Fast Friends

by Jill Mansell

  “I’m sure,” said Camilla happily. “And I’ve been staying in a terrible hotel for the last few days, so I’d like to move in tonight, if that’s possible.”

  “Done!” said Zoë. “Thank God!”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  “Buy a bottle of champagne, Lou.” Joshua ran his hand absentmindedly over her bare back, sending shivers down it as he always managed to do. Loulou breathed in, inhaling the crisp scent of his aftershave, and looked fondly up at him. Josh looked spectacular in a dinner jacket, even though he had spent most of the evening complaining that the wing-collared shirt irritated his neck. The gold silk bow tie and matching handkerchief in his top pocket were the only splashes of color.

  She giggled as his fingers moved and the wide rhinestone strap of her dress slipped off her pale shoulder. She had chosen the extravagant Zandra Rhodes creation specially, in order to match Joshua. The tight-bodiced, full-skirted black taffeta was saved from indecency only by the single strap that snaked up from her left breast, over her right shoulder, and all the way down her back until it reached her left hip. The black taffeta, strewn with black-and-silver net butterflies, was slit to the thigh and lined with silver satin. Loulou had happily made sure that she looked spectacular, and her current favorite press photographers, particularly excited by the sight of her new “close friend,” had used up several rolls of film on the pair of them.

  “This is crap, man,” Joshua had murmured out of the corner of his mouth, quelling his Scottish upbringing and adopting a heavier-than-usual Jamaican accent.

  “I know, I know,” hissed Loulou, clutching his arm and tossing back her wildly disorganized hair. They had fallen into bed earlier in the evening, overcome with lust, and there had been precious little time afterward in which to get ready for the ball. “But it’s publicity. For both of us.”

  “It’s still crap.”

  She watched him now as he headed toward the champagne bar, and shivered involuntarily, although the two thousand guests ensured by means of body heat alone that she couldn’t possibly be cold. The champagne bar was situated in the old library and had been strung with what seemed like miles of fairy lights for the occasion. It was weird, mused Loulou, to think that she was finally back here, in stuffy old Elm House, for a decidedly debauched all-night charity ball. She scarcely recognized the oak-paneled library, but then, that wasn’t really surprising since she had always made a point of avoiding anything to do with books. The dining room, where ranks of knackered refectory tables usually stood, was occupied now by a band too loud even for her practiced ears. The massive hall where morning assembly had been held was pounding with the music of a rock group and heavy with the scent of cannabis. The washroom, where she and Roz had smoked innumerable cigarettes, was now crammed with bright young things repainting their lips and snorting cocaine.

  Plus ça change, thought Loulou with a wry smile. At least this night would be making tens of thousands of pounds for charity. The more the guests drank, smoked, and snorted, the higher they got and the more they spent. Would the Renal Transplant Unit really be bothered if it knew that it had gained its donation largely by virtue of illegal substances?

  Like hell they would, she thought, draining the glass and wishing Josh would return. And at least she wasn’t getting through the night on coke or speed. No way. She was doing it purely on champagne. The champagne that she was buying at forty pounds a bottle. Christ, the amount she’d spent so far would surely buy a new dialysis machine. And—the thought crept unbidden into her slightly muddled brain—Josh had paid for none of it. Not a single drink. And quite abruptly, after several weeks spent resolutely denying that any such doubts ever existed, Loulou realized that all those hidden qualms were finally, unwillingly, becoming a reality.

  She found herself in that most difficult situation: being wildly in love, but at the same time chillingly aware that it was all going to end in tears. Something was wrong, and if she didn’t have the experience to recognize the dawning symptoms, she told herself sadly, then no one did.

  Joshua was with her for neither her mind nor her body. And finally acknowledging the true reason for his apparent devotion didn’t give her any happiness at all.

  * * *

  I must be mad, Mac told himself as he elbowed his way past a crowd of dickey-bowed stockbrokers and their yuppie girlfriends. One of the men had his trousers around his ankles, and everyone was shrieking with laughter. If it’s that small, I’m not surprised, thought Mac dismissively.

