by Susan Lewis
‘He told Louisa that you and he know each other,’ she said, ‘so you don’t have to deny it any more.’
He looked searchingly into her eyes as though unsure whether to believe her. In the end he obviously decided that he did. ‘Did he tell Louisa how we know each other?’ he asked.
Sarah shook her head.
To her surprise he let go of her hand, saying, ‘I’ll get you that drink.’
Sarah turned and resting her chin on her hands gazed out at the lustrous blue sea, the brilliant shards of sunlight that sparked from the yachts and the clear, velvety sky. It seemed somehow incongruous to be on the brink of discussing something whose darker side she was becoming more convinced of by the day when they were in surroundings that appeared so beautifully pure and benign. It was so easy, she was thinking, to lose a sense of reality here, and maybe in their own ways that was what they were all doing, she, Louisa and Danny. Without the constraints of normal, everyday life upon them it was as though they were drifting aimlessly through a fantasy world, untroubled by direction, unanchored by responsibility or consequence. They had found themselves a mystery and were going blindly into it as though it were as innocuous as a child’s game, as though they had cast themselves in a movie over which they neither had nor wanted any control because there would never be a price to pay since all movies had happy endings and even if they didn’t none of them was real.
‘So,’ she said still staring out at the horizon as Morandi put their drinks on the table and sat down, ‘are you going to tell me how you and Jake know each other?’
He followed the direction of her eyes, watching the shimmering surface of the sea, feeling the heat pounding down on him. ‘I want to,’ he answered, ‘but I just don’t know how much of it is safe for you to know.’
Sarah felt a knot tighten in her stomach, but whether it was of excitement or apprehension she couldn’t tell. ‘Then why don’t you tell me just some of it?’ she suggested.
He took a long time thinking it over before he said, ‘Jake fixed me up with my company down here. He did it because I owed him a favour, a very big favour and he needed someone he could trust to run … to organize certain ventures for him.’
‘So you’re not just soft porn?’ she said, turning to look at him.
‘No, but that’s as much as I can tell you. The rest is up to Jake.’
She nodded, thinking that he hadn’t really told her anything. ‘OK,’ she said. ‘But what about Aphrodite? Can’t you tell me where she fits into it all?’
‘She’s my assistant. Jake employed her, but she answers to me.’
‘But you can’t get rid of her because Jake won’t let you?’
‘If she wanted to go I don’t think Jake would stand in her way, but she doesn’t want to. I’m not sure how much she knows about what’s going on, we’ve never discussed it for the simple reason that we’re both afraid of revealing things the other might not know. But the truth is, I think she knows more than I do.’
Sarah was quiet for a moment, mulling over in her mind the little he had told her and deciding that she still wasn’t really any the wiser. ‘Jake told Louisa that it has nothing to do with drugs,’ she said. ‘Is that true?’
‘As far as I know it’s true, but Jake doesn’t tell me everything.’
‘What about the Mafia?’
He lowered his eyes and tilted his drink towards him. ‘That I don’t know,’ he answered soberly. ‘Consuela has a lot of contacts, knows a lot of people, so does Jake. But please, don’t ask me any more. I’ve sworn never to betray Jake’s confidence and I don’t want to lie to you.’
‘Can’t you just give me the basic ingredient?’ Sarah protested. ‘I mean, if it isn’t drugs and it isn’t the peddling of porn, then what is it?’
‘Probably just about everything else you can think of,’ he answered. ‘And that’s all I’m going to say. Can I sing you a song?’
Sarah blinked. ‘Are you serious?’ she said.
He was, for picking up the guitar he strummed a few chords then started to sing: ‘My eyes adored you, though I never laid a hand on you, my eyes adored you; Like a million miles away from me you couldn’t see how I adored you, so close, so close and yet so far …’
‘I don’t believe you,’ Sarah laughed incredulously when he’d finished. ‘That was wonderful and I just can’t work you out at all. One minute you seem so shy and the next you’re, I don’t know, you’re so …’
‘Brazen?’ he suggested.
