Ruthless (25 page)

‘Hm?’

‘Are you
aware
that there are four men watching you?’

Layla sighed. ‘My dad’s men. And Alberto’s.’

‘Oh, that’s good. They’re looking out for you.’

Layla shuddered. ‘I hate it,’ she said.

‘Is this how you always live? Under guard this way?’

‘No. It isn’t. It’s just . . .’ Layla stopped herself. She was in danger of saying too much. It was so easy to talk to Precious, to confide in her. And she mustn’t. ‘Something’s happened, that’s all. It’s put the family sort of on red alert.’

‘Ah, then I suppose all you can do is loosen up, let them carry on with their job of guarding you, and get on with your life.’

‘Loosen up?
How would
you
feel if someone was after you, someone you didn’t even know, so you had to be surrounded by all these
people . . .?’

Precious stared at Layla. ‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘Me and my big mouth. But, well . . .’

‘Well what?’

Precious shrugged. ‘You’re Max Carter’s daughter. I thought you’d be used to all this shit.’

‘I’m not.’ Layla felt guilty now. Precious was trying to be friendly, and she had slapped her down quite hard, for the second time. Both times, Precious had hit a nerve.

‘Look, I’m sorry I bit your head off,’ she blurted out. ‘And before, when we spoke about Alberto. Sorry.’

Layla swallowed a bite of sandwich. It was dry. She took a swig of Coke, then set it aside on the bench. She was going to have to start eating properly soon, but right now food just made her gag.

Precious waved a casual hand. ‘Ah, forget it. I do it all the time. Poke and pry. And I shouldn’t. People hate it. And you’ve been stressed to hell, I can see that.’

Stressed?
She’d been going out of her mind. She still was.

‘I know you were only trying to help,’ said Layla.

‘That’s true. I was.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘Forget it. It was nothing. If I’d known it was such a sore subject, I wouldn’t have opened my fat gob.’

‘Can I ask you something?’ said Layla.

‘Anything. Go on.’

‘About the dancing. It’s
naked
dancing, have I got that right?’

Precious shrugged. ‘Sometimes. Sometimes it’s a G-string, but mostly it’s nude.’

‘How do you
do
that? In front of strangers?’

‘Easy.’

‘And what about when – you know – you’ve got the curse?’

‘That’s easy too. Put in a tampon, cut off the string. Sorted.’

Layla was silent for a few moments. ‘You ever been in love with anyone?’ she asked finally.

‘God, yes. Too many to count,’ grinned Precious.

‘Not punters?’

‘Sometimes.’ Precious’s eyes grew distant. Then she turned her head and smiled at Layla. ‘Not often.’

They carried on eating, and shared the Coke. After a while Layla glanced at her watch. ‘Got to get back,’ she sighed, ‘or Etchingham’s going to kill me.’

She stood up, depositing the detritus from their meal into the nearest wastebasket.

‘It’s been nice,’ said Precious. ‘We should do this again.’

‘Yeah. Why not,’ said Layla, feeling a little pang of something, maybe happiness, settle into her gut. Precious had forgiven her, the sun was shining, she was back at work in a world she understood. All was well
except
. . . she had killed someone. The glimmer of happiness vanished in a flash.

The shooting filled her dreams, tormenting her nightly. It was there when she woke too. Occasionally, for a blissful moment, something else would distract her, but it was never long before the memory came crashing in on her again. She’d killed Orla Delaney.

As she left Precious and walked towards her office, her minders following, that tiny fragment of happiness fell away. There was danger all around the Carters, and none of them knew where it would come from next – or who was directing it.

She looked ahead, to her office block, to the third-floor window where she worked. It almost looked as though the glass was obscured. She stared, wondering what trick of the light had caused the effect. And then she realized that what she was seeing was smoke behind the glass. There was a
fire
in her office.

56

Annie was waiting at Ellie’s place when Layla showed up carrying a small cardboard box containing her Filofax, her pens and a few other bits and pieces.

‘What the hell’s going on?’ demanded Annie, stopping her in the upstairs hallway.

Layla looked blankly at her mother. This she didn’t need. Not now. She could see Ellie and Chris rubber-necking along the hall. She pushed past Annie and went into her room, dumping the box on to the bed.

