by Karen Swan
She peeled off her jeans, slapping her thighs, which were bright red from the wet. She walked through to the bathroom – which was so small she hadn’t been able to get a full-length bath in, and so had fitted a semi-upright slipper bath instead – and opened the taps, pouring in lashings of her favourite Benefit bath oil. She moved quickly around her little home, closing the shutters, putting a frozen pizza in the oven, and putting on the gas fire in the little sitting room so that it could heat up and the tell-tale blue flame would have disappeared by the time she came to sit down.
She switched on her computer and let the emails download while she soaked in the tub with a couple of bottles of Merlot – suitably dusty from several months on the worktop. It worked a treat, soothing her frazzled nerves into languid torpor, and by the time she slipped on her PJs and sat eating pizza slices on the sofa, the discovery that her boyfriend had both forgotten to dump her and was planning at some point to blackmail her had begun to seem like a distant, bad dream.
She channel-hopped between her only five channels, working her way slowly through the tower of mail. She couldn’t believe how much unsolicited rubbish came through, and eighty per cent of it she chucked without even opening. There were a few letters from schoolfriends living in New York and Paris – her finishing school had impressed upon them the importance of maintaining friendships through written correspondence – and there was a bundle of cheques from her parents for her monthly allowance.
She realized with sudden alarm that she’d better get to the bank tomorrow. All her bills would have left her account through direct debit, and she needed to get these funds in quickly before things started to bounce. She took another slug of wine, her head beginning to spin. She hadn’t had to think about any of this with Harry. She’d just forgotten about all of it. Left it without a backward glance. With him, life was limitless, pampered, catered, every whim realized. Whatever you wanted, it just happened.
She filed through the rest of the post, disappointment barging past drunken fog as she realized that what she’d been hoping for wasn’t here. She’d known the odds had been long from the start, but she’d worked so hard, tirelessly for months, sleeping at odd hours, and eating erratically. And for what? Some romantic notion of honour.
She staggered over to the computer and saw with despair that she had 894 new messages. Without bothering to look at them, she fired off a couple of new ones, letting neglected friends know she was ‘back in town’ and not dead and rotting in her flat.
She slumped back on the sofa as her mobile began to ring. Lethargically she picked it up and checked the caller.
It was Harry. Of course it was.
Her heart didn’t bother to quicken. It was too late now. So late. She let the phone drop from her hand, and slid down the sofa until she was lying flat out and surrendering to fast, fast sleep.
It was mid-morning before she retrieved the message. She’d spent most of the early hours running fresh baths, climbing back into bed and with her head down the loo. But even the Alka-Seltzer couldn’t perk her up as much as the shock and puzzlement in Harry’s voice that she wasn’t at home. Where was she? Ring back, baby.
By the time she’d slept off the worst of the hangover and managed to keep down a cup of tea, he had left three more. Her heart soared higher with each. He still wanted her. Or needed her. Whichever, it didn’t matter. Because as bad as her hangover was, she had still woken to a pain in her heart that hurt far more than her head.
Chapter Thirty-four
‘Oh, what now?’ Cress muttered to herself crossly as she hurtled round the one-way gyratory system. Rosie had been ringing practically non-stop since she’d left the office, but she couldn’t pick up. She’d left her bluetooth at home and there was a police car in front of her. She already had six points on her licence. She couldn’t afford any more – it would have to wait until she got home.
This is what happens when you try to get away early, she thought, as she accelerated up Trinity Road, slowing down just in time for the speed camera before swinging into the residential tree-lined avenues which fed off to her street.
She turned the corner into her road and – Christ, it was bedlam! There must have been an incident, she thought, her hands gripping the wheel as she got nearer to the crowd jostling in the road.
‘What’s going on?’ she asked, pulling alongside a man in his early twenties, wearing bum-fluff on his chin and a khaki parka.
He turned and looked at her.
‘It’s her!’
