by Orla Bailey
I pace the suite and jump out of my skin when Blackstock returns. My nerves are shot to pieces. He props me against his shoulder and walks with me to the elevator and out to the car. He exudes such confidence, has the situation so completely under control, no-one even glances at us despite my sickly pallor and the trembling of my limbs.
All the way back in the car I weep in self-pity. I wipe the tears away on Jack’s jumper until its sleeves are damp. Losing Jack so cruelly, after our beautiful day on the river together, feels like having my soul ripped from my body. Is he feeling the same way? That thought makes me cry even harder.
By the time we reach Belvedere, I’m in such a state of self-induced misery even Blackstock doesn’t know what to do with me.
“Are you sick, Miss? Do you need a doctor?”
“No, I’m not sick. I’m sorry I ruined your weekend. Go home. Leave me. I’ll be okay.” I curl up, face down on the sofa and bury my face in my arms.
He goes to the bathroom and returns with a box of Kleenex. “You didn’t ruin my weekend. I’m always on call.” He pauses to gentle his voice. “You’ll make yourself ill if you go on like this.”
“I don’t care.” I’m wallowing in despair too much to see that I’m acting like a three year old. Nothing matters without Jack.
“I’m going to call Miss Devereaux.”
“No. Don’t!” That shuts me right up. I shoot upright, sniff and dab at my eyes. “Not her.”
“Mr Keogh said I’m to call her if you need someone. It’s clear you need someone. I’m not the right person to deal with this. To help you. You need a friend.”
I stare at him. The concern on his face almost makes me pity him. I suspect he’s fought in wars; confronted violent enemies; looked down the barrel of a gun. He’s probably dealt with all sorts of private security situations. But he’s completely flummoxed by a woman who can’t stop weeping. Absolutely and utterly out of his depth.
It brings me to my senses. “Do not call that woman. She’s no friend of mine. She’s the one who engineered this chaos in the first place.”
“You need someone here with you. Mr Keogh didn’t mean for you to be alone.”
“He’s alone.” Unless he’s with her. “If you call her here, I’ll kill her.” That should stop him.
He looks at me like he believes I very well might. “What about Lenuta?” he suggests.
A much better choice. Lenuta knows Amanda for what she is but I can’t drag her out here to babysit me on her precious weekend off.
“I’ll call Libby. She’s my friend. She’ll come and stay with me.”
Blackstock considers for a moment then nods. He’s met her before, the first time he came to drive me to Belvedere. He gave her a lift home when Jack found us in the pub. He digs in his pocket and hands me his phone, waiting while I dial her number. He’s not planning on going anywhere until I make arrangements, by the looks of things.
Actually it would be good to have a friend beside me. My best friend. I press the keys and wait. It’s gone midnight. I so hope I’m not interrupting any special moment after her barbeque.
“Hello?” She answers far too quickly to have been asleep, I note, with some relief.
“Libby, it’s Tabitha.”
“Tabitha? I thought you’d have danced Jack Keogh into a big soft king-sized by now. What are you doing calling me? Is this a sharing moment?”
Her joke forces a sob to erupt.
“Tabitha? What’s happened? What has he done to you?”
“Nothing. He… I…” I have no idea how to begin. I thrust the phone at Blackstock.
“Hello? This is Mr Keogh’s employee. My name’s John Blackstock. Libby, isn’t it? We met when I drove you home recently from the Prince Albert. There’s been a bit of an upset tonight and Miss Caid would appreciate having a friend here to stay with her. Are you able to come over? She’s at Belvedere.” He listens to her reply.
“I’ll text the address. Take a taxi. I’ll pay this end. Goodbye.”
I watch him log her number and text what I presume is this address. He turns to me pocketing his phone again. “She’ll be here shortly. Lie out on the sofa and wait for her.”
He watches as I put my legs up and lean back against the cushions. He pulls the cashmere throw down to cover me. I can’t seem to stop trembling.
“Thank you, Mr Blackstock.”
“Is there anything I can get for you?”
