Black Widow

by Jessie Keane

  ‘No,’ said Annie, although she wasn’t surprised. And the irony of Tony calling her ‘Boss’ for the very first time didn’t pass her by, either.

  Some ‘Boss’.

  Jimmy Bond had put his cards on the table, had called her bluff. Had taken the kids off Kath. Had sent Annie Carter a message, loud and clear.

  He was the boss of the boys and the manor now, not her.

  She went back up the stairs and out the door with Tony, locking it behind her. The light was going, the grey weather was turning day into night. People were turning on their car headlights. In the distance, a woman walked away, a woman with a blonde Afro hairstyle. Could be Jeanette. Vita’s sister. Una’s sister. Danny’s sister. And why not? She lived just round the corner, in her little love nest with Jimmy. All very cosy, one big happy family plus Jimmy Bond.

  It was all starting to add up.

  And what it was starting to add up to was igniting a cold fire of fury in her belly, a stark and sickening realization in her mind. She had believed Jimmy’s attitude toward her to be nothing more than male posturing; she’d been sure he was acting up because she’d put his nose out of joint by coming back to rule the roost.

  But now there were all these new connections.

  Jimmy. Jeanette. Vita. Una. Danny.

  The fury consumed her now, leaving a cold and deadly purpose in its wake and a hard single fact in her mind: she had been misled into believing that Jimmy Bond was her friend.

  But he wasn’t.

  He was her enemy.

  61

  ‘So what do you think?’ Chris asked.

  Chris was getting to be a regular visitor at Dolly’s place. He liked a chinwag with Ross, and having a bite to eat with Aretha and the other working girls. It was about two o’clock on Tuesday, and he’d caught Annie on the stairs when she’d come in and headed straight up them, not wanting to chat, needing to be alone, to think all this through.

  ‘What?’ Annie paused on the bottom stair.

  Ross was off somewhere, probably on a fag break. Tony was out in the car. Chris and Annie were alone in the hallway.

  ‘About the…you know,’ said Chris pointedly. ‘The money.’

  He meant the job at his depot. The money. The huge stash of money that could have saved Layla’s life. Could have, but now wouldn’t.

  Annie shook her head. ‘No, it’s off.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Can’t get the muscle.’ She wasn’t about to tell him that the boys had just given her a resounding vote of no confidence. It stung too much. She had thought she was gaining ground with them, but now she knew exactly where she stood, and it wasn’t in a good place.

  ‘Yeah, but you got the Carter boys,’ said Chris, twisting the knife deeper.

  ‘No, Chris. It’s off.’ She started walking off upstairs. Didn’t want to hear any more about it.

  ‘If the boys don’t want to get involved, I can maybe get some people together.’

  Annie paused, shook her head in irritation. ‘Come on, Chris. Be reasonable. There ain’t time to set up a decent heist. And you don’t want to get into the heavy game. Think about it. We’d have to get you out and away somewhere; you wouldn’t be able to get in touch with your family or friends again; it wouldn’t be safe. Do you really want to go that far, just to please Aretha?’

  ‘We could do it,’ said Chris obstinately.

  ‘Oh sure. We could. Forget extra muscle, we could do it ourselves. You and me, Dolly and poor bloody Darren, Ellie and Aretha, all dolled up in balaclavas and packing shotguns. Get real, for fuck’s sake. Now drop it, okay? It’s off.’

  She went upstairs. She had decided what she was going to do now. She sat on the bed, still wearing her coat, and her mind was suddenly clear and sharp. Jimmy had called her bluff, but he was mistaken if he thought she wouldn’t send that straight back at him. She sat there, breathing deeply, listening to the sounds of sex coming from the other rooms. Una drifted past the half-open door in a black leather basque and fishnet stockings. She looked in, her eyes cold, her face still bruised from the pounding she’d got off Annie. Then she looked away.

  Watching me, thought Annie. She’s been watching me all the fucking time.

  Annie listened to Una’s footfalls as she went down the stairs. Annie wanted to run after her, grab her by her scrawny, drugged-up head and give her a harder pounding than last time, but she fought back the urge. No, she had to think. No good going off half-cocked, not with Layla’s life still swinging in the balance.

  Ecstatic moans were coming from Aretha’s room at the front of the house. Now there was a liberal marriage and no mistake. Chris was downstairs sipping tea; Aretha was upstairs shagging the clientele.

