Persuading Annie (35 page)

Right. To work.

He switched on the kettle and, to silence the emptiness that echoed in his ears, he turned on the radio.

Two minutes later he walked his coffee into the front room which doubled as his study. He tidied up the sofa and switched on his computer.

Ah, Annie had sent him another nondescript, indecipherable e-mail. How nice.

He clicked on.

He read it once.

And then again:

Life’s too short. If you don’t both seize the wonderful gift life offers you with great bit fat fistfuls, you could spend the rest of your life regretting it.

You have a choice. A life of lonely regret or happiness with some pain along the way.

You choose.

I love you both.

A

Jesus. It was all or nothing with that girl.

With a nasty shock, he realised she’d sent the same e-mail to both of them. So Joy had received the same message. What could that mean? Did Joy know how he felt? Thank God he’d cancelled her! He’d never be able to look at her in the face again. What did Annie think she was doing?

He started replying to Annie, but his hands were shaking so much above the keyboards, he couldn’t get beyond
Daer Anie
…

The knock on the door made him jump so high he almost fell off his chair.

He stretched to the window and looked through the net curtain to the front door.

There stood Joy. As she looked over, he let the net curtain drop.

Oh bother, now she’d seen him, she knew he was there. What was she doing here? Was she going to be angry with
him for sending Annie e-mails about her? Was she going to demand for him to be turned away from the Samaritans for stalking her?

Maybe she hadn’t seen her message yet. Maybe she was just popping round to see if he wanted anything from the shops …

She knocked again. Louder this time.

He knew he had no choice. He walked, like a prisoner to his execution, towards his front door. Thankfully it was a very short walk.

He opened the door.

He stared at Joy. Her eyes seemed more bright than usual, but it was an edgy brightness.

‘Marlon.’

‘Joy.’

They looked at each other a bit more.

‘Are you going to invite me in or do I have to use force?’

‘Do come in.’

Now he was really terrified.

They stood in the hall, aware that the small but significant movement from terraced street to narrow hall had done nothing to ease the tension.

Maybe it was just a lighthearted social call …

‘I take it you got the e-mail.’

Oh Jiminy.

‘I just found it.’

‘I take it that’s why you cancelled me this morning.’

Was that pain and embarrassment behind her abruptness? His heart went out to her. It almost killed him to know he’d hurt Joy.

‘No—’

‘First you flirt
shamelessly
with me for five years. Then you
use me as a well-padded shoulder to cry on when your wife leaves you. Then you cancel me – no excuse – just because some silly girl in New York seems to have got it into her head that I can’t take—’

‘I love you.’

His voice was brittle with fear.

‘What?’

‘I love you.’

It was surprisingly less terrifying to say the second time.

They stared in shared disbelief at each other.

Marlon felt ashamed.

‘Sorry.’

Joy’s smile was slow and full. Her voice was suddenly full of tenderness.

‘About bloody time,’ she whispered.

Later that evening, toes entwined under the warm blankets, they toasted the New Year in together and thought of Annie with more gratitude than she’d ever know.

* * * * *

The 31st December started sluggishly in New York as if, aware that it was the last day of the year, it just didn’t have the energy to do it all over again. Annie knew the feeling. She lay in bed, too tired to get up, too wired to sleep. Scraps of information whizzed and whirred round her brain so fast that they met, fused and sparked, creating entire new worlds of emotion. The Big Bang was going on inside her head. Unsurprisingly, she was getting a headache.

The sound of a phone ringing interrupted her thoughts. Safe in the knowledge that no one else in the apartment would bother to answer it, she forced her body out of bed and over to her phone, beside the chaise longue.

‘Annie it’s me,’ whispered Cass urgently.

Annie’s heart stopped for a beat.

‘My God,’ she croaked, wide awake, ‘are you all right?’

‘Yes—’

‘Sure?’

‘Yes—’

‘The baby’s all right?’

‘Yes—’

‘Have you had your test results yet?’

‘Yes, everything’s fine—’

‘What’s up?’

‘Annie! You have to come in and see me.’

‘I was going to. I’ve only just got up—’

‘Yes, but you’ve got to come in soon, before my mum gets here or Edward. It’s very important.’

