Читать книгу The Annie Carter Series Books 1–4 - Jessie Keane - Страница 34

‘I think he’s had enough,’ said Annie, passing through the hallway and pausing to look at what Aretha was up to.

More and more Annie was becoming blasé about the sex parties. Men were a strange lot, straight sex seemed to be the last thing on their mind. One client had begged her to let him redecorate the kitchen – while stark naked of course – while Aretha whipped the crap out of him and told him to do it better. Annie had declined his request. The kitchen was off-limits to clients. Men! What a bloody strange bunch they were. In her limited experience, women were so much easier to please. Most women wanted a nice warm one-to-one cuddle – blokes wanted much more diverse pleasures.

‘Why? He’s a very naughty boy,’ purred Aretha.

This was becoming a practised part of their little act. Aretha was the slave mistress, the beater and abuser dressed in a leather basque and holding the whip, Annie was the prudishly clad, sweet voice of discipline and reason who said enough was enough. It was good cop/bad cop, really. Which was ironic, when you considered that the bloke who was strung up from the stairwell was a chief inspector.

‘Who’s a naughty boy then?’ asked Aretha, biting pineapple and cheese from a cocktail stick and then giving the copper a playful stab in the buttocks with the point. He shrieked with ecstasy and writhed about.

Frankly, Annie had seen prettier sights than this middle-aged man, his fat arse slick with baby oil, hung up there like a sodding Christmas ham. It tickled her that Chris was still sitting by the front door, his face impassive. He could have been a eunuch standing guard in a harem for all the interest he showed in the proceedings.

‘Another ten minutes.’ Annie looked at the alarm clock set up on the hall table. It would ring at three o’clock in the afternoon, announcing to their visitors that it was time to get gone. She was always relieved at this point, however much she became accustomed to what happened here. Dolly was upstairs with two punters, Ellie was drinking sherry with one of their dear old fellows in the front room. Darren had a judge upstairs, doing God knew what. Connie Francis was belting out her latest on the radiogram, Annie loved that song.

She was tired now, tired of smiling and being Madam. Their new barman, Brian, was boxing up the empties, putting the dirty glasses to one side. All the food had been cleared today. It had been a busy party, and very profitable. No trouble, either. All in all, a good day’s work.

Annie went through to the kitchen and put the kettle on. She kicked off her courts and sighed with pleasure. You couldn’t beat a cup of tea and a sit-down at the kitchen table with all your mates to talk over the day together. She looked around her happily, then frowned at the new kitchen door.

Not frosted glass now. She didn’t like it, but this one was solid wood, with a peephole and a Yale lock. At the kitchen window, which looked out over a tiny square of garden, there was now an iron grid. There was also a discreet strip of barbed wire on the fence at the bottom of the garden and the side of the house, and a solid securely locked side gate had replaced the pretty, white painted, wrought-iron one that used to be there.

None of this pleased Annie. She felt like she was living in fucking Stalag 13, and the wooden door blocked out a lot of light from the kitchen. Everyone was admitted from the front of the house now. No surprises, nasty or otherwise. She picked up Chris’s paper from the table and browsed through it, stopping dead when she came across a piece about two nightclubs being burned to the ground. Arson was suspected. The clubs were owned by the ‘influential’ Delaney family, it said. Enquiries were ongoing.

Annie sat down at the table. Yeah, sure, she thought. The Bill were sure to enquire closely about what happened to gangland clubs, weren’t they. She hugged herself and shivered. She’d been feeling down since going over to Mum’s to see Ruthie. She didn’t know what she’d expected. Maybe a tearful, happy reunion? Perhaps for Ruthie to hug her and say, there, there, it’s all forgotten. To be forgiven for the unforgivable? What a fucking laugh. She’d told herself to buck up and get a grip. She’d done the deed, and these were the consequences. Still, she’d been undeniably low ever since. And now this!

Did the fires have anything to do with Eddie Carter falling off the twig? She couldn’t forget her own involvement, or Darren’s. Or the way Celia had bottled it and taken off, who the hell knew where. She looked again at the solid door and the metal grille over the window. No surprises, nasty or otherwise. Perhaps it was best to be on the safe side after all.

Redmond Delaney’s call came at four o’clock that afternoon. Everything was cleared and ready for the evening’s trade, Annie had luxuriated in a hot, deep bath, she’d got over the jitters. Wrapped in her thick towelling dressing gown, she came downstairs from her room at Chris’ call and picked up the phone.

‘Mr Delaney,’ she said as Chris shook out his paper and took his usual seat in the corner by the front door. ‘Are you keeping well?’

‘Very well, Miss Bailey,’ said Redmond. ‘And you?’

‘I’m good, Mr Delaney. Thank you.’

‘And how is business?’ he asked.

‘Thriving,’ said Annie. She considered mentioning the fires, but thought better of it. Her relationship with Redmond was strictly formal. She knew that any hint of familiarity would be met with a sharp rebuff.

‘The barman is satisfactory?’

‘Brian’s perfect, Mr Delaney.’ And I’m paying his wages out of my profits, thought Annie. But she couldn’t complain. The profits were bloody good. ‘I shall need more girls for the next party.’

‘I’ll put the word round,’ said Redmond.

‘Only nice girls,’ said Annie. ‘Presentable and clean and experienced.’

‘Exactly so,’ said Redmond.

‘Maybe six?’

‘Six it shall be,’ said Redmond. ‘Goodbye, Miss Bailey.’

‘Goodbye, Mr Delaney,’ said Annie, and started to put the phone down.

‘Oh, Miss Bailey?’ said Redmond.

‘Yes, Mr Delaney?’

‘I hope I shall see you at Kieron’s exhibition on Saturday night?’

Annie nearly dropped the phone. ‘Well … yes,’ she said in surprise.

She hadn’t planned to go, but she supposed she ought to put in an appearance, if only to give Kieron a bit of a boost. She was amazed that Redmond had mentioned it. This was surely crossing the line into informality. That wasn’t like him.

‘I look forward to it,’ said Redmond, and the line went dead.

‘Blimey,’ said Annie.

‘Problem?’ asked Chris.

‘No, not at all. Just Redmond Delaney being nice to me.’

Chris smiled and returned his attention to his paper. Annie put a call through to Kieron.

‘Listen, am I invited to this shindig on Saturday? This exhibition thingy?’ she asked.

‘Of course you are, if you want to come. I didn’t think you would.’

‘Why not?’

‘Because you’ve been such a reluctant sitter!’ barked Kieron. ‘Jaysus, you’ve acted right the way through as if I was trying to sell you into white slavery instead of painting your ruddy picture. I thought you’d hate to see the thing hung on a wall.’

‘Sorry,’ said Annie.

‘Apology accepted. Come as my guest, I’ll pick you up at eight, will that do you?’

‘Hadn’t you planned to take anyone else?’

‘No, I hadn’t. I’m a working artist, I haven’t time to be chasing girls all around the town, you’ll be doing me a favour. How about it then?’

‘Okay,’ said Annie. ‘Saturday at eight.’

After she’d put the phone down she realized that she hadn’t talked to Kieron about the fires, either. Ah, it was just as well. What would she say about it anyway? She didn’t want to go treading on dangerous ground. She didn’t want to know more than she knew already.