‘Talking like that won’t help.’ They knew at least that Annie wasn’t at Partyland; that had been checked out. Their only hope was that Malone had taken her to the place out on the marshes. If not, they were stumped. And Annie was finished.
‘Don’t tell me what I can and cannot think. You might boss everyone else around, but not me, OK?’
‘What’s going on?’ asked Max, turning in his seat. He looked at Sandor, sitting there like a slab of rock, then at Alberto, and finally at Layla.
‘She’s upset,’ said Alberto smoothly, his eyes holding hers.
Max reached back and took her hand. ‘I said this was a bad idea. I told you not to come.’
‘I had to come,’ said Layla. Her brain kept presenting her with nightmare images of Precious, beaten to death. And the same man had Mum now. ‘For God’s sake, how could I not? Anything could happen to her, I have to be here.’
Max and Alberto exchanged a look. They both thought that Layla would be in the way, a liability; that they might have to waste time protecting her, when they ought to be able to focus on getting Annie out of danger. They had told her as much before leaving London. But Layla was having none of it.
‘What’s going on with you two?’ asked Max, his eyes moving from his daughter to Alberto and back again.
‘Nothing,’ she said.
‘Nothing? You sounded like you were ripping lumps out of each other a moment ago. You had a fight?’
Layla stared hard at Alberto, who returned her look coolly.
He’d kill you if he knew, her eyes said.
Yeah? Alberto’s gaze said. So do it. Tell him.
‘It was nothing,’ said Layla, dropping her eyes to her lap. ‘Really, nothing.’
Max looked at Alberto. Something was going on with these two.
‘I’d take a dim view of anyone upsetting my daughter,’ he said to Alberto.
‘Of course,’ said Alberto.
‘So don’t,’ said Max.
‘Wouldn’t dream of it.’
‘Good,’ said Max, giving Alberto one last thoughtful look and Layla’s hand a brief squeeze before he turned to stare ahead again.
‘Can’t you go any faster?’ Layla asked Steve.
‘We’ll get there,’ he said.
‘Yeah. In time for what?’
97
Annie couldn’t quite believe it when the van finally came to a halt. Her mouth was bone-dry. She was so cold that she shivered constantly, and so frightened that she was barely keeping a grip on herself any more.
She heard movement at the front of the van. Apart from the clicking of the engine cooling down, she could hear little else – only the faint sighing of the wind. The roar of the engine, that noisy nightmare, was finished.
All was quiet.
Then suddenly there was dim light through the mouldy smelling sacking covering her head as the back doors of the van were thrown open.
Annie stiffened. She could just about see his outline against the square of dying daylight. She couldn’t speak, couldn’t even try to reason with him, her mouth was still taped. He stood there, looking in at her. Then he… what was he doing? She strained to see through the weave of the sacking.
He was taking something out of his jacket pocket.
Oh shit, please no.
It was the taser gun.
Annie squirmed, trying to get away. Useless. Hopeless.
But it wasn’t the taser. This time, it was a cosh. He leaned in, and a jagged knife of pain exploded in her head. After that, there was nothing.
98
Consciousness returned slowly, dimly, as if through a dreamlike gauze. Annie was lying on something hard and smooth. No, not lying. She was leaning forward, and her back ached. Her head hurt. Her fingers felt wood. The darkness returned, and then it receded again. This time she felt she was sitting. Definitely sitting, on a chair.
More darkness.
Her eyes flickered open.
Slowly it all came back to her. Everything. Walking across the hall, Bri twitching and writhing on the floor by the door, seeing the big man coming towards her, running for the study to get the Mace spray. The taser gun. The journey, the cosh…
Her head really ached, and she was now… where? She hadn’t a clue. But she knew she was still in danger.
‘So when are you going to admit you’re awake?’ asked a voice.
Someone poked her arm, hard.
‘Annie Carter? You’re awake. Come on. No play-acting now.’
Slowly, she lifted her head. It felt impossibly heavy. A stab of pain hit her behind the eyes, then settled into a steady, nagging ache on her left temple. She raised a shaking hand, ran her fingers over the lump there. She blinked, looked around.
She was sitting at an old dirty table. There was a lantern at the far end of it, the flame flaring and smoking, throwing up quavering shadows. The room in which she found herself was nothing but a shell, with exposed beams and grimy walls, and now she could smell – her nose wrinkled – salt water and decaying seaweed in the air.
Rufus wasn’t in the room. So where the hell was he? She’d heard him speak to her, but that could have been minutes or hours ago. He was somewhere close by, he had to be, ready to fry her brains again with that damned taser.
She was glancing around now, coming back to full awareness. Her eyes were wide with terror as they moved, searching for a weapon. There was nothing in this room except the table, the chairs.
Was this the place on the marshes?
Her eyes flew to the front door. There had been explosives rigged there last time she was here, but there was nothing now. The other door had a filthy window beside it. It was hanging loose, slightly ajar, on rusted hinges.
That was how it had been when Max spotted the bomb in here.
She could get out. Make a run for it. She braced both hands on the table and pushed herself upright. Then a wave of giddiness hit her and she fell back into the chair. Her head was spinning from the after-effects of the cosh and the taser.
Oh shit am I going to be sick…? she wondered.
She tried to breathe deeply, easily, but the sudden realization of her own weakness panicked her, sent her heart rate into overdrive. She couldn’t afford to be weak, not now. But she was.
Then Rufus Malone entered the room, and she knew her chance had passed.
Too late.
Too late for anything.
99
Annie felt her insides shrivel with fear when Rufus came in. In his muddy hands he was carrying a bottle of whisky, two tin mugs and a torch. She saw that he wore rubber boots, and they were mud-covered too.
His eyes met Annie’s as he sat down in one of the chairs across the table from her. He put the torch on the table, unscrewed the bottle and slopped the liquid into the two mugs.
‘Let’s have a drink, Mrs Carter,’ he said in a broad Irish drawl.
He pushed one mug in front of Annie, swallowed his own drink in one gulp.
‘Sheesh! That’s good whisky,’ he said. He fixed her with an intense stare. ‘So come on now. Where’s my girl, eh? Where’s Orla?’
Annie looked back at him. ‘What?’
‘Orla. Orla Delaney. She came to do you, didn’t she. And you know what? I haven’t seen her since. The plan was – she had a plan – that she was going to finish you. Slit your throat. Only she didn’t, because you’re still alive. And she hasn’t gone back to the auld country, as we agreed. So where is she? What’s happened to her?’
Annie’s heart was beating hard. ‘There was a break-in at my house. Was that her? Was that Orla?’ She took a gulping breath. ‘But how could it be? I thought Orla took off years ago. Got lost. Or died. Or something.’