by Karen Swan
He nodded his assent and they took it in turns using the bathroom, changing into fresh clothes. Cress shrugged on a short navy piqué tennis dress; Tor stepped into a red-and-blue-printed jersey dress with fluted cap sleeves and shirring at the shoulders that pulled open the front and made her breasts look full and peachy – for once.
As they trundled back down through the trees, Tor glimpsed a herd of fallow deer, well away from the cricket pavilion. Just as well, she thought. Cricket balls could do serious damage. She wondered whether any of the heads on the wall at the Lodge came to be there from sustaining grave cricketing injuries, rather than lead shot.
A group of green-and-white-striped deckchairs had been opened out in front of the veranda, looking like a flotilla of yachts in Cowes harbour, and were gradually filling up with lithe, tanned bodies.
Cress and Tor grabbed another drink each and sat down. The men had changed into their whites and were standing in a gaggle on the pitch, tossing a coin.
‘I know everyone goes on about men in uniform,’ Cress murmured, ‘but give me a bloke in cricket whites any day of the week.’
The OEs won the toss and opted to bowl first. Harry, naturally, was the fast bowler. Tor felt sorry for the batsman stepping up to him. Stocky, with a tummy that protruded over the waistband of his trousers, a ruddy complexion and a handlebar moustache, he was as far from the glistening, hard-muscled Adonis hurling a ball at 90 m.p.h. at him as it was possible to be.
She looked around at the other guests. Laetitia Latham was still holding court, talking to two brunettes whom Tor vaguely recognized.
‘Cress, do you know the women Laetitia’s talking to? They seem familiar to me.’
Cress twisted in her chair.
‘Umm, mmmm. I know what you mean. But I can’t place them off the top of my head. Give me a few minutes. It’ll come to me.’
They watched the action on the pitch. Despite the batsman’s inferior presentation, he proved a formidable player and managed thirty-two runs before Harry bowled a yorker that caught him LBW.
The second batsman – same belly, rough hands and a receding hairline – walked on to polite, slightly patronizing applause which died when he promptly hit a huge six off the first ball. His second sliced deep to cow corner and had the OEs running like billy-o to stop him before he ran a third.
A player in the deep cast an impressive flat throw that covered the outfield, and was caught by Guy Latham at the bowler’s end to stop the runs.
‘Thank God for that!’ Cress said. ‘We’ll be out here all night if they carry on scoring runs like that.’
Tor shaded her eyes and tried to see the deep fielder more clearly.
‘It was the tennis,’ Cress whispered.
‘Huh?’ Tor said, not paying the least bit attention.
‘Yep, definitely. I remember her glasses.’
Tor turned and looked at her. Cress widened her eyes and looked at Tor as though she were an idiot.
‘You asked me who those women were? They were sitting next to James White at the tennis.’
‘Oh. Were they?’
‘Right before you slugged him,’ Cress wanted to add, but didn’t.
Tor looked over at the two women. They were still chatting to Laetitia. A couple of young boys were chucking a cricket ball at each other nearby.
‘I wonder if one of them is his girlfriend,’ Cress hissed. ‘Now that Coralie’s out of the pictu—’
‘They aren’t,’ Tor said tersely.
Cress shifted in her seat and looked at her.
‘How do you know they’re not?’ she frowned.
‘Because Kate and I saw him in Burnham a couple of weeks ago. He’s with Amelia Abingdon.’
Cress’s jaw dropped.
‘No!’
‘Yes.’
‘No!’
‘Sly old dog.’
‘That’s just what I said.’
They both looked up. Kate was standing in front of them, looking achingly glamorous in a floppy chocolate wide-brimmed hat and white linen palazzo pants.
‘You’re here,’ Tor cried.
‘We didn’t hear you,’ Cress said. ‘Where’s the chopper?’
Kate inclined her head. ‘Up at the main house. Well, we couldn’t very well interrupt play, could we?’
They all kissed their hellos, and Kate sank down into the chair next to Tor, as Monty jogged over with a drink for her.
‘Hi girls,’ he said.
‘Are you playing?’ Cress asked absently.
