Guilty Pleasures

by Tasmina Perry

  She glanced at her Cartier watch. It was almost eleven o’clock. At some point she wanted to slip away and call Max but right now there was a more important phone call to make.

  ‘I’m just going to the bathroom,’ she smiled, handing Giles her glass of champagne.

  She moved through the villa admiring Leopold’s fabulous art collection; a Bacon, some Keith Harings, a couple of Hockney poolscapes. Whilst they were a joy to behold, they only served to remind Cassandra that she was not yet operating at the most lucrative end of the fashion industry. She went to the bathroom; she always felt more powerful with a slick of red on her lips.

  Finding the room empty, she was refreshing her make-up when the door burst open. Clover Connor staggered in and, grabbing the hem of her skin-tight white Alaia dress, wriggled it over her head and dropped it on the floor, leaving her completely naked.

  ‘Clover! Are you OK?’ asked Cassandra. The model was swaying like a willow in the breeze, her eyes completely glassy.

  ‘I need a pee, I need a pee,’ she repeated, before slumping to the ground.

  ‘Clover! Clover! Are you all right?’ asked Cassandra leaning over her. ‘What have you taken?’ Clover’s drug use, which was an open secret in the fashion industry seemed to be sliding from recreational to something much worse. Cassandra wasn’t so much concerned for the girl’s physical or moral wellbeing. No, she was more worried because an addicted model was an unreliable one and Clover was one of the few models whose presence on a cover always guaranteed a sales uplift. Concerned that she might get vomit on her ivory Le Smoking, Cassandra ran out of the bathroom to look for Giles. She found him coming down the corridor towards her.

  ‘Quickly, come with me,’ she ordered.

  ‘I was just looking for you,’ replied Giles quickly. ‘Leopold says Ste Donahue is totally strung out on the balcony in his bedroom. He’s been looking for Guillaume to remove him but I think he has already left for the yacht. There are wagging tongues everywhere, we need to do something quick.’

  Tania bounded towards them holding a flute of champagne aloft. She had stripped down to just a white string bikini.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ she trilled.

  ‘Ste isn’t feeling too well,’ said Giles diplomatically.

  ‘I was going to say the same about Clover,’ said Cassandra through her teeth.

  Giles grasped the situation immediately.

  ‘Where is she?’

  ‘In a bathroom, on the next floor.’

  ‘What’s the problem? We’re not going already are we?’ said Alex, strolling up to the group.

  ‘Possibly,’ murmured Giles. ‘Alex, can you go and get Security? Failing that, someone big and muscly. You shouldn’t have a problem around here.’

  ‘But I was just on my way back to the pool,’ he replied, a note of whine in his voice.

  ‘Just go!’ snapped Giles, his usually gentle voice now clipped and firm.

  ‘Now, Tania, get someone with one of those golf carts round to the front.’

  ‘Mmm, Giles. You can be so butch when you want to be,’ smiled Cassandra approvingly.

  He took off his white jacket and turned towards the bathroom. ‘Let’s just go and find her, shall we?’

  Clover was lying spreadeagled on the bathroom floor when they found her, vomit trailing from the side of her mouth. Tania followed them in, and gasped when she saw her idol in such a state.

  ‘Is she dead?’ she gulped, both hands flying to her mouth.

  Giles turned on her. ‘Didn’t I tell you to go and get a golf cart?’ he barked. ‘And has Alex gone to get Security?’

  ‘I think he’s gone to the bar.’

  Giles was too distracted to get angry.

  ‘All right, stay here and help me,’ he said in a low voice that left no room for argument. Giles pulled a towelling robe from a cupboard and folded it around Clover’s naked body.

  ‘Help me lift her,’ he said to Tania.

  Meanwhile, Cassandra had left to find Leopold to help locate Ste and get him out of the party. Ten minutes later, two security guards dressed in white loaded Ste’s limp body into a golf cart before helping to put Clover in beside him too.

  ‘I’ll go back with them to the yacht,’ said Giles.

  ‘Tania. Why don’t you go too?’ said Cassandra. ‘I’m sure Clover will be really grateful for your help.’

  Tania looked at Alex who had just come from inside the villa.

  ‘Are you going to come?’

