“It was not the best way. By no stretch of the imagination was it the best way. What if she finds out?”
“She won’t.”
“She might.”
“Well …” I swallow. “So what? I had her interests at heart—”
“By having her massaged with peanut oil? What if she’d had an extreme reaction and died?”
“Shut up,” I say uncomfortably. “She didn’t.”
“But you’re happy for her to spend a night in pain.”
“She’s not in pain!”
“How do you know? Jesus.” He rests his head in his hands a moment, then looks up. “Again, what if she finds out? You’re prepared to lose your relationship with her? Because that’s what’ll happen.”
There’s silence in the hotel suite, although words still seem to be bouncing off the smoky mirrors, sharp, accusing words. The erotic atmosphere has disintegrated. I can’t find the phrases to rebut Lorcan. They’re in my brain somewhere, but I’m feeling slow and a little dazed. I thought he would be impressed. I thought he’d understand. I thought—
“You talk about Unfortunate Choices?” says Lorcan suddenly. “Well, what the hell is this?”
“What do you mean?” I glower at him. He’s not allowed to talk about Unfortunate Choices. They’re my thing.
“You suffer a painful divorce, so you rush out and decide to save your sister from the same fate by derailing her honeymoon. Sounds like a pretty fucking Unfortunate Choice to me.”
I’m almost winded with shock. What? What?
“Shut up!” I manage in fury. “You don’t know anything about it. I shouldn’t have told you.”
“It’s her life.” He stares back implacably. “Hers. And you’re making a big mistake interfering with it. One you may live to regret.”
“Amen,” I say sarcastically. “Finished the sermon?”
Lorcan just shakes his head. He finishes his whiskey in a couple of gulps, and I know that’s the end. He’s going. He walks over to the door, then pauses. His back is tensed, I can tell. I think he feels as awkward as I do.
Uncomfortable thoughts are needling me. There’s a painful dragging at the pit of my stomach. It feels a bit like guilt—not that I’d ever admit this to him. But there is something I must say. Something I must make clear.
“Just in case you were wondering.” I wait till he turns his head. “I care about Lottie a great deal. A great deal.” My voice gives a treacherous wobble. “She’s not only my little sister, she’s my friend. And I’ve done all this for her.”
Lorcan stares at me for a moment, his expression unreadable. “I know you think you’re acting for the right reasons,” he says at last. “I know you’ve had a lot of pain in your life that you want to protect Lottie from. But this is wrong. Deeply wrong. And you know it, Fliss. You do, really.”
His eyes have softened. He feels sorry for me, I suddenly realize. Sorry for me. I can’t stand it.
“Well, good night,” I say shortly.
“Good night.” He matches my tone and leaves the room without a further word.
19
LOTTIE
It was meant to be! This is my all-star, gold-plated, total dream scenario. Ben and me on a boat again. Skimming across the Aegean waves. On our way to total bliss.
Thank God we’ve left the Amba. I know it’s luxurious and has five stars, but it’s not the real Ikonos. It’s not us. The moment we were dropped off for the day at the little bustling port, I felt something buried inside me come alive. This is what I remember of Ikonos. Old white houses with shutters, and shaded streets, and elderly women in black sitting on corners, and the dock for the ferry. The port was full of fishing boats and water taxis, and the overpowering smell of fish made my senses reel. I remember that smell. I remember all of it.
The sky is a bright morning blue and the sun is dazzling my eyelids, just as it always did. I’m lying back in the water taxi, the way I did when I was eighteen. My feet are in Ben’s lap and he’s idly fiddling with my toes and there’s only one thing on both our minds.
My skin has recovered perfectly from its allergic reaction, and Ben was keen on a quick shag this morning. But I talked him out of it. How could we consummate our marriage in a boring old hotel bed when instead there’s the chance to do it in the cove where we first did it, all those years ago? The romance of it makes me want to hug myself. Here we are after all these years! Going back to the guest house! Married! I wonder if Arthur will be there. I wonder if he’ll recognize us. I don’t think I look that different. I’m even wearing the same tiny tie-dye shorts I wore when I was eighteen … and praying desperately they don’t split.
