by Sam Blake
Lily shook her head. ‘The teapot’s worth more than that.’
Jack shrugged like he really didn’t know.
Lily picked it up again and lifted off the lid. The inside was stuffed with greying tissue paper. She’d glanced at it when Jack had dropped it over to her, had given it a wipe, meaning to check out the maker’s mark and date later. Then the email had arrived from No. 42 and, as if a tornado had hit the house, one that would lift her right of Kansas, her world had gone into a spin.
Now Lily carefully pulled out the paper. It was all screwed up, as if it had been stuffed in to protect the china from impact. Pulling the bundle of tissue free, Lily put it carefully on the dressing table and opened it up.
In the middle lay four gold charms. At least, they looked like charms. Lily picked them up carefully. They were a dull gold, obviously a high carat value, and they were articulated, hanging from loops.
‘What the hell are they?’
‘I’ve no idea but I think these are what Edward Croxley was looking for.’ Lily turned them over. ‘They’re containers. Look – they’re in parts, like they were designed to hold something.’ Lily screwed up her face. ‘We had a lecture on …’ It took her a few moments. ‘They’re amulets. Do a search, these must be what he was looking for.’
She smoothed the tissue paper while Jack went to get his phone, charging on the floor. The screen was smashed but his iPhone was faster than her Android, its memory choked with photographs.
‘Now let’s see what Google says.’ It only took a moment. He stared at the phone.
‘Well, come on!’ Lily looked over his shoulder impatiently. She had no idea how he coped with that phone, the smashed screen would drive her insane.
‘Do these look the same? Apparently there are some in the British Museum. They’re Sumerian, seventh to sixth century bc.’
‘And very likely looted from the museum in Baghdad. Small, easily portable. How much are they worth?’
Jack did another search. ‘This result says up to $6,000 each. But that’s assuming you’ve got them to sell. I’d imagine the majority of them are in museums around the world. I mean how long ago was the seventh century bc? They have to be incredibly rare.’
‘And highly collectible – you could wear these now.’
Jack looked at her quizzically. ‘They are thousands of years old.’
‘I know, but someone Croxley knows wants them for something.’
‘Something old, something new … I’m reading this thriller where someone put a baby’s bones in the hem of a wedding dress and this detective finds them.’
Lily grimaced. ‘That’s horrible. Were they the something old or the something new?’
‘No idea, haven’t got to the end yet. So what do we do now?’
‘We give them to my friend.’
‘Whoa, is that a good idea? Why can’t we just go to Croxley and tell him we’ve got them and we want the shop back?’
Lily raised her eyebrows. ‘Because if these were smuggled out of the Middle East and Edward Croxley is a link in the chain to get them to the buyer, a buyer who is happy to buy goods looted on the black market, I don’t think Croxley is going to be very happy that we know he’s involved. We don’t know who this buyer is but my friend said Croxley was frightened – she said the name on Croxley’s phone was Sergei.’
‘So Croxley’s selling these to some Russian dude? That’s playing with fire.’
‘Exactly. So much as we need to get the shop back, it’s not much good to us if we’re both at the bottom of the Thames with concrete blocks around our ankles.’
‘I don’t think they do that any more. It’s all nerve agents these days.’ He hesitated. ‘Except that dude that hung himself …’
Lily turned around to him, her face paralysed with fear. ‘What’s to say he won’t have my friend killed?’ Lily closed her eyes. What on earth had she got Vittoria into?
Chapter 28
WHEN STEPHANIE CARSON slowly surfaced from sleep on Wednesday morning, the autumn sunshine was pouring in through the gap in her curtains, but rather than enjoying its warm glow, she felt chilled to her core. Marcus had been tossing and turning beside her all night and sometime in the early hours had gone downstairs, enabling her finally to sleep. As the memory of the previous night began to hit her, she woke up fully, shocked and mentally broken into so many pieces she wasn’t sure she’d ever be able to reassemble them.
