Black Widow by Jessie Keane Read Free Book Online Page A

scared the crap out of her, big time. Annie looked almost grey with exhaustion, but Annie was made of tough stuff. Annie would always bounce back…or would she? Looking at her now, Dolly wondered about that.
    ‘How’s business? Good?’ asked Annie, her head in her hands.
    ‘Good enough,’ said Dolly. She leaned back against the cream-coloured fake marble worktop and crossed her arms over her chest. ‘You going to tell me what happened? I couldn’t believe it when you called me.’
    ‘I couldn’t believe it either,’ said Annie.
    There had been only brief telephone calls, three or four a year, between the two of them since Annie had left, but they had remained friends.
    ‘Come on, Annie,’ said Dolly in sudden exasperation. ‘Spill the beans, will you?’
    Annie looked at the open door into the hallway. ‘Anyone else around?’ she asked.
    Dolly shook her head. ‘We’re alone. I made sure we would be, at least for now. So come on. Give.’
    Annie sighed and shook her head. ‘No, Doll, I’m knackered. I need a bath and a lie-down, then I can think about what’s going on.’
    Dolly nodded, but she was frowning. This was big trouble—she could smell it. She wasn’t exactly over the moon to have Annie Carter here. She didn’t want to make waves with the Delaneys. The feud between the Irish Delaneys and the Cockney Carter clans had been raging for years and was still going strong. The Delaney patch wasan uncomfortable and maybe dangerous place for Annie Carter, wife of the boss of the Carter clan, to be, but then Annie knew that. The fact that she was here must mean that she had nowhere else to go.
    A friend’s a friend
, thought Dolly. She couldn’t turn the poor bint away, now could she?
    Annie sat there and the jumble in her brain was as bad as Dolly’s, only with more anguish added on.
    I could be the only Carter left
, she thought.
Max. Jonjo. Both gone. And maybe Layla too.
    Sick despair washed over her again. She just couldn’t take any of this in. Not yet. She had to gather herself first, if she could. Then, she’d see.

7
    ‘Your little friend’s gone,’ said a disembodied female voice.
    Annie shot up in the bed, heart hammering, horrors erupting in her brain. She was in a strange bed, in a strange room. A blonde woman was at the window, yanking back the curtains so that Annie winced at the brightness of the new day. A double bay window. A nice room, prettily furnished. The woman with the bubble perm placed a mug of tea on the side table.
    Dolly.
    Annie clutched her head in her hands as it all came back to her. And with the grim memories came guilt and intense self-hatred. She had slept, deeply and dreamlessly, while her husband lay dead in a rocky gully far away and her daughter was God knew where, in the hands of people who could do her serious harm.
    ‘You were worn out,’ said Dolly, sitting down on the side of the bed and staring at her friend with concern. ‘I came up last night to see if you wanted anything to eat, and you were spark out. So I let you sleep. This is my room, you remember?’
    All Annie knew was that she had fallen on to the bed and literally passed out.
    ‘God, I’m sorry. Where did you sleep?’
    ‘Don’t be a silly mare, Annie, there’s always a spare bed in a place like this. You can have this room for the time being, no worries.’
    ‘You should have woken me up. Have there been any phone calls? Has anyone asked to speak to me?’
    Dolly shook her head.
    ‘There must have been!’ Annie burst out in fury.
    Dolly kept staring at her. ‘Nobody’s called. I would have fetched you. But they didn’t.’
    ‘Sorry,’ mumbled Annie. ‘Didn’t mean to shout the odds, Doll’
    ‘That’s okay.’
    ‘She’s fucked off then?’
    ‘Jean, yeah.’
    ‘Jeanette.’
    ‘Who the hell is she? Not your sort, I’d have thought.’
    ‘One of Jonjo’s blondes.’
    ‘Ah. Drink your tea.’
    Annie took up the mug with shaking hands and sipped it. The tea was