Rupert knew what Mia was getting at and resisted the urge to throw his champagne in her pious face. It would have been wasted on her.
‘Haven’t you got some babysitting to do?’ he spat. ‘Now that your manchild is back, shouldn’t you be looking out for him? He’s over there with the predatory WAG. I think he needs a chaperone.’
‘Careful, Deyton, you almost sound jealous.’ She raised a mocking eyebrow. ‘Ahh, but of which one?’
Rupert sighed. He cut to the chase: ‘What exactly do you want from me, Manhattan? Do you enjoy watching me squirm?’
Mia remained smiling, unfazed. ‘Yes, Deyton, as a matter of fact, I do. I consider it karma.’
‘Why can’t you let it go?’ he asked. ‘It was all a long time ago now. And you do realise that blackmail carries a heftier sentence than murder and rape? Besides –’ he leaned in closer to her ‘– don’t forget I also know about your past Mia, and your dirty little secret.’
Mia felt her heart palpate beneath the delicate fabric of her Cavalli kaftan but held her nerve. She knew it was dangerous to goad him but he’d kept quiet for this long and Mia could never help pushing people’s buttons. It was instinctive to her contrary nature.
‘My secret – should it ever make the light of day – would no doubt illicit empathy, as indeed would your own “dirty little secret”, only the empathy wouldn’t be for you, would it, Rupert?’ She glanced over in Angelika’s direction once again. ‘Poor girl.’ She gave an over-exaggerated sigh. ‘She hasn’t the first clue, has she?’
‘Why didn’t you die in that crash, you evil old witch?’ he said, contempt billowing from his lips. ‘You really are a spectacularly vindictive cunt, do you know that?’
Mia cackled.
‘Oooh,’ she said, mockingly, satisfied she’d got a rise from him, ‘and less of the vindictive, if you don’t mind.’
She realised, however, that she had probably overstepped the mark. Rupert’s secret, should it be revealed, would undoubtedly destroy his marriage, and despite the loathing she felt for the man himself, she rather liked Angelika.
‘Have you explored the island yet?’ she changed the subject, attempting small talk, she wasn’t in the mood to fight with him again. ‘It really is rather spectacular, reminds me of one of the Greek islands. Santorini was a particular favourite of mine and Dick’s … Anyway, now that Joshua’s back safe and well, I may do a little sightseeing.’ She paused. ‘You could accompany us if you like,’ she added in a spontaneous and uncharacteristic flash of olive branch.
‘I’d rather contract Malaria,’ Rupert remarked, though it lacked real contempt. He was tired of the banter between them already. Perhaps Angelika had been right; maybe it was time to bury the hatchet. ‘And no, I haven’t, not yet, though I intend to before we leave … if we ever bloody get to leave that is. Apparently the phone lines are still down.’ Rupert pulled a face. ‘Can’t work it out myself. I mean, we’re on an island. It’s not the third world, though I’m beginning to wonder if it isn’t the Third Reich.’
Mia laughed. Deyton had always been a wit. She reluctantly admired him for it.
‘What do you think McKenzie really wants with us?’ he said, genuinely interested in Mia’s take on it. He might despise the woman but she was nobody’s fool. ‘If this was simply a PR exercise for McKenzie, then surely he would’ve invited the press exclusively. I mean, what can us mere mortals bring to the table?’
‘Speak for yourself,’ she quipped as Remi approached to refresh their glasses with more fizz, though she had to concede that Rupert did have a point. ‘Who knows what goes through that bastard’s mind … personally I’m not sure I even want to.’
‘Hmm … indeed.’
Rupert strained to recall the small print of the contract he had scan-read before his stupid bloody wife had gone behind his back and signed their lives away, almost quite literally. He was sure it had said something about being required to partake in all publicity requested of them prior, during and following the duration of their stay on the island.
‘Well, he’ll certainly make headlines if that’s what he wants. We could’ve all died in that crash. No doubt I will be forced to go on some ghastly talk show to relive it all once we’re back in Blightly.’
