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She stood up and took it. ‘Thanks, Ross.’
She sat back down at the table and spread out the piece of paper. Looked at it. Numbers.
‘Jesus H. Christ in a sidecar,’ she murmured.
‘What is it?’ asked Dolly, craning forward.
Annie sat back, shaking her head, her mouth twisted in a bitter smile.
Dolly looked at her. ‘Come on! What is it?’ She peered interestedly at the note. ‘Numbers? Haven’t you had some of these before? There was a name for them, I remember. Pizza somethings.’
‘Pizzino,’ said Annie.
‘That’s the feller. Oh!’ Dolly’s eyes widened. ‘It’s from that Mafia bloke. Barolli. Well, come the fuck on, what’s it say?’
‘What’s it say?’ Annie stared back at her in outrage. ‘Look, Doll, mind your bloody own will you? I can’t think about him now, how the fuck could I? Poor Aretha’s dead because of some psycho, and he thinks he can just waltz back into my life, after three months of nothing, with a note?’
‘Well, when you put it like that…’
‘There’s no other way to put it, Doll.’ Annie screwed up the note and lobbed it angrily into the sink. She took a calming breath and nodded to Dolly’s notebooks. ‘Right, Doll, let’s get back to business.’ She stood up. ‘I’m going to phone Jerry, get him down the station to speak to Chris.’
Jerry Peters was Annie’s brief from way back: a tall, overweight man with a shock of fluffy ginger hair, a florid complexion and a brilliance in legal matters that belied his shambolic looks. ‘While I do that, dig out Aunt Louella’s address. And—yeah—everything you’ve got about Aretha’s last client, and where she met him.’
‘Ah,’ said Dolly awkwardly.
‘What do you mean, “ah”?’
‘Fact is,’ said Dolly, her eyes downcast, ‘I don’t actually know who her last client was. A woman phoned in the booking, said room two-oh-six at the Vista in Park Lane and the time, asked for Aretha, and the client paid Aretha, so…’ Her voice tailed off.
‘You didn’t know this woman? You didn’t even take a name?’
Dolly looked up, her expression unhappy. ‘Sorry,’ she said, ‘no.’
‘Shit,’ said Annie.
Chapter 5 (#ulink_eec75fdc-918c-5d81-93f0-914eb87bb78d)
Mira Cooper would forever remember the first time she set eyes on Redmond Delaney. She’d been sitting in the luxuriously ornate dining room at Cliveden with Sir William Farquharson, married ex-member of the House, when they’d shown Redmond and his party to a nearby table.
He was just the most exquisite man she’d ever seen: tall and lithe, with red hair, lime-green eyes, smooth skin and an air of command about him. He was with a group of five others, and a darkhaired stunner was paying him a lot of attention. Redmond’s attention, much to the brunette’s visible annoyance, was fixed upon Mira, whose beautiful blonde looks had always been her fortune.
Chatting to William as they ate, her eyes were constantly drawn back to Redmond—and she couldn’t help but compare the two. William wasshort, pot-bellied, balding and plain. Redmond Delaney, however, was a god.
Oh yes, she remembered it all: being in the pool the following afternoon, wearing her best silver bikini, hoping he’d be there. And he was. Sir William was lounging on one of the chairs at the side of the pool, talking to another old man and smoking a Havana cigar. Mira’s heart almost stopped when Redmond appeared at the edge of the pool. He slipped off his robe and dived in, swimming a couple of powerful laps until he ended up leaning against the side of the pool, right beside her.
‘Nice day,’ he said.
She flicked a flirtatious glance at him. She knew how to use her looks to good effect. He saw her stunning blue eyes widen slightly, saw her pupils dilate, and that was good. She liked the look of him and she was determined to let him know it. He was a handsome man, a striking man. He wasn’t old or pot bellied—and he had to be rich to stay here; she knew that.
‘Lovely,’ she said, and smiled.
‘Staying long?’ he asked, glancing over at Sir William, who was deep into his conversation, noticing nothing, certainly not the way her eyes were playing with the younger man’s, certainly not the way her nubile body was half turning towards this new kid on the block.