  ‘There’s no point us all going,’ said Cassandra, touching Alex’s shoulder.

  ‘I agree,’ he replied, after viewing the events with the superiority of a Roman emperor watching lions and Christians.

  By the time they reached Le Soleil, Guillaume had already been woken and he had alerted the deck hands to help Tania and Giles bring Clover and Ste on board. Guillaume was out on deck in his long, navy, silk dressing gown. His mouth distorted into an expression of distaste and then disbelief as Clover crouched down on her hands and knees and puked onto the deck.

  ‘Get her off this boat as soon as possible,’ he whispered to the captain.

  ‘We’ll throw them in the hold to cool off,’ said the captain.

  ‘And get one of the crew to hose them down,’ added Guillaume, picking an imaginary fleck of dust from his robe. ‘And remind me next year to be more careful with the guest list.’

  Back at the party Cassandra took her mobile out of her white clutch bag and propped it under her neck. Everything was turning out more beautifully than she’d hoped. She’d had one agenda for this evening but this was like a bonus prize.

  ‘Can I have the entertainment desk, please?’

  ‘Jacqui speaking. How can I help you?’

  ‘I have a story that I think might be of interest,’ she said, looking at her watch. It would only be 8 p.m. in London; perhaps not too late to make the late edition of the Sunday papers.

  ‘Who about?’ asked the journalist.

  ‘Clover Connor and Ste Donahue.’

  ‘Keep talking.’

  ‘They are on Guillaume Riche’s yacht in Greece taking enough cocaine to build a snowdrift. Tonight the pair of them collapsed at a fashion party after overdosing and have been forcibly removed. Clover was completely naked when they dragged her out.’

  ‘Without decent pictures I’m afraid we can’t offer you much.’

  ‘Money is not necessary,’ said Cassandra shortly. ‘Just make sure you mention in the copy that Clover Connor is the new face of Milford.’

  She flipped down the phone and tossed it into her bag. Spotting a silver atomizer inside, she spritzed her body with Fracas. Then she shrugged and fished the mobile out again. While she was at it she might as well call Page Six. Just a quick call, she couldn’t be long. She had other things to attend to tonight.

  On the other side of the villa, Alex Jalid knew that the party was just getting started. Most of the people from the Le Soleil delegation had already gone back to the yacht, so now it was really time to have some fun. He had been eyed up all evening by an outrageously good-looking brunette who was now naked except for a slim-fitting pair of white trousers. When their eyes locked again, Alex realized it was a call to action. His senses blurred by alcohol, he knew there was no turning back as the stranger began to walk towards him smiling. It was now dark, and the mood of the party had changed; it was now prickling with sex and promise. The handsome stranger took hold of Alex’s hand and whispered into his ear. There was a discreet little club in a backstreet not too far away where they could really enjoy themselves. They took separate golf carts into town; you couldn’t be too careful and he was right. When they stumbled out of the club two hours later, his arms draped around his companion, he was too drunk to be cautious, too high to hear the gentle whir of a camera shutter. He was too driven by lust to notice anything else as he spent a sexually-charged ten minutes in a doorway saying a passionate goodnight to his new friend.

  ‘Good morning, Alex,’ said C
assandra, taking a small sip of freshly-pressed raspberry juice. ‘And where is the lovely Tania today?’

  Alex slid into the booth opposite her and took a croissant off a bone-china plate. It was indeed a beautiful morning and the sun was already beating down on the deck canopy under which they were being served breakfast.

  ‘Still in bed, where I’ll be in about five minutes, but I’m starving so I had to surface for some food. I waited five minutes for room service and nothing happened. I wouldn’t get that back home.’

  ‘Well, it’s fortuitous that you’re here because I want to talk to you.’

  ‘Really?’ said Alex in a bored voice, pushing a pair of sunglasses down over his bleary eyes.

  Cassandra took a moment to look at him. Alex was such a good-looking boy. Dark brown hair, strong elegant features and liquid chocolate eyes. His bare chest was tanned and toned, his six-pack rippling over the top of his surfer shorts.

  ‘Why don’t you come with me?’ said Cassandra, briskly dabbing her mouth with a napkin.