  Aretha and Una, both mistresses of the dominatrix trade—but there was a difference. Aretha enjoyed enslaving her willing victims, got a sensual buzz from chastising and humiliating them, but there was a line she wouldn’t cross. Una was another thing entirely. Una adored shouting and screaming at her victims, relished inflicting pain on them, loved to grind them, squirming in agony, beneath her booted heels.

  Max would rip my head off if I went on the game, she thought.

  But then, Max was gone. She was alone.

  And she wasn’t sure about Chris and Aretha. She wasn’t convinced that Chris was cool about Aretha coming back on the game. Maybe Chris was fed up with working nights, with the pitiful pay he got as a security guard; maybe he was edgy about Aretha’s return to the massage parlour.

  Maybe Chris felt Aretha was undermining his position as breadwinner by coming back to work; maybe Aretha was even doing it intentionally, saying: Look, you can’t keep me as I wish to be kept, so I’m going back to humping strangers for money, how’s that with you, honey?

  Marriages!

  Annie’s face clouded. Well, she didn’t have any of that any more. No more jealousy, no more tiptoeing around the male ego. She had nothing at all.

  The phone was ringing in the hall. She heard Dolly pick up. Then Dolly’s voice, taut with urgency, was calling up the stairs.

  ‘Annie! You there?’

  Annie went out on to the landing and peered over. Dolly, white-faced, was holding the phone aloft to her.

  ‘It’s him,’ she hissed. ‘It’s the fucking kidnapper.’

  Annie wasn’t even aware of going down the stairs. Suddenly she was down there in the hall, grasping the phone. Una was gone, thank Christ. She could hear Chris in the kitchen, talking in low tones to Ellie. Dolly stood there beside her, watching her face, wanting to help but unable to.

  ‘Hello?’ said Annie.

  ‘Ah, Mrs Annie Carter,’ said the Irish man.

  Annie’s heartbeat picked up. What the fuck was going on? It wasn’t Friday yet. She still had some time. Was he going to tell her they wanted the money now, right now? Oh Jesus God—if that was it, then she was well and truly stuffed.

  ‘What do you want?’ she asked stiffly.

  ‘Well that ain’t very friendly, now is it?’

  She could hear the smile in his voice—the loathsome piece of scum. She said nothing.

  ‘Just a social call, Mrs Carter,’ he went on. ‘Just checking you’ve got the money ready, that’s all.’

  That’s all.

  And she didn’t have it. Not a fucking penny.

  ‘Yeah,’ she lied. ‘I’ve got it.’

  ‘Good. Now I suppose you want to speak to your baby girl, Mrs Carter?’

  Layla.

  Annie closed her eyes, holding back the hot, sickening flood of hysteria. Dolly put an arm round her shoulders. She opened her eyes. Braced herself.

  ‘Can I? Can I speak to her?’ Her voice cracked on the last word.

  There was a pause.

  ‘Nah,’ he said. ‘Not yet. When Friday comes, when I get the money, Mrs Carter, then you can speak to little Layla, how’s that?’

  ‘You fucking bastard,’ said Annie, unable to hold it back.

  She had no way of knowing if Layla was alive o
r dead. Just to hear her voice would be so wonderful, so unbelievably sweet. He was playing with her, enjoying watching her writhing like a fish on a hook.

  ‘Yeah, and I’m the fucking bastard who’s got your girl, Mrs Carter, so you just remember that, you remember to keep a civil tongue in your head when you speak to me. Got it? Or maybe I’ll let you have a word now. What do you think?’

  Annie was swallowing bile, locked in this mad cycle of fury and loathing, feeling powerless and defeated.

  ‘Please—let me speak to her,’ she managed to get out.

  There was rustling at the other end of the phone. And then Layla said: ‘Mummy?’

  Annie let out a scream. Couldn’t help it. She’d been sure Layla was dead; she knew they’d tortured her, cut off her finger, and she sounded so sleepy…was she drugged, was that it?

  ‘Now,’ said the man’s voice after a few seconds. ‘You’ve got the cash, right? I’m just checking, because if you ain’t got it, if you’re lying or some damned thing—then, Mrs Carter, your little girl is dead.’

  ‘Let me speak to her again, you scumbag!’ yelled Annie into the phone.

  ‘No. No more talking. Just answer the question, you got my money?’

  Annie drew in a breath. Layla was alive. She was alive.