Marcus had finally come home yesterday in a taxi, his face grey. From where she was sitting in the living room, she’d seen him come up the tiled path, heard his key in the door but stayed where she was. She was having a glass of wine – the first of her pregnancy, but tonight she really needed it. On the granite breakfast counter she’d spread out the papers, Marcus’s face staring back at her from the double-page spread with Bellissima Serata, the dark-haired tart, flashing her tits at the camera. What the hell had he been doing?
Dropping his flight case in the hall with a clatter, he’d come straight through the kitchen to the lounge where she’d been sitting on the sofa, failing to watch TV. He’d paused at the double doors, his uniform tie pulled loose. He’d just stood there not saying anything. She didn’t stand up.
‘How did your meeting go?’ She couldn’t look at him.
‘Well, they saw the pictures.’
‘Them and half the world. They realised it was the same woman that the papers said you were in The Velvet Club with?’
‘Yes. No. I mean, it’s not real – I’ve never met her.’ He came into the living room and sat in the armchair, his face in his hands. ‘Why won’t anybody believe me?’
‘Because there’s a photo, maybe?’ Stephanie’s tone was full of sarcasm. They’d been over this, but she couldn’t resist the dig.
‘But it’s not real. Someone’s photoshopped me in. I don’t understand this, any of this.’
‘Why would anyone do that, exactly? How could the paper print a fake picture?’
‘I’ve no idea.’ He rubbed his face with his hands again. ‘I’ve just no idea. I have to go to a disciplinary hearing on Friday.’
Stephanie had looked at him, the hand holding her wine glass frozen in the air. ‘I thought you said you could sort it out today?’
‘I thought I could. But because the picture shows her in the cockpit, and that’s against regulations, it takes it to a whole new level.’ His voice was strained. ‘And the other one shows me having a few jars,’ he shook his head, ‘when I was flying the next day.’
And she, Stephanie, was the only person who could say that he wasn’t out that night, that he was tucked up at home with her.
‘You’re going to have to tell them you were here.’
Marcus didn’t answer for a moment, like he’d already given it some thought. ‘I don’t know if they’ll believe me. Quite apart from the fallout with Vittoria, they’re going to think you’d be inclined to support me. If we pretend that I’d just dropped in for an innocent dinner, they’re bound to find out it’s more than that.’
‘I don’t see why they wouldn’t believe me.’ Her tone was stubborn.
‘Well, for one thing, you’re an actress, so you’re paid to pretend. And you’re carrying my child. That gives you a bit of an agenda.’
Stephanie tried to get comfortable. It was all so much to take in, and she couldn’t get the image of that well-endowed olive-skinned bitch out of her head. She didn’t know if the woman in the picture taken in the bar was Bellissima as well – she had her back to the camera. Maybe he had another one on the go. Whoever it was, it looked like they were all having a great time.
But for all his flaws, Marcus was fastidiously professional about not drinking before he was flying – was he telling the truth? Had the picture been faked? Or had he got carried away and had a drink that night? She knew the penalty for that was immediate dismissal. The implications hit her again, as if someone was stabbing her already broken heart with a knife. If he lost his job how would she cope?
<
br /> Thoughts swirled in Stephanie’s head, anxiety making her feel suddenly extremely sick.
She wasn’t sure what was worse. Had he been seeing this Italian whore? He was married after all, and she, Stephanie, was the other woman. Perhaps he had other other women in other places, places he flew to every week. Who knew what life he led when he wasn’t with her? He’d told her he loved her, that he wanted their baby, wanted it more than anything, but he’d said from the start that leaving Vittoria was going to be complicated.
Remembering their conversation of the previous evening, Stephanie turned over in bed trying again to make herself more comfortable, waves of emotion washing over her, her eyes hot with tears. She should have been stronger about him divorcing Vittoria in the first place – it wasn’t like they had any children. But he seemed weighed down by guilt about the car accident, like it was his duty now to stay with her. He’d poured it all out one night.
