Wicked Beauty

by Susan Lewis

  ‘You should have seen him squirm,’ she told Max. ‘It was a treat. And he got in such a sweat when I mentioned Bombola …’

  ‘Oh shit,’ Max muttered.

  Laurie glanced at Dan. ‘What?’ she said, her smile starting to drain.

  ‘That was why I wanted to speak to you first. Elliot didn’t want you to bring up Bombola.’ Then after a pause, ‘It’s bad, Laurie. I mean really bad. We’re going to put it all together, what you’ve got there, what we’ve got here, but I don’t mind telling you, they’re going to do everything they possibly can to stop that from happening – and now we’ve got to ask ourselves, is that why Tim Hendon’s dead, because he was threatening to expose them?’

  Laurie’s heartbeat was a dull thud in her chest. ‘What about the four million?’ she said.

  ‘I don’t have an answer for that, and he was sleeping with Katherine, so I’m not trying to paint the guy white. I’m just saying, if someone like him can end up the way he has, then so can anyone.’

  Completely sober now, Laurie said, ‘Where’s Elliot? Have you see him?’

  ‘Yeah. He should be leaving Paris in a couple of hours. When are you back?’

  ‘In London? The day after tomorrow. Is that where you are now?’

  ‘I will be in about half an hour.’

  ‘Good. I want you to see this interview. And I need someone to check on Katherine Sumner’s father, and why there wasn’t an inquiry into his death.’

  ‘OK. I’ll get on to it.’ Then he added, ‘Just be careful who you talk to over there, and especially who you trust, because if Koehler is styling himself on this Maurice Conchis character from The Magus, then he’s got some of the smoothest operators working for him that any of us have probably ever come across, and from what I remember of it, they’re so damned convincing you could find yourself going so far as falling hook, line and sinker for one of them and only find out when it’s too late that you’ve been conned.’

  Chapter 20

  ‘THERE YOU GO, one Virgin Mary,’ the barman announced, setting a tumbler full of iced tomato juice on the low-level table in front of Rachel. ‘And one Planter’s punch,’ he added, putting another glass, topped off with nutmeg, in front of Chris.

  Chris waited for him to clear, then picked up his drink to salute the other two men who’d joined them under the flamboyant tree, which formed a huge feathery green umbrella outside the bar at the Bitter End Yacht Club. ‘Scott, Fenn,’ he said, clinking his glass against their beer bottles.

  ‘To Scott and Fenn,’ Rachel echoed, following suit.

  ‘And to finding … what did you say her name was?’ Scott asked, in an unmistakably Australian drawl.

  ‘Katherine Sumner,’ Rachel provided.

  As they drank, Rachel regarded their sun-weathered faces, Fenn’s much older and lived in than Scott’s, whose was smoothly chiselled and extremely good looking, though both men seemed to share an enviable laissez-faire attitude that no doubt came from living a much more natural kind of existence than urban pressures allowed. The temporary break in the storm must have helped too, for even she was feeling more relaxed now that they were no longer being battered by gale force winds, and blasted out of their wits by clashing explosions of thunder. The strain in Chris’s eyes had lessened since this morning, though she suspected that had much more to do with the lengthy call he’d taken from someone in Europe, than with a change in the weather. In fact the call had gone on for so long that the battery on his mobile had run down, making it necessary to ring back on the house phone – and by the time he’d come to find her the tension he’d been struggling to hide these past few days had already noticeably eased.

  ‘Aaah,’ he sighed ecstatically, as the rum punch hit the right spot. ‘Nectar.’ He offered the glass to Rachel. ‘Do you want to try?’

  Taking it, she helped herself to a generous sip, then instantly regretted it, for one simply wasn’t enough. She looked at it longingly, painfully even, then groaned and laughed as the baby delivered a hearty kick, as though to remind her that he, or she, was far too young for such indulgences. So handing it back she started to get the video camera out of its case, while Chris turned to Fenn saying,

  ‘Thanks to you, my friend, I believe we’re at least one step closer to finding Miss Sumner than we were half an hour ago.’