Spray splashes my face as we bump across the waves, and I lick the delicious saltiness off my lips. I’m surveying the coastline as we pass and remembering all the little villages we explored back then, with their narrow cobbled alleyways and unexpected treasures, like that half-ruined marble statue of a horse we once came across in the middle of a deserted square. I look up to share this thought with Ben, but he’s engrossed in his iPad. I can hear rap coming from it and feel a flicker of irritation. Does he have to listen to that now?
“Do you think Arthur’s still there?” I try to attract his attention. “And that old cook?”
“Can’t be, surely.” Ben looks up briefly. “I wonder what happened to Sarah.”
Sarah again. Do I even know this girl?
The music seems to be getting louder, and now Ben’s rapping along. He really can’t rap. I mean, I’m being a dispassionate, loving wife here—and he’s crap.
“It’s lovely and peaceful out here, isn’t it?” I say with a meaningful edge to my voice, but he doesn’t take the hint. “Could we maybe not have the music on for a bit?”
“It’s DJ Cram, babe,” says Ben, and turns the volume up. Fuck yo brudder blares out across the beautiful sea, and I wince.
He’s a selfish git.
The thought lands in my brain with no warning and makes me panic slightly. No. I didn’t really mean “selfish.” Or “git.” It’s all good. All blissful.
I don’t mind rap music, anyway. And we can talk over the top of it.
“I can’t believe I’m going back to the place where it all changed,” I say, beginning a new tack. “That fire was, like, the turning point for my life.”
“Will you stop going on about that bloody fire?” says Ben irritably, and I stare back in hurt shock.
I shouldn’t be surprised, I suppose. Ben’s never been interested in the fire. He’d gone sponge-diving on the other side of the island for a couple of days when it happened, so he missed the whole thing and has always been chippy about that. Still, he doesn’t have to be so snappy. He knows how important it was to me.
“Hey!” he suddenly exclaims. He’s peering at his iPad and I can see he’s just got a text. We’re fairly near the coast, so there must be some random patch of signal.
“Who is it?”
Ben looks as though he’s bursting with pride and excitement. Has he won something? “Heard of someone called Yuri Zhernakov? He only wants a private meeting with me.”
“Yuri Zhernakov?” I gape at him. “How come?”
“He wants to buy the company.”
“Wow! And do you want to sell?”
“Why not?”
Already my mind is whirring. This would be amazing! Ben would get a lump of cash, we could buy an old farmhouse in France.…
“Yuri wants to talk to me.” Ben seems totally puffed up. “He asked for me personally. We’re going to meet on his super-yacht.”
“That’s amazing!” I squeeze his arm.
“I know. It is amazing. And Lorcan can—” Ben stops himself. “Whatever,” he says moodily.
There’s some weird vibe going on which I don’t understand, but I don’t care. We’re going to move to France! And we’re about to have sex, finally! I’ve forgotten my earlier irritation. I’m back to super-bliss. As I happily swig my Coke, I suddenly remember something I
’ve been meaning to say to Ben for days.
“Hey, last year I met these scientists at Nottingham who were researching a new way to make paper. More eco. Something about a special filtering process? Have you heard of them?”
“No.” Ben shrugs. “But Lorcan might have.”
“Well, you should link up with them. Do some funding or whatever. Although I suppose if you’re selling the company …” I shrug too.
“Doesn’t matter. That’s a good idea.” Ben nudges me. “Do you have lots of good ideas like that?”
“Millions.” I grin back.
“I’m going to tell Lorcan right now.” Ben starts typing at his iPad. “He’s always going on about research and development. He thinks I’m not interested. Well, bollocks to that.”
“Tell him about the Zhernakov meeting too,” I suggest. “Maybe he’ll have some good advice.” Immediately, Ben’s fingers freeze and his face closes up.
“Not a chance,” he says at last, and shoots me a warning look. “And you’re not saying a word to anyone either. Not a word.”
20
FLISS
The morning after is always hell.
