by Nigel May
Nikki could feel her heartbeat quickening to panic levels. ‘You wouldn’t. I’ll tell him you’ve been shagging me.’
‘The foolish, desperate words of a foolish, desperate girl caught with her hands in the family candy jar. Firing off harsh, untrue words against her father’s trusted accountant and right-hand man, who through his brilliant bookkeeping was able to discover that the eldest daughter was a cheating, lying bitch…’
Julian’s words cut to the quick. Was it the strength of his love for her that was suddenly making him so angry? She didn’t know, but Nikki knew that what he said was true: Sheridan would be heartbroken if he knew that she had done the dirty on him and stolen money from behind his back.
It was Julian who had the final word as he finished his destruction of her before walking out of the restaurant. ‘And as if for one second he’ll believe that a beauty like you was interested in shagging me. But I’m glad you were. It was nice while it lasted, eh?’
He grabbed his wallet from his pocket, took out a wad of notes and threw them on the table.
‘I think that’ll cover my half. I assume we’re going Dutch now we’re not together anymore. I’d offer to pay for you but I think I’ve done enough of that lately and anyway my days of dishing out the cash are well and truly over.’
He was gone and hailing a taxi to take him back to his Brighton Beach home before Nikki could formulate her thoughts.
She watched the paddleboarders disappear around the corner of the cove, their night at an end then she pushed the scattered bank notes on the table together and signalled for a waiter. He approached the table and she ordered a Mai Tai – she needed a drink and was in no rush to leave the restaurant. She didn’t want the night to end, as following that would be the morning and that would bring Julian’s meeting with Sheridan, which could only mean two things: disaster for Nikki and betrayal for Sheridan.
How had she managed to play things so wrong?
25
Kassidy Orpin had not been able to concentrate ever since she had flown back from Crete. As she sat in her apartment on the outskirts of Oistins, Barbados’s famed small town of choice, she tried everything to take her mind off what had been pressing down onto her consciousness like a brick.
It was Friday night and she could hear the soca sound of the hugely popular Oistins market, with its stalls selling fried fish and colourful handcrafted items, buzzing with life just down the street. Kassidy loved Oistins for its vibrancy and when Sheridan had asked her where she would like to be based on the island, straight away she had chosen the town. Not that she managed to spend many nights there. Her job as Sheridan’s PA meant that she was hardly ever in one time zone for more than five minutes but when Sheridan had decided to reward her for her loyalty to the Velvet empire, and more so to his ever-throbbing groin, by buying her an apartment at the location of her choice near any of the Velvet hotels, she had chosen Barbados as her base.
She loved the laid-back friendliness of the locals and the relaxed attitude of people on the streets. She also loved the climate and any days off would be spent strolling along the Caribbean sands, staring out to sea. The small Oistins flat was hers and paid for outright. Even if she was one day no longer employed by Sheridan, the flat would always be hers, a step on the property ladder and a place that she could genuinely say that she had obtained, and not just by bending over or laying down and thinking of England, or in her case Ireland. A man had bought it for her, but it was she as an independent woman who had rightfully earned it through hard work.
Kassidy stared out of her window and looked at the long line of people carriers and cars, bumper to bumper, moving slowly but surely towards the neon fish that hung across the road at the entrance to Oistins’ famous nightlife. It was the same every Friday night that she had been there, admittedly not that many given the air miles she clocked up with Sheridan, but she knew from talking to her neighbours that the whole of the island, tourists and locals alike, flocked to Oistins to party in true Caribbean style. But despite the allure of the bright lights and the carnival atmosphere of the pulsating beat that boomed across town, she was in no mood to party.
The last few days had been so exhausting, both mentally and physically. News of Max’s death had knocked her for six. One moment she had been sitting alongside him, enjoying a meal amidst the tranquillity of a harbour village, and the next she was blasted by the sound of her boss barking orders down the phone to her, telling her that the man seated with her just a couple of hours ago would never be lifting a knife and fork again and that she was to bring Heather to the hospital immediately. Kassidy may have done many things in her short life but dealing with the close proximity of death was not one of them. The hot-headed violence of her father and his ever-ready fists was something she was used to, but the cold finality of death was something else. And to see it happen to someone younger than her was something she was struggling to understand. Max had everything to live for and now he was buried in the hills of St Lucia – a beautiful resting place for a beautiful soul, but one who was definitely been taken before his time.
The cogs of Kassidy’s brain were circling at great speed as she lay down on her bed and stared up at the ceiling fan spinning above her. Dark thoughts of confusion and a need to make a decision ran through her head. Not just any decision, but the right one; this was all-important. She had thought of ringing her mother and explaining the events whirlpooling round her head, but she knew what she would say. She knew what her mother would consider to be the right thing, what would be the way of God.
Kassidy made a decision. She had a couple of days off. Sutton and Sheridan were at Sandy Lane for their hotel dinner dance weekend and he had said that he wouldn’t be needing her. Time was on her side. She knew the right thing to do and the signs were telling her that now was the time to do it.
Reaching over to her phone, she opened her web browser and typed a few words into the search engine. Within seconds she had found what she was looking for. She needed to make this right and there wasn’t a moment to waste; she just hoped she was doing the right thing. Her heart told her she was.
