by Jill Mansell
“It’s my break now,” said Lucille, putting aside her guitar and eyeing Suzy defensively. “I suppose this was Harry’s idea.”
She was wearing torn black jeans and a tiny scarlet cotton camisole. Her beaded hair—appropriately enough, given their location—was fastened up on top of her head pineapple fashion. Harry, returning from the bar with their drinks, said, “It’s Malibu night. I got you both a Malibu and Coke.”
“Why? Because they were two for the price of one?” Suzy looked indignant. “I hope this doesn’t mean you’re a penny-pinching cheapskate.”
“It means this bar only sells Malibu,” Harry told her patiently. “If you want anything else you have to go downstairs.”
Oh. That was all right then. Suzy forgave him. Even though she couldn’t stand Malibu.
“And yes,” Harry went on, addressing Lucille, “it was my idea to bring her here.”
“I don’t know why you wanted to keep it such a secret,” Suzy exclaimed. Although she did, of course.
Well, it was pretty obvious.
“Look, it must be bad enough as it is, having me crawl out of the woodwork,” Lucille said frankly. “Going, ‘Hi, guess what, I’m your sister!’ and claiming my share of your inheritance.” She gazed steadily at Suzy. “So it’s hardly going to improve matters, is it, if the next thing I do is whip out my guitar and say, ‘Oh, and by the way, I’m a singer—hey, didn’t you used to be married to Jaz Dreyfuss? Maybe you could introduce me to your ex!’”
“You wouldn’t do that,” said Suzy, taken aback.
Oh God, would she?
Lucille looked faintly exasperated.
“I know I wouldn’t. But you don’t know me at all, do you? You might think I’m building up to it, angling for an introduction…you know how it is, some people will do anything for the chance of that big break. Well, anyway,” she went on, “I just want you to know that I’m not that kind of person. In fact, I’d rather you didn’t tell Jaz what I do. Less awkward all around.”
Suzy shrugged. “OK, if that’s what you want.”
It made a change, certainly. In her experience, getting to meet Jaz was most struggling musicians’ mission in life. Amazingly—in Suzy’s view—they didn’t regard him as a has-been, a washed-up old alcoholic. To them, Jaz was still the genius who had written one of the bestselling rock albums of all time. It was quite touching really. Even now, a day seldom passed without at least a couple of demo tapes from eager wannabes either arriving in the mail or being pushed hopefully through his door.
Total waste of time, of course, because Jaz never listened to them. His life these days was a music-free zone.
“She doesn’t push herself,” Harry announced, “that’s her trouble. She’s a bloody good singer.”
“So bloody good that I get ignored in pubs all over the city.” Lucille’s tone was dry. The next moment a balding manager-type appeared at their table, bossily tapping his watch.
“We don’t pay you to sit around gossiping.”
Breaks around here evidently weren’t allowed to last longer than three minutes. What a dump, thought Suzy.
Lucille drained her glass and stood up. When she saw Suzy removing her jacket and settling back to watch, she said, “Oh God, you don’t have to be polite.”
“I’m never polite,” Suzy said happily. “I wouldn’t stay if I didn’t want to, I can promise you that. I just can’t imagine where you get it from, this being all musical—none of our family can sing for toffee. Well, I think I can, but everyone else assures me I can’t. Jaz says I sound like Edna Everage being garroted with her own tights.”
Lucille reached down for her guitar. “My dad was a singer.”
“Oh, wow!” Suzy was impressed. “You mean he was famous?”
Lucille smiled.
“No, it wasn’t his job. He just sang for fun. Actually, he drove a taxi for a living.”
A taxi driver. Gosh. Try as she might, Suzy couldn’t imagine the double life her mother had led over the years, flitting between the wealthy, serious-minded scientist and the—less wealthy, presumably—singing taxi driver.
* * *
It took Suzy less than fifteen minutes to clear the entire fourth floor of the Pineapple. Each time Lucille reached the end of a song, Suzy clapped and cheered with noisy enthusiasm and stared so meaningfully at the rest of the customers, daring them not to join in the applause, that in no time at all they were nudging each other, knocking back their drinks, and sloping off downstairs.
