Kiss

by Jill Mansell

  ‘I know, I know.’ Vivienne had spent the entire night listening to this argument. ‘I’m not a country lady in twin set and brogues, with a Labrador at my heels and a shooting-stick up my bum. I’ve never baked a “scone” - whatever the hell that might be - in my life. But the moment I set eyes on your dad, something . . . clicked. I really like him,’ she concluded with a simple gesture. ‘And I think he likes me.’

  With a sideways glance, Theo took in the clinging, shell-pink satin dress, the expanse of tanned thigh, the astonishing bosom and cascading blonde hair. ‘I’m not surprised.’

  Vivienne smiled. ‘I have a great personality, as well.’

  ‘So I’m beginning to realise,’ he admitted wryly. ‘What I really can’t wait to see are the faces of all those tweedy county ladies, when they find out what kind of competition they’re up against.’

  Sam, in white cotton trousers and a grey sweatshirt, was stretched out on the sofa surrounded by paperwork when she let herself into the apartment. Vivienne, who hadn’t expected him to be up at this time of the morning, hesitated in the doorway before kicking off her shoes and dropping her bag into a chair. Despite the exhilaration of the last twelve hours, she was now gripped by a spasm of self-doubt. Sam was so stunningly handsome, so physically perfect, how could she even think of leaving him? Yet she had adored him and it hadn’t been enough. Nothing she could do would ever make Sam adore her in return. She had done everything in her power, but the necessary spark simply wasn’t there.

  He glanced up from his paperwork. ‘Good party?’

  ‘It had its moments.’ Vivienne pushed her fingers through her tangled, wind-blown hair. Then, with a trace of exasperation, she said, ‘Well? Aren’t you even going to ask me what I’ve been doing?’

  It was a last-ditch attempt to force some kind of reaction, some shred of jealousy, but all Sam did was glance across at her opened bag and look faintly amused. After pausing to pencil in an alteration, he replied, ‘Since your bra is hanging out of your handbag, I think I can probably guess.’

  So much for jealousy and belated protestations of love. The pale pink bra was new and expensive but a size too small, and Vivienne had merely removed it in the early hours of the morning in order to be comfortable. She hadn’t been unfaithful to Sam, yet he had calmly assumed the opposite and still didn’t even have the decency to care . . .

  ‘How did you ever get to be so unfeeling?’ Her voice rose to a wail and at last Sam reacted.

  ‘Ssshh,’ he said sharply. ‘Izzy’s asleep in the spare room. Don’t make so much noise.’

  Despite everything, Vivienne was instantly diverted. ‘Izzy’s here? Why?’

  ‘While you were elsewhere, flinging off your bra and enjoying one of your . . . moments, Izzy realised what a bastard Tash Janssen really is.’ Sam, who hadn’t been to bed, abbreviated the facts. ‘She’s left him.’

  ‘And she came here?’

  ‘I brought her back here.’

  Vivienne, bewildered, shook her head. ‘You mean she phoned you up?’

  ‘I thought you might have wanted a lift home,’ said Sam evenly. ‘So I drove out there when I’d finished at the club. But you weren’t around, and Izzy was.’

  At that moment her gaze travelled past him and fixed upon the green-and-gold sequinned bodice draped damply over the back of a chair. It was recognizably the top Izzy had been wearing earlier.

  Still confused, she frowned and said with a trace of suspicion, ‘Are you and Izzy having an affair?’

  ‘No.’ Sam, looking not in the least put out by the suggestion, shook his head. ‘We are not.’

  ‘Hmm.’ Overcome suddenly by fatigue, Vivienne turned and headed for the bedroom. ‘So that makes none of us. No wonder we’re all so bloody fed up.’

  ‘How do I always manage to make such an incredible mess of everything?’ said Izzy despairingly, over lunch at Langan’s. It was three days since the party, two days since she’d moved back to Kingsley Grove, and the question had been preying on her mind ever since.

  ‘I don’t know.’ Gina attempted a witticism. ‘I suppose some people are just naturally untidy.’

