Playing Dead

by Jessie Keane

  He moved into the hall and past the mirror where he’d always paused before, paused to check his appearance, his faultlessly handsome face . . . and now he saw himself in it, the scars on either side of his mouth making a mockery of his memories. He saw a monster.

  People will try to hurt you, he heard his father say.

  And the mean, crazy old bastard had been right all along – people did try to hurt you, and sometimes they even succeeded. Like dear old dad had hurt him, cutting him out of his will without a thought for how he would manage without the money the house would have brought him.

  He turned away from the mirror and went on through the hall to the kitchen at the back of the house. He kicked his way out of the back door and stumbled outside, into the overgrown garden. The lawn was knee-high and thick with brambles; it hadn’t been touched in years.

  He waded through the weeds and detritus, burrs catching his trouser legs and dew dampening them right up to the knee. He went to the workshop, where the horseshoe still hung, rusty and decaying now, above the door.

  For luck, he heard his father’s voice say.

  Well, it hadn’t brought Rick Ducane any luck and it certainly hadn’t brought Frances any either.

  He opened the door and moved inside.

  Looked around at the guns, the knives, the boxes stuffed full of instruments of death.

  What you need, boy, is an arsenal, said Rick Ducane’s voice.

  And look at this!

  He had one. Even better than the one he’d been gathering together in the States.

  Chapter 50

  ‘And where is my favourite girl?’ asked Alberto.

  ‘What?’ Annie asked, startled. She was sitting with her chin propped on her hand, stirring her coffee, glad that the night was over, that it was morning, that the sun was bright outside and the forecast promised more hot weather to come. Not that it mattered to her, not really. Rain or shine, it was all the same.

  Layla was somewhere with Gerda, not here with her, and the knowledge of that, the absence of her little girl when she craved her so badly, was like a hard gnawing pain in her belly.

  Soon, surely, Gerda would get in touch? She had to. Annie had already gone to the room Nico had occupied, and turned it upside-down searching for some clue to Layla’s whereabouts; she’d found nothing. Nothing except the contact details for the management team at the new club in Times Square, the one Nico had put in place before they left the States. She was still the majority shareholder of the new Annie’s, and she knew she ought to be doing something about that. She owed it to Constantine, who had set up the purchase in the first place. To just let the whole thing go to hell, to let it fall in its entirety into Lucco’s clutches, would be an insult to his memory.

  And now his family were here, and she was wondering whether it would be best to go somewhere else, anywhere else; but her innate obstinacy had kicked in. Lucco would love to see her run for cover. Spiting him was reason enough to make her stay.

  They were at the breakfast table in the dining room – her and Alberto, Aunt Gina and Daniella. Cara and Rocco hadn’t yet put in an appearance, and neither had Lucco. Neither, much to her relief, had Max.

  ‘Layla,’ said Alberto patiently. ‘Where is she?’

  ‘Oh.’ Annie jolted upright, thinking quickly. ‘Gerda’s taken her out to stay with my sister for a few days.’

  ‘And how are you, since the . . .?’ he asked, looking at her with Constantine’s eyes.

  He means the baby, thought Annie. Since the miscarriage.

  ‘I’m fine now,’ said Annie.

  ‘You don’t look it. Come on, eat something.’ He pushed some toast and conserve towards her.

  Annie started slathering the red goo onto the toast. It looked like congealed blood. Alberto was watching her, so she took a bite anyway, but nearly choked on it as Max came into the room and sat down beside her.

  ‘Morning,’ he said to them all, while the maid poured out coffee for him.

  Gina nodded sourly. Daniella blushed then smiled shyly at him before returning her attention to her breakfast. Annie looked at the toast and determinedly took a few more bites. Alberto was right. She had to start eating again.

  Alberto nodded a greeting to Max. ‘I know it’s hard,’ Alberto said to Annie. ‘It was bad enough losing Papa, but then to lose the baby too . . . any woman would buckle under the strain.’

  Annie wished she could just sink into the floor and disappear. She was hotly aware of Max sitting right there, taking all this in.

