by Victoria Fox
‘I do.’ He slammed the door and came round to her side. ‘The attention over Selznick—’ was that a grimace as he said Peter’s name, or had she imagined it? ‘—will worsen before it improves.’ On the warm wind Lori caught the aroma of JB’s skin, the same as it had ever been: the same as that first day, the same as La Côte. ‘A fortnight of troubling publicity, then it’s over.’
He seemed certain. How many other La Lumière girls had JB offered this to?
They were parked outside a low-lying structure with an ornamental front. Steps led up to a grand entrance, on either side of which were poised two stone-carved sea monsters, Oriental in style, with ridged heads and tongues like fire.
‘Follow me.’
Inside, the air conditioning was prickly cool. Behind a marble counter, a smiling woman in a blue uniform greeted them.
‘Welcome to Cacatra.’
‘Lori will take Villa 19,’ he informed her. The woman appeared fleetingly surprised before vanishing wordlessly into an adjacent room. JB put one arm on the counter. Lori caught his eye. They watched each other a moment.
‘Enjoy your stay, Ms Garcia.’ The uniform reappeared and a card was passed to Lori. She reached to take it but JB claimed it first, slipping it into the top pocket of his shirt and patting it once as if to make sure it was there.
Set apart from the rest of the accommodation, Villa 19 was positioned yards from Cacatra’s easternmost tip, where the rocks ended abruptly and plunged into turbulent sea.
JB brought the vehicle to rest a short distance away. ‘Dramatic, isn’t it?’
To Lori it was the perfect word. ‘I love it.’
The villa was sparsely furnished, rustic in style and charming for those reasons. Lori felt inexplicably at home, and, entering the master bedroom, she saw why. The windows at the foot of the bed were thrown open, crisp white curtains dancing in the breeze. From here, high up, there was nothing to see but endless ocean. As she gazed out at the view she knew it from her fantasies. This was the place she had visited when she was a girl, immersed in her books, wishing for a future … quite simply, it was the same. The likeness was irrefutable, a cousin of déjà vu but with none of the shadows that cast it into doubt.
‘We used to stay here when I was a boy,’ said JB. ‘In this villa.’
She turned, taken aback by his honesty.
‘Every summer.’ He had his eyes open but something in him was dreaming. ‘My parents came. They would let me join them.’
It struck her as an odd way of putting it.
‘Some years I’d bring a friend. A girl I knew from our village …’ His gaze refocused. ‘It was a long time ago.’
Lori waited. ‘Are they happy memories?’
He blinked, looked away. ‘I’ll leave you to settle in.’
The moment was lost if ever it had been there. JB tapped the doorframe once, with his knuckle, an absent-minded, affectionate gesture. The ghost of a smile played on his top lip, pulling gently at the scar like a child tugging his mother’s arm, pleading for a game.
Reuben van der Meyde’s mansion was in its own territory, positioned above a private horseshoe of pale sand, metres from the beach. Lori recognised it from the pictures she had seen.
‘Cacatra is Reuben’s base,’ qualified JB, ‘as it is for me. The rest of the time, he travels.’
She wanted to know where JB lived on the island. Was it on a cliff edge, like Villa 19? Or less imaginative, like here: a gentle gradient chosen over a sudden drop? Was Rebecca Stuttgart there too, waiting for her husband to return?
At the top of the winding stone steps, an irate-looking woman appeared. Small, flinty eyes, pinched with suspicion, flitted between JB and Lori. A boy of about six trailed at her heels.
JB’s face broke into a grin, an easy sort she’d never before seen him wear. ‘Hey, buddy—’ he ruffled the child’s hair ‘—what’s happening with you?’
The boy looked up at him adoringly. ‘I went swimming.’
‘Yeah?’
‘And I saw fishes.’
‘What kind?’
‘Whales.’
‘Seriously? I don’t think you’re being serious.’
The boy laughed, high and excited, and bobbed a little dance, which Lori noticed made JB’s eyes light up. ‘I did see one,’ the boy said. ‘It was big as a house!’
‘Not this house, I bet.’
‘Bigger.’