  ‘I’ve got it,’ she said.

  ‘Good. Nice to know we understand one another. Speak to you again on Friday. Twelve noon.’

  62

  Her life was in bits but she still had things to do, places to go. Tony drove her to the place she told him, and when they got there he looked at her and his eyes said, I don’t fucking well believe this.

  They were outside a breaker’s yard in Battersea. It was rumoured to be the same yard where Jack ‘The Hat’ McVitie’s car was crushed after he’d been done by the Krays. Forever after, the car had been known on the streets as ‘the Oxo’, because all that had been left of it was a tiny cube of mangled metal.

  ‘It’s okay, Tone,’ she reassured him. ‘Wait here, yeah?’ she said as they got out of the car and stood in front of the gates.

  The yard was completely fenced off with tall, thick wire panels. Tony looked at the security guard approaching with a black-faced Alsatian, snarling and yanking at its choke chain. At the back of the yard, piled high with the rusting hulks of dead cars, they could just glimpse the edge of a static caravan that served as an office.

  ‘No, Boss, I’m coming in with you,’ said Tony.

  The dog was going mad. The guard snapped a command at it, jerked the chain. The dog fell silent.

  Annie nodded acceptance of what Tony had said. Easier than arguing. Now she’d braced herself to do this, she hadn’t the energy for a fucking debate. Best to get it over with, get it done.

  The guard looked them over. And suddenly the one man became, as if by magic, three men. Big, hard, flint-eyed men who gathered around the other side of the fence and stared at them with extreme suspicion.

  One of them was Charlie ‘The Dip’ Foster, the Delaneys’ number one man. He stared at Annie as if he’d like to slit her open like a rotten fruit. She looked down at his hands: one was bandaged. Annie didn’t feel sorry, not any more—even though she knew she’d made a huge mistake over the Delaney involvement in Layla’s kidnapping. Charlie was a bastard; she was surrounded by bastards. If he had to refine his dipping technique to cope with his new disability, so what? Fuck him.

  ‘I’ve come to see Redmond,’ said Annie.

  ‘Maybe he don’t want to see you,’ said Charlie.

  ‘Just tell him I’m here,’ said Annie, hard-faced even though inside she was quaking.

  They all stood there looking at her sceptically. Charlie went away.

  He came back inside five minutes. He looked at the guard and nodded. Annie and Tony were ushered inside the yard.

  ‘Open the coat,’ said Charlie to Annie.

  ‘Hey!’ said Tony.

  ‘It’s okay,’ Annie told him, and unbuttoned her coat and held it open.

  Charlie watched as one of the other men searched her pockets and then frisked her with leisurely relish. By the time his pal had finished, Annie felt completely fine about the damage she’d done to Charlie Foster.

  Tony looked like thunder as the man repeated the exercise on him. Neither of them carrying, they had nothing to hide. Tony kept sending Annie looks that said, What the fuck are we doing here?

  ‘Okay, come on,’ said Charlie, and led the way.

  Inside the static, Redmond and Orla Delaney were sitting at a desk. They stared at her steadily as she came up the steps and walked in. It was basic in here—a desk, three chairs, a lamp, a kettle and tea tray, some filing cabinets. Nothing fancy.

  The twins said nothing. One man, one woman, with the same thick red hair, white skin, pale green eyes. Both tall, both thin. Book ends, thought Annie. A perfectly matched pair of beauties: cold as ice and twice as nasty.

  Finally, Redmond spoke.

  ‘Mrs Carter,’ he said cordially. The faint Irish lilt was there in his voice. Southern Irish, like the voice on the phone. But Redmond’s voice wasn’t harsh, it was low and well educated. Totally deceptive, as she knew only too well. This effete and perfect specimen of manhood had ordered Billy murdered with as much compunction as he would swat a gnat.

  Annie stepped forward. She felt nauseous and her hands were clammy with sweat. Her heart was pumping madly.

  ‘Hello Redmond,’ she said coolly. ‘Hello Orla.’

  ‘Annie,’ acknowledged Orla.

  ‘Can we do something for you?’ asked Redmond.

  Yeah, you can drop dead, the pair of you, she thought furiously.

  But Annie remained outwardly calm. ‘I’ve come here to set the record straight over a few things.’

  The twins stared at her flatly.

  Then Orla said: ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I’ve come to say that what you did to Billy was beyond the pale. He didn’t deserve it.’

