‘Don’t bother, I’ll come to you . . . two days’ time.’
Skye replaced the phone and reached for the vodka. Edward had walked back into his life once before. The first time Skye had tried to tell him to go to hell, but he was broke, boozed up and easy for Edward to manipulate, just as easy as it had been all those years ago. He smiled as he recalled the days of Edward’s first big scam, and wondered what he would have in mind this time. He knew intuitively that it would be crooked.
Alex began to get edgy. He had been away from London far too long, and was worried that his telexes to Edward had gone unanswered. But he had been enjoying himself so much that he put off his return even longer. The auction of the Hunter Hardyman estate was now imminent.
Barbara showed not the slightest interest in the auction; all she wanted was to be rid of the place, with its reminders of her hated grandfather. Alex was fascinated by the old man’s massive wealth. There were, however, many branches of the Hunter Hardyman family, a few of whom he had met and found loud and uncouth in comparison with Barbara.
‘I owe that to my mama. She hated him too, and I was educated in the very best school we have to offer, and so were my daughters. But I’m afraid they’ve inherited some of the worst of the family traits. They both need to go to France or Switzerland to complete their education, what do you think?’
At times she was so innocent, turning to Alex for guidance, but it was often quite obviously calculated. She didn’t really need anyone; she had a mind like steel, and yet she could smile so like a child that it touched him. ‘You know I was married at sixteen, I really never had any time for myself, with two young daughters and an alcoholic for a husband. Now I want to live, Alex, really live.’
She had tried to steer Alex towards the bedroom, but had never pushed it. She was much too calculating and, although he was attentive, he had never so much as kissed her.
When he told her he had to leave for England in two days, and suggested she and her daughters might like to visit him some time, Barbara bit her lip. It was an invitation, but a very open-ended one. He mentioned no dates. She decided she would have to work even harder on him, she had held off the seduction for too long.
A bottle of champagne, on ice, was waiting for them when they entered his hotel suite. Barbara slipped off her chiffon wrap, trailed it along the floor and murmured that it was dreadfully hot. He opened the balcony windows and turned up the air conditioning, but that was not what she had in mind. She insisted on taking a bath to cool off. She turned on the taps of the vast double bath, trailed her hand in the water and sipped champagne. Alex could see her through the open door, and she knew he was watching. Slowly she took off her diamond necklace and earrings, then even more slowly she untied the chiffon sash at the front of her dress.
Aroused, Alex moved to the bathroom door, watching intently. The dress seemed to slip away from her of its own accord, and she sat naked on the side of the bath. ‘Take your clothes off, slowly, Alex, do it really slowly.’
He loosened his tie, pulled it off slowly and dropped it to the floor, then began to unbutton his shirt. She sat, sipping champagne and watching. His initial nervousness dropped away as his shirt did. He unzipped his flies and still she watched, sipping and smiling up at him.
Barbara had found him an intensely attractive man, but now as he stripped in front of her it took all her willpower not to rip his trousers down and go down on him there and then. Her first husband had been a drunk, but a very experienced man, and a kinky one. He had trained his blushing bride well – too well – and his alcoholism had resulted in his sweet, not-so-innocent young wife moving on to fresher fields, taking his carefully taught sexual prowess with her. She had had many lovers, and when she realized she had outgrown her husband, she divorced him on the grounds of his drinking. Now she put all her experience into this one night – she was going to seduce this quiet, handsome Englishman, and what’s more he was never going to forget it. It was a gamble, but Barbara never gambled without being very sure she would win.
Alex would have taken her as soon as he was naked, and moved to hold her, but she slipped away from him, the bath forgotten, and walked into the bedroom. In her hands she held a bottle of sun-tan oil from the bathroom . . . She smiled and held out her hand to take him to the bed.
‘Lie down, lie down . . . come on, baby, lie down.’