‘No!’ he crossed his fingers one over the other in the sign of the cross. ‘I didn’t go to Eton, foul fiend.’
Cress laughed.
‘Sorry, hon. Forgot. Try not to feel inferior.’
‘Thanks,’ he said, bashfully. ‘So what’s going on? What’s the score?’
‘No idea! And who bloody cares?’ Cress said. ‘I was just finding out that James White has scored with Amelia Abingdon.’
‘Amelia?’ Monty said questioningly. ‘No way. They . . .’ A cricket ball whistled past, narrowly avoiding his head. ‘Hey! What’s the bloody idea?’
The ball hit the strut of the pavilion behind him and trickled back to his feet. He turned around and picked it up, just as the two young boys ran over.
‘We’re so sorry, sir,’ said the younger, dark-haired one. ‘We didn’t . . . Uncle Monty! It’s you!’
‘Max!’ Monty said, picking the boy up and spinning him around. He put him down and gave the older boy – probably sixteen or so – a solid handshake. ‘How are you, Billy?’
‘Very well, thanks, sir,’ Billy nodded. Tor admired his manners.
‘Are your mothers here?’ Monty asked, looking around, his eyes coming to rest upon them as he said it. ‘Lily! Anna!’ he called over.
The two brunettes both broke into wide smiles when they saw him and skittered over, leaving Laetitia alone.
Kate got up as elegantly as she could manage from the deckchair and greeted the two women with friendly kisses. It was hard to know which one to look at first. One was a lissom five foot ten in a silk tea dress, the other had dynamite curves and a glossy tan. They made a formidable pair.
Monty stood there with a heavy hand on each of the boys’ shoulders.
‘You realize your boys damn near killed me with a cricket ball just now,’ he teased.
The taller brunette looked at Billy scoldingly. ‘Don’t tell me you missed, Billy. How long have we been practising for? I told you, you may only get one shot.’ She looked back at Monty with a wicked look in her eye and winked.
They all guffawed.
‘Charming!’ Monty said, ruffling Billy’s hair.
There was a sudden rush of activity as gallon teapots and platters of cucumber sandwiches were brought out on to the tables. It was tea-time. The players jogged over, jostling the group slightly as they tramped through to the dressing rooms to take off the hot, heavy kit.
‘Cress, Tor,’ Monty said after they’d passed. ‘I’d like you to meet Anna – who is Max’s mother – and Lily – who is Billy’s mother. Ladies, Cress and Tor are friends from London.’
The two brunettes smiled. ‘There is actually more to us than being the boys’ mothers,’ Lily said dryly.
‘I’m sure,’ Tor smiled back, as they shook hands. ‘We get it all the time too.’
Monty groaned. ‘Urgh. Mothers’ etiquette. I can’t do anything right.’
‘Once you accept that, you’re halfway to a quieter life,’ said a voice behind them. They all turned. ‘I see everybody’s already met.’
James was standing there, his cap in hand and raking a hand through his dark hair. His cheeks were flushed and his sweaty shirt, streaked with red, was clinging to him in the heat.
‘Daddy!’ Max cried. ‘You did such a great throw. It was awesome.’
‘Yeah,’ Billy agreed. ‘It was wicked, Uncle Jamie. Can we do some practice later?’
‘We’ll see,’ James smiled, looking up from the boys and locki
ng eyes with Tor. He shrugged, indicating his dishevelled appearance.
‘I would kiss you hello, but I fear it would be a far less pleasurable experience for you, than for me.’ He looked at the group, trying to include them all in the comment, before finding his gaze magnetically brought back to Tor again.
‘Uh, so . . . sorry! Sorry!’ Cress said, waving her hands in the air. ‘Run me through this again. Max is your son, James. And Anna, you are Max’s mum, so that means you are . . .’ She looked over at Anna, who was busy watching James and Tor. She had seen the look he’d given her.
‘Anna is my, er – my ex-wife,’ James said awkwardly. ‘And Billy is my nephew. And Lily here is my little sister.’
‘And so is your husband playing?’ Cress asked Lily.
Lily shifted position. ‘No. He didn’t go to Eton.’
‘Ha! Monty neither,’ Cress snorted. ‘They can form a rival gang.’
