“So, what of this necklace?” he says, still watching her, drumming the lid with his forefinger. “You say it’s a family heirloom. What else can you tell me?”
“If I tell you, will you sell it to me?”
He shakes his head.
“Will you at least let me look at it?”
“But I don’t want to tease you, give you hope then let you down.”
“Which is a roundabout way of saying you’ve got no intention of selling it to me. I’m wasting my time?”
Guy sighs.
“If I could sell it to you, I would. In fact, I’d give it to you if I could. But I have my reasons for wanting it too. I have…a responsibility. Anyway, how can you be sure it’s your family’s exact necklace?”
“I’d know it anywhere. I used to play with it when I was little, in my mother’s jewelry box. It disappeared after she died.”
Guy lowers his eyes.
“Sorry about that.”
“It’s okay,” says Jess, racing through the sentiment. “All a long time ago. The thing is, recently my grandmother’s started asking for it. I’ve been keeping an eye on auction sites for her, not thinking I’d ever find it. And then, well, it turned up, didn’t it? Almost as though…it was meant to. But then you came along and ruined it.”
Outside, the traffic slows to a standstill. The warm evening descends into the streets, bathing the Georgian mansion blocks of Knightsbridge with its mellow light. Long shadows of smartly dressed pedestrians pattern the pavements, the bags at their sides bearing high-end labels: Harrods, Selfridges, Fortnum & Mason. And then, smashing this sedate backdrop, a trio of drag queens march out of a side street, followed by a pair of stilt walkers, whose primary attire seems to be body glitter. They weave between the motionless vehicles, dancing their way to the opposite pavement.
“Overspill from Pride,” says the cab driver. “Half the streets in central London are gridlocked.”
“Looks like we’re going nowhere fast,” says Guy, sinking into his seat, the sun on his face. “So you’re stuck with me a little longer. If you can bear it.”
Jess gives a noncommittal nod, hiding the fact that she feels curiously glad, a little nervous, a little exhilarated—and very disconcerted by the prospect. To calm herself, she winds down the window, sits back.
“Is that Versace, circa 1976?” says Guy, leaning over to share her view of the drag queens and their incredible assortment of costume jewelry. The colors are kaleidoscopic: plum, turquoise, peridot green, citrine.
“I love those paste brooches,” he says, as the queens strut past. “It’s like they’re telling the world: you think we’re super frivolous, but we’re epic enough to rock vintage Versace.”
Jess throws him a side glance.
“But it’s what they’re saying, isn’t it?” He shrugs. “I mean, they’re hardly dropping under the radar with Thomas Sabo eternity rings. They like a spectacle. Yet they also want us to know they take their art seriously.”
“That’s how I think,” she says, surprised.
“You take drag seriously too?”
“Yes. I mean no… I mean…that’s how I think about people, through their jewelry. No one has to wear jewelry. Earrings, brooches, bracelets—none of it’s necessary, not in the way clothing and footwear are.”
“The ultimate extra,” says Guy, smiling, “its only purpose to reflect some intangible quality that we believe is our essence, or that might make us distinctive or attractive to other people.”
Jess grins, intrigued.
“It sounds like you think about jewelry as much as I do!”
Guy laughs. “Okay, I admit I have a fascination with small, sparkly things. I collect huge amounts of crap and generally like anything that shines.”
Tickled, Jess momentarily shuts her eyes, a warm, melting sensation filling her stomach. When she looks again, her attention returns to the gold leopard ring on Guy’s left hand. He twists it, revealing the ring’s emerald eyes.
“It’s a favorite,” he explains. “It’s sacred to me.”
“Your own family heirloom?”
“Kind of.”
“And what does a golden leopard head say about Guy…?”
“Van der Meer. The full hit is Guy Arlo van der Meer.”
“That’s quite a name.”
“My ancestors were big in the Dutch diamond industry. Old school.”
