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Alice had been conceived following a brief affair Cabhan had had during a short business trip to the States sixteen years ago. Although Alice’s mother, Clara, and Cabhan had parted on good terms – friends even – and had kept in contact over the ensuing years, Clara had never told Cabhan anything about Alice until it’d been completely necessary for her to do so. And that had only been in the most extreme situation, when Clara had been diagnosed with a rapidly progressing form of multiple sclerosis.
Cabhan had been thrown into the deep end: he had only learnt he was the proud father of a beautiful young girl two months before Clara had died. Alice, of course, had been devastated. The other thing she had been was naïve for her age, having grown up in a tiny farm community in George County, Mississippi. Clara had not only protected her from the world, but had brought Alice up in a highly religious environment, which was certainly at odds with Cabhan.
Though not knowing how to get through to a teenager who had not only lost her mother but had been brought up as if God were her best friend, Cabhan had asked around and found a small and exclusive boarding school at a girls’ convent – as nuns and the religious community were something Alice understood. Business allowing it, Cabhan had visited her every day, then after a while a smile had slowly returned to Alice’s face.
What followed was the blossoming of a beautiful loving bond between Cabhan and Alice Rose. He loved Alice as Alice loved him. Completely and absolutely. In fact, Franny didn’t know anyone who’d met Alice and hadn’t fallen in love with the sweet, innocent, kind-hearted girl, who somehow had been shielded from the world turning upside down.
Suddenly, Franny shook herself out of her thoughts. She didn’t want to start feeling sentimental, she had a job to do: somehow she had to get Cabhan out of the mess he’d found himself in, before the Russos began to point the finger of blame.
Quickly looking along the corridor, making sure no one was coming, Franny tapped lightly on door 493. ‘Cab! Cab! It’s me.’
It took less than thirty seconds for Franny to hear the locks of the hotel room unbolt. Then, looking stressed and tired, Cab opened the door, giving her a quick, grateful smile before his expression immediately turned pensive as he glanced up and down the hallway. ‘You made sure no one followed you?’
Saying nothing, Franny nodded as she walked into the large Presidential suite, which looked out west across the city, over the Broncos’ ‘mile high’ stadium to the snow-capped Rocky Mountain National Park.
She turned to Cabhan, who was pouring himself a large bourbon at the bar in the corner of the freshly decorated room, and gently spoke, her large emerald eyes imploring him and full of kindness. ‘How about you leave that drink for a minute until you give me a hug … It’s good to see you, Cab.’
With her mane of thick, glossy chestnut hair falling over her beautiful face, skin like a porcelain doll, she smiled at Cabhan, though it was tinged with sadness. For a long time now, he hadn’t been himself. He’d been withdrawn, troubled, and each time they had spoken she’d also got the sense he was on edge. Nervous. She’d even go so far as to say he seemed afraid, and the man she’d known all her life had never been afraid of anything. But that was before. Before he’d started working for the Russo brothers.
She’d warned him. Begged him to think carefully about getting involved with them, because she knew, knew how dark and dangerous they were. Her father – who at one time had done business with the brothers – in the end refused to do so, which spoke volumes, because the game they were in was filled with sewer rats, scumbags, thugs, but the Russo brothers? They were on another level entirely. They had no moral code. Anything went. She’d heard the stories and wished she hadn’t. Nico, Salvatore, Bobby. All three brothers as twisted and dark as each other.
But there’d been no telling Cabhan back then. After what had happened with her father, he’d retreated and put a whole ocean between them. It’d hurt her and she’d missed him, but although she’d never been happy with him heading off to America, she’d understood that was Cabhan’s way of dealing with things. Though what she’d never grasped was why he’d gone to work with one of the most notorious families on the East Coast. The only reason she ever came up with was that it was some kind of self-imposed punishment, Cabhan’s guilt over her father; though when she’d put that to him, Cabhan had simply laughed it off.
Now, however, he’d realised that he needed to come home, and nobody could’ve been more delighted than her. It was the right thing to do for everybody, but after what happened to Ally, to get Cabhan away from the Russos would be harder than ever.
Welling up with emotions, Cab’s voice broke. ‘Fran, I don’t know what I would’ve done if you hadn’t come. Thank you. I’m indebted. I—’
She cut in. ‘Cab, stop. You don’t owe me anything, and truthfully, there’s nowhere I would rather be. Okay, maybe under different circumstances, but you, me and Dad, we were always a team, weren’t we? So, me being here certainly doesn’t need any thanks.’
Absentmindedly patting down his short, boxed Afro, Cab asked, ‘What about Alfie? Was he all right about you coming?’
Franny’s pause, although only a millisecond, was long enough for Cabhan, who knew her so well, to say, ‘You haven’t told him, have you? Franny, don’t ignore me.’
