It was another bluebird day. The sky billowed taut above them, cloudless and bright, the sun making the snow dazzle so that not wearing goggles or shades wasn’t an option. Everyone, it seemed, was out. The chairlifts were full and the mountainside felt more like a festival.
‘Woooah!’ someone yelled as the rider coming down the pipe pulled off a Method Grab. He landed it, throwing his arms up in the air jubilantly.
‘Who was that?’ Johnny asked, looking up from the camera. They were positioned just outside the bottom corner again, across from the airbag. Johnny had been getting ‘epic’ shots all morning – shooting straight up the chute – and Clover could practically read his mind, see him envisaging the montage he was going to pull together of all these athletes, airborne. A slo-mo composite arc, perhaps, of them twisting and spinning . . .
‘I don’t know, but I’ll try to get their attention. See if they’ll talk to me.’
Clover raised a hand up, the mic clearly visible in her glove, waving the rider down as he snaked his way out of the pipe.
‘Hi!’ she said, smiling widely as he swooshed to a dramatic stop. She could tell from his body language alone that he was pumping with adrenaline. ‘Hi! Can I talk to you for a moment, please?’
‘Clover?’ The rider took off his goggles.
‘Beau?’ She froze.
‘That was you up there?’ Johnny cried.
‘Yeah, man!’ Beau laughed, nodding excitedly as the two of them high-fived.
‘Oh my god,’ Clover breathed, looking from Beau to Johnny again. But in all his excitement about the aerial acrobatics, Johnny seemed to have completely forgotten about what Beau’s presence meant for her. Where Beau was . . . She looked around them apprehensively.
‘I can’t believe I just did that! But I was feeling so good, y’know? I just thought, fuck it, why not?’
‘You cranked it!’ Johnny laughed as Beau’s body went rigid and he gave another long whoop.
‘I am STOKED!’
Clover looked up the chute but there was nothing from here by which to identify the next rider. He was silhouetted against the sky. Besides, they’d been working here all yesterday afternoon and not caught sight of any of the three of them; Kit and Ari might not even be here.
‘When did you guys get over here?’ Beau asked them, fiddling with the chinstrap on his helmet.
‘Uh . . . yesterday,’ Clover said, looking back at him. ‘Late morning.’
He frowned. ‘So how come you’re not in with us? The chalet’s huge!’
Clover stared at him. Was he for real?
‘We thought we’d get our own place for this bit,’ Johnny said for her, seeing how she’d stalled. ‘Give you guys some peace. It’s been pretty full-on the last few weeks.’
‘It’s been pretty full-on here! You shoulda come out with us. We’ve had a non-stop partay since getting here.’
‘Well, we’ve been really buried with work,’ Clover said carefully. It was true. She and Johnny had been editing yesterday’s interviews until long after midnight last night while Matty continued her deep dive into Kit’s romantic history. ‘But another time.’
‘Clo, any time! Look, I gotta go. Tipper’s calling me but I’ll get Ari to hook you up with our plans. He’s got your numbers, right?’
Johnny and Clover nodded, watching as he slid away.
‘He doesn’t know?’ she whispered, looking back at Johnny.
‘He so doesn’t know.’
‘But why wouldn’t Kit tell him? I thought it’d be the first thing he’d do?’
A sudden slicing of snow made them both jump as another boarder came to a hard stop right in front of them.
‘What are you doing here?’ He didn’t remove his goggles. He didn’t need to. She’d recognize that contemptuous manner anywhere.
What are you doing here? So then, he had expected her to give up? Leave?
‘Working,’ she said quickly. ‘You?’
The comment was pithy and bullish, a push-back against his arrogant expectation that she would walk from her job while he continued – uninterrupted – with his own. She stared at her own reflection in his mirrored goggles, hating that while she was plainly visible to him, she couldn’t see him at all. She couldn’t see what he was thinking, only the image of the last time she’d seen him, the last time he’d seen her . . .
For several moments, he said nothing. Then, with a single twist of his ankle, he was gone again, catching up with his brother, who was talking to the coach.
‘Shit . . .’ Clover stammered, visibly slumping from the sudden ordeal. She hadn’t realized she had become so erect in his presence, as if braced for the next onslaught – verbal, physical, emotional, whatever it might be.
‘You okay?’ Johnny put his hand on her arm.
‘Of course.’ She nodded, trying to let the adrenaline settle. ‘. . . It’s good. It’s done now. Like you said, now we’ve seen each other, we can move on.’
Johnny was quiet for a bit. ‘Yeah. You did well, Clo. He never would have known.’ He pulled his goggles down. ‘I need the loo. Just look after the camera for me. I’ll be back in five.’
Clover watched as he too sped off, frowning as his words sank in. ‘Johnny, wait!’ she yelled after him. ‘He never would have known what?’
Clover shuffled forward in the lift queue, making way for the dozen ESS ski school mini tornadoes who had all passed her on the way down. She supposed falling didn’t hurt so much when the very top of you was only two feet off the ground.
