Drop Dead Gorgeous

by Anna Cheska

  There were however – much to her relief – also English people living over here, and it was in order to visit two of these that they were heading over to Limione tonight. Thank goodness. At last she would be able to spend a relaxing evening secure in the knowledge that she was with her own. Hazel exhaled slowly.

  ‘Are you feeling well, my love? Is it getting a leetle chilly for you?’

  Hazel’s eyes flicked open at the interruption. Giorgio had placed one hand on her thigh and, well, it might be very English and repressed of her, but one didn’t always want to be pawed in intimate places. It could be most irritating. ‘I’m perfectly fine.’ She tried not to snap because he couldn’t help being Italian and hot-blooded.

  So far she had managed to repel his advances. They had been given separate rooms – Gianfranco’s wife had seemed clear on this point, and Hazel had ignored Giorgio’s raised eyebrows and torrent of Italian, taken the proffered towels and tried to ensure through body language to Marianna that, yes, this was precisely what she’d expected.

  ‘Per’aps I should buy a place in Limione,’ Giorgio said thoughtfully as the boat made its approach.

  ‘Hmm.’ Best to remain non-committal. Though, What’s happened to your place in Malcesine? one might well ask. Hazel looked around her as they disembarked. They began a leisurely stroll along the waterfront. This was certainly a charming town with its lemon trees, narrow streets and tiny restaurants. But somehow she couldn’t raise much enthusiasm for living here. One would tire – wouldn’t one? – even of cypress trees and lemons?

  * * *

  ‘So what’s the new student like?’ Imogen asked as they floated lazily in the deep end, twenty minutes later. Imo had managed a couple of lengths, Jude must have done at least a dozen.

  ‘What did you say?’ Her eyes were closed and she looked … well, unusually peaceful.

  ‘Your new student.’

  Jude opened one eye. ‘The trouble with Brazilians,’ she said, ‘is that they always spoil Daisy something rotten. So she adores them and begs me to go out just so she can be baby-sat.’

  ‘Sounds perfect to me.’ And this wasn’t bad either, lying here with the water gently slurping around her neck and shoulders as another swimmer rippled past in the next lane. Jude was right – swimming was so relaxing, she’d forgotten how good it made you feel.

  Jude turned on to her front and trod water. ‘Almost,’ she agreed, shaking back hanks of chestnut hair. ‘I just have to keep a watchful eye on the telephone.’

  ‘What’s her name?’

  Jude was heading towards the side. She mumbled something foreign and indistinct. ‘Are you ready to get out?’

  ‘OK.’ Imo followed her up the steps. There was, she sensed, a new resolution about Jude these days.

  * * *

  After a quick coffee they left the Leisure Centre and headed back to the car park and Imo’s Nova. Ten minutes later, she was pulling up outside The Goddess Without.

  She noticed someone standing by the side entrance that led to Jude’s flat. ‘Hang on a sec…’ She grabbed Jude’s arm. A tall dark denim-clad young man seemed to be letting himself in. ‘Who’s that?’

  ‘Oh, er, let’s see…’

  What was wrong with Jude? She could be a little security-conscious, for goodness’ sake. Imo pressed the heel of her hand firmly on the hooter. They both jumped at the sound. ‘D’you think he’s a burglar?’

  ‘Don’t be daft, Imo.’ Jude’s voice was crisp, though she was looking a little shame-faced. ‘That’s Roberto.’

  ‘Roberto?’

  He – and everyone else in the street – had looked up at the sound of the blaring horn. He peered towards the car and began grinning and waving. And now, yes, here he was, loping towards them like a great big hairy wolfhound. ‘Who the heck is Roberto?’

  ‘My Brazilian student,’ Jude hissed.

  ‘Judy, Judy,’ he sang.

  Judy? Imo felt an irrepressible giggle rising in her throat. The woman sitting beside her had never been and never would be a Judy …

  ‘Roberto, hi.’ Jude began to struggle out of the door.

  At the same moment he opened it with a flourish and she fell – very conveniently – into his arms.

  Brazilian student? As in tall, broad-shouldered, dark-skinned and smouldering … late-teens perhaps? Early-twenties? So perhaps Jude hadn’t been exactly lying when she’d said she was giving up men.