‘Not brazen, no,’ she laughed, ‘more self-assured, at ease with yourself.’
‘I feel relaxed with you,’ he said, ‘but I’m trying to make a good impression too. Does that explain the schizophrenia?’
‘I suppose so.’ She picked up her drink and swirled it around the glass, clinking the ice-cubes. ‘I like it here,’ she said. ‘I like your apartment, I like your paintings and I like you.’
‘I’m glad,’ he smiled.
‘Tell me about your children. How old are they? What are their names? How often do you see them?’
‘I guess I’d better come clean here,’ he said, grinning awkwardly. ‘I do have seven children, but they’re not exactly all mine.’
‘How exactly aren’t they all yours?’ Sarah said, with a little wave of her hand.
‘Well, four of them are stepchildren. They came with my wives, but I’ve tried never to show any favouritism.’
‘So in actual fact you have three children?’
‘Two by my first wife, one by my second. I can show you photographs if you can bear to put up with a proud father,’ he said.
‘I think I can bear it.’
An hour later, having gone through no less than six family albums and listened to countless tales of childhood pranks, achievements, illnesses and brilliances, Sarah had finished her third drink and was sitting beside him, her arm resting against his, their legs brushing lightly beneath the table.
‘She’s very like you,’ she said, looking down at the picture of Morandi’s eldest daughter who was going to be fourteen the next day. ‘Will you call her tomorrow?’
‘Of course. She’s hoping I’m going to tell her she can come down for a while, but it’s not a good idea right now. The trouble is I’m not very good at saying no where my children are concerned. I’m afraid most of the discipline has fallen to their mothers.’
‘I think they’re very lucky to have a father like you. They must miss you.’
‘Probably not as much as I miss them.’
‘You know,’ she said, feeling a lump inexplicably rising in her throat, ‘I could quite envy you having such a big family. It’s what I’ve always wanted. Not that I ever had as many as seven in mind,’ she laughed. ‘But my husband, he didn’t want any. He just didn’t like children. Strange that we should ever have got together really, considering we wanted such different things from life.’
‘But you’re still young,’ he said softly. ‘There’s still plenty of time for a family, even a big one.’
‘Yes, you’re right,’ she smiled, as his hand closed over hers. For a while she looked down at their hands then feeling him turning her towards him she looked up and watched him as he lowered his mouth to hers. Her eyes fluttered closed as he kissed her so tenderly that it sent delicious swirls of warmth eddying through her heart. He pulled her closer and ran his fingers over the plump, soft flesh of her shoulders, smoothing a hand into her shiny hair, caressing her gently, assertively yet undemandingly.
When finally he let her go he took both her hands in his and gazed down at her, his velvety brown eyes smiling yet concerned.
‘I’m sorry,’ she whispered, aware of how very aroused he was, of how aroused she was too. ‘I want to, but I’m afraid.’
‘It’s OK,’ he told her.
‘I wish I knew what I was afraid of,’ she said. ‘Maybe I think you’ll despise me after, I don’t know.’
‘Have you made love at all since your husband left?’ he asked.
‘Just once. In Consuela’s bathhouse. I take it you know about the bathhouse?’
He nodded.
‘But somehow that was different,’ she said. ‘It was anonymous. I didn’t know anything about him, nor him about me so I didn’t have to worry about what he thought of me. But I didn’t like myself too much after. Oh I don’t know!’ she said, suddenly impatient with herself. ‘I laugh and joke about sex all the time, I pretend to be a mad, bad, wild woman, but it’s all a front because when it comes right down to it I know I’m frigid.’
‘A woman who kisses the way you do isn’t frigid,’ he assured her, smiling. ‘You’re merely bruised and it’s not sex that will heal the bruises, it’s love.’
She laughed wryly. ‘You make it sound so simple.’
‘It will be when you come to trust me.’
‘That’s just it, I think I do trust you.’
‘Then let’s wait until you’re sure.’
She smiled fondly up into his eyes. ‘You’re a wonderful man, Trevor What-ever-your-name-is.’
‘Trubshaw,’ he said.