‘Why? What’s happened?’

‘We can’t tell you over the phone. We have to tell you face to face.’

‘
We?
’

‘Just get here. Quick.’

And the phone went dead.

For some reason Annie was terrified. What the hell was so important that Cass had called her specially? And who was ‘we’?

Annie convinced herself during her shower that ‘we’ was Jake and Cass. They were going to elope and they needed Annie to put Brutus and Susannah off their trail.

Fumbling frantically for her clothes, she changed her mind. Jake had told Cass that Annie had been obsessed with him for seven years and he’d had enough. He would be waiting for her with cameras from the
Ricki Lake Show
to humiliate her into closure.

In the taxi on the way to the hospital, she changed her mind again. Jake had confessed his true feelings for Sophie – he had been in love with her all along– to Cass, and Cass wanted Annie to spike David’s drink and give Sophie concussion again—

The taxi arrived at the hospital.

She ran into Cass’s room and saw straight away who ‘we’ was. It was a big disappointment.

Dr Sarah Hastings was sitting in the chair next to Cass’s bed and Annie’s entrance interrupted their deep conversation.

‘Thank God! I thought you’d never get here,’ started Cass.

‘Is this going to be a big shock?’ asked Annie, sitting on the other chair by Cass’s bed. ‘Because I’m not very good with shocks.’

Cass sighed deeply.

‘I don’t know.’

‘Oh dear.’

Dr Hastings spoke.

‘I think you should know something that might – might upset you,’ she said.

Oh no, thought Annie. Jake is a Mafia boss, using the screen of consultancy as a front … No, wait! He’s a
woman
, like in that film—

‘It’s about Edward.’

Who? The stunned, baffled expression on Annie’s face seemed to worry the other two.

‘Oh dear, this might be even more difficult than we thought,’ whispered Cass. ‘Be gentle with her,’ she told Dr Hastings. ‘Pretend you’re telling a much-loved patient that they’re dying.’

Dr Hastings nodded. ‘Eddie Goddard is an ex-convict who’s embezzling money out of your father’s business.’

‘Jesus Christ!’ exclaimed Cass. ‘Remind me not to come to
you
if I’m dying.’

Annie was mute.

This meant she
shouldn’t
marry him, right?

She turned slowly to Cass.

‘It turns out that—’ started Cass.

‘Back in England, before I specialised, I did a stint as a doctor for Pentonville Prison,’ interrupted Dr Hastings, ‘Eddie was one of the inmates there.’

‘Plain old Eddie Goddard,’ interrupted Cass again. ‘His parents were rich, but certainly not related to aristocracy. He went to Eton so he had all the right contacts but went totally off the rails and once his parents lost all their money in some hideous investment cock-up, he used all his old contacts for his own illegal aims.’

‘But why – why me?’ asked Annie.

‘It’s just part of his trick,’ explained Dr Hastings in the same tone as she would explain that someone prefers two sugars in their tea rather than one. ‘He gets inside a company and steals from within. And if possible, he screws the prettiest girl in the company. But he had a bit of a thing about you. I’m afraid that was my fault.’

Cass and Annie stared at her.

‘I used to bring him in
Hello
and
Tatler
. There were pictures of you all over his cell walls. In fact, I was very jealous.’

‘Jealous?’ repeated Cass and Annie, shocked.

‘Yes, jealous,’ sighed Dr Hastings. ‘We had a very short-lived fling. I couldn’t help myself. A moment of madness.’ She looked down at her hands as she mumbled this.

Annie and Cass both suddenly felt sorry for her.

‘He can be very persuasive,’ murmured Annie reflectively.

‘And totally convincing,’ added Cass.

Dr Hastings shook her head. ‘That’s nothing. You should have seen him in his prison outfit. Buns of steel.’

Cass and Annie blinked.

‘Anyway, as soon as he came out of prison, he actively sought you out,’ continued Dr Hastings to Annie.

Annie put her head in her hands.

‘So, let me get this straight,’ she said weakly. ‘He hasn’t got management experience?’

Cass gave a deep sigh.

