“You!” cried Mrs Yuri. Her bright red mouth fell open. “You!”
It was one of those awful moments when time seemed to free-fall. Suddenly, Angel was right back in Blush, where she had been screamed at in both Russian and English and sacked with such speed her head had spun for days.
Mrs Yuri rose to her feet. “My husband, he haff been looking for you!”
Angel’s mouth was dry. Vanya was Mr Yuri’s daughter? Did Fate really hate her this much? Suddenly, now she was in the heart of the Alexshovs’ house and surrounded by the kind of security that made the Kremlin look slack, all those stories about concrete boots no longer seemed quite so far-fetched.
“Mrs Yuri, I—”
“He haff searched everywhere but nobody could find you!” Mrs Yuri interrupted. She was pulling herself up to standing now, her hands clutching the armrests of her chair until her knuckles were white. “Everywhere! But nobody knew where you go! The salon, they no tell me!”
“Mama? You know Angel?” Vanya asked, looking from her mother to Angel in confusion.
“Ya, ya!” Mrs Yuri nodded. “This is the girl I tell you about? Angelique? The one who didn’t like my mole?”
Angel groaned. She would never, ever try to do anyone a good turn again. “It wasn’t that I didn’t like it. I just thought it looked a bit suspicious and I was worried. I never meant to insult you or hurt your feelings!”
But neither Mrs Yuri nor her daughter was listening to a word Angel was saying. The older woman was gabbling away in frantic Russian and gesticulating wildly, while Vanya’s eyes grew wider by the second. Angel tried to work out what her chances of escape were. Pretty slim, since she was on the second floor and Rottweilers prowled the garden.
“It was you?” Vanya gasped finally. “You are the girl who didn’t like my mama’s mole?”
Angel opened her mouth to try to explain, but before she could speak the words were literally knocked from her as Mrs Yuri engulfed her in a massive bear hug. Kisses were smacking against Angel’s cheeks and hey! Was the older woman crying?
“Sank you! Sank you!” gasped Mrs Yuri, in between sobs and kisses. Stepping back so that Angel could see her properly, she pointed to her chin. “Has gone, ya?”
Angel’s eyes widened. Where only weeks ago there had been a large mole, there was now a faint scar. Mrs Yuri had had the mole removed? After all the fuss she’d made about ignoring it? God, weren’t people odd?
“I explain,” said Vanya, after yet more machine-gunfire Russian from her mother. “My mama, she go away after she see you and she think very hard.”
Mrs Yuri added something else in furious Russian and her daughter nodded.
“OK, I tell her! Angel, Mama say that nobody had ever dared to mention her mole before. You first one. She very hurt by it.”
“Sorry, but—” Angel began, but Vanya held up her hand.
“I not finish! Mama very cross at first but then she think, ya, mole is sore and maybe she need to see doctor? Has got bigger too. Maybe you right? So, Papa take her to see specialist and is bad news. Very bad news. Is cancer. Mama, she has to haff operation very quick. Doctor say that if she left it longer, pah!”
“You save my life!” Mrs Yuri cried. “If you not say about mole, nobody else brave enough. I die!”
“If you not mention it, maybe Mama not get treatment and get better,” Vanya agreed. “Angel, you save her life. Papa he haff looked everywhere for you. He not know how to thank you.”
Angel was stunned. Not about the mole – she’d seen enough of those to know when one was suspicious – but at how the circumstances of the past few months had all come together to this point. This was beyond weird. It was like something from one of Gemma’s cosmic-ordering books.
“You save our little Dmitri too, when he hurt foot,” continued Mrs Yuri, tears sending her mascara down her cheeks in sooty rivers. “Our family, we owe you so much.”
“Honestly, you really don’t,” said Angel. She was a bit embarrassed at this outpouring of gratitude, to be honest. “Anyone would have done the same.”
“No,” said Mrs Yuri firmly. Her fat hands clutched Angel’s. “They would not. They too scared. They coward! But you? You really are angel!”