Jess nods, cautiously impressed. She has always preferred the unpretentious allure of semiprecious gemstones, but she’ll take diamonds if she must.
“Okay, Guy Arlo van der Meer, what does your choice of finger adornment say about you?”
“I think you should answer that question,” says Guy teasingly, “since we both know that the optimal way to appreciate jewelry is to see it on another person’s body.”
He lifts his ringed hand, offers it to her for closer inspection. She takes it, thrilled to touch his warm skin, to feel the sinews of his tapered fingers in hers. She looks up from the shadow of her brow, holds his gaze.
“Very playful,” she says, unable to resist flirtation, “but I can see that it’s fine. Good gold, carefully worked. Are they real emeralds?”
“Of course.”
“My favorite precious stone,” she says, scrutinizing the tiny verdant leopard eyes.
“Mine too.”
“Beautiful but innately flawed,” they say together.
“My next thought,” Jess continues, “is how does a fine but quirky statement ring chime with the rest of your image? I’m seeing expertly ruffled hair, a T-shirt, jeans, and linen jacket—trying to look casual, but all very carefully put together. You want people to think you’re relaxed about your appearance, but really you’re right on it, carefully managing the way the world sees you, creating a smoke screen, covering up the truth of your dirty laundry. Perhaps you’re something of a con artist?”
“Ouch.”
“You asked for it.”
“And I certainly got it. But hang on a minute…you talked about my general appearance—what specifically about my ring?”
“An heirloom, you say?”
“That’s right.”
“Then I’m going to assume you’re not entirely shallow. And that you’re desperate to tell me your life story, something about your grandmother’s great-aunt who smuggled the ring on a cruise liner, tucked in her corset, so it wouldn’t get pinched by the riffraff.”
He laughs. “How did you guess?”
“There’s always a cruise liner and a corset involved,” she replies, relishing the banter, taking in his face with a surreptitious flick of her eyelids. Those chestnut curls, ruffled but not shaggy… They are—she feels it in her core—so tempting to touch. What would he do, she wonders, if she gave in to that urge and went for it, drew her hands to his forehead, swept those luscious loops from his face, leaned forward, brought her lips to his…and…
Oh, Jess! she berates herself sharply. No!
She folds her arms, presses the small of her back into her seat, and thinks about office furniture—her go-to solution when besieged by unhelpfully seductive thoughts. Just because he looks like her type and acts like her type doesn’t make him her type. If life—and Aggie—have taught her anything, the lesson is definitely: stay away from “her type.” Besides, she has Tim. She has matured and found Tim, who is lovely and gorgeous and, best of all, a fully functional human being.
“Look,” she says, dropping Guy’s hand, matter-of-fact, returning to the purple box, “you outbid me and won. I accept your victory. I just need you to understand that this necklace means more to my grandmother than you could begin to imagine. I told her I was getting it for her. I made a promise.”
“Never promise.”
“Too late. The bottom line is, I’d do anything—”
“Anything?” says Guy
, his left eyebrow scaling his forehead in a way that can only be interpreted as roguish.
“I’ll give you the sum of money that you paid the auction house. In cash.”
Guy shrugs. “Actually, I was thinking more along the lines of dinner?”
Jess shuts her eyes. Never mind hardwired flashes of physical attraction or the delight of their common interest in jewelry. He’s one of those, can’t help himself. She could say no a hundred times and he’ll still believe that, deep down, she really wants a date with him. And that he’ll get one. Until he’s distracted by the next blond/brunette/redhead that he fancies, and then suddenly he’ll drop off the face of her earth. Standard.
“No, thank you,” she replies. “I’m spoken for.”
“Spoken for?”
“I have a boyfriend.”
Guy shrugs, the rejection ricocheting off him. “So?”
“So I don’t intend to go to dinner with a stranger.”
“But we’re no longer strangers. We’re cab sharers. Inextricably linked by an art nouveau butterfly necklace. Obviously dinner is the next step.”