‘Annie, the man’s a convicted crook,’ she said slowly. ‘Nothing he has ever told anyone holds any water.’ She paused.

Annie waited for her answer. Clues weren’t enough any more.

‘No. He has no management experience.’

Annie shook her head and finally spoke slowly. ‘So while we’ve been hoping that he can save us from ruin,
he’s
the one who’s been ruining
us
.’

Dr Hastings and Cass looked at her sadly.

‘The more keen he is on you, the more money he’s been swindling out of your father’s company. It heightens the chase for him.’

They all sat in silence for a moment, letting their minds catch up with this latest piece of information.

‘Are you all right, honey?’ asked Cass quietly.

‘No!’ whispered Annie, exasperated, hot tears stinging her eyes. ‘I’m not all right. I’m furious with Edward. I’m furious with myself for enjoying his company and friendship and flattery so much and … and for falling for his lies. I’m terrified of what he’s done to the company and all of our futures. I’m angry with you, Cass – yes I am – and your mother, for always trying to influence my thoughts. Why couldn’t you both just leave me alone?’

She slumped in her chair.

‘And I just don’t know who to believe any more,’ she mumbled finally.

She took a deep, deep sigh, that seemed to reach her toes.

‘Happy New Year.’

For the first time in Annie’s experience, Cass was speechless.

* * * * *

That was
it
, she thought furiously, as she stormed back to the apartment. She was
sick
of other people trying to tell her what to do, who to be, who to be with. She didn’t trust anyone any more, least of all Cass and Susannah. She could only trust herself. That was the last time she would ever let anyone influence her decisions.

When she got home, she was relieved to find she was alone. Her family were all out at a champagne luncheon at the Houselmans. They would be there for hours yet, before coming home to change for the New Year’s Eve celebrations at The Plaza hotel down the road.

She lay on her bed, exhausted. She was just about to phone Joy in London for a heart-to-heart, when the phone rang. She stretched out to answer it.

It was Jake. She was almost as unnerved by this as by his almost desperate tone.

‘Can we talk?’

She couldn’t have been more shocked if he’d asked ‘Can we rumba?’

‘Of course.’

‘Where’s your family?’

‘Out.’

‘How long for?’

‘Hours.’ She frowned. ‘Why?’

‘I can’t say over the phone. We’ll be there in a minute.’ And he hung up.

She sat up on the bed. What was all this with the ‘we’ again? What the hell was going on? Why was her body acting as if she was about to make a parachute jump? As if she didn’t know. How long had she got before Jake arrived? Was there time to put more make-up on? Was there time to—

The door buzzed.

Standing with Jake was a bulky man in a pastel puffa jacket with thin legs in black jeans. He looked like a rather ugly stick of candyfloss. Jake introduced him as a policeman and she forgot his name immediately.

‘We’d have been quicker,’ explained Jake, ‘but I thought you were actually
on
Fifth Avenue—’

‘Come in.’

It didn’t matter how much she kept thinking she was in control of her emotions, the sight of Jake always left her body in mild shell-shock. Ice-cold hands, hot head, stomach of blancmange.

She was surprised that there was still some residue anger left over from the last time she’d seen him when he’d walked out on her again. And now she had no fall-back position. She could hardly draw herself up to her full height and say to him chillingly, ‘Don’t you know I’m about to be engaged to an ex-convict who’s swindled my whole family?’

Didn’t quite have the right ring to it.

They walked into the drawing room where Annie sat down to stop her legs from trembling.

‘I’d offer you a drink,’ she said, ‘but I don’t think I’d get much of it in the glass.’

‘That’s OK,’ said Candyfloss Cop happily. ‘I don’t drink on duty. But Jake could make you one.’

Jake found the drinks cabinet and poured Annie a stiff whisky.

Duty? Did he say duty? This was a
duty
call?

‘So you know about Edward? Or should I say Eddie?’ she asked.

Candyfloss Cop and Jake looked at each other.

Jake handed Annie her drink and sat down next to her. He stopped himself from putting his arm round her.

‘You knew?’

‘I found out about half an hour ago.’

‘Who from?’

‘My friend Cass is in hospital. Her doctor knew Edward – Eddie – when he was in prison.’