  ‘Look, the plan is that we’ll spend a few days here, then we’ll all shoot off to Sussex for the races. You can just rest until then, but you will come with us, won’t you?’

  ‘Oh, I . . .’ Annie started. Winding Lucco up by being here was one thing, but joining the whole bunch of them on a family outing was the last thing she wanted to do.

  ‘Papa would have wanted us to carry on the family traditions,’ said Alberto firmly.

  Oh shit, she thought. He was right. Constantine would have wanted it, she knew that. She took a breath.

  ‘Okay,’ she said. ‘Why not?’

  She could think of a thousand reasons why not.

  ‘And Annabella’s running,’ added Alberto.

  Annabella had been Constantine’s last equine acquisition, a stunning and speedy filly he’d named after Annie. Annabella was stabled at Newbury, at Josh Parsons’ yard: Josh was the trainer who’d handled all Constantine’s horses here in the UK. Now Annabella and the other horses, like nearly everything else, belonged to Lucco.

  ‘I know you will probably want to be alone until then, but we won’t get under your feet – will we Aunt Gina?’

  ‘No,’ said Gina with a tight smile at Annie. ‘Of course not.’

  ‘Excuse me,’ said Annie, jumping to her feet and quickly leaving the room.

  She went into the study, trying to find a quiet corner, but Lucco was sitting there at the desk, talking into the phone and smiling.

  ‘’Bye, Sophie,’ he said when he saw Annie there.

  He put the phone down and stared at her as she came in and shut the door behind her.

  ‘Oh – sorry,’ she said, and was opening the door again when he said: ‘No – stay.’

  Annie let the door close. Sophie? she thought.

  ‘I wasn’t expecting you to be in here,’ she said.

  ‘You weren’t expecting me at all, were you?’ Lucco smiled. ‘You looked so shocked when we arrived last night. You know, the risks you take, you really do need a bodyguard. I hope this Mark Carson comes highly recommended?’

  ‘Yeah. He does.’

  ‘I’m surprised Nico just left you here, unattended.’

  Annie shrugged. ‘He said he had business back in the States.’

  Lucco sat back in his chair – in Constantine’s chair – and eyed her speculatively.

  ‘You know, I’m sorry we parted on such bad terms.’

  ‘Forget it,’ said Annie.

  ‘I know you were upset when I refused you entry to the Manhattan penthouse.’ He smiled. ‘It’s sold, by the way.’

  ‘Oh? Good for you.’ Annie’s jaw was clenched so hard she could hear it creaking.

  ‘It’s just business,’ he went on. ‘Nothing personal. Just as when I leave here – my house – I will expect you to hand your keys back and not to come here again unless it is with my express permission.’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Annie.

  ‘Unless we can come to some mutually acceptable arrangement . . .?’ he said smoothly. His eyes were crawling over her.

  Annie shuddered but forced herself to give him a twisted smile. ‘I don’t think so,’ she said.

  ‘No? That’s a shame.’

  ‘Ain’t it just,’ she said, and opened the door and stepped back out into the hall. She was crossing to the stairs when Max came out of the dining room.

  ‘So,’ he said, ‘at what point were you going to tell me that Barolli got you up the duff?’

 
Annie glared at him. ‘At no point. Since it’s none of your bloody business. And can you keep your voice down?’

  Max squared up to her and hissed: ‘You think it’s not my business when my wife’s pregnant by another man?’

  ‘He was my husband. And the baby’s not a problem any more,’ said Annie, her voice nearly breaking with the effort to remain calm. ‘As Alberto said, I lost it. It’s dead. Just like its father. Happy now?’

  Max folded his arms and stared hard at her face.

  ‘What?’ she demanded.

  ‘Oh, I’m just wondering how it could have worked, you and him. I knew Constantine. He always had to be the boss. And you’re such a bloody handful, such a bolshy cow at the best of times.’

  Annie glared at him. All right, maybe he had a point. Maybe she had suppressed her true personality just a little with Constantine. But she’d be damned before she’d admit it to Max.

  ‘This “Gerda” woman been in touch with you yet?’ he asked.