Tor couldn’t help but sneak a look at Anna, and was surprised to find her already staring back. So she was the ex-wife. She knew she’d recognized her. She’d seen her photographed with him in society magazines a few years back.
Anna tipped her beautiful head to one side. ‘Do you live in London?’ she asked, her voice as silky and mellifluous as a negligée.
‘Not any more. We’ve just moved to north Norfolk.’
‘How interesting. That’s where we are. Where are you exactly?’
‘Burnham Market.’
Anna smiled quietly. ‘We’re in Burnham Overy Thorpe.’ The two women weren’t more than three miles from each other, but Tor could feel that an invitation to coffee would not be forthcoming.
‘Gosh,’ Tor said, struggling for something to say. ‘There’s a super pub there, isn’t there?’
‘Yes,’ Anna smiled tightly. ‘But we don’t go there. My husband and I.’ Tor felt chastened. Of course she didn’t. She didn’t look like a pub sort of woman.
Tor decided to follow Cress’s lead. ‘Is your husband here? Your new one, I mean?’ Christ! That had come out wrong.
Anna looked at her coolly. ‘He’s coming back from the States. He’ll be here tonight. And your husband – is he here?’
A piercing silence fell over the group. Cress, Kate, Monty, James – all of them hesitated over whether to speak for Tor, or let her say it herself.
Tor got in first.
‘No. He’s not . . . My husband is . . . he died, a few months ago.’ She managed to keep her voice consistent, although she couldn’t maintain eye contact.
Ever alert to her friend’s distress, Cress stepped in to divert sole attention from Tor.
‘So, boys – which one of you can show me how to do a proper serve?’
‘A serve? But we don’t have any tennis balls here,’ Max replied earnestly.
‘That’s OK. We can use this cricket ball.’
Billy laughed. ‘You’ll break your wrist trying to serve with that.’
‘I don’t think so, Billy. I’m a tough old bird. Just ask your uncle. Monty – give us a hand, would you?’
Chapter Twenty-five
The day beat on under the hot blue sky. The women lathered themselves with suntan lotion and made like onions, gradually peeling off layers; the men stood around drinking beer and either reddened or tanned before Cress’s eyes, depending upon their colouring. James was one of the brown ones; poor Monty was not. His hair was cut in such a close crop; Kate kept trying to rub spots of cream into his scalp but he seemed irritated by her fussing and moved away to chat to the players.
The OEs had bowled the Locals out for two hundred and nine; and after tea, they swapped sides, so that all but two of the OEs were constantly in the bar. Cress reckoned that was why they’d chosen to bat last – nothing to do with strategy and knowing what you were running against.
The ambient noise level was steadily increasing as the beer took hold, and she saw a few couples randomly straggling off for various mini-breaks before casually returning twenty minutes later. She wondered what Mark and the kids were up to. He’d said he was going to take them to Richmond Park for a picnic – said they’d think of her if they bagged a deer. Ha bloody ha.
Cress’s mobile rang and she moved away from the group to get better reception. Nobody noticed. Lily and Kate were catching up on last summer on the beach in Norfolk, and Anna and Tor were now getting on famously, discussing the local schools and where to go for the best langoustines and who stocked Joseph. Everything but James, in fact.
‘Yes?’ Cress yelled into the receiver.
‘Cress? It’s Rosie.’
‘Yes, Rosie?’
‘Sorry to bother you on the weekend, but we’ve had a development.’
Cress pressed the phone closer to her ear. ‘Go on,’ she urged.
‘Joe in the post room has got a mate who works from Fulham. He’s not in the sorting office, he works in the special deliveries section, but he’s managed to get some info for us.’
‘Go on, go on,’ Cress said, stalking the grounds like a ghillie.
‘Well, it seems the address given is not actually a Royal Mail PO box number. It’s a private company. He thought it looked like one from a place called the Box Shop. They’re based in Fulham too, just off the Munster Road. I’ve got a number. Do you want it?’
‘Yes, but give it to me slowly. I’m in the middle of grass. Not a fucking biro in sight. I’ll have to punch it direct into my phone.’
She took down the number, one digit at a time.
