In the Shade of the Blossom Tree

by Joanna Rees

  But then he’d left her on her own.

  ‘How is he?’ she now asked.

  ‘You haven’t heard?’ Angus asked. He swilled his wine around in his glass and took a swig. There was something both angry and frustrated in the gesture.

  ‘Heard what?’

  ‘He’s buggered off to the back end of beyond. To become a bloody sheep farmer of all things.’

  Savvy smiled, remembering how Red had told her that living on his family’s Scottish island was his ultimate dream. She wondered whether he’d fallen in love with a local girl, as he’d planned.

  ‘God knows how long he’ll survive, though. He’s got no money. After the last time he cleaned me out, I’m not stumping up a bean.’

  Savvy made small talk and excused herself as soon as she could. Hearing that Red was living his dream only confirmed his rejection of her in her mind. She felt as if a small part of her had been cut loose. Knowing that he was living his life somewhere that she couldn’t imagine, made her feel as if a link between them had been severed for ever.

  She looked down at her wrist. She still wore the friendship bracelet that he’d given her. She’d got used to it, hidden as it was in the rack of silver bangles. But now, for the first time since leaving Peace River, she thought about taking it off. It was silly to still wear it. Especially now. Red had told her that it was to remind her that he was always with her in spirit. But he wasn’t. Not any more.

  CHAPTER FORTY-NINE

  It was three days after Aidan had left Shangri-La that Mario summoned Lois to a meeting out of hours in their favourite bar in Shanghai.

  They were both exhausted. The clean-up operation at the Good Fortune was in full swing and, after the stress of the past few days, she was glad of the opportunity to slip away from work into the bustling streets of Shanghai, where no one knew her name. And no one was going to ask her to make a decision.

  Everything Aidan had told her had been relentlessly whirring round and round in her mind, until Lois thought she was going crazy. She wished he’d never voiced his suspicions about Jai Shijai. Because every decision, every enthusiastic comment from a member of her team, now had a cloud hanging over it. Because the Good Fortune’s future had a cloud hanging over it too. If it turned out it had been built on drug money, it would not only put her and Roberto out of business for good, it would also bankrupt Roberto and ruin both his and Lois’s reputations for ever.

  She knew that Aidan had warned her so that she could be prepared. But she had no idea what she should be preparing for. Should she jump ship now? Tell Roberto? But tell him what? Because Aidan hadn’t got any proof.

  All she could do was wait.

  She pushed open the door of the diner-bar and saw Mario sitting on a high chrome seat at the counter. She smiled and waved, but she saw immediately from the look on Mario’s face that he had news.

  She slid on to the stool next to him. He had a beer waiting for her on the counter top. He slid it across.

  ‘It’s about Savannah Hudson’s phone.’

  She felt her breath catch. Was this what she’d been waiting for? Proof, at last?

  ‘You know I told you I copied the memory card?’ Mario said.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Well, there was no doubt she was planning a stitch-up of the Good Fortune. She’d taken damning pictures of the spa area. From what I can tell, she had tried to mail them to Paige Logan back in Vegas.’

  Lois slumped. Another shit storm coming her way, then. Did Savannah Hudson have no shame?

  ‘Well, that wasn’t all. There were . . . let’s say . . . fairly explicit pictures on there,’ Mario said. He looked away sheepishly. ‘And some film footage too.’

  ‘Go on . . .’

  ‘It was just, I was looking through it all late last night.’ He put his hand in front of his mouth and coughed and Lois realized all at once why he was so embarrassed. She felt oddly riled that he’d been looking at pictures of Savvy Hudson.

  Mario moved quickly on. ‘She must have thought she’d deleted them, but I found some old files. Amongst them were some of the Enzo Vegas on Fight Night.’

  Lois felt anger rise up inside her. ‘Let me guess,’ she said, remembering now how she’d first met Savannah Hudson waiting for an elevator outside the Enzo’s hub. ‘More snooping, right? What did you find? Footage of the hub?’

  Mario shook his head. ‘No. It was of the arena. And at first I didn’t think anything of it. It was footage of the Hamilton fight.’

