Jessie Keane - Black Widow

Annie turned on her heel and walked back to the car. After a few paces she paused and looked back at him.

‘Oh yeah-and get the boys together for a meet at the Palermo tomorrow morning at eleven. Nice and discreet, no rolling up mob-handed, got it?’ she said. ‘I’ll see you there.’

‘Basically, Vee, you’re just a fucking moron,’ Danny was saying.

Vee sat at a different kitchen table this time, in a house that was no better and no worse than the last-in other words, a shit-heap. She was getting very, very tired of shit-heaps. And also of Danny, who did not believe in letting bygones be bygones. He was still going on about the fact that she had once- just once -left the sodding door unbolted, and the kid had tried to do a runner.

‘Look,’ she said suddenly, losing it. ‘She didn’t get out.’

‘Yeah, but if she had-’

‘If she had , that would be a different matter, wouldn’t it? But she didn’t. So can you please now for fuck’s sake let it drop !’

‘Why do I always have to work with fucking fools?’ asked Danny morosely, downing another can of beer.

‘Hey, don’t include me in this,’ said Phil Fibbert, who was also sitting there and who was also getting pretty damned tired of the way Danny kept carping on about ancient history, about things that nearly happened, but didn’t.

‘And you can shut the fuck up too,’ said Danny.

Vita looked at Phil. Phil was built like a brick shithouse and Danny shouldn’t keep talking to him like that, or one of these fine days he might just get his teeth back in an ashtray. Right now Vita was looking forward to the day when Phil finally snapped. Phil winked at her and she half smiled back.

Actually, she was sort of beginning to like Phil.

Sure, they’d had their moments, but this was a tense situation. They were all on edge. And Danny didn’t help. She wished he’d stop it with the drink. He was a tetchy bastard anyway, but when he had a few pints down his neck, he was like a bear with a sore head.

Vita looked at Phil. She liked his dark good looks and his muscular physique. She didn’t notice that he hadn’t really defended her, he had only defended himself.

‘Ain’t it time you checked on the kid?’ Danny said to Vita, while eyeing them both with a critical eye.

Vita stood up. ‘I’ll be so glad when all this is over,’ she groaned, reaching for the hood and pulling it on, tucking her blonde hair up under it. ‘You really think she’s gonna play it straight now?’

‘What else can she do? It’s all going good.’ Danny downed the dregs of the beer and crushed the can in his fist and grinned. Then he frowned.

That was Danny-happy to crazy mad in a single bound. Vita had long ago got used to his sudden switches of mood.

‘And this time, lock the fucking door, okay?’ said Danny sharply.

Boy, could her brother hold a grudge.

But then-so could she.

When Annie came downstairs next morning, thinking, Oh fuck, it’s Tuesday already , a stony-faced Ross handed her a slip of paper.

‘What’s this?’ she asked.

He shrugged, uninterested. ‘Chap just handed it to me. Said it was a “pizzi,” or something. For Mrs Carter.’

Annie felt her heart thud sickly in her chest. The last unexpected delivery here had been Layla’s severed finger. She didn’t want any more surprises.

‘Thanks, Ross,’ she said, and took it through to the empty kitchen and spread it out on the table. It was a pizzino from Constantine, using Caesar’s code. She quickly deciphered the line of numbers. The note read: Sorry. C.

Annie stared at it in bewilderment. She thought of their last meeting, when she had behaved like a vestal virgin being propositioned outside the temple. She groaned aloud. Christ, what a fool she’d made of herself. Turned him right off the whole idea; ruined everything. But now this. Sorry. Meaning what? Meaning that there still might be a chance he’d go ahead with it, that she could still, somehow, get Layla out of this?

Dolly came in, clipping on discreet diamond stud earrings. She looked at Annie.

‘Any news yet?’ she asked, indicating the note.

Annie shook her head and folded the piece of paper.

Dolly’s face was grave. ‘They’re phoning back this Friday, ain’t that right?’ she said.

‘I don’t need reminding, Doll,’ said Annie, the panic eating at her. Time was running out fast now-it was all but gone. And so far she’d achieved nothing. Not a damned thing.

‘I thought you were going to get a loan off the Barolli mob?’

‘I was. Um…there were strings attached.’

‘What sort of strings?’

Annie got up and closed the door into the hall. She turned and looked at Dolly.

‘Constantine Barolli wanted to sleep with me,’ she said.

‘And?’ Dolly looked at her blankly.

Annie returned her stare. ‘What do you mean, and? He wanted to sleep with me, Doll, and then and only then would he hand over the money.’

Dolly leaned back against the worktop and studied Annie closely. ‘Sorry. You’ve lost me. Barolli wanted to sleep with you…?’

‘Yeah, that’s what I said.’

‘For half a million quid.’

‘Yeah.’

‘Then what the fuck are you waiting for: hell to freeze over? Why ain’t you done it?’

‘Jesus, Doll, I was going to.’ Annie clutched her head in her hands as her mind replayed the whole embarrassing experience in detail. ‘I offered myself on a plate. Which was what he wanted. And then he changed his damned mind.’

Dolly nodded at the note on the table. ‘That’s from him?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Saying…?’

‘Saying sorry.’

Now Dolly looked bewildered too. ‘Sorry for what?’

‘I don’t know. How the hell should I know? Sorry for changing his mind, I suppose.’

‘Look,’ said Dolly reasonably, ‘if he’s saying sorry, then at least he’s still talking to you, so maybe it’s not too late. You could still get over there, do the deed, get the money, get Layla back.’

‘I don’t know,’ said Annie, her mind in turmoil. The thought of going through that again was humiliating, but she’d do it for Layla.

‘It’s a bit of business, that’s all.’

‘What?’ Annie let out a mirthless laugh. ‘It might be a bit of business to you , Doll, but not to me. I’m a married woman.’

‘You’re a widow.’

‘You want me to go and shag some-some stranger? For money? You think that’s easy?’

‘Got it in one,’ said Dolly, filling the kettle. ‘And no, I don’t think it’s easy, but tough. Do it.’

‘Look, you may have some experience of selling your body like a farmer sells his pigs in a market, but I don’t,’ snapped Annie.

Dolly’s face was suddenly a picture of hurt. ‘Oh, and you think I enjoyed being a brass? You think I liked being a brass? You know damned well that I was only on the game because of what happened to me at home. I went out on the streets when I was fifteen, and it was only Celia being so kind and giving me a roof over my head that saved me from those filthy rotten pimps out there. You also know that I jumped at the chance to stop all that, to become a Madam. You know it.’

Annie took a deep breath. ‘I’m sorry, Doll,’ she said, contrite. ‘It’s just…it’s a really sore subject. Fact is, I tried. I really did. I bottled it, turned him off the idea. I just couldn’t do it.’

Dolly switched the kettle on and eyed her friend. ‘Oh don’t be bloody daft. It’s a business fuck, that’s all. Have a brandy, take the plunge.’