by Tara Bond
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To my readers
Prologue
Eight years ago
“Ah, Charlotte, there you are!” My mother’s voice boomed out as I walked into the drawing room, the last one to arrive. I froze, automatically straightening my shoulders, as her eyes swept over me, assessing my appearance. She looked elegant in a cream linen suit, and I knew she expected me to try to live up to her high standards.
After a moment, she gave a brief nod of approval, and my body relaxed as I exhaled.
“I like that dress on you. It suits your figure.”
I bit back a smile. It was hardly a surprise that my mum was a fan of the navy coat-dress—after all, she’d bought it for me that day, commenting in her usual none-too-subtle way that it would probably be nice if I wore it when we went out that evening. To be honest, I’d rather be in jeans and a T-shirt, but I trusted my mother’s choice implicitly. A successful human rights lawyer, she always looked neat and stylish, and I aspired to be just like her. Unfortunately that was pretty much a pipe dream. While her petite frame and poker-straight, glossy dark hair made her seem effortlessly chic, my heavier build and untameable mousey curls meant I was unlikely to ever attain her polish and sophistication.
“William?” She turned to my father, who was sitting on the couch, reading the newspaper. “Tell your youngest how good she looks.”
“I don’t need to.” My dad glanced up from his paper and winked at me. He was a neurologist, equally as successful as my mother in his field, but while she was sharp and businesslike, he was softer, cosier, like an academic. “Charlotte always looks beautiful.”
I could always rely on my father for support. He was much more approachable than my mother—less intimidatingly perfect. While he was undoubtedly an attractive man, tall and trim with salt-and-pepper hair, there was just enough hint of a middle-aged paunch to make him seem human.
“Let’s have a look at you,” my sister Kate chimed in. She was curled up on one of the armchairs, her long, slender legs tucked beneath her as she texted on her mobile phone. I looked enviously at the simple white dress she was wearing, feeling suddenly over-dressed and chunky in my own dark ensemble. Kate was the lucky one; she took after our mother. Sometimes it was hard not to feel bitter about that.
My sister finally sent her message and then looked up to smile at me. “Good job, Mouse. You scrubbed up well.”
I cringed at her use of my hated nickname. It didn’t take a genius to work out why I’d been branded with it—in my over-achieving family I was the quiet one, the shy girl who lurked in corners. I often felt like the ugly duckling in a family of swans.
“Well, now we’re all here, shall we open the bubbles?” As usual my mother took control. “What do you say, darling?”
Sighing, my father folded up his newspaper, and headed over to the sideboard where a bottle of champagne rested in an ice bucket. Tonight was a celebration. Kate had just finished her second year at medical school, and she’d found out this morning that she’d come top of her class in the end-of-year exams. We were going out to a nearby restaurant to celebrate—it was in a country hotel, where we always went to celebrate family occasions. For me, those tended only to be birthdays, never the academic successes that came so easily to my siblings.
The only person missing from the family gathering was my brother, Christopher—or Kit, as we all called him. Like our mother, he’d studied Law at Oxford, and now, having just finished his one-year Legal Practice course, he was taking a well-earned break before he started his training contract at one of the big corporate law firms. Not that I’d personally have called climbing Mont Blanc much of a “break,” but my brother loved sport and any kind of physical challenge.
My father eased out the champagne cork with a loud pop. Bubbles fizzed over and he quickly picked up a flute to catch the liquid. He poured three glasses—for him, my mother and Kate—and then turned to me.
“And how about you, Charlotte?” At seventeen, I was still a year too young to drink. “Perhaps a small glass just for a toast.”
“Thank you,” I murmured as he poured out a measure that was a third the size of the others.
“To Kate,” my mother said, and my dad and I echoed the words, as the four of us clinked glasses.
I took a sip of the champagne. It wasn’t my first time drinking it, but for whatever reason it hit my throat the wrong way, and I hiccupped. My hand clamped over my mouth as my family turned to look at me.
“Oh, Mouse!” My sister laughed indulgently. “Very elegant—”
The phone rang, cutting off her words. No one moved to answer it. Kate’s friends and admirers all used her mobile, and I didn’t really have anyone who’d be calling me.
My father sighed. “Don’t trouble yourselves. I’ll get it.”
He put his glass down, and headed across the room. As he lifted the receiver, he automatically checked the caller identification. “International. It must be Kit.
“Hello. Kit, my boy—” His cheery greeting froze on his lips as the caller began to talk. The smile dropped from my father’s face, and his expression grew serious. “Sorry—what are you saying?”
A knot began to form in my stomach. Whoever was on the end of the line spoke again, and my father’s eyes darted over to where the rest of us stood, waiting, watching. He swallowed, hard, as though trying to clear a lump in his throat. “Just hold on a second.”
He turned from us and disappeared from the room, closing the door behind him. He began to talk again, but we could hear only the muffled sound of him speaking and couldn’t make out the words.
Mum, Kate and I all exchanged worried looks. None of us spoke. It was as though we sensed this wasn’t the time to speculate on what was going on.
