‘Did Layla get a good look at the man who tried to attack her? That could be a help,’ said Alberto.
‘I’ll talk to her,’ said Max.
The phone rang on the side table. Annie snatched it up. Listened. Then put it back down on the cradle. She swore once, loudly.
‘What?’ Max demanded.
‘That was Ellie. About Layla.’
‘What about her? She OK?’
‘She’s gone back to work.’
Rufus was going crazy with worry. Three days had gone by and still there’d been no word from Orla.
He’d called the farm in Limerick. She should have been there by now. She’d told him that if anything went wrong, that was where she’d go. But there was no answer. Even though he’d let the phone ring and ring, no one picked up.
Knowing Orla, she was probably out in the barn, music blasting out of the speakers while she worked on those mad paintings of hers. She’d be livid, knowing that Annie Carter was alive, that her plan had failed. Maybe she was still angry with him, for letting the daughter slip through his hands. Maybe that was it: she was ignoring the phone deliberately, to punish him. Her mother was a bit deaf, so she wouldn’t hear it ringing, and old Davey’s mind was too far gone for him to notice.
Despite the sick dread in the pit of his stomach, he would not let himself consider the possibility that she was dead, that the Carter woman had somehow turned the tables and emerged triumphant.
After the car bomb screw-up, he had driven to the house in Holland Park. There was a burly guy guarding the front door, so he kept to the far side of the square, careful not to attract attention. It was as well he was cautious, because it was soon apparent that he wasn’t the only one keeping an eye on the place. He spotted a couple of men in cars, and there were other men repairing the burglar alarm and replacing the basement window.
I’ll be back by six. If I’m not, stick to the plan… we meet back at the farm.
He remembered how insistent she had been that there must be no deviation from the plan. So that was where she would be: at the farm, waiting for him. And he would join her there.
‘I will. I swear it,’ he muttered under his breath.
It was a promise he intended to keep. But he wasn’t going to show up empty-handed.
First he would kill Annie Carter. Then he would take a little gift for his beloved, something to prove that he had succeeded in his mission – a hand or a foot would do, or perhaps the scalp. Yes, that beautiful long dark hair would make the perfect trophy.
The Holland Park address remained heavily guarded, but Rufus had seen the daughter leave the house on the day of the bomb, he’d followed the car that took her to the Shalimar. He’d been keeping an eye on the place ever since, waiting for an opportunity. And finally he was rewarded for his patience. The girl emerged, minders all around her. And she travelled into the City. An accountancy firm, Bowdler and Etchingham. He went in, timing his entry so that he walked in with another man while the girl on the reception desk was on the phone, busy. Once inside, he took the lift to the second floor.