In Sofia, Bulgaria, after too many glasses of wine, an excruciating argument, and a night of sexual frustration, the morning after achieves fresh levels of hellishness.
From Lorcan’s expression, he feels the same way. Noah ran joyfully to greet him as soon as we entered the dining room, which is why I’m sitting with him, not through choice. He’s savagely buttering a piece of toast, and I’m crumbling a croissant. From our desultory conversation we’ve established that we both slept terribly, that the coffee is abysmal, that there are 2.4 Bulgarian leva to the pound and that the flight to Ikonos today hasn’t been delayed, as far as we can glean from the airline website.
Areas we haven’t touched on: Ben, Lottie, their marriage, their sexual conduct, Bulgarian politics, the state of the world economy, my attempts to sabotage my sister’s honeymoon and thus risk losing my relationship with her forever. Among others.
The restaurant is adjacent to the bar we were in last night, and I can see a pool attendant dabbing at the pristine water with a filtering net. I’ve no idea why they bother. I expect Noah is the only person to have swum in that pool all year. Although, to be fair, he might well have peed in it.
“Can I swim?” he says, as though reading my thoughts.
“No,” I say shortly. “We’re getting on the airplane soon.”
Lorcan has his BlackBerry to his ear again. He’s been speed-dialing all through breakfast but never getting through. I think I can guess who he’s been calling, and this is confirmed when he says, “Ben, at last,” and pushes his chair back. I watch in slight resentment as he walks right away, to the side of the pool, and perches in front of the sauna entrance. How am I supposed to eavesdrop now?
I try to ignore my tension by slicing up an apple for Noah. When Lorcan returns, I force myself not to grip his lapels and demand information. Instead, I ask, with only moderate urgency:
“Well? Have they done it?”
Lorcan gives me a disbelieving look. “Is that all you’re interested in?”
“Yes,” I say defiantly.
“Well, they haven’t. They’ve just arrived at the guest house. I guess they’re planning to do it there.”
The guest house? I stare at him in horror. I can’t get at them there. There’s no Nico. It’s out of my power zone. Shit. Shit. I’m going to be just too late—
“Your sister is quite something,” Lorcan continues with animation. “She’s come up with a great idea for the company. We’re far too weak on the research-and-development side, and I’ve known it for a while. But she’s suggested we tie up with a research project in Nottingham she knows about. It’s a tiny team, which is why I hadn’t heard of it, but it sounds as if it’s directly relevant to us. We could get some joint funding going. It’s brilliant.”
“Oh yes,” I say, still preoccupied. “She’d know about that. She works for a pharmaceutical company. She meets scientists all the time.”
“What exactly does she do?”
“Recruitment.”
“Recruitment?” I look up to see that his eyes have lit up. “We need a new head of HR! This is perfect!”
“What?”
“She could head up HR, keep the good ideas coming, get involved with the estate.…” I can see his mind working hard. “This is just what Ben needed! A wife who can be a business partner too. A helpmate. Someone to stand at his side and—”
“Stop right there!” I plant a hand on the table. “You’re not poaching my sister to go and play a game of Happy Families in Staffordshire.”
“Why not?” demands Lorcan. “What’s your problem with it?”
“My problem is it’s nonsense! It’s ridiculous!”
Lorcan stares at me silently for a moment, and I feel the briefest of shivers under his gaze.
“You really take the biscuit,” he says at last. “How do you know you’re not ruining your sister’s great love? How do you know this isn’t her chance for a fantastically happy life?”
“Oh, for God’s sake.” I shake my head impatiently. I’m not even going to answer that question, it’s so stupid.
“I think Ben and Lottie have every chance of being happy,” he says firmly. “And I, for one, am going to encourage them.”
“You can’t switch sides!” I glare at him in fury.
“I was never on your side,” retorts Lorcan. “Your side is the nutty side.”
“The nutty side.” Noah picks up on this and decides it’s hilarious. “The nutty side!” He falls about in laughter. “Mummy’s on the nutty side!”
I glare at Lorcan, stirring my coffee viciously. Traitor.
