by Susan Lewis
‘Well, let’s just say I’m pretty certain it was him who had my book stolen from the publisher.’
‘How do you know?’
‘Who else would it be? Certainly not anyone from the press, because what could they do with it? They’d be sued if they printed without permission and I was hardly going to give it, was I?’
‘But why do you say it was Marcus Gatling?’
‘Because men in his position are always paranoid about the things they’ve got to hide.’
‘So what’s he got to hide?’
‘You’d best ask him.’
‘But he thinks, or thought, there might be something in your book that’s likely to what? Expose him in some way?’
‘Evidently.’
‘Is there?’
Ava laughed. ‘Why would I write about him? He hardly cuts a romantic figure, does he? In fact, the only reason his wife’s with him is because of all that power and money. Everyone knows that.’
‘So there’s nothing about him in the book? Nothing that could even be construed as being about him?’
Ava frowned. ‘Why are you asking?’
Georgie took a breath.
Ava’s heart gave a beat of unease. ‘Georgie. What’s going on? Why are you asking all these questions about the book?’
Georgie braced herself, and said, ‘Your agent should be telling you this really, but apparently they’re not going to publish it.’
Ava froze. Then her mind spun into turmoil. They couldn’t do this. They just couldn’t, because without a book there would be no Ava, and without Ava there would be only Beth, and Beth couldn’t cope with all this. ‘But we had a deal!’ she cried. ‘I signed a contract!’
‘Which apparently stipulates that you have to comply with certain editorial demands, and you’ve refused to do so. So on that basis, they’ve cancelled the book.’
Ava could hardly think. The sun was so dazzling she could no longer see.
‘It’s why your agent’s been trying to call,’ Georgie told her.
‘What about the film? They can’t cancel that too. Can they?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘But Theo loves this book. He really wants to make it.’
Georgie was silent.
‘What if I agree to the changes? Will they publish it then?’
‘I don’t know,’ Georgie said again.
Ava was trying not to panic. She’d known she’d be made to pay for that incident on the plane, she knew too that it wasn’t going to end here, but like a fool she’d been trying to convince herself it would. Oh God, if only she hadn’t been drunk she’d never have approached him; he might not even have known she was there. But it was too late now, she’d taunted him with his own nightmares, and here they were coming to haunt her.
‘Does Colin know any of this?’ she demanded suddenly.
‘I’m sure Bruce has told him.’
‘Doesn’t he have any advice? He knows the man better than anyone. What does he say I should do?’
‘I don’t know. Bruce hasn’t told me.’
‘Is he there?’
‘No. He’s in London tonight. But listen, before you call him I think you should know that Colin’s instructed him to proceed with a divorce.’
Ava reeled under the blow. ‘No! He can’t!’ she cried. ‘He doesn’t understand. It’s not supposed to happen like that …’
‘What isn’t?’ Georgie said.
‘Nothing. None of it. Georgie, this is why I didn’t want to talk to you – because every time there’s something else, something that totally devastates me, and I can’t take any more. I want to help him. I need to be there for him.’
‘If you really mean that, then you still can be.’
‘How? Just tell me how. He won’t see me –’
‘Talk to Laurie Forbes, or Elliot Russell.’
‘No! I’m not talking to anyone from the press.’
‘Why?’
‘You know why. I don’t trust them.’
‘They really want to help you. In fact, they’re worried about you.’
‘What do you mean? Have you been talking to them about me? Georgie, you can’t do that. As my friend –’
‘No, I haven’t spoken to them at all. But Bruce has, and he tells me what they’re saying. They’re really keen to talk to you, and if not to you then to me, but I won’t do anything unless you say it’s all right.’
‘It’s not,’ Ava said without hesitation. ‘It’s really not. Just stay clear of them, Georgie. Don’t talk to any one of them.’
‘But if Colin’s prepared to trust them, why won’t you?’
‘You just don’t understand, Georgie. He’s using them …’
‘What do you mean? How is he using them?’