“Jack?”
“I’m afraid I can’t do that, Miss.”
I cry again. “He hates me.”
“He doesn’t hate you.”
I feel for the eternal knot pendent he gave me on the river twelve hours ago. How things have changed since then. Another tide turning.
But ebb tides flow again, don’t they?
Blackstock stands quietly guarding me as I use up Kleenex after Kleenex and discard them on the floor in a pile. I think he’s quite relieved when the house bell finally rings.
“I’ll go and pay the taxi and send Libby straight up to you,” he tells me. “My number’s logged into the house phone. Just press one and it will come straight through to me, if you need me.” He pauses as the elevator opens. His voice is compassionate. “Things will work themselves out, Miss Caid.”
I hear the elevator doors close behind him and shut my eyes to try to bring my emotions under control. I don’t want to scare Libby as soon as she arrives.
I turn towards her when the doors reopen. “I’m over here.”
“Oh, honey. What’s happened?” She drops her bag, rushing straight over to take me in her arms.
Her sympathy is enough to set me off again and I weep on her shoulder. She doesn’t press for details but knows just to let me cry myself out. When I’m done she hands me another Kleenex and sits back on the sofa. I bend my legs to give her room.
“Bloody men,” she says. “Can’t live with them. Can’t kick ’em in the nuts. Too damned often.”
I laugh. Libby is just what I need. “He hates me.”
“What? Jack Keogh? He traipsed to France to fetch you back, you goose. He took you on his boat.”
The look I throw her makes her snort. “Dirty girl.”
“Jack said that.” The reminder makes me cry again.
“Honey, trust me, he doesn’t hate you. Tell me everything.”
“You know when Amanda Devereaux came to CaidCo on Friday?”
She tosses me her knowing, narrow-eyed look. “I’m thinking this might be a litre of ice-cream type of story. Any ice-cream to be had around here?”
I shrug. “Kitchen’s over there.” I point in the right direction.
“Mind if I go look?” She’s up and moving already. Libby is a very practical girl.
I feel calmer already, glad she’s here. I haven’t even enquired what I’ve dragged her away from tonight, to be with me. Some friend I am. She’s soon back carrying stuff.
“Thanks for coming over. I hope I didn’t ruin your night.”
She rolls her eyes. “No chance of that. Family barbeque. My lot’ll be drinking ’til dawn. Look what I found.” The expression of naughty glee as she holds up the tub makes me smile. “Bailey’s ice-cream.” She produces two spoons from the back pocket of her jeans.
Libby settles on the sofa beside me and we both hack a spoon into the rock-hard surface.
“We should wait for it to melt a bit,” I suggest.
“Nah. We’ll manage. Trust Jack Keogh to have a super-efficient freezer. Mine would have come out perfect. How d’you think I got these hips?”
“Hips Don’t Lie.”
Libby breaks into a few bars and I smile again. But it only reminds me of joking around for the reporters and making Jack overreact, by playing it on my violin. Everything reminds me of Jack’s absence. I wonder where he is and who he’s with now. I hope I’m wrong.
“So. Mizz Devereaux?” Libby says her name like she’s a particularly nasty variant of the Ebola virus.
She already knows of A
manda’s plans for Jack’s surprise birthday dinner and the part I was supposed to play in it. What she has no idea about was what happened once I got to the hotel. We tunnel into the ice-cream faster as it defrosts and the story ensues.
By the time I’m finished her jaw has dropped.
“You should call the Police. You were imprisoned and drugged.” She isn’t joking.
“Police means media involvement and media means scandal. It will look exactly like Amanda wants it to. Tabitha Caid, brand new fiancée to Jack Keogh, caught with her knickers down. That’ll make Jack ecstatic.”
“Sod, Jack. What about you?”
“I’m not about to fall any further into Amanda’s little traps. I have to be smarter.”
“I see what you mean. Calling in the Police might play right into her hands. She’d expect it.”
“And I don’t intend to do that ever again. Jack would be incensed and I’d never get the chance to put things right. Besides, any investigation the Police do, I can do privately.”
