The Vow (9 page)

‘
That can soon be remedied,’ he replied smoothly. ‘Use my account to set yourself up with half a dozen outfits and another formal evening dress whilst you’re at it.’

Lucy looked doubtful, said nothing and started to wind a lock of her hair around her finger.

Marcus shot her a sharp look and said a little impatiently, ‘Come on now, Lucy, we will be attending a good many functions and people will soon notice if you’re always wearing the same clothes. I thought women liked shopping.’

Still unconvinced, she objected.
‘It’s a lot of money.’

He laughed.
‘Not to me it isn’t. Anyway, you have to speculate to accumulate; it’s simply part of my investment in you.’

Ah, so that’s what I am is it, an investment? The idea was disconcerting but she told herself not to be so sensitive, after all they were investing in each other weren’t they? That was what it was all about, wasn’t it?

She forced a smile. ‘I’ll go as soon as I can.’

‘
Good girl, and avoid black it doesn’t suit you.’

Lucy sighed inwardly.

~

‘
Christie! That bloody idiot Nigel has keyed in all the wrong circulation figures. He’s about as much use as a one-legged man in an arse-kicking contest! Get on to him and tell him to sort it out pronto.’

As she finished shouting at her assistant through her always open office door
, Catherine Davis stubbed out her cigarette in the already overflowing ashtray, took a swig of her fifth coffee of the morning and began hammering furiously on her computer keyboard.

A bundle of nervous energy and expert at multi-tasking
, she could achieve twice as much in a working day as anyone else on the magazine. Impatient, demanding and tireless, she shouted a lot but her bark was worse than her bite and she was respected and well liked by her staff.

Her enthusiasm and relentless pursuit of excellence was infectious and in the four years since she had become editor the current affairs magazine had grown in stature and readership, and started picking up journalistic awards.

That she was only five feet two and getting, in her mid-forties, a little broad across the beam were facts that came as a complete surprise to her whenever she caught her reflection. She was convinced in her own mind that she was tall and willowy.

An investigative journalist with a reputation for being as tenacious as a small terrier, Catherine had been thirty-two when she met and married Kit Weston. She was attracted by his talent and charm, and he by her exuberant appetite for life. But they were badly mismatched and that the marriage lasted six years was mainly due to Catherine’s characteristic refusal to admit defeat. She remained unattached for quite some time after the divorce, but was currently living with a television producer whose energy and drive rivalled her own.

Never having wanted her own children she had however enjoyed the experience of having a stepdaughter, encouraging Lucy’s artistic talent whilst trying along with Amelia to engender some ambition in the seriously laid back teenager. After the split she stayed in close contact with Lucy as she did with both Amelia and Kit himself. She was fond of all three of them. But Ellen, now that was a different matter.

Despite it being well after the end of her relationship with Kit, she was most put out at being replaced by the young, beautiful and famous model.

Catherine couldn’t understand why a woman would want to spend her life just being an elegant clothes horse and mistakenly believed Ellen didn’t have the brains to do anything else. It wasn’t that she actually disliked Ellen herself, more that she despised what she represented. The model was well aware of this and the relationship between them was, although not openly hostile, cool and given to point scoring. Catherine had been quietly pleased when the marriage failed and Kit went on to meet, in her opinion, the much more suitable Sarah and she rarely crossed paths with Ellen these days.

There was a tap at the door and Catherine looked up expecting it to be Christie but seeing instead a rather colourless young man casually dressed in jeans and tee shirt.

‘Hi, Tony, how’s it going? Want some coffee?’ She waved in the direction of her espresso machine. ‘Help yourself.’

The young reporter did exactly that and then slumped into a chair across from his editor. Tony Mason was Catherine’s protégé, physically unprepossessing he had a razor sharp mind and a prodigious memory. With the enormous network of contacts and informants he had built up, he would ferret out the facts of a story and then write it up with style and originality. Catherine had come across him two years ago working on a local paper, had offered him a job and he was yet to disappoint her.

‘So what’s new?’ she asked him.

‘
Well, I thought I’d drop by as I’ve heard a couple of things this week which may be of particular interest to you given who your ex-stepdaughter is walking out with these days,’ Tony responded.

Catherine raised an eyebrow and enquired,
‘More dastardly deeds in the dark by Mr Delacroix?’

‘
You could put it like that, yeah. Do you remember around last spring when the Delacroix Corporation seemed to be looking at a spot of bother with the DTI over alleged insider trading?’

She nodded.
‘Yes, I do remember, but then it just seemed to come to nothing.’

‘
Hmm, well apparently the person who was looking into it initially was a middle-aged woman who just happens to be gay. Not the militant, geezer-bird, out of the closet kind. Just a nice quiet lady with, shall we say, rather homely looks, who has spent her life keeping her little secret from friends, family etc. Suddenly Ms DTI meets a young and beautiful like-minded girl and thinks true happiness has come her way.’

