A Kept Woman (17 page)

Ernie had let Mira in. Ernie had let her try on Diana’s clothes. Maybe Ernie had given her her own key.

Mira was red-faced, sputtering like a landed fish.

‘We didn’t think you’d be home,’ she muttered, eventually.

Diana steadied herself against the solid oak of her’

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doorway. There was a rush of blood to her head and her

heart. Desperately she tried to pull herself together. We?

‘Is Ernie here?’ she managed to say.

The door from Ernie’s private bathroom swung open

and he entered their room. His skinny frame was wet from the shower, and he was wrapped in his navy-blue cashmere bathrobe. I gave him that for Christmas, Diana thought.

‘You’re early,’ he said, looking at her stupidly. ‘Why

are you home?’

‘I had a headache.’

She didn’t ask him what they were doing. It was painfully, embarrassingly obvious. The girls’ voices came back to her. Everybody knew. It was all over town.

She dug deep for a reserve of dignity. How little he

must really care about her, to do this to her. Fucking that tramp in her apartment. Letting her try on her clothes. What other things of mine has she worn? Diana wondered. Paraded around in?

She turned to Mira.

“Get out of my things, and then get out of my apartment.’

The small, compact little body was already struggling

out of the dress.

‘Hurry up,’ Diana said coldly, ‘or I’ll have to call security.’

She looked at Ernie. He had gone red-faced with embarrassment and now, as he .faced her, with spite.

‘You can’t call security,’ he said nastily, ‘I asked her

here.’

‘I realise that.’ Diana’s voice seemed to be coming from someone else, some other girl located at the far end of a tunnel. ‘But I didn’t, so if you don’t want this all over the front page of the papers I suggest you let me handle it.’

Ernie fell sullenly silent. Tears had started to prickle at

the back of Diana’s eyes and she fought for better

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control. She turned on her rival. ‘Hurry up, Mira, would you? Hadn’t you better get going? I think some of you, r regulars down on Forty-second Street will be getting impatient.’

She was rather proud of that sally. Maybe not the wittiest, but not bad at the last minute. Diana regarded Mira Chen. She was super-skinny and her hair was broken and tattered at the ends. And this was who her husband had been with all the nights she’d waited up alone?

‘Ernie is my only regular,’ Mira said smugly.

‘Somehow I doubt that. Now get out,’ Diana snapped. ‘I want to talk to my husband.’

Mira looked over at Ernie as she struggled back into her pants, iut he avoided her eyes. ‘I’ll see you later, honey,’ she purred, and swept out past Diana, deliberately joshhag past her shoulder.

‘Oof.’ Diana pinched her nose. ‘Next time try to use a little less of that lavatory air freshener you’re wearing. You’re going to stink up my clothes.’

Mira opened her mouth for a catty comeback, but Diana wasn’t having it. ‘Get out. Your lap-dancing job is waiting. Plenty of dirty old men in booths want value for their Viagra.’

She shoved Enie’s mistress into the elevator and punched the lobby button, then turned back to her husband. Ernie was busily tightening the robe’s soft belt around his skinny little flame. His hair was plastered with sweat. Hell, she thought. She knew she’d never get that image out of her mind. Sexuality was something best avoided, in Diana’s opinion, but although she didn’t know what turned her on she knew what turned her off. Mira in her clothes? Her stomach was churning. She wanted to vomit.

Weakly, Diana steadied herself on one of the wide sofas. Now that bitch was gone she felt she had nothing’

holding her up. Central Park swam outside their huge windows, and Diana’s knees buckled and she sank onto the leather.

‘What the hell do you think you’re doing?’

Ernie had righted himself and now he was shouting at

her. His plucked brows knitted together and his face was purple. He wiped the sweat off his forehead. ‘You came back early. It’s your own fault.’

‘Oh, right,’ Diana said, faintly. ‘I see. It’s my fault you

were unfaithful, fucking some slut in our bedroom?’

‘She might be a slut,’ Ernie said nastily, ‘but at least she

can fuck.’

Diana breathed in. Time had stopped for her.

‘Then that makes one of you, I suppose,’ she snapped.

She was completely adrift. What was the-smart, groomed, pulled-together woman’s response to catching her husband in flagrante? Her style was failing her. She had no idea how to act. Those betraying tears were thickening her voice in the back of her throat and squeezing out of the corners of her eyes, no matter how sh tried to blink them back.

‘I’m a fantastic lover,’ Ernie insisted. His voice had

gone high-pitched and wavery. ‘You’re the one with the problem. Mira says I’m the best she ever had.’

