by Jessie Keane
‘And?’ prompted Max when she hesitated.
Annie gulped. ‘She had no right hand. A present from you, those who did it told her.’
Max paused, taking it in. Annie could almost see his mind ticking over. She didn’t know, or even want to know, what was going on in his head.
‘I told you once, Annie. What happened with Celia had nothing to do with me or my boys. Whoever said otherwise is trying to fit me up.’
Annie drew a breath. These were the words she wanted to hear, but it was so much easier to hate him than to love him.
‘I know it wasn’t you. I know it now, anyway. I didn’t know it then. Then, I just couldn’t face you. I hated the very thought of you. I had to leave. But now I know it was Pat Delaney who did it. Something he said before he died. It was him, the rotten, sick bastard. He did it to cause trouble for you, you’re right.’
Max gazed out over the river. A barge passed by, slipping silently through the water like a snake through oil.
‘Then you left me for nothing,’ he said. ‘You lied to me and told me it was because of Ruthie.’
Annie turned her head and glared at him. ‘It is about Ruthie. It always has been and it always will be! It was just …’ she paused, feeling hopelessly confused. ‘It was just easier to lose you if I could believe that you were the one responsible for Celia.’
‘You’re still in love with me.’
Annie looked directly at him. She quickly looked away. ‘Do you still have the apartment?’ she asked. ‘Not that it matters.’
‘No,’ said Max. ‘I hated the fucking place without you.’
Annie shook her head. ‘I loved it there,’ she said sadly.
‘We could be there again,’ said Max.
‘No. No going back.’ She felt as if her heart was bleeding. He was right, she was still in love with him. Totally and hopelessly in love. But it could never be.
‘Why?’
Annie leapt to her feet and started to pace around in agitation.
‘You fucking-well know why, Max,’ she burst out. ‘Because it’s still about Ruthie. My blood. My kin. All right, I didn’t tell you the full story when I told you I was leaving you because of her. I didn’t tell you about Celia and I should have done. Maybe I should have trusted you more and doubted you less, but you made it hard for me.’
‘So what are you saying?’
‘I’m saying I did the right thing that day, for the wrong reason.’
‘You’re saying it’s over.’
‘Yes.’
‘Is there another layer to this?’
‘What?’ Annie frowned. Now what the hell was he talking about?
‘Kieron Delaney?’
Annie sighed. There had always been trouble between the two families, trouble from way back, and she knew it wasn’t over yet.
‘You and the sodding Delaneys. You’re like a dog with a bone, Max.’
‘It’s my fucking bone.’
‘There’s nothing between Kieron and me.’
‘He’d like there to be.’
‘Oh, for fuck’s sake!’ Annie threw her arms wide in exasperation. She was shaking with nervous exhaustion. ‘Make this easy for me, will you? I can’t do this to Ruthie any more. It’s making me sick. Let me go, Max.’
‘I can’t.’
‘You have to.’
‘Telling me what to do?’
‘I have free will, Max. Like Kieron, I’m not afraid of you. Go back to your boys, and leave me to live my life again.’
Max stood up and came very close to her. They locked eyes.
‘It’s Kieron Delaney,’ he said again.
‘No. It’s not.’ Annie stared straight back at him.
‘It fucking is.’ Sudden rage flicked on in Max’s eyes. ‘I’m going to do that rotten little fucker.’
Now Annie was getting riled up too. ‘What, like you did his brother Tory?’
‘For Christ’s sake, Annie, you can’t get on your high horse, now can you? Or have you forgotten what happened to Pat?’ spat Max.
Annie went pale. He was right, she was no better than he was.
Max was furious now, coming in close to her and glaring into her eyes.
‘Listen,’ he growled. ‘I didn’t touch Tory Delaney, but right now I could wipe every Delaney there is right off the face of the earth. Why the fucking hell you feel you have to defend the bastards I just don’t know. Perhaps you could explain that to me?’
‘I don’t have to explain anything to you, Max,’ yelled Annie. ‘It seems to have escaped your notice, but you don’t fucking own me, okay?’
Max leaned forward, breathing hard. He was going to kiss her. Annie braced herself for it, told herself that she would be strong, she wouldn’t weaken. But he hesitated, then drew back.
‘If I find out you’re lying over that ponce Kieron Delaney, I’ll kill the bastard, Annie. You hear me? I’ll kill him.’
He turned away and started walking back towards the car.
Annie stood there staring after him. Fuck it, she had wanted him to kiss her. He could still get to her, just like he always could.
‘Home’s in a different place now,’ she called after him.
‘I know,’ Max threw back over his shoulder. ‘It’s in Upper Brook Street. You’re running a business there.’
‘Is there anything you don’t know?’ asked Annie, her voice sad and low.