  Lois frowned. This wasn’t what she wanted to hear. She wanted to know that Mario had found hard evidence that Savannah Hudson had set fire to the Good Fortune deliberately. Lois wasn’t interested in the past – only in nailing her rival once and for all, in the here and now.

  But Mario clearly thought he was on to something. He took a deep breath. ‘I couldn’t work out what was bothering me until I looked again. Savannah Hudson was standing just in front of Fernandez. She’d taken a video file probably seconds before the shooting, when Hamilton was down in the ring . . .’

  ‘And your point is?’

  ‘Well, it occurred to me that the angle at which she was holding her phone gave her direct line of sight between where she was standing and the person in the gallery who fired the shot at Fernandez. And hit you.’

  ‘Benzir fired the shot. We know who the shooter was,’ Lois said, startled. She took a deep slug of beer. She wanted to move the conversation on. Even talking about that night was making her scar ache.

  ‘That’s what I thought too,’ Mario said. ‘But when I slowed down the footage to individual frames, they were so blurry I couldn’t make out Benzir’s face in any detail at all. And something about the whole scene didn’t seem right. So I sent the file over to a contact in M.I.T. He used the latest photo enhancer software he’s developing to generate some much clearer stills.’

  Mario lifted a large brown envelope from the counter next to him. He pulled out some photographs.

  ‘He mailed them to me yesterday. I think you’d better take a look,’ Mario said, handing them to her.

  Lois frowned, intrigued now in spite of herself. Benzir. She’d only ever seen his face in the press. Mug shots. Even the few bits of footage the Enzo’s own surveillance cameras had picked up of him had been compromised by the hat he’d worn to cover his face.

  But here was an opportunity to see him up close. To see the look on the face of the man who shot her, seconds before he fired.

  She took the envelope and slipped the sheaf of photos out.

  The first showed a man pointing a rifle into the arena. A body was clearly slumped by his feet.

  ‘It’s a fact that this footage was taken before the shot was fired . . .’ Mario said, ‘and there are clearly two people up there.’

  But Lois put her hand up to stop him, her brain working overtime, as she stared at the face of the man holding the gun, pointing out into the arena, to where Senator Fernandez was sitting.

  The face of the man who had shot her.

  ‘Oh, Jesus,’ she whispered.

  CHAPTER FIFTY

  Savvy watched the ball rolling round and round the wheel. Luc was on a lucky streak and he was sure that this latest ball was going to be the luckiest ever.

  If it lands on red, I’m going to bed. If it lands on black, I’ll stay . . .

  No! Staying is too dangerous.

  She could already feel herself slipping out of control. Winning like this was making her want to risk more and more. All her old behaviour was being triggered. It made her want to order bottles of champagne at the bar. It made her want to do lines and lines of cocaine. To take this high to another, new high. To prolong this amazing night for as long as she possibly could.

  The ball landed on red.

  ‘Well, that’s me done,’ she said, stepping away from the table. ‘Goodnight, everyone. It’s been fun.’ There were gasps from her companions. Nobody wanted the night to end, least of all Savvy. But she had to remember where she was. And who
she was with. Luc Devereaux – her gorgeous companion . . . her colleague . . . and the man who must not see her lose control.

  Only days ago, she’d wanted nothing more than for Luc to admit that he cared for her, so that she could reject him. But now, especially right now, she realized what a stupid and dangerous game she’d been playing. Who was she kidding? She was the one with feelings. Call it chemistry, call it hormones, there was an undeniable attraction that she couldn’t control.

  But she had to control it. To resist. No matter what.

  There was no future for them, apart from a professional one.

  ‘Goodnight, Luc,’ she said. She didn’t look at him. Couldn’t look at him. Because if he looked into her eyes, he’d know in an instant what she was feeling.

  ‘I’ll walk you to the hotel,’ he said.

  ‘There’s no need, honestly. You stay,’ she urged, but he was already collecting up his piles of chips.

  They walked back through the casino to the connecting doors that led to the hotel. Savvy tried making polite chit-chat about the people they’d met, but she’d fallen silent by the time they stepped into the old-fashioned hotel elevator.

