A Perfect Husband

by Hilary Boyd

  He fell silent as the waiter brought two chef’s salads, laid a round tin of mini-baguettes on the table, a saucer of butter wrapped in waxed paper, then topped up the Badoit they were drinking. He was desperate to broach the subject of the wedding money, but there was an unusual weariness about his mother today, a distracted air, which gave him pause. ‘How’s Freddy?’ he asked.

  ‘Busy,’ she said, without her usual enthusiasm.

  It had been a painful revelation, seeing his mother fall in love. As it had never occurred to him that she might find another husband, he had been unthinkingly hostile to the very idea of Freddy. Hostile to Freddy as well, in the first months of their acquaintance. Even though, when they’d first met, it had been six years since his father’s death, the sight of his mother being held and kissed, however chastely, in front of him and his sister had made his stomach turn.

  But Sara had told him scornfully that he was an ‘Oedipal cliché’, the son who is in love with his mother and jealous of his father. Or stepfather, in this case. Which had brought him up short and forced him to soften his hostility, because it was so clear that the man made his mum happy. And when he finally allowed himself to like Freddy, he found he liked him a lot. Freddy, wisely, had never tried to be a substitute father to the twins.

  ‘I suppose neither of us would have been happy with a layabout,’ he commented wryly, as they began to eat.

  It wasn’t till coffee and an extensive chat about books – both of them devoted readers and always storing up recommendations for each other – that Dillon spoke about what was really on his mind. ‘Mum, I don’t want to bother you with this, because Freddy said he’s on it, but the Roof Gardens is hassling for the balance and Freddy did offer . . .’

  ‘Have you spoken to him?’

  ‘I tried. I’ve emailed and texted a few times, and he says not to worry, he’s got all the details.’ Dillon took a sip of his macchiato, not looking at his mother. ‘But they rang again this morning and said that if they don’t get it by the end of the week we’ll lose the booking.’

  He saw the puzzlement in his mother’s eyes.

  ‘It’s only five weeks away, Mum. I’m sure they can sell the slot three times over if we don’t cough up.’

  That wasn’t the only problem. The expensive venue was one thing, but all the other costs that went with it – invitations, cake, dress, cars – were eye-watering. And Dillon was too embarrassed to keep asking for more money. He wished he’d turned down his stepfather’s offer and gone for something smaller, more low-key. It would have suited him far better, but he’d wanted the best for his fiancée and Gabriela was so excited.

  His mother was frowning. ‘I’m sure he’s just forgotten. He’s been putting in such long hours at the studio, and with these idiotic networking evenings he insists on doing, I don’t think he can remember his own name at the moment.’ She put a hand reassuringly over his. ‘I’ll talk to him tonight.’

  Dillon breathed a sigh of relief. ‘Thanks, Mum. That’d be great.’ He didn’t add that his friend Josh, who was flat-sharing with Samuel, one of Freddy’s sound engineers, said Samuel hadn’t been paid last month.

  It’s probably nothing, he told himself as he said goodbye to his mother, thanking her for lunch, then twisted open the D-lock securing his bike. An admin error or something. Freddy was loaded, that much was clear, and he’d been the one pushing for the Roof Gardens. The studio was always incredibly busy, too, according to Samuel. But the uneasiness he’d felt since he’d seen his mother’s expression when he’d told her about the wedding money would not go away. Something was up: his mother was not a worrier by nature. She was more a dreamer, someone who often didn’t seem properly attached to real life, with a calm, almost fatalistic outlook – a trait he envied. But she had appeared distinctly tense today, no question.

  Chapter 6

  ‘Ha! Rent-a-mob.’ A deep male voice made Lily turn. Joe Tarrant, a middle-aged music producer and one-time client of her husband, laid a hand on her bare arm and reached forward to set his heavy, sweating jowls briefly against her cheek. He smelt end-of-the-day rank, of stale aftershave and cigarettes. Brushing his thinning grey hair back from his forehead, he took a large gulp of champagne and raised his eyebrows at Lily. ‘Where’s Fred, then?’ he asked, although he didn’t seem too interested in Lily’s response, his pale shark-eyes darting back and forth across the crowd, presumably hoping to spot someone more interesting than herself.

