Ruthless Girl: An absolutely gripping, gritty crime thriller Read online

  ‘Yeah, I guess there’s that,’ he replied.

  The bottle and fresh glass arrived and one of the servers from their area hastened over to pick it up. ‘Sorry, Miss Davis,’ she said with wide eyes. ‘I didn’t realise we’d run out.’

  ‘Don’t worry, Letty, we hadn’t. Just add it to the circulation and make sure that lady over there gets this glass,’ Anna responded. As the waitress rushed off to do as she’d been bidden, Anna took a deep breath and walked back towards the group. ‘We’d best make sure everyone knows to be on their guard and that she has a good night,’ she said resolutely.

  Freddie straightened his jacket and fell into step beside her. ‘You took the words right out of my mouth.’

  Twenty-Six

  Sophia twirled the slim stem of her champagne glass between her fingers and took a small sip as she looked around – the polite smile she’d fixed upon entering not once slipping from her lips, despite the anger that bubbled inside. That she had been curious to see what they had made of the place wasn’t a lie. She wanted to see what her husband’s blood had bought this firm. And it was most certainly his blood which had bought it. Had Aleksei been alive, they would never have got their hands on this place again. Had they not killed him. They were curious to know how much she knew, of this she was certain. All of them were sneaking glances at her, their faces guarded. They knew she knew – she’d made no secret of her knowledge, letting Freddie know outright that she knew exactly where her husband’s body lay, crushed and festering beneath thousands of kilos of rock and cement.

  She turned in a wide circle as if admiring the place, to hide the snarl that was threatening to take over her expression. Yes, they knew that she knew. But they did not know how much, and she was enjoying having this power for the time being. Until such a time as she made her deeper intentions clear, at least. Because whilst she had been curious to see what they had done, this was not the only reason she was here tonight. There was someone here that she wanted to speak to. Alone.

  Leaving the small group she had been pretending to engage with to talk amongst themselves, Sophia wandered over to the side table where some of the canapés had been set down for the group to enjoy. One man stood there stuffing his face with his back to her. As her shadow fell across the platter in front of him he turned, licking his fingers unceremoniously.

  ‘Oops, don’t mind me,’ he chuckled. ‘You dive in. Those little beef things are blinding.’ He pointed with a freshly licked finger and Sophia had a hard time hiding her distaste for a moment. She just about managed it though and smiled at him instead.

  ‘Oh, I’m not hungry, thank you.’ She turned slightly, checking that they were still safely out of earshot of the others. Luckily, it wasn’t too hard with the music and general sounds of activity in the busy establishment. ‘I was wondering, what’s your name?’ she asked.

  ‘Me? I’m Jim,’ he said with a grin, chuffed that he was being singled out to be spoken to by the attractive young woman. Maybe she liked an older bloke, he thought to himself, oblivious to the lack of charm his balding head, pot belly and absence of manners afforded him.

  ‘Jim.’ Sophia nodded. ‘I’m curious, Jim. Do you spy on all of your employer’s meetings?’

  Jim’s smile faded and he glanced around to make sure no one had heard her. ‘You what?’ he responded.

  ‘Mr Tyler may have had his back to the door you were watching us through the other day, but I did not. And you were not as covert as you thought you were.’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ Jim continued, his face clouding over angrily.

  ‘Yes, you do,’ Sophia responded. ‘You don’t have to worry,’ she added casually. ‘I’m not going to tell him. I just wondered why you felt the need to eavesdrop.’ She looked him up and down critically. If what her man, Ali, had told her was correct, he was the new guy and was an odd fit for the firm. There was a chance he was exactly what she was looking for. ‘Perhaps he isn’t paying you enough. Perhaps you were hoping for some bit of juicy information you could sell on.’

  ‘Eh? How dare you—’ Jim started, puffing his chest out in self-defence.