‘And how much are you paying her to tell you that?’ ‘You can talk. You don’t exactly come cheap, darlin’.’

‘I am your wife. I deserve more than this.’ Diana sobbed.

‘Oh you do?’ Ernie’s tone was nasty. ‘You deserve

what, exactly? After going and talking about our personal business to a bunch of slappers that have blabbed it all round town? You couldn’t come to me, love, could you? No - you have to make me look like a fucking idiot and have girls ring me up–’

‘What girls? Who rang you up?’ Diana wept. ‘I did

come to you, Ernie! And you lied to me!’

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‘But not until you’d already gone to a bunch of harridans. Let me give it to you straight, girl.’ Ernie folded his thin arms and stared at her. ‘You aren’t mide for sex and a man needs that. I thought you’d be discreet. Understanding. If you hadn’t shoved your nose in my business you would never have been hurt.’

‘You have to give up that whore. I want her fired,’ Diana said, trying to ignore the large tear that had splashed off her lashes onto the end of her nose. Thank goodness she’d had to wipe off her mascara earlier. Waterproof never was.

‘Well now, that wouldn’t be fair. She could bring a sex-harassment suit, too. And she’d win. I don’t want to take the chance.’

‘At least have her transferred. To another country.’ ‘No,’ Ernie said reflectively, ‘I don’t think I will. It’s not her ult. Maybe I like having her here. Maybe if you were better in bed I wouldn’t need her. Anyway, I work fucking hard and you need to deal with me ‘ow I am.’

Diana drew herself up to her full height and wiped the tears from her eyes. ‘You’re going to have to make a decision, Ernie. If you really need a little slut like that, go ahead. But you’ll have to choose. Her or me.’ ‘Don’t you try to threaten me,’ Ernie screeched at her departing back. ‘And don’t think I’m moving into a hotel either. I paid for the bloody pad and I’ll come home when I feel like it.’

‘And when will that be?’ Diana demanded, one hand on the door. It was so hard to see with water in your eyes.

‘Whenever I fucking feel like it,’ Ernie snarled, ‘maybe after I’m done with Mira. Tell you what, Di. Don’t wait

up.’

Diana burst into tears and ran from the room.

She rushed out onto the street and tried to get a cab, but it was rush hour and nothing was free. Diana fought

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to stop herself dissolving into a messy puddle. No cabs, and now she had to walk down to the Park in her broken, achy high heels. She caught sight of herself in a shop window. Her hair was blown into messy strands, her ankles looked swollen, her eyes were reddened and her make-up had run. Oh please, Diana thought, don’t let anybody I know see me now.

A horn was blaring loudly in the traffic. Diana tried to

ignore it and moved forwards, tightly gripping her handbag.

The horn blared louder.

‘Diana!’

She spun on her heel, and saw Felicity Metson, leaning

out of the window of her BMW, looking trim and polished in a new pink hat and shades that reflecved the early evening sun. ‘Whatever is the matter?’

‘Oh, Fee, thank God you’re here,’ Diana sobbed. She

ran forwards into the traffic and Felicity leaned over to

unlock the back door.

‘Darling, hop in. Whatever can have happened? Were

you mugged?’

‘Nothing like that. Oh, Felicity, I can’t go home,’

Diana said weepily. ‘Can you ta.ke me to your place?

Could I stay with you tonight?’

‘Of course you can, sweetie. Although I can’t think

why you would want to.’ In the front seat, Felicity’s fist

curled into a cruel little ball.

Something had obviously happened. Something bad.

The perfectly pulled-together Diana was crying in the street. Felicity had been on her way to pay her a visit, ask her out to lunch tomorow, try to dig up some more dirt on their shaking marriage.

Felicity had looked like this the day she found out her husband was gay. It was the face of a woman in the pit. A girl who felt utterly, completely betrayed. And she was going to want Felicity to pick up the pieces.

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The rain had started up again by the time they Rot downtown. Diana lay curled up on Felicity’s uncomfortable leather couch, swathed in an enveloping white towelling robe. She had taken a long, hot bubble bath at her friend’s insistence - ‘absolutely nothing feels quite so bad after a hot bath, sweetie’ - and felt a tiny fraction better. She was still crying, but at least her face was washed, her wretched shoes had been kicked off, and Felicity had provided her with a mug of hot chocolate and a large box of Kleenex. The hot chocolate was fat free and taste-free, but at least it was warm. Right now, Diana thought, she would take what she could get.