By ten o’clock Lucille’s audience had shrunk to Harry, Suzy, and two mildly bemused bartenders.
“Isn’t she brilliant?” Suzy stuck her fingers in her mouth and whistled shrilly with appreciation as Lucille finished with a dreary-sounding song by PJ Harvey. Not catchy enough for Suzy’s taste, but now clearly wasn’t the time to be critical. “She’s my sister, you know! Fancy me having a sister who can sing like that!”
“Fancy her having a sister who can turn off an audience like that,” observed the taller of the two bartenders. “Especially before she’s even had a chance to take the hat around.”
“Is that what happens?” Appalled, Suzy clapped her hands over her mouth. “Oh God, oh God, I didn’t think! Quick, where’s the hat? Let me put something in… How much does she usually get?”
“Don’t worry.” Lucille materialized at her side as she searched frantically for her purse. “They’re teasing you. I get paid.”
Suzy looked unconvinced. “Much?”
“Not much. Actually, a pittance. But I get by. And next week I start at the Bar HoopLa on Whiteladies Road.”
“You get by,” Suzy echoed doubtfully. Honestly, there were still so many questions she wanted to ask. She was tempted to draw up a ten-page questionnaire, a bit like a tax return, listing every single thing she was bursting to know. “Do you do anything else, apart from the singing?”
“I do some dog walking,” said Lucille. “It’s good. Flexible.”
“She walks my brother’s dog,” Harry added. The phone in his jacket pocket began to ring. “Damn, I hope that isn’t work.”
“Dog walking,” said Suzy, shaking her head. “Do you know, that’s something I’ve never understood. How can people own dogs and call themselves dog lovers when they can’t even be bothered to take their animals for a walk? I mean, how hypocritical can you get?” She ranted on, beginning to get carried away. “What’s wrong with these people? If they loved their dogs they’d want to walk them, wouldn’t they? But oh no, that would be too much like hard work! Why bother to take your dog for a walk when you can sit on your fat backside and pay someone else to do the dirty work for you? Talk about bone idle…”
“Right. Right,” said Harry, nodding into his phone. He held it out to Suzy. “For you.”
Suzy looked at it. “How can your phone be for me?”
He wasn’t smiling. “Trust me, it is.”
Warily, she took the phone from him. “Hello?”
“Name?” demanded a peremptory male voice.
Oh Lord, not the chief constable!
“Myfanwy. Er, Myfanwy Shufflebottom,” said Suzy. She made alarmed eyes at Harry, who shrugged and sat back, looking sorry for her.
“OK, now, you just listen to me. Every morning I take my dog for a run across the Downs. He probably covers three miles. And every evening I take him out on another run, this time for maybe four or five miles. But during the day, I do have to work, and because my dog is an Irish wolfhound, he enjoys as much exercise a day as he can lay his paws on. Which is why, Ms. Shufflebottom, I pay a dog walker to visit him at lunchtime and take him out for an hour.” He paused, then concluded, “Furthermore, I do not have a fat backside.”
“What can I say?” said Suzy. “I apologize. From the heart of my shuffly bottom.”
The male voice drawled, “I should think so too.”
And then he hung up.
Suzy listened in disbelief to the dial tone. “He hung up.”
“Surely not,” said Harry with a grin.
“Who was he?”
But Harry, clearly enjoying himself, simply shrugged.
Suzy found the number of the last call received and pressed Return. It was picked up on the second ring.
“Hello?”
“Who are you?”
She heard him laugh. “A dog lover, Ms. Shufflebottom. Or perhaps I could call you Myfanwy?”
Her fingers tightened around the phone.
“Look, I’ll tell you my real name if you’ll tell me yours.”
More laughter. For heaven’s sake, thought Suzy indignantly, how irritating was it when people did that?
“This is rather like the dormouse saying to the elephant, ‘I won’t step on you if you won’t step on me,’” said the man on the other end of the phone. “You see, I already know who you are.”
Suzy’s ear was tingling. She was loving every second of this. The smart thing to do now, of course, would be to hang up. Ha! That would show him what kind of—
“Bastard!” wailed Suzy, staring at the phone in disbelief.
