‘Jesus…’ the man wept, rolling from side to side while the life’s blood flooded out of him and was sucked up by the sand.
‘It don’t have to be that way, though,’ said Max. ‘Tell me where Gina Barolli is, and help’s on its way.’ Max frowned. ‘Think I can do a bit of first aid, patch you up good enough to get you to the hospital. If you talk, that is. If you don’t, forget it.’
The man’s dark eyes were glaring up into Max’s. ‘I will never talk,’ he said.
‘Now see, that’s annoying,’ said Max, wondering what a Sicilian male would place more value on than loyalty. He thought he knew. He leaned down and unzipped the man’s fly.
‘What are you-’ the man babbled, bleeding, squirming.
‘What, you’re like your mate in the wheelchair? You’re prepared to die to keep her secret?’ asked Max. ‘Then you’re going to arrive in hell minus your prick, you cunt. Now talk, or things get ugly. That’s a promise.’
Oh, the fucking rain. How could she have forgotten about the rain? And the grey skies. A year in Barbados, and now Annie Carter’s default setting was blue skies, white sand, vivid sunshine. This was strange to her, but the damp air and the cool wind reminded her forcibly that this was home, where she was born, where she had spent most of her life. London. Traffic swooshing by in the downpour as she sat in the taxi from the airport. Grimy buildings looming like canyons overhead as the car edged along in thick traffic, the windscreen wipers sweeping back and forth in a sleep-inducing rhythm.
She’d love to sleep. She hadn’t slept on the plane, although she’d tried. Her brain just kept churning over what Tony had told her on the phone the day before yesterday – that Dolly was gone, lost to her, dead and never to return.
It choked her up, every time she thought about it.
And she thought about it all the time.
She hadn’t even spoken to Dolly recently. They called each other maybe once a month, just for a chat. Annie would ask how the business was going, and Dolly would always say fine and tell her what the girls in the club had been getting up to. There was always some funny story with one of the punters, Annie always put the phone down laughing.
The last time they’d spoken had been about a fortnight ago, and then there had been no suggestion that anything was wrong, and Annie had been blissfully unaware that that was the last time she would ever talk to her friend.
She just wished that she had been able to speak to Max before she left Prospect. She’d left him a note in their usual place, told the maid where she was going, and to tell him when he got back, but… she’d really needed him there when she got that awful news. And as usual he was away, busy, doing something that didn’t concern her.