Not wanting to get into it any more than that, Ava suddenly banged down the phone. Then throwing off her wrap she stalked back out to the pool. ‘I knew I should never have made that call,’ she said shrilly. ‘I knew it!’
Mitzi only looked at her, not sure what to say.
Suddenly Ava swung round, eyes glittering, mouth trembling. ‘Where’s Fabio and his star dust?’ she demanded angrily. ‘I’m ready to give it a go.’
Chapter 20
ELLIOT’S PORSCHE WAS speeding through the rosy early morning sunlight, like a pinball following the winding grey ribbon of road that carved through the dewy fields of Kent. The sun was rising in a vast, golden orb over the horizon, creating one of those magical, invigorating mornings that never failed to instil exuberance, though Laurie was still stifling the occasional yawn after getting up so early.
The anticipation she was feeling, as they drew closer to the south coast, wasn’t unlike how she’d felt as a child on a day trip to the sea, though the seriousness of their purpose today tempered the edges of her excitement and kept her focused. They were heading for a rendezvous with one of Elliot’s most infiltrated government sources, who’d made contact a few days ago from his holiday home in Brittany. As Elliot had been trying to reach him virtually since the day of Ashby’s arrest, the man’s call had created quite a stir in the office, not to mention some high expectation in Elliot. Their meeting point was a café just outside of Le Touquet, on the northern coast of France. For the occasion Laurie had dressed in a pair of straight black jeans, a white sleeveless sweater and a boxy dog-toothed jacket, which was one of the smartest outfits she owned. She’d also thickened her lashes with mascara, highlighted her cheeks and coated her lips with a subtle caramel frosting. And just to finish it off, she’d replaced her perpetually scruffy topknot with a demure, low-lying ponytail that was trapped into obedience by an extremely sophisticated slide. She didn’t actually want to admit that it was all for Elliot, who’d risen admirably to the occasion when he’d come to pick her up by making no comment at all, so she couldn’t actually allow herself to feel miffed by his neglect, even though she was.
They’d been working on this story for over a month now, seeing each other virtually every day, as they and the rest of the team co-ordinated the information that was coming in with increasing regularity from all over the world. The potential scale of the syndicate’s operations was now growing to such an extent that Elliot’s team was on it full time, as was Tom Maykin and at least a dozen other reporters from Australia to Asia, Brussels to the Bahamas and London to Washington. Neither Elliot nor Laurie had mentioned the fact that she hadn’t returned to the office since her short stay at the Gatlings’ home, but she knew very well that there was no way she could go back now, when the paper’s behaviour towards her and the story would necessarily be included in her and Elliot’s final report. So effectively she was out of a job, but since it had yet to be made official, and her salary had yet to cease, she’d decided to put it to the back of her mind as something that needed to be dealt with when she had time.
What her mind wasn’t managing to escape quite so easily was the possibility that Gatling’s people might try abducting her again. She hadn’t heard from them,
nor had Stan spotted anyone keeping tabs on her, but for some reason she couldn’t shake the feeling of foreboding. She hadn’t told anyone about it, especially not Elliot, though she occasionally wondered if he sensed it. But that was probably just her being fanciful, wanting him to care when no doubt he’d all but forgotten the entire incident.
Taking her mobile out of her bag she clicked on to answer.
‘Laurie? It’s Bruce Cottle. I hope I’m not too early.’
‘Oh hi, Bruce,’ she said, glancing at Elliot. ‘Not at all. What gets you up at this hour?’
‘I went down to the country last night,’ he said, ‘so I’m trying to beat the traffic into London. Giles and I are seeing Colin later. We’re hoping we might have more luck persuading him to meet you again.’
‘Good. If you can’t then at least try to find out why he’s being so reticent. And ask him if he knows where Heather Dance is. Apart from an email telling us she’s all right, she and her mother might have vanished off the face of the earth.’
‘OK,’ Bruce said. ‘We’ve been through it with him before, but I’m prepared to do it again. Where are you now?’
‘Actually, we’re heading towards the Channel Tunnel, and if we go much faster we might gain enough momentum to fly off the edge of England and land in France without the aid of a train.’