‘Thanks, Rosie. I don’t know what I’d do without you. And tell Joe, on the QT, there’ll be a thirty per cent mark-up in his take-home next month. I’ll speak to accounts on Monday.’
‘Sure thing. Have fun.’
Cress hung up and looked back at the party. She’d wandered several hundred yards away already, and decided to go for a walk. She needed to think about her next move. She had to close in on this author, find out who he was and find out the nature of his relationship with Brendan Hillier. Was the dedication page in The Wrong Prince some kind of threat? Was the author letting her know they knew about her and Harry Hunter? Because if it was, those three words on that page had changed everything, changing its status from the book that could save Sapphire to the book that could take them down. After all, she hadn’t done what she was supposed to with Harry. She’d been greedy, gone for the money, looked the gift horse in the mouth. She could be implicated with him. She had to find out who was behind this new book before he made his next move.
She walked along the pitch boundary towards a copse, lost in thought and kicking stray pine cones through the dusty grass, instantly regretting it when a needle rolled into her thong sandals and pricked her toes.
‘Ow-ow-ow-ow,’ she said, hobbling for a couple of steps, before sitting in a heap on the ground and kicking off the shoe.
‘May I assist this damsel in distress?’ came a bemused voice.
Cress looked up and saw Harry leaning against a tree, a cigarette dangling insolently between his fingers. He looked like a splendid Robert Redford in The Great Gatsby in his kit.
‘What are you doing here, Harry? Aren’t you up in a minute?’
‘Well, I certainly could be,’ he smirked, stubbing out the cigarette beneath his foot and sitting himself next to her.
Cress glared at him. They hadn’t flirted once since she’d brought up Brendan Hillier. He used sex to corroborate his dominance, and as soon as he’d lost his power over her they had settled into an almost familial role play.
Until now. His eyes ran over her face hungrily, and he pushed a hand through her hair, cupping her cheek. He was huge compared to her, his hands like bear paws, his breath warm against her cheek. He leaned in and kissed her mouth.
‘What the hell are you doing?’ she demanded, pulling back.
His eyes danced. ‘Well. You know those four children you’ve got?’ he smiled. ‘This was how they happened.’
He started kissing her neck, his hand moving down to her bare thighs, pus
hing up the hem of her dress.
‘Get off, Harry. Just stop it,’ she cried, smacking his hand away and trying to pull away from him.
Barely noticing her protests, he scooped her arms away from beneath her and cradled her down on the ground. He pinned a leg over hers and, with his elbow on the floor, rested his head in his hand.
‘Come on, why not?’ he said, smiling down at her. ‘You know we’d have fun. We were always supposed to – let’s be honest. We both wanted it.’
‘I did not!’
‘You were one little signature away from going into that hotel bedroom with me.’
‘It was never going to happen, Harry. I would always have played my trump card if it had come to that.’ She pushed him roughly away and sat up. She saw the fire blaze in his eyes. ‘I would never cheat on my husband. And certainly not with someone like you.’
‘How very noble of you,’ Harry muttered under his breath, taking another cigarette from his shirt pocket. ‘The thing is, Cress, do you think your husband returns that particular compliment of fidelity?’
Cress stalled. ‘What are you talking about?’
‘I’m talking about your husband and the very pretty nanny.’
‘Oh, don’t be idiotic. That’s such a fucking cliché.’
‘Doesn’t mean it’s not true, though,’ he said into his cupped hand as he lit another cigarette. He took a drag and exhaled slowly, looking at her through hooded eyes. ‘I saw more than enough at Lucy’s party.’
Cress watched him, looking for a sign, a muscle twitch, anything that would show he was lying, bluffing her. There was nothing.
‘What did you see?’ she said quietly.
‘I saw that your nanny doesn’t like wearing panties. And I saw Mark see it too. Why’s he not here by the way?’
‘The idea of forty-eight hours with tossers like you didn’t really appeal. He’s spending the weekend with the kids.’
‘Oh yes. Quality time is it? And how about the nanny? Is she filling in in your absence?’
‘She doesn’t work weekends,’ Cress said, but her voice lacked edge. He was too close to the bone.
‘You sure about that?’
