Celebrity Bride

by Alison Kervin

  'Can I interrupt?' asks Henry, suddenly, cutting through the gentle sound of violins wafting through the car.

  'Sure.'

  'If you want to know anything about Elody, try Dr Bronks-Harrison. I think she knows her well.'

  'Thanks,' I say, and since Henry never says anything without considering the consequences and ramifications, and utters nothing without first debating the appropriateness of speaking out, I realise that Isabella must know plenty about Elody and have a view that I should probably hear. Certainly, it would be worth me calling to find out.

  'Hi, Isabella, it's Kelly Monsoon,' I say sheepishly. I'm not very good on the phone and I hate the idea of disturbing her when she's probably just got back from work. 'Are you OK to talk? I mean, I'm not interrupting anything, am I?'

  'Don't be silly; it's lovely to hear from you,' says Isabella. 'Isn't Rufus back tonight?'

  'Yes. I'm just on my way to the airport now,' I say. 'Can I ask you something?'

  'Go ahead.'

  'What do you think of Elody?'

  'Aaahhhhh,' says Isabella. 'I think it's obvious to everyone what I think of Elody. I think she's bad news. I think she's bitter and twisted and there are times when I want to kill her. What do you think of her?'

  'I thought she was a friend, but I'm feeling used,' I say. It's a relief to talk to someone like Isabella about it. 'I've just found out she's been alienating all my friends and making me rely on her more and more. And you know you asked me how I'd lost so much weight so quickly? Well, you were right; I have been taking diet pills. Elody gave them to me and told me they were harmless, but they've been making me feel just awful. Really awful.'

  I burst into tears as I'm talking to her; I can't help it. I feel all this emotion come tumbling out again.

  'OK. Don't take any more of those pills, and don't see Elody again.'

  'I won't,' I say. 'My friends took the pills off me and threw them down the toilet, so I can't take any more of them, and Elody and I had a row and I threw her out of the house, so I won't be seeing her again. Sorry, I shouldn't be saying anything but . . .'

  'Of course you should be saying something. I'm very glad you called. I feel terrible that you didn't tell me sooner as perhaps I could have helped. I should have come round to check you were all right, but you seemed to be out and about going to parties all the time with Elody. When I saw you at our little "wine-tasting" you were on great form, and when you didn't return my calls afterwards I assumed that you were busy.'

  'No, that was Elody. She had my phone calls diverted to her phone so I never knew people were calling me. I would definitely have called you back. I always call people back.'

  'I can't believe she did that. What an absolute bitch. Have you managed to talk to Rufus about all this while he's been away?'

  'I've spoken to Rufus,' I say. 'But I haven't told him about Elody diverting my calls because I've only just found out. Something's just occurred to me. He was texting me every day from LA, but I never received the texts. I thought it was something to do with texts not coming through properly from LA, but that's it, isn't it? It was Elody's fault; that's why they didn't come through. Christ.'

  'How have you managed to talk to him at all, if all your calls are diverted to Elody's phone?'

  'He always calls on the home phone,' I explain. 'He thinks it's safer not to use mobiles unless it's absolutely urgent. Apparently a tabloid journalist once managed to listen in on his mobile and he's never trusted them all that much since.'

  'Sounds like he's right,' says Isabella. 'I wish I'd called you at home.'

  'Why would Elody do this?' I ask in dismay. 'Why would she want me to feel so bad?'

  'Because she's a very sad woman who's desperate because her career is on the slide and she's got nothing else in her life except for that career and the distorted memory of a boyfriend who died years ago. Her ex made her, and she knows it. She'll never get back the life she had with him, and she takes it out on everyone she meets who's in any way happy.'

  'You mean Jon, the fashion designer,' I say.

  'Yep . . . I think he's the only person she ever loved. She has no close friends . . . except you and Rufus and I think he just tolerates her because he's too kind not to.'

  'Yes,' I say weakly, promising Isabella that I won't worry any more and will call her very soon.

  'Text me to say that Rufus is back safely,' she says. 'And make sure you tell him everything, or I'll be round to tell him myself.'

  'OK?' asks Henry.