‘I told you to stay put. Not to go wandering the streets. Not to go in to work. I
told
you.’ Annie followed Layla into the bedroom and closed the door.

‘Well?’ asked Annie.

‘Well
what
?’ Layla flung her bag aside and slumped down beside her box of possessions.

Annie let out a sharp breath. ‘Layla. We aren’t playing here. This is serious.’

‘I realize that.’

‘So, no more flouting the rules, OK?’

‘No fear of that.’ Layla looked up at her mother, her eyes suddenly bright, her expression brittle.

‘What do you mean?’

‘I
mean
I’ve been sacked.’

‘You what?’

‘Yeah. Sacked.’

‘Well . . . it doesn’t matter. Jobs are ten a penny, you’ll get another when all this blows over. Why’d they sack you?’

‘Blows over?
’ Layla let out a sobbing laugh. ‘What are you
talking
about? I shot someone, Mum. Shot her dead. You nearly died in a car bombing. Someone tried to grab me, and if he’d caught me . . .’ She stopped, shaking her head. ‘And you talk about when it
blows over
! How
can
it?’

Annie took a breath. Somehow or other, Layla was going to have to tough this out, absorb it. She’d always seemed soft, but Annie thought that deep down her daughter had a strong core. Now, she was going to have to prove it.

‘Why’d they sack you?’ Annie repeated, more gently.

‘Because I was smoking in the office.’

‘Well, there’s no law against
that
.’ Annie frowned. ‘Since when did you start smoking?’

‘I don’t. That’s the point. I went out to lunch, met Junior and then Precious. As I was heading back to the office I saw smoke at my office window. By the time I got inside, all the fire alarms on the third floor were going, people were running around shouting. A cigarette had been left smouldering in the waste bin and it caught fire. Luckily, someone spotted it quickly and put it out. But my boss, who’s fed up with me anyway because of all this
shit
that’s happening, because I’ve been off sick and I’m never sick and he thinks I’m taking the piss – he lost it completely. Said I could have burned the whole place down, I was a fucking nuisance, and to clear my desk.’

Layla stopped speaking, seeing the whole scene again. Everyone watching. The gloating, avaricious expressions on their faces, the stench of smoke, the endless shrieking of the fire alarms, while Etchingham tore into her.

‘But you don’t smoke. Surely they
know
that?’

Layla waved a tired hand in front of her face. ‘Oh, no one came leaping to my defence. Even the young mums who keep having time off to nurse their sick kids aren’t as hated as much as I am. And that’s saying something. I told Etchingham I didn’t drop the cigarette in there, but he wasn’t buying. He wanted an excuse to fire my arse, and he found it.’

‘Does anyone else have access to your office?’ asked Annie.

‘Everyone. I don’t lock it when I go out – there
is
no lock on my door. No one goes in there, as a general rule. But
someone
did. And they tossed a lit cigarette into the bin, and got me sacked.’

‘Jealous colleague?’ suggested Annie.

Layla dropped her head into her hands. ‘Oh, you know what? Take your pick. They all hate me. What does it matter now anyway.’

‘He’s probably done you a favour,’ said Annie, wondering if someone in the office would really risk a major fire just to get Layla into trouble. Or had someone from outside the building walked into her empty office and started it?

‘Thanks for that,’ said Layla coldly.

‘There’s no security on the front door at your office, is there?’

‘No. Of course not. Why would we need it?’

‘Maybe to stop someone coming in off the street and setting a fire.’

Layla grew still. ‘I thought it was just a prank, to get me in bother with Etchingham.’

‘It’s possible,’ said Annie. ‘But on the other hand . . .’

‘Jesus!’

‘All the more reason to stay here and stay secure, OK?’

‘I’ll die of boredom,’ said Layla.

‘There are worse things to die of.’ Annie peered intently at her daughter. ‘Look, I had a thought. Why don’t you help Ellie out with the books?’

Layla stared at Annie. Fuck’s
sake.
She had sworn she would never get involved in her parents’ business, and here she was: living over the shop, and now about to do the firm’s accounts. This was absolutely bloody great.

‘Thanks, but I don’t think so.’ Layla took out her Filofax. She had contacts. She would phone around, see what she could come up with. She unfastened the Filofax and screamed when a four-leaf clover fluttered out and floated gently to the floor.