Franny’s tone was slightly irritated. ‘I’m not a child, Cab.’
‘That’s right, so you can start off by telling me why Alfie’s in the dark.’
Putting her bag down on the tangerine orange furniture, Franny decided to take a bourbon herself. ‘Look, it’s just best like this. The fewer people who know where you are, the better.’
Cabhan pulled on Franny’s arm, turning her round to face him. His Irish accent was always more pronounced when he was passionate. ‘Don’t give me that, Franny Doyle. This is Alfie we’re talking about. There’s no way he’d say anything to anybody. We both know that. So, come on, tell me what’s really going on.’
‘Cab, I love you, but I know what I’m doing, so leave it, please. Besides, I think you’ve got more to worry about than what I do or don’t choose to tell Alfie.’
Before Cabhan had time to reply, his phone – which was sitting on one of the dark wooden deck chairs on the balcony – began to ring.
Stepping outside, he gazed at it, his expression becoming strained again. ‘It’s Salvatore.’
‘Have you spoken to him since the accident?’
Cabhan shook his head. ‘No, you told me not to, but he knows about Ally. Actually, the whole of the American press seem to know. It was splashed across all the papers yesterday. The headlines all say the same thing: notorious crime boss’s daughter dies in accident. The only reason I left my phone on was in case you needed to get hold of me, but Salvatore’s been calling day and night. I haven’t listened to the messages, I thought it was probably best not to, though I doubt he’s wishing me well.’
‘Give it to me.’ Franny gestured with her hand, her manner and her authority reminding Cabhan of her father, Patrick. But then that wasn’t surprising: Patrick had taught Franny everything he knew about the business they were in. He’d started her off young, knee-high, showing her everything from how to pick pockets like she was the Artful Dodger to cracking safes and locks. And when she was old enough he’d gone on to show her how to run large business empires built on handshakes with dangerous men and dangerous deals.
Taking the phone, Franny looked at Cab, then, giving a tight smile and taking a deep breath, she swiped the answer button.
‘Salvatore. It’s me. Franny Doyle. You need to listen to what I’m going to say, because there are a few things we have to talk about …’
7 (#ulink_7c521b97-8b6e-520e-9ea4-cfe36ddbdfca)
Salvatore Russo, holding the phone, kicked away the naked teenage hooker who seemed to think helping herself to his best cocaine was part of their deal. Watching her sprawled on the floor, he glared angrily as he sat at his gold-leafed kitchen table in one of his palatial homes in Fort Collins, northern Colorado, in only his cream cotton boxer shorts, which were straining at the seams and sticking to him like glue. His diamond-encrusted medallion, given to him by his father, hung amidst the sweat-drenched hair on his chest, and the oozing perspiration trickled leisurely from between the creases of his twenty-inch neck.
It was hot. Too damn hot, added to which the maintenance guy had given him a whole heap of bullshit along with some prissy smirk about how he wasn’t able to fix the air con until Monday. Two goddamn days away. Well, he’d teach the motherfucker about how it wasn’t possible to fix things. He’d make sure no doctor, no hospital, no surgeon could fix his goddamn legs and face once he’d finished with him and then he’d see who was smirking … Two goddamn days. The man was a jerk. And now, now, he had this bitch, this ball-breaker of a woman answering the phone like she was goddamn Capone.
Spitting at, but missing, the waste bin, Salvatore growled down the line as he gestured to the prostitute to leave the room.
‘Put Cabhan on … adesso! Now! I wanna know what the fuck he’s done with my coke.’
‘He’s not available to speak to you … but I am.’ Franny stopped, then, with her tone dripping in sarcasm, added, ‘And it’s good to see you’ve got your priorities straight.’
Salvatore, shaking with fury, hissed through his teeth whilst he squeezed his phone in both hands. ‘Fuck you!’
‘No, fuck you, Sal. I would’ve thought you’d have asked about Ally first, but I forgot, you’re a Russo.’
‘There’s nothing to ask, my niece is dead. Now if I were you, I’d go and sort your fucking period out and pass the phone to Cab. I don’t deal with women.’
Another pause before Franny, coolly and matter-of-factly, said, ‘That’s not what I’ve heard, Sal. I hear you deal in women all the time.’
Flickers of white light appeared in front of Salvatore’s eyes. Blind rage and fury surged through him as he felt his blood pressure go from baseline to sky-high. He pressed his muscular fingers onto his eyelids, massaging them, trying to find some relief from the stress.
‘Bitches like you need to be put in their place.’
‘And that’s why I’m at the top of my game. I’m in my place … So, are we going to keep going round and round in circles, or are we going to talk business? But I do want you to know I am genuinely sorry about Ally. Le mie condoglianze.’