  ‘I’m just saying, if that were the case, you might not have been that far off the mark,’ Sophia said, cutting him off. She paused to gauge his reaction and then continued when he fell silent. ‘Yes, I thought so.’ She smiled at him, turning on the full charm. ‘I’m new to working with this firm and could do with someone on the inside, who could give me any information I lack, perhaps sometimes to locate specific information for me. I’d be happy to pay that person very well indeed. They could end up being on two payrolls. Infinitely better than just one, I find.’ Watching Josephine disappear to the ladies out of the corner of her eye, Sophia reached into her clutch bag and pulled out a card. She handed it to him discreetly. ‘Think about it and contact me if you’re interested. Oh, and, like the incident of you spying behind the door, this conversation is to stay between us.’ She walked off, leaving Jim staring after her.

  Next Sophia approached Freddie and Anna, smiling widely as if they were old friends. ‘Well, tonight has been a pleasure, thank you for inviting me.’

  ‘You’re leaving so early – can we not entice you with a few more drinks?’ Anna responded. She’d barely had a chance to talk to Sophia in the couple of hours she’d been at the party and was still no closer to finding out what she needed to know.

  ‘Thank you, but no. I need to get back. I’ll speak to you both soon, I’m sure.’ With a nod, Sophia turned and walked away towards the front door. Freddie and Anna watched her go, their expressions sombre, until she disappeared from view.

  Sophia paused in the entrance hallway for a few moments before turning back inside. ‘Stay here,’ she ordered her man, Ali, curtly. Keeping her head down, she quickly slipped up the side of the room until she reached the toilets. Entering, she checked the cubicles and found only one occupied. As the sound of the flush came through, Sophia stepped back and waited for Josephine to appear.

  The door to the cubicle opened and out she came, almost jumping back in surprise as she saw Sophia standing just a couple of feet away, staring at her with a cold, hard expression.

  ‘Oh, er…’ She looked away and stepped forward to the sink to wash her hands, her cheeks burning.

  Sophia looked her up and down in disgust. The tacky purple garment she wore was ill-fitting and the sprays of feathers everywhere could have been placed by a five-year-old. No amount of make-up could hide the masculine features that made up her large face and her big droopy brown eyes reminded Sophia of a dog her father once owned. She hated her even more in person than she had from afar.

  As Josephine turned on the tap, Sophia’s hand shot over and slammed it shut. Josephine let out a small squeak of surprise and fear.

  ‘Do you not think that I know who you are?’ Sophia snarled. ‘Why are you pretending we are strangers, Josephine? I know exactly who – or should I say what – you are, you foul, disgusting creature.’ She looked her up and down cruelly. ‘Acting as though you are something you could never be, whilst still taking the benefits of the parts of you that you try to hide. You’re a disgrace.’ Spit flew out of Sophia’s perfect mouth as her rage and hatred began to make her shake.

  Tears pricked behind Josephine’s eyes as the prejudiced onslaught rained down and she stepped back, her mouth gaping open in shock. She had been expecting some sort of look or comment from Sophia, but had not expected to be so viciously attacked.

  ‘Yes, I know exactly what you are.’ Sophia looked her up and down in contempt once more. ‘And what you’ve done.’ Her cold eyes shot up to meet Josephine’s frightened gaze. ‘And I can promise you this.’ She stepped forward, pulling herself to full height in an attempt to reach Josephine’s much taller level. ‘I’m going to make you wish you had never even met my husband. I’m going to make you wish you’d stayed in whatever dirty fucking swamp you crawled out of.’ Her lip curled up into an ugly grimace as she pressed her
face closer to Josephine’s. ‘And I promise you that when you least expect it, I’m going to make you pay for what you’ve done. No one gets away with crossing me. No one.’

  Without waiting for a response and not wanting to be walked in on, Sophia stepped back, turned around and swept out of the ladies as though nothing had happened.

  Twenty-Seven

  Anna gratefully took the second cup of steaming coffee from Mollie and melted back into the kitchen chair, wishing the sun wouldn’t shine so brightly through the window. Ethan walked round the table, filling everyone’s glasses with fresh orange juice, a chirpy smile on his face.

  ‘Me and Nan squeezed these oranges ourselves last night, didn’t we, Nan?’ he told Anna as he reached her glass.

  ‘Nan and I,’ she automatically corrected in a tired voice. ‘I bet it’s delicious, thank you.’

  ‘Nan said you’d all have had too much lemonade and would need evening out. But…’ A small furrow of confusion appeared in his brow. ‘I’ve had loads of lemonade at parties before and it didn’t do anything to me.’