  Redmond shrugged his shoulders. ‘We discussed this before, Mrs Carter. It was business. Nothing personal.’

  ‘It was personal to me,’ said Annie.

  Again the shrug. He didn’t give a fuck, she could see that. ‘And was there anything else?’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Annie. ‘Plenty. Max is dead. So’s Jonjo.’

  They were silent, staring. Brains whirring like calculators, if she was any judge.

  ‘They were hit in Majorca,’ she went on. ‘They’re gone.’

  ‘I see,’ said Redmond slowly.

  ‘Yeah, I bet you do. But what you don’t see yet—and I’m going to fill you in on this, stay with me—what you don’t see is that I’m taking over here. Now we were friends once, and because of that I’m telling you all this, just marking your card before you decide to do anything foolish.’ She could feel sweat trickling down her back. ‘All the shit stops here. I run the Carter patch now. It belongs to me, and that’s the way it’s gonna stay. Max is gone. Jonjo’s gone too. But I ain’t. So, before you get any ideas about taking over or anything rash like that, think again. I’ve got muscle, and no one is taking anything away from the Carters.’

  When she finished speaking, they were silent, taking it all in.

  ‘You’re still in Limehouse,’ said Redmond at last.

  ‘Not for much longer.’

  ‘Good.’

  ‘I appreciate you letting me stay there,’ said Annie, although it nearly choked her. ‘It’s temporary, as I said. But Dolly Farrell’s my friend and I’d like to call on her in the future if I can. I appreciate it’s your patch and I respect that. But I’d like to be able to call in there. Just occasionally.’

  Redmond shrugged again. ‘I don’t see why you shouldn’t. You see, Mrs Carter, I’m not an unreasonable man. Now if that’s all…?’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Annie. ‘That’s all.’

  She turned and walked out of the little office, back down the steps. She crossed the yard with Tony, and the guard let them out, the Alsatian emitting a
low, threatening growl throughout. Charlie Foster and his co-workers watched them blankly as they got back into the Jag.

  ‘Jesus,’ said Tony.

  Annie sat back, feeling on the point of nervous collapse. She closed her eyes.

  ‘Amen,’ she said faintly.

  63

  ‘Hot candle wax,’ Aretha was saying to Annie and the others later in the day when Annie got back. They were all sitting around the kitchen table. ‘Can you believe that?’

  ‘I can believe anything,’ said Darren, sipping tea and shivering.

  ‘But don’t it hurt?’ asked Dolly.

  ‘That’s the buzz, I guess,’ said Aretha with a shrug.

  ‘What a bloody pervert,’ said Ellie, dipping into the biscuit tin.

  ‘Hey, whatever gets you through the night,’ said Aretha. ‘That’s what massa wanted, that’s what massa got. So there I was, dripping hot candle wax on to his balls, and you know what? He seemed to like it.’

  ‘Takes all sorts,’ said Darren.

  ‘But when he said he wanted me to pass the flame over his cojones, I drew the line. Think that’s more Una’s bag than mine. She enjoys beating the living crap out of men, after all. Has a fucking orgasm when she hurts people. Burning their balls has just got to be a major turn-on for that bitch.’

  Annie took off her coat and sat down. Dolly pushed a mug towards her and poured the tea. Annie thought that marriage had softened Aretha, just the same as it had softened her. Which could be a bad thing, and she knew it. She wanted to tell Aretha, to warn her not to let her guard down too far, but she kept quiet and drank her tea. Tried, for five blissful minutes, not to think of the complete mess her life had become. Then Ross came in, and gave her a note.

  A pizzino, he said coldly. For Mrs Carter.

  ‘What’s it say?’ asked Dolly eagerly as Annie unfolded it. ‘Hey, that’s all numbers.’

  ‘It’s code,’ said Annie, and quickly deciphered it.

  It said: Come Friday morning. Early. C.

  ‘Is that from Constantine Barolli?’ asked Dolly. ‘He’s keen.’

  ‘He’s persistent, for sure,’ said Annie. She thought about Constantine: handsome as the devil and just as alluring. She still didn’t know if she could trust him. She didn’t know who she could trust any more. She looked across at Ellie, who was watching her. Redmond must know that she had been in talks with the Mafia boss, because Ellie knew and Ellie was the Delaneys’ insider. Nothing happened here that the Delaneys didn’t know about.