‘Oh God,’ she laughed, ‘how can someone as wonderful as you have such an awful name?’
He laughed too. ‘Actually it’s Deighton,’ he said, ‘but we can stay with Morandi if you like. And now, as loath as I am to let you go, didn’t you say you were meeting Erik at one?’
‘Oh heaven’s, yes,’ she cried, looking at her watch. ‘Oh my God, it’s twenty to already. Would you call him for me and tell him I’m on my way?’
‘Of course,’ he said standing up with her. ‘I’ll ring you, OK? And good luck this afternoon, I’ll look forward to seeing the results.’
‘Call me soon?’ she said turning back from the door.
‘Very soon,’ he promised.
A few minutes later Sarah was on the point of getting into her car which was parked on the edge of the harbour when Aphrodite suddenly appeared from out of the strolling crowds.
Oh God, Sarah groaned inwardly, as a mental picture of herself flying into the oily water passed through her mind.
‘I know where you’ve been,’ Aphrodite hissed, her jet black eyes burning with fury, ‘but you keep away from him, do you hear me?’
‘Now hang on a minute,’ Sarah said, making an attempt to be reasonable.
‘Keep away from him! I don’t know what he’s told you, but I’m telling you he’s a liar, a cheat and a blackmailer and if you don’t back off right now I’m warning you both, I’ll expose him for what he is,’ and spinning on her heel she stormed off in the direction of Morandi’s apartment block.
Because of the traffic it took Sarah over half an hour to reach Monaco. She drove straight to the Parking des Pecheurs, which Erik had told her to head for, then clutching her map and camera case got into the lift and glided sedately up through the rock to the outer ramparts of the exclusive, sunbaked town.
As she wound her way through the meandering tourists along the twisting pathways fringed by magnolias, eucalyptus and oleanders she was still thinking about what Aphrodite had said. It had shaken her, there was no doubt about that, but the drive had calmed her a little and she was able to approach it more rationally now. She had, she knew, to put her personal feelings to one side as she considered Aphrodite’s accusations against Morandi. But it was hard, very hard when she had truly believed in those two hours they had spent together that he was everything he appeared to be, father, brother, friend and soon-to-be-lover. But had she seen only what she wanted to see? It was true she’d asked him about Jake, but she knew she hadn’t pushed it any harder because she hadn’t wanted anything to spoil the beauty of what was developing between them.
‘He’s a liar, a cheat and a blackmailer.’ Aphrodite’s words resounded horribly, repeatedly through her ears and as much as she hated to admit it she knew she had to face the fact that if he really was the father of seven children then maybe it was blackmail that was helping not only to support them, but to provide him with the means to take her to the kind of restaurant he’d taken her to the other night and to parties like the one at the Colombe d’Or. But who was he blackmailing?
By now she had passed the Musée Océanographique and was in the midst of the fairytale town with its narrow, polished brick roads and flat-fronted pink and lemon buildings. Gifts and postcards, T-shirts and memorabilia spilled out of tiny shop fronts, back-packing students with slender, tanned legs and greasy hair studied their maps, squinted up at the sun and flopped exhaustedly into the cafés. Prim old ladies with tightly curled hair and chic, young sundresses tottered by, poodles tucked protectively under their arms and jewels sparkling lavishly under their chins. She’d taken a wrong turn, she knew that, but imagined if she pressed on ahead she would find another way round to Erik’s apartment that overlooked the Port de Fontvieille.
She wasn’t too sure now that she was looking forward to the afternoon. Maybe it would be better if she and Louisa gave up on this crazy idea of solving whatever mystery they’d stumbled upon. They were out of their depth, she could sense that as fiercely as she could sense the biting heat of the sun. But deep down inside she knew she was resisting letting go. She didn’t want this all to be an illusion, to find herself the victim of lies and chicanery and feel a fool for believing in someone who, on the surface at least, seemed like the answer to her prayers.
She stopped a moment to admire the palace, sitting like a huge, creamy cake beneath the jutting, barren mountain top that scaled the flawless blue heavens behind it. Then glancing at her map again she walked quickly across the Place du Palais, down the steps to the Promenade Sainte Barbe and onto the walkway that skirted the clifftops above the Port de Fontvieille.