  ‘Ha, ha.’ Izzy pulled a face. ‘No, I’m being serious. Look what’s happened to me over the past few months. A spectacularly failed love affair and an alienated daughter. OK, Kat speaks to me - but only just. We used to have such fun together . . .’

  ‘A few months ago,’ said Gina spearing a bite-sized piece of chicken breast in tarragon sauce, ‘you’d never even seen the inside of a recording studio and you worked in a sleazy club for peanuts. Today you’re buying me lunch, having driven me here in your very own Mercedes, and you have a single at Number Two in the charts. All you’ve ever wanted to be is a success and now you are one.’

  ‘Ever heard of sleeping your way to the top?’ Izzy retaliated, taking a slurp of wine. ‘Everyone treats me as Tash Janssen’s sidekick, that’s all. Without him, I’d still be a nobody. And I’m hardly a successful mother, for heaven’s sake.’

  It was a tricky subject. Gina still froze every time Katerina’s name was even mentioned. With a shrug, she glanced sideways at the diners at the next table and saw that they were still watching. It was heady stuff, being ogled by two such attractive men, even if most of the attention was going Izzy’s way.

  ‘Your daughter’s choice of partners is hardly your fault,’ she replied stiffly.

  ‘But it’s still my concern! Everything’s been spoiled and I simply don’t know where I’ve gone wrong. I’ve never been so miserable in my life. And you,’ she continued in accusing tones, ‘have never looked better. God knows, I’m glad you couldn’t make it to that terrible party, but what’s been happening with you? Is Ralph back on the scene . . . ?’

  Indirectly, Gina supposed, Ralph had been responsible for her new-found sense of well-being. For some reason she had been unable to fathom, she simply had felt better since sending him away with a flea in his ear that stormy afternoon when he had erupted, brimming with self-confidence, into the office. In deflating his ego, she had boosted her own immeasurably, and the relationship between Doug and herself had subsequently improved in leaps and bounds. Almost overnight he had become less of an employer, more of a real friend . . .

  For a moment she was almost tempted to tell Izzy that Doug was taking her to the theatre this evening, but she held her tongue. Izzy would either leap to conclusions and imagine some grand romance or gaze at her with fascinated disbelief, which would spoil everything. It wasn’t as if she was going out on some kind of date, after all. She simply enjoyed being with Doug and was able to relax in his undemanding company.

  ‘Ralph is definitely not back on the scene,’ she said briskly, finishing her lunch and feeling decidedly in control. ‘Credit me with some sense, please.’

  ‘I’m the one with no sense.’ Izzy gazed gloomily at her own barely touched food. ‘I’m an abysmal failure.’

  ‘Excuse me.’ The bolder of the two men at the table next to theirs leaned back in his chair and attracted her attention. ‘Aren’t you Izzy Van Asch?’

  Being recognised wasn’t turning out to be quite as much fun as she’d imagined, either. It always seemed to happen at the wrong moments. But she forced a gracious smile. ‘Yes, I am.’

  ‘We thought so.’ He smirked at his friend, then said, ‘What’s it like then, screwing Tash Janssen?’

  Gina cringed and held her breath, waiting to see what would happen next.

  Finally, Izzy smiled.

  ‘Terrible,’ she replied sweetly. ‘His willy’s even smaller than yours.’

  Disasters, as a rule, came in threes. As far as Doug was concerned, however, they were threatening to run into double figures. The harder he tried, the more things seemed to go wrong.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said again, pulling out his handkerchief in order to mop his forehead and managing to spill whisky down the front of his jacket as he did so. ‘This is the worst play I’ve ever seen. You can’t possibly want to go back in
side. Shall we skip the second act and find somewhere to eat instead?’

