And suddenly, it all came flooding back to Lola. The last time she’d been here, with Jean-Marc. And the time before. Both with groups of friends, all party animals, all determined to live life to the full, no matter how many drugs they had to take, or how much chaos they created for the staff. Skinny-dipping off the pier, drunken excursions in the speedboats. Chopping up lines in full view of everyone who worked at the villa, on the polished travertine tables meant only for displaying the exquisite collection of Buhl candelabra that Jean-Marc’s family had assembled over centuries. Bed-swapping, orgies; Lola hadn’t participated in those, but she’d known about them and laughed at the stories. Roaringly loud music, crates of vintage champagne emptied in an instant as Jean-Marc yelled for more, glasses smashed everywhere. Some incredibly valuable vase had been broken, she remembered. Two crazy Swiss girls had surfed down the main staircase naked, sitting on trays, and then had a cat fight in the swimming pool and nearly drowned; hadn’t they had to call a doctor? She knew a doctor had been called for someone . . .
They must have left the staff with weeks of work just to clear up after the mess they’d made.
‘Um, Maria?’ Lola began, not even knowing how to apologise for what she’d done.
‘Marta, ’ the woman corrected, folding her hands in front of her, her glare intensifying.
‘Marta. Sorry.’ Instantly, Lola was wrong-footed. ‘Really sorry I got your name wrong. And I’m so sorry too for – for all the mess we made when we visited before—’ Lola attempted.
‘That is your affair, ’ Marta said coldly. ‘It is not my business. My business is to look after the family.’
She gestured beyond her, to the main living-room that led onto the spectacular terrace.
‘Mr Niels is waiting for you, ’ she said.
How could I have forgotten about the parties we threw here? Lola thought guiltily as she walked across the entrance hall, her shoes echoing on the marble floor. Because I was off my face most of the time. Too off my face to wonder why Jean-Marc and I never ended up sleeping together.
Huge, priceless embroidered silk tapestries hung on either side of the hall, depicting Perseus fighting the sea monster to rescue Andromeda; on the left, Perseus was swooping down on the monster, sword in hand; on the right, he was unchaining Andromeda, who was swooning into his arms, her bosoms falling out of her dress in relief. They were 15th-century, truly priceless, and Lola had a horrible flash of memory associated with them: some girl at one of the parties grabbing the deep gold silk fringe that hung below each tapestry and trying to swing on them.
And had Lola done anything to stop her? She didn’t think so. She’d probably yelled some laughing encouragement and poured more champagne down the back of her throat.
I must have been loaded the whole time, she thought in shame. No wonder Marta made it very clear she didn’t want to let me in.
‘What the hell are you doing in Italy?’ Niels demanded the moment she crossed the threshold into the main reception room. ‘I seem to remember us laying down a considerable sum to guarantee your bail! Five hundred thousand, wasn’t it? And you had to surrender your goddamn passport! What the hell are you doing out of America? Do the authorities know about this?’
God, nothing gets past Niels, Lola realised. Jean-Marc sorted out my bail. I didn’t even realise Niels was involved. He must check on everything Jean-Marc does nowadays . . .
She stood in the doorway, looking at Niels. His back was to the terrace, to the sun, so his face was in shadow, and she couldn’t see his expression. But she didn’t really need to. She was sure he was glowering at her. He was dressed more casually than she had ever seen him, in jeans and a long-sleeved black T-shirt, rolled up to just below his elbows, revealing his muscled forearms, while the jeans showed off his slim hips and strong thighs.
She gulped. For some reason, the thought of Niels’s thighs always sent her into temporary paralysis.
‘Hello! Wake up!’ Niels actually snapped his fingers at her, which was so annoying that it did have the effect of bringing her out of her momentary trance. ‘Are you going to explain yourself, or are you just going to stand there gaping like a goldfish?’
Oh, thank God. He’d made her angry. At least this way she could talk back to him.
‘I am not gaping like a goldfish!’ she said crossly. ‘I’m just trying to get a word in edgewise!’ She cleared her throat. ‘I did jump bail, ’ she admitted. ‘I’m not supposed to leave the States. But it was for a really good reason. I—’
Niels strode across the room to the terrace, flinging open the doors.