The entire crowd turned as one, like a shoal of fish, and in seconds had engulfed the car, flashbulbs popping in her face, microphones thrust towards her.
‘Have you got any comment to make?’
‘What?’ she cried, flustered by the onslaught. ‘What do you mean? I don’t know what you’re talking about!’
She panicked and tried to press the button for the window to scroll up, but she pressed the wrong one and the back window opened instead. Someone reached their arm in and tried to lift the door lock, trying to get into the car.
‘Get out! Stop it! What the hell do you think you’re doing?’ she screamed, managing to close the window up again. She started pressing on the horn, trying to get the crowd away from the car, as her neighbours poured out of their houses to see what was causing the commotion.
With one arm up against her face, trying to shield her eyes from the glare, she inched forward, eventually managing to crawl, sobbing, into her driveway. Cress sat there for a moment, too terrified to get out, petrified of the swarm that would engulf her as soon as she stepped out.
She tried to calm down. She was only twenty yards from her front door. Nothing could happen to her here. She hurriedly wiped away the tears and took several deep breaths, feeling an angry calm descend. She could do this.
She fished her house keys out of her bag and opened the door. As she’d feared, they rushed forward, but she turned sharply to face them and they stopped abruptly.
‘This is private property!’ she shouted, stalking towards them, diminutive but menacing. ‘And I will prosecute any one of you bastards who is still standing on my drive in the next five seconds.’
They rushed back again, recognizing from her tone, authority and massive house that her threats were real. But they didn’t disperse, merely regrouped on the pavement.
‘How long’s it been going on, Cressida?’
‘Does your husband know?’
‘Any comment?’
Cress turned on her heel and stamped up the drive, hoping to look more frightening than frightened. She let herself into the house and slammed the door firmly behind her. No comment.
She dropped her bags at her feet and breathed into her hands, trying to calm herself again, the adrenalin coursing through her like a Ferrari in Monaco. What the hell had that been about? She’d never been so scared in her life.
She looked up. The house was stony quiet.
‘Greta!’
Nothing.
She walked straight into the study. She needed a stiff drink.
Mark was sitting at the desk, a half-empty glass of brandy in front of him, his head in his hands.
‘Oh God, Mark! Mark!’ She ran over to him and threw her arms around his neck. ‘You’ll never guess what’s just happened. I’ve just been doorstepped! There’s all these reporters out there. Loads of them. Didn’t you see? Can’t you hear them?’
‘Yes, I heard,’ he said calmly, holding out his brandy to her. ‘You’ll be needing this, I imagine.’
She was too distracted by his answer to notice the drink.
‘Wha–– What? What do you mean you heard? Why didn’t you do something? For God’s sake. Have you seen them?’
‘Yes. I had just the same thing. They’re just as interested in me too. Unsurprisingly.’
‘What do you mean? Oh my God, where are the kids?’
‘They’re at the Harbour Club. I’ve asked Greta to keep them there until that lot clear off. Here, take this.�
� He motioned the drink towards her.
She took the drink and gulped half of it down. It burned her throat and she gave a little involuntary shudder, walking over to the reading chair by the fireplace. Mark walked around and sat facing her on the edge of the desk, as though interviewing a graduate.
‘What’s going on?’ she asked, taking in his posture and uncharacteristic detachment.
‘That’s what we all want to know,’ he said. ‘Them and me.’ He thrust a rolled-up magazine into her hand. ‘Care to explain?’
She looked down at the glossy cover shot of Harry Hunter pulling himself half-dressed in cricket whites out of a stunning Olympic pool. His shoulders were broadly muscled, his stomach as chiselled as his jaw. His eyes were blazing and a stray blond curl had fallen forward. It was a magnificent shot. A defining image. Iconic.
‘Holy cow!’ Cress said, smiling as she took it all in. ‘Great cover! God, you’ve got to hand it to him – he really knows how to turn it on!’ She flicked her eyes up at Mark. ‘This will single-handedly boost his sales, you mark my words.’