‘
I don’t like the direction this seems to be taking,’ interjected Catherine.

‘
You’re right not to. So, Ms DTI sees the gorgeous one, who we will for the purpose of this story call Candy, a couple of times and on the third date gets invited up to her flat. A night of passion ensues and Candy introduces her inexperienced new friend to practices more erotic than she had ever imagined possible. By the next morning she was imagining a new life full of love and frolics with this girl. Two days later she received a visit at home from a very tall black man with facial scars.’ Pausing, Tony said ironically, ‘I think we know who that is, don’t we?’

His boss frowned an
d lit a cigarette. He continued. ‘She was shown photos so explicit a gynaecologist would have been proud of them, and it was suggested that the way to keep these from reaching her colleagues’ desks, her family’s letter boxes and being posted on the internet was to make Delacroix’s problems go away. She was terrified, and devastated at the thought that she’d lost Candy. She tried calling her but the number was now unobtainable, went to the flat only to find a different name on the entry phone and had to accept she’d been caught in a honey trap.’

‘
She folded?’ Catherine’s question was more of a statement.

‘
Completely, wouldn’t you have? Being gay may not be a big deal to most people these days but it is in this lady’s family. She couldn’t bear the thought of anyone seeing those pictures or knowing the humiliation she’d brought on herself in falling for Candy. Her career would have been over simply because she could never have faced her colleagues again. Apparently the case against Delacroix was a bit weak anyway; she misplaced a couple of the papers and simply closed the file.’

‘
How do you know all this, Tony, is this woman prepared to speak out now?’ Catherine was looking grave.

‘
No, nothing like that. It turns out that her best friend, who is the only person who knows anything about all this, and I have a mutual acquaintance. She asked to meet with me and talk off the record because she’s so angry at the effect it has had on her pal. It seems she lives in terror of being found out or having the photos used again to make her do something illegal. Her nerves are shot, she’s taking a lot of sick leave and is looking at enforced early retirement on health grounds.’

‘
Poor cow!’ said Catherine with feeling. ‘But what does the friend think you can do about it?’

‘
I’m not sure she thinks I can really do anything. She said she just wanted someone like an investigative journalist to know what Delacroix is really like and perhaps if someone started nosing about he might think twice about doing it again.’

Catherine sighed.
‘It just doesn’t work like that unfortunately. This isn’t the first time we’ve caught wind of Delacroix’s strong arm tactics and I don’t suppose it will be the last, while it keeps working he’ll keep doing it. He’s rich and well connected; he could probably literally get away with murder’

‘
Nice boyfriend for your Lucy,’ mused Tony.

Catherine had been thinking exactly the same. She was going to have to think of a way of at least giving Lucy a bit of a warning about what sort of man she was getting involved with.

‘Quite! What was the second thing, not more blackmail I hope?’

‘
No, something very different. My contact in Downing Street tells me they are about to start floating the names of some of the possibles for the New Year’s Honours List.’

Catherine’s eyes widened and Tony grinned.

‘Yeah, you’ve guessed it. How does Sir Marcus Delacroix grab you?’

Or Lady Lucy Delacroix, wondered Catherine. Had she completely misjudged the seemingly unambitious young woman?

Lucy loved Graylings from the moment she caught sight of its ivy clad mellow stone walls, mullion windows and tall chimneys standing in line like soldiers on guard. Beyond the beautiful formal gardens surrounding the house her eye was drawn to the small orchard and wild flower meadow some little way in the distance. Entering for the first time through the rose festooned front porch she felt immediately at home. With the gentle ticking of the grandfather clock and the faint smell of wax polish, the house had an air of peaceful well-being.

‘
I can see why you come here as often as you can, Marcus,’ she told him.

Pleased, he replied,
‘Let’s just put the groceries away and then I’ll show you around.’

They had stopped off at the nearby small market town which boasted an excellent delicatessen where they had stocked up for the weekend
, reaching Graylings just before noon.

When Marcus had arrived to pick her up that morning, it was Amy who opened the door to him. Coming down the stairs a minute later Lucy was relieved to find they had introduced themselves and Amy was chatting pleasantly with him in the small hallway, obviously on her best behaviour. They all wished each other a good weekend and Marcus carried Lucy’s bag out to the car.

She looked at the Aston Martin with admiration. ‘No Saule today then?’ she asked.

‘
I almost always drive myself at the weekend,’ he told her. ‘I enjoy it and Saule has a deep seated apathy towards the English countryside, if I make him leave London he sulks.’

She wasn’t sure if he was serious or not but the vision this conjured up amused her.