  Annie shook her head. She so wished that Gerda would call, and yet, if she did, she knew she would lose Layla in an instant. Her guts were knotted with hope and terror every time she heard the phone ring. She was frantic for news and at the same time scared to death that she would get it.

  The dining-room door opened and Daniella came out, saving her from the necessity of dredging up an answer. Daniella looked lost; the poor little bint always looked lost. Annie felt so sorry for her, married to a nasty piece of work like Lucco. She left Max and went over to the girl.

  ‘Hey, shall we go out?’ she asked.

  ‘Sorry . . .’

  The girl’s English was improving rapidly, but it still wasn’t the best.

  Annie made hand gestures. ‘You. Me. Out?’

  Daniella’s face split in a wide smile.

  ‘Go get ready, then,’ said Annie, and Daniella hared off up the stairs. Half smiling, Annie watched her go. She liked Daniella very much.

  ‘I’d better get ready too,’ said Max.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Wherever you go, I go too, remember?’ He gave a humourless smile. ‘I’ll drive you.’

  ‘That’s not . . .’

  ‘Button it, Mrs Barolli. As I said before, I’m not letting you out of my sight.’

  Chapter 51

  ‘One question,’ Annie hissed at Max in fury. ‘Just one.’

  ‘Yeah, what?’ he said, tight-lipped.

  ‘Why are you so damned nice to Daniella, when you’re such a complete shit to me?’

  They were in the Burlington Arcade in Piccadilly, a nearly two-hundred-year-old covered building stacked with antique emporiums, expensive perfumeries and jewellery shops. Daniella was swooning over a coral necklace in one of the brightly lit shop fronts, while Annie and her fake ‘security’ stood to one side. Daniella loved the Arcade with its ‘beadles’, liveried guards dressed in Edwardian frock coats and top hats. She thought it was so quaint, so English, with its strictly enforced rules of no whistling, no bikes and no spitting.

  ‘There’s a simple answer to that,’ said Max under his breath. ‘Daniella’s a sweet young girl, and you’re a fucking tart.’

  ‘Annie, do you think I could buy that?’ Daniella came hurrying over to them, indicating the necklace.

  Max was weighed down with bags, all of them Daniella’s. When Annie had asked him to carry her bags, he had told her to carry them her effing self and that he was not her bloody servant.

  Annie looked at Daniella. Really, you had to like the girl. She was so fresh and innocent with that messy fall of glossy dark hair, her air of excitement, her big dark doe-eyes. Daniella was a most unlikely Mafia queen – but that was precisely what she was now: she was the wife of the Don; she would be accorded great respect just like Annie had been when Constantine was alive.

  Poor little thing, Annie thought.

  She’d come over from Sicily to marry an unkind stranger, someone picked out and agreed upon by her parents years ago. Her wedding day had been blighted by tragedy. Annie hoped that wasn’t an omen of more trouble to come.

  ‘Daniella,’ said Annie, ‘you could buy this entire building if you wanted.’

  The girl looked bemused. Her English wasn’t great, but she seemed to understand most things. She must surely understand that she was an extremely wealthy woman now. She turned back to the shop, flashed Annie a brilliant smile, and hurried inside.

  Max and Annie stood there as people walked around them.

  ‘You know, I’d almost forgotten how thoroughly fucking nasty you could be,’ said Annie.

  ‘Yeah, and I’d forgotten you’re a tramp. Thanks for reminding me,’ said Max.

  Annie stared at him. She knew his face so well, almost like her own. But inside, he was different: colder, crueller.

  ‘I won’t let you take my daughter away from me, you bastard,’ she said.

  ‘How you going to stop me?’ he asked.

  ‘Any way I can.’

  ‘Yeah?’ He leaned in, his eyes staring into hers. His voice cut into her like a whiplash. ‘Don’t make me laugh. Look at the state of you. You’re a fucking lightweight. All you do is marry money, or steal it. Wealthy men have always floated your boat, ain’t that the truth? And you don’t have the backing of one any more. You’re on your own.’

  They were standing there among the shoppers, apparently talking amiably, while spitting insults at each other.

  ‘You shit,’ said Annie, enraged, charging at him for a split-second, wanting to dent that calm exterior.