There was no way a manicure was taking place now, Vanya told Angel firmly. They were going to celebrate! Did Angel have any idea just how hard her papa had been searching? Angel didn’t, but she was very glad Mr Yuri hadn’t found her; she would have died of terror if she’d run into him. Before long she was sitting in the opulent drawing room with an excited Dmitri on her lap and a glass of very expensive vintage Krug in her hand, while Mr Yuri – still managing to look terrifying even clad in a Hawaiian shirt and board shorts – clasped her hand and thanked her over and over again.
Gradually, in between bouts of exuberant broken English and even more glasses of Krug, Angel managed to piece the story together. After the episode at Blush Mrs Yuri had returned home, where she’d fumed for a while and told her husband everything. Then on her iPad (a present from Vanya, iPads were marvellous, ya? She had five, all in different colours and one with diamonds, so pretty), she’d Googled melanoma and had instantly spotted an image of something very similar to her mole and labelled cancerous. Frightened, the Yuris had gone straight to Harley Street where an oncologist had diagnosed malignant melanoma. Mrs Yuri had been operated on the very next day and then undergone an emergency course of radiotherapy. So far things were looking good, the specialist had told her, but if she’d left the mole much longer it could have been a very different outcome.
“If you hadn’t spotted it,” Mr Yuri concluded. “My wife would haff died.”
Everyone fell silent. Angel couldn’t argue. She’d seen her own mother die of skin cancer and maybe if somebody had spotted her mole in time…
She swallowed back the knot of grief. Even all these years on it was always lurking and threatening to choke her. “I’m glad I could help,” she said.
Mr Yuri beamed at her. It took every bit of self-control that Angel had not to recoil: it was a bit like being smiled at by Jaws.
“So, now I find you, Angel Evans, I want to say thank you. What would you like? Just name it and it is yours.”
Once upon a time Angel would have leapt at this. A designer bag? A week on the superyacht? Trolley dash in Prada? Her only problem would have been whittling down the list. Now, though, things were different. Bags and baubles were still nice but Angel had different priorities. She’d tried protesting but Mr Yuri was adamant.
“To refuse thanks is an insult to us,” Vanya explained gently. “Papa is a very proud man.”
Mr Yuri crossed his arms across his barrel chest and nodded. He looked just like a Bond villain. If it came to a choice between tanks of sharks with lasers on their heads and choosing a reward, then Angel knew what side she was coming down on.
“Anything?” she asked.
“Anything,” said Mr Yuri firmly.
Everyone stared at her expectantly. They were probably waiting for a request for a supercar or maybe some diamonds, thought Angel. Well, nothing so clichéd for her.
“In that case,” she said thoughtfully, “maybe there is something you could help me with…”
Chapter 42
“You look awful,” Gemma said to Andi. “Are you coming down with something? Is your hand hurting?”
It was mid-afternoon and the girls were sitting outside the caravan, drinking tea and enjoying the warmth of the late summer sun. Although Andi’s skin was now a subtle golden shade, Gemma thought she looked drawn and pale beneath her slight tan. She held out a Tupperware box. “Would the last of Cal’s banana bread help?”
Andi attempted a smile, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “I’m fine for banana bread, thanks.”
Gemma glanced down at the container and then at her rippling midriff. “Yeah, me too actually. I can’t face a thing. Maybe it’s nerves about tonight?”
She put the tub down, picked up her copy of Twelfth Night
and flicked to the final scene. Not that she really needed to go over it again; she was word perfect. Last night’s rehearsal had gone brilliantly, the director had been thrilled with her and for those few wonderful hours on the stage Gemma had forgotten all about Cal’s silence and Emily’s horrible words. Now, though, the other girl’s invective buzzed around in her head like acid-tongued hornets. No wonder she couldn’t face eating.
“You’ll be great,” said Andi warmly. “I’m really looking forward to seeing the play tonight.”
At the word tonight nervous fingers traced a shiver up Gemma’s spine. Bloody hell! In less than six hours she’d be on the stage, for the first time in two years, and performing in front of a live audience. God, she hoped she still had what it took. Gemma supposed that at least this pressure took her mind off Cal and his lack of communication. There was still no word from him, and if it hadn’t been for the banana bread and lack of baking ingredients Gemma would have thought she’d imagined his visit to the caravan.
And what about the electricity that had crackled between them like Space Dust? Had she imagined that too?