When she reached the pale orange apartment block with its black wrought iron balconies and sienna and white striped awnings she looked up at it warily. She wondered if Danny was inside – they hadn’t seen her for almost a week and though she’d called frequently she’d never said where she was. But even if Danny was there Sarah still wasn’t sure she wanted to go in. Then someone came out, the door slammed behind him and Sarah pushed Erik’s bell.
She rang and rang, but when, five minutes later there was still no reply, she could only conclude that he’d got fed up waiting. She could always ring Morandi to see if he’d called, maybe Erik had left a message for her there, but she wasn’t sure she wanted to speak to Morandi right now.
Wandering back onto the path she put her heavy camera case between her legs and leaned her elbows on the wall, gazing thoughtfully down at the turquoise-blue waters of the harbour where white-sailed yachts and gleaming cruisers were gliding smoothly past each other on their way out to or back from the sea.
For the moment no one else was around and as the peace stole over her she closed her eyes and prayed for guidance. Or maybe it was for the courage to admit that she was so desperate to find someone to love, someone to make her feel normal and desirable again, that she was prepared to ignore what was staring her in the face and go blindly, blithely into something that was only going to end up making her even more insecure and screwed up than she already was.
Suddenly she started to smile, for somewhere in the distance, almost as though in answer to her confusion, she could hear a church organ. She turned to look along the path, then checking her map she saw that she was only fifty yards or so from the cathedral.
Picking up her case she began walking towards it and the closer she got it seemed the more fervent and demanding the organ became. Its strident, chords surged out of the silver-grey structure, filling the humid air with sound. Sarah watched in fascination as though the frenzied notes might suddenly explode through the walls and the whole cathedral collapse, slowly, melodically, before her very eyes.
When the music stopped leaving only a sluggish resonance petering into the silence, she continued to stand there, staring. A gaily painted wooden train passed in front of her and she heard the English tour guide inform his passengers that inside this neo-Romanesque cathedral, built in the late
nineteen hundreds, was to be found the tomb of Her Royal Highness the Princess Grace.
Sarah watched as the sweltering tour party disembarked and moved languidly towards the cool darkened interior of the now silent cathedral. She toyed with the idea of joining them, took a step to follow, then without really knowing why, turned abruptly away and started back to the car.
15
AS THE CAR came to a stop at the end of the lane Danny picked up her holdall, turned her scarlet lips to kiss Jake on the mouth and got out. She didn’t wait to watch him pull away, but continued on up the lane towards the villa, humming tunelessly to herself and smiling like the cat that just got the cream and knows there’s more to come. She was at the point of turning in through the gates when she heard a car coming up behind her, radio blaring through the wide open windows.
‘Hi!’ Louisa cried, the genuine pleasure in her greeting telling Danny that she clearly hadn’t seen Jake.
‘Hi yourself,’ Danny grinned back. ‘Where have you been?’
‘More to the point where have you been?’ Louisa laughed, turning the radio down.
‘All over,’ Danny answered, swinging the passenger door open and getting in for the short ride up the drive.
‘Oh come on,’ Louisa protested. ‘Stop being so mysterious. Where did he whisk you off to?’
‘Who, Erik? Nowhere. As a matter of fact, I’ve hardly seen him since last Sunday when he came here to pick me up.’
The warmth started to seep from Louisa’s smile. ‘Then where have you been all this time?’ she asked.
‘Actually, I went back to London to see my parents for a couple of days and the rest of the time I was staying at Consuela’s. She and my mother are old friends it would seem.’
‘Really?’ Louisa said, brightening again. ‘Did your mother tell you anything juicy about her?’
‘Not particularly. Where’s Sarah?’
‘As far as I knew she was spending the afternoon with Erik learning the tricks of the trade. In fact she thought you were going to be there too, but something must have gone wrong because you’re here, her car’s back and there’s no sign of Erik. How did you get here, by the way?’