Alex moaned, hardly able to contain himself, and he lay face down on the bed, clutching the satin cover. Barbara sat astride him and began to oil his shoulders, and he gasped, gritting his teeth . . . He was back in jail with Brian, in their cell . . . She smoothed the oil over his back, over his shoulders, and was kissing his neck and his ears, all the time her expert hands moving up and down his body. Twice he tried to turn, but she pushed him back, oiled him and smoothed him until her hands reached his buttocks . . . She licked at him, she was driving him crazy, and eventually he turned over and pulled her beneath him . . . Still she fought him off, kissing his chest and murmuring all the time, soft, lewd words . . . ‘Beg for me, Alex, beg for me, come on baby, beg for me. Tell me how much you want to fuck me . . . Come on, baby, tell me . . .’
He wanted to scream, she was sucking him, biting him between his thighs, and he was helpless, her hands were everywhere, smoothing, pulling, oiling . . . and then he grabbed at her head, pulled at her hair until she cried out, pushing her face against his thighs, pushed so hard that her teeth cut into his leg . . . and then she put her perfect mouth around his prick . . .
Alex came with a shudder that shook the bed. He put his hands over his face, he didn’t want her to see the extent of the pleasure she had given him, but she pulled his arm away . . .
‘Now it’s your turn . . .’
Alex did not leave the bedroom the next day. They remained together, food was sent in, eaten, and then they were back to screwing again. Alex had never known such pleasure, he made up for all the lost years . . . until even Barbara was exhausted. He never stopped, this Englishman was more than she had ever bargained for . . .
‘You’re really going to leave me, go back without me? You can’t leave your baby, can you? Alex? You can’t leave me now, can you?’
He moaned and held her tight, her body slithering in his arms like an eel, and he kissed her. ‘I’ll take you with me.’
Barbara was determined she would somehow trap Alex into marrying her. Marriage to Barbara had, naturally, crossed Alex’s mind, along with the massive fortune that went with it. He certainly found her the most sexually attractive woman he had ever encountered, but then he had not had all that much experience with women.
He lay on the bed and thought about Ming, then his mind wandered back over all the years to Dora. He closed his eyes, let the memories flood through him, and he had a sudden impulse to see Dora again. He reached for the telephone wondering if the operator would be able to trace Dora’s husband with just the name Kinnerton. He couldn’t remember the man’s first name . . . On second thoughts he decided against it. He rolled off the bed and walked into the bathroom, where Barbara was lying in the bubble-filled tub. She flicked water at him, and sat up so he could see her beautiful breasts, the soapsuds around her like a cloud.
‘Tell me about your husband, what was he like?’
Barbara blew bubbles at him from her hand, but her eyes narrowed. Why did Alex want to know about her husband?
He sat on the side of the bath and gently soaped her shoulders. She caught his hand and kissed it, kissed each finger, sucking at them, and he bent down to kiss the top of her head. The damp, steamy atmosphere in the bathroom had made small curls form by her ears, and he twisted one around his finger.
‘I hated him, Alex.’
‘Not at first, surely?’
‘Oh no, I was sixteen, and he was very glamorous. He used to ride up to see Daddy, and he was always bringing me little gifts . . . But he was thirty-eight, married four times already.’
‘So, go on . . . you agreed to marry him?’
‘Daddy married us – wanted him to oversee some of his oilfields, and then they had this new pipeline running through Alaska or something, I don’t know. But it was more of a business deal. Contracts were exchanged.’
Alex looked at his nails. ‘And? Go on.’
Barbara was desperately calculating how much she should tell Alex about this part of her life. She remained silent, flicking at the soap bubbles with a fingernail. She had trailed after her first husband, panting after him like a chubby puppy. She had been as overweight as her daughter Selina, and so besotted with this handsome, debonair man that she had persuaded her father to somehow arrange that he marry her. At first her father had refused, but at the thought of how much business he could acquire by joining the two together he changed his mind and pressured Joe Taverner to marry his plump, spoiled brat of a daughter. Taverner had accepted the deal, and Barbara.