We waited in silence as the minutes ticked by. Finally everything went quiet in the hallway. We watched as the door handle bent and my father walked back into the room. His head was bowed, and he was still clutching the phone in his hand. He looked stunned, as though he’d just been punched and was trying to make sense of what had happened to him.
“William?” My mother was on her feet, her arms wrapped protectively around her body, already anticipating bad news. “What is it? What’s going on?”
There was a long silence, when all I could hear was the sound of my own heartbeat filling my ears, and then he finally raised his eyes to her.
“It’s Kit.” He spoke slowly, clearly, as though trying to make an effort to enunciate every word. “It seems there was an accident. An avalanche. Kit was buried in the fall. The rescuers managed to dig him out, and they airlifted him to hospital. The doctors did everything they could . . . But Kit . . .” His voice broke a little, and then he tried again. “Well, I’m afraid Kit’s dead.”
Chapter 1
Present day
I burrowed farther under my duvet, trying to block out the incessant ringing. I wasn’t sure where the shrill sound was coming from, but it was the last thing I needed after the tequila shots I’d downed the previous night. All I could think about right now was the incessant throbbing pain hitting me right between my eyes, beating away like a pulse. I just wanted the noise to stop, so I could fall back to sleep, and hopefully wake up hangover-free in a few hours.
It was only when I heard my flatmate, Lindsay, throw open her bedroom door, and stomp across the hallway, that I finally figured out the source of the noise—it was our intercom. That was when
the pieces fell into place.
It was him, of course, the bane of my existence—here to ruin my day.
As Lindsay answered the intercom, I closed my eyes, and willed her to pretend that I wasn’t in. She knew how much I hated these occasions, and had been known to lie on my behalf more than once. But it was too much to hope for today, I realised, as I heard her tell him to come up. Lindsay was a good friend, but she didn’t like to get up before midday, and I knew she’d hold me responsible for today’s early-morning call. This was her revenge.
She didn’t bother waiting for him to climb the five flights of stairs up to our top-floor flat. Instead, I heard her leave the door on the latch, and then on the way back to her room, she threw something against my door, to make sure I was awake—from the thud it sounded like a shoe.
“Charlie? Mr. No Fun’s here,” she called out. I flinched at the volume. “You might want to make yourself decent. If that’s even possible . . .”
I heard her bedroom door slam shut, as she headed back to sleep. Lucky her.
As though I didn’t have enough problems already, the mattress next to me shifted, and I froze as a warm, hairy leg brushed against my bare skin. I came out from behind the pillow, peeled my crusted eyes open and saw a man lying next to me, naked apart from a sheet pulled over his middle, mercifully preserving his modesty. My alcohol-addled brain couldn’t exactly place him right now, but he was an attractive guy, if you liked that rough, rock-band look. His hair was way too long, his nose and lip were pierced, and both arms were covered in tattoos. He was entirely my type.
I couldn’t remember much about last night, but it didn’t take a genius to figure out what had happened. I worked behind the bar at a pub in Camden, and he was typical of our clientele. No doubt I’d served him, we’d got talking, and then after my shift we’d headed on somewhere to continue drinking, before one thing led to another. It wasn’t the first time something like this had happened—in fact, it was kind of a weekly event for me. I was just surprised I’d let him stay over. Most of the time, I kicked them out straight after the deed was done. It was the best way to avoid that awkward morning-after moment, where the guy felt obliged to pretend he was going to call, and I felt obliged to pretend I wanted him to.
But I didn’t have time to worry about getting rid of my unwanted guest right now. I had far more pressing problems with my other male visitor, whom I’d just heard coming into the flat.
I’d just about managed to sit up and pull on my black kimono dressing-gown when the door to my bedroom door was thrown open by my self-appointed protector—and gigantic pain in my butt—Richard Davenport.
Even at this time in the morning, Richard was the epitome of a young, successful businessman. Tall and tanned, no doubt from Saturday mornings on the tennis court, he was, as always, impeccably turned out in chinos and a blue button-down shirt. He never seemed to step out of the house looking anything less than perfect, and today was no exception—his dark hair was short and neat, his strong jaw clean-shaven, and I could smell the fresh scent of his shower gel from where I sat hunched over on the side of the bed, reeking of my own signature aroma of fags and booze.
I’d known Richard for most of my life. He’d gone to the same boarding school as my older brother, Kit, and they’d been best friends since they were eleven. I’d never had much to do with Richard growing up. After all, I was five years younger than him and Kit, and a girl—he’d barely seemed to notice me. But when I’d moved to London seven years ago, that had all changed. I guess out of some sense of duty to my brother, he’d taken it upon himself to keep an eye on me, which entailed phoning every few weeks to check up on me, and making sure that I attended the obligatory family get-togethers. Which would explain his presence in my flat today.
Of course his interference irritated me no end. At twenty-five years old, it wasn’t like I needed a babysitter. I wasn’t sure why he couldn’t just mind his own business.
It was hard to believe he was only thirty, a mere five years older than me. The contrast between us couldn’t have been greater. I didn’t need a mirror to tell me how I looked—I’d had enough mornings like these to know that I had mascara and eyeliner smeared round my eyes, and my bleached hair was sticking up all over the place. I no doubt resembled something even the cat wouldn’t bother to drag in.