  Lily hated going to these openings without Freddy, but he had texted her only as she got out of the cab, saying he’d been held up and wouldn’t be able to get there for another half an hour. She hadn’t fancied wandering around Leicester Square in her dangerously high heels while she waited, so she’d decided to brave the scary PR girl with the platinum crop and lime green micro-dress alone, then negotiate the gang of black-clad minders hovering at the entrance to the new restaurant with as much nonchalance as she could muster.

  ‘This opening is unmissable,’ Freddy had told her. A new dim-sum restaurant – Freddy loved Chinese food – with the most extraordinary interior. ‘Everyone is talking about it,’ he said. ‘We can check out what all the fuss is about, grab a glass of free bubbly, then go and get some supper, just the two of us.’

  Lily had smiled her agreement, but she had known that would not happen. Her husband, inevitably, would bump into an acquaintance – someone who might be helpful with clients, Freddy would insist – so they’d stay, and when they did go, it would be with a whole gang in tow. The evening would be fluid, messy, drunken. Freddy wouldn’t leave her side, but they would have no chance of a private conversation. And that was all Lily wanted to do: sit down and talk things through with him, ask why he hadn’t paid the wedding money as he’d promised, finally find out what was wrong.

  The interior was as spectacular as the press had insisted, the suspended ceiling of wide bamboo mesh swooping across the cavernous space all the way down to the pale marble floor. It created a grotto effect, within which curved bamboo screens and backlit bamboo sheets on the walls provided smaller pockets of more intimate dining space. To Lily it had a modern, slightly futuristic atmosphere, with the huge round saucerlights above the bamboo mesh providing a garish yellow glow over the assembled first-nighters below. Stylish, she decided, but not cosy: the room was too high, the marble too chilly, the bamboo somehow impersonal. It reminded her of a restaurant in Hong Kong, where Freddy had taken her a couple of years ago, and she wondered if the same designer had done the job.

  There must have been around sixty people in the room, the babble of conversation and the odd shout of laughter echoing as it disappeared up into the roof. She spotted a few celebrities: a glamorous presenter, an actor in a recent television drama – for whom Sara claimed to have the hots – a tall blonde with a familiar face she couldn’t quite place.

  ‘On his way,’ she said to Joe now, preferring to stand alone with her pleasantly cold champagne flute and watch the people than make small talk with a man she barely knew and was aware Freddy did not particularly like.

  ‘Hear he’s having some trouble with Jerome. I did warn him.’ He suddenly grabbed the arm of a slim dark-haired girl in a long patterned dress, high wedge-heeled sandals, and an oversized leather jacket which made her look even more waifish than she already was.

  ‘Hey, Suki, you trying to avoid me?’

  Suki twitched her arm free. ‘I certainly was, Joe. Seems not very successfully.’

  The hollow smile she flashed made her words, spoken in a south London accent, sound more truthful than Joe obviously chose to believe, because he laughed and said, ‘Ooh, we’re on form tonight!’

  She tossed her hair back and waved at him dismissively as she strode into the crowd.

  ‘Going to find another drink,’ Joe muttered, not bothering to ask Lily if she might also like her glass topped up.

  Freddy was suddenly by her side, scoop
ing her into his arms, lifting her off her feet as he dropped a kiss on her cheek. ‘Sorry. Got caught up.’

  He put her down and gazed around, taking in the woven ceiling, the bamboo screens. ‘Hmm, think I like it . . . different anyway.’ Then she saw him searching the crowd. ‘Talk to anyone interesting?’

  ‘Only Joe Tarrant.’

  Freddy pulled a face. ‘That’s a no, then.’ He grabbed two sticks pierced through breaded balls of something from a passing tray, held one out to Lily. ‘Let’s do a quick circuit, see if there’s anyone I need to bond with, then we’ll go. Fancy Hakkasan? Keep in the spirit of the evening? I know it’s usually a bit of a zoo, but it’s Tuesday night, shouldn’t be too manic.’