Rupert shuddered at the idea and Mia once again laughed, although she herself was beginning to ruminate on what a great press opportunity the air crash may potentially afford. Global singing sensation cheats death at 30,000 feet! There would inevitably be myriad TV and media interviews desperate to hear about her brush with mortality, giving her the chance to make headway with her comeback while exposing her to a whole new audience in the process. Every cloud, Mia thought, suddenly quite enamoured by the whole idea.
Rupert smiled at Raj as he refreshed his flute and thought he caught a familiar look in the man’s dark, chocolate eyes as they briefly met, though he could not be entirely sure. It was a look he’d only been privy to on a couple of occasions.
He glanced over towards Angelika again, suddenly seeing her celebratory antics through slightly different eyes. Perhaps he was missing out on something fun and exciting. Billie-Jo had already stripped down to her barely there crochet string bikini and was submerged in the sunken Jacuzzi next to the pool swigging Cristal from the bottle, JJ was struggling to undress himself with one good arm in a bid to join her and Nate was behind the DJ decks seemingly unperturbed by his wife’s close proximity to the guest of honour and instead smiling and laughing as Angelika entertained him with her risqué impersonation of a stripper. Rupert necked his glass of champagne in one.
‘You’ll probably only ever hear me say this once,’ he said to Mia, adrenalin suddenly buzzing through him like electricity, the need to move his feet to the music reaching the point of unbearable, ‘but would you care to dance?’
29
Martin McKenzie sat back into the plush, cream, leather seat inside one of his fleet of private jets and prepared for take-off – destination Beijing. Flipping his iMac open, he loosened his Tom Ford silk tie and settled down to enjoy a little in-flight entertainment. The party was kicking off just as he’d planned, his guest’s inhibitions disappearing as quickly as the ground beneath him. He sipped his drink, a smooth, vintage cognac, pulling his lips over his teeth as the strong liquid scorched his palate, and watching intently as the blonde discarded her pink bikini top with a shriek and that dumb American fuck began to fondle her impressive tits with his good hand. Soon enough that bitch journalist woman practically fell into the Jacuzzi next to them, closely followed by the footballer, already in a half-state of undress, his shirt discarded along with all sense of morality. The blonde, the footballer, the journo, the uptight lawyer, the rock star and the has-been; to refer to them by name would be to humanise them. These people were simply actors, players in his latest production. And right now they were headed for a collective Oscar.
He hoped the Super Eight were relishing the show with as much anticipation as he was. An orgy in a Jacuzzi would round the day’s proceedings off nicely. But where was that bitch, Mia? And the journo’s husband for that matter? He clicked on another screen to search for their whereabouts - and it wasn’t long before he found it.
‘Well, well, well,’ he said aloud, viewing the scene with morbid interest. This was far better than even he could’ve hoped for. Ahh, the wonder drugs that were MDMA and Rohypnol, they really did get to the truth of a person. The champagne had been spiked with a measured amount, just enough to loosen everyone up, but not enough to be traceable in the blood after forty-eight hours, according to Elaine’s research anyway, and as an added bonus he’d arranged for amyl nitrate to be pumped out through the water sprinkler system that was hidden underneath the shady bougainvillea-covered pergola. McKenzie finished his drink, clicked his fingers to request another and settled in for some decent viewing content in the knowledge that the Super Eight Club were all glued to their screens at this very moment. Still, if they thought they were getting their money’s worth
now, they were soon to be in for an even bigger surprise.
Cody Parker was feeling pleased with himself. In less than twenty-four hours the link he had posted to a select few had already caused a major stir within the higher echelons of the hacker community, fast-tracking him to the top of his game and affording him the praise and admiration he so voraciously sought from his special ‘family’.