  But he was still convinced that he was mad, coming all the way down to a charity ball in Gloucestershire in the very faint hope of seeing Loulou.

  He didn’t even know why he had done it. Impulse, presumably. But it was quite alien to his deliberately laid-back character. The idea of her had simply overwhelmed him earlier this evening, and he had driven almost against his will to Vampires. How would she react when she saw him there, after their last non-eventful meeting? Mac had been hollow with anticipation when he had walked into the packed wine bar—and quite disgusted with himself when he realized how disappointed he was to discover that she wasn’t there.

  Finally, he had asked Christo Moran where she was.

  “The Easter Ball, at Elm House,” Christo had responded with a typically Irish shrug, at the same time pouring Chardonnay at lightning speed into six glasses. “Some charity do at her old school.”

  Shit, thought Mac, taking the glass that Christo had poured for him. All that anticipation and now this. What a waste. And this was his fifth drink in an hour.

  “Call me a taxi,” he had demanded, and Christo had nodded sympathetically, only too aware of the power Loulou was capable of wielding even when she wasn’t aware of doing so.

  “Where to, Mac?” They both knew already what the reply would be.

  “Elm bloody House,” said Mac, draining his glass in one. “Gloucester-bloody-shire. I must be bloody mad.”

  And now he was here, the only male in the entire place dressed in faded Levis and a baggy white linen shirt without a tie, only reluctantly allowed inside because he had employed every last ounce of his charm upon the doorman.

  “My wife thinks I’m still in Egypt,” he had told him with a totally disarming smile. “She’s here with her sister and it’s her birthday. I’ve flown back specially. I promise you, this will make her night.”

  The doorman had pouted upon hearing the word wife, but an encouraging wink from Mac and a handful of tenners had finally done the trick. He was in.

  Now all he had to do was locate Loulou among the frantic, heaving, noisy masses. It shouldn’t be too difficult, he thought sardonically; there were only about two thousand of them crammed inside the place. If he could make his way up the main staircase upon which a jazz band was playing “Sweet Georgia Brown” and jostle for position at the carved-stone balustrade overlooking the main hall, he might have a chance of spotting her. Damn the woman, he cursed to himself. And damn himself for succumbing to his own sudden desperate urge to see her.

  * * *

  Noise, noise, noise, thought Loulou miserably, realizing that she had been hiding in the loo now for over twenty minutes. Searching the bottom of her bag for stray aspirin to numb her headache, she stared at her reflection in the age-spotted mirror above the basin. The unglamorous fluorescent lighting wasn’t doing anybody any favors, but it wasn’t only that.

  I’m not happy, she thought, reaching automatically for the fuchsia-pink lipstick that would show off her mouth to its best advantage, but that couldn’t make her smile. Half of her wanted to run away, to disappear into the night and escape the problems that were becoming more menacing with every glass of champagne she drank. The other half wanted to stay, either to fight it out or simply pretend it wasn’t happening. That, of course, would be the easiest thing to do for the moment, but it wouldn’t solve anything.

  Pathetic, she told her reflection, mouthing the single w
ord with perfect clarity. The woman standing next to her dropped a pot of shimmering eye shadow into the basin and said, “Shit.”

  “Absolutely,” said Loulou, from the heart.

  “You think you’ve got problems,” said the woman, abandoning the glass pot and zipping her makeup bag with a decisive gesture that made her look like an efficient secretary. Loulou noticed her eyelids were wet with recent tears. “My fiancé disappeared upstairs with some little tart over an hour ago. They’re in one of seven locked rooms on the second floor, and I’ve shouted through the keyhole of every one.”

  Despite her own unhappiness, Loulou was fascinated. “What did you shout?”

  “I said, ‘That’s my husband you’re bonking, and for your information, darling, I’ve got a gun,’” the woman explained gloomily.

  “And do you?”

  “I wish I did.” She managed a weak smile. “You’ve cheered me up a bit. Can I buy you a drink? My name’s Poppy.”