  ‘Can’t you see I’m busy?’ he said petulantly, tearing his croissant in half.

  ‘Alex, I think you’ll find this is important,’ she replied, meeting his gaze.

  Sighing, he pulled himself up and followed Cassandra down to her stateroom and flopped into a leather club chair in the corner.

  ‘So what is it?’ he asked impatiently.

  ‘As you might guess, as an editor-in-chief of a major magazine, I never switch off. My mobile is on 24/7. I check my emails every day even on holiday.’

  Alex looked at her as if she were a halfwit.

  ‘And?’

  What a pompous little prick, thought Cassandra.

  ‘And this morning a set of images was sent to me by my friend Gary. He owns a photographic agency which deals largely in red-carpet events, but occasionally freelance snappers approach Gary with more scurrilous stuff.’

  ‘If there’s a point, I hope we’re coming to it soon,’ said Alex, rolling his eyes.

  ‘It seems this trip has been targeted by various paparazzi,’ said Cassandra boldly. She took a brown A4 envelope from the dressing table and handed it to Alex. ‘There’s a few long-lens bits and pieces of Clover sunbathing on deck. Some of Serena and Tom when we went to Santorini and of me getting off Le Soleil last night. It’s all pretty harmless stuff except the pictures in that envelope.’

  Alex opened the envelope, tipping the contents on his lap. There were a dozen 10 × 12 inch snaps that had been printed off in Le Soleil’s communications room, and as Alex shuffled through them, his face crumpled in shock and horror.

  ‘At first I wasn’t sure it was you,’ said Cassandra. ‘The quality could be better after all, but I think when you look at them from a certain angle it’s quite clear, don’t you? Not to mention the fact that that jacket you’re wearing – that you were wearing – is quite distinctive. Gary wanted me to tell him who the person in the photographs is. I suspect he already knows and simply wants me to confirm.’

  Cassandra had the curious sensation of being able to read someone else’s thoughts simply from watching his face. First Alex had that look of someone being caught out, swiftly followed by a glistening sweat trickling down his brow. She could see every emotion, shame, fear and panic written across every inch of his handsome face.

  She took the prints from him and looked at them as if she was considering them for the first time. In the first shot she could see Michaelis, the Greek rent boy she had hired to do the job, threading his arms around Alex’s waist as they came out of a discreet Mykonos Town gay bar. The next two pictures showed them kissing. In the fourth photograph Michaelis was on his knees in front of Alex. The grainy image was poor quality but the photograph could not disguise Alex’s face twisted with delight.

  ‘I don’t know who this is,’ said Alex finally putting the pictures calmly back in the envelope. Ah, now the denial phase, thought Cassandra and had to stop herself from grinning with glee. The photographer had produced better pictures than she could have hoped considering they were taken from a distance and as for Michaelis, he had worked wonders getting Alex so out of it that he’d made an intimate moment in a semi-public place possible. It had helped immeasurably that Tania had been taken out of the picture by the sheer fluke of Clover and Ste’s timely collapse.

  ‘Come now,’ said Cassandra firmly, ‘to anybody who knows you, who knew what you were wearing that night, it’s obvious it’s you.’

  Alex sat silently on the chair, his face white.

  Cassandra knew Michaelis wasn’t Alex’s first gay lover. Nick Bowen had uncovered a more long-standing relationship with a New York model-bartender called Bradley Mathis. Bradley and Alex had been together for six months before Alex had called it off at the beginning of summer, fearing his tony college friends might have got wind of it. Nick had shown him a photograph of Bradley; tall, dark and handsome. At least Cassandra had known his type.

  ‘What do you want me to tell Gary? You can see what sort of position this puts me in.’

  ‘It’s not me!’ said Alex, his voice raised.

  ‘Alex, if I say I don’t know who these pictures are of, who knows who else Gary might ask? Someone who doesn’t know you, someone who doesn’t understand how your family might react.’

  ‘Do you think he’s asked anyone else?’

  Cassandra shrugged. ‘I’m guessing he’s sent them to me to confirm because he thinks he knows who it is, he knows I’m on Le Soleil with you and he knows the shit he’ll be in if he gets it wrong. But if I don’t respond to him quickly he’ll certainly snoop around. Believe me they’ll find your friend in the photograph and give him a big cheque to talk.’