Elliot slanted her a look, as Bruce said ‘Oh, that’s a shame, I was hoping to see you later, but if you’re not around –’
‘We’ll be back by late afternoon. What is it?’
‘Georgie’s spoken to Beth on the phone. She only told me about it last night. It happened a few days ago.’
‘You sound worried,’ Laurie commented, starting to feel the same way. ‘What happened?’
‘Well, Georgie wasn’t at all happy with the conversation. She’s got herself quite worked up about it. Beth’s …’ He seemed at a loss for a moment, then more firmly, he said, ‘Well, to begin with she claims there was some kind of encounter with Marcus Gatling and his wife on the plane going out there.’
Immediately Laurie said, ‘Bruce, I need to put you on the speaker for this, so I’ll have to call you back with Elliot’s phone. You’re in your car, yes?’
Bruce confirmed it, and a couple of minutes later his voice was coming from the tiny overhead speaker.
‘I don’t know the details,’ he was saying, ‘only what Georgie told me, but I think it would be a good idea for you to talk to her.’
Laurie gave a laugh of surprise. ‘I’ve been trying, Bruce,’ she reminded him.
‘I know, and she still won’t agree without Beth’s permission, but I think, if you go down there, if you just turn up unannounced, she might change her mind.’
Laurie looked at Elliot as he said, ‘Tell us more about this encounter with Gatling.’
‘All I know is that she told him there was new evidence to say Colin didn’t do it, which apparently he didn’t take too well. And she also said something about his secrets not being safe with her.’
Elliot’s expression was dark. ‘What does that mean?’ he said. ‘What secrets?’
‘Georgie didn’t know, but when she asked Beth she more or less said she was winding him up.’
Laurie and Elliot exchanged glances.
‘Has there been any contact since?’ Elliot asked.
‘I don’t think so.’
‘Did she give any indication of being afraid of Gatling?’
‘Not that Georgie mentioned. She’s never liked the man, though, or his wife, but winding him up like that … She’d never have done it before. She was always too unsure of herself. She seems to have lost some of that now, though.’
‘How did she take the news of the book being pulled?’ Laurie asked. ‘Did she already know? Did Georgie mention it?’
‘She was upset, angry, all the things you’d expect.’
‘Surprised?’
‘I don’t know. But apparently she’s convinced it was Gatling who had her book stolen from the publishers. She didn’t say why, but she did say something that both Georgie and I find very strange indeed. She referred to Sophie Long as being a sacrificial lamb, and when Georgie asked her what she meant she said Georgie should either ask Colin, or read the book, then ask Marcus Gatling.’
‘Confirmation,’ Laurie said in an undertone to Elliot, ‘that even her best friend hasn’t read the book.’
‘What was that?’ Bruce said.
‘Nothing,’ Laurie replied, braking with Elliot as he slowed for the tunnel approach. ‘When’s a good time for me to go down there?’
‘Probably during the late afternoons,’ he answered. ‘She won’t be there for the next few days. She’s going to a health farm with my sister …’
‘OK, I’ll wait to hear from you.’
‘There’s just one other thing,’ he said, before she broke the connection. ‘Apparently she’s had some plastic surgery. Beth, I mean, not Georgie.’
Laurie looked at Elliot. ‘What kind of plastic surgery?’ she asked.
‘Breast enlargement and something to do with her lips.’
At that Laurie’s eyes started to dance, for she knew that Elliot, like her, had imagined something much more sinister than bulging breasts and rubbery lips.
‘It’s out of character for her to do something like that,’ Bruce said. ‘Or it always was in the past. Lately we haven’t been quite sure what to expect.’
‘OK,’ Laurie said as a blast of static interrupted the line, ‘we’re about to board the train now, so we’ll speak to you later.’
As she rang off, and they pulled alongside a toll booth to buy a ticket, Elliot said, ‘Tom Maykin told me last night that the Gatlings were back in California, so I’d say, given the way things seem to happen in places where they’re not, that for the moment at least Beth Ashby’s got no more to worry about than the writing of a screenplay that doesn’t appear to have been cancelled, and what she’s going to do with her old bras.’