When her mother was gone – taking the shamrock with her – Layla reassessed the situation. The fire and the fact that some creep had been up close, handling her Filofax, slipping that damned thing inside it, gave her the shudders.

Much as she hated the fact, she knew Annie was right: going out to work –
any
work – was out of the question. But maybe she could do what Mum suggested, help out with the company accounts? She didn’t want to. On the other hand she couldn’t just sit here and wait for the next disaster to occur. This forced inactivity was
killing
her.

She approached Ellie early that evening, when the club was still empty but the girls were getting prettied up for the punters. Ellie was in the office, talking to Miss Pargeter, a dried-up old stick of a woman who came in and helped out with the bookkeeping.

‘Um . . . could I have a word?’ asked Layla. She glanced at Miss Pargeter. ‘Privately.’

Ellie moved out of the tiny office and into the hall. ‘Yes, Layla?’

‘I was wondering . . . Mum suggested you might need some help with the accounts . . .?’

Ellie hadn’t closed the door of the office. Miss Pargeter looked up at Layla, and in that single glance Layla saw the whole story of Miss Pargeter’s life. Some of the more unkind girls laughed about her behind her back, called her an old maid. She was often seen bent double over the desk in the windowless office, scratching away at figures.

That’s me, isn’t it
, thought Layla.
That’s me in thirty years’ time, an aged lady, unmarried, childless, with a hairy upper lip and nothing to live for but doing the accounts.

‘Well . . .’ said Ellie, glancing back at Miss Pargeter. Miss Pargeter returned her attention to the page she was working on.

‘Actually, no,’ said Layla quickly. ‘It was an idea of Mum’s, but I don’t think I want to, not really. Not just now. Sorry to have bothered you.’

Layla hurried back to her room.

No
, she thought grimly.
No way am I becoming that.

Precious was in there waiting for her, glammed up for the evening’s trade, wearing her sapphire-blue silk gown this time. She turned from the mirror and smiled when she saw Layla there.

‘Precious?’ said Layla. She thought that she had never seen anyone as beautiful, as poised, as downright
fabulous
as Precious.

‘Yeah, sweetie?’

Layla
almost
said what was on her mind. She felt restless and trapped. As if she was on the edge of something awful, momentous, some twisting turn of fate that was going to change everything forever. She wanted to say all this to Precious, to talk it through with her. But instead she bottled it up and turned away.

‘Nah. It’s nothing.’

57

When Annie left the Shalimar after talking to Layla, she bumped straight into Max.

‘Oh!’ she said, taken off-guard. She glanced at Tony, who was hovering nearby. ‘Wait in the car, Tone, will you?’

Tony went off, leaving her and Max standing in the busy street, people passing by, stepping around them.

‘Has she told you about the fire?’ she asked him.

‘Yeah, she did. She phoned me from the office. Sounded like all hell was breaking loose. That’s why I’m here.’

She told you before she told me,
thought Annie, feeling the familiar nagging sensation of hurt.

‘I’d warned her to stay put,’ said Annie defensively. ‘There was one of those paper shamrocks in her Filofax, you know. The same as was left in her trainer when that arsehole tried to get her.’

‘Right.’

There was a silence. It wasn’t a comfortable one.

‘So,’ she said brightly. ‘How are you?’

Max’s eyes widened. ‘Christ, we’re being civilized all of a sudden, aren’t we?’

‘I’ve always tried to be civilized with you, Max. Despite provocation.’

‘Well don’t. You spitting and yelling at me seems more natural.’

Annie stared at him. He was trying to rattle her. He
loved
to rattle her. And he wasn’t going to succeed. But her teeth were gritted and her shoulders were tense.
Fuck
him.

‘I’ve done all that,’ she said. ‘And you know what? It’s not worth it.’

‘Quite happy with Golden Boy then,’ said Max.

‘I’m not
with
Golden Boy,’ she said. There was a cramp in her left shoulder. She could feel her temper starting to take hold. ‘I never have been.’

‘Sure.’

‘Alberto’s my stepson.’

‘Yep.’

‘And that’s all,’ she said. She wanted to scream it. She forced herself not to.