Jessie Keane - Ruthless

Annie stood up.

‘What are you going to do?’ asked Layla.

‘This and that,’ said Annie, heading for the door.

‘And what does that mean?’ demanded Layla.

‘What it says,’ said Annie. ‘Stay here. No running around the park or anything like that.’

‘I wasn’t going to.’

‘Good. Use the gym in the basement if you want. And there’s the outside pool. Steve’s left one of the boys on the door, his name’s Bri. You’ll be quite safe here.’

‘You’re saying I can’t go out?’

‘I’m saying it’s wisest not to. Seriously, Layla: stay inside. I’ll be back in about an hour.’

By dawn Rufus was climbing the walls of the rented flat in Islington with anxiety. Orla should have been back hours ago. The previous night she had gone to bed still angry with him. Given the mood she was in, he’d sensed that sharing a bed was out of the question, so he’d gone to sleep on the couch. At one o’clock he’d woken to find her all dressed up in black like a ninja, fired up with excitement about what she was about to do.

‘I should come with you,’ he’d said, worried for her.

‘No!’ she’d been adamant. ‘Keep away, Rufus. I don’t want your help, not with this. We stick to the plan, this time. No deviations.’

He nodded. He wasn’t happy, but this was her quest, not his.

‘If anything goes wrong, anything out of the ordinary happens, we meet back at the farm. OK?’

He wanted to kiss her, but knowing it would not be welcomed he merely nodded.

‘I’ll be back by six. If I’m not, stick to the plan.’

‘I’ll say a prayer for you,’ he said.

‘Don’t bother,’ sniffed his beloved. ‘I don’t need your prayers. Say one for her, she’s the one who’ll need it.’

But now it was seven the following morning and Orla hadn’t returned.

Her orders had been crystal clear: If I anything goes wrong, we meet up back at the farm . But he couldn’t just go back to Ireland, not if it meant abandoning her. He loved her. Anything could have happened.

He got dressed, not bothering with breakfast, stuffed his gear into a backpack – safer than leaving it here in the flat – and went out and hailed a taxi to take him to Holland Park. Having paid the driver, he loitered at the end of the square. He could see the house where he’d almost caught the girl. The place was quiet, no signs of life. His car, the one Orla had taken the previous night, was parked a few doors down. It was a Fiat, bought cheaply off an East End car lot a couple of weeks ago. He strolled towards it, glancing in as he drew level. It was empty, the keys still in the ignition. He took off his backpack and carefully placed it on the front passenger seat, then got behind the wheel and closed the door, his mind in turmoil, his eyes glued to the dark blue doors of the house.

Where could Orla have got to?

Follow the plan, she’d told him. Meet up back at the farm.

But she hadn’t come home to their tatty little rented flat. And the car was here, keys in the ignition. She must have done it, though. When Orla set her mind to anything – and this in particular – for certain, it would be done.

He thought of Rory then, mouldering in an early grave, and shuddered.

Still undecided, he sat in the car, weighing his options.

She’d be angry if he stormed in there, went looking for her.

No, he couldn’t do that. He’d…

And that’s when he saw Annie Carter, alive and well, exit the house, stride down the steps and across to a black Mercedes. She got in and drove away.

He was so taken aback that for a moment he was unable to think. Then he gunned the engine, and followed.

Layla remained sitting at the breakfast table, too numb to move, as her mother left the room and closed the door. She heard Annie’s rapid footsteps going off across the hall.

The house settled around her, silent, waiting. Rosa was downstairs but that wasn’t much comfort. Annie had questioned the old housekeeper before breakfast, and Rosa had sworn she’d set the alarm last night, same as she always did. A swift examination by Bri, the man now on the door, of the outside of the house revealed that the wires to the alarm had been cut and the lock on the basement window forced. Orla had climbed in through there, made her way to the ground floor and up the stairs.

Feeling like a prisoner in her own home, Layla went into the study and sat down at the desk, chewing her lip nervously. Shivers of dread and horror still coursed through her body every time her mind went back to last night, to what had happened.

Someone had come to kill her mother .

She couldn’t absorb it, no matter how she tried. Worse still, she had killed the woman, never intending to – of course not. Nonetheless, she had shot the woman dead.

But she was carrying a knife. A knife she’d intended using on Annie Carter .

Annie Carter… Her mother hadn’t reverted to her maiden name after the divorce. She’d claimed that Bailey didn’t suit her, she hated the name, it conjured up bad memories. So she’d remained Annie Carter.

Maybe she still loves him a little? wondered Layla.

She shrugged the thought aside. No. When her parents had been together, there’d been nothing but ferocious rows and ugly scenes.

Sitting in her mother’s study, she wondered where Annie had gone, what she was doing that was so urgent. Feeling sick to her stomach and cripplingly anxious, she picked up the phone, called the office. As she’d anticipated, it wasn’t well received. The work ethic at Bowdler and Etchingham was set in stone: illness was unacceptable.

She put the phone down and listened to the silence in the house. What had once seemed to her a comfortable home had changed overnight. The whole place now felt creepy, unsafe. Layla stared at the phone, trying to make her mind up. Finally she picked it up and made another call. This one was international.

Max Carter was lying in the hot sun on the terrace, wearing black Speedos and nothing else. He loved basking in the sun. It refuelled him, made him stronger. At teatime he would take a shower and dress for dinner, until then this was his time and he was all alone, blissfully alone at the villa with the sun warming his skin and no sound but the lap of the waves on the narrow crescent of white sandy beach.

He let his mind meander into freefall. He had a good life out here in Barbados. His villa was one of a select few situated on the west coast up near Prospect, away from the encroaching luxury hotel complexes, shaded by manchineel trees and palms. He passed his time easily, developing the odd property or two around the islands, doing a few deals, swimming off Prospect beach and target-shooting in his garden among the mango and breadfruit trees to keep his eye in.

He was living the Bajan dream of hot sands and turquoise-blue seas. And there were other diversions too, very pleasant diversions – like the women who sometimes shared his bed, but never his life. Nevertheless there were times – though he would never admit this to a living soul – when he woke up and she was there in his mind, even after all these years. That annoyed the hell out of him. Sex with other women shifted her image, but somehow it always returned. He’d even find himself reaching for her in the night before it hit him that she wasn’t there, that they were divorced, that she was involved with another man and living half a world away.

The fact that she was so far away was a good thing, he knew. Their fights, his suspicion of her, her defiance – they had caused each other nothing but pain. Jealousy had made him vicious, verbally attacking her: she had retreated into coldness, had become as responsive as a block of stone.