Jess sighs, throws her head back. Just stop, she thinks. All this attention, making out that a dinner date is their destiny. She knows exactly what Aggie would say. Hallmark behavior: the charming deceiver. Been there. Done it. Over it.
“So who exactly is this boyfriend who speaks for you,” Guy asks. “The love of your life?”
“Quite possibly,” says Jess, as she fixes her thoughts on Tim.
Tim, who is so utterly handsome with his solid, square jaw and sweet brown eyes. A proper grown-up with a steady soul, who makes her head fill with calm whenever he’s near.
“I’m here for the necklace, that’s all,” she asserts. “If you’ll sell me the necklace, then we can go our separate ways.”
“And if I don’t?”
Silence bulges as the cab moves forward, crawling to the next set of traffic lights. She could get out and walk. Even with her cane, she’d probably reach the Tube station quicker, but…the necklace. As though reading her mind, Guy pulls the purple box even closer to him. On the pavement ahead, a crowd has gathered in front of a shop window.
“What are they looking at?” says Jess, hoping a more neutral conversation will defeat the tension.
“I’m not sure,” says Guy. “Some kind of sale or giveaway. Let’s see—”
Before she can react, he opens the door of the cab.
“I’ll be right back!” he calls, dashing toward the heart of the crowd.
Jess blinks. Curiosity has fueled her since childhood, often mistaken as waywardness or disobedience. The places she’s never been, the things she’s never done, the people she’s never met—they shimmer in her thoughts like unopened gifts. Indeed, she’s also been known for rash decisions and fits of impulse, but she has never joined a random crowd just to see what the fuss is about. She looks at her watch, makes brief eye contact with the cab driver, then realizes the purple box, the necklace inside, is now there on the seat unguarded.
Her heart thuds. What to do?
The necklace. No barriers. At least have a look at it.
She creeps her fingers toward the lid. Why should she feel guilty? After all, it’s what she climbed into the cab for. She opens the box, peeps inside.
“Oh!” she gasps, drawing a hand to her mouth.
It is more beautiful in real life than she’d remembered. Immediately, it speaks to her, its little, fat moonstone glinting in the sun. She lifts it out of the box, cradles it in her palm—the impossible delicacy of the wings, the way the light blooms through the emerald enamel, every line and curve, such free-flowing grace. Here in her hands, the essence of what it is to be a Taylor woman, her mother, her mother’s mother, her mother’s mother’s mother, and beyond, now here, caught forever in the luster. She turns the main pendant over and there, on its base, carved in shaky lettering, is one simple word: “OUI.”
She looks up, feels a lightning strike of emotion in her soul.
With no sign of Guy, she knows she has her chance, right now, to take the necklace. She could tuck it in her pocket, exit through the passenger door, walk away. Tomorrow she could deliver it to Nancy, who’d never need to know the tussle involved. And that would be the end of the journey. But…she hesitates. She can’t quite find it in her conscience. She places the necklace back in its box, snaps it shut, sniffs, and blinks.
“Doughnuts!”
Guy is at the window, holding a tray of sugary, chocolaty doughnuts.
“They were selling doughnuts. That’s what the crowd was for. I bought us some. You okay? You look a little…startled?”
“I’m good,” she squeaks, smiling through it. “Look at those bad boys!”
“Have one.”
He shoves the tray in front of her, grins like a schoolboy.
“Oh, I’m not hungry.”
“Go on. You only live once.”
“True,” says Jess, caught by the word: OUI.
She accepts one of the smallest on the tray, which nevertheless has an entire Mars Bar chopped on top. They eat in silence, licking the sugar from their lips. The traffic opens up, and a few minutes later, the cab pulls in front of Queensway Tube station.
“Well,” says Guy. “This has been a pleasure.”
“Thank you for the doughnut,” says Jess. “And…if you should change your mind about selling the necklace—”
“I’ll stalk you on Instagram.”
“Promise.”