  ‘Yeah, go on then,’ he said when she stopped, gathered herself. He was smiling sarcastically. ‘Just try it. Hit me. See where it gets you.’

  ‘Oh, so now you’re threatening me?’ Annie snorted. She shook her head and sneered at him. ‘You won’t lay a finger on me. You think I know where Layla is, you think I’ve hidden her away from you. Don’t you? You damage me, you might lose Layla for good. Ain’t that the truth?’

  ‘Listen,’ said Max, leaning in, glaring. ‘If I thought for one minute that you knew where she was, I’d have knocked it out of your cheating arse by now.’

  He was lying and she knew it. Max Carter would never strike a woman. It would be beneath him. Or at least . . . the Max Carter she had known wouldn’t do that. But he had changed.

  ‘I never cheated on you,’ snarled Annie. ‘They told me you were dead. I believed you were dead.’

  ‘You didn’t even look, did you?’

  ‘Look where?’ Annie burst out. ‘Where would I have started? They said they’d kicked you down a mountain, they’d seen you die. You know what it’s like out there; you know it would have been impossible to find anyone in those mountains. And why would they have lied to me?’

  Max was staring at her, breathing hard. ‘Maybe to hurt you.’

  Annie looked away. ‘Well fortunately they didn’t,’ she snapped, but that wasn’t true; it had hurt her beyond belief, ripped the heart out of her.

  Her angry words hung between them as Daniella came dashing back out of the shop, clutching a small burgundy-red bag.

  ‘I got it!’ she crowed, delighted. She dived into the bag and opened a velvet box to show them both her find. It was lovely, and would suit her olive-dark colouring perfectly. ‘Do you think Lucco will like me wearing this?’ she asked, and there was an edge of anxiety in her voice now.

  You’re wasting your time there anyway. Lucco’s a selfish, uncaring bastard, thought Annie, trying to calm down. She had already noticed how dismissively Lucco treated his new young bride. She thought that Daniella could troop round the house naked and he’d barely even notice – or care.

  ‘He’ll love it,’ she said out loud. Why load more misery onto the poor cow?

  Chapter 52

  Frances Ducane was spying on Rocco and he knew he was cheating on his wife again. Within days of arriving in London, Rocco was slipping out to clubs in the evenings and then taking young men off to one of the smaller, cheaper hotels near Soho to rent a room by the
hour.

  Bet his ever-loving wife doesn’t know about all this, he thought, watching them with envy and hatred in his eyes as they smiled and chatted with each other.

  The latest one was handsome and blond. Tall and thin.

  Once, Frances had been handsome too, but not now.

  He thought of Rocco, and how much he loved and hated him.

  How harsh Rocco’s treatment of him had been.

  How unforgivable.

  Frances knew what he had to do now.

  She was sorting her problems out, one by one, ticking them off her fingers. Trying to pretend that her whole world hadn’t descended into madness. That Constantine wasn’t dead. That Annie Carter still lived and breathed.

  ‘It’ll have to be done when I’m not there,’ she said as they strolled in the sunshine. ‘I don’t want any comebacks. We’re all out next Tuesday – you can do it then.’

  But do it how? Frances had kept a few pieces in the States, but here he was spoiled for choice. He had a whole armoury of weapons to choose from, inherited from his father and all stashed down at his home in Whereys in Kent – so he’d have to start moving it all out soon now, before the new owner took possession.

  New owner! The owner should have been him.

  ‘Have you any preference?’ he asked her politely.

  ‘Preference? What do you mean?’ She frowned at him.

  ‘For the method. The method to use,’ he said, his tongue snaking out to moisten his lips as he spoke.

  He was weird. But he was also useful: she had to keep reminding herself of that.

  ‘I don’t care what method you use,’ she told him. ‘You choose, okay? I don’t want to know. Just get it done.’

  Chapter 53

  Annie, Daniella and Max didn’t get back to Holland Park until late in the afternoon. Max went off to park the car, and Daniella went into the drawing room to show Aunt Gina her purchases. Tired to the bone, Annie trudged up the stairs, longing for a shower and a lie-down.