Wicked Beauty

by Susan Lewis

  Rhona turned over a page. ‘What’s to think when she’s got a gorgeous man in tow?’ she responded.

  Laurie sighed. ‘This is the first time she’s gone so long without checking to find out what progress I’m making,’ she said. ‘What’s more, I wouldn’t mind knowing how she’s getting on, because it’s been over twenty-four hours since she took off with a mission, a camera, and said handsome man, so surely to God she must have something to report by now.’

  Rhona’s voice was steeped in irony as she said, ‘Well, surely that tells you all you need to know.’

  Laurie looked at her.

  ‘Paradise, camera, gorgeous man,’ Rhona said, incredulously. ‘It doesn’t take that vivid an imagination – or does it?’

  ‘You’ve just got a one-track mind,’ Laurie told her. ‘And her husband’s hardly been dead for two months, so I don’t think it’s very likely she’ll be getting involved with anyone else just yet. No, what I’m more concerned about is what she’ll do if Katherine does turn out to still be on the island. Or, maybe more importantly, what Katherine, or someone else, might do to her.’

  ‘Well, this Chris guy sounds quite capable of taking care of her,’ Rhona commented.

  Laurie stirred her drink with a straw. A few seconds passed, then she said, ‘I was thinking about calling her sister if I don’t hear by tomorrow.’

  ‘And what’s her sister going to do?’

  Laurie frowned. That was a good question. What was Anna going to do, not so much about Rachel, as Robert, or the film, or whatever was stressing Anna so much that she’d actually put the phone down on Laurie earlier. She’d called back to apologize, but she’d still sounded frazzled, and Laurie could only imagine that things were going from bad to worse on the husband/actress front.

  ‘You know,’ Rhona said, still half reading her book, ‘people can be in a weird place in their heads during grief, so give Rachel a break, and let her do this her way. And what’s more, if a rebound situation does develop, what’s to say that a Caribbean island and a few nights of rampant sex won’t do her the power of good.’

  Picking up a pen Laurie threw it at her, for Rhona’s sexual appetite was no secret amongst her friends, nor was her belief in its healing powers, which, it had to be said, had never seemed to fail for Rhona. However, the two personalities were so entirely different that Laurie found it hard to imagine Rachel going for the same kind of wonder cure, especially while pregnant – or maybe she was just attributing her own feelings to Rachel, because the very idea of sleeping with anyone but Elliot turned her cold inside and out.

  However, she wasn’t going to think about that, so returning to the programme’s opening sequence, she began jotting down the kind of library footage they were going to need of Tim Hendon – at work with his colleagues, relaxing with his family, debating in the House, campaigning for the election, celebrating the victory with his wife – and Katherine Sumner, of course, though Rachel probably wasn’t going to like that much – then the horrible, and unexpected, transition to this very vital man’s very public funeral. When she got back from Washington she’d put several days aside to go through as much news coverage as she could find of all this, and on the many public statements he’d made regarding world events, particularly in Africa … There was even a chance that in there somewhere would be the keys to a few of the right doors.

  A few minutes later she was staring at her mobile phone, willing it to ring.

  Noticing, Rhona said, ‘Does he know you’re going to Washington tomorrow?’

  Laurie nodded. ‘Unless he’s forgotten, but that would be unlike him.’

  Rhona rearranged the pages on her lap to settle in more comfortably. Then fixing Laurie with frankly probing eyes, she said, ‘Tell me, what exactly do you want from Elliot, because I don’t mind admitting I’m as baffled as he is over why you’ve left him.’

  Again Laurie’s cheeks reddened. She’d rather not confess the truth, even to Rhona.

  ‘If you’re still having problems over Lysette …’ Rhona began.

  ‘No, we’re not. Well, we are, but I know we could get past them if he’d just …’ She broke off, not wanting to continue.

  ‘He’d just what? You can tell me, surely.’

  Keeping her eyes lowered, Laurie shrugged. ‘Give more, I suppose,’ she said.

  ‘Ah, you mean like diamonds?’ Rhona said, waggling her eyebrows. ‘Now you’re talking my language.’