“I hope I pull it off,” she said to Andi.
Andi tucked her curls behind her ears. “Of course you will.”
Gemma hoped she was right. “Are Simon and Mel going to come and watch? And Jonty? Is he coming with you?”
Andi suddenly seemed fascinated by the daisies growing by the caravan steps. Her slim fingers plucked at them agitatedly. Ouch, thought Gemma. If those were voodoo daisies then the hot handyman was in trouble!
“I doubt it,” Andi replied, her gaze still fixed on the flowers. “He’s probably busy with his girlfriend.”
Gemma was surprised. Since when had the quiet Jonty, he with depths as dark and rich as Thorntons’ truffles, had a girlfriend?
“His ex is back on the scene,” Andi explained when Gemma looked confused. “She had the big party last night down in the town. Where I was working?”
Gemma shook her head. “Sorry, Andi. I don’t know what’s the matter with me at the moment. Of course I knew: I let you in and paid the taxi driver. I just didn’t realise she was back with Jonty.”
“I’ll pay you back as soon as I collect my bag,” Andi said quickly, choosing to ignore the first part of what Gemma had said. She hated owing people money. She would go down into town later on, maybe on the way to the play, and fetch her bag back. It was just that she couldn’t face seeing Jax right now. Even worse, what if she bumped into Jonty? The image of Jax entwined with Jonty was branded in her mind’s eye and the very thought of them being together made Andi feel as though her stomach was clenched up in knots. Honestly, it was ridiculous. There was nothing between her and Jonty anyway; there never had been and never would be. He was free to get back with his ex if he wanted to, just as she was free to go out partying with Travis Chumley.
If she wanted to.
The problem was that, as much fun as Travis was, Andi knew in her heart that didn’t want to spend time with him. She wanted to hang out with Jonty, out at sea in Ursula watching the sea birds and munching hot pasties, or sitting in the garden at Ocean View and chatting easily until the sun slipped into the sea and the shadows lengthened across the lawn. She wanted to hear his stories of travelling and watch as he tried to teach his nephews to surf. All she wanted to do was spend time with him. They didn’t even need to talk; it was enough just to be near to him.
Andi buried her face in her hands. How had this happened? She hadn’t come to Rock intending to become close to anyone, but somehow Jonty had slid beneath the radar and his warm friendship had become a part of her life. Andi didn’t think she’d ever been able to talk to somebody so easily or met another person with whom being was as simple as breathing. Jonty got her and she thought she had got him. So what had changed?
“No rush for the money,” said Gemma. For a moment she looked as though she was going to say something else, but then she seemed to think better of it. Standing up, she brushed crumbs from her lap and threw her pasty crust to the beady-eyed seagulls staking out the caravan from the tin roof. “I’m off to work for a couple of hours and then I’ll be up at the town hall getting ready. I guess I’ll see you later?”
“Try keeping me away,” said Andi.
Gemma picked up her rucksack and swung it onto her shoulders. “If anyone comes looking for me,” she added nonchalantly, “could you just tell them where I am?”
She looked so hopeful that Andi’s heart ached for her. Honestly, she could throttle Callum South. He might be an A-list celebrity but what was he thinking, blowing hot and cold with Gemma like this? If Cal couldn’t see what a treasure Gemma was then he was an idiot.
“Of course,” she assured her friend. Andi decided that she’d also give Callum a piece of her mind if he showed up, but maybe she wouldn’t share this sentiment with Gemma.
Looking satisfied with this answer Gemma set off for Rock Cakes, her nose deep in Shakespeare, which left Andi alone in the meadow. It was so peaceful that she closed her eyes and listened to the lazy drone of fat bumblebees and the endless calling of the gulls. Before long the events of the night before and stresses of the past few days began to recede and she drifted away into sleep. It was only when a shadow fell across her face, blocking out the warmth of the sunshine, that she opened her eyes, crying out in surprise when she saw the figure looming over her.
“Hello, Andi,” drawled Tom. “Hard at work I see.”
Andi shot up; sleep scattered in a heartbeat. For a moment she hoped that she was in the middle of a horrible dream, but no matter how hard she rubbed her eyes, grinding her knuckles into the sockets until stars flared across her sight, Tom was still there and grinning down at her like a Halloween pumpkin. There was no waking up from this nightmare.