She folded with laughter as she suddenly caught sight of the Tatler cover line: ‘The Lonely Lover’.
‘Yeah, right!’ she snorted, shaking her head. ‘They have got to be kidding.’ She flicked through the magazine, looking for the article that accompanied the image.
Things had settled back into a courteous rapprochement since that hideous weekend, Harry sending her an incredible spray of yellow roses and a Tiffany bracelet by way of apology the very next day. She had kept the roses but returned the bracelet; they both knew neither had forgiven nor forgotten.
She found it on the centre spread, and Mark watched the smile fade from her face as she saw their hook for the piece. Another holding image of Harry – this time actually playing cricket and looking every inch the classic English gentleman – was on the left-hand page, but facing it, the page had been quartered. In the top left quadrant was an image of Harry carrying Cress triumphantly – and seemingly post-coitally – out of the woods; next to it was an image of Tor sitting next to Harry at dinner. He was wearing black tie, but with his shirt ripped open, Tor’s hands all over his torso. She had her head tipped back and was laughing, looking like the belle of the ball; in the bottom left was a picture of Harry necking a busty redhead, whom Cress didn’t know. And then, in the bottom right – Christ, Cress couldn’t believe it – was a picture of Kate and Harry down by the poolhouse. He was wearing just his dinner trousers, she was wearing just a shirt – his shirt. They were only talking, but it was clear the relationship was anything other than business.
Cress looked up at Mark, speechless.
‘Read it,’ he said sharply.
She looked straight back down again. The strapline read: ‘The Heartbroken Hero’. She frowned. Hey? She read on, her hands beginning to tremble as she married the article’s insinuation with the images.
‘You’re kidding, right? You don’t actually think that I am the married woman he’s in love with?’
Mark shrugged. ‘Why not? According to that, one of you has got to be. He is clearly quoted as saying the love of his life was down there with him in Cornwall. Why not you? It actually makes a lot of sense.’
‘Mark! Don’t be idiotic! You know Harry’s not in love with anyone but himself . . .’
‘You’ve barely looked at me since Cornwall,’ he cut in. ‘You certainly haven’t touched me. You’re detached, cold, absent. Gone, really, in every way. It’s hard to see why you do actually come back to us each night. The children are in bed, you despise Greta – who does a great job of looking after your children for you – and you’re sleeping in the spare room. Why shouldn’t it be you?’
‘Why shouldn’t it be me? Why shouldn’t it be me? I’ll tell you why,’ she said, her voice rising with her temper. ‘Because everything I do, I do for you and our family. The hours I work, the stresses I take, I do it all in the hope that one day, in the not too distant future, I will be able to make us financially secure and we can retire and be together all the time.’
‘Right! Because I don’t make enough to support you, is that it? We’re doing so badly on my banker’s salary that we need you to sail in and save the day?’
‘No! You know I don’t mean that. This is not a reflection on you, Mark.’ She walked over to him. ‘But the sky is the limit for Sapphire – for us! – now that I’ve signed Harry Hunter.’
‘Mmmm, I’m glad you brought that up, actually, because I’ve been wondering for quite some time now exactly how you got him to sign with you. I mean, let’s be honest, Cress. You weren’t exactly a front-runner in the race. You’d only been going for eight years. It’s nothing! So how did you land him, huh? How exactly did you get him to sign on the dotted line?’
Cress faltered. ‘I – I just did what everybody else did. I pitched and I got him on merit. He liked our background, said we were forward-thinking, dynamic. The future of publishing. I said we could give him the global reach he needed, that we’d actively develop his Hollywood career . . . you know all this!’
‘Oh, I know it all right. I just don’t buy it, Cress. You’re hiding something. You have been for a long time. And now these photos, these rumours, come out in the national press, and you expect me to believe your flimsy tale? What exactly were you doing in the woods with him anyway? Why is he parading you around like his goddam trophy?’
‘We – we just went for a walk. We were talking shop. That was all. I promise.’
