Jessie Keane - Ruthless

No, no bother. Turns out this is the deal: someone tried to snatch Layla, then Orla Delaney rose from the dead and tried to knife me in cold blood, and I’m damned sure I was meant to be in my car when that bomb went off. No, Tone, no bother at all .

‘That motor of yours is never going to be the same again,’ said Dolly. ‘I’ve been seeing stuff like this on the TV, you just never think…’ She stopped speaking, shook her head.

‘Stuff like what?’ asked Annie.

‘Like that . Car bombs. It’s been on the news, haven’t you seen it? The IRA. Northern Ireland.’

Now Annie really did feel sick. The sirens were getting louder, people were coming out of shops and offices, milling around, staring, fascinated and horrified at the same time. There was a flicker of flames darting from the broken bonnet of her car. Her eyes were drawn back to the pavement, to the splodge of crimson there. She shuddered and looked at Tony.

‘I’m getting out of here,’ she said. ‘Tone, drive me back to Holland Park, will you?’

‘’Course,’ he said.

Dolly was looking at her like she’d flipped.

‘It’s no good going,’ she said. ‘What am I supposed to say when they come in here asking questions? The Bill will trace you through the registration number anyway.’

Annie looked at the Merc’s number plate. The front one was nothing but a piece of blackened metal. The one at the back was probably intact, though, and there’d be the ID on the engine. Plus her prints would be all over it – if they could still find any.

‘Tough,’ she said. ‘Let them. If they ask, you don’t know a thing.’

‘Well, I don’t, ’ said Dolly in exasperation.

‘That’s fine then, isn’t it? Come on, Tone. Let’s get the fuck out of here.’

When Annie got back to Holland Park, Bri was still there on the door.

‘Hiya, Bri,’ said Tony, as he followed her in, eyeing him curiously.

Bri nodded a greeting to them both. He was tall, lean, with a shaven head and a steady gaze. A man of few words but – Annie hoped – direct action.

‘Layla!’ called Annie, crossing the marble hallway, her steps echoing in the stillness of the house.

No answer.

‘She could be downstairs in the gym,’ said Annie, peering around her with worried eyes as she made her way to the basement stairs.

Suddenly she needed to know where Layla was as a matter of urgency.

This place was grand, luxurious in the extreme. It had belonged to Constantine, one of many properties he owned all over the world. These included vineyards in the Loire Valley, an old sugar plantation in Jamaica, a beachside retreat in Martha’s Vineyard and a compound in glamorous upstate Montauk. When he died, all Constantine’s properties had passed first to Lucco, then to Alberto, with the exception of the Upper East Side apartment, and this London house, both of which were now Annie’s. Much as she loved the New York apartment, this was the place that had always felt like her true home.

Or it had done until now. After the events of the last twenty-four hours it made her feel uneasy, just being here.

Orla Delaney had made her way in here with murder in mind. Annie found herself starting at shadows. She no longer felt secure in her own home. And that explosion… she could still hear it, ringing in her ears. The jar of the shockwave when the device had gone off kept reverberating in her bones. Her mind insisted on replaying each detail, over and over. And it was dredging up memories of that other explosion, the one in the States, that had wrecked her life seventeen years ago, the whole ghastly thing playing on an endless loop. She stopped at the bottom of the stairs, closed her eyes, gulped hard. It felt as if someone heavy was sitting on her chest.

Tony took her arm. ‘You OK?’

‘Yeah.’ She managed to raise a smile. ‘Bit shook up, that’s all.’

They could hear Duran Duran blaring out of the speakers, and the treadmill humming.

That was a relief. Layla was OK, she was here, she was safe. So was Tony. Annie thought again of the panic she’d felt when there was no sign of him after the explosion.

‘I thought we’d lost you back there,’ she said with an unsteady laugh.

‘I thought we’d lost you .’ He grinned. ‘Scared the shit out of me, till I saw you standing in the doorway.’

They crossed the hallway and pushed open the door to the gym. It was state-of-the-art, with a mirrored wall and a water cooler, cross-trainers, rowing machines, static cycles and a heavy-duty treadmill – on which Layla, hair pulled back in her usual no-nonsense ponytail, wearing black shorts and beige T-shirt, was pounding furiously away. She saw her mother and Tony in the mirror, and punched a button on the machine. The treadmill slowed, then stopped. Layla unclipped the safety tie.

Breathing heavily, she stepped off, turned down the music. She snatched up a towel, patted her face. ‘Did you want me?’

‘You OK?’ asked Annie.

‘Yeah,’ said Layla.

Annie didn’t think she was. Layla’s eyes were shadowed, haunted. She’d done a dreadful thing last night, and Annie could see that it was tormenting her.

‘What’s up? Has something else happened?’ Layla was glancing from Tony’s face to her mother’s.

‘Somebody blew up my car,’ said Annie.

Layla’s jaw dropped. ‘You what ?’

‘It went off too early,’ said Annie. She thought of the bloodstained pavement. ‘Maybe the bomber muffed it.’

‘Thank God for that. Are you OK? The person who set it, were they… were they hurt?’

Annie let out an irritated breath. ‘Was the bomber hurt? Not that I care, but he was blown to fuck . That’s what bombs do to people, as a general rule.’

‘Right.’

Seeing the chastened expression on her daughter’s face, Annie felt guilty.

‘Sorry,’ she said quickly. ‘It was a shock. Get cleaned up and come upstairs, will you? I think we’d better talk about all this stuff that’s been happening.’

Tony was looking at Annie curiously. He held up a shovel-like hand. ‘Wait on. Are you telling me there’s something else, apart from the car?’

Annie heaved a sigh. ‘You don’t know the half of it. Unless Steve’s told you…?’

‘He ain’t told me nothing. Is this to do with Bri being on the door? What’s going on?’

‘Look, let’s go upstairs and I’ll fill in the blanks.’

‘Mum…’ Layla grabbed Annie’s arm. Her eyes were wide with alarm.

‘It’s OK,’ said Annie. ‘Tone’s sound as a pound. We’ll see you up there.’ She’d already decided to dig out the kiyoga Tone had given her years ago. And she had a can of Mace here somewhere.

Yeah, really effective against knives and bombs , she thought.

What the hell. Any protection was better than none.

Rufus couldn’t believe it. He’d stayed to watch, from a distance. This time he wanted to see the Carter woman get what she deserved. Instead some scruffy little tit had come along, trying car doors. And it wasn’t as if he could run over and stop him.

The inevitable happened. The car blew up, taking the homeless guy with it.

Boom!

That bitch must have nine lives, like a cat.

Worse, there was still no sign of Orla.

If anything goes wrong, we meet at the farm .

He clung to the hope that she was following the plan, that when her hit failed she’d hot-footed it back to Ireland. Part of him wanted to race to the farm, to see for himself that she was OK. Part of him was terrified to go there in case it would confirm his worst fears.

Either way, he was determined not to leave London until he’d finished the job she started. When Annie Carter was dead, then he would head home.