  If this had been a proper date, Gina might have been equally embarrassed by the almost farcical events of the evening. But since it wasn’t, she couldn’t understand why Doug should be so distraught. It was hardly his fault, after all, that his car should have broken down in Park Lane and needed pushing to the side of the road, just as it wasn’t his fault that the new play he had brought her to see was one of the unfunniest comedies ever staged. Since it wasn’t a real date it didn’t even matter that she had ended up with rain-soaked hair, oil stains on her coat and two broken fingernails. All that mattered was that despite all these setbacks, she was still enjoying herself . . .

  ‘We can’t leave now!’ She looked shocked. ‘Mavis is expecting us to go backstage afterwards and congratulate her. The play may not be up to much, but she’s acting her heart out on that stage and it’s her first big break. The least we can do is tell her how great she is.’

  Doug didn’t understand how she could be so cheerful. Gazing down at his damp jacket, he was further mortified to realise that his new shirt, fresh out of its box, was displaying tell-tale box-shaped creases. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d put so much effort into getting ready to go out. Now he was unhappily aware that he still possessed about as much sartorial elegance as a hippo in a mac.

  Worse was to come. It seemed impossible to imagine that someone so uptight could fall asleep, but to his utter shame Doug found himself jerking awake halfway through the second act. The noise that had awoken him was his own snoring. Gina, beside him, was in fits of suppressed giggles.

  ‘I’m a lost cause,’ he said mournfully, when they had done their duty and visited a stiff-upper-lipped Mavis in her tiny dressing room. Leaving via the stage door, which led out into a narrow side-street, they found that the rain was bucketing down harder than ever, and there wasn’t a cab in sight.

  ‘Of course you aren’t.’ Gina squeezed his arm as they set off up the road. ‘You gave the audience their best laugh of the evening for a start. And the really nice thing about awful plays is they do wonders for your appetite . . . look, why don’t we try this little Italian place on the left, then we don’t have to worry about finding a taxi.’

  Doug winced as the slender-hipped waiter whisked past, missing him by millimetres as he disappeared into the kitchen. Moments later the swing doors burst open once more as another waiter shimmied past bearing plates of steaming pasta. Anthony Hopkins, he thought darkly - because someone had once said he looked a bit like him, and because that great actor had always secretly been his hero - would never be dumped at the worst table in the house.

  Gina, apparently unperturbed, was engrossed in the menu. ‘I’m going to have the moules marinière.’

  ‘You’ll get food poisoning.’ He looked more lugubrious than ever. ‘That should round off the evening nicely.’

  The meal, in fact, was exquisite. By the time they had finished their strega coffees Doug found himself in imminent danger of actually cheering up, but fate hadn’t finished with him yet.

  The manager, with a discreet cough, appeared by their table. ‘I’m sorry, sir,’ he said, not sounding sorry at all, ‘but have you some other means of payment? This credit card is out of date.’

  ‘It really doesn’t matter,’ Gina insisted for the fourth time as they climbed into their taxi. ‘You can pay me back tomorrow if it makes you happier, but there’s no need to keep apologizing. It could have happened to anyone.’

  It wouldn’t have happened to Anthony Hopkins, thought Doug with silent despair. Bloody expiry dates, bloody sanctimonious restaurant managers, bloody broken-down cars, bloody, bloody rain . . .

  Chapter 42

  The weather continued to deteriorate. On the third Friday in October, London and the south-east of England cowered in the grip of one of the worst hurricanes of the decade. With Izzy away in Scotland pre-recording a television Hogmanay ‘special’ and her own television out of action as a result of the power lines going down, Gina decided the only sensible course of action was to have an early night. By the light of a flickering candle she made her way slowly up the stairs, prayed that the tiles wouldn’t be ripped from the roof by the blistering storm, and wondered if she’d ever be able to get to sleep.

  She was just dozing off an hour and a half later when the phone rang downstairs, jerking her back to wakefulness and instant apprehension. Whoever would be calling at twelve-thirty at night with anything but bad news?

  The parquet floor was cold beneath her bare feet. Gina’s heart was still hammering as she picked up the receiver. Guardedly, she said, ‘Hallo.’