“Are you going to be okay, honey?” She gently rubs my arm.
“How come you believe me and Jack doesn’t?”
“Well it sounds like you never exactly got the chance to tell him your side of the story.”
“Not a word. Well just a couple that came out all wrong.” I tried to tell him I love him but he badly misinterpreted my ridiculously slurred efforts.
“That’s your first move then. You need to speak with him. Tell him what really happened.”
“He won’t believe me.”
“Make him.”
“How? He hates me?”
“I’ve told you, he doesn’t hate you.”
“Why does everyone keep saying that?”
“Because it’s true. He’s hurt, honey. Look at it from his perspective. He thinks he caught you with another man. How would you feel if you caught Jack with another woman?”
I see her point.
“How did he know to find you at the hotel anyway?”
“Amanda was supposed to get someone to phone him with a story about me getting stranded there.”
Libby scoffs. “I bet the story she told you doesn’t match the story she will have told him. You need to talk to him. Find out exactly what he believes.”
“I don’t know where he is. No-one will tell me.”
“He has to come home sometime.”
“I suppose.” I blow my nose on a Kleenex again.
“Meanwhile, we’ll find out what we can for ourselves.”
That is something I can do. “I could go back to the hotel and find out who made the room booking.”
“Atta girl. That’s our plan for tomorrow then. I bet he’ll be back here by morning anyway and you two can slug it out.” She scrapes her spoon along the bottom of the decimated carton.
“Thanks for coming, Libby.” She’s given me hope. Perspective.
“What are friends for? Oops. Looks like we’ve finished the first carton.” She waves it in the air like she’s achieved something spectacular.
“There’s more?”
“Tons. Don’t you check out the size of a man’s assets?”
We laugh. Things seem brighter because for the first time, I feel like I have a real chance of putting things right. Of getting to the truth.
We share the bed in the guest room. I don’t want to be alone tonight. I can’t help waking up throughout the night though, thinking Jack’s returned and finding my hopes die as I realise it’s not him I’m lying next to. I dream he lifts me from my bed and carries me away to his. But it’s wishful thinking.
At first light of dawn I search the entire apartment to see if he’s returned in the dead of night and I’m bitterly disappointed. I look for my phone which is not where I left it beneath the bed. Jack must have found it and taken it away. It was part of Amanda’s conniving plan.
Too anxious to wait for him to call me, I try ringing Jack’s phone from the house phone but no-one answers no matter how many times I let it ring. It really worries me. Either he’s deliberately ignoring my calls or something bad has happened.
I contemplate phoning Blackstock but it’s far too early in the morning and I can’t be so selfish, especially after stealing his Saturday night. I tell myself he’ll be sleeping late and decide to leave it to a reasonable hour before I try calling Jack again.
I make coffee and drink it. Everywhere I go, everything I do, highlights the fact that I’m doing it without Jack by my side. Why doesn’t he call me? He knows where I am.
“There you are.” I jump as Libby swings through the door into the kitchen. “It’s only me,” she says, yawning. “I shouldn’t creep up like that.” She rubs a soothing hand across my shoulder. “You’re bound to be on edge after what you went through.”
“Did I wake you? It’s very early.”
“Couldn’t sleep? Then let’s get a head start on our investigations. How are you feeling this morning?”
“Pretty numb.” The only thing keeping me from falling apart is the knowledge that somehow I’m going to make Jack trust me again. Somehow I’m going to get him back.
“Doing stuff is a good cure for that. We’ll head straight to Claridge’s, find out what we can then plan from there. Jack will probably be here by the time we get back and I’ll leave you two to thrash it out.” She presses her lips together expectantly.
I can’t help thinking she thought he’d probably be here by the time we woke up too. I don’t hold out as much hope of his return as I did last night.
“Remind me why I appointed you my Business Manager?” I quip.
“Because I like managing everyone else’s business,” she counters.
I relax a little as I pour her a coffee and myself another cup.