  Laurie’s eyes came up. ‘No, it’s not about material things,’ she said, her sense of humour for once failing her. ‘They’re not important …’

  ‘Oh, but they most certainly are,’ Rhona protested. ‘Where on earth would a girl be without them? I mean, look at me. This flat, my car, all the jewels and furs …’

  Rolling her eyes, Laurie said, ‘You’re not at all as mercenary as you make out, so don’t think I’m fooled.’

  ‘Oh dear,’ Rhona sighed, ‘she really doesn’t know me at all. But regrettably this isn’t about me, so we’ll save that for another time and return to you, and,’ she said, drawing out the word, ‘the fact that I think I’ve just rather brilliantly hit the nail on the head, haven’t I?’

  Laurie frowned, but couldn’t quite meet her eyes. ‘What do you mean?’ she said innocently.

  ‘Diamonds, darling,’ Rhona trilled. ‘Or most particularly one single diamond, preferably oval, or maybe round, but no less than three carats and no smaller than a sixpence, on the third finger of your left hand, where, I might add, it would look absolutely stunning. So, I think that’s what we’re talking about here, isn’t it? Yes, I can see that it is. So you, my darling, independent, career-driven, stand-on-her-own-two-feet, celebrated-investigative-reporter, are just an old-fashioned girl at heart, because what you really want is Elliot Russell to make an old-fashioned proposal of marriage.’

  ‘And if you ever tell him that, I’ll kill you,’ Laurie vowed. ‘In fact, I even want to kill myself for being so … disgustingly conventional and embarrassingly … Oh God! I can’t believe I’m doing this, or that it should matter so much, but it damned well does!’

  ‘Darling, even Gloria Steinem’s done it, so give yourself a break. And while you’re at it give Elliot one too, and tell him.’

  ‘No! Never. I don’t want him asking me to marry him because I told him to. He’s got to want to do it, and if he cared about me the way I do about him, he wouldn’t need any prompting. It would just happen. But it doesn’t even cross his mind. He thinks we’re fine the way we are. It works for him, but he never even stops to wonder if it works for me. I’ve become a habit, and I deeply resent that.’

  ‘You don’t think a wife might turn into a bit of a habit after a while?’ Rhona tentatively suggested.

  ‘That’s not the point. The point is, I want to know that he loves me enough to make that commitment, but he obviously doesn’t, or he’d have done it by now.’

  ‘I don’t think that quite follows, but I can see we’re not really worrying too much about that,’ Rhona responded.

  ‘Well it all seems perfectly logical to me,’ Laurie retorted.

  ‘Oh, I’m sure, but it obviously doesn’t to him, and I’m afraid, my darling, if you want your own way over this, then you’re at least going to have to give him a hint.’

  Laurie’s face showed her disgust. ‘What, you mean wheedle it out of him?’ she snorted.

  Rhona laughed. ‘No, I don’t believe that’s what I meant,’ she responded. ‘But if you don’t want to give a hint, why don’t you go right out there on an emancipated limb and just ask him to marry you?’

  Laurie looked at her, aghast. ‘Absolutely no way!’ she cried. ‘I want to be asked.’

  ‘On bended knee?’

  ‘Preferably. Yes, all right, you can laugh. But that’s what I want – him asking my dad, and … Oh stop it, will you? It’s not funny. In fact, it’s very serious to me. But anyway, it’s never going to happen because he’s actually anti-marriage. He just doesn’t believe in
it, either as a concept or an institution.’

  ‘So you have discussed it?’

  ‘No. I just know that’s how he feels.’

  ‘Well his first marriage wasn’t such a disaster,’ Rhona pointed out. ‘In fact they’re still friends, so I don’t know why you think he’s so against the idea.’

  Laurie’s eyes were sparking. ‘Even so, there’s still just absolutely no way that I am going to ask him to marry me,’ she declared, ‘not when I know already that he’ll turn me down.’ Shuddering as a bolt of nerves shot through her at the very idea, she said, ‘Now, I’m sorry, but I need to get on with this before I go back to the office to see Dan.’

  Still smiling, Rhona obediently returned to her book, then a moment or two later she remarked, half seriously, ‘You know, I’m surprised you feel that way about marriage, when just about everyone around you, right now, is having such a rough experience of it.’

  Laurie looked up.

  ‘Well, there’s Rachel Hendon and what she’s going through thanks to her husband. Then there’s her sister whose other half, according to you, seems besotted with some actress. Then there’re your own parents who’ve decided to explore wife-swapping parties …’

  ‘Don’t, don’t,’ Laurie shuddered, covering her ears.

