Vanity (22 page)

‘Hi, Mum.' Bella automatically gave her mother a hug and kiss. ‘Journey was fine, thanks. But what's
he
doing here?' She nodded over in Mark's direction.

‘Your father asked if he could bring a guest, and I said yes. I must admit, I was expecting somebody more – er …'

‘… female?' Mark laughed sheepishly.

‘I don't know how you can stand there so brazenly.' Bella turned to glare at him, hands on her hips. ‘Do you know how devastated Sam is by what you've done?'

‘You mean I can't get you to put in a good word for me?' Mark gave another nervous laugh.

‘So
that's
why you're here?' Bella's voice rose incredulously.

‘Please, Belles. I miss her so much; it was a moment of madness …'

‘And you should have
seen
that girl,' chimed in Justin, who had just walked through the back door, followed by Andy and Bernie. ‘Really, you'd 'ave to be made of stone to resist Karolina …'

‘Justin, I really don't think that's going to help,' said Olivia, rolling her eyes. She was right. Bella rounded on her father, the father that only minutes earlier she had been so delighted to see.

‘Oh, for fuck's sake, Daddy, I should have known that
you
'd be involved. You bloody men have no idea how much pain you cause when you can't keep your fucking dicks in your trousers.' Bella was on the verge of tears and everybody fell silent, knowing she was thinking of Ben and Poppy. ‘So, no, Mark, I'm not going to put in a good word for you. You should have seen the state Sam was in. Poor little thing said she'd never be able to look at you again without picturing you fucking that slapper on the boat. So maybe you should have thought about that …' She turned to her father, her voice rising again. ‘However
irresistible
she was, Daddy.'

‘OK, darling, I think we get your point,' said Olivia
gently. ‘Why don't you come into the kitchen and help me get this lunch together. Bernie, darling, make sure everybody's got nice big drinkies, please?'

‘Course I will, Princess.'

And Bella followed her mother into the kitchen, leaving Mark gazing forlornly after her, Andy looking at his feet in embarrassment and Bernie busying himself pouring drinks. Justin sat down at the white wrought-iron garden table, looking sad for a few seconds. Then he shrugged and started to roll a joint.

Olivia's kitchen was large and sunny, the heart of the family home. Faded checked curtains in shades of green, yellow and cream framed big sash windows that faced south onto the back garden. A wooden bookshelf crammed with
well-t
humbed cookery tomes stood next to the old, chipped cream Aga, and a couple of armchairs that used to be
overstuffed
sagged fatly either side of the fireplace – one upholstered in a shabby cream-and-green Regency stripe, the other a sprigged floral pattern of tiny blue flowers with green leaves on a pale yellow background. The scrubbed pine kitchen table was large enough to seat eight comfortably, and the double ceramic sink made light work of the mountains of washing-up Olivia liked to create with the elaborate meals she prepared (of course she had a
dishwasher
, but it was terribly old and never really got things as clean as she'd like them). Worn flagstones underfoot and mismatched jugs of flowers from the garden on almost every available surface added to the room's welcoming air of warmth and comfort.

‘Sit down and have a drink, darling,' said Olivia, opening
the fridge and taking an open bottle of white wine out of
the door. ‘And for God's sake, calm down.'

‘Calm down? Mum! I don't understand how you can be like this, after the way Dad treated you. Fucking bastards are all the same …'

‘Just listen to yourself, darling.' Olivia handed Bella a wineglass filled almost to the brim, and Bella took an enormous swig. ‘Oh, God, I think I probably indoctrinated you too well when you were little.'

‘What do you mean?'

‘Oh, Belles.' Olivia shook her head sadly. ‘I know I used to say that all men were bastards, because I was so jolly well hurt by your father's behaviour …'

‘See? That's exactly what I mean …'

‘Try not to interrupt, darling, it's terribly bad manners.'

‘Sorry, Mum.'

‘But that was years ago, and I've come to accept that that's the way he is. I think that some men are simply incapable of being faithful to one woman – I'm afraid that Mark's one of them too. The thing is to find one who's a keeper. And you and I are lucky enough,
now
,
that we've done so.'