  “I’d love a drink,” said Loulou, her own spirits lifting, “but could we possibly have it in here? I rather need the privacy at the moment.”

  “No problem,” said Poppy briskly. “I’ll go get a bottle of bubbly, and you can tell me why you’re having such a shitty evening.”

  She turned to leave, clutching her purse, but Loulou deftly removed it from her grasp. “Just outside the champagne bar you’ll see a man holding a bottle of Moët. Tell him you’re a friend of Loulou’s and that she’d like her drink. Bring back the Moët and two clean glasses.”

  Poppy looked doubtful. “There are going to be a couple of hundred men holding a bottle of champagne.”

  “Ah.” Loulou carefully gathered up her glittering skirt and slid down the wall into a sitting position. “He’s the good-looking one with the gold bow tie.”

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Where the hell was she? Mac leaned against the balustrade, searching the crowds below for the instantly recognizable, rippling hair of his ex-wife. For almost an hour now, he had been leaning and looking, and so far three women he had never seen before in his life had waved and smiled back at him, and climbed the curving staircase to introduce themselves. But there had been no sign of Loulou.

  Was she actually here, after all? He was beginning to doubt it now, recalling the ricocheting decisions she had always been capable of. It was quite possible now that Lou was sitting in some seedy pub in North Wales playing dominoes with the locals, but at the same time, some sixth sense told Mac that she was here. It was just a question of discovering exactly where.

  Damn her, he thought with a trace of irritation. Loulou’s spur-of-the-moment decisions always seemed to work out for her. Yet here he was, as out of place as a nun in a nudist colony, making his first truly spontaneous action in years…and it was proving to be a total disaster.

  * * *

  “It’s not the fact that he doesn’t have money,” explained Loulou, balancing her champagne glass precariously on her bent knees and examining a tiny hole that had appeared in one of her sheer black stockings. “It’s just that he bullies me. He does it very nicely, which is why I’ve only just realized that that’s what it really is. Do this, do that, buy this…but at the same time he’s calling me angel and running his hand down my back. I guess I’m just a girl who can’t say piss off,” she concluded with a sigh, leaning her head back against the cool white tiles and realizing that she was beginning to feel slightly drunk. What a relief, though, to finally voice the thoughts that had been subconsciously troubling her for days.

  “Well, darling,” said Poppy, her cut-crystal accent becoming more pronounced with every glass of champagne, “with your looks, you don’t have to put up with gigolos, so if you know what’s good for you, you will learn to say it. I suppose he’s sensational in bed,” she added with a directness that Loulou found reassuring. She nodded, and Poppy said, “I thought as much. He looked as if he would be when I introduced myself. Those kind always are, though, aren’t they?”

  “You mean good-looking men?”

  Poppy laughed and shook her head. “I mean bastards. Which is why, of course, they so often manage to get away with it.” Then she looked serious again, remembering why she was spending the evening in the ladies’ lavatory instead of dancing out in the main hall. “And speaking of bastards, I wonder how mine is getting on. What are we going to do, Loulou? Your man’s been waiting out there for you for quite some time, and he wasn’t exactly thrilled when I told him you’d be back in five minutes.”

  “Perhaps he’s given up and gone home,” said Loulou wistfully, then gave herself a mental shake. Bloody hell, she hated being wistful. It simply wasn’t necessary. She should be grateful to Poppy for helping her sort out her muddled ideas. Briskly, she rose to her feet. “But I don’t care what he’s doing,” she announced with a new determination, her silver-gray eyes flashing and her fingers snapping as she gestured Poppy to follow her lead. “Let’s see what we can do about your bastard. Do you think he’ll still be in one of those rooms upstairs?”

  “Oh, bound to be,” said Poppy gloomily. “Yours isn’t the only one who’s good in bed, you know. Jamie always takes his time.” Then she brightened and winked at Loulou. “Particularly when there’s a madwoman shrieking through the keyhole that when he comes out she’s going to shoot him.”

  “Well, let’s go then,” Loulou urged, helping her to her feet and tucking the almost-empty bottle of Moët under her free arm. “I think it’s time we practiced a little coitus interruptus.”