‘Bullshit! I don’t believe you!’ he shouted. ‘And nor will anyone else. Do you think they will?’ He motioned towards the reporters outside. ‘Do you think that they will buy – for one second – your flannel about going for a walk in the woods with Harry Hunter to discuss business? Do me a favour.’ He drained his drink and slammed it down on the desk, making Cress jump. ‘Why don’t you just do us all a favour and do what you’ve been trying to do all along. Go! Go, so that lot out there will fuck off and your children can get back into their own home and not be scared half to death. Just go and don’t bother coming back. I suspect we’ll scarcely notice the difference anyhow.’
Cress watched in horror as he marched out, her marriage, her family, her life being crushed beneath every step. There was nothing more she could say to convince him. Not unless she told him the whole truth. And she couldn’t do that. Not yet. She couldn’t afford for anyone – not even her own beloved husband – to know that she was blackmailing Harry.
She looked at the magazine spread out on the desk, the lustrous photos depicting a world so glamorous, so beautiful, so spirited. So rotten to its core.
And then she suddenly realized . . . Tor! She picked up the phone on the desk and hurriedly rang the number. She wasn’t the only one whose life would be falling apart from this.
Chapter Thirty-five
Harry told Christophe to get the Range Rover ready. The flashbulbs couldn’t penetrate the blacked-out windows, and he needed something more anonymous today. This wasn’t the time for the Harry Hunter roadshow.
He checked his Patek Philippe and strode the marble floor impatiently. Why did women always take so bloody long? She’d already changed outfits four times. You’d have thought they were going to a Paris couture show.
He walked over to the intercom and tapped the button for the bedroom. ‘Kate, we have got to go,’ he said. ‘Anyone would think you didn’t want to go.’
‘I nearly don’t,’ she said softly, behind him.
He turned around. She had gone back to her original choice after all, the camel-coloured Amanda Wakeley shift dress with matching long shearling coat. She looked incredible, tawny and supple.
He kissed her on the mouth. ‘What do you mean?’ he said, combing her hair back from her face, so that he could see her cheekbones.
She gave a small shrug. ‘It’s been so exciting keeping it as our little secret. Now, we’re going to share it and . . . I don’t know. I guess I’ve just enjoyed being in our little bubble.’
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br /> ‘I know. I don’t get to have many secrets these days.’ He kissed her again. ‘Come on. The car’s ready.’
They walked out and climbed into the back of the car. She looked back at the house as the gates opened and they swept out of the drive. She could scarcely believe the way her life had changed since the summer. She had only stayed at the club a month before he’d moved her into his home. It had been pointless them camping out in her room, he’d said, when he had a perfectly adequate place in Kensington.
And so they had set up home together – after a fashion. She didn’t need to do any of the cooking or the cleaning or the shopping. He’d recalled his staff from Verbier to do that. She just worked and made love and slept, and he wrote and made love and slept too – except for the days when he had to ‘check in’ at the Chelsea apartment.
There had been a brief hiccup when Emily had gone AWOL for a few days and Harry had been frantic, thinking he’d blown it. She’d come back fairly quickly though, having let her hair down with her girlfriends, but Kate had urged him to stay with Emily until he was completely sure she was back under his thumb. It was nearly two weeks before he did come back, and even though he’d gone at her insistence, it had been harder for her to accept than she’d let on.
They needed resolution to the whole situation, and soon. It couldn’t drag on. Not now. She just kept telling herself that the debate at the Oxford Union was tomorrow night. The place would be absolutely crawling with press. Emily had promised him faithfully she would go and he was holding her to it – he needed her support, he’d told her.
Kate looked out of the window at all the ordinary people walking by, some trying to peer into the car and see who was lucky enough to be living the life those tinted windows protected.
If only they knew. The past fortnight had been awful. The Tatler story had well and truly put the cat among the pigeons, and her name – along with Cress’s, Tor’s and Marina’s, the busty redhead – was now synonymous with Harry’s.