26
Heather Stoneham switched off her laptop and closed the lid, a teardrop falling from her chin and onto the shiny silver surface of the computer casing as she did so. Shards of sunlight streamed through the window, highlighting the minute specks of dust that floated in the early evening air. Her house in St Lucia had never looked lovelier, but for Heather it had never felt lonelier. Without Max by her side, to hold her in his arms, to share the greatest love that she had ever known, nothing seemed beautiful anymore. The wild red-rose design on their living-room wallpaper might as well turn a morbid, morose black. Heather couldn’t see anything but misery in the retro design. A photo frame on a desk in the corner of the room stared blankly at her, the image that it housed – of Max and Heather on their wedding day – having been turned around by Heather, as staring at it just seemed to compound the total heartache that Max’s death was causing her. The frame, decorated with butterflies and ditzy daisies, looked lost without an image to wrap itself around. An old wooden chair on the far side of the living room that she and Max had covered in richly coloured tissue paper, a crafting technique he had learnt from some of his shows, looked forlorn. Covering it together had been such fun, both of them ending up with glue and bits of tissue stuck to their fingers, but they had laughed so beautifully together as they had scrubbed their hands clean. Now it seemed every last trace of happiness had been washed away from the house. The wallpaper, the photo frame, the chair… They were all things that she and Max had chosen together to turn their St Lucia house into a home, a home for them as a couple and a home for their future together. But now there was no future; there was no Max. The two things were entwined like colours on a candy cane. As she looked around her home, all Heather saw was what might have been.
She had been on the computer looking at the memorial page that Max’s shopping channel had set up for him. There were
thousands of comments from viewers bereft that they had lost their blue-eyed boy and that they would never again see him extolling the virtues of a pressure washer or a set of kitchen knives, or flashing his million-dollar smile at the camera as he attempted to compile a brag-book page alongside one of his creative guests. Max had been shopping telly gold and viewers from across the States had written in with their stories of what he had meant to them. Heather had tried to take some solace from the mass of comments that she had read, but she couldn’t, the impenetrable blanket of suffering and wretchedness not allowing her to feel anything but a solid rock of heartache that she knew would never shift. The tears that ran down her face and fell onto the computer in front of her were not for the viewers and their kind words, they were for herself, the life she was now destined to lead – one that, due to the horrors of the car accident in Crete, would now always be without Max.
Since Max’s funeral, she had become as insular as she possibly could. Whereas some people in her position would have wanted to be surrounded by friends and family, a hive of activity keeping their minds off the tragedy of their loss, Heather had chosen to be alone with her thoughts and retreating to the house on St Lucia was the perfect bolthole to hide herself from the outside world. It was where she had chosen for Max to be buried and it meant that she could still be as close to him as possible. She may not be able to see him or experience the joyful touch of his flesh against hers anymore but she could feel him in her heart. His closeness was her only comfort. The mental touch that she felt from him was still incredibly strong.
Her family had been amazing – offering to spend time with her, to not let her out of their sight, to try and ensure that her grieving process was as bearable as possible. Sutton and Nikki had been her towers of strength. If it hadn’t been for her mother by her side Heather was sure that seeing Max’s body in the Crete hospital would have been too much for her to bear. Her legs would have crumbled and her heart would have stopped then and there as she looked down upon his lifeless corpse. Sheridan had tried to give support in his own typical way, dishing out the ‘Time is a great healer’ and ‘He’s gone to a better place’ clichés as if handing out flyers for a new hotel, but at Max’s funeral he had been distant and awkward, leaving it to the females of the family to comfort her in her time of need.
Heather knew that compassion was not one of Sheridan’s strong points but she had longed for her father to hold her in his arms, to wrap her in his love. His compassion had been as wispy as the tiny clouds that had thinly streaked the blue skies above St Lucia as Max was laid to rest. Even for him, Sheridan seemed overly removed. Sutton and Nikki had phoned many times since the funeral and more often than not she had taken their calls – though sometimes she chose not to, preferring to be in solitude with her distress. But her father had not phoned once, his well wishes and love always given by proxy through Sutton.
Heather was thinking about her father and trying to fathom the workings of his mind when the doorbell rang. The house was large and normally one of the maids would answer the door, but since Max’s death she had given all of her staff paid leave. She wanted to be alone in the house; to try and search for some kind of inner peace without having to see sadness in other people’s eyes – there was enough in her own to contend with.
Heather chose not to respond and ignored any fleck of sense telling her to answer the door. After another two rings, though, it was clear that whoever was there was not going away. Thinking maybe it was one of her staff coming back to discuss returning to work or the gardener worrying about the fact that the borders were becoming overgrown, Heather thought maybe it was best to answer and so she moved to the door, wiping any last trace of tears from her face as she did so.
She opened the door to find Kassidy standing there. Her father’s PA was the last person she had expected to find on her doorstep and her response did little to hide her surprise.
‘Kassidy! What on earth are you doing here?’
‘I needed to come over and see you in person. I have the weekend off and flew over from Barbados. How are you?’