‘We were at a party, it was late, I was tired. But it was my fault. We were having a row about this girl. How stupid is that? I was angry; I was driving too fast.’ They’d been cuddled up on the sofa when he’d told her. He was just back after a different Sydney trip and had seven days off so she’d cooked an amazing dinner and opened a bottle of his favourite brandy. He’d sipped it as he’d continued, his eyes full of pain, his voice husky. ‘She was in intensive care for months – her pelvis was crushed. She couldn’t dance any more. She’d got a scholarship to the Royal Ballet School – she’d been there for four years, and I ended her career in one moment. And I can’t even remember what happened.’ He’d sighed. ‘I must have blacked out. I remember Vittoria screaming and the next thing I woke up in hospital. The car flipped and she was thrown out, apparently. It was a 1972 MG, red, beautiful car. I had the roof down – it had been such a bloody cold wet summer, it was the first time I’d been able to use it that year.’ He’d shaken his head and, turning to her, kissed the top of her head. ‘I’m so sorry. I love you so much but it’s so complicated.’ He’d sighed. ‘The thing is, her injuries mean that she can’t have children now either. I did that to her.’
He hardly needed to say that if Vittoria found out he was having an affair she’d feel like the crash was happening all over again, would feel that he’d taken her best years as well as her career from her. Stephanie had felt him shudder.
Somehow she’d always hoped Marcus would come up with a solution, but he seemed almost afraid of her, of what she might do if she found out about everything, which seemed a bit ridiculous.
Last night, Stephanie had watched him get up and pour himself a drink, the golden liquid splashing into the cut glass. He hadn’t bothered with ice.
‘Was that you in that picture?’
Standing beside the drinks cabinet, his back to her, he’d said, ‘Of course it was me. It just wasn’t taken on that day. And certainly not with her. I’ve never even met this woman. I just have to prove it.’ He sighed deeply.
Stephanie took a sip of her wine. ‘So what happens next?’
He turned around and looked at her, taking a large swig of his brandy. ‘At this disciplinary hearing? I think they’re going to sack me.’
‘Can they do that?’ Her hand went unconsciously to her belly, smoothing the soft grey fabric of her sweater over it.
‘TransGlobal Airways are a multimillion-pound corporation and at the moment I’m seriously embarrassing them in the tabloid press. They need to be seen to be acting.’
‘Can’t you fight it? I mean, it’ll be unfair dismissal, won’t it?’
Marcus sighed. ‘I don’t know if I can afford to take on TransGlobal. We’d have to go to court and, whatever happens, even if a court found in my favour, I couldn’t ever work for them again …’
‘But there are other airlines?’
Marcus grunted. ‘There are, whether they’d want to take me on after I’ve been tainted by taking a case against my employer is a different matter.’
‘But if it wasn’t you, if you weren’t there, you must be able to prove it?’
‘In the picture in the bar I’m wearing that T-shirt you bought me, the one that came in the wrong size and you had to get it replaced. Have you got the receipt? It’ll have the date on it and show it was bought after the photo was supposedly taken.’
Stephanie frowned, thinking. ‘I ordered it online – I’ll have the emails.’
‘So that’s one thing. It just means you might have to be brought into court to testify.’
Stephanie shrugged. ‘What’s the problem with that?’
Marcus looked at her. ‘Vittoria, mainly. Obviously.’ He shook his head. ‘I’ve been thinking about it and I think I’m going to need to take an action against the Sunday Inquirer in the first instance – if I’ve any hope of TransGlobal believing me, they’ll expect that.’
Stephanie pursed her lips. ‘They must have been pretty sure to publish those pictures. Their lawyers must have looked at them.’
‘Exactly. And the captions are really cleverly phrased – they imply it’s me and a real photo but there’s enough ambiguity in the article for them to say they knew they were faked all the time. I’d have to sue them for libel, for bringing my reputation into disrepute, but their lawyers will dig through every detail of my life and find out about you. You could have the paparazzi camped on the doorstep.’
Stephanie put her glass down, a feeling of utter desolation washing over her. She hadn’t had alcohol for over eight months and now it tasted horrible, as horrible as this whole mess was.
