said Annie.

‘That’s right. It was,’ said Ruthie, and put the phone down.

Annie put the phone back on the cradle. Well, what had she expected? A tearful reunion, Ruthie coming over for coffee and cakes?

Oh yeah, that was sure to happen
, she thought.

She looked around her, at her beautiful empty apartment. She was alone and feeling the ache. She missed the cosy chats around the kitchen table with the Limehouse girls. She missed Celia. She missed Max. She missed Ruthie more than anything. Then she jumped as the phone rang. She snatched it up. It was Ruthie, phoning back, had to be.

But it wasn’t. It was Kieron.

‘What do you want, Kieron?’ she asked him wearily.

‘I just wanted to see how you are,’ he said.

‘I’m fine.’

‘Oh. You sound … I don’t know. Upset.’

‘Just a bad day.’ One of many.

‘Only you went off with Max Carter at my exhibition, and I haven’t seen or heard from you since. It’s been some time, I’ve been worried.’

‘Nothing to worry about. He just drove me home.’

‘Oh.’ Kieron gave a laugh. ‘I was a bit put out, I’ll admit. After all, you were my guest. It isn’t quite the done thing, leaving with another man, is it?’

Fuck it, now he was chiding her for her behaviour. Stung from Ruthie giving her an ear-bashing, she had no inclination to sit there and listen to Kieron giving her another one.

‘I’m not a fucking trophy, Kieron,’ said Annie. ‘I went with Max because you were heading for trouble with him and you were too bloody stupid to even see it.’

‘Ah, catch yourself on,’ said Kieron breezily. ‘I can handle the likes of him.’

‘Don’t be fucking funny, Kieron,’ exploded Annie. ‘He’d bloody-well eat you and spit out the bits. Now don’t be a fucking idiot. Stay away. We can’t see each other any more, and that’s an end to it.’

‘You don’t mean that.’

‘Don’t tell me what I mean. Listen to what I’m saying. I don’t want to see you again. Fuck off.’

She slammed the phone down.

It rang again.

She picked it up.

‘Annie, listen,’ said Kieron.

‘For God’s
sake
,’ Annie roared, and crashed the phone back down.

It rang again and this time she let it ring.

So much for making bloody decisions. Ruthie was nowhere even close to forgiving her, and Kieron didn’t seem to be taking the hint. She left the phone ringing, and went to take a bath to calm herself down.

Billy knew everyone thought he was dim, but actually he knew a lot. He sat in the snug of The Grapes sipping on a pint of lemonade, his briefcase on his lap, his notebook on the beer-stained table. It was lunchtime and the pub was quiet. Eric was behind the bar polishing glasses. Someone had put Des O’Connor on the jukebox.

Oh yes, Billy knew
lots
.

Like, for instance, he knew Pat Delaney had died four months ago in the Limehouse massage parlour. He’d seen Gary and Steve there, two of Max’s boys, doing a clean-up job and then carting the body out to the car and driving off.

You didn’t have to paint Billy no pictures, even if everyone did think he was thick as two short planks coated in pig shit. Ever since that night he’d been hearing around town about how Pat Delaney hadn’t been seen since. Easy to put two and two
together and come up with four. Easy, even for him.

He knew about all that had been going on with Max and his beautiful Annie, too. Billy frowned and took a long pull at his drink. He was in a quandary here. He was fiercely loyal to Max, but on the subject of Annie Bailey, Billy found his loyalty tested to the limit.

He hadn’t liked her doing dirty things in the Limehouse place. He knew what they did there, his mum had told him often enough about what these sorts of women got up to, what Celia Bailey was, and how doing such things with these women would affect a man. He’d go blind, or catch something that would make his knob rot and drop off.

It was one of his most vivid memories, his mum bathing him when he was a boy, her rough meaty hand grabbing hold of his todger and her saying: ‘Do dirty things with dirty girls and this will drop right off, son. And you wouldn’t want that, now would you?’

But what about the dirty things Mum did with his many ‘uncles’? He’d wanted to say that, but he was frightened of his mum’s temper. She had a terrible temper. It was best to just nod, agree, keep quiet. Billy was good at keeping quiet.

Billy had been relieved when Annie had moved out of Limehouse, but his relief had been short-lived. She had moved into that posh place with
Max. That was awful. From doing bad things with bad men, she had progressed to doing bad things with
Max
. That was even worse.

Then that had come to an end, and now she was at it again.

Doing bad things.

Bad,
bad
things.

Now she was in Upper Brook Street, a posh place filled with toffs, and he had seen those toffs, people who should have known better, people who had a position in society and ought to have known how to behave, how to set an example to others, he had
seen
them going in and out of the building, seen the girls too, fantastically beautiful girls, going in and out, laughing and joking and tossing back their lustrous manes of hair.