Standing up, Salvatore began to pace around the large, expansive kitchen. He laughed scornfully. ‘Is that some kind of joke? I don’t want your fucking condolences. I curse them. You hear me? Like I curse Cabhan. He murdered my niece, and he’ll pay for that.’
Franny spoke firmly. ‘Salvatore, we both know that it wasn’t Cab who killed Ally. She was the one who was driving, not him.’
Mopping up the trickling sweat from his brow with the corner of a blue napkin, Salvatore opened the fridge and stuck his head inside for cool relief. ‘Let me tell you something, if you were standing next to me right now, I’d blow your fucking head off. My niece is dead. She was sixteen years old, yet you think you can disrespect her when she’s not even cold in the ground?’
‘No, Sal. I’m not saying it was her fault, I’m saying it was an accident. A tragic one, but she was driving nevertheless. They are the facts.’
Salvatore raised his voice along with his head, banging it hard on one of the fridge shelves, sending cooked meat and salad along with his temper up in the air. ‘Goddamn whore, pass me over to Cabhan! I wanna know what happened to my coke.’
‘He got rid of it.’
It was Salvatore’s turn to pause. ‘What the fuck are you talking about?’
‘Like I say, he got rid of it. Ripped the bags open and let it go.’
Incandescent with rage, Salvatore ran his arm along the breakfast bench, dragging and smashing the bowl of cut fruit along with bottles of olive oil and vinegar onto the marbled floor.
‘So Cab thought it was a good idea to play snow globe with my coke, like it was Santa’s fucking day out?’
‘It was a good job he did, otherwise the police might’ve been wanting to talk to you.’
‘Rat me out? That wouldn’t be a smart idea, he knows exactly what happens to rats and their families.’
‘No, he wouldn’t have, but it would’ve been pretty easy for the police to work out who it was they needed to come and talk to. He did you a favour.’
Salvatore burst into menacing laughter. ‘Some fucking favour. Do you know how much money I lost?’
‘Not exactly, but I’m willing to compensate you. Every dollar. So, what do you say?’
Salvatore stared out of the large window of his house, which looked out across the lawn towards the ornate water fountain. ‘I don’t think so.’
‘Problem is it’s not your decision to make, is it, Sal? We both know who’s really in charge.’
‘Where you’re concerned, I am in charge.’
‘No, but you’re not. I want to speak to your brother. I want to speak to Nico. Make it happen, otherwise the offer’s off and you’ll be out of pocket by about three million dollars.’
8 (#ulink_cb7701f0-3b64-5c49-85f2-d6868dcd8196)
Back in the heart of Essex, Lola Harding sat in Janine Jennings’ mansion worried sick. She’d had a sleepless night fretting about what she should do, about what she should think, and this morning she was still none the wiser.
Looking out of the bedroom window of the house, located just outside the pretty village of Wimbish, Lola groaned, the shot of rum she’d added to her morning coffee not helping. The problem was she classed herself as a close friend to both Alfie – Janine’s ex-husband – and Franny, knowing them both for as long as she could remember.
When she’d been a tom in Soho, they’d been kind and looked out for her, making sure none of the pimps gave her a hard time. And when eventually she’d turned her back on the street, becoming the proud owner of a café, Alfie, the number-one face at the time, had made it known that her café and her café alone was the only place to go. Consequently, customers flocked in, not wanting to get onto the wrong side of the irrepressible Alfie Jennings.
But time had passed and Soho had changed. Most of the faces, including Alfie, had moved away, leaving her alone. With business bad and it becoming too much to run the café, she’d closed up and the life she’d loved, had cherished, vanished overnight. It’d made her feel like there’d been a death. Loneliness had engulfed her, strangled her, and the days and weeks had been passed in her small flat, which soared high above the city, not speaking to a soul.
They’d been awful days and she’d sunk into a dark depression, but out of the blue she’d bumped into Janine at a supermarket, or rather she’d watched from one of the aisles as Janine gave the manager a tongue-lashing. It had made her laugh, reminding her that some things never changed.
Although she knew Janine well through Alfie, they’d never been particularly close, but that afternoon they’d had a cup of tea and a chat and reminisced for hours. By the end of the day a miracle happened: Janine, with her loud, coarse mouth, and her busybodying, troublemaking ways, had asked her to come and stay and she’d never looked back. Not once, and she loved Janine for that.
Despite being fraught with fights and quarrels, Alfie and Vaughn had recently moved into the house. They had come back from Spain to set up their business and Janine was allowing them to stay whilst they got back on their feet and re-established themselves as faces to be reckoned with.
But now there was trouble. Big trouble. Franny, who’d been so good for Alfie, made him grow up, had taken none of his bullshit or his womanising ways, had done what she thought Franny would never do – she’d taken his money and disappeared. Just like that.