  At first she couldn’t make out who was on the other end. It was a terrible line, awash with crackles and electronic hisses. Eventually, straining to listen through them, she heard what sounded like uneven sobbing and gulps for breath. Not Izzy, surely not Izzy . . .

  ‘Hallo, who is it?’ she said, more loudly this time. The all-enveloping darkness was eerie and the wind still howled outside.

  ‘Mum,’ came a small voice, amid more sobbing. ‘Mum, is that you?’

  Gina had neither seen nor spoken to Katerina since that nightmare day when she’d learned of her affair with Andrew. Now her grip tightened on the receiver and apprehension gave way to annoyance.

  ‘Your mother isn’t here,’ she replied coldly. ‘She’s in Scotland.’

  ‘Wh-what? Where?’

  ‘Edinburgh. She’s due back on Monday evening.’

  A static-riddled silence ensued. Then, with almost animal anguish, Katerina wailed, ‘But I want my mum!’

  She sounded in a terrible state. Gina, whose initial instinct had been to slam down the phone, relented slightly and took a deep breath.

  ‘Look, she’s left me the number of the hotel, but there’s a power cut here and it’ll take me a while to find it. Why don’t you phone directory enquiries and ask them; she’s staying at the Swallow Royal in Edinburgh.’

  ‘I want . . . my . . . mum,’ repeated Katerina, her voice choking on the words. ‘I . . . want . . .’

  ‘What’s the matter? Are you ill?’

  ‘I want my mum.’

  She sounded almost demented with grief. Feeling increasingly ill at ease, Gina said, ‘Directory Enquiries. The Swallow Royal in Edinburgh. They’ll be able to give you the number. But look, Katerina, if you’re ill . . .’

  The phone went dead. Katerina had hung up on her. With a sigh, Gina replaced the receiver and began to feel her way towards the staircase. Katerina’s problems were no concern of hers.

  But it was no good. After a second of deliberation she turned back, fumbling in the inky darkness for the notepad next to the phone, upon which Izzy had scrawled the hotel’s number. By the time she managed to locate the matches and relight her candle she would be able to speak to Izzy herself, discover what was going on and put her own mind at rest. Then she’d be able to get back to sleep.

  Forty minutes later, her teeth chattering with fear as much as cold, Gina edged the car out of the drive and set off up the road at a crawl, wincing as the storm buffeted the sides of the little Golf and sent twigs and leaves hurtling against the windscreen.

  The telephone lines to Scotland were down. While she had been ringing Sam’s flat and getting no reply, her own phone had gone dead. The hurricane was wreaking havoc everywhere. And although she had tried to tell herself that Katerina deserved everything she got, the sheer anguish in the girl’s voice had shaken Gina to the core. Listening to her on the phone, she’d sounded more like seven years old than seventeen, and desperately in need of help. She was suffering, and alone. And Gina knew only too well how that felt. Driving across the storm-swept city, she wondered if she’d ever been more scared in her life. The streets were mercifully empty of pedestrians and cars, but the air was thick with swirling leaves and rubbish. When a triangular roadworks sign smashed into the passenger door Gina screamed aloud but kept going. She couldn’t give up now. It couldn’t be
more than a mile to Katerina’s bedsitter. Not more than another ten terrifying minutes . . .

  She hammered on the front door for what seemed like an eternity, struggling to remain upright against the howling gale and make herself heard above it. Finally, just as she was about to give up, the door opened. Katerina’s face, pinched and white, appeared in the narrow gap behind the security chain.

  ‘Oh my God,’ she wailed. ‘What do you want?’

  It wasn’t quite the welcome Gina had been expecting. Hopelessly on edge after her nightmare journey, she snapped back, ‘Charming. Are you going to let me in?’

  Katerina’s eyes filled with fresh tears. ‘Why?’

  ‘Because it’s almost two o’clock in the morning and I’ve driven here to make sure you’re all right.’ Gina spoke through gritted teeth - so much for genuine concern. ‘But if all you’re going to be is fucking ungrateful, maybe I’d better just leave.’