With a strength I was surprised I could muster, I forced myself off the bed and stood to face him, my arms folded across my chest. “You could’ve knocked.”
Irritation at being woken, and the pounding in my head, put me on the defensive. But if I was hoping he might apologise, I clearly had no chance. He looked just as furious as I felt.
“And you could have answered the door. I’ve been ringing that wretched intercom for twenty minutes.”
“Yeah?” I affected a bored look. “Well maybe you should’ve taken the hint and left.”
“Oh, no, Charlotte.” I winced at his use of my full name—only he and my family ever called me that these days. To everyone else, I was Charlie. “Not today. It’s your parents’ thirty-fifth wedding anniversary party. You’re going, even if I have to drag you there, kicking and screaming.”
I didn’t doubt that he would, so I wisely kept my mouth shut. I felt too fragile to be getting into one of our arguments this early in the day.
Richard cast a quick glance around my room. I could sense his disapproval, and I felt a twinge of guilt at the state of the place. Lindsay and I were lucky enough to live in a top-floor warehouse conversion in the heart of Shoreditch. Even though the area’s relentless gentrification meant it was no longer considered cutting-edge, it was still a decent enough area for going out, with lots of good bars and clubs. Our flat was pretty impressive, too—it had double-height ceilings, exposed brickwork and original iron beams. Obviously under normal circumstances the apartment was well out of our price range, but luckily for us a school friend of Lindsay’s owned the place, and when his lucrative banking job took him to Hong Kong, he’d let us stay here for a fraction of the market price—I suspected because he had a crush on my friend. We’d repaid his generosity by completely trashing the place.
My room was by far the worst. Dirty plates and mugs were scattered across every surface; it was impossible to see the polished concrete floor with all the clothes strewn over it; and there were two used condoms on the bedside table. Oh, well—at least Richard should give me points for practising safe sex. It still amazed me, my instinctive sense of self-preservation—no matter how drunk I was, I always managed to insist on taking proper precautions.
Richard’s eyes finally settled on the naked man in my bed—taking in his long, greasy hair, the piercings and tattoos.
“And who might this be?” Richard made no effort to disguise his distaste. It didn’t bother me in the slightest. I’d never made any attempt to hide how I lived my life, and while this might be the first time he’d been so directly confronted with it, I didn’t give a damn if he had a problem with it. If anything, I hoped this might make him stop coming round. It wasn’t that I didn’t like Richard, I just resented his interference in my life, and went out of my way to remind him of that every chance I got. It had become a game—whenever we saw each other, I’d try to push his buttons, being deliberately rude and ungrateful, and he’d do his best to ignore me. One day I was sure I’d find his Achilles’ heel and get him out of my life for good. Until then, I’d just have fun goading him as best I could.
I followed his gaze to my unwanted bedfellow and shrugged. “Your guess is as good as mine.”
Richard’s nose wrinkled at that, which was exactly the reaction I’d been trying to elicit. In fact, I knew exactly who the tatted guy in my bed was. It had come back to me now—his name was Gavin, and he was the lead singer in a band that’d played at the bar a few times. But it amused me to try to shock calm, unflappable Richard.
My bed-mate was by now wide awake and struggling to sit up. His eyes were wide with apology and fixed firmly on Richard. “Aw, shit. I didn�
��t realise she had a boyfriend, mate.”
“He’s not my boyfriend,” I said automatically.
“And if I was, you wouldn’t still be in that bed. Trust me. Mate.”
Richard’s silky-smooth voice belied the threat behind his words. I could see Mr. Rock Band swallow, hard, and I bit back a smile. Richard might act and dress all corporate, but at six foot three and 180 pounds of pure muscle, it was clear he wasn’t someone to pick a fight with. Even if you didn’t know he had a black belt in tae kwon do.
He turned his attention back to me, his gaze sweeping over my kimono and dishevelled appearance. “I take it you’re not intending to attend lunch looking like that?”
“Of course not. Give me fifteen minutes to have a shower and get ready.”
“You have five. We’re already late.”
He didn’t need to bother adding that it was my fault we were in that predicament. Earlier that week, when he’d phoned to arrange to pick me up, we’d agreed that I’d be outside, ready and waiting, when he arrived. Personally I thought he should have known better than to expect me to be so willing.
“Fine.” I wasn’t about to argue with him, but I had no problem teaching him a lesson for being so inflexible. “If that’s how you want it . . .”
Before he could figure out what I was about to do, I loosened the tie on my kimono and slipped it from my shoulders, letting it drop to the floor so I was standing there stark naked.
Perhaps it wouldn’t have been such a statement if I had the kind of boyish figure that fashion models possess. But instead I had Jessica Rabbit curves, which I’d given up trying to hide a long time ago. Even Richard, the master of self-control, couldn’t help letting his eyes linger on my 34C breasts a second longer than he should have. I watched his jaw tighten, which was pretty much the biggest reaction I ever got from Richard, and then he averted his eyes.
I crossed the room, walking deliberately by him, and started hunting in my drawer for underwear.