“Morning, everyone.”
I look up to see Richard approaching the table. He looks about as cheery as the rest of us, i.e., suicidal.
“Morning,” I say. “Did you sleep well?”
“Terribly.” He scowls and pours himself some coffee, then glances at my phone. “So, have they done it yet?”
“For God’s sake!” I take out some of my resentment on him. “You’re obsessed!”
“You can talk,” mutters Lorcan.
“Why do you keep asking if they’ve done it?” says Noah alertly.
“Well, aren’t you obsessed too?” counters Richard.
“No, I’m not obsessed. And, no, they haven’t done it.” I put him out of his misery.
“Done what?” asks Noah.
“Put the sausage in the cupcake,” says Lorcan, draining his coffee.
“Lorcan!” I snap. “Don’t say things like that!”
Noah has exploded with laughter. “Put the sausage in the cupcake!” he crows. “The sausage in the cupcake!”
Great. I glare at Lorcan, who stares back, unmoved. And, anyway, cupcake? I’ve never heard it called that.
“I suppose you think it’s funny.” Richard turns his ire on Lorcan. “I suppose this is all a joke to you.”
“Oh, give it a break, Sir Lancelot.” Lorcan loses his patience. “Isn’t it time to butt out? You must want to give up by now. No woman is worth this rigmarole.”
“Lottie would be worth ten times this ‘rigmarole,’ as you put it.” Richard juts his chin at Lorcan. “And I’m not giving up when I’m only six hours away from seeing her. I’ve worked it out exactly.” He takes a piece of toast from the rack. “Six hours.”
“Sorry.” I put a hand on his. “But you should know. It’ll be more than that. They’re not at the hotel anymore. They’re at the guest house.”
Richard stares at me, wide-eyed with horror. “Bugger,” he says at last.
“I know.”
“They’ll shag there, for definite.”
“They might not,” I say, to convince myself as much as him. “And mind your language, please. Little pitchers.” I gesture at Noah.
“They will.” Richard is hunched with gloom. “That place is Lottie’s fantasyland
. It’s her yellow brick road. Of course she’ll—” He stops himself, just in time. “Put the sausage in the muffin.”
“Cupcake,” corrects Lorcan.
“Shut up!” I say, exasperated.
As we’re all sitting there silently, a waitress approaches the table with a coloring book for Noah, and he accepts it with delight.
“You can draw your mummy or daddy,” she suggests, producing a box of crayons.
“My daddy isn’t here,” explains Noah politely, and gestures at Lorcan and Richard. “Neither of them is my daddy.”
Great. What kind of impression is he giving?
“It’s a business trip,” I say, smiling quickly.
“My daddy lives in London,” says Noah chattily. “But he’s moving to Hollywood.”
“Hollywood!”
“Yes. He’s going to live next to a movie star.”
My stomach plunges in dismay. Oh God, he’s doing it again. Even after we had the Big Talk. As soon as the waitress has moved away, I turn to Noah, trying to hide my agitation.
“Noah, sweetheart. Do you remember what we said about telling the truth?”
“Yes,” he says equably.
“So why did you say that Daddy’s moving to Hollywood?” I’m losing my cool, but I can’t help it. “You can’t say things like that, Noah! People will believe you!”
“But it’s true.”
“No, it isn’t! Daddy isn’t moving to Hollywood!”
“Yes, he is. Look, here’s his address. It says Beverly Hills. Daddy says that’s the same as Hollywood. He’s going to have a swimming pool and I can swim in it!” Noah reaches into his pocket and produces a slip of paper. I stare at it in disbelief. It’s in Daniel’s writing.
NEW ADDRESS
Daniel Phipps and Trudy Vanderveer
5406 Aubrey Road
Beverly Hills
CA 90210
I blink several times in bewilderment. Beverly Hills? What? I mean— What?
“Just wait there a minute, Noah,” I say, in a voice which doesn’t sound like mine. I’m already speed-dialing Daniel and pushing back my chair.
“Fliss,” he replies in his infuriating I’ve just been doing yoga, how about you? voice.