  ‘Well, sometimes it happens when you’re old like us,’ Paul said with a small chuckle. ‘The curse of too many lemonades.’

  ‘Oh, OK.’ Ethan accepted this with a shrug. ‘I just thought all the alcohol had given you hangovers.’

  Paul glanced over at Freddie, who just shook his head with a crooked smile of defeat. The boy was too savvy for his own good sometimes.

  ‘Right, here we are. Get this lot down ya,’ Mollie said, bustling over with a serving dish full of juicy sausages, plump mushrooms, sunny eggs and bacon still sizzling from the pan. She placed it in the middle of the table and went back for the mountain of toast. ‘Who else is coming? I’d have thought Tanya would have been with you.’

  Mollie’s family fry-ups were legendary among Freddie’s inner circle. When she told them to invite the whole family, she really did mean the whole family. Bill and Sammy were almost always in attendance, as was Tanya these days. Mollie kept the food and coffee coming to the table until everyone had to practically be rolled out and they all loved her for it.

  ‘Bill’s not coming, he and Amy are off doing something out of the city today,’ Freddie responded. ‘But Sammy should be here any minute.’

  ‘And I texted Tanya,’ Anna added with a small frown. ‘She wasn’t in when we left.’

  As Mollie opened her mouth to reply, there was a knock at the front door. ‘Ah, well. That will be one of them now, no doubt,’ she said cheerily. She scurried off to let whoever it was in, happiest as always with a full house.

  A minute later a very dishevelled Tanya waltzed through to the kitchen and melted dramatically into one of the vacant chairs at the table, her wild red hair even wilder than usual and big black sunglasses covering her eyes.

  Anna leaned forward and peered at her across the table. ‘You look terrible,’ she started. ‘Have you still got last night’s make-up on?’ she asked in wonder. Tanya never left the house without full grooming, hangover or not, so this was unheard of.

  ‘Yeah, alright.’ Tanya’s voice came out cracked and tired. ‘Kick a bird whilst she’s down, why don’t you?’

  Sammy waltzed into the lounge behind her with Mollie, casually taking the seat between Freddie and Paul. He looked as tired as the rest of them and leaned over to grab a corner of toast. ‘This looks blinding, Mollie. Cheers,’ he said.

  Anna’s sharp mind began to connect some of the dots. ‘Did you two come together?’ she asked, suspiciously.

  ‘Yeah, I asked Sammy to pick me up. Don’t think I should be driving my own car just yet,’ Tanya answered.

  ‘Pick you up from where? Where were you?’ Anna continued, narrowing her eyes.

  ‘What’s this, the Spanish Inquisition?’ Tanya said with a crooked smile of amusement. ‘She ride you this hard after a night on the lash, Ethan?’

  Ethan giggled but after a look at his stepmother’s face decided wisely not to reply.

  ‘Well, you weren’t in, I checked,’ Anna said accusingly. Tanya didn’t reply, which just fuelled her curiosity further. There was something fishy going on here and Anna wanted to know what it was.

  ‘So, other than the restaurant, what else is new, anyway?’ Mollie asked brightly, changing the subject as she poured her two new guests a cup of coffee from the pot.

  ‘Not much,’ Paul said, leaning forward to help himself to some breakfast. He exchanged a look with Freddie. They told Mollie a certain amount, but not everything. Their new venture into gun-running was a good example of the kind of thing they kept to themselves. It would only keep her up nights, worrying about them.

  ‘We’ve got a new member of the team,’ Freddie piped up, reminded of the fact he had yet to talk to her about Jim. ‘Says he knew Dad, actually.’

  ‘Oh?’ Mollie paused and looked over to her eldest son in surprise.

  ‘Yeah, it was an odd one, I’ll admit,’ Freddie continued. ‘He’s been away on a long stretch, just got out. Says he used to work for Vince and Big Dom, back in the day. Came to me looking for a job, so I’m trialling him out at the moment. Jim Martin, do you remember the name at all?’

  Mollie’s skin paled to a deathly shade of white and the empty cup in her hand fell to the floor. At the sound of the porcelain smashing against the tile, she blinked and looked down.