  Fenn’s leathery brown skin folded over his eyes as he frowned, though whether he was shy of the camera that was now being directed at him, or embarrassed by the praise, wasn’t too clear. ‘Europe’s a big place,’ he said gruffly. ‘I only know I flew her to St Thomas, where she got a flight to Madrid. And that was weeks ago. She could be anywhere by now.’

  ‘But the name she used was Sandra Grayson?’ Rachel said, checking the camera’s visual display to make sure he was framed right.

  He nodded.

  ‘What about the man she was with?’ she asked. ‘Did you get his name?’

  ‘I didn’t see him,’ he replied. ‘He didn’t come on the flight. It was only Scott here who saw him.’

  Rachel turned the camera to Scott, then handed it to Chris, since he was in a better position to get a good angle.

  ‘He was with her when she came asking about going on a night dive,’ Scott said. ‘He was a quiet bloke, older, didn’t say much. I kind of got the impression that anything she wanted was OK by him.’

  ‘Did you take them on the dive?’ Rachel asked.

  He shook his head. ‘It turned out that it wasn’t your regular night dive she was after,’ he answered. ‘What she wanted was a cover for getting out to sea, where she was arranging for another boat to meet them, to take them on to St Thomas. If anyone asked, when I got back, I was supposed to say I’d dropped them at the Baths, at the far end of the island.’

  ‘So what happened?’ Rachel said.

  He shrugged. ‘Nothing. I agreed to do it – she was paying well, let me tell you, but when the time came she just didn’t turn up. Then I got talking to Fenn, here, a few days later, and he told me how she’d paid him to fly her to St Thomas. She was using another name by then, but we kind of worked out it was the same woman, which was why I asked him to come and meet you this afternoon.’

  Rachel glanced at Chris, who was still watching the visual display as he said, ‘What about the man’s name? Did you catch it?’

  Scott pulled a face as he thought. ‘It was unusual,’ he replied. ‘Zac? Zachary?’ He shrugged. ‘Something like that, but not that.’

  ‘What about Xavier?’ Rachel said. ‘Could that have –’

  ‘That was it!’ he cut in. ‘I’m sure that’s what she called him. Bit of a blinder, eh?’

  Rachel couldn’t help smiling, and was about to continue when Chris’s mobile started to ring.

  ‘Sorry,’ he grimaced, and passing her the camera, he took the phone from his shirt pocket and trotted down the steps towards the harbour edge, where rows of colourful surfboards stood to attention like sentries and the club’s single-mast sailboats were floating at anchor just offshore.

  Carrying on with the interview, Rachel took them back over Katherine’s request for a night dive, then the approach she had made to Fenn, for an eight hundred dollar flight in his Piper Aztec to St Thomas’s international airport. Later she’d get some shots of the aircraft itself, hopefully taking off from Virgin Gorda, as well as some footage of the dive-boat that ended up not being used. Meanwhile, she got Scott to hold the photograph of Katherine, then to look to camera as he nodded, saying that he’d seen her.

  ‘Great!’ she declared, when he’d finished. Then with a big smile, ‘I can’t tell you what a relief it is to hear all this. I was beginning to think the woman had some kind of invisible powers.’

  Scott cocked an eyebrow, and reached for his beer. ‘So, who is she?’ he said, taking a sip. ‘Why are you guys looking for her?’

  Though Rachel’s expression didn’t change, the professional objectivity that had kept her aloof from her personal feelings immediately dissolved. ‘Chris
didn’t tell you?’ she said. ‘You don’t recognize her from the news?’

  Scott looked at Fenn, and both shook their heads. ‘We tend to switch off when the news comes on,’ Scott confessed. ‘Too bloody depressing.’

  She nodded agreement. Then forcing another smile she said, ‘I’ll tell you what, if you’re going to join us for dinner, over at Saba Rock, I’ll let Chris fill you in, if that’s OK?’

  Scott glanced at Fenn. ‘Fine by me,’ he said.

  ‘Me too,’ Fenn replied, looking round at the sound of a motor launch that was scudding across the waves towards the jetty in front of them.

  Rachel turned too, and saw that it was the same boat that had brought her and Chris across the bay half an hour ago, from the tiny dock at Gun Creek. Though it was only a five or six minute journey, from where they were sitting the creek was no more than a speck at the bottom of the big, rolling green hills that flanked it like giant paws. On top of one, at the very end of the peninsula, she could see the white pointed rooftops of their villa, and above that a menacing grey mass of cloud that was starting to form like a Thoric netherworld. So it seemed the forecast was right: the storm would return some time later tonight. In the meantime, the calmly glittering blue sea could hardly appear more idyllic.