  Laughing, Rhona said, ‘It just doesn’t seem that anyone’s sticking to the rules, so a fat lot of good those vows have done them. Whereas you and Elliot have never slept with anyone else in the entire eighteen months you’ve been together. Nor do you want to.’

  ‘No, we’re only presuming that about Elliot,’ Laurie responded. ‘And since it took him all of a week to ask if we were now free to see other people I would say the presumption is wrong.’

  ‘It could have been his ham-fisted way of trying to find out if you were seeing someone else,’ Rhona suggested.

  Laurie took a moment to think about that, then finding she quite liked the idea, she decided to leave it exactly as it was, rather than risk diminishing it with analysis. So changing the subject slightly, she said, ‘I wonder how he’s getting on in Paris? I wish he’d call and let me know. We don’t normally go this long without speaking, so it’s starting to bother me. Even after I left we were on the phone to each other again the very next day, and every day after that.’

  ‘Then why not call him?’ Rhona suggested.

  ‘I’ve tried. His phone’s turned off. And Max hasn’t heard anything either. That’s what’s really bugging me, that Max hasn’t heard.’

  ‘Where’s he staying? Can’t you leave a message at the hotel?’

  ‘I have. So at least I know he’s still there, or presumably they wouldn’t have taken the message.’

  ‘This is hardly the first time he’s gone a few days without calling,’ Rhona reminded her. ‘So stop worrying, will you? I know it’s in the air these days, and most of us are doing it anyway, but you’re starting to give me sleepless nights lately.’

  Sighing, Laurie looked back down at the screen, where the name Hendon was standing out large amongst all the others. It was true, it wasn’t so unusual for Elliot to go a few days without getting in touch, but it was for Rachel, so just what on earth was going on over there on Virgin Gorda?

  Chapter 18

  ‘OK,’ RACHEL SAID, coming out from behind the camera. ‘We’re all set. So all you have to do is answer the same questions I asked earlier, when Chris was here, but this time we’re going to record your answers.’

  Mrs Willard, the villa’s manager, beamed into the lens.

  Rachel was too edgy to laugh, and only just managed to stop herself delivering a sharp reminder to ignore the camera. She pulled a chair up alongside the tripod, then peering into the viewfinder again, to check that the pristine blue sea and a clutch of bright pink oleanders was caught in the frame around Mrs Willard’s milky brown face, she said, ‘We’ll start with the woman you were calling Mrs Hendon. Can you tell me again about the booking she made?’

  Mrs Willard delivered another cheesy grin to the camera, and kept her eyes fixed right on it, as she said, ‘Well, you see, the booking was cancelled, just a few days before Mr and Mrs Hendon due to come. Then they contact me again and say there was a mistake, they not mean to cancel, so everything all right, they coming again now, but six days later. They pay for the whole time though.’

  ‘How did they contact you?’ Rachel asked.

  ‘By the email.’

  ‘And how did they arrive?’

  ‘They come in by plane, down at the Virgin Gorda airport.’

  ‘Was that a private plane?’ Rachel prompted.

  Mrs Willard nodded. ‘It come in from San Juan.’

  Rachel handed her a photograph of Katherine. ‘Is this the woman who was calling herself Mrs Hendon?’ she said.

  Mrs Willard looked at it. ‘Yes, that her.’

  Rachel had just drawn breath for the next question when a sharp gust of wind suddenly blew in, rocking the camera. At the same time, Mrs Willard spotted something behind it and waved.

  Rachel glanced over her shoulder, wondering if Chris had returned sooner than expected, but it was the villa’s gardener, hauling his equipment up the steps to the patio. She turned back to Mrs Willard and waited for her to refocus her attention.

  ‘Tell us about Mr Hendon,’ Rachel said. ‘What did he look like?’

  Mrs Willard immediately started grinning again. ‘What he look like?’ she said. ‘Yes. He very nice man. I think, when they come, that he her father, or her uncle. But they Mr and Mrs, so I know he her husband. He very dark. I think maybe he Indian. Nice looking man, with moustache. But like I told the other people that come here, he don’t speak very much. Not to me, or my daughter. She the maid here. He keep himself to himself. And he sleep in separate room.’