  ‘Shit,’ she muttered, before grabbing a nearby tea towel and bending down to pile the pieces up in it.

  Freddie and Paul looked at each other in surprise. Mollie never cursed.

  ‘Mum? You alright?’ Freddie asked.

  ‘Yeah, yeah, I’m fine,’ she said in a forced bright tone. ‘Just annoyed I’ve dropped this,’ she continued. ‘Now I won’t have a full set.’ In reality, she couldn’t care less about the damn mug. Clearing it up bought her some time to think.

  Jim Martin. What the hell was he doing coming back here after all this time? And what was he doing, approaching Freddie?

  Picking up the last of the shattered pieces of the mug, Mollie dropped them all into the bin and shook out the tea towel. As she turned back around to dump the towel in the wash basket, she caught the sea of confused looks being shot in her direction.

  ‘Jim Martin,’ she said slowly, as if racking her brain. ‘Oh yes, I remember that name. If it’s who I think it is, your dad wasn’t that fond of him.’ It wasn’t a lie. Her Richard had hated Jim Martin with a passion – and with good reason. ‘He’s bad news, Freddie,’ she said, shaking her head at him. ‘Best to steer clear of people like him. Stick to those you can trust.’

  Freddie frowned as he studied his mother. She had never looked so pale and flustered. And she could barely make eye contact with him. ‘Why is he bad news?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know.’ Mollie swatted the air with her hand, as if batting the subject away. ‘He just is, OK? Your dad would tell you the same thing, if he were alive.’ Her voice became sharp as she turned away to the sink and Freddie closed his mouth into a hard line.

  There was clearly something more to this than Mollie wanted to let on, but she wasn’t going to tell him now. He’d have to come back on his own and try and prise it out of her then. Turning back to his breakfast, Freddie bit into his toast and moved his attention to his son.

  ‘So, Ethan, good night last night?’ he asked.

  ‘Yeah, it was good. Not as good as yours though, by the looks of it,’ he added with a cheeky grin. ‘Was Auntie Tanya dancing on the tables again?’

  ‘You cheeky beggar,’ Freddie replied with a laugh.

  ‘’Course I was,’ Tanya piped up. ‘That’s what they’re there for on a night out – and don’t let no one ever tell you otherwise, Ethan.’

  ‘Tanya Smith,’ Mollie scolded as a ripple of laughter made its way through the room. ‘What a thing to say. He’s a child, for Christ’s sake.’

  ‘Is he?’ Tanya exclaimed in mock surprise. ‘Well, knock me sideways and call me Barbara, I hadn’t realised that. You sure?’

  Molli
e narrowed her eyes and put her hands on her hips, but Tanya was spared the scathing response as her phone began to ring.

  ‘Oops, saved by the bell,’ she said cheekily, winking at Mollie and taking the call. ‘Hello? Oh…’ Tanya’s face dropped into a frown of deep concern and all previous conversation was forgotten. ‘What! Is the fire out? Wait there, I’m coming now. Anna’s with me. Just don’t move.’

  ‘Fire? Where?’ Anna stood up, ignoring the protest inside her aching skull.

  ‘The Sinners’ Lounge.’ Tanya shot her a meaningful look. ‘We need to go.’

  ‘Shit,’ Anna cursed. She looked at Freddie. ‘Can I take your car?’

  ‘’Course.’ He stood up. ‘I can come with you.’

  ‘No!’ both Anna and Tanya cried in unison. Tanya looked away and Anna stepped forward to continue more casually. ‘There’s no point. You stay with Ethan, finish your breakfast. I’m sure it’s nothing major.’

  ‘OK, if you’re certain.’ He threw the keys over to her and settled back in his seat.

  ‘Thanks.’ Anna leaned over and kissed him on her way out.

  Twenty-Eight

  Rushing up the road towards The Sinners’ Lounge as fast as they could from where they had left the car, Anna sighed heavily with stress as they reached the door. At first glance there was nothing hugely noticeable, but upon closer inspection Anna realised there were fingers of black soot clawing around the door from the inside.

  ‘What the hell happened?’ she demanded, as the door was opened by a miserable-looking Josephine. Her eyes were immediately drawn to the still smoking burns all around her and the charred remains of something on the floor.