  ‘What are you staring at?’ Jude practically slammed the door in Imo’s face.

  Undeterred, she opened the window. This was too good to miss.

  Jude was attempting to drag him across the pavement – perhaps that was why she needed to build up her muscles? – but there was an awful lot of him, and most of it was standing still.

  ‘I was looking for you.’ Roberto’s eyes were liquid sex appeal. Imo knew that Jude would never be able to resist. ‘My back – it is bad again,’ he said mournfully.

  Bad back, hmm? Imogen rested her hands on the steering wheel and strained to hear Jude’s response. Whatever it was, she was smiling.

  ‘Ah, yes. That is exactly what I need.’ Roberto was smiling too. He had more teeth than a crocodile but they were very, very white. ‘Another one of your specials. Hands on sports injury massage.’

  Hands on? No wonder Jude had been looking so peaceful in the pool. Her problem, Imo thought, would be how to keep her hands off.

  Chapter 30

  ‘I’m off now, Imogen.’ Naomi’s voice broke into her thoughts and Imo saw it was almost three – time to emerge from her sanctuary, potting on seedlings out back, to face the shop, the telephone, customers …

  ‘Okey-doke.’ She resealed the pack of potting compost, rubbed the dusty earth from her gloves and pulled them off. It was a complicated arrangement, she knew, but women were good at complicated. Term-time, Naomi came to work in the shop from ten till three, picked Daisy up from school and took her back home, to Jude’s or to Say It With Flowers, depending on everyone’s itinerary and when Jude was free to take over. Admittedly, half-term had proved chaotic until they realised that Daisy loved gardening, and would be happy for hours pottering about with a tub of compost and some seeds.

  It had seemed strange at first, Imo reflected, pulling down the sleeves of her overalls, but they had become quite a community, working well, one for another. She shifted the seed trays so they would get maximum light. Only … it didn’t seem to be enough. Picking up her planting fork, she stabbed it into a pot of earth on the bench. What was the matter with her? Was she cracking up? She raked her fingers through her hair – immediately regretting the action. Her hands were encrusted with earth that had crept through the holes in both gloves.

  ‘Are you all right, Imogen?’ Naomi had come through and was watching her, arms at her sides – steady, calm. She had taken off her green overalls and put on her camel coat.

  Imo knew she could confide in her, if she was so inclined. Their relationship had progressed into friendship despite all the odds. But she didn’t. She said, ‘Of course.’

  ‘Sure?’

  She was tempted to snap, ‘Don’t fuss.’ But Naomi was a godsend, a natural. She was the link holding all this together; the strongest of all three of them in a way. She had proved expert at dealing with people, she’d picked up the way the business was run in super-quick time, and she was flexible. Women were good at that too.

  ‘I should have taken you on years ago,’ Imo joked. But she couldn’t confide in her and she couldn’t ask her – about Marisa, about Alex.

  * * *

  As Imogen began dealing with an order for a bouquet, and Naomi set off for Daisy’s school playground, Marisa was scanning the newspaper column once more.

  The first time she’d made a number of strong strokes with her red pen. This time she studied detail. Every word counted. Every word would tell her something. Because she had no intention of wasting her time. Time was money, as Shelley would say.

  This time round, a new wiggly l
ine dismissed a couple of her previous possibilities. Bohemian was almost as dodgy as eccentric and surely meant no money. And a girl in her position had to be wary of rented … Rented was a long way from ownership in her opinion. Ambition was a favourite one; romantic should be avoided at all costs. Intelligent was so-so. But it was what was being sought that was most important by far. Beauty for starters. Marisa smiled. She could do beauty.

  This was an investment for the future. If she’d stayed working for Shelley, what would she be at thirty? Worn out, through and through. She had seen those girls. Shelley wanted them to go on forever. Well, Shelley would, she was running a business. But Marisa had more sense.

  Slowly, she dialled Alex’s number. He was usually back from college early on Wednesdays. She called him most days … thought of him all the time.

  * * *

  Jude was humming as she let herself into the flat. She broke into song in the hall, a Spanish ditty about senoritas who could sway the night away, that was always being played on the radio.