They didn’t look like tarts – or at least not the sort of tarts he was used to seeing around Bow and Limehouse; they were a bit raddled, a bit tired. These were luminous, glowing, but somehow still tarty. They were on a par with Annie for their looks and their elegance. So that was how he knew she was at it again.

Doing bad things.

It was awkward.

‘You all right here, Billy lad?’ asked Eric, coming to gather up his glass. ‘Want another in there?’

‘No, thank you,’ said Billy.

Poor bastard, thought Eric, taking Billy’s empty
glass back to the bar. Daft as a brush, sitting there staring into space with his mouth open. But no one gave Billy any real aggro. Everyone knew he was on Max Carter’s payroll and that Redmond Delaney had said hands off, and you didn’t piss around with that lot.

Billy mulled it all over. It was a knotty problem. Which was the trouble with knowing so much, he’d found. If you knew a lot, you tended to worry over it all. So he was worried about the Pat business because he thought Annie was involved. And he was worried about her doing nasty things all over again. And he was worried about the job Max was planning, because it was big, and things might go wrong.

Oh, he had
lots
to think about. He had to work out what he thought about it all, because he had trouble getting it all straight in his head sometimes. It was the medication, it made him feel muddled. But he’d take his time and think it all through. Then, and only then, he would decide what he had to do.

Annie was still in bed one winter morning when she got a call from Dolly.

‘I’m coming over to see you at ten. I’m bringing Ellie.’

Annie sat up, the tension in Dolly’s voice triggering her instantly into a state of alert.

‘What’s up?’ she asked.

‘Not on the phone,’ said Dolly, and hung up.

Annie stared at the humming receiver. Her heart was thumping. She got up, showered, dressed, fixed herself some tea and toast then stalked around the empty apartment. Another party tomorrow. She’d been thinking of ideas to perk up the business still more, jotting down notes. It was all she had to concentrate on.

Dolly arrived bang on ten, Ellie trailing pale-faced behind her. Ellie had lost weight, Annie noticed – and it didn’t suit her.

‘Come in,’ said Annie, taking their coats. ‘Tea?’

‘We need something a fucking sight stronger than that,’ said Dolly, sprawling out on one of the Chesterfields and looking around her in amazement. ‘You’ve got this place well nice, Annie, you’ve made some changes.’

She noticed that Dolly had a piece of chewing gum stuffed into her missing tooth – the tooth that had been knocked out the night Pat Delaney died. Annie felt almost amused by this. You could take the girl out of Limehouse, but you couldn’t take Limehouse out of the girl. Dolly was terrified of dentists. Any medical procedure filled her with horror. Annie was sure this was because of the abortion she had endured in her youth.

‘Take a seat, Ellie,’ said Annie.

Ellie didn’t look right, she thought. And she was far too quiet.

Annie went and poured three brandies. She brought them back and put them on the big coffee table between the two Chesterfield sofas. Ellie grabbed hers with a shaking hand and chucked it back in one.

‘Ellie’s being a bit silly,’ said Dolly, watching the girl.

‘I’m not being silly,’ said Ellie flatly.

‘Yes you are,’ snapped Dolly. She looked at Annie. ‘She’s talking about going to the Bill and confessing.’

Annie’s mouth dropped open.

‘Look, this has been tormenting me for months now. We killed him,’ said Ellie defensively. ‘
I
killed him. I can’t go on like this. I’m jumping at everything and anything. I can’t sleep. I can’t eat. Chris is suspicious.’

‘Chris is getting suspicious because you’re acting like a cat on hot bricks,’ said Dolly. ‘Chris knows nothing. If you cool it, he’ll settle down.’

‘But I’ll still know I killed him.’

Annie took a breath. She could sympathize with Ellie’s plight. The flashbacks had gone now, but for some time after that awful night she too had been like Ellie – in a right fucking state.

‘Look, Ellie,’ said Annie. ‘We all know what happened that night and it wasn’t our fault. Pat was out of control. He was going to hurt us. We had to get in first, that was all.’

‘That’s
all
.’ Ellie laughed loudly. ‘We
killed
him. We didn’t just rap him over the knuckles and tell him not to be a bad boy any more. We slit his fucking
throat
.’

Dolly gave Annie a look that said: ‘You see?’

‘We all know what we did,’ said Annie. ‘We did what we had to do to survive.’

‘The Delaneys suspect something,’ said Ellie.

‘What do you mean?’ asked Annie.