He had never let her live it down. In the first year of their marriage he tormented her, forcing her to beg to be taken into his bed. He found his young bride only too eager to act out his fantasies. She became a slave girl, a mute, a willing partner in every sexual game he could devise. For the first three years she lived with him, tied to his bed in chains, whipped in the stables, dressed in kinky leather costumes made to his own designs. He turned away from his many mistresses – his wife had supplanted them. She balked at nothing, and took him to such a sexual peak that his obsession inverted itself. He became the slave, the mute, and her fertile young brain devised many more perverted games – he became the one bound to the bed, tied up in the cellar, now he was the one to crawl and beg for her favours.
Taverner had always been a hard drinker, and with a wife whose energy was directed into nothing but sexual gratification, he spent more and more time at their ranch, drinking. Two daughters were born, and immediately handed over to nannies and nursemaids. The games began again as soon after the births as possible. Then Taverner made the mistake of introducing third parties. At first it was other women, but when Barbara had tired of that, he brought home men of all shapes, colours and sizes – paying them to screw his wife.
By the time she was twenty-one, Barbara had had more lovers than most women would have in three lifetimes. She tormented her husband with them and drove him to distraction. Her puppy fat had disappeared and, as though emerging from a chrysalis, she had been transformed into a stunningly beautiful woman, insatiable and obsessive in her desires.
Taverner lost control of his drinking and wrecked his business. Rumours of his wife’s behaviour were spreading – she was becoming notorious, not only for her sexual perversions but for her outrageous spending sprees. Having always had plenty of money, she had never known a moment when she could not have whatever she wanted when she wanted it. She threw parties, bought speedboats, yachts, racehorses, even a plane, and grew bored with them almost before the ink had dried on the cheques. Taverner, sodden with drink and broke, was cast aside. Barbara’s father threatened to cut her off unless she behaved herself, so she controlled her urges and limited herself to one man at a time in the privacy of her own home.
And this was what was lying in Alex Barkley’s bathtub, this beautiful sophisticated woman was more of a whore than any of Dora’s girls – even Dora herself. Barbara Taverner was a slut in thousand-dollar dresses with a billionaire’s daughter tag around her neck. The veiled looks that Alex had detected from Dallas society and presumed were envy, really meant ‘sucker’. They knew all about her, and they pitied him.
‘My husband, Alex, wasn’t a very nice man. He would subject me to horrible things, tie me up and beat me . . . It was terrible because I was so young, I had no one to turn to, no one. My father wouldn’t listen, and then when Joe got so drunk, so drunk he couldn’t screw me himself . . . Oh I can’t, I can’t tell you . . . I am so ashamed . . .’ Tears rolled down her perfect cheeks . . . ‘I hated him so much, and I could do nothing . . . Now you know, I am so ashamed, oh God, he beat me, and . . . Alex . . .’ She turned her tear-stained face to him, held out her arms. ‘Sometimes he even made me enjoy it. Help me, oh, don’t leave me, I need you, Alex, I would die if you left me . . . You’re everything he wasn’t. I trust you, I trust you so much, and you have made me respect myself again, when I never thought I could.’
He knelt and took her in his arms. She seemed so childlike, so desperately lonely. He kissed her forehead, her cheeks, her lips. Barbara knew it was now or never, and she clung to him, held him tight. She became girlish and coy, nuzzling his neck, giggling. ‘I would be such a good wife to you, Alex, entertaining – and something I’ve always wanted is to be part of English society, you know, mix with the titles and meet everyone. I’d be such a good wife, I would – do you mind me being so rich? Is that what troubles you? But it mustn’t – think, darling, oh think what we can do together, what we can accomplish . . .’
She climbed out of the bath and danced around the room, putting on a plummy English accent, bowing and curtseying, then knelt at his feet and looked up into his handsome face. ‘I love you, Alex, I love you so much. Whatever you want I want, I love you.’
Alex hugged her tight and said over and over again that he loved her too. He had never spoken those words to anyone in his life before, and it was as if she had opened a floodgate inside him. Taking her by the hand he dragged her into the bedroom, opened a bottle of champagne and poured them each a glass. ‘Will you be my wife?’
She wept, flinging her arms around him, shouting over and over, ‘Yes! Yes! Yessss . . .’
Skye Duval discovered just what Edward wanted him to do. Even if he wanted to, he couldn’t back out.