‘Mr Moreau.’ The woman cut in, her accent clipped English as she wiped her hands efficiently on her skirt. ‘Can I be of assistance?’
JB rested a hand on the back of the child’s small neck, his thumb fondly stroking the skin there. ‘Reuben’s expecting us.’
‘Mr V!’ Inside, the woman bellowed into the mammoth atrium, sending the last letter bouncing violently off the walls. The boy was clearly accustomed to such a summons. Unfazed, he was fidgeting with the sails on a toy boat.
Lori bent to speak to him. ‘What’s your name?’
He gazed up at her, unsure.
‘I’m Lori,’ she offered.
‘Don’t frighten him,’ said the woman, placing a proprietorial arm across his narrow shoulders and pulling him close. ‘He’s shy.’
‘JB.’ Reuben van der Meyde charged into the lobby, his bulk and vigour a marked contrast to the prim manners of his housekeeper. He was shorter than Lori had believed, and wider, with pink calves and freckled forearms. His chest was bare and round like a barrel, covered faintly in coils of silvery-red hair. He didn’t look like one of the richest men in the world: he looked like a kid with attitude who’d got lucky. She remembered having the same impression when she’d seen him at the Frontline Fashion event in Vegas.
‘Meet the one and only Lori Garcia,’ JB said. ‘She’s one of ours.’ There was a sliver of a pause before he tacked on, ‘At La Lumière.’
‘Glad to meet you.’ Reuben’s lizard eyes raked her up and down. Lori was hot in her jeans, had been wishing she’d worn something cooler, but was now glad of the extra layer.
‘Likewise,’ she returned. Over his shoulder, the housekeeper was regarding her frostily.
‘Tell me what you make of Cacatra,’ Reuben puffed, readying himself for her eulogy. His South African accent made the word sound like someone sharpening carving knives. ‘First impressions are everything.’
‘It’s stunning.’
‘Isn’t it.’ It wasn’t a question. He grinned and she saw he’d had his teeth capped, an expensive, subtle job. ‘Whatever you need while you’re here, let me know.’ He winked. ‘Anything for a Valerie Girl.’
She noted the implication she wasn’t the first he had welcomed.
‘Join us tonight.’ Reuben threw the next bit over his shoulder, not bothering to address the woman directly. ‘You got that, Margaret?’ Lori caught the prickle of dislike between them.
‘Do you want to see my sailboats, Daddy?’ The little boy stepped forward, tugging on Reuben’s shorts. ‘I’ve got ten of them, all reds and yellows.’
Instantly the woman called Margaret softened. ‘Not now, sweetheart,’ she said, steering him back. ‘Your father’s working.’ But she threw a glance at Reuben, like it was a test.
If it was, he failed. ‘Later,’ Reuben informed the boy, with an awkward pat on the head. Sensing this was insufficient, he added, ‘We’ll go hunting on the beach.’
‘For turtles?’
‘Whatever you like.’
The boy looked sad. But as Reuben ushered them both across the lobby JB must have said something, made things better, because the child emitted a burst of laughter.
Outside, Lori was momentarily blinded by sunlight.
‘You haven’t seen the island till you’ve seen it from the water,’ Reuben was saying, rubbing his hands together as he gestured to where a sleek speedboat was moored in the shallows. In true entrepreneurial style, she saw he was able to jump from one thing to the next instantly and without reflection. He led the way.
The Frenchman didn’t
follow. ‘I’m needed elsewhere,’ he told her. ‘The boy’s name is Ralph. He’s quiet, but give him time.’
‘You’re good with him.’
‘He reminds me of someone.’ JB backed away. ‘Don’t let Reuben take you too far out.’
Lori lost track of time on Cacatra. A week passed. Then another, and another, until she woke one morning and realised she had been on the island for over a month. Minutes, hours, days had lost their meaning. She was swimming, walking and diving, enjoying the yawning blue sky and fresh salty sea. She slept deep, untroubled sleep and woke feeling alert and contented.
The conversations she was obliged to have with Desideria and Jacqueline were unwelcome interruptions to her routine, reminders that this wasn’t real life. Desideria was keen for her to return. LA missed her, she said, and so did Dante and Pearl. But right now she could imagine little that appealed to her less than returning to the thrust and noise of the city—not when she could be here, a capsule of perfection in an imperfect world.