  * * *

  Mac was on the verge of giving up and going back to London when he heard Loulou, her voice echoing from the far end of the darkened corridor on the second floor. To his utter disgust, he felt his heartbeat quickening and experienced a diving sensation in his stomach.

  Without even daring to think, or to wonder how she would react when she saw him, he headed away from the gallery encircling the hall and made his way along the wide corridor, which was unlit. His eyes, accustomed to the glittering bright lights from the chandeliers, strained in the blackness to detect shapes or movements but were unable to make such rapid adjustments. There were no sounds now either, and for a second, he wondered whether he had been hallucinating, conjuring up the sound of Loulou’s voice because it was what he so badly wanted to hear.

  Then he caught the rustling sound of taffeta skirts and realized that someone was standing just a few yards away from him. Narrowing his dark eyes, he glimpsed a flash of silver amid the darkness and drew to a silent halt, his heart thumping wildly. If this was Loulou, what was she doing? And with whom? Dear God, this was all a terrible, humiliating mistake! If she’s with a man, thought Mac, his stomach churning with jealousy, what on earth can I do? As only the second of Loulou’s three ex-husbands, he hardly had any rights, after all, and none that permitted punching the other guy’s lights out, which was what sprang most immediately to mind.

  I’ll go, he decided, praying that he could make his escape undetected. It had been wrong to come here. Now all he could do was have the grace to admit that to himself and leave.

  Slowly, and with extreme caution, Mac took first one step backward, then another. Just as he was about to take his third step toward retreat, he heard Loulou’s voice again. And this time he heard with astounding clarity exactly what it was that she was saying as she hammered her fist against a heavy wood-paneled door.

  “You lousy son of a bitch, have you told her you’ve got herpes? I’d get out of there fast, sweetheart, if I were you—he’ll only give to you what he gave to me. And I may not have a gun this time, but I’m still deadly serious.”

  For several seconds there was total silence, while both Mac and the occupants of the room digested this thought-provoking statement. Then Mac heard angry male voices inside the room, and footsteps heading purposefully toward the door. Glimpsing another flash of silver as Loulou moved backward, he ran unthinkingly toward her, re
aching out into the blackness until his fingers encountered bare flesh. A shoulder. As Loulou squealed with fright and the door began to rattle, he located her arm and yanked her toward him so fiercely that she stumbled on her high heels.

  “Get off! Who is it? Let go of me…” she protested, wriggling like an eel, but Mac knew from long practice how to deal with that. Hoisting her expertly over his shoulder, and without saying a word, he started down the corridor just as the door began to open, heading back toward the noise and bright lights of the ball. It wasn’t, he thought ironically, quite how he had envisaged his reunion with Loulou. But then when had anything ever gone according to plan where she was concerned?

  Loulou was thinking as fast as she knew how, and she was thoroughly confused as a result. Was she being rescued or kidnapped? And while it would seem logical to assume that the man over whose shoulder she was unceremoniously dangling was Joshua, he didn’t feel like Joshua. Cautiously raising her arm, she touched his hair. This definitely wasn’t Joshua, she thought, realizing at the same time that the champagne she had consumed was battling against gravity in her stomach.

  “Stop!” she hissed, pounding his shoulder. “I feel sick, for Christ’s sake. Put me down…”

  But even as she spoke, it became apparent that what her subconscious had already realized was becoming an inescapable, unbelievable reality. The silky texture of the hair she had touched, the grip of those hands around her thighs, that graceful, catlike stride…

  But how was it possible that Mac was here, rescuing her from the clutches of two infuriated boys without even uttering a single word? What was he doing here? Was it really him?

  They reached the end of the corridor, and as they rounded the corner to emerge upon the balustraded gallery, Loulou realized that she was being put down. But she kept her eyes resolutely shut, as she put out her hands until they rested against broad male shoulders. Adrenaline was hurtling through her body as if it were a NASCAR track, and she was trembling slightly, sick now with anticipation and the thundering rush of love that she was quite unable to suppress.