“Never promise. But for the record, yes, you’ll be the first person I go to…if I change my mind, that is. By the way, the dinner invitation is still very much open.”
“Right. Thanks. In that case, I’ll be sure to stalk you too…if I change my mind, that is.”
“Oh, you’ll change your mind,” he says, holding her gaze, an infuriatingly cocky fix in his sparkling dark eyes.
She half smiles, opens her door, takes longer than necessary to back away. Then finally they part, the necklace between them—craftily, quietly playing its part.
Chapter Three
The aromas of Sunday lunch—succulent meat, crispy potatoes, buttery carrots—fill the airy kitchen-diner extension. Every weekend since its installation, the John Lewis marble-topped island unit has hosted occasions big and small: cocktails with school mums, wine with book group, cupcakes for the neighbors, and dinners of various origins, from Malay to French to Cajun, all prepared and presented with Aggie’s signature precision. But this joint of beef, thinks Jess, as she places dish after dish on the dining table, is her sister’s culinary trump card—not to mention a thinly veiled attempt to persuade her daughter, Steph, that a traditional meat feast is a worthy alternative to textured soy and pinto beans.
“Open-plan living, lesson number one,” says Aggie, fanning the oven, “the smells get everywhere. Fine when you’re baking sourdough. Not fine when you’re roasting half a cow.”
She then turns to her husband, Ed, flaps her hands, and is bemused when he doesn’t immediately understand that the gesture means “Open the bifolds.” Eventually, he shuffles to the aluminum doors and heaves them apart. A bolt of cool, fresh air blows in. Everyone seats themselves, and the dishes are shared and served to the tuneful chink of cutlery on china.
“Wine?”
“Yes, please,” says Jess.
“Me too,” says Steph, eyeing the bottle of Picpoul, crisp and cold, fresh from the built-in wine fridge.
“I think not,” says Aggie, snatching her daughter’s glass away. “And don’t start with the ‘All my friends’ parents let them’ nonsense, because I know your friends’ parents and they all feel the same way I do.”
Steph scowls, while Marcus, her younger brother, smirks at her from behind his floppy bangs. The exchange isn’t lost on Jess, who, having lived at her sister’s for the past ele
ven months, has grown close to her niece and nephew—and the intricacies of their ceaseless rivalry. She prods Marcus under the table, gives Steph a bolstering wink, tries to diffuse the dynamite. She then casts her eyes to Tim, hopes he’s ready for this hefty slice of domestic life. But, of course, he’s easy with it, complimenting Aggie on her crispy potatoes, chatting bikes with Ed, giving the Hoppit children no reason to think he’s a total dork.
Once the plates are loaded and the glasses—apart from Steph’s—are poured, he gives a little cough, the educator in him that likes a captive audience.
“So,” he says. “I got short-listed. I’m in contention for the deputy head post.”
Ed cheers. “Great news, mate!”
“Excellent,” says Aggie. “That school is lucky to have you.”
“Well,” says Tim modestly, “the post’s not mine yet, but—”
“He’ll get it,” says Jess, with a rush of pride.
She remembers the first time she saw him in action at school; how he commanded the corridors with such authority, yet was liked by the students. From her own wayward school days, she knew that took something special.
“When’s the interview?”
“Next week.”
“Good money?”
“It’s a jump, but the main thing is, it’s where I want to be. I’m thinking three years, then I might start looking for a headship…”
He glances at Jess and it gratifies her that he looks for her approval, that it matters to him what she thinks of his future plans. She can see Aggie from the corner of her eye, also looking pleased, her boyfriend-with-prospects gauge swinging high. Although Aggie has never admitted it, Jess knows it was her who set them up, asking Ed to pinpoint the most eligible man in his cycling club, then somehow have him “drop in” one Friday evening just as Jess and Aggie were mixing rhubarb gin and tonics in the sun-filled back garden.
The Lost and Found Necklace Page 3