  They stood together, side by side, looking up at the numbers on the floors ticking past on the elevator panel.

  Was he, like her, remembering the time she’d taken him up in the lift to the hotel suite at La Paris? Was that why he was so quiet? Was that what he was thinking about?

  How self-assured she’d been back then. How confident that she’d seduce him. But now she felt terrified. All she had to do was get to the room. Put a solid wall between them. Lock the door and then she’d be safe.

  But she could feel Luc next to her. Feel the warmth of his body. She couldn’t deny how aroused she felt.

  They strolled down the thick carpet of the corridor to her suite.

  ‘Our flight leaves at eleven,’ she said, as they reached the door.

  ‘I know.’ He paused. ‘I’m glad we had this time, Savvy. To, you know, reconnect. I thought we might always avoid one another.’

  She said nothing, but felt the weight of his words. He’d been avoiding her, too? It hadn’t just been one-sided? She forced herself to smile and shrug, as if it didn’t matter.

  ‘Time changes things,’ she said. ‘We’ve both moved on, haven’t we?’

  He nodded. ‘I guess we have.’

  ‘Well, goodnight,’ she said.

  He sighed. It was his cue to say goodnight and move away. He didn’t.

  ‘There’s still so much we never got to talk about,’ he said.

  All that time after he’d rejected her and gone out with Elodie, she’d done nothing but want to talk to him. But he hadn’t let her. He hadn’t believed her.

  ‘We could talk now . . . ?’ he said.

  No, she thought. Too much had happened. Too much time had gone by. They had to leave the past alone.

  But as her eyes met his, she realized that they couldn’t spend any longer running away from it.

  They’d once been an ‘us’. To move forward to the future, they both needed closure on the past. She owed him that conversation at least.

  Savvy didn’t turn the light on in the room. Instead, she walked out to the private balcony and looked down at the bay, lighting a cigarette. She shivered, despite the warm breeze. She stared out at the dark water.

  She gripped the balcony rail, bracing herself, as Luc stopped behind her.

  What the hell are you doing? she asked herself. She was his boss. She had control . . . was in control. Raking up emotions . . . it was too dangerous.

  ‘I’m sorry, Savvy. Maybe I shouldn’t have said anything . . .’ Luc began. ‘Maybe it’s too painful.’

  There was a beat as she turned and stared at his handsome face. She knew that this was probably the only chance she’d ever have to get to the bottom of where they’d gone so wrong.

  But it took all her strength to start speaking. ‘If you want to talk now, then you have to tell me the truth,’ she said.

  He nodded. ‘OK.’

  ‘Did you honestly think that you could marry Elodie? Did you think you’d be able to keep such a big secret? That we’d been together?’

  She could tell that he hadn’t expected her to dive in at the deep end and mention their brief affair and Elodie in the same sentence. But she had to speak her mind. She had to tell the truth. It was all or nothing now. Or what was the point?

  ‘No, I didn’t,’ he said quietly.

  This wasn’t the answer she’d expected. She’d been expecting Luc to defend his relationship with Elodie, but instead he shook his head. His dimples pitted his cheeks as he bit his lip. He looked so sad . . . and so beautiful in the moonlight. ‘Poor Elodie,’ he said. ‘You know, I didn’t really ask her to marry me at all.’

  ‘What?’

  Luc sighed. ‘You know what she was like, Savvy. I know this sounds callous . . . but Elodie was very manipulative. In the nicest way, of course. In the way she wanted everything to be right, to be perfect. There was a conversation we had about the future. She twisted my words. And then she was so overjoyed that I got swept up in the whole thing.’

  He looked so earnest . . . so confused himself.

  She knew exactly how Elodie had been, and how hard it would have been for him to stand up to her sister. She’d found it hard enough herself at times. But even so, that didn’t stop the fact that he’d been weak. So weak. He couldn’t blame Elodie.

  ‘You could have told her no,’ Savvy said, hating the way her voice trembled. She’d thought that she’d processed all of this, but now that they were talking, she realized that the emotions she was feeling were still uncontrollably strong.