  'Fine,' I reply, thinking that everyone seems to have worked out that Elody was a witch except for me. 'I've been a complete bloody fool. I could kill her. Sorry, Henry, but I could.'

  'No problem, ma'am,' he says and we roll on through the traffic, heading for Heathrow.

  Chapter 17

  How my moods seem to swing these days. A few hours ago I was in tears and now I'm wrapped up in Rufus's arms and have never felt happier.

  'God, come here now,' he said, when he saw me standing there. We were rushed out of the airport via a series of back doors and escorted to the car away from fans and photographers. 'I've never missed anyone as much as I missed you. But look at you! How did you get so skinny? You're tiny, Kelly. Have you not been eating properly?' He holds me so tightly I fear he might squash me. 'Next time you're coming with me.'

  'OK,' I say, delighted by all this affection and attention. Still, I can't quite let myself relax and enjoy it completely.

  'Did Olivia enjoy it?' I can't help myself. Elody's horrible little voice is wedged in my head, chipping away at my self-esteem.

  'Who's that, sweetheart?' he asks.

  'You know – Olivia, Lord and Lady Simpkins's daughter.'

  No. It turns out Olivia wasn't there. She never planned to be there. And Cindy? No, she's not an ex-girlfriend; Rufus would never go out with someone like that.

  'Kelly, why are you so worried about other women? You're the only one for me. I fell in love with you the first time I met you. I adore you and I'll love you till I die. Please stop worrying. There's nothing to worry about.'

  'I'm sorry,' I say. 'It's been horrible while you've been away. Elody kept hinting that you were off with all these other women, and I just became paranoid about it all. I'm sorry, Rufus. I know Elody is a friend of yours, but we really fell out. She gave me these diet pills because she said you wouldn't love me if I didn't lose weight, and even though I know that's not true, I still took them and they made me feel horrible. Anyway, I ended up having a huge row with her and throwing her out of the house. I haven't seen her since, but I worked out that she diverted all my mobile phone calls and texts to her phone. It's been horrible. I mean – she was nice to me sometimes and took me shopping and everything, but then I ended up feeling guilty about spending your money, so I took most of the clothes back and that made her cross.'

  'OK,' he says gently, stroking my hair and pulling me close to him. 'Tell me all about it, but promise me you'll never worry about spending money. We have lots of it, and I want you to enjoy it. In fact, I'm going to put some into an account for you tomorrow, for you to spend however you want. Now, tell me everything . . .'

  It's 3 am in the morning now and we're wrapped up in bed. Everything is wonderful. I want us to stay like this for ever; all entwined. It's funny; we just seem to fit together so well, as if we were designed to be like this: all snuggled up. Just as I'm starting to drift off to sleep, he strokes my hair gently, then sits up slowly, being careful not to disturb me.

  I turn to face him as he stands on the carpet next to the bed in all his naked glory. Even after some eight months of being with him, the sheer bloody beauty of his body drives me nuts sometimes. As I'm staring at his thighs rather unashamedly, he drops onto his knees next to the bed, his eyes not leaving mine.

  'It's been a difficult few weeks for you, hasn't it?'

  'Yes. It hasn't been too much fun,' I confess. Though, to be honest, the happy combination of Rufus coming back and me being off those blo
ody horrible diet pills means I feel about 150 times better now.

  'I hate the fact that you've been so miserable. I love you,' he says.

  'I love you too.'

  'How can I prove to you how much I love you?'

  'You don't have to prove anything,' I say.

  But he seems determined to try. He looks into my eyes. 'Kelly, I love you. I'll always love you. Please will you marry me? I want you to be my wife. I want us to grow old and grey together. I want us to have children and grandchildren. Please say yes.'

  'YES!' I squeal. It comes out more loudly than I'd intended, and Rufus jumps a little, if I'm honest. Suddenly my problems have dissolved into nothing. There are no problems. There is no Elody. The press don't matter. There's no worry. I'm no longer a sad unemployed girl whose boyfriend is running around with every other woman in town. Funny how much difference thirty seconds can make. As far as I'm concerned, there are no problems in the world anywhere. Right now – in this moment – everything is more perfect than ever. I've never felt so calm, at peace, happy or sure of anything in my life before.