It had rained overnight, the city streets had a fresh newly washed look but the sun was out again now and not a cloud in the sky.

As they made their way out of town Marcus said,
‘I should warn you, I don’t care to talk much on this journey. I’m invariably alone of course, but I like to drive as fast as I can get away with, listen to Mozart and let the events of the past week wash through my mind one more time before I switch off for the weekend.

‘
Suits me,’ she replied. ‘I like to sleep in the car, in fact I have trouble staying awake.’

‘
There then, the perfect couple,’ he said lightly and again she couldn’t tell if he was serious.

It wasn’t long before they
reached the motorway. Marcus turned up the music and hit the accelerator. Reclining her chair Lucy shut her eyes, but she didn’t sleep. She thought instead about what Catherine had to say when she called the previous evening.

‘
Got a fancy for a title have you, young Lucy?’ Catherine had asked without ceremony.

‘
Sorry, Catherine, I don’t get you,’ Lucy answered, bemused.

‘
The word is your new boyfriend is up for a knighthood in the New Year’s honours, didn’t he mention it?’

‘
What! No, he hasn’t said a word. Bloody hell!’ Catherine knew Lucy well enough to believe her amazement. Lucy went on to ask, ‘Would he know about it?’

‘
Oh yes, he’d know alright. People are approached privately well in advance to avoid any embarrassing refusals, no doubt he and his chum, our beloved PM, have had a good chat about it. It’s not an unusual way to reward an influential supporter of the government who also makes generous donations to party funds.’

‘
So is it official then?’ Lucy asked, still trying to take it in.

‘
No, that’s a long way off. It’s usual for names to be leaked to test the water and to see if anything nasty crawls out of the woodwork. I can name several who have been strongly rumoured to be in the running for an honour only to find themselves quietly dropped because something that deemed them unsuitable surfaced in the intervening period.’

‘
Well, I didn’t know anything about it, but then I’ve only known him two minutes,’ commented Lucy.

‘
It strikes me there may be an awful lot you don’t know about Mr Delacroix, perhaps it’s time you and I had a chat, Lucy. How about a drink after work one evening next week?’

Without moving her head Lucy opened her eyes and sto
le a glance at Marcus’s profile. Seemingly deep in thought, he didn’t notice and she watched him for a while trying to process her own thoughts.

She wasn’t particularly surprised he had said nothing to her about the possible knighthood. He seemed to work on a need to know basis and the flow of information between them was as yet rather one-sided. She wondered if she should say anything to him about it but something told her that wasn’t a good idea.

She thought about the possibility of becoming Lady Delacroix and had to suppress a gurgle of laughter. She said the name over and over in her head and decided, as ridiculous as it was, she rather liked the sound of it. Closing her eyes again she realised just how little she knew about this man. Perhaps over the next two days that would change.

She had the feeling that nothing Catherine was going to tell her would be flattering; she had mentioned before that he had a reputation for being ruthless. But surely all really successful businessmen had to be ruthless, it came with the territory didn’t it, the killer instinct? He was on close terms with such important people and the Prime Minister thought he deserved a knighthood. He couldn’t be doing anything too dreadful surely.

When the shopping had been dealt with Marcus showed her around the downstairs of the house with its flagstone floors, ornate ceilings and a huge fireplace in every room, hence all the chimneys. The furniture was old but good, put together to create a relaxed and comfortable home far less formal than the London house. Picking up their bags, they made their way up the wide oak staircase with its elaborately carved newel post. The upstairs floors were wooden, waxed to a soft sheen, and a beautiful velvet upholstered chaise longue stood on the large landing.

Marcus led the way along a wide passage and opening a door he told her,
‘This room has lovely views out across the gardens. I hope you’ll be comfortable.’

Lucy followed him into the large sunny bedroom with its three windows, two to the back and one to the side which as he said afforded full views of Grayling’s impressive grounds. These windows were draped with delicate floral curtains, the Victorian brass bed was covered by a crisp white cotton counterpane edged with lace and the other furniture was honey coloured antique pine. It was a lovely room and Lucy told Marcus so. Opening a door in the corner of the room he said,
‘This is the bathroom.’

‘
Wow!’

A huge claw footed bathtub dominated the room, set almost centrally it lined up with the window.

‘Helena always said this bath has the best view in the house. She liked to lie there with a glass of wine, just looking at it.’

‘
I’m not surprised,’ Lucy told him.

‘
Well, I’ll leave you to unpack. My room’s at the front, the other doors are to the guest rooms. Come down when you’re ready and we’ll have some lunch.’

Lucy unzipped her overnight bag and thought about what Marcus had said, all of which suggested that she had been given his late wife’s room rather than a guest room and that the Delacroixs had slept separately. But then lots of couples did, perhaps one of them snored.