  He began to push through the crowd, clutching her hand in his, stopping frequently to say hello to someone and introduce Lily if she didn’t already know them. Lily was content to be by his side. He seemed happier this evening, more relaxed, and she began to enjoy herself as the second glass of champagne hit the spot. It was always the same when she was with Freddy: nothing else seemed to matter.

  They got separated and Lily found herself talking to Suki, who turned out to be a witty, no-bullshit singer, currently freaking out about finishing her next album. She thought she would have liked to draw the girl’s face, which held a raw edginess, all monochrome angles and hollows.

  But Lily did not have a chance to study Suki’s face further, because Freddy interrupted. ‘Got to go, Lily.’

  She raised an eyebrow at his brusqueness.

  ‘Now. Please, come on.’

  His arm slung round her waist, he waved an apologetic hand at Suki, and hustled Lily towards the stairs and out past the minders into Leicester Square.

  ‘What on earth’s the matter?’ she asked, breathless. But he didn’t reply. His face set, he took her hand and began to sprint towards Charing Cross Road, past the slot-machine arcade and the Hippodrome’s timeless exterior.

  ‘Wait, please! I can’t run in these shoes – I’ll break my neck.’

  He glanced impatiently at her feet and slowed his pace a bit, turning to cast an anxious look back towards the restaurant.

  When they reached the edge of the square, he left her on the busy pavement and ran to the middle of the road, traffic pouring past in both directions, twisting this way and that in his effort to find a cab. He finally flagged one down on the opposite pavement and yelled to Lily, holding the door open and ushering her inside.

  ‘Are we going to Hakkasan?’

  ‘I’d rather go home, if you don’t mind.’ Freddy clutched her hand so tightly as they sat in the dark of the taxi that she thought she’d lose the circulation in her fingers. She didn’t question him further, though, aware of the tension coming off him in waves. Once at home, he went immediately to the kitchen and opened a bottle of red wine, the sharp, metallic grinding as he unscrewed the top the only sound in the room. He poured two large glasses and handed one to Lily.

  ‘What was that about?’

  ‘Sorry,’ was all he said, taking a gulp of the wine and not looking at her, resting one hand on the gleaming white marble island in the middle of the room as if he needed support.

  Lily sat down on one of the pale beechwood chairs that stood around the kitchen table. The room was almost entirely white, which Lily had thought ridiculously impractical when she first saw it, but had come to love. It was a light, restful space in which they both enjoyed cooking and eating, the view across the rooftops mesmerizing from the wide wall of window.

  Freddy was acknowledged between them as the better cook – Italian his food of choice, although he was capable of turning his hand to any country’s cuisine. Unlike many men he was fanatically tidy, setting out his ingredients in neat rows, tidying away each pot or pan as he went, wiping the marble clean of any spills. Lily’s cooking, by comparison, was hit-and-miss, even after years of family meals still unconfident – but then she’d never had much interest in it beyond feeding Garret and the twins.

  Lily took a deep breath. ‘Sit down. Tell me what’s bothering you, right now. I can’t stand the tension a moment longer, Freddy.’

  The look he gave her was veiled, unseeing. She waited. He put his glass down on the marble top, resting both hands on the surface now, bowing his head. But still he remained silent.

  ‘Dillon says the Roof Gardens is yelling for the final payment and you haven’t been returning his calls. Joe said you were having trouble with someone called Jerome. You look like someone’s died. You stay out all night. Then running from that party tonight as if you were being chased by Mad Max . . .’ She stopped, feeling the familiar tightness in her chest, and tried to steady her breathing. She always carried her blue inhaler wherever she went, but it had been months since she’d needed it.

  Freddy sighed, raised his face to look at her, then came slowly over to the table and dropped into another of the beech-wood chairs, pulling it sideways and stretching out his long legs, crossing his feet at the ankles. He rested his elbow on the table, his fingers still clutching the stem of his wine glass.

  ‘Okay.’ He stopped again. ‘Okay, well, the truth is that one of my clients hasn’t paid up, and it’s a lot, and it was money earmarked for the salaries.’ He shrugged. ‘I’ve been really worried, although I know this guy’s good for it . . . or at least I assume he is. But cash flow is an issue and the bloody man won’t return my calls.’