‘Until the weekend,’ she said, smiling.
He smiled back at her. ‘Good. I hope we’ll meet up again.’
‘We might,’ she said playfully.
‘I think we should.’
‘That’s very forward of you.’ Her eyes were dancing; she was enjoying this.
‘I am forward,’ he said, ‘in most things. My name’s Redmond, by the way.’
‘Are you a businessman?’ she asked him, entranced by his soft southern Irish accent.
‘Yes.’ It was true, more or less. He owned the streets of Battersea and a little pocket of Limehouse. He did business. Not legitimate business, but it was business anyway.
‘I’m here with—’
‘Sir William. I know.’
Mira was silent for a moment, but her eyes spoke volumes. ‘Billy has a sleep after dinner,’ she said at last.
‘Does he?’
‘For an hour.’
‘You know what? A person could do a lot. In an hour.’
‘Yes. That’s true.’
‘What’s your name?’
‘Mira,’ she said. ‘Mira Cooper.’
She flicked her leonine blonde mane and was off, streaking across the pool, her blood fizzingwith excitement. Oh yes, she remembered everything. The good bits…and the bad.
She’d told him all about herself, something she had never done before, not with any man. That she had once worked in a high-class brothel run by her friend Annie Carter—who’d been Annie Bailey then—in the West End of London. She told Redmond that, while they lay naked together in his sumptuous Cliveden suite.
‘I don’t want you seeing Billy again,’ he said as they lay back against the pillows, him lazily playing with her splendid breasts, her lightly caressing his flat, well-toned stomach. ‘Not after this week.’
She turned her head, looked at his face. ‘He’ll be upset,’ she said.
‘Fuck him,’ he said.
She grinned at that. Knelt up on the bed and straddled him.
‘I’d rather fuck you,’ she said, and bit his nipple quite hard.
‘Okay,’ he said, smiling up at her. ‘Do it.’
Chapter 6 (#ulink_9baaddbf-3426-50a8-9431-68dea6fd018b)
Annie was in church. She never went to church except for the usual stuff—funerals, christenings and weddings. Apart from those, she normally wouldn’t have been seen dead in such a place. She hadn’t been raised that way.
Her mum, Connie Bailey, had never even sent her or her sister Ruthie to Sunday school. Other kids had attended, collected those neat little stamps with pictures of Jesus to stick in books and get a gold star, got those little raffia crosses from the vicar on Palm Sunday. Annie and Ruthie had spent Sundays wondering whether this was going to be the day when their mother finally up and died on them. Choked on vomit, drank herself into oblivion, take your pick. Their mother had been a drunk, and Dad was nothing but a faint memory.
So, no church. No giving thanks to the Lord, because excuse me but what had there ever been to give thanks for, really? Annie and Max had been married in a no-fuss, no-frills ceremony in Majorca, and Layla had been christened there too. The Church of England, into which Annie had been born, was foreign to her.
But now here she was.
In church.
And a choir was lifting the roof off, singing ‘Praise the Lord, hallelujah!’ Twenty purple-clad black women were standing in front of the high altar, shafts of multicoloured sunlight illuminating them through the stained-glass window. They were moving rapturously to the beat. A dumpy, pop-eyed little man was at the organ, flapping one arm at the choir and mouthing along, obviously doubling up as choirmaster. The vicar was standing silently beside the lectern, listening and watching. The organ was belting out the backbeat, the beaming women giving it their all, the very rafters of the beautiful old building were vibrating with the power of the combined sound.
Annie sat in a pew and listened, feeling all the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. Yeah, it was magic.
She’d called first at Louella’s address, expecting that a whole bunch of family would be gathered around to support her. But a neighbour told her that Louella had gone to church. Said Louella always went to church this time every week for choir practice. So Tony had driven Annie over, and now here she was, listening to the choir pounding and clapping and swaying and singing to the rafters and wondering what good she could possibly do here. But she had to be here, had to say how sorry she was, had to ask if there was anything she could do to help, if only for Aretha’s sake. She didn’t even know what Aretha’s aunt looked like—but, as it happened, that proved no problem, because there, on the left-hand side of the group, bellowing out the words of praise and swaying in time to the beat, grinning and clapping with all the rest, was a woman whose eyes were full of tragedy and whose cheeks were wet with tears.