‘How can you be so sure, though, Mummy? I mean, I think you're right about Bernie, but how do I know that Andy's never going to fuck around on me? He's been working late so often recently that he could easily be
shagging
someone in his office …'

Witnessing Sam's devastation, just over a week ago now, had burst something of Bella's bubble of joy with Andy. It had brought back all those feelings of pain and suspicion she had felt after the Ben debacle; in fact the distrust of men that she'd had her entire life, really, after observing her father's behaviour over the years.

Olivia hooted with laughter.

‘Andy? Having an affair? Now you really are being
ridiculous
. He's absolutely devoted to you, and you really need to start appreciating what you've got.'

Bella gave her mother a rueful smile. ‘I am being silly, aren't I?'

‘Yes, you are. And, for the sake of a harmonious lunch, I'd like you to go outside and make it up with Mark …'

‘Bu—'

‘I told you, darling, don't interrupt. Mark is a far older friend of yours than Sam is; he hasn't cheated on
you
; and however sorry you feel for the girl, it's not your position to judge his behaviour.'

‘Oh, all right then,' said Bella sulkily, draining her glass in one gulp and reaching for the open bottle on the table in front of them to top it up again.

‘And awful though I know Sam must be feeling now, she's very young, and very pretty. I can't imagine she'll be devastated for too long. What she needs is a nice boy of her own age, not a 30-something lothario who gallivants around the fleshpots of Saint-Tropez with your father. Really, it was a disaster waiting to happen.'

Bella laughed.

‘Put like that, you're right, Mum. You always are. OK, I'll go outside and make my peace with the buffoon, if I must.'

‘You do that, darling. But hurry right back – this lunch isn't going to cook itself, you know.'

‘All well?' Olivia looked up from the potatoes she was peeling as Bella re-entered the kitchen five minutes later.

‘All fine.' Bella smiled. ‘God, that's starting to smell amazing.' She nodded at the Aga. ‘Slow-cooked shoulder of lamb?'

Olivia nodded back.

‘I can smell the garlic and rosemary. Anchovies too?'

‘Of course.' It had been a family favourite since Bella was a teenager, when they'd spent several summer holidays in Provence.

‘How long ago did you put it in?'

‘About four hours ago,' said Olivia, checking her watch. ‘Needs a couple more at least, which will give us a chance to have a jolly old natter.' One rarely sat down to Sunday lunch before five p.m. at Olivia's house. By which time one was generally pretty well oiled.

‘OK, chuck me a knife and I'll get started on the shallots.'

Seated at the table, armed with knife and chopping board, an enormous array of vegetables spread out in front of her, wineglass happily within reach of her left hand, Bella looked at her mother over the table.

‘You're looking pretty, Mum. I love your top.'

Olivia was barefoot, in rolled-up jeans and a floaty white embroidered tunic top that wouldn't have looked out of place in Ibiza Old Town. She'd tied her very slightly
silver-th
readed dark brown hair up into a girlish ponytail, and adorned earlobes and wrists with ethnic turquoise jewellery.

‘Thanks, darling. I picked it up in a little boutique a couple of days after Poppy's wedding. It's more suited to a Balearic climate than this ghastly English weather though.' She nodded out of the window, at the lowering clouds and rapidly darkening sky. ‘Looks like we'll be eating around the kitchen table again. Such a shame – we haven't managed one alfresco lunch with you and Andy this summer.'

‘Never mind,' Bella smiled. ‘We always have a good time around this table.' She took a sip of her wine and laughed. ‘So, how long has Dad been taking pictures of Bernie?'

Olivia groaned. ‘I knoooww. Ridiculous, isn't it? Of course, it's nice that my ex-husband and my …' She paused coyly for a moment.

‘Please, don't say lover, Mum.'

‘Don't worry, darling. Um … it's nice that Justin and Bernie are friends, but I hadn't anticipated them getting on
quite
so well. Your father almost seems to hero-worship Bernie, and Bernie treats
him
with the kind of affectionate amusement you'd reserve for your favourite naughty child.'

‘And which one of us would that be, then?' Bella had never quite got over her sibling rivalry with Max.

‘Don't be silly, Bella. Anyway, I'll be quite glad to have Bernie to myself again, once your father's buggered back off to Mallorca.'