She was supposed to have joined Alfie back in England, but instead she’d cheated him out of his money. And Lola had to admit it hurt to think that’s what Franny had done, because to her, Alfie and Fran were family, and family looked out for their own.
But the question she had to ask herself was why? Why would Franny do it?
Taking a sip of her coffee with the sun blazing through the window, Lola shook her head. She couldn’t stand to see Alfie – whom she loved like a son – so torn apart. She had to do something, somehow try to sort it out. Both Alfie and Franny were too important to her and, even though he’d told her to stay right out of it, telling her not to breathe a word to anyone, she needed to follow her instincts and do what was right.
Sliding out her phone from the pocket of her pink towelling dressing gown, Lola dialled a number. She moved across to her bed in the corner of the grey velvet room, listening to check no one was coming.
The phone rang several times before it was eventually answered by a sleepy voice.
‘Hello?’
‘Franny, it’s me, Lola.’
There was silence on the phone before Franny spoke again. ‘Hello, Lola. It’s good to hear your voice.’
‘You might not think that after I’ve said what I need to. I’ll get right down to the bones of it: I want to know what the hell’s going on. Alfie’s in a real state. His head’s all over the place. How could you do it to him? I thought you loved him. I thought you were different, and to tell you the truth, Fran, I’m shocked. I keep telling myself there must be a good explanation, a reason why you robbed him blind, but for the life of me I can’t think of one.’
Sighing, Franny quietly but firmly said, ‘Lola, I love you, you know I do, but this isn’t anything to do with you.’
Not remembering a time when she’d ever raised her voice to Franny, Lola, upset by her coldness, shrieked down the phone. ‘But that’s where you’re wrong, darlin’. It is to do with me, because I thought we were family and family don’t do this to each other. What is it? Have you met someone else? Want to set up shop on your own? Or is it some kind of payback that you’ve been planning all along?’
‘Lola, that’s not what happened. You’ve got it all wrong. Look, I’m tired, it’s the middle of the nigh—’
Franny stopped, realising what she was about to say.
Frowning, Lola asked, ‘What do you mean? You were going to say middle of the night, weren’t you? For God’s sake, Fran, tell me where you are. Are you in trouble? Is that it? Cos I know you, my Franny wouldn’t do anything like this.’
‘Lola, please, you trust me, don’t you?’
Lola sniffed, her body stiffening as she sat on the silky grey covers. ‘I did. I thought you were the most trustworthy person I ever met.’
‘I still am.’
Forcing back the tears, Lola closed her eyes. ‘Well, you’ve got a funny way of showing it. At least speak to Alfie, sort this out with him before it’s too late. He’s devastated, sweetheart, and not just because he needed that money for his business deal – which thanks to you looks like it’s now going to fall through – but because he loves you. He’d never loved anyone in his life before he met you. You’ve broken his heart, not to mention mine.’
‘Lola, I have to go. I’m sorry. Just know that if there was any other way, I would’ve chosen it. Look after Alfie for me, won’t you? I hope that one day I’ll be able to explain.’
‘Franny, listen to me—’
Lola sat looking at the phone as Franny cut it off.
‘Who was that?’
She jumped, not realising anybody had come into the room. It was Alfie. His handsome face stern and suspicious.
‘No one.’
Pushing back his black hair away from his eyes, Alfie walked across to Lola. Standing over her, his six-foot-plus muscular frame dwarfing her, he said, ‘You weren’t speaking to no one, you were speaking to someone and I want to know who that someone was.’
Fidgeting with the phone, Lola smiled, assuming innocence. ‘When I say no one, I mean it was no one important. You know, one of those cold calls.’
Alfie bent down towards her, his nose inches away from Lola’s. ‘You’re lying to me. I always know when you’re lying. Don’t go behind me back, Lola, otherwise you and I are going to fall out, big time.’
Feeling guilty, Lola looked Alfie straight in the eye. ‘And why would I want to do that, hey? Listen, I know you’re having a hard time, Alfie, but there’s no need to get paranoid. Look, lovely, why don’t I make us a coffee, this one’s gone cold. I’ll make you and Vaughn a bit of breakfast, what do you say? Look, darlin’, I am so sorry that you’re hurting. I hate to see you like this.’
Alfie shook his head, feeling the shame creeping over him. ‘No, I’m the one who’s sorry; I shouldn’t take it out on you. This thing with Franny is eating me up. If only I could get to speak to her, you know?’
Lola gave a tight smile but said nothing as she continued to listen to Alfie. ‘But I guess her message is loud and clear. It’s pretty obvious how she feels, cos she won’t even answer my calls, so I’m left here not knowing what I’ve fucking done. Have you any idea what that feels like? I should’ve known though, shouldn’t I? Look at her father and Cabhan: gangsters, faces, and they taught her everything she knows. What do they say? The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.’