There was no Rebecca Stuttgart. JB’s wife was in Canada visiting her mother. Lori told herself it was irrelevant: no matter where the woman was, she was still JB’s wife, and no matter how much time had passed, JB had still lied to and humiliated her in the worst possible way.
Yet, as the days mounted, the island cast its slow, creeping spell. She felt herself breaking through the vine of her defences, the one she’d grown, remembering reading a tale with her mama when she was little about a prince who’d slayed foliage dense as wire, thick as a wall, to reach the castle of his sleeping love. All the uncertainty of those first months with JB, the wonderings and the what-ifs, returned, more demanding of answers than ever. Life became a basic dichotomy: the hours he spent with her and the hours he didn’t.
Once, Lori had been exploring a deserted cove and cut her foot on a rock. Bleeding, without shade, and dehydrated in the heat of the midday sun, she’d called for help, aware the likelihood of being heard was minimal. And yet she knew, simply, he would come.
JB’s boat had slipped into view, closing in till expertly he dropped anchor, jumping into the shallows and even though the bottoms of his trousers were rolled above the ankle they got wet. He’d handled her foot lightly, cradling it like a damaged bird, and had removed his shirt, binding the wound tight so the cotton turned red.
‘It’s going to scar.’
He’d helped her up, one solid arm round her waist. ‘Is that OK?’
Lori could feel his muscles, his skin. Yes, it was OK. It was OK.
Now, as Lori fingered the promised scar on her ankle, she hoped it would always be there. A reminder of the time they had shared, a mark on her body to prove it.
39
Aurora
Clearly her name still carried currency where it mattered. Aurora was pleased at how easily Rita had been able to secure their place on the exclusive island. ‘Cacatra?’ Rita was surprised when she suggested it. ‘Why? I was thinking Barbados, the Maldives …?’
‘Why not?’ she replied easily. ‘It’s the hottest place to be right now.’
‘It’s a rehab spa, Aurora. You don’t need that.’
‘I know I don’t.’
‘So why are we doing it?’
‘You asked me where I wanted to go, and now I’m telling you.’ She sounded snappish—it was an easier, lazier way of getting things done. The fact remained that Rita was her agent and she was the one calling the shots.
‘What do your parents think?’
Aurora shrugged, irritated by the reference. The less she thought about them, the better. ‘It’s cool.’
Tom and Sherilyn would be too distracted to enquire after her plans anyway—her mom was now house-bound, unable to leave the confines of her bedroom, while Tom was in the thick of it on tour—and that was exactly how Aurora wanted it. Several times since returning from school she had talked herself into voicing her fears to Tom, only to talk herself out of it again. It didn’t occur to her to broach it with Sherilyn, because they’d never really been close about stuff. It was she and Tom who shared that bond: Tom who she told when she’d started her periods; Tom she ran to when she’d had a fight with her friends; Tom whose shoulder she cried on when things got tough. But this wasn’t just a boohoo moment, nor was it anything she could accurately label and go to him with. She needed to find out more. She needed to get the facts.
She needed to see JB Moreau.
They arrived on Cacatra at the weekend. Aurora was tired and tetchy after the journey—a mask for her nerves—and, now she was here, started to wonder if it was all a mistake. What exactly was she looking for? What did she expect to find?
The women were taken across the shallows to a tranquil villa, raised on stilts of wood. Rita thought it about the most peaceful place she had been. The view of the ocean was wide and uninterrupted. Below, in clear water, tiny fish darted across the alabaster sand.
Aurora seemed too distracted to take it in.
‘Are you all right?’ asked Rita. ‘You haven’t stopped fidgeting since we landed.’
‘Sure.’ She wandered on to the veranda. ‘I’m fine.’
‘Do you like it?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Is that all you’re going to say? “Yeah”?’
Aurora didn’t seem to hear. ‘Yeah.’
Surreptitiously Rita rolled her eyes. Having kids had never been on her agenda. It was easy to remember why when dealing with belligerent teenagers. ‘I’m going for a swim.’