Darling Felicity. What a trouper she was. Diana smiled gratefull˘ at her friend and listened to the rain drumming on the roof.

‘I don’t want to rush you, darling,’ Felicity said, kindly. If you took off all the make-up and the smart dress and towering heels, Diana Foxton looked - well, beautiful. Unfortunately. But she also looked very soft and vulnerable. What had happened? Felicity tucked a straying platinum strand behind her diamond-drop earring and leant forward, trying not to look too much like the vulture she Was. ‘Tell me whenever you’re ready. Or don’t tell me at all! Whatever makes you comfortable.’

‘It’s Ernie.’ Diana looked down and reached for another wad of Kleenex. She .was bitterly ashamed, but there was no getting past this, and anyway, Felicity was an angel. She’d swooped down and rescued Diana, she’d run a blessed warm bath, she’d fetched slippers and made up her tiny guest room. Diana could trust her. She was divorced herself, she’d understand the pain of a cheating bastard. ‘I - I walked in on him.’

‘Walked in on him?’ Felicity pretended that she didn”t

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understand, but her whole skin was prickling with thrilling anticipation.

‘Yes. He - he was - having sex.’

‘With someone else?’ Felicity did a good impression of somebody shocked. ‘Oh, Diana! I thought you must be wrong about him, at lunch. Who on earth could he prefer to you?’

‘Do you know who?’ Diana said painfully. ‘You won’t believe it. Mira Chen. It was her. To think, she’s been to dinner with us. And there she was, the little hooker—’

‘Oh, no. What a tragedy. What on earth did you say?’ Diana sobbed and blew her nose loudly. I’ll tell you, I’ll tell you. Fee, could I possibly stay here? Just for a couple of days? He won’t leave the apartment and I can’t face going back there.’

‘Of course you can.’ Felicity reached forward and stroked Diana’s damp hair. ‘Stay with me, dear, and don’t worry about a thing.’

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Diana woke up before her alarm. She glanced at the glowing numerals of Felicity’s bedside clock and saw that it was only six fifteen, but she still got up. There was no way she would be able to sleep now.

Felicity had lit a comforting, cra.ckling little fire in her wood-burning stove last night, and now, in the dawn light, it was ashen and cold. The empty bottle of Chardonn’ay they had shared lay on her eat-in countertop. Nobody had cleared it away. Diana looked round Felicity’s apartment. Decent, above average for Manhattan, certainly. But it could not compare to the exquisite life of servants, interior decor and fine furniture Diana had carved out for herself with Ernie. Her husband.

Diana groaned. She felt groggy from the alcohol, and there were small blisters on her feet. Plus, she had no clothes. Unless she wanted the guys at Green Eggs to see her in last night’s clothes, there was nothing for it. She’d have to go back home.

She regarded her reflection in Felicity’s mirrored kitchen cabinets. There were dark circles under her pretty eyes, and stress and alcohol seemed to have aged her ten years. Panicked, Diana dived for her handbag and retrieved her Gucci sunglasses. They were tinted pink, so that you looked at the world through rose-coloured lenses. Very funny. What was rosy about her life?

Outside, in SoHo, New York was already awake and bustling. Diana watched a Chinese vendor bicycling through the streets, intent on buying the freshest stock at

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the market stores before his rivals. Manhattan was one big Darwinian experiment, and up until yesterday, she’d welcomed the competition. In her particular pond she’d been one of the biggest fish. Survival of the most stylish. Which nobody could say she wasn’t.

The hired-help mafia would, of course, have her now. The doormen had seen Mira enter; Ernie hadn’t even had enough respect for her to keep Mira out of their home. It would take about a day for the news to leak up through the ranks of Manhattan society, maybe three before veiled items appeared in the gossip columns. The triumph of her enemies would be bad; the pity of her friends even worse. And, of course, word would reach England. Oh hell.

Diana pressed her neat nails to her throbbing-head. There was no help for that. The question was, what would be her most dignified response? Live with Ernie and pretend it never happened? Out of the question, he hadn’t even fired Mira Chen yet. Stay here? She glanced back across the neat little oyster-white apartment to Feli4ity’s bedroom. Thank heavens for one good friend, but she couldn’t impose and, besides, how humiliating to have to share the details every night of her lousy job and cracking marriage. No, the best thing was to rent a luxurious, fully furnished place with Ernie’s money until he came to his senses. Diana allowed her anger to start to build up in her stomach. She would not let him get away with this. Think of the gorgeous fairy-tale wedding that darling Daddy had paid for!