‘Five million dollars!’ he exploded. ‘You realise that’s what we’ll have to pay for this little exploit of yours? Five million dollars, because you got bored in New York and thought you wanted to pop over to get a little Italian sunshine! You’re not even a member of the family any more, now that you’re not my brother’s future wife! But somehow, we’ve ended up covering your legal fees, your living expenses—’
‘Actually, Jean-Marc’s doing that, ’ Lola retorted furiously. ‘Out of his trust fund, which has nothing to do with you. And he’s doing it because he’s my best friend in the world, and also, frankly, because he completely humiliated me by getting engaged to me and sneaking off to have sex with boys in a tranny’s drug den. Which if it had happened to a sister of yours, you’d be absolutely furious about!’
Niels stood with his back to her, staring out over Lake Como, his shoulders bunched with tension.
‘You and Jean-Marc, ’ he muttered. ‘I don’t understand it. I don’t understand why you got engaged. I don’t understand how you could possibly have considered marrying each other.’
‘It seemed like a good idea at the time, ’ Lola said rather feebly.
‘So are you going to tell me what you’re doing here?’ he asked eventually, still not turning to look at her. ‘How did you even know how to find me, for God’s sake! I only arrived half an hour ago myself!’
‘I rang your office and said I was calling from Cascabel, Jean-Marc’s rehab centre, ’ Lola admitted. ‘I said I needed to talk to you when you were in a private setting, not the office or travelling, and eventually they gave me this number and said you’d be here after nine, and I worked out it was the area code for Como. So I knew you must be coming here, to the villa.’
‘Very super-spy, ’ Niels said sarcastically. ‘Well, at least I don’t have to worry about that call I was expecting from Cascabel any longer. Why didn’t you just say who you were, instead of going through that elaborate pretence?’
‘Because, ’ she said frankly, ‘I didn’t think you’d want your office to give me any information about where you were. I thought you’d have told them to hang up on me if I said who I was.’
Niels raised a hand and rubbed his forehead as if he were trying to get rid of a headache. Then he stepped outside, onto the terrace. Lola watched him walk away, admiring his strong, muscled back, his firm buttocks taut in the faded jeans. God, ever since she’d met Niels – or, to be honest, had sex with Niels – she’d turned into some sort of sex addict.
No! she told herself firmly. No no no! I mustn’t think about having sex with Niels when I’m talking to him . . . I’ll get all embarrassed and distracted and forget what I need to say . . .
Niels was leaning on the balustrade of the terrace, looking over the waters of the three lakes below. Villa Aurora was exceptionally placed, high up at the tip of the Bellagio promontory, affording it panoramic, sweeping views over the lake. Beyond, high wooded hills rose steeply on each side of the water, rich and lush.
‘So, ’ Niels said finally, still not looking round at her.
He’s barely looked at me since I came in, Lola thought forlornly. He must really hate me.
‘You’d better tell me what’s going on, ’ he continued. ‘Obviously something is, and obviously I’m not going to get away without hearing it. So let’s get it over with, eh?’
It wasn’t a promising start, but beggars c
ouldn’t be choosers. As succinctly as she could, Lola told him everything, in the way she had been rehearsing on the whole long train and boat journey up from Rome. The story of what had happened the day of her father’s death, how Joe had manoeuvred her into touching the syringe and the insulin. His accusation, which had caused her arrest. Her lawyers’ concern that with the fingerprint evidence and his testimony, she was in real danger of being convicted for a crime she hadn’t committed – the murder of her father, no less.
And her own determination to track down Joe and confront him, to plead with him and convince him to tell the truth.
There was a wrought-iron table on the terrace, four matching chairs around it, padded linen covers tied over them, a big parasol standing in the centre, its white canvas umbrella opened already to provide shade from the morning sun. Lola walked over to the table and set her bag down, pulling out from it the contract that Joe had signed, anchoring it under her phone so that it wouldn’t blow away in the light breeze.
‘There it is, ’ she said. ‘Read it. You’ll see.’