‘Yeah, I can imagine – he and Bernie had nipped off to take some more photos by the apple tree when I went out there just now. You must feel a bit of a spare prick—'

There was a loud clap of thunder and seconds later the heavy black clouds outside the south-facing windows disgorged the contents of their swollen bellies. It was really, seriously, pissing it down.

‘Well, they won't be down there for much longer now,' said Olivia, and on cue a sorry trail of sodden males burst through the kitchen door, dripping and panting like wet dogs.

‘Oh, you poor things,' said Olivia, trying not to laugh. ‘You'd better go and get into some dry clothes – do help yourselves to hot showers, if you want. There are fresh towels in both bathrooms. And by the time you're down again we'll have got the potatoes on, and then I've got a treat for you all.'

‘So what's the treat?' Bella asked her mother as they basted the par-boiled potatoes with sizzling goose fat and slid them into the Aga's pre-heated second chamber. She was expecting homemade Scotch quails' eggs or some such delicacy.

‘Poppy's show! It's not meant to be coming on for another month, but there was a preview last night on a really obscure American channel. I thought it would be a nice surprise for you all.'

‘I watched it, Mum.'

‘Oh.' Olivia's shoulders sagged slightly, the wind taken out of her sails. ‘I assumed you and Andy would be out – you know, Saturday night …'

‘Nope, he was working.' Bella's voice was slightly bitter. ‘We don't go out on Saturday nights any more. I stayed in and watched Poppy looking gorgeous in the sunshine instead.'

‘And didn't she just?' Olivia beamed. She wasn't stupid, and could hear the resentment in her daughter's voice, but wasn't about to pander to it. ‘I've Sky Plus-ed it, but can't work out how to get it to work today. Bloody remote's gone missing again. Please help me, darling. I'm sure
everybody
else would love to see it.'

So Bella was on her hands and knees, unable to work out, herself, how to get Poppy's show on her mother's telly, when the men, all dry and fluffy now, reappeared from their ablutions.

‘Oh, I can't work out how to do it,' she snapped.

‘What?' asked Andy.

‘Mum recorded Poppy on Sky Plus last night. I've seen it anyway.'

Andy looked at her in bemusement.

‘Really? Why didn't you tell me?'

‘You weren't in the mood to be told about anything so trivial when you got in last night.'

Andy felt guilty. All he had wanted to do the previous night, after yet another evening steeped in the horrors of people trafficking, was collapse into bed with Bella in his arms.

‘Oh, God, I'm sorry, sweetheart. Well, I can't wait to watch it now.' He crouched down next to her and started to sort out the buttons on the machine.

‘Poppy's show?' said Mark from the armchair in which he'd ensconced himself. ‘Bet it's a stormer.' He was slightly pissed by this stage, but very aware of trying not to offend anybody. Not the most sensitive of souls, he honestly thought that praising Poppy might get him back into Bella's good books.

‘Course it will be,' said Justin from the sofa. ‘That girl's a knockout. Your best friend for life, isn't she
,
Angel Face?'

‘Yes, Dad.' Bella's teeth were gritted as the opening credits scrolled up, revealing Poppy's beautiful, smiling face framed against the New York skyline.

‘Wow,' was her opening comment. Not particularly clever, or eloquent, but as she spread her arms wide to indicate the roof terrace on which she was being filmed, she also exposed her lovely, slender body in its Missoni string bikini, which more than compensated.

‘Wow, indeed.' Mark whistled.

For fuck's sake
!
thought Bella.
They'll be rubbing their crotches and panting next.

‘I have to say that I have the best job in the world,' Poppy confided to the camera. ‘As an English girl from the sticks …'

‘Puh-lease …' groaned Bella, until she realized that everybody was looking at her weirdly. She shifted uncomfortably on the floor and leant back against the sofa. Andy kissed the top of her head as he sat down beside her.

‘… who has been lucky enough to do a bit of global travelling, I've seen some amazing places. But I don't think anything can really beat this! I mean – come on! A pool on a roof in the centre of the coolest city in the world? That's what I call glamour. And look at this weather!' She gestured up at the cloudless, almost-navy-blue sky. ‘It's as hot as it looks, and – you know what? I can't resist that water. Sorry, Patrick …' This was directed at the
cameraman
. ‘But I've always been able to resist everything but temptation.' And, holding her nose, she took a running jump into the bright blue pool, covering the camera's lens with droplets of water.