  'I will,' I say once more, just in case there was someone in West London who didn't hear me last time. Then I throw myself into his arms. 'Of course I will.'

  'Then you'll need this,' he says, and he opens his hand to reveal the most beautiful and enormous diamond ring I've ever seen. 'I was going to continue the theme and get you a ring with three diamonds in a row on it, but I fell in love with this one, with twenty on it,' he says.

  'I've never seen anything so beautiful,' I tell him as I study the ring sitting elegantly on my finger. 'It's amazing.'

  'You are amazing,' he says. 'You're super-amazing.'

  'I have to tell the girls,' I say. 'They'll kill me if I don't tell them straight away. You have to let me call them.'

  'But it's 3 am.'

  'I'll text them then.'

  'Go on then,' says Rufus indulgently. 'But then you switch your phone off. Deal?'

  'Deal,' I say. 'As long as you switch yours off.'

  Chapter 18

  I wake the next morning to the feel and smell of Rufus right beside me. We've been cuddled up together all night . . . me and my husband-to-be. Aaaaahhhh . . . my husband-to-be . . . how mad does that sound? Shit, this is weird. How could I ever have doubted Rufus? After he dropped off to sleep last night I found myself thinking through everything and wondering why on earth I'd spent the time away from him so convinced he was up to no good and out to hurt me. It was Elody of course. Every word spoken, every dark thought in my head – they were all planted there by her. I blame myself for trusting her but I'd felt so awful and isolated and bloody lost. She exploited me.

  Rufus stirs next to me but doesn't wake; he just snuggles up a bit closer and pulls me to him until I can feel his chest hair tickling my nose and find myself twitching like a bunny rabbit. God, this is fabulous.

  One thing I love about my new home here with Rufus is just how dark and cosy it is in the morning. The soft cream curtains are so thick and luscious that they keep all light out. But the windows are so large, and they face the sun, so when we want to get up, and we swing open the curtains, the sunlight comes flooding in all over us and across the pristine white sheets. What I like most of all, and truly the only thing I'm really enjoying about not working, is that we get up when we are ready to get up, without that horrible alarm clock thing. I also love the fact that it's so warm in the house, not like in my old flat where I'd leap out of bed and run to the bathroom, hoping not to catch pneumonia on the way, then hurl myself into the shower which was always too cold, trying to wash quickly and without breathing in. Somehow the cold lost its awful impact if you held your breath. I sometimes think that the ultimate measure of how much my life has changed, and how far up the social scale I've clambered since meeting Rufus, is illustrated no more dazzlingly than in a comparison of the bathrooms.

  'Mmmm,' Rufus sighs as he runs his hands down my back and kisses me on my forehead. 'Come here, Mrs George.'

  'Ooooo . . . OK,' I say, kissing him back. 'Mrs George huh? And what if I decide to keep my own name? Will the wedding be off?'

  'Keep your own name?' he says in mock horror. 'Well, if you're going to do that, then I guess I'd better change mine. I'll have to be called Rufus Monsoon; how do you think that would go down with the world's greatest film directors?'

  He tickles me while he's joking about our names until I can't stand it any more and I'm choking and crying with laughter. 'Stop,' I cry. 'OK, OK, I'll change my name to bloody Kelly George, just please stop the tickling.'

  We laugh and joke about the name possibilities. 'Kelly Monsoon George? Kelly George Monsoon? Kelly Rufus George Monsoon?'

  'Have you told your mum?' asks Rufus, and I realise I haven't. I didn't want to call at 3 am when I texted the girls, and I didn't text Mum because she's just not into that sort of thing. She's a mum so she has a mobile phone that is never switched on, always needs charging, and certainly won't reduce itself to doing anything as technical as texting. I don't know why she has it.

  I reach over and switch on my newly fixed phone to find about twenty missed calls. 'Bloody hell,' I say, turning to Rufus. 'I've got missed calls from just about everyone I've ever met!' There are messages waiting on the phone too, but I decide to leave them until I've spoken to Mum. She answers immediately.

  'I knew it would be you,' she says. 'I've heard, I can't believe it. Are you OK?'

  'Yes, never better,' I say. 'How on earth did you hear?'

  'It's been on the news all morning.'