This wasn’t how her life was supposed to go. She was regularly in the press, used the papers as much as they used her, but with something like this, the paparazzi would be everywhere – they could rip her career to shreds. How could she afford childcare and get back to work if Marcus had no job? Would they even be able to stay together if Vittoria found out?
It was all such a mess. Stephanie turned over again, still not comfortable, and winced as the baby kicked her, objecting to all the movement. Stephanie rubbed her stomach. That brand ambassador job with No. 42 was starting to look very attractive from a financial perspective, but would they be interested if she was in the middle of a sex scandal? One thing was for sure, she needed to get that moving and get the paperwork signed before anyone found out anything about this. It would be a solid income for the next twelve months. That girl she’d met, Lily, had been talking about after Christmas, but she needed things to happen faster than that.
A moment later she heard Marcus’s tread on the stairs and he put his head around the bedroom door. ‘I brought you tea, and there was an almond croissant in the fridge. I’ve warmed it up.’
She turned over to look at him. His face was pale with exhaustion. He looked about ten years older than he had when he’d left for Sydney.
He came around to her side of the bed and put the tea and croissant down on her bedside locker, then sat down beside her on the bed.
‘I’ve been thinking. I do have to contest this. I have to go into the meeting on Friday saying I’m suing the Sunday Inquirer.’
‘But that could cost thousands.’
‘It will. I’ve got savings, quite a lot in bonds and stuff, and money from my parents too, but I want to transfer them into your name or into a trust for the baby. That way, whatever happens I’ll know you’ve got something to fall back on, and Vittoria won’t be able to touch it.’
Stephanie put her hand on his and squeezed it. She really couldn’t bear to lose him, to lose this life they’d built. When he was in Dublin with Vittoria it was just like he was flying, and she looked forward to the next time she’d see him. She’d got used to that, could share him quite happily when she knew he was thinking about her and she would see him soon. And the time they had apart made the time they had together all the better and more precious. She picked up her tea. So much was changing so fast. And she hated being so out of control of events that she had no idea what might happen next. ‘Thank you.’
‘I need to talk to
a lawyer, but I’m not planning on losing. It’s not going to be easy.’ He shook his head. ‘It’ll be a risk but I can’t lose the house. My parents worked so hard for that – it was their dream.’
‘I’m sure Vittoria wouldn’t let you risk it either – it’s technically half-hers while you’re still married.’
He didn’t seem to be listening. ‘I need to move those assets pretty quickly. It’ll mean me going back to Dublin today. I need to get to the bank and do the transfers in person.’
Stephanie frowned. ‘When will you be back?’
‘Thursday evening latest, earlier if I can manage it.’
‘You’ve really thought about this?’
He nodded. ‘I don’t have any choice.’
Chapter 29
VITTORIA’S PHONE rang just as she had found a quiet corner in The Hogarth’s Lighthouse Bar. The velvet sofa was a little soft but it was cosy, and with the morning sun streaming in it was bright and cheerful. She’d already been out this morning, had just ordered a smoothie and was about to check her email when Marcus’s name flashed up on the screen.
She paused for a moment, wondering whether to answer the call. But he rarely called her unless there was an issue of some sort. She swiped to answer, pretending she didn’t know it was him.
‘Hello, Vittoria Devine.’
‘It’s me.’ At the other end he hesitated. ‘Did you see the Sunday papers?’
‘Which papers?’ She deliberately sounded surprised.
‘The Sunday Inquirer.’
‘Why would I be looking at the Sunday Inquirer?’ Pausing, Vittoria lowered her voice, as if Yana’s problems were the biggest issue on her radar right now. ‘I’m busy – I’m in London, remember? Yana is rehearsing in Covent Garden and needed some support. There’s a lot going on. I can’t discuss it.’ Then, as if realising something was wrong, ‘What was in the paper this time?’
Marcus cleared his throat. She could almost hear him fidgeting on the end of the phone. ‘They have some pictures. There was that ridiculous thing about that Italian woman?’