He grinned, clicking a ring pull on a diet Dr Pepper and guzzling back half of it in celebration. He had sent the link out to a selected few of his contemporaries, hackers he knew would be impressed not just by the content itself but by his ability to have found a way in. He’d added the message: ‘Dear friends, my latest discovery: a game show with a difference; one where the contestants have NO idea they’re being filmed...viewing figures (present company excluded) eight. The source: TOP SECRET!’ Cody knew he couldn’t take all the credit for uncovering the site’s host, but he wanted to give the impression that he had, and steal the lion’s share of the glory. It was risky, however; he knew that by sharing his find with fellow hackers there was a chance of it being leaked. As insular as the world he operated in was, and as much as there was a code of conduct between fellow hackers, a discovery such as this was too good not to share, in which case it wouldn’t be long before it infiltrated the mainstream. If this shit hit social media anytime soon, the exclusive Super Eight would be looking at adding a healthy few noughts onto its membership within hours. Hell, now that was PR for you right there. However, Cody was keen to keep it within the hacker’s secret society, for the time being anyhow. In spite of his glory-seeking fantasies, he was still aware that he might get into trouble and would need to remove all trace of himself before this thing went public, which it would, eventually. And when it did, Cody wanted to be able to sit back and watch McKenzie’s public fall from grace with a sense of schadenfreude and bask in the glory that it was he who had brought such a powerful man down. ‘I’m making a polite request for you keep this one on the low-down, guys, so just sit back and enjoy in private,’ he’d added, ‘for now at least.’
As it was though, he was already too late.
30
Angelika woke with a start.
‘Jesus Christ, I’m going to throw up.’
She sprinted from the bed to the en suite, dropping to her knees and grasping the rim of the toilet before emptying the contents of her guts into it.
‘Ang?’ The sounds of her retching had caused Nate to stir awake. ‘Ang, are you OK?’ Unsteady on his feet, he pulled himself up and shuffled into the bathroom after her. ‘Fuck,’ he whispered, kneeling down next to her, pulling her long hair from her face and rubbing her back as she violently convulsed. ‘Fuck.’
Nate thought he heard the door to the cabana open. It was Rupert; he was pale and dishevelled, his hair sticking up on end almost comically, the buttons on his white, muslin shirt askew, pool sliders in his hand.
Rupert was not prepared for the sight that greeted him. Billie-Jo was spreadeagled on the white, leather couch, naked, her hair a tangled straggly blonde mess, limbs protruding awkwardly at various angles, her mouth open. She looked like a mannequin, a blow-up doll, and for a horrifying second he thought she might even be dead – that was until he saw her large breasts heaving. Thank God.
JJ was slumped on the armchair opposite her, his body leaning to one side. He was, at least, wearing boxer shorts. Empty bottles of Veuve Clicquot and Jack Daniels were scattered around the room like bowling pins. There was shattered glass on the floor, a marble ashtray upended on the table next to remnants of white powder, rolled notes and other paraphernalia discarded besides squashed cigarette butts. Aftermath.
Rupert swallowed dryly, his anger beaten down by his own sense of shame. It seemed like he wasn’t the only one with some explaining to do. Instinctively he walked over to the glass coffee table and with a shaking hand up-turned the ashtray and an empty bottle next to it. He stepped over Billie-Jo’s discarded bikini bottoms and made his way towards the bedroom. Where the hell was his wife? Where was Angelika? He was torn between calling out her name and turning and leaving the carnage behind him, his own guilt following like a shadow. He needed time to think about what he was going to say to her. He was scared that his face would project the truth – that it would silently confess his own terrible sins from the night before.
God almighty, what had happened to them all last night? He wasn’t sure what but something had … something bad. He could recall Angelika dancing, that he himself had begun to dance at one point, a pastime he hadn’t indulged in since his student days. Last night, however, he had been compelled to move himself around to the music, lost in it like it had somehow become part of him.
Images flashed up in his mind, grainy and sketchy; he’d been dancing with Mia, Mia … the sound of human noise, of chatter punctuated by the chorus of crickets in the air, the music – God, the music. It was like he’d been born deaf and was hearing it for the first time; the clarity of the drums, the pulsating bass and hiss of hi-hats … he’d been in tune to every cymbal, every note. And it had enchanted him, hypnotised him like a snake charmer, forcing his body to respond, to move and react in time to it.
He’d watched Billie-Jo enter the Jacuzzi, her narrow, tiny body almost like that of a child’s, were it not for the shop-bought air bags making a splash on entry. JJ had followed her, dancing, his good hand in the air, lost, too, in the music.