They peeled and chopped harmoniously together at the granite topped work island, Lucy admiring the collection of old copper pots which hung above it, intermingled with bunches of dried herbs and flowers. Marcus described to her the sad condition the house had been in when they bought it and how gradually over the years it had developed into the place where he most liked to be. They ate their Caesar salad and wild strawberries at the big old table in front of the window looking out onto the perfectly manicured lawn.

‘
What would you like to do this afternoon, Lucy?’ Marcus asked.

‘
I’d love to see around the garden, but I’ll fit in with you,’ Lucy replied, starting to clear the table.

‘
Well, when we get down to the orchard there’s a nice walk through the woods and on to the village if you fancy that.’

‘
Sounds lovely,’ she said.

Lucy was captivated by the garden’s exuberant planting and as they walked through the wisteria-covered pergola, the flowers hanging like huge bunches of grapes, she said with admiration,
‘Helena was a wonderful gardener, a real plants-woman.’

‘
Indeed she was,’ Marcus agreed.’ It was her passion and things always grew well for her. She was quiet and gentle, everything responded well to her, plants, people, animals and children.’

‘
Would she have liked her own children?’ Lucy was emboldened to ask.

He thought for a moment before answering.
‘I don’t think it was something which bothered her much, but we never really talked about it. By the time we married she was forty six so it was never an issue.’

‘
And how old were you Marcus?’

‘
Twenty-eight.’

‘
I bet that raised some eyebrows.’

He laughed.
‘One or two. Of course most people thought I was marrying her for her money.’

‘
But you weren’t.’ It was a statement not a question.

Marcus sighed.
‘No, money was not the reason I married Helena.’

‘
Did you ever regret it?’

She wondered if she’d gone too far but he smiled at her and said,
‘No, I never did. Come on, let’s go for that walk.’

In those few minutes he had told her more about himself than ever before, it wasn’t much, but it was a start, and made Lucy hopeful that he would soon sto
p holding her at arm’s length.

From the small wild flower meadow and orchard they strolled into the dappled light of the woods, the sun was warm on their backs and, like Marcus, Lucy was glad to be out of the city.

She had been back in London three weeks but still hadn’t grown used again to the hustle and bustle, traffic, noise and dirt that were part of life in a city. A country girl at heart, she had been happy in rural South West France, coming to love its rolling hills, large tracts of woodland and the ridge roads with their breathtaking views of the snow capped Pyrenees. Lush green pasture played host to herds of Blondes d’Aquitaine cattle, chubby butter-coloured beasts whose beautiful bovine faces stared back at you with gentle curiosity. With clouds of mimosa in the spring, miles of sunflowers in summer and the elegant albizzia trees with their silky pink feathers later in the year, it was a far cry from the urban life she was now leading.

Reaching the edge of the village Marcus helped her over a stile and she would have left her hand in his but as they walked on he released it. They bought ice creams at the little shop on the green and ate them sitting on a bench overlooking the duck pond.

‘How’s it going at the workshop, have you settled back in?’ Marcus asked.

‘
Yes, it’s fine. They’re a nice crowd, it’s good to see them all again. I’ve set up my equipment, bought materials and I brought back enough finished pieces from France to make a reasonable display. All I need now are some customers.’

‘
Are you alright for money?’

‘
Hmm, just about,’ Lucy answered whilst taking a big lick of rum & raisin. ‘I had some through from my French outlets this week which will tide me over for a while.’

‘
Would it help if I paid off your credit cards? I remember you saying they were up to their limits.’

‘
Probably, but I’d rather you didn’t.’

‘
As you wish, but if you change your mind the offer is there.’

‘
Is it fun being very rich?’ she asked.

Amused, he responded,
‘Yes it is, although I’m not sure how much more fun it is than just being rich. I’m sure you will enjoy it.’

Lucy sat quietly, a thoughtful expression on her face. Watching her Marcus asked,
‘What are you thinking about, Lucy?’

‘
Just how funny it is the way things turn out. If we hadn’t met at the airport I wouldn’t be about to become rich and you wouldn’t have tutti frutti all down your shirt!’

Back at the house, Lucy made a pot of tea and they sat under the tree where the previous week Marcus had sat with Alicia, and looked through the newspapers they had bought in the village.

‘I hardly dare look at Martin Culver’s page. Saturday seems to be when he picks on us. How often does his column appear, do you know?’ Lucy asked.

‘
Three times a week,’ he told her.

‘
I never seem to get the chance to read a paper in the week but I suppose you read them all to keep abreast of things.’

‘
I have someone who does that for me.’

‘
You pay someone to read the newspapers for you?’ Lucy said in surprise. ‘Well, they never mentioned that job during careers advice at school!’