Though Laurie smiled at the joke, she was deep in thought, trying to imagine what Beth Ashby looked like now, where she lived, what her life was really like over there in LA.
‘That was interesting, what she said about Sophie Long being a sacrificial lamb, don’t you think?’ she said as they inched on to the train behind a new Vauxhall Zafira.
‘Very. But since all trace of every copy of the manuscript seems to have vanished since the book was cancelled, we’re left with a scant synopsis from the Hollywood Reporter that tells us … What did it say again?’
‘Something about a journey of love through time, and an existential righting of old wrongs.’
‘Sounds more like a clue from The Times crossword than the plot for a feature film,’ he commented, ‘but as we’ve already been through it a hundred times, we won’t go there again.’ And bringing the car to a stop, he turned off the engine, unfastened his seat belt and turned on the CD.
‘Opera?’ she said, as the opening strains of La Traviata began drifting into the car. ‘You like opera?’
He briefly opened one eye. ‘Yes. Do you?’
‘Yes,’ she answered.
‘Then relax and listen.’
She nodded and looked out of the window as the train doors started to close. Her heartbeat was increasing, as the music filled up the car and swamped her with a longing to groan and laugh, for she knew very well he loved opera, she even knew which were his favourites, and though they might not be her favourites too, the passion, the drama, the sheer power and visceral energy were, for her, just about the greatest aphrodisiac imaginable. So exactly how she was going to relax when every chord and cadenza, aria and bravura was inciting such eroticism in her mind that her body might just lose control, was a feat she was going to find it impossible to perform, unless, by some God-saving miracle, she could manage to fall asleep.
It was around ten when Laurie was woken by the sound of the Porsche engine dying. Stiff and bleary-eyed she struggled to sit up, remembering just in time not to rub her eyes. T
o her surprise, they seemed to be there, for they were on the outskirts of what might be called a village, though it appeared to consist of no more than a few dreary rain-soaked houses either side of the road, a closed boulangerie next door to a single-pump garage, also closed, and an almost derelict-looking café called Emile’s.
Elliot was already getting out of the car so, following suit, she picked up her bag and thanked him as he came to hold the door open. The promise of sun later was glinting through breaks in the thick wedges of cloud, but by the time they’d crossed to the café, a few fat blobs of rain were starting to fall.
An old-fashioned bell jangled overhead as they entered, and immediately, through the smoky darkness, they were assailed by the smell of cheap red wine, tobacco and strong coffee. Relics of past Christmases hung dejectedly from a couple of the overhead beams, and a small TV on the bar was showing an episode of Murder She Wrote, dubbed into French. Two elderly men, dressed in blue serge, with unfiltered cigarettes dangling from their lips, were so engrossed in the programme that they didn’t even look up when the door opened. Another, younger man, whose elbows were resting on the bar as he too absorbed Jessica Fletcher’s story, glanced their way and greeted them with a gruff, ‘Bonjour.’
‘Are you sure we’re in the right place?’ Laurie whispered, looking round at the vinyl-topped table where ashtrays had been left overflowing, and a few smeary glasses awaited collection. The windows had brass poles across their centres, supporting dingy nets, and the cheap plastic chairs were scattered haphazardly, as though a crowd had taken off in a hurry.
‘You surely can’t be doubting me,’ Elliot responded.
‘Qu’est-ce que vous voulez?’ the younger man growled.
‘Do you speak French?’ Elliot said from the corner of his mouth.
‘Yes, so do you,’ she answered from the corner of hers. ‘I’ll have a beer.’
Laughing, Elliot ordered two then pulled a couple of chairs up to the cleanest-looking table.
Laurie sat down, praying she wouldn’t need the loo, and was about to speak when his mobile rang. He was quiet as he listened to the caller. Then, looking at her with comically raised eyebrows, he said, ‘Great news, my friend. Call me when you get here.’