Niels turned around at last, resting his arms along the balustrade. The breeze caught his dark-blond hair, ruffling it up, and she thought he looked as if he had been somewhere hot in the past couple of weeks: his skin was tanned, the golden hairs on his arms glinting in the sun.
I must not stare at his forearms, Lola told herself firmly. I must not.
‘Lola, ’ he said wearily, ‘all that contract proves is that you paid some corrupt little man a lot of money, and agreed to pay him a small fortune if he lies for you on the witness stand.’
Angry words burst from Lola’s mouth, but Niels held up a hand to silence her.
‘Or tells the truth for you, OK, ’ he continued. ‘But all it proves to me is that this Scutellaro is corruptible. Not what he did, or didn’t see you do the day your father died.’
Lola’s eyes flashed fire.
‘Right, ’ she said with icy coldness. ‘Fine. If you really think I’m capable of killing my own father, there’s nothing more to be said, is there?’ She snatched the contract off the table and forced it back into its folder.‘I don’t know why I bothered to even try to convince you in the first place!’ she snapped. ‘What was the point? If you really have any doubt about whether I killed my own father for money, then I’m completely wasting my time here.’
She put the folder back in her bag and slung the whole thing over her shoulder.
‘I know I’ve got a bit of a sordid past, ’ she said bravely. ‘I know Jean-Marc and I were spoilt idiots who partied much too hard and haven’t done a day’s work in our lives, either of us. But believe me, we’ve both learned our lesson. Jean-Marc’s at Cascabel, and I haven’t touched drugs since that night at Maud’s. And I won’t be going near them any more. We’re both cleaning up our acts. You can believe that or not, as you want. I don’t give a damn what you think of me.’
She ticked points off on her fingers.
‘Yes, I was a spoilt party girl. Yes, I lived off the money that my father made and didn’t lift a finger to try to earn any myself. Yes, I cared much too much about getting my picture in the glossies and sitting in the front row at fashion shows and being famous for doing nothing at all apart from wearing the latest clothes. All of that’s pretty pathetic. I get it. But none of it makes me a murderess. Particularly someone who’d kill her own father! Your own brother’s been supporting me ever since I got arrested! Do you really think he’d do that if he thought I’d killed my father? Do you really think he’s such an idiot that he can’t tell I’m innocent?’
She was almost out of breath by now, she was so angry.
‘So you know what, Niels van der Veer? Go to hell. Fuck you, if you can’t see what kind of person I am. Fuck you and the horse you rode in on.’
She turned on her heel.
‘And now, if you’ll excuse me, ’ she said over her shoulder, ‘I’m walking out of here, if you wouldn’t mind telling Marta to buzz the gates open for me. Don’t bother to call me a cab. The walk back down to town will do me good.’
Lola had failed, completely failed. She was going to have to get herself back to Milan, head to Malpensa airport, and board a plane with Evie’s passport, knowing that she was sure to be arrested as soon as she stepped back onto American soil.
But strangely, as Lola walked away across the terrace, the heels of her boots clicking loudly on the marble floor of the reception room, she was full of a sense of triumph that she had barely ever experienced before. Her head was buzzing with excitement. All her life, she had done what her father said, lived the carefree, society-girl existence he had chosen for her. She’d never said no to him, never done anything he didn’t want, never made a single real decision of her own. There had been nothing to rebel against, because Ben Fitzgerald had wanted only the best for her.
Lola had achieved more in these past two days than she had managed in her entire over-indulged, rich-girl life. And standing up to Niels van der Veer, telling him to go to hell, was the culmination of it all. He was the strongest, most powerful, most intimidating man she had ever met; and still, she had managed to tell him exactly what she thought of him, and done it, too, in a way so articulate that she could be really proud of herself.
She was so high on her own success that she didn’t even hear Niels coming after her, had no idea that he wasn’t still standing on the terrace, until his hand grasped her arm and he said:
‘Lola – Lola, don’t go. I’m sorry. I really am sorry.’
She stopped, but she didn’t turn around. She made him come to her, walk around her till he was looking down at her. And she shook his hand off her arm for good measure.