Startled, Lucille said, “What?”
“He hung up again! He bloody hung up on me before I could hang up on him! That is so unfair.” She swung around to Harry, who was trying hard to keep a straight face. “Was it your boss?”
“No, thank God.” Harry exchanged an amused glance with Lucille. “It was my brother, Leo.”
Chapter 6
Lucille refused their offer of a lift home; she had her bike with her. Harry and Suzy, waving good-bye, watched her pedal off into the night with her pineapple hairdo bobbing and her guitar strapped to her back.
“She’s very independent,” said Suzy.
“Oh yes.”
“I feel like the new owner of a puppy from Battersea Dogs & Cats Home. Desperate for her to like me. Do you think she does?”
Harry shrugged, then smiled.
“I don’t know. Lucille’s wary, but she’s no puppy. Give her time.” He slid his arm around Suzy’s shoulders as they headed for the car. “If it’s any comfort, I like you.” He gave her a quick squeeze. “A lot.”
* * *
They pulled up, less than ten minutes later, outside Suzy’s apartment. Eyeing the rakishly parked Rolls, Harry said, “Couldn’t you just sell it and buy a Porsche?”
Suzy loved her Rolls because nobody expected her to drive one. When you were twenty-four, with tumbling tortoiseshell hair, long legs, and breasts that frankly shouted “Hello, boys!” you conformed to a certain stereotype. People automatically pictured you driving some sporty little number, something sleek and curvy and with a propensity for getting its top off.
But that had never been her dream. When, barefoot and abandoned, she had first been rescued by Jaz from the hard shoulder of the highway all those years ago—well, six years ago, though it seemed more like fifty—he had asked her what her favorite car was, and she had told him. And six months later, on her nineteenth birthday, he had bought her the Rolls.
It had been love at first sight. Plus, of course, it had lasted a lot longer than the marriage.
“When I have to pay to leave my car in a parking space,” Suzy told Harry, “I like to get my money’s worth.”
“Right, well, early start tomorrow. I’d better make a move.” He revved the engine slightly and glanced at his watch.
Suzy, who hated it when men pulled up outside her apartment and switched off the ignition, was impressed.
“OK. So, do I get a good-night kiss?”
Harry leaned across and kissed her briefly on the cheek. Then he smiled. Oh, that heartbreaking smile!
“Have you enjoyed yourself tonight?”
“So-so,” said Suzy. “Average. Comme ci, comme ça.” She paused. “Would you like to come in for coffee?”
“Better not.”
“Fine.” Suzy approved of this too. She liked it when they said no. So long as she knew they wanted to really. Saying no because they actually didn’t want to…well, that would have been the pits.
As she reached for the door handle, Jaz’s front door swung open. Jaz, wearing only a pair of jeans, whistled through his teeth, gazed into the distance, and called out, “Cat, hey, cat, come on in now, puss puss puss.”
“Your ex-husband,” Harry remarked.
“Er, yes.” The ex-husband who didn’t even have a cat.
Jaz peered across at the car, did an oh-so-surprised double take—good job he’d never yearned to be an actor, thought Suzy—and shouted across, “Hey, Suze, is that you? Coming over for a drink?”
“A drink? I thought he didn’t drink.” Harry sounded startled.
“He doesn’t. I do.” Suzy knew exactly what Jaz was up to.
“Hey, come on,” said Jaz. “It’s early. Just one drink.”
“Are you and he still…?”
“No,” said Suzy, “we’re not.”
“Both of you,” Jaz called out easily. “I meant both of you.”
“Do you want to?” said Suzy.
Harry hesitated, then shrugged. Casually.
“OK. Why not?”
Suzy smiled to herself. It worked every time. Nobody turned down the opportunity to meet Jaz.
“The bad news is,” she told Harry, “you’ll have to meet Celeste too.”
* * *
Celeste, Jaz’s girlfriend, was the bane of Suzy’s life. With her short white-blond hair, huge china-blue eyes, and dinky size-six figure, she had that irritating Barbie-doll look about her—and an even more irritating habit of constantly reminding other people how dinky and fragile she was.
