Scarlet Women

The flat was empty, quiet. She turned on the radio over the sink. James Brown started punching out ‘This Is a Man’s World’.

Annie smiled grimly. Yeah, you got that right, she thought.

She was a woman in a man’s world, but she was going to make her own way in it, she was determined about that now. She wasn’t going to call him. She didn’t need a man, any man. Not even one as red-hot as Constantine Barolli. As soon as all this shit was over, it was going to be just her and Layla. She picked up the phone and dialled Ruthie’s number, feeling a sudden overwhelming need to hear her baby’s voice.

Chapter 31

The Alley Cat club was busier in the evenings. In fact, the place was heaving, with bare-titted hostesses in little frilly skirts shimmying through the seated throng bearing trays of wildly overpriced drinks. ‘Get Back’ was pounding out of the huge sound system until Bobby Jo swaggered on to the stage in a long gold-sequinned gown and huge red bouffant wig to a wave of rapturous applause. He promptly started turning the air blue with his jokes.

Struggling to see through the rising smoke of a hundred cigarettes, Annie and Tony descended the stairs and took a table while Bobby Jo did the build-up to the next act. Annie was annoyed and worried. At her instruction, Steve had checked out the canal bridge under the Mile End Road last night, and Mira hadn’t been there, only Jackie.

When asked, Jackie had shrugged and told Steve that she hadn’t seen Mira and it looked like she was gone for good, and while he was there how about a blow-job for a fiver?

Steve had graciously declined. Asked how Rizzo was doing. Told her to go get a life, kick Rizzo to the kerb. Jackie graciously told Steve to fuck off.

‘That one won’t bail out,’ he told Annie on the phone when he reported the news. ‘Thinks the little runt loves her or something.’

‘Don’t worry about Jackie,’ said Annie. ‘It’s Mira I’m concerned about. She’s a friend from way back. I want her found.’

‘I’ll put the word out. And I’ll check again tonight, okay, but don’t hold your breath. She won’t be there.’

Annie had said: yeah, do that. She looked at the Rolex on her wrist and hoped and prayed that Mira wasn’t gone for good.

‘Now the ONE, the ONLY, SASHA!’ Bobby Jo roared at last, and stepped down from the stage. Spotting Annie there, he came across to her table. On the way, he snapped his fingers at one of the hostesses, pointed to the table. She instantly swerved around a punter’s grasping fingers and made her way back to the bar.

Bobby Jo pulled up a chair as whoops and shouts erupted all around them.

‘Nice to see you in again, Mrs Carter,’ he said loudly in her ear. ‘Welcome back to the jungle.’

‘Thanks.’ The hostess was back with Bobby Jo’s ice bucket containing an opened bottle of Krug.

Expensive tastes, thought Annie again.

‘Drink?’ offered Bobby Jo.

Annie shook her head. Tony too. He looked as though he wished he’d brought his paper, like last time. Annie saw him glance at the act unfolding on the stage. Sasha was up there doing something obscene with a boa constrictor. She turned her attention back to Bobby Jo.

‘Do you own this place, Bobby Jo?’ she asked him.

The sharp black eyes met hers from beneath their concealing forest of fake lashes.

Talk about Halloween, thought Annie. She really didn’t like this man at all. There was something sinister, something deeply hidden, about Bobby Jo.

‘Nah,’ he said shortly, turning his gaze back to Sasha and her pet. ‘Wish I did,’ he said, pouring himself a glass of champagne. ‘I’d make a mint. This is a fucking Wednesday night, can you believe it?’

There was no accounting for taste, that was for sure. Annie refused to be sidetracked.

‘So who owns it?’ she asked.

The ferocious painted face of Bobby Jo was still for a moment. The black pebble eyes looked coldly into hers. Annie didn’t look away.

‘Consortium of businessmen,’ said Bobby Jo. ‘You know the sort of thing. Tax write-offs…’

‘Money laundering?’ suggested Annie. ‘Clubs are good for that.’

She knew that all too well. Years back, this had been the main function of the Carter clubs. But now she made sure that any cash that passed through them was squeaky clean.

Bobby Jo gave a grin, shrugged.

‘As I said, I’m only management.’

‘And you don’t know any of the owners?’ Annie stared at him. ‘That’s hard to believe.’

Bobby Jo gave a tight, mirthless grin. ‘I’m paid to know nothing,’ he said. ‘That’s the deal.’

‘How about the tattoo parlour next door?’ She and Tony had paused outside the little parlour on the way in, looked in the dirty windows, seen the faded pictures of clients and their tattoos, the charts detailing all the many and various designs a person could have tattooed on to their body. The CLOSED sign was up. In the flat above the shop, a dim light burned behind closed curtains. ‘They own that too, these businessmen? I heard Pete Delacourt runs it.’

Bobby Jo looked at the act. Annie looked at Bobby Jo.

‘No, they don’t,’ he said.

‘You know who does?’

Bobby Jo turned his head and his eyes met hers. ‘No.’

Annie nodded and looked at what Sasha was doing with the python. ‘Did Sasha know Teresa?’ she asked.

‘Yeah, I suppose. But I told you. All the girls in here hate each other. They compete. They don’t do bosom buddies.’

‘Did you know Teresa?’

Bobby Jo squinted at her. ‘Sure I knew her. I told you, she pissed me off by passing around her business cards in here. And she was nicking stuff from behind the bar. I can’t prove that—but I’m sure it was her because the minute she went AWOL, the thieving stopped.’

‘I mean, were you intimate with her?’

‘Intimate?’ The grotesque face was a picture of shock, then suddenly Bobby Jo was laughing. ‘What, me and that little slapper? Jeez, I wouldn’t touch her with someone else’s, let alone my own.’

‘Then who was? Someone must have come close to her.’

‘Nobody in this place,’ said Bobby Jo. ‘Not that I know of. I told you. She was a right little cow, good at making enemies, shit at making friends.’

‘You don’t know much,’ said Annie. ‘Considering you run the place.’

Bobby Jo turned his face to hers. No flicker of amusement there now.

‘I keep my head down and do my job,’ said Bobby Jo. ‘Best that way. Safer.’

‘You don’t mind if I have a chat to the staff?’

Again the shrug. ‘I’ve no objections.’ But he didn’t look happy.

‘Good,’ said Annie, and stood up. ‘No time like the present.’

After about an hour it became clear to Annie that the bulk of the staff neither knew nor cared whether Teresa Walker was dead or alive. But the hard-eyed hostess who had waited on their table, Tamsin, visibly wobbled when questioned about Teresa’s love life. Bobby Jo was watching Annie’s progress around the room; she could feel those cold shark eyes boring into her back everywhere she went.

‘Hey,’ Tamsin said above the roar of the crowds, her eyes darting nervously around the smoke-filled room, ‘I don’t know nothing about that. I keep my head down and do my job.’

Echoing, with spooky accuracy, Bobby Jo’s own words.

Annie told her thanks, and Tamsin hurried gratefully away.