Authors: Jessie Keane
‘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?
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.’
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.
It was only when she was passing Cara’s bedroom door that she heard the grunts and moans coming from inside. She paused. The door was slightly ajar. She knew she shouldn’t, but she peeked inside and had to stifle a gasp.
There was a couple across the room beside the big line of fitted wardrobes, a man facing away from Annie, holding up a woman whose legs were wrapped around his waist. His trousers were down around his ankles and she could see his nude buttocks clenching and unclenching as he thrust hurriedly into the woman, each thrust pounding out a hard beat on the wardrobes behind her.
The woman was Cara.
‘You hot little
bitch
,’ he was groaning out, panting and pushing at her like she was a blow-up doll.
Cara’s response was about the same as he’d get from a doll, come to that. She was almost grimacing, staring blank-eyed over his shoulder, as if . . . as if she didn’t want this but couldn’t bring herself to say no.
Annie stood there, frozen in shock – and then Cara’s eyes met hers through the crack in the door.
Annie stepped back, embarrassed to have been caught spying. She quickly walked on along the hall to her own room, her mind wiped clean of all but the startling realization that Cara was playing away. The man between her legs wasn’t Rocco, her husband. It was Fredo, the driver.
She wasn’t even surprised when there was a tap on the door an hour later. She’d been lying on the bed, half dozing, and now she got up and went and answered it. Cara stood there, her expression guarded.
‘Can I come in?’ she asked.
‘Sure.’ Annie stepped back. Cara walked into the master suite, straight over to the window seat. She sat down. Annie came over and stood there, watching her.
‘Look,’ said Cara, ‘it’s not what you think.’
Annie shrugged and folded her arms.
‘Don’t give me that shit,’ she said flatly. ‘And don’t even take the trouble to explain. You don’t have to. All I would suggest is, if you want to fuck the help, at least shut the door.’
Cara’s eyes grew spiteful. ‘And what would you know about anything? You had a great man in my father. You would never have had to look elsewhere.’
‘Is that what you’re doing?’ Annie eyed her stepdaughter speculatively.
This was almost the longest conversation they’d ever had. And Cara had sought her out. She’d certainly never done
that
before. And thinking back . . . Annie remembered Cara coming up the stairs at the Montauk house, looking shattered. And then on the day of Lucco and Daniella’s wedding, Cara had been clearly unhappy, and Fredo had been watching her with a gloating gleam in his eye. If the girl was enjoying the excitement of a clandestine affair, shouldn’t she at least look happy about it?
Cara stared at the floor. ‘I’m not happy with Rocco. I told Papa so.’
Annie was intrigued despite her dislike. She sat down beside Cara.
‘And what did Papa say?’ she asked.
Now it was Cara’s turn to shrug. ‘Oh, nothing very much.’
‘If you were unhappy, I can’t believe that Constantine wouldn’t have suggested something to remedy the situation.’
Cara looked up, into Annie’s eyes. ‘He was too preoccupied – with
you
,’ she spat.
Well, she’d always known that Cara resented her. No big news there. She stood up. So much for the sisterhood.
‘So what do you want me to say?’ Annie asked. ‘You’re an adult. Adults sort their own problems out.’
Cara’s mouth opened but she bit back whatever words were about to tumble out. She looked away. Then she stood up. ‘Look, I just . . . I don’t want you telling anyone, Aunt Gina or Alberto or Lucco, about this.’
‘Why would I? It’s your business.’
‘All right then.’ Cara still looked uneasy. Annie felt she wasn’t getting the full story here; and looking at Cara’s closed, uncommunicative face, she doubted she ever would. And, come to that, did she care? Answer: no.
There were summer storms for a few days and then the sun came out again and everyone congregated around the swimming pool in the steaming grounds behind the house to soak up this rare event.
Annie had been studiously avoiding contact with everyone, especially Max. Dolly had called and said she wanted her over at the club soonest, but that would be some convoluted business problem that Dolly couldn’t sort without Annie’s say-so, and she didn’t want to do business right now so she was putting that off. She couldn’t think straight when she was so screwed up over Layla.
She’d forced herself to make the effort to call the management team at the new Annie’s nightclub in the States, and she’d been both surprised and relieved to find a very sharp-sounding individual called Sonny Gilbert in charge there. Sonny reeled off the state of preparations for the September opening, the guest list (‘You’re going to
love
it!’ he gushed), the planned advertising campaign, and he detailed for her the lushness of the new place’s interior, the colours they were using (‘
So
on trend!’), the particular size of the ‘Annie’s’ sign outside the venue.
‘Massive,’ Sonny told her happily. ‘Huge. You’re going to adore it, I promise you.’