Max stopped walking and turned back to face her. ‘I don’t know how to get you, Annie Bailey,’ he said. ‘But I tell you this – if I can’t have you, no one else is going to have you either. Particularly not a fucking Delaney.’
47
Orla Delaney bent and laid a bouquet of twelve blood-red roses on her brother Tory’s grave. Kieron stood to one side and watched her as she emptied the dead blooms, put in fresh water from one of the council cans, and carefully started to arrange the fresh flowers in the urn. Petey, her minder, watched them from the cemetery gates.
She was good to do it, thought Kieron. Every week, she was here.
‘I do it for Mum and Dad,’ she said once when he questioned her about it. ‘I promised them I would.’
Still, he thought she was good to do it. Very good, under the circumstances.
It was cold today. An arctic breeze swept through the graveyard. It was autumn and soon winter would be here. Jaysus, he hated the winter. Africa had been heaven compared to this. He pushed his hands into his coat pockets, hunched his shoulders against the cold, and watched her.
‘I’ve been thinking,’ he said. ‘Maybe we should report Pat missing to the police, what do you think?’
Pat hadn’t been seen for over two months now. All right, Kieron hated the bastard, but the bastard was his brother and it seemed like he had dropped off the edge of the world. Whether he wanted to or not, he was starting to feel concerned.
Orla thrust the last of the blooms into the urn and straightened up. She looked him dead in the eye.
‘You’re having a laugh,’ she said.
‘No,’ said Kieron. ‘I’m not. It’s looking odd, Pat not checking in with any of us for this length of time.’
‘We don’t ever deal with the police, Kieron,’ said Orla. ‘Jaysus, you don’t know much about this family but you must know that.’
There it was again. He was Kieron the outsider. Kieron the precious little artist, while his brothers did all the real work. It annoyed him.
‘So what do we do then?’ he demanded. ‘Just let it go?’
‘Yes, you’ve got it. We just let it go.’
‘You’re joking.’
‘I’m not joking, Kieron.’ Orla stuffed the dead roses into a bag and handed him the watering can.
Kieron looked at the grave. The roses looked starkly red in the cold grey light. Hothouse blooms, he thought. A frost was threatened. They’d be dead overnight, too delicate to survive the elements. A bit like him, maybe. He still felt bad about how Max had made him look the other night at the exhibition. The basta
rd had belittled him in front of all the important London faces, and he was still seething with hatred over it.
Annie hadn’t even had the decency to call him on the phone, either. That really riled him. She’d been there as his guest, and she’d just fucked off with Carter without a word. She couldn’t treat him like that, and he intended to tell her so.
‘Pat’s a very big boy now, Kieron,’ Orla pointed out. She glanced at him. ‘Hey, are you listening to me?’
Kieron snapped back to the present. ‘Yeah. I’m listening. And I know that. But I suppose we should at least enquire …’
Orla shrugged. ‘We’ve put the word round that we’re looking for him. No one’s come up with anything.’
‘Well, do you think anything’s happened to him?’
Orla looked at Kieron. Her eyes were cold. ‘We both know that’s a possibility,’ she said.
‘Then perhaps we ought to be more worried?’ said Kieron.
‘Perhaps we ought.’
Kieron thought with irritation that she sounded completely dispassionate. Orla was a cold fish and he hated her lack of feeling sometimes. Redmond was the same. Both of them, cold as haddock.
Orla stood there, looking down at their brother’s grave, murmuring something under her breath. She was a diamond of a girl, he knew. She did this for their parents in Ireland. She tried always to do the right thing. Molly was old now, and their father was shot away to put it mildly, didn’t know what day of the week it was, by all accounts. Didn’t know which way was up. A sad end to a dynamic man. Sad for those around him, anyway. Davey himself seemed perfectly happy. It was Molly who shed tears over the man who no longer even knew her. So Orla did this little service, and phoned Molly and told her so. Just a little thing, but to Molly, so important. Davey had adored Tory.
Now he couldn’t even remember him.
His eldest.
His first-born.
His favourite.
Now the old man was gaga, and the son was dust and ashes. Life was strange. It was all down to Redmond now to hold the remains of the Delaney empire together. Pat might show up next week, or never be seen again. Kieron drew closer to his sister and put an arm around Orla’s shoulders.
She stiffened.
He withdrew his arm. He had forgotten that she didn’t really like to be touched. Hugs and kisses were out. He stood there, frozen to the marrow, while she murmured her prayers and gazed at the grave. Her red hair danced in the breeze. He tuned in to what she was saying. Prayers for the dead, no doubt. He listened, and was shocked by what he heard.
‘You bastard, dead at last aren’t you, and you know what? I’m glad. And if I was alone here I’d dance on your grave.’
48
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 breezil
y. ‘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.
49
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.