  ‘Is this Jerome?’ Lily felt his anxiety, but was aware that she was partly relieved. Surely this was par for the course with any business. Prem had frequently been in a similar situation, clients taking it to the wire before coughing up, sometimes leaving it till they were threatened with legal action.

  Freddy nodded.

  ‘When was the money due?’

  ‘Nearly six weeks ago.’ He ran his hand through his dark wavy hair, shaking his head as if trying to rid himself of his problem.

  ‘What are you going to do?’

  He frowned. ‘I honestly don’t know. This is a very successful producer. He’s absolutely minted. I just don’t understand what game he’s playing.’ He paused. ‘He lives in sodding Frankfurt, so I can’t even go and doorstep him.’

  ‘Does this mean you can’t pay the wedding money? I’m sure I can find it, if not. It was good of you to offer in the first place.’

  Freddy looked momentarily alarmed. ‘No, no, it’s not a problem. I’ll drop it in tomorrow. I’m sorry, I’ve had so much going on. I keep meaning to speak to Dill.’

  She nodded. ‘So you haven’t paid the February salaries?’

  ‘Nope.’

  ‘Won’t the bank sub you for a few weeks?’

  ‘Not on a potentially bad debt, no.’

  She fell silent.

  ‘Everyone’s being very understanding at the studio, but they all have mortgages, rent, the usual shit to cover. They won’t be understanding if I don’t come up with something pretty damn soon.’ He drained his glass, gave her a weary grin. ‘But, hey, I’m sure I’ll find it somehow. I always do.’

  He got up, stretched his arms to the ceiling, cracking his knuckles as he bent back his interlaced fingers.

  ‘So why did we have to leave the party in such a hurry?’ She knew there was more he wasn’t telling her.

  Freddy yawned. ‘Oh, just someone I really didn’t want to talk to . . . You know how it is.’

  Lily didn’t know. Nor did she think this explained her husband’s excessive anxiety to flee, but she could see he was tired and when he reached for his phone and asked, ‘Chinese or Indian?’ she chose Chinese and left it at that.

  Chapter 7

  With every foot the plane rose in the sky, Freddy’s heartbeat slowed. The anonymous, womb-like interior; the constant hum of the engines; the low light; the chilly air tinged with a faint scent of fabric freshener; safety in the company of hundreds of fellow passengers, none of whom knew
Freddy or his problems . . . He loved flying. Best of all, no one could contact him in this blessed lacuna: no threats, no pleading, no harassment. For the next few hours – he changed planes in Detroit, then another hour and a half to Las Vegas – he was safe, real life slipping from him like a discarded cloak.

  Fish had insisted. ‘This guy could be the answer,’ he’d told Freddy the previous morning, his voice on the phone unusually excited. ‘Don’t know where the fuck he gets his money, maybe nowhere honest, but he’s up for serious investment in the UK, he claims . . . and he loves show business. You only have to throw him a few famous names and he’ll be eating out of your goddamn hand.’

  ‘Money-laundering?’ Freddy had asked.

  ‘Didn’t ask and I suggest you don’t either.’ His friend had let out a low hum, a familiar sound that meant Fish was thinking. ‘You’re not going to go all virtuous on me, are you, buddy? The guy could be perfectly legit.’

  ‘It’s worth a meeting,’ Freddy had replied cautiously. He had no desire to get himself embroiled with some Vegas gangster who wouldn’t just break his kneecaps when things didn’t go well. But if it meant saving the company . . .

  ‘So get your ass on a plane and I’ll set something up with Larry tomorrow,’ Fish had said.

  Aaron Fishley III was a rich Californian in his sixties who’d spent his life – and the immense fortune from his father’s furniture empire – occupying a stool around the curved blackjack tables of the world’s casinos, gambling away his inheritance. Which, as luck would have it, was immense enough to accommodate even Fish’s ongoing extravagances. Tall and lean, his long, impassive face, handsome nose and small black-dark eyes reminded Freddy of an ageing Mr Spock. No pointy ears, but his tidy cap of greying hair also strongly resembled Leonard Nimoy’s.