“What the hell are you doing here?” she demanded.
“What a charming way to greet me,” said Tom, in the cut-glass tone Andi knew he practised in front of the mirror. Hugh Grant had nothing to be afraid of. “And I’ve come so far to see you as well. A kiss hello would have been nice.”
Andi scrambled to her feet. Tom was only a couple of inches taller than her; she was well aware that his lack of height bugged him, and she was not going to let him look down on her. Whatever he’d come to say, he could say to her face.
“What do you want?” she demanded, hands on her hips. “Why are you here?”
Tom didn’t reply. Instead he just smiled a self-satisfied smile and Andi’s heart plummeted. Tom wouldn’t have made the long journey down to Cornwall just on a whim or to say hello. That would have been hoping for far too much. He’d have some ulterior motive in mind, and she had a nasty suspicion she knew exactly what it was.
She exhaled slowly. “How did you find me?”
“Sweetheart, it hardly took the detective skills of Sherlock Holmes.” Tom slid his Oakleys onto the top of his head and fixed her with a stare. His eyes were such a cold blue that goosebumps rose on Andi’s arms. He looked scruffy, she thought. The collar of his white shirt was grimy and his shades were scratched.
“Who told you where I was?” she demanded. If this was the result of Angel’s social media obsession then Andi would kill her sister.
“Ands, you were all over the press the day Callum South nearly drowned. And obviously I recognised Gemma. I’d know that fat bum anywhere.”
Another black mark in Travis’s book, thought Andi darkly. If it hadn’t been for his showing off, Tom wouldn’t know where she was.
“So there I was, reading the paper and without a job on, so I thought it might be fun to come and find you and have a little summer hol,” Tom continued. A lock of lank blond hair flopped over his eyes and he brushed it away impatiently. “Come on, babe, we were together for ages. Aren’t you just a little bit pleased to see me?”
“The last time I saw you, you were shagging the neighbour, so no, quite frankly, I am not pleased to see you.”
“How harsh.” Tom shrugged. “Well, play your cards right
and I won’t stick around here for very long. I’d hate to interrupt the nice little number you’ve got going on.”
Unease crawled down Andi’s spine. What did he mean by play your cards right?
“Bit of a grotty caravan though,” Tom remarked, glancing around with a critical expression. “I’d have thought you’d be living somewhere a lot flashier, seeing as you’re working for Simon Rothwell. He’s worth a fucking fortune. Bet he pays you really well? And what about the boyfriend? I hear he’s worth a fortune too. It would be a shame to upset him.”
Andi gritted her teeth so hard that she thought they might shatter. “I don’t have a boyfriend.”
“Really? That’s not what I hear in the town,” grinned Tom. “Come on, Andi, I know you. There’s always some cash squirrelled away. Would it hurt to lend me some, for old time’s sake?”
Andi was close to screaming. “In case you don’t remember, somebody ran up loads of debts in my name. I’ve got shedloads of debts to pay off! Every penny I earn goes on doing that. I don’t have anything spare!”
“Jesus, you always did harp on about money.” Tom grimaced. “Well, let’s not change the habit of a lifetime, baby; let’s talk cash.” He exhaled slowly. “Let’s keep it simple. Why don’t you just give me a couple of thousand and we’ll call it quits?”
Andi stared at her ex, totally lost for words. His once handsome face was etched with petulance and his mouth was set in a sulky sneer. He looked grubby and down at heel. Life, it appeared, was not going Tom’s way.
“You honestly think I’ll give you some money?” she said slowly. “After what you’ve done?”
“I was hoping you’d be reasonable,” Tom said. “But if you prefer, we could always make it a business transaction.” He reached into the fake LV manbag slung over his shoulder and pulled out some photos. “You can buy these from me, if you like? Or maybe we could call it insurance? It would be tragic if any of these pictures found their way onto the Internet, wouldn’t it? Hardly the kind of image that Mermaid Media would want associated with their brand. Or any reputable accountant, come to think of it.”
[Escape 01.0] Escape for the Summer Page 37