Suzy, who liked being a long-legged, curvy size twelve, was tired of Celeste’s endless derogatory comments regarding her weight. She couldn’t understand what Jaz—who in the past had always had such excellent taste in women—possibly saw in her.
Well, that wasn’t strictly true. She did know. Because Celeste had a trump card she played to the hilt. She might spend her life bitching about Fee and Suzy, and she might teeter around in fluffy mules with completely ludicrous satin bows in her hair, but she was also—cue that card!—a recovering alcoholic, just like Jaz.
And Jaz had apparently convinced himself that Celeste had saved his life. Now, as far as he was concerned, she was his talisman, his lucky charm.
When actually, as Suzy so often pointed out to him, Celeste was nothing but amazingly self-centered, a gold digger, and a total pain in the neck.
* * *
“We met at an AA meeting,” Celeste told Harry, as if he didn’t already know. The whole planet, Suzy thought wearily, must have heard this story by now. “I just walked in, and there was Jaz. Not that I even recognized him at the time, I was in such a state. I’d only been sober for a couple of days. I was going through hell. After the meeting, I just broke down and cried in the street—I was that close to running into the nearest pub. But Jaz saw me crying and came over. He got me through the crisis.” She nodded for emphasis, and the massive pink bow on top of her head bobbed around like a pair of rabbit’s ears. “We talked all night. It was like there was this incredible connection between us. I mean, Jaz had been sober for almost four months, but he was still struggling too. If it hadn’t been for him, I know I’d have started drinking again. And he feels the same way about me. We supported each other, Harry, d’you see? Whenever one of us weakened, the other had to be strong. And we did it, didn’t we, darling?” Her wide blue gaze fixed lovingly on Jaz. “We saved each other’s lives.”
It was the loving look that got Suzy most of all. Whenever she saw it—which was, sadly, often—she had an overwhelming urge to stick two fingers in her mouth and make loud gagging noises. Why was it that other women could see through
Celeste in a flash, yet men fell for her nauseating charms every time?
Lucille wouldn’t be taken in for a moment, Suzy thought with pride. If she were here now, she’d see Celeste for the celebrity-hungry bimbo she is. She watched Harry falling for her nonsense hook, line, and sinker—oh well, he was a man; what could you expect?—and topped off her wineglass from the bottle of Pouilly-Fumé Jaz had opened for her.
Harry, needless to say, had taken the diplomatic route and settled for coffee.
“Don’t worry about Suzy. She does it on purpose,” Celeste told Harry as the neck of the bottle clunked against Suzy’s glass. “She loves to goad us. I think it must give her a cheap thrill.”
“Pouilly-Fumé?” Suzy raised an eyebrow. “Hardly cheap.”
In Celeste’s favor, at least there was no pretense, no shilly-shallying around. Since she made no secret of her disdain for Suzy, they were free to taunt each other with abandon. Suzy enjoyed these insult-flinging sessions immensely; she just wished Jaz wouldn’t roar with laughter at the pair of them and call them his double act.
“Anyway,” she went on, “after being married to Jaz for two years, I deserve a few thrills. And why shouldn’t I have a drink? We don’t all have to suffer for the rest of our lives, do we, just because you two are on the wagon?”
“If someone were about to throw themselves off the Suspension Bridge,” Celeste said to Harry, “she’d help them over the barrier.”
“This is the real world,” said Suzy. “People do drink. You either lock yourselves away from temptation or get used to it.”
“She has no idea.” Celeste gave Harry’s arm a consoling pat. “Take no notice. It’s sheer ignorance.”
“Oh, this is good.” Suzy seized on this with glee. “You’re the one who thinks Tuesday is spelled with a ch and I’m the one who’s ignorant! Plus,” she went on, “if Jaz doesn’t want his guests drinking in front of him, why does he keep alcohol in the house?”
Harry’s head was swiveling between Suzy and Celeste like a one-man Wimbledon audience. Jaz, standing in front of the fireplace, grinned broadly and let them get on with it.