  Naomi would have dropped Daisy off at her friend Hannah’s house by now, and Jude didn’t have to pick her up till 6.30. She turned up the central heating. Her last client (a nutrivital facial treatment to hydrate, nourish and balance) had just left. Jude had given the salon a rapid brush-over and wipe-down, her face an even more rapid check-over – a touch more eyeliner, powder top-up and lip in-fill – and she was there. Or rather here. And she knew exactly what was waiting for her.

  She paused mid-chorus. ‘Coo-eee.’ Too late she realised she sounded like her mother.

  He emerged from his bedroom – Hazel’s room, to be precise, but her mother would never know – wearing only a pair of bum-hugging denim jeans.

  Jude leaned against the wall to stop herself from falling over. He was gorgeous. And at her mercy. OK, he was young too, but so what?

  ‘Hello … Judy.’

  She pouted. She could be a Judy. She could be anyone she liked. True colours could change with the wind and hell was losing your make-up bag. ‘Roberto – hi. Er…’ She surveyed his torso. Wide shoulders, narrow waist. Dark brown skin, masses of thick and curly black chest hair. ‘How’s the back?’ She grinned inanely.

  ‘How do you say? Desperate?’ He grinned back at her. Also inanely.

  ‘Well, we do say that sometimes, yes.’ She dumped her bag on the floor, pulled off her outsize coat. ‘But I’m not sure it’s exactly the right word here.’ The heating had kicked in. She took off her sweater and got down to the little black shift that she liked to work in.

  He flexed his biceps in response. ‘Could you … Would you…?’

  The pleasure would be hers. ‘Coconut oil, I think.’ She fetched some from the bathroom, led him back into her mother’s bedroom.

  He followed her like a lamb.

  ‘You’d better take off those jeans.’

  He didn’t need asking twice. She peeled off the duvet and he peeled off everything but a pair of black boxers.

  ‘Down here.’ She pointed.

  He lay prone on the bed, face down. A lamb, yes. A lamb to the slaughter. She would fix his back – and how.

  Jude straddled him – her favourite position, his bum between her legs – rubbed some oil between her palms and began the massage. Slowly, slowly … ‘You’re very tense today.’ The skin was tight, the shoulder muscle knotty, and she kneaded gently to start with, working the oil deep into his brown skin with her fingertips.

  But after a bit he seemed to relax and she began to put everything into it: pummelling, stroking, pounding. Talk about healing hands … She was a star. The oil was sweet and fragrant. It reminded her of summer days, hot bodies and foreign beaches. Holidays and pleasure and … Under her hands his body grew warmer and his skin grew softer and sweeter and hotter and …

  ‘Ooh … aaah,’ he said.

  She’d give him ooh, aah. She rolled the flesh of his waist between her thumb and fingers, used the heel of her hand for added pressure under the shoulder blades. With her oily fingertips, she traced each knob of the spinal cord. In turn. Slowly …

  ‘Aah…’

  Yes, from the neck down. Slow, sensual, rhythmic, teasing.

  He broke out in a spate of Brazilian. That was better.

  At last she finished. If she went on any longer with this heat charging between his back and her hands, one of them might combust spontaneously. ‘That’s it. Done.’ She slipped off and sat on the edge of the bed.

  More Brazilian. God knows what he was saying, but it sounded enthusiastic enough. It didn’t matter a bit that he spoke almost no English. They could communicate perfectly well without words, she decided.

  He turned over. It was impossible not to notice that he was several sizes larger than when he had first laid down – in some departments anyway. Jude stared.

  ‘I wish…’ he said, eyieng the black shift, one strap of which had slipped off her shoulder ‘… that I could do that for you.’

  ‘Be my guest.’ She slipped the other shoulder strap free. ‘And if you … er … get stuck, I’ll remind you what to do next, OK?’

  Jude lay down on the bed that was still warm from Roberto’s body and he sat astride her, his weight on his knees.

  ‘Ooo … er … mmm.’ She could feel him – a lot of him – pressing on top of her in a rather delicious way.

  ‘We must take this dress down. We must not let it spoil,’ he said.

  ‘Absolutely.’ Jude wriggled to accommodate him as he eased the shift down to her buttocks.

  ‘Now we begin.’

  She felt the warm oil seep into her skin. His hands travelled slowly down her back. They stopped just below the sternum, and then began again from the neck. ‘Aah.’

