Simply Divine (45 page)

'Tom?'

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'Mmm?' said Tom, pulling her to him in the crook of one strong arm.

'You know you used to talk about writing a bonkbuster?'

The organ swelled as Jane approached the altar, lightheaded with happiness and days of not eating. It had been worth it - the tiny waist of the wedding dress now fitted her with ease, and she was blissfully aware of her slender form moving gracefully beneath the thick satin. The air was heavy with the scent of freesia and white roses as, smiling shyly beneath her cathedral-length veil and perfect make-up, Jane drew up alongside Tom.

Looking at her with a gratifying mixture of awe and wonder, Tom gave her a tender smile. He looked exhausted, thought Jane, but then again, so would anyone who had spent the last six months writing his own book in the morning and knocking off a novel with Champagne in the afternoons. In the end, though, it had been relatively painless. The editor from the publishing house had been thrilled with it, so much so that the more literary arm of the house had made a substantial offer for Tom's own first novel. The advance for his sister's, meanwhile, had ensured they had one hell of a honeymoon ahead of them. And if half what was being said about German rights, US rights and film rights was true, they'd be holidaying on Mustique for the rest of their lives.

Jane glanced behind her, catching Tally's eye. Tally raised a gloved hand and grinned, looking as if she might burst with happiness. The Dewsbury business was obviously all over now; Tally had not even commented on the recent tabloid pictures of her erstwhile lover snapped with some unsuspecting anorexic heiress in a nightclub. Sitting in what passed for a beer garden at the Gloom, Jane had

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turned the page over quickly. Tally had merely smiled faintly and rolled her eyes, as if unable to believe any of it had ever happened.

Next to Tally, Julia blew Jane an exuberant, two-handed, bracelet-rattling kiss, almost knocking off Big Horn's headdress as she did so. Affecting not to notice, the majestic Indian remained as stock still as ever, his massive chest covered with even more feathers, bones and brilliantly coloured tribal beads than usual. It was obviously his gala outfit. As Jane's gaze passed to him, to her utter amazement he raised one magnificent dark eyebrow and tipped her the lewdest of winks.

Next to Big Horn, Archie Fitzherbert s attention was completely taken up by the person sitting on his other side. There, in a vast red hat under which her eyes burned smokily and her hair poured down as flat and black as tar, Jordan Madison,
Fabulous s
most successful cover girl ever, sat in all her waifish glory. Her air of fragility was exaggerated by the fact that on her left sat the solid form of Mrs Ormondroyd, tissue clamped firmly to her nose. Jane shuddered at the memory of her most recent dealings with the huffy housekeeper. It had not been easy persuading her not to make the wedding buffet.

Jane turned her head back to the front, admiring how wonderful the restored Mullions altar looked now. Tally had insisted Jane's wedding should be the first to take place in the newly refurbished chapel. Even the eighteenth-century organ had been restored for the occasion and, as it struck up for the final hymn, the sound flowed out as confidently as when Handel, who was supposed to have inaugurated the instrument, first set finger to keyboard. It sounded, Jane thought, as smooth and strong as the well-aged brandy she had sipped to steady her nerves before the

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ceremony. As the quavering voices of the congregation struggled and failed to match the purity of the music, Jane felt Tom beside her fumble beneath her veil and squeeze her hand.

The service flashed by. Much to her relief Jane got Tom's many names right. She had spent a panicked night before whispering them into the dark surroundings of the Elizabethan bed, terrified that she'd get them all wrong like the Princess of Wales. She hadn't realised what a minefield this was. It would make a great problem for the
Fabulous
advice page. Only, on this day, her wedding day, she had vowed to try not to think of
Fabulous
once. She was, she knew, obsessed with the magazine, and thought of very little else except, of course, Tom. And
Fabulous
had repaid her devotion handsomely by soaring twenty per cent in circulation since she took over, leaving
Gorgeous
and Josh a very satisfactory distance behind.

Jane turned to walk back down the aisle with Tom. It was not difficult to spot Champagne's vast and violent magenta feather hat bobbing wildly as she waved at her brother. Beside her was her latest swain, an up-and-coming film actor in an electric-blue satin frock coat who had, it was said, ensnared Champagne with the promise of a cameo role in his next project. Jane wondered, noticing Brad at the back of the chapel with Lily Eyre, if the actor knew quite what he was letting himself in for. His subdued expression, contrasting profoundly with Champagne honking (and looking) like an excited Canada goose beside him, suggested that it had begun to dawn on him.

It was amazing, Jane thought, as she passed serenely by the exquisitely refurbished Jacobean oak pew where Champagne was sitting, to think they were now relations. She would never have imagined this possible. The strange

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fate which had intertwined their destinies from the start had by no means given up its influence. She had not only married Tom in the chapel at Mullions; she had also married Champagne. Jane plastered a vast, shaking but hopefully genuine-looking smile on as her new sister-in-law tottered up in the receiving line outside the chapel door.

'Ow!' Jane winced as, attempting an air-kiss, Champagne speared her in the eye with her huge and sprouting hat. A few guests down the line, Jane spotted Big Horn eyeing up the feathers with interest.

'Darling, you look
wonderful,'
Champagne gushed. It's so
interesting,
isn't it, how not everyone suits white? And so sweet of you to wear what is obviously your
own
jewellery,' she added, before passing on in a cloud of Jo Malone.

Jane gasped indignantly, as if a bucket of freezing cold water had been thrown over her. 'She's amazing, isn't she?' she stammered to Tom. 'I mean, it doesn't matter that I'm actually related to her now. She'll always see herself as the glamorous society girl and me as the slave. She'll always be the It Girl and I'll always be the Shit Girl.'

'Oh, ignore her,' said Tom, grinning. 'Let's go and have a drink.' He bore her off in the direction of the party, held in the newly refurbished and almost unrecognisably smart Blue Drawing Room.

A few circuits of the room later, her face plastered in lipstick from all the congratulatory kisses, Jane bumped into her new sister-in-law once more.

'Wonderful party,' Champagne gushed. 'Rahly marvellous.'

Jane grinned. Champagne had clearly not been stinting on her namesake beverage. 'Thank you for saying so,' she

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said, beaming delightedly. Champagne
could
be pleasant when she tried. Jane was almost beginning to feel fond of her. 'That's a real compliment,' Jane said, warmly, 'considering you've been to more parties than I've had hot dinners.'

Champagne pursed her lips, lifted an eyebrow and slowly scrutinised Jane's body from head to toe. 'Oh, I don't think so,' she smirked. 'Not quite
that
many.'

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