‘See, old chap, I need someone here I can trust, someone who will keep their mouth shut and run the business this side. You’ll have a lot of money passing through your hands, and as I said, I need someone I can trust.’
Skye shrugged. ‘I don’t have much choice, do I? Hey, listen, I’m not arguing, I need the bread . . . but there’s got to be something more in it for me than cash, I want my papers back.’
Edward gave his word, he would return them, even if Skye didn’t agree to do the business. Skye laughed, he had to hand it to his old buddy boy, he could still lie better than anyone he had ever known. Skye knew he was caught in Edward’s web, Edward could eat him alive if he wanted to. ‘Okay, you’re on . . . make me a rich man again, eh?’
Edward held Skye’s shoulders. ‘Yes, but keep off the booze. You foul it up and I’ll kill you.’
Skye laughed again and told Edward he would have a hard time – he had been dead for years. Edward then took him completely off guard, held him in his arms, like a caress. ‘I need you, buddy boy, don’t let me down.’
Skye’s voice was barely audible as he gazed up into the strange, dark eyes. ‘You know I won’t, you’re all I’ve got, even though you’re an incorrigible bastard.’
Edward began to tell Skye of his plans for buying up vast areas of land for mining perlite.
When Edward returned to London, he was angry that Alex had still not returned. He responded to Alex’s many telexes by telling him to ‘get his arse back to London’.
Dewint noticed how unkempt Edward looked, and he was drinking more heavily than ever. He did not ask after Harriet, and made no effort to visit her. He prowled moodily around the manor, eventually giving Dewint instructions to have the studio repainted. Looking at the bright-yellow walls, he said, ‘It’s enough to drive anyone nuts. Get it cleaned up.’
‘Yes, sir . . . do you have any particular colour in mind, or will you be asking Mrs Barkley when you see her?’
Without replying, Edward walked out. Dewint watched him drive off far too fast, clipping the gatepost. He decided to paint the studio a pale lemon, he was sure Harriet would like that.
Edward tried hard not to think about Harriet’s eventual return. He felt guilty about the thoughts that kept creeping into his mind. He wanted an heir, a son, and it was obvious to him now that Harriet would never have a child. Harriet’s love had always made
him feel good – her almost innocent attitude to sex meant that it was always he who made the first move. It was this innocence that had always attracted him to her. Having had a surfeit of sexual experience in his youth, he had not given it a great deal of importance in later years. But now, the girls in the Notting Hill Gate house had whetted his appetite, brought desire to the surface again. Now he made up for lost time. Harriet seemed like a ghost from the past, and one he was seriously considering consigning to the past. He was not sure how he should go about it given her precarious mental state.
The last person in the world Edward wanted to see was Richard Van der Burge. One of the staff informed him that Richard was trying to get into the club, and had mentioned Edward’s name. Edward excused himself from his table, leaving the attractive Brigitte Bardot look-alike pouting. He strolled out to meet Richard.
Richard looked terrible, down-at-heel and as scruffy as Skye. He was shaking, and his fingers were badly stained with nicotine.
‘So, Richard, how’s life?’
Richard shrugged and smiled nervously, and lit yet another cigarette.
‘You still work for De Veer’s?’
After inhaling deeply on his cigarette, Richard replied, ‘No, no I don’t . . . Not working at present. Had a bit of trouble, you know, chaps kept getting promoted over my head. Got difficult, so I walked.’
‘You all right for cash? You know, if you need tiding over while you’re out of work?’
Richard asked for ten thousand and, without batting an eyelid, Edward wrote out a cheque. Then he offered Richard a job in the insurance office. He suggested quite a high salary, more than he had intended. ‘It’ll be old pals’ time – you see, you’ll be working with Allard Simpson.’
‘Oh, that’s fantastic . . .’
‘Yes, that’s the good part . . . the bad part is that you’ll be in South Africa.’
Richard agreed, and with a hesitant look in the direction of the gaming rooms he left to pack his bags. He didn’t thank Edward for the cheque, believing that he was owed more than a meagre ten thousand, much more – and he intended to get it.
The Talisman Page 47