“I’m glad you’re here, Libby. It’s good to have a friend like you.” Blackstock was absolutely right not to leave me by myself.
She smiles. “Mind if I make myself some toast? Can’t work on an empty stomach.”
I stare back thinking of the half-litre of ice-cream we scoffed between us only a few hours ago. Most of it by her. She reads my mind perfectly.
“Ice-cream doesn’t count.”
“Just as well. Wouldn’t want anyone accusing me of being drunk on Bailey’s.” I pull out a selection of Jack’s good bread and Libby chooses the walnut, cinnamon and raisin loaf and starts to slice it.
“I’m making toast for you too. Please eat it. I don’t want you passing out on me.”
I must be pale and drawn, I guess. It’s more to do with heartache and missing Jack than any lack of sustenance but Libby’s kind enough to care and I don’t want to worry her unnecessarily. I eat some.
A good cry in the shower gets everything out of my system for a little while longer.
Then I fix on my game face. Lip gloss and all.
Chapter Two
It’s a quick ride in the taxi to Claridge’s this early on a Sunday morning. Not everything works that smoothly though.
As soon as we step inside I’m stopped in my tracks by a sudden impulse to run. Sweat prickles under my armpits and my breathing shallows to a rapid sequence of air puffing.
“You okay, Tabitha?” Libby asks, concerned, stopping beside me to take my shaking arm.
I close my eyes for a second to stop myself weaving then look across at her. “Whoa. Remember that time we did all those shots of Barcardi 151?”
“I pass out every time I even think about it.”
“A bit like that. But I’m alright now.” I walk meticulously, like I’ve got a pile of books on my head, the whole rest of the way to reception while Libby hangs on to me and tells me about other flashbacks she’s known and loved.
I wonder if this is how our ex-soldier, Phil, who lives rough on the streets around the CaidCo building, feels every time he remembers a war zone.
“Welcome to Claridge’s, Madam. May I help you?”
I smile at the smartly dressed, male receptionist. “The booking for the Prince Alexander Sui
te, last night. Can you tell me who made it?”
Just as soon as I see the look on his face I realise this isn’t going to be quite as easy as it sounded when Libby and I planned it.
“I’m afraid we can’t give out information about bookings, Madam.”
“But the room was booked in my name, I think. At least the receptionist last night seemed to know my name when I arrived. Can you just take a look?”
He stares at me like I might be pulling a scam.
“She stayed here last night,” Libby cuts in, pointing at me. “Show him your ID.”
“Oh, are you checking out?”
“I checked out last night.” In more ways than one.
The receptionist frowns at me. He starts to get details up on his computer. Probably looking to see if I’ve paid my bill. “Was there a problem with your visit, Madam?”
No shit. I was kidnapped and drugged. I wonder how he’d react to being informed of that game changer. I take a calming breath, glancing at Libby. Once again I’m glad we chose things to wear from my designer collection and went to town on hair and make-up. At least security haven’t shown up yet to show us the way to the door for being lunatic randoms off the street.
“Not exactly a problem,” I lie, coming up with a bright idea. “I just wish to thank the person who gifted me the room.” I nearly turn and high-five Libby for my sudden inspiration. “However, I don’t know who that person is.”
He hesitates. “Well that suggests they don’t want you to know and it would be breaking customer confidentiality if I gave out that information.”
And that is why you’ll always be a loyal receptionist and not a Manager, I think uncharitably. He’s probably only a student. I briefly consider bribery. Libby’s hand steadies my quaking arm. She probably knows exactly what I’m thinking and that I’m about ready to lose it. I need this information too badly.
“Perhaps we could speak to the Duty Manager?” Libby suggests.
“Certainly, Madam. I’ll call her.” He snatches up the telephone, looking relieved to kick his problem upstairs to someone paid more to deal with such matters.
When the Manager arrives, I briefly explain my dilemma once again, hoping we don’t get passed from pillar to post going round in circles. I’m ready to bawl in frustration as it is and the sooner I’m out of this building the better. I don’t like the bad memories it evokes.