‘Cool.’ Aurora turned her back on the view. Rita thought how very pretty she was, even when she was frowning. Maybe she needed this trip more than either of them realised.
‘Why don’t you take a look around?’ Rita smiled. ‘See what van der Meyde’s hiding.’
Never mind big fat sweaty Reuben van der Meyde. It was JB Aurora had to find.
The island was bigger than she’d pictured. It wasn’t going to be easy. But, then, how had she thought it would unfold? Had she imagined she’d just turn up on Cacatra, be shown straight to him and then demand he tell her what he’d been discussing in a conversation he’d had some months previously and which he’d believed to be private? The idea was laughable. Not to mention how foolish he’d made her feel last time they’d met.
As Aurora crossed the walkway she spied a pleasure cruiser departing the shore, manned by an actor couple, A-list sweethearts who had recently got married. They didn’t look like newly-weds—both sat to the rear of the boat, a gaping space between them. The woman had her chin cupped in her palm, deep in thought as she gazed at the water.
‘Do you need anything, Ms Nash?’ She almost ran straight into the guy. He was dressed in a blue uniform and was grinning fixedly at her, robotic in his willingness to please. For morons like you to leave me alone, she wanted to retort. Instead, she decided to take advantage of the offer. ‘I’m here to see JB Moreau. It’s important I speak with him.’
The man was charmed by her beauty. Hundreds of gorgeous famous women came to Cacatra, but rarely were they more captivating in real life than they were in pictures. Still, it didn’t change the fact that Mr Moreau was unavailable—no matter how pretty Aurora Nash was or how she rated her chances. ‘If there’s anything I can help you with …?’
‘I’d prefer to see him.’
‘Of course.’ The girl’s resolve, the obstinate set of her mouth, told him she was here on personal business. It wasn’t the first time a cast-off lover had come to Cacatra to corner Moreau. He’d pass on the message. ‘I’ll ask him to contact you directly.’
She nodded, mumbling her thanks and padding off up the beach.
Cacatra was the world’s most opulent playground for grown-ups. Aurora surmised from the accommodation that there couldn’t be more than fifty or sixty people staying at any given time, including staff. As well as the blue uniforms she saw others, too, wandering between the white-block buildings: balding, bespectacled men reminiscent of Dr Lux, and women with tight-wound buns and serious expressions.
But the expanse of the island made it easy to become lost and to feel entirely alone. Celebrities paid for solitude. It was impossible to get it anywhere else.
Settling on a patch of sand, she listened to the gentle waves rippling lazily on to shore. The sand was damp and compacted between her toes. She breathed in deeply through her nose and for a moment wished Pascale were here. Rather, she wished they could erase the past six months and be as they used to be. The friendship with Pascale had been the closest she’d ever known. She’d never had a friend like that before and doubted she ever would again: someone integral in every way, an ally, them against the world. But like all intense things it had burned itself out. In the final weeks of term the girls had barely said two words to each other. Aurora had suspected Pascale was keeping things from her, paranoid because Pascale had always kept things from her, hadn’t she, so why was this any different? But it felt different. Ever since Capri.
Privacy, retreat, loneliness. Looking out across the liquid distance, Aurora had never before felt so by herself.
She was distracted by activity at the other end of the beach. A couple were rounding the cliffs. Or maybe they weren’t a couple. The woman, she couldn’t see who it was, held her arms round her as if she were cold, or self-conscious. Wild black hair whipped in the ocean breeze. She was wearing a pair of frayed denim shorts and a thin vest, no bra. And the man…
Aurora put her hand to her forehead to counter the glare.
It was him.
She sprang to her feet. As they came closer she realised the woman was Lori Garcia, the Valerie Girl. Back at St Agnes everyone banged on about how glamorous she was, but in real life she was less glamour—the word didn’t do her justice—and more raw, absolute beauty. The sun was dipping, casting her skin a rich brown. Her eyes, as they met Aurora’s, were raven-black.
JB seemed taken aback when he saw her, managing in time to produce the conceited grin he had accosted her with on Capri. She wanted to slap it off his face. She hated his smugness, the fact he was always making out as if he was privy to a joke she didn’t get.