  He stared directly at her. ‘I could have told her no. But I didn’t.’

  ‘You loved her, then?’ Savvy asked.

  Luc paused. He looked down at his feet, then into her eyes. ‘I guess what I loved were the parts of her that reminded me of you.’

  ‘But . . . but I was there. I hadn’t gone anywhere,’ she said.

  ‘Hadn’t you, Savvy? It didn’t seem that way to me.’

  He was talking about Marcus, about what Elodie thought she’d seen. She stared at him defiantly.

  ‘I don’t care what Elodie told you,’ she said. ‘What she saw that night never happened. Could never have happened. I hadn’t been near another man in months. I was saving myself for you.’

  She turned her head and looked up at the cliffs, willing herself not to cry. What did it really matter now? she told herself. What they were talking about happened so long ago.

  ‘But I thought—’

  She glanced at him. ‘Yes, I know what you thought. But you were wrong.’

  He seemed to slump. ‘I didn’t listen. I know that. I judged you.’

  All or nothing. The whole truth.

  ‘I told her, you know. Elodie. About us,’ Savvy said.

  ‘You told her?’

  She looked at him and nodded slowly.

  ‘What did she say?’ Luc asked.

  Savvy remembered that night at Elodie’s apartment. ‘She didn’t believe me. But when I made her believe me, she was furious.’

  What was she doing? This was a secret she was supposed to be taking to the grave. Not telling Luc. Luc, who’d believed all this time, along with Paige and Hud, that Elodie’s death had been a tragic accident. One in which Savvy had played no part.

  But she couldn’t help herself. She had to release it. He had to know. He had to know what she’d had to carry around, because of him.

  ‘We had . . . we had a fight. A physical fight.’

  ‘A fight?’

  ‘She punched me in the face. My nose was pouring blood. She wouldn’t stop hitting me. It was like she was possessed. In the end I was on the floor and she was above me. She was about to slam down on me and I . . . I kicked her. And that’s how she fell backwards . . . backwards down . . .’ She struggled to say the words, picturing the halo of blood. ‘. . . and broke her n
eck.’

  Luc said nothing. He stared at her, unblinkingly.

  ‘She died because of me,’ Savvy said. ‘I killed her.’

  In one step Luc was right up close. He gripped her arms tight. ‘Don’t say that. It was an accident, Savvy.’

  But Savvy shook her head and pulled herself free. ‘She’s gone, Luc. She’s gone. Because of what we did.’

  She turned away. She’d thought that talking about the past would settle it and put it to rest, but she realized now what a mistake she’d made. She didn’t feel relieved, or vindicated. She felt guilty and broken all over again. As if all the strength she’d garnered since leaving Peace River had now been torn away.

  She swiped angrily at the tears which had sprung to her eyes. She didn’t turn round. ‘You should go now. Please. Just go.’

  Savvy waited for Luc to leave, but instead he spoke.

  ‘I wanted you to tell her,’ he said. ‘About us. I hoped you’d have the guts to say what I couldn’t bring myself to.’

  Savvy turned to face him. Hadn’t he heard what she’d just told him? About Elodie. About what she’d done? But she could see in his face that he had. He’d heard every word of it, but he still hadn’t gone away.

  ‘I hoped you’d tell her and that Elodie would break our engagement. And that somehow, crazily, you might take me back.’

  ‘But why? After what you thought had happened between me and Marcus?’

  ‘Because I still loved you. I loved you desperately. I always did.’ He looked at her then. Right at her. ‘I still do.’

  She was shaking uncontrollably as she felt Luc’s arms go round her. She felt him lean in close, holding her tight.

  ‘I never wanted Elodie, Savvy. Not like I wanted you. You have to know that,’ he whispered. ‘I always wanted you. It was you I wanted to marry.’

  Her heart was racing so hard, she could barely breathe. She couldn’t seem to pull herself away, as if she was melting against Luc, fusing with him. As if the force were just too great for her to resist any longer.

  ‘That night we spent together. It changed my life,’ he said. ‘I’ve never felt like that. That connection we had. I have been living in the shadow of it ever since. Until right now.’