  By the time Chris finally came back Scott and Fenn were on their third beers, and umpteenth island story, while Rachel, awash in Virgin Marys, was quietly fearing that the call might have upset whatever the morning’s good news had been. But to her relief, though the battery on his mobile had given up the ghost again, he appeared every bit as relaxed as he’d been half an hour ago, and more than ready to take off to Saba Rock, the restaurant that was its own small island, in the middle of the bay, where the catchy sound of a steel band was already beginning to liven up the evening.

  For Rachel, as the boat carried them closer to the twangy rhythm and the smell of barbecuing fish, it was as though the real magic of the Caribbean was at last starting to work its charms. She could see it in Chris’s eyes too, which didn’t surprise her, for one thing she knew absolutely about him was his love of music. And of art, for he’d been entertaining her with many wonderful stories about Picasso, Diego Rivera, Modigliani, and others whose names she wished she could remember, because it was like stepping into a whole new world of intrigue and romance, that was so far from the darkness and complications of her own that she almost wished she could just close the door behind her and never go back. He also loved to fly, she’d just discovered, because he was discussing it now, with Fenn, as they sped across the waves. He even owned a small plane, it seemed, though maybe that shouldn’t be so surprising, for these past few days had left her in little doubt that there was a great deal more to this man than good looks, a cultured mind and a very wicked sense of humour. But as fascinated and charmed as she was by him, she’d been careful to keep her barriers up, for she was afraid of the closeness it might create if she got to know him too well. Yet, thinking about that now, especially in the light of how supportive and generous he’d been, she could see that such caution wasn’t only absurd, but mean-spirited, which was why, as they stepped off the boat at Saba Rock, she made a firm decision to stop resisting their friendship. After all, whether she liked it or not, being with him was one of the few things right now that made her feel even close to happy.

  The large, crescent-shaped restaurant, with its highly varnished tables and hanging baskets of luscious green plants, was already half full as they were shown to a waterfront table with a view across the waves to the elaborate Creole-style yacht club that was glistening like a Mississippi steamboat in the reddening twilight, and out across the wide blue bay where pristine white yachts were gliding like swans through the waves. Though no one was dancing yet, plenty of feet were tapping and Rachel could see that Chris was only minutes away from getting them all going. However, there was the serious business of cocktails to be dealt with first, and the bushwhacker that Scott and Fenn insisted she had to try.

  ‘I can’t possibly,’ she laughed, clasping a hand over the growing mound of her tummy. ‘Not with all that alcohol.’

  ‘Ah, but I have a hot line to that little fellow down there,’ Chris informed her, ‘and he tells me he wants to have some fun.’

  ‘It’s a she,’ she protested, ‘and she only drinks wine in very small and diluted amounts.’

  Scott turned to the waiter. ‘Bring us a bushwhacker for the boy, and a glass of champagne for the girl,’ he demanded.

  Rachel glared at him helplessly, then turned as Chris pointed out the sudden eruption of an air battle between one of the peculiarly prehistoric looking frigate birds that glided like an ugly military jet around the skies of the bay, and a young brown booby that was trying desperately to hold on to a fish. The frigate bird soon won, and swept off towards the setting sun to a chorus of boos from the restaurant, that turned to cheers for the booby as it began the search for supper all over again.

  ‘OK, food for us now,’ Chris declared, returning to the menus.

  ‘Mahi Mahi in Cajun spice and wine-lemon sauce,’ Rachel responded, starting them off.

  ‘Jalapeño poppers and chips for me,’ Scott said, rubbing his hands together.

  ‘I’ll go with the popcorn shrimp and chips,’ Fenn added.

  ‘And I’ll have the Ahi tuna with wasabi-soy sauce,’ Chris finished, passing his menu back to the waiter, then taking hold of Rachel’s hand he promptly spun her out into the aisle.

  ‘This is one of my all-time favourites,’ he told her, jigging about and shouting to make himself heard over the jaunty beat.