It had to be Louella, singing and sobbing at the same time.
Annie gulped as it hit her again. Aretha was gone. Had Aretha ever come here, with her Aunt Louella? Had she ever sat right here and listened to the choir? Before Aretha and Louella had fallen out over Aretha’s career choices, had they come here together to worship?
Annie didn’t know. There was so little that she really knew about Aretha Brown. All she did know was that she’d been a friend. All she knew beyond that was that she couldn’t let Chris get stitched up for something he didn’t—couldn’t—do.
The choir roared out one last, bell-like note, and it echoed all around the great vaulted ceiling before finally fading away. Their organist clapped madly. The vicar clapped politely too. Annie stood up and joined in. The choir started to disperse. Annie walked up the aisle. Some of the women were patting Louella’s shoulder, murmuring to her. The vicar came forward and talked quietly to her. Annie waited until he moved away, then she stepped up and said: ‘Louella?’
The woman looked at her blankly. Her eyes were swollen with all the tears she’d shed.
‘Louella, I’m a friend of Aretha’s. I’m Annie.’
Louella’s face closed down. She looked at Annie with suspicion.
‘You one of them Delaneys?’ she asked.
Annie shook her head.
‘Only she was workin’ at a Delaney place,’ said Louella.
‘I know.’
‘And you ain’t one of them? You ain’t one of them that preyed upon my little girl?’
My little girl.
But Aretha wasn’t Aunt Louella’s little girl: she was someone else’s. Someone thousands of miles away, toiling under the baking Rhodesian sun, had lost a daughter. The Africans had extended families; they shared their children, their grandparents, their joys and their losses. The English did not.
‘I’m not a Delaney, Louella. I’m Annie Carter.’
Louella looked no happier. She rubbed a hand over her face, drying her tears.
‘She spoke about you,’ she said.
‘Did she?’ asked Annie.
‘Yeah, she said you was tight together. But you was involved with that place she worked, I know that. You and that Dolly woman, and there was a boy too who worked there…’
‘Darren,’ said Annie, swallowing hard. Darren was gone, and she still missed him.
‘He was homosexual, that’s against the word of the Lord,’ said Aunt Louella huffily.
‘He couldn’t help what he was,’ said Annie.
Louella looked at her. She shrugged. ‘Maybe. Anyway, the Lord says hate the sin, but love the sinner.’
‘Can we sit for a moment? Have a talk?’
‘They told you she’s gone, my baby?’ asked Louella, tears spilling over again.
Annie nodded sadly. She indicated one of the front pews. Louella heaved a sigh and sat down. Annie sat beside her.
‘I’m so sorry,’ she said.
‘Oh, I sorry too,’ said Louella, choking on a sob. ‘I’m sorrier than I can say. The police, they come to me and they tol’ me what happened, they tol’ me they got the one who did it. I said to her so many times, don’t do that stuff, why you got to do that when you could get a nice job, be a good girl like I promised your mama you would be. How could I tell her that her little one was doin’ things like that when she sent her here to me, put her in my care, expected her to get a good life for herself?’
They tol’ me they got the one who did it. Annie’s guts churned and her mind rebelled. They had Chris; they were convinced he was the murderer. Annie was equally convinced he wasn’t.
So prove it, she thought. She had to, or Chris was fucked.
Louella was looking at her. ‘Yeah, she spoke about you,’ she said again. ‘You’re one of the bad people, the people my baby should never have got herself involved with. I know about the big gangs, the things they do. I know. You were with Max Carter.’
Annie took a breath. ‘I’m in charge now,’ she said.
‘Yeah, you’re bad people. I know that,’ said Louella.
‘I’m not a bad person, Louella. I was a good friend to Aretha. She was an even better one to me.’
‘Yeah, you say.’
‘Hate the sin, not the sinner?’
Louella looked at her sceptically.
‘That’s neat, turnin’ my own words back on me,’ she said.
‘We both loved her. That’s what matters. We both want to see who did this brought to justice.’
