Then the moment was gone. Max brushed past her, walked across the hall, picked up his suitcase and bag, and left.
Annie gulped hard, trying to compose herself. It was finished. Leaving her with a heartbroken girl to look after. It didn’t matter how she felt, she had to focus on Layla. She walked towards her. Layla’s sobs had died away to hitching little gasps.
‘Honey, why don’t you go and find Ros-’ she started.
‘Don’t you come near me,’ yelled Layla suddenly, stopping Annie in her tracks. ‘This is all your fault. All you had to do was be here, but you always had to be running around doing your stupid business. I hate you.’
She ran past Annie, shoving her aside. She flew across the hall and up the stairs.
Annie stood there, feeling sick with hurt, and heard the door to Layla’s room slam shut. She closed her eyes and took in a deep breath. The silence of the house enveloped her. She was alone again.
On shaky legs she walked over to the leather-tooled desk and sat down behind it, slumping there in exhaustion and despair. She didn’t even know who she was any more. She took the decree absolute out of her pocket and put it on the desk and stared at it.
Well, I’m not Mrs Max Carter, that’s for sure.
God, she was tired. Too tired to think, but still it all spun around, unravelling in her tortured brain – losing Max in Majorca, believing him to be dead. Then her involvement with Constantine Barolli, Alberto’s father. All the troubles and the dangers she had endured to come to this point.
Was it worth it?
Ten years ago she had been an underworld power to be reckoned with, running the streets of Bow. Until Redmond and Orla Delaney, the psychotic twins who’d ruled Battersea with an iron fist, tried to kill her. And that had ended in their deaths, organized by her Mafia contacts.
So much trouble.
So much pain.
The attempt on her life had caused her to step away from all that. She’d thought she could leave it behind her, sit back and enjoy the good life – but it hadn’t worked out that way.
Annie gazed around her at the empty, opulent study with its tan Chesterfield sofas, its walls lined with books, the costly Aubusson rugs on the floor. She had everything… and she had nothing at all. She’d lost her husband, and her daughter hated her.
Raindrops pattered against the window panes. She stared out of the window at the darkening sky, and wondered how the hell she was going to come back from this. She’d fought so long and so hard, but all she felt was defeated. She was too worn out even to try any more.