Sonny was so enthusiastic, so patently on-the-ball, that Annie knew Nico had selected exactly the right person for the job.
‘I’ll send you pictures,’ he enthused. ‘If you’d like that, Mrs Barolli?’
Annie declined. Everything was in hand; right now, that was all she needed to know.
The day was so beautiful; the sun was blazing down. With nothing to do except worry about Layla, she thought she might have a swim in the heated pool in the grounds behind the house, try to relax if she could manage it. The trouble was, everyone else seemed to have had the same idea.
She had done a couple of lengths and was lying on a sun bed in her black bikini, which was nearly falling off her – she’d lost so much weight in the depths of her grief over Constantine and the baby.
Before very long, Cara was stretched out in a red thong and a barely there bikini top, and even Aunt Gina was out by the pool reading
The Financial Times
, sitting primly, fully dressed in her black mourning dress at a table sheltered by a parasol. Rocco dived in and shouted out: ‘Christ! I thought this pool was heated? It’s freezing!’ before doing slow, un coordinated laps. He was a terrible swimmer.
His wife was flicking through the pages of a magazine and paying him scant attention.
‘This is England, Rocco,’ she pointed out, sounding bored. ‘Pools are never hot enough. Beer is warm. And it rains nearly all the time.’ She glanced up at the radiant blue sky. ‘Just be grateful it’s not raining today. Or not
yet
, anyway.’
Lucco came out, looking svelte and toned in white shorts, and sat in splendid isolation at the other end of the pool. He was followed by Alberto, looking every bit as attractive as his darker, thinner brother; looking in fact so much like Constantine that for an instant, glancing up, Annie thought it
was
him once again, and her heart caught in her throat. Then Alberto smiled and sat down on a sun bed beside hers and the illusion was gone.
‘Stepmom,’ he said, dropping a quick kiss onto her cheek. ‘How are you?’
‘Baking nicely,’ said Annie, smiling at him because you could do nothing else
but
smile at Alberto, he was so charming – and, like his brother, so deadly, she reminded herself.
Then she looked beyond him and saw Max coming out onto the terrace in black bathing trunks, carrying a newspaper and a drink. He sat down at a distance, and she just knew that he’d seen that smiling kiss she’d exchanged with her stepson. He was wearing shades so she couldn’t see his eyes, but his mouth was grim.
Fuck it
, she thought. And then she wondered why it bothered her anyway. He thought she was a slut: nothing she did would make him change that opinion.
Lucco looked up and saw Max there. He glanced at Annie.
‘Do we
really
have to have the help intruding on private family time?’ he asked her.
You snobby little bastard
, she thought. But she smiled at him with her teeth gritted so hard that she felt her jaw ache. She didn’t want any confrontations developing between Max and Lucco. All she wanted was a little peace and quiet.
‘Mark is my security,’ she said. ‘He stays with me.’
Lucco glared at Max but then shrugged and got back to his paper.
Max didn’t even glance at either of them. He just stretched out on the sun bed with all the indolence of a big cat. Annie tried and failed to stop herself looking at his body, so tanned and muscular; she had to admit he looked super-fit and incredibly tough. On each of his ankles she could see a tiny circular mark, like a cigarette burn. Those hadn’t been there before.
‘I was upset that you left the States without even saying goodbye,’ Alberto was saying.
‘Hm?’ Annie’s attention shot back to him. She’d left the States because she was done there: finished. And Lucco had warned her off. And, she reminded herself, not even Alberto – whom she had believed to be her staunch ally – had let her know the will was being read.
‘What?’ he asked her, seeing her eyes fastened on his face.
‘Nothing,’ she said.
‘It’s not nothing,’ he laughed lightly. ‘Come on, give.’
‘You didn’t tell me when the will was due to be read.’
‘Oh, yeah. That.’ His face grew doubtful. ‘Lucco didn’t think we should tell you. You were so upset already, and you were really too ill to attend.’
‘Then it should have been postponed,’ Annie pointed out.
Alberto gazed steadily at his stepmother. ‘You were married to my father, you know how it works. The Don’s word is final. It always was, with Papa. Now it’s the same with Lucco. The will was Lucco’s call. Whatever he chose to be done about it, that would
be
done. Without question.’
‘But Constantine told me I’d have the New York penthouse, and this house, and all the shares in the Times Square club instead of fifty-one per cent. He said it was in the will.’
Alberto frowned. ‘I’m sorry. There was no mention of any of that. And it can’t be questioned. You do see that?’
He was worried about her, concerned where this questioning might lead her if she persisted with it. She could see
that.
He didn’t want her crossing swords with Lucco.