It had occurred to Rupert that his wife might be sexually attracted to Nate Simmons; he had been briefly aware of fleeting clandestine exchanges between them, how she seemed slightly looser of limb in his presence. Naturally he’d been jealous. After all, Nate was a good deal younger, fitter, and aesthetically blessed than him – these days at least.
Rupert struggled to admit it to himself but his feelings of envy were based less on the fact that his wife might lust after another, and more that someone as ridiculously attractive as Nate was would actually consider her an option. It was a competition; everything between them always was: who was the more successful, witty, popular and attractive. Well, two can play that game, he’d thought at the time, watching as they had begun to fool around in the Jacuzzi, Angelika practically impervious to his existence. Rupert had never seen her like it in all their years together; she was behaving like a common slut, dancing like a hooker displaying her wares in a brothel window; stripping down to her underwear and jumping into the pool like a teenager on drugs.
Good God! The thought suddenly hit him like a comet. Had their drinks been spiked with something? It seemed too absurd an idea to entertain but it would explain things. Dismissing the thought more or less instantly, Rupert made his way up towards the bedroom where he was met with the sound of his wife’s vomiting.
He looked around the bedroom. Had Angelika and Nate spent the night together? Had they fucked each other’s brains out? The carnage and discarded items of clothing would certainly suggest that something had taken place. Not that he was in any position to start creating even if they had.
Rupert stopped short of the en suite, hovering outside it. He caught sight of himself in the ornate wall mirror, a look of anguish etched across his tired face. This was all Mia Manhattan’s fault, he decided. Whenever he was around that woman bad shit happened. She was a fucking omen, make no mistake. He’d been dancing with her; him, dancing, with Mia, twirling her around to the sound of Nicki Minaj’s latest, dross he would otherwise have switched off the second it came on the radio.
‘He’s looking at you,’ she’d said with that half-raised-eyebrow mocking expression of hers.
‘Who is?’
‘Raj.’ She nodded at the handsome dark-skinned mute with the washboard stomach, his ice-white teeth illuminating his face in the low, night sky as he looked on obediently.
‘Can’t say I noticed,’ he replied tartly. ‘Besides, why would he be looking at me?’
Mia had fixed him with a knowing smile, her blood-red lips parting, almost Machiavellian.
‘One in
discretion,’ he’d eventually said quietly.
‘Didn’t look much like an indiscretion to me at the time.’
‘Leave it, Mia. It was a long time ago.’
During Mia’s ill-fated trial, Mia had been driven to and from court by a young man called Michael Curtis whom inevitably Rupert had come to know. Michael was vivacious, attractive and out, though not overly camp, and the two had struck up an unlikely friendship, a friendship that had turned into a quiet obsession, for Rupert at least, and he had begun to grapple with emotions he had never experienced before. He’d been attracted to Michael – sexually attracted – and it had left him feeling both elated and unhappy. Was he gay? Had he always had homosexual leanings that he’d buried, refusing to recognise in himself? He’d loved women all his life: Angelika being the ultimate. He was engaged to be married to her when the inevitable happened and he’d given in to his desires and slept with Michael. The sex had been incredible, had made him feel whole and alive, more than any sex he’d had with any woman, his wife-to-be included. But gay? Rupert didn’t think so. If only that spectacular cunt Mia hadn’t walked in on them, then it would’ve been an experience to have savoured, a memory to treasure and remember fondly before burying. Only Mia wasn’t about to let that happen. When the case collapsed and her vitriol was at its worst, she had threatened to out him, to tell Angelika, go to the press. And he’d been in no doubt she would’ve had he not known about her own secret. Rupert didn’t feel particularly gallant about using it against her but she’d backed him into a corner. She’d confessed all to him one very drunken evening when she’d been in one of her highly emotional and vulnerable states during the case, possibly even using such tragedy to try and make him work even harder on her behalf. Who knew that damned woman’s motives? What he did know, however, was that she didn’t want her confession leaked to the press, and so there they were, adversaries, each with something on the other, bound by respective secrets, each holding the others over them like a weapon.
Pleasure Island Page 18