‘They keep saying when did I last see Pat, have I heard anything about Pat, where is Pat …’

‘They’re just fishing,’ said Dolly.

‘They
know
,’ said Ellie.

‘They know nothing,’ said Annie firmly.

‘I’m telling you, they know we did it,’ shouted Ellie, jumping to her feet. ‘What does it take to make you two see that? We have to go to the police, they’ll protect us!’

Annie stood up, hauled her arm back and gave Ellie a hefty slap across the face. Ellie recoiled and nearly fell. Annie grabbed her shoulders and shook her hard.

‘Listen to me, you daft little bint,’ snarled Annie. ‘Go to the police? Are you off your head? Do that and the police will be the least of your troubles. Do you seriously think that when you’re banged up inside for murder the Delaneys won’t be able to reach you? An eye for an eye, that’s their motto. They’ve got contacts everywhere. They’ll get to you even if you are behind bars. You’ll be found hanging in your cell, so sad, just suicide, these lags commit suicide all the time – or you’ll somehow miraculously get hold of some razor blades and slit your wrists. Tragic! Do you think anyone will care whether or not it was suicide or if someone helped you on your way?’

Ellie was crying now. The side of her face where Annie had delivered the slap was glowing red. She was staring at Annie with shocked, wounded eyes. Annie felt bad, but she had to harden her heart.
Ellie was hysterical and she was going to get them all done for at this rate. She had to be told.

‘But what are we going to
do
?’ Ellie wailed.

Annie’s grip on Ellie’s shoulders relaxed.

‘What we are going to do is nothing,’ she said. ‘We’re going to sit tight and let the whole thing die down. There was no great affection between Redmond and Pat, everyone knows that. Redmond might look around for his brother, but he won’t look too hard or for too long.’

‘I don’t know,’ moaned Ellie.

Annie’s eyes met Dolly’s over Ellie’s head. This was worrying. They couldn’t have Ellie rattling around like this, threatening all their lives.

‘Sit down, Ellie,’ said Annie, and Ellie thumped back on to the Chesterfield beside Dolly. Dolly put a motherly arm around the younger girl and patted her shoulder.

Annie sat down opposite. She’d made a decision. She knew what to say.

‘You don’t know that Dolly and I met Celia at my mum’s funeral, do you Ellie?’

That got her attention. ‘Celia?’ Ellie stopped dabbing at her eyes with a tissue. ‘Is she … Jesus, did you really? Is she all right?’

Dolly was silent, watching Annie. She had an idea where this was headed, and she was going to let Annie get on with it. It might even work.

‘No, Ellie. She wasn’t all right at all.’

‘What … ?’ Ellie glanced feverishly between Annie and Dolly. ‘What do you mean? Is she okay?’

‘She’s fucking marvellous, Ellie,’ said Annie, sipping her brandy. She felt like she needed it. ‘Only she had a slight accident, you see.’

‘What sort of accident?’

Annie felt sorry for Ellie, but she ploughed on. This had to be done.

‘A serious one. You see, Pat Delaney cut her hand off.’

Ellie gave an audible gasp.

Annie went on. ‘He blamed it on Max Carter. He as good as told me on the night we killed him that he’d done it. He did it out of spite, on a whim.
That’s
what your precious Delaneys are like, Ellie. They’re vicious and they’re violent. And the fact that you’ve been passing information to them won’t help you if they’ve got you in their sights. It didn’t help Celia. She’s been paying them off for years, she must have thought she was well in. Well – she wasn’t.’

‘I don’t pass them information,’ said Ellie lamely, her face a picture of shock and dismay.

‘Come off it Ellie. It was one of the first things Celia told me about you. You’re a Delaney girl. That’s okay. But be your own girl first, Ellie. Don’t throw your life away and ours with it.’

Annie paused, letting it all sink in.

‘I’ve had bad dreams since it happened, Ellie,’
Annie went on. ‘Waking dreams sometimes. Seeing it all over again. That night.’

‘Me too,’ said Ellie in a shaking voice.

‘It’s going though, Ellie. It’s passing. Soon it will be gone. Yours will too. It will get better and soon it will be nothing but a memory. Until then, we’re all here to help you and talk to you, day or night. Darren and Aretha, they’ve been good friends to you. So have Dolly and I. We’re friends. We’re tight together, aren’t we? We’re the closest any of us have got to real family. You don’t betray your family, Ellie love, now do you?’

‘Thanks, Annie,’ said Dolly quietly when Ellie had gone off to the bathroom to sort out her ruined make-up. ‘I think you’ve done the trick. She was giving me the willies. Climbing the walls.’

‘Let’s hope that’s the last of it,’ said Annie.

But she wasn’t convinced.