But Heather ignored Kassidy’s question. ‘Did my father send you? Are you here on your own?’
‘Yes, it’s just me. Can I come in? I need to speak to you.’
‘I suppose so, seeing as you’re here.’
She opened the door fully to let Kassidy in. The other woman could see that Heather had been crying, the redness of her eyes and the slight glistening of her cheeks giving the game away. She hugged her as she entered, the embrace slightly awkward given Heather’s lukewarm welcome to her guest. It was clear to Kassidy that the youngest Rivers daughter was not in the mood for company.
Five minutes later, Heather handed Kassidy a glass of water as they sat down on the cream-cushioned rattan chairs on the veranda at the back of the house, overlooking the swimming pool where she and Max had spent many hours frolicking together. Heather moved her hand across her stomach, trying to remember the feel of Max’s touch once again.
‘This is a great place. The view is stunning,’ said Kassidy.
‘We love it here,’ replied Heather. ‘Well, we did… It’s different now. Obviously.’
‘It’s a beautiful place.’ Kassidy wasn’t sure what else to say, not knowing what would be the right thing, given Heather’s loss. She liked Heather a lot but they hadn’t really spent that much time together in the past and Kassidy was finding it hard to know what to say to keep the conversation as buoyant as it could be given the timing. ‘I hope you don’t mind me coming here, I managed to find the address through the Velvet files. I kind of guessed you were still here. I did try phoning a few times but there was no answer.’
‘I choose not to always pick up, I don’t like speaking to a lot of people,’ said Heather. It was more of a statement than an apology.
Kassidy shifted in her seat, the fabric of her skirt sticking to her bare legs as she did so. She was nervous and needed to try and calm herself down for what she had to say. Her mouth was dry and she took a sip of the ice-cool water before continuing.
‘I am so sorry about Max. Really I am, he was such a great guy and everybody seemed to like him. I know I did.’
‘Thank you.’ Heather’s answer was clipped and brusque but there was no intentional rudeness.
‘He didn’t deserve to die.’
Kassidy remained in silence for a few seconds, chewing nervously at her bottom lip. As she did so, she stared at Heather, so calm and beautiful, her hair still shining in the fading Caribbean sunlight. It was clear that she wasn’t wearing a scrap of make-up, yet she possessed a glow of vitality and beauty most women could only dream of, her face a perfect canvas in its unpainted state, somehow so pure, yet in possession of an inner knowledge and intelligence. To Kassidy she epitomised the kind of woman that she herself had always wanted to be, ever since she left school at the age of sixteen. She couldn’t imagine that Heather Stoneham had ever been the sort of girl who would bend over the edge of a hot tub and let a man screw her just to try and further her career, especially one who was not exactly piling on the Casanova charm with his less-than-poetic pillow talk. A wave of doubt about a few of her own life choices and decisions broke in Kassidy’s mind. Any hesitation and nervousness she was feeling about speaking to Heather seemed to wash away too as the thought cleansed her mind.
Without any further hesitation, Kassidy said what she had flown to St Lucia to say: ‘I think your dad was responsible for Max’s death. In fact I know he was.’
27
‘I’m telling you, Caitlyn, you get your lily-white ass over here for the fight! You and Jona need to see Hatton Eden in action. The man may have turned down a chunk of my chocolate delights but that muscled warrior sure knows what he’s doing in the boxing ring, girl, so put the twenty-eighth of July in your diary and make sure you and Jona travel over here. I will not take no for an answer. You hear me?’
Caitlyn Rich, one of Sutton Rivers’s best friends and the woman currently lov
ed up with Sutton’s UK cosmetic surgeon, Jona Fleet, certainly did hear her, even though she was 2,500 miles away, sitting in the Harrods food hall in Knightsbridge, London, sampling the delights of the creamiest of desserts. Sutton’s current position was almost horizontal, poolside at the Sandy Lane Hotel in Barbados, phone in one hand and her chosen ‘breakfast’ – a vodka-drenched cocktail from the bar at the middle of the magnificent pool – in the other. She had ordered one of the ultra-smiley bar staff to mix it and bring it to her as she lounged in the Bajan sun, enjoying the heat on her skin as she chatted overly loudly to her friend from the UK.
It wasn’t just Caitlyn who could hear her, it was everyone else around the Sandy Lane pool, and from some of the glances she was receiving it was clear that not everyone was happy to listen to her alcohol-fuelled decibels. Not that Sutton cared an iota. It was the first time in weeks that she had totally relaxed; the weekend of ‘business’ at Barbados’s famous five-star luxury hotel with Sheridan had come at just the right time. After her trip to the UK and the horror of Max’s death and the subsequent funeral, she couldn’t help but feel that a few days of relaxation, during which she would have to deal with nothing more taxing than which treatment to have next at the hotel spa, was just what she deserved. Sheridan was off having some kind of meeting with Julian about a Canadian acquisition and even though she was determined to be there for Heather as much as possible, despite her youngest daughter having made it more than clear that she wanted to be on her own in St Lucia right now, a bit of quality ‘me time’ was definitely what she required. And ‘me time’ meant cocktails and girl talk.