  The phone rang. It probably wasn’t important, but since Daisy wasn’t safely at home, Jude couldn’t ignore it. She reached for the extension.

  ‘Is this a good time?’ James Dean’s dry tones drawled down the line.

  ‘Not exactly.’ Roberto was working on her shoulder blades now, and since she’d raised herself up to answer the phone, he was getting dangerously close to her left breast.

  ‘I won’t keep you a moment then.’ He sounded terse. ‘I just wanted a quick word about Florrie.’

  ‘Florrie?’ Jude protected her breast with her spare hand and pushed Roberto’s marauding fingers away. Now was not the moment.

  ‘I can’t get round there…’

  In the background, Jude could hear soft music playing. No, he was probably far too busy. ‘The rent’s not due, is it?’ she snapped.

  ‘No, I’m just worried about her—’

  ‘Worried?’

  ‘Concerned.’

  ‘That she won’t be able to pay it?’ Jude felt reckless. ‘That she’s going to spend it?’

  Roberto reached a certain point just below her armpit that was particularly ticklish, and she collapsed on to the bed. ‘Oof.’

  ‘What’s the matter?’ He didn’t sound as if he cared. ‘What are you doing? And this has nothing to do with the rent.’

  The receiver was now stuck between her mouth and the pillow, digging into her neck. Jude wriggled in an attempt to get more comfortable. ‘What then?’ she demanded. ‘Still worried that she can’t look after herself? Still think she should be in a home?’ But even as she spoke, she was aware of a twinge of guilt. How long was it since she’d last called round to see Florrie? Four days? A week? She shivered as Roberto’s probing fingers discovered the niceties of her lower spinal cord. Too busy thinking of her own pleasure.

  ‘I think you and I should discuss this matter face to face.’ James Dean’s voice was colder than ever now – in polar opposition to Jude’s burning skin.

  Was he mad? ‘Oh, do you indeed?’ She almost sat bolt upright, until she remembered where she was and who with.

  ‘I do.’ He sounded very forceful. ‘I suggest we meet up for a drink.’

  A drink? ‘Won’t your wife object?’ she muttered.

  ‘I’m not married.
’

  ‘Girlfriend, then.’

  ‘Not guilty.’

  There followed a silence so intense that Jude swallowed very hard and was sure he must have heard it. ‘I don’t really think…’ she began, wondering why her heart seemed to be flipping around her ribcage like a demented frisbee.

  And then Roberto lunged.

  ‘Aargh!’ She fought him off but he was strong. He whispered, ‘Is that good, yes? Just there, yes?’ into both her ear and the telephone receiver.

  ‘And I can tell you’re extremely busy.’ James Dean, the original Mr Iceberg, spoke very deliberately. ‘I do apologise for disturbing you.’ He rang off.

  ‘Shit.’ Jude said.

  ‘More?’ Roberto asked.

  Jude shook her head. ‘No more.’ Somehow, she was no longer in the mood.

  * * *

  Brian and Phoebe were – much to Hazel’s relief – extremely ordinary.

  Their house was charming, not ostentatious in the least, and although Hazel spotted a pool, it was small, secluded and tucked away in the modest grounds to the side. The place was set back from Lake Garda, almost embedded in the mountainside.

  Brian was very English and respectable, Hazel observed, in his casual trousers and a navy blazer. And Phoebe wore a turquoise cocktail dress with pearls – real ones, she could tell.

  They provided a most welcome sherry before dinner and after the starter – mozzarella cheese with avocado and plum tomatoes – came an English and understated breast of chicken in some sort of creamy sauce. The pudding was Italian ice cream which even Hazel couldn’t complain about. Some things, she had to admit, the Italians did best.

  And they spoke English! They were pleasant and intelligent and Hazel could understand every word. It was heaven. She found herself drinking perhaps a touch more Bardolino than she should. But what did it matter? She was with friends here. At last.

  With coffee, liqueurs and still more wine, Giorgio started telling funny stories about Trident. He could be quite amusing – Hazel had almost forgotten. And he was clearly at home here in this house. The dining-room in which they were seated was small with white ceilings and walls and white drapes at the windows. The furniture was sparse and certainly not what Hazel was used to but what there was, was tasteful.