  Guessing he’d probably never even heard it before, she treated him to a sceptical look and tried to follow his rhythm, but the way he was flapping his elbows and stamping his feet, was just too hilarious for her to do much more than laugh, until suddenly he swooped her off into his own version of the tango.

  Within minutes the other diners were up, including Scott and Fenn, bobbing and rocking, twisting, jiving, throwing their arms in the air and in some cases, attempting to sing along. A couple of blondes in microscopic shorts and tight Lycra crop tops made a beeline for Scott and Fenn, treating them to outrageously suggestive hip wiggles and hair tumbles, while the two men responded with gusto. Noticing, Chris waggled his eyebrows at Rachel, making her grin, though she couldn’t help wondering if he wouldn’t prefer to be partnering a girl with a flat stomach, large breasts and free love written all over her. Suddenly feeling certain that he would, she beckoned one of the blondes over, then stepped deftly aside as the tanned beauty shimmied up to him, big brown nipples all but visible through her skimpy top, and wicked blue eyes giving as blatant a come-on as Rachel had ever seen.

  Returning to the table she found the champagne and bushwhacker waiting, though what she needed right then was water. By the time the waiter brought it she had her breath back, and was watching the blonde’s stunningly unsubtle seduction technique, which amounted to clamping Chris’s hips hard to her own as she gyrated like a stripper, and arching her back away to make sure he couldn’t miss her gigantic breasts. For his part Chris seemed to be lapping it up, and put on a playful show of aggression when Scott suddenly wrenched her away. However, he’d no sooner started dancing with a middle-aged woman with carroty red hair and braces, than the blonde was back, clinging on to his waist as though the other woman simply didn’t exist.

  As she watched, Rachel could feel the warmth in her smile starting to fade. She tried to bring it back, but, to her dismay, her mood was on a downward spiral, heading back to the grief it could never escape for long. Then she began to feel the oddness of being here with so many strangers and the guilt of disconnecting from the painful reality of her life, as though she were in some way neglecting Tim. Turning to gaze out at the darkening red night, where the first stirrings of the next storm were now starting to blow, she tried to will herself away from the encroaching sense of loneliness, but it seemed as determined and irreversible as the wind, sweeping around her like a s
hroud, as though to close her off from the laughter and light-heartedness behind her and lock her back into the awful prison of despair.

  As her eyes pricked with tears, she quickly grabbed the champagne and took a sip. Self-pity had no place here, when everyone was having so much fun and when it was no one’s fault but Tim’s that he had deceived her, then been killed in such a horrible way. Why should they have to put up with her misery, when they’d played no part in the lies and cheating that had deprived her of her husband, and their baby of its father? They didn’t want to know how hard she was finding it even to think about a future that couldn’t now be with him, but might instead be cruelly blighted by the scandal of his death. Nor would they even care that thanks to a monstrously cruel twist of fate, she was here searching for the woman he’d not only deceived her with, but who had taken his life.

  Feeling more anger and emotion well up inside her, she took another sip of champagne, then turned her face back into the cooling wind. Behind her the music changed, and a raucous whoop of laughter was followed by resounding applause. She felt such a longing to go back and join them, to be able to pretend that there was no pain in her life, or fear in her heart, that she just didn’t understand why she couldn’t. Surely she was strong enough to hold on to these few minutes of happiness without letting the inner demons chase it away like this? She wished she could be more like Chris, able to throw herself into the moment and enjoy it no matter what was going on inside. She’d heard him on the phone often enough, sounding angry and frustrated, then seen the way he could so easily let it go once the call was over. So why didn’t she at least try? Why not just go back out there and dance? It didn’t even have to be with him, it could be with Scott or Fenn, or someone she’d didn’t know. It didn’t matter, just as long as she tried.

  Forcing herself to turn round she looked for Chris in the crowd then felt her heart flood with affection as she spotted the devilish expression on his face. He wasn’t looking in her direction, so she was able to watch him for a while, still enjoying the lascivious attentions of the blonde, who was now rubbing her bottom up against him, while clasping his hands around her bare midriff. Rachel knew she was in no position to feel jealous, especially when she already had enough confusing emotions to deal with, but she was, because it felt ridiculously as though the blonde was coming between them.