  ‘The other people that came,’ Rachel said. ‘Who were they?’

  ‘They the police,’ she answered.

  ‘When were they here? How long ago?’ Rachel asked.

  ‘First time they come, about five days ago, and second time was yesterday.’

  It was that piece of information that was interesting Rachel more than anything else, for she had no way of knowing, yet, whether it really had been the police, or if it was Franz Koehler’s private investigators masquerading as the police. Considering the two trips, there was a good chance that both parties had got here before her, and she was curious, even anxious, to know what, or who, had tipped them off to Katherine’s stay, when she’d assumed that only she knew.

  ‘What kind of questions did the police ask you?’ she said to Mrs Willard.

  ‘The same as you,’ she answered, her thick, woolly hair being buffeted by the strengthening breeze. ‘They want to know how Mr and Mrs Hendon come here, how long they stay. What he look like. If I hear them using other names …’

  ‘Did you?’ Rachel jumped in.

  ‘No. I don’t really see them much, so I don’t hear them talking.’

  ‘What else did they ask?’

  ‘They want to know how Mr and Mrs Hendon leave the island.’

  ‘What did you tell them?’

  ‘I tell them I don’t know. I not even know they gone till my daughter come up to villa to clean and find it empty.’

  ‘Was that when –’ She broke off as the gardener abruptly started up his strimmer.

  She was about to go and stop him, when she decided that, in fact, she really had all she needed from Mrs Willard now, and since another storm seemed imminent anyway, this would probably be a good time to wrap.

  A few hours later she was sitting cross-legged on the bed, the interview all but forgotten, as she read over what she’d written in her journal during the past three days. Through the open french windows the sky was by now a wildly billowing mass of grey and blue, while the wind scudded sharply across the churning Caribbean waves, and up over the hillside to shimmy her curtains and join the overhead fan in dispersing the cloying humidity in the room. The camera and tripod was beside her on the floor, along with t
he cassette of Mrs Willard’s interview, and the one other tape she’d managed to fill, mainly with shots of people shaking their heads and shrugging, or pointing her on down the beach to another café, or along the road to another shop, where someone else might be able to help. No one had yet, except Mrs Willard, and the little she’d told them hadn’t really got them any further.

  But what had she expected? To be told that Katherine was still hiding out somewhere on the island? That she’d revealed her plans to some barman or waitress? That someone would recognize the picture and say, ‘Hey, she’s the one who chartered a plane to St Thomas, or a private speedboat to Tortola? Whatever she’d expected, or merely hoped for, it certainly hadn’t materialized, and she could only wonder if the police, or Franz Koehler’s people, had met with the same frustration.

  Looking up from her journal, she gazed around the master suite of the luxury villa, with its tastefully simple décor and spectacular sea view, and felt such a painful and conflicting mix of emotions that it was hard to separate one from another. The sharpest and most hurtful of all was the constant longing she felt for Tim, and the happiness they should have shared here, in this very room, where she’d planned to tell him about the baby. In her mind’s eye she could see him, even now, shouting with joy, and scooping her into his arms. She pictured them holding each other tight, laughing and kissing; then walking hand in hand on the beach, swimming naked in the pool, making love on this bed. It was so easy to capture the happiness they’d have known as they celebrated each other, their love and delight in having conceived a child. But an unbearable grief soon swallowed the imagined joy, turning it into a seemingly endless pain, for added to all the terrible doubt now was the fact that he really had made love to another woman, and that he’d obviously had secrets with that woman that he’d never shared with her.

  ‘Just thank God,’ she’d written in her journal, ‘that no one can see what I’m feeling inside, because I’d almost rather die than have anyone know just how wretched and broken apart I am by all this.’ But she was angry and vengeful too. Her mind was swollen with hatred for the woman who had dared to trespass on her marriage; who had known more about Tim than she had, who had presumably been with him when he was shot to death, who might even have pulled the trigger herself. And then had come the final, insufferable insult of hiding out here, taking refuge in Rachel’s identity. It was as though all her memories and dreams had been torn from a precious place in her heart and trampled to dust by the callous and cunning use of a location that should have been so private that no decent person would have even considered it. It was a kick in the face of her grief that hurt and enraged her maybe even more than Tim’s betrayal.