‘I deserve that, ’ he said, grimacing.
His silvery eyes were softer than they had ever seemed before; their expression was almost pleading.
‘Don’t go, ’ he repeated. ‘Tell me what you need. Tell me what you came here for.’ He swallowed. ‘I’m sorry, Lola.’
The sound of her name on Niels van der Veer’s lips was so powerful that she would have given him anything he wanted, just to hear him call her by her name again. She realised that she had hardly ever heard him say it: he had always been snapping at her. ‘You, ’ said with contempt in her direction, was probably the best she’d ever got from him until that moment just now.
When he’d said ‘Lola’, three times, almost – for him – imploringly, it had melted her as if she’d been made of wax, and Niels had been holding a blowtorch.
But at least she hadn’t let him see. That was the key, she was realising as she grew up. You could feel anything in the world you wanted, as long as you could disguise it when you needed to.
So, eventually, she had consented to follow him back out to the terrace, and he had asked what she needed, and called Marta to organise her breakfast – whatever she wanted, everything they had that she might like – and gone off to make a series of phone calls. And now she was sitting here, in the shade of the umbrella, watching the shining waters of Lake Como ripple gently in the breeze, sipping freshly squeezed blood-orange juice, and picking at the feast that a maid had carried out on a silver tray and arranged on the table.
There was a whole salver of the sweet pastries Italians ate for breakfast: almond croissants, dusted with a matt covering of icing sugar; brioches golden and shiny with egg-yolk glaze; little fruit tarts, rich with pastry cream and dotted with bright red berries; pains au chocolat, drizzled with zigzags of dark confectioner’s chocolate. And of course, a cup of cappuccino, the milk thick and perfectly foamed.
But in case she preferred to eat something savoury, there were platefuls of tempting little morsels. Bright green broad beans, podded, mixed in with tiny cubes of pecorino cheese, placed on slices of prosciutto and rolled up into little packets, drizzled with extra-virgin Tuscan olive oil; slices of torta salata, the Italian version of the French quiche, made with spring peas and new-season chives; a mousse of radicchio, sitting in a pool of savoury cream, toast fing
ers on the side to dip into it; a dish of smoked salmon and swordfish, sliced so fine she could see the pattern of the china below, arranged in the centre of a circle of lemon wedges and feathery silver-green fennel leaves.
Everything simple and elegant and of the best quality, nothing showy.
I should send Marta a really nice present, she thought. Something from Fendi. She’s very classic, she’d love Fendi. Even if I never come back here again, I should apologise properly for all the trouble we caused.
‘Lola?’
Niels appeared in the open doors to the terrace.
‘I’ve arranged everything, ’ he said. ‘The plane’s refuelling now. Have you had enough to eat?’
She nodded, standing up and reaching for her bag. Niels looked at the table, still brimming with food.
‘You’ve hardly touched anything!’ he said. ‘Did you not like the breakfast?’
Oh, for God’s sake, Lola thought, rolling her eyes. I had a prosciutto parcel, some smoked salmon, some salad and half a croissant! I ate so much I feel sick! Do you not know women like me barely eat anything to keep ourselves as slim as we are? Do you think I’m a size two because I have a really, really fast metabolism?
Men, she sighed. They don’t want you to be fat, but they hate it when you tell them how much you diet. Bloody hypocrites, all of them.
‘I’m fine, really, ’ she said, smiling at him.
He looked away.
‘Come on, ’ he said, turning and plunging down the stone staircase to the side of the terrace.
Niels was leading her down a gravel path, along the side of the house, past what, in a month or so, would be a spectacular rose garden, when the flowers that were budding now started to bloom. He was walking so fast, taking such long strides, that she had to trot inelegantly to keep up with him. The path began to rise again, taking them through a thickly grown tunnel of boxwood planted steeply up round the side of the villa. And then the hedges rose on either side to a topiary arch, the ground levelled out, and they emerged into a clearing cut into the woodland, a big circle of poured grey concrete, painted with the unmistakeable markings that identified a helicopter landing pad.
Divas Page 35