  ‘My father can buy your friend’s company,’ snorted Alex, his face in an angry scowl. ‘My father can make anything go away.’

  Cassandra went up to him and touched his shoulder.

  ‘The question is, do you want your father to know?’

  Alex ran his hand through his hair and exhaled, his eyebrows knotted together in concentration. It was several seconds before he spoke.

  ‘O K. Yes, it is me in the photograph,’ he said quietly. ‘Yes, I’m gay. Yes, I have silly, star-struck girlfriends who don’t ask too many questions to cover up the fact that I am gay.’

  He stood up and faced Cassandra. ‘Being gay might not be such a big deal in your world of fashion but to my family it would be a very big deal indeed. Do you know that there are still laws against homosexuality in over a third of countries around the world today? My country is one of them. Do you think I want to be gay? Do you think I want to wear it like a badge?’

  ‘So your family don’t know,’ said Cassandra, making her voice sound as sympathetic as possible.

  ‘My stepmother suspects I’m sure but my father doesn’t know. As a matter of honour my father will cut me off without a penny.’

  He walked to the bar, twisted open a bottle of mineral water and gulped heavily, tears falling down his cheeks.

  For a second Cassandra felt guilty. He was a playboy, he was careless and arrogant, but he couldn’t help his sexuality. Then she remembered what a little prick he had been earlier and pushed away any feelings of sympathy.

  ‘I can get back to Gary and tell him he’s mistaken and that it’s just a couple of male models, nobody of interest. It might generate a bit of gossip but nobody will be surprised this goes on in Mykonos in party season. It’s a nothing story.’

  Alex looked up, his face full of hope.

  ‘So you’ll help me?’

  She nodded and smiled. ‘I’ll help you Alex. Who knows? One day you might be able to help me.’

  34

  No one could believe it. The guests at the Milford relaunch party were genuinely taken aback at how fantastic the company’s revamped Bond Street store looked. It was a reasonable reaction, especially from the few who had ever ventured inside the dusty original. It had been so faded and unremarkable, even the most regular visitors to Mayfair’s famous sho
pping street would be hard pressed to remember it even being there. Now the Milford store was the talk of London Fashion Week; journalists whispered it was the work of uber-architect Peter Marino, the king of the luxury goods store who had redesigned everything from Barneys to the Dior store on Avenue Montaigne, while fashionistas wondered if, in the Milford bag, they had finally found an alternative to their beloved Hermès Birkins.

  Up on the mezzanine floor, Emma looked down on the packed shop floor below her, sipping a flute of champagne to take the edge off the adrenaline buzz coursing round her body. It really did look like a different place compared to the shop she had first encountered six months ago. Now it was sleek, chic and luxurious, the perfect embodiment of the new Milford brand. In actual fact it hadn’t been overhauled by Peter Marino – the cost of a superstar architect would have broken the bank. Instead, Emma had drafted in a small but creative firm of architects who had followed her brief to the letter; keeping the elegance you’d expect from a brand with Milford’s British heritage, but giving it a much more edgy, contemporary feel. Now the store felt like a colonial country club with its walnut panelling, brass ceiling fans and wooden floorboards. A sweep of staircase, lavishly carpeted in white, led to the mezzanine floor where they had created a private salon for bespoke clients with velvet tiger-print chaises longues and a bar dispensing drinks. Even empty, the shop looked glamorous but with the hundreds of wide-eyed fashion players crammed inside, not to mention the string quartet who were playing in a corner and the white-tailed waiters dispensing raspberry martinis, it looked like a scene from White Mischief.

  ‘I hope you’re feeling pleased with yourself,’ said Ruan, climbing the stairs to join Emma at her lookout post.

  ‘You do realize that this is the first party I’ve ever thrown in my life?’

  ‘Well, what a way to start,’ he laughed. ‘According to Zoe, simply everyone is here.’ To give credit where it was due, Zoe had done an amazing job with the guest list; the right mix of money, celebrity and press. Apparently she had secured the attendance of several key society people by promising them a Milford bag and once they were on board, the rest of London Fashion Week had followed as word trickled out that it was the week’s hot party.