  Oh God. How on earth have the news channels found out already? Is this room being bugged or something? No wonder everyone's been trying to get hold of me. I turn to Rufus and shrug my shoulders, raising my eyebrows somewhere up into my hairline.

  'How was my engagement on the news?' I ask Mum.

  Rufus looks at me equally quizzically.

  'Your engagement?' says Mum. 'What engagement? I didn't know you were engaged. Why does no one tell me anything?'

  'That's what I'm ringing to tell you; Rufus proposed last night. So it wasn't on the news?'

  'No. Why would it be on the news?'

  'Oh, it doesn't matter, Mum. Look, I just wanted to let you know that I'm getting married . . . to Rufus . . . how cool is that? You're the first person I've phoned.'

  'That's brilliant, love,' she says. 'I think we all need a bit of good news at the moment, don't we?'

  'Yes,' I say rather vaguely. I'm not sure why particularly at the moment. Good news is worth having any time, isn't it?

  'Now then,' Mum says, and I can hear her scrabbling around. 'OK. Things to do . . . shall I book the church or will you? That community centre gets booked up. Marian's daughter was trying to hold her reception there but had no luck at all. I'll get on to them straight away. What date did you want to do, love? Try and avoid the end of April and the beginning of May because your father likes to help out with the gardening down on the seafront then and he'd hate to miss it.'

  'Mum, Mum,' I try to interrupt. The idea of the world's press descending on the Hastings Community Centre, and the most famous people on the planet flying in from New York for it, leaves me trembling. Shit. I need to think this through. Kofi Annan and Great-Aunt Maude . . . how's that going to work? And if we leave the cars down by the pier, they'll all get broken into.

  'We haven't set a date yet, and I don't know where it's going to be. As soon as I know, I'll let you know.'

  'Winter or summer?'

  'Sorry?'

  'The wedding: winter or summer? I need to get my hats out and work out which one's going to work. I can't wear brown in summer or pale pink in winter can I, silly?'

  'Um. Summer,' I say.

  'Oh,' says Mum, disappointment pouring down the phone. 'I look much better in autumnal shades. I'm a bit old for pastels.'

  'OK, winter,' I say.

  'Great. Right. Well I'll go down to the community centre just in case and see what the bookings are like
for winter.'

  'OK, Mum.'

  As I put the phone down to my mother, and begin to regale Rufus with the mad conversation I've just endured, there's a gentle tap on the door.

  'What is it?' asks Rufus. 'Mrs George and I are busy.' The staff never, ever knock on the door to Rufus's private rooms.

  'Terribly sorry to interrupt, sir.' David's distinctive old voice comes floating under the bedroom door. It has an almost ghostly feel to it. 'There are some people at the door. They've come to see Ms Monsoon.'

  'There's no Ms Monsoon here,' says Rufus, laughing as he half smothers me with the pillow. 'She's changed her name. Tell them to go away.'

  'I really am sorry to interrupt, sir,' says David, coughing gently as if to illustrate how terribly inconvenient he is finding all of this. 'Only it's the police.'

  'Oh God!' I cry. I'm terrified of the police. If there's a police car driving behind me, I go into a blind panic and can hardly drive properly. I don't know why; I guess it relates back to that time I was caught drink-driving. It was awful. Every time I see a policeman now, I'm in pieces. Now there's one in the house! Shit.

  'Don't worry,' says Rufus, smiling and giving me a hug. 'You haven't got drugs in your handbag, have you?'

  'Of course not.'

  'Good. Neither have I, so we have nothing to worry about.'

  'Elody gave me those drugs before though, to help me lose weight. It couldn't be those, could it?'

  'No. Don't be daft,' he says. 'It'll be something to do with security. We have to deal with the local police a fair bit.'

  'Oh,' I say. 'But why would they want to see me?'

  'Let's go find out,' says Rufus, kissing me on the forehead and leaping out of bed.

  It turns out it isn't someone checking on our security downstairs, but two stern-looking police officers, pacing up and down the sitting room floor as if they were keeping guard outside a prison cell; neither is wearing a uniform. They both look solemn. Thank God Rufus came down with me. He picks up on how serious this appears to be.