She was carrying back a very late lunch for herself and Johnny. After the hostile run-in with Kit at the pipe, they’d spent most of the day covering the big air and slopestyle fields, trying to get interviews with anyone they could. She’d spoken to passing ski instructors, more chairlift operators, coaches and almost every pro rider they could find on the mountain. They all had an opinion, which invariably fell into one of three camps: Kit Foley’s a jerk/a victim/hot.
‘Is that a baguette in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?’ a voice asked as she finally got to the front of the queue.
She gave a shocked laugh.
‘Oh, it’s okay, she’s with me,’ the stranger said as the lift operator went to tell her to hold back – the pro riders were entitled to priority use. He came and stood beside her.
The chairlift scooped her legs from under her and she felt the familiar swing into the air as they were whisked off together, just the two of them on a six-seater.
‘I’m sorry, who are you?’ she asked with a bemused smile.
‘I’m hurt you don’t remember.’ He pushed up his visor.
‘Ah. I guess the accent alone should have told me,’ she said, looking back at Mikey Schultz.
‘Yes it should. I’m a rare breed round these parts.’ He grinned at her, cocky as hell. He knew he was a king on this terrain. Easy on the eye, too. ‘So, I’ve been watching you all day. You’ve been busy.’
‘Well, you know what they say – no rest for the wicked.’
‘You’re hotter than hell and wicked?’ He looked delighted.
She laughed. She couldn’t remember the last time someone had flirted with her.
‘You realize I don’t actually know your name,’ he said. ‘Makes you hard to find. Although most people knew who I meant when I said Camera Lady.’
‘Catchy!’ she grinned. ‘. . . It’s Clover. Clover Phillips.’
‘Of course it is,’ he said, looking at her intently. ‘What else could you possibly be?’
Clover laughed, hoping she wasn’t blushing.
She felt the wind blow past them. She wanted to take her goggles off and feel the sun on her face but she didn’t want him to see the vestiges of her black eye. In some ways, it looked worse now than it had at the beginning, withering into a sallow peakiness that made her look ill.
A flashback of Kit’s bruised and cut face, his battered body, zipped through her mind again. She shuddered.
‘Late lunch?’ he asked, looking at the baguettes sticking out of her pockets.
‘I’m starved,’ she nodded. ‘We’ve not stopped.’
‘You’re really after him, huh?’
She looked back at him. Mikey Schultz – Matty had done a brief biog on him for their files: twenty-five years old, two times X Games gold medallist, American Olympic team. He had sandy brown hair, freckles, a California smile. ‘We’re just trying to be comprehensive. We’re not coming at it with any particular angle,’ she lied. ‘We’ll gather the data, so to speak, see what it tells us.’
He leaned on the safety bar, looking down at the dramatic landscape below them. They were crossing a crevasse, deep rocky chasms overlayered with thick, bulbous skins of ice that glowed blue in the sunlight. ‘I don’t know the guy all that well, and I don’t reckon I’m gonna either, but there’s not much love for him that I can see; I know you can’t be getting good stuff. So why’s he letting you do this?’
‘He’s not. His sponsor is.’
Mikey’s mouth opened in understanding. ‘Ri-i-i-ght,’ he said slowly. ‘He signed up with Mr Moneybags . . . So that’s the pound of flesh, huh?’ He gave an amused exhale. ‘Oh man.’ He shook his head, chuckling softly. ‘Can’t you give the poor guy a heads up and tell him to go home? That film you’re making is gonna be a shitshow.’
‘Is it? Maybe you’re just trying to get me to strong-arm off your competition for you?’
Mikey threw his head back and laughed. He had a good, easy smile. ‘No. He doesn’t bother me.’
‘You’re not threatened by him? You really don’t think he could challenge you? He matched you stroke for stroke in Kaprun. I was there. I saw it.’
‘Oh technically, sure. He’ll be up there. But on the podium?’ He shook his head.
‘Because . . .?’
‘Because he’s not got it here.’ He gave a single thump to his chest, above his heart. ‘Those are just shapes he’s making out there. He’s not got the love. He doesn’t feel it. He belongs in the water.’
‘What if I told you he was a boarder before he was a surfer? He was born in New Zealand, lived by the mountains.’
Mikey shrugged. ‘Love is love though, right? You can’t help what you love, or why. You just do. Don’t matter which one he did first.’ He looked at her skis. ‘You ever tried riding?’
She knew that the boarders looked upon the skiers with, if not open scorn, at least pity. Johnny had told her they were known to the riders as ‘plankers’. ‘No. I’m perfectly happy with skiing. I know my limits. Thanks.’
‘Fair enough.’ He chuckled, unclipping the chinstrap on his helmet and taking it off for a few moments. He ruffled his hair, turning his face to the sky and enjoying the feel of the breeze. She could see that out here was his element. His entire body was relaxed, in harmony with greater rhythms.
He put the helmet back on again. ‘. . . So I didn’t see you out last night.’
‘You were looking for me?’ She was bemused by the intimation.
‘Anyone with eyes in his head would be looking for you, Clover Phillips.’ He pinned her with a direct look, making his feelings plain. He had a confidence that was alluring. ‘You should come out tonight. Penultimate night. It’s gonna be big.’
‘I can’t. I’m really snowed under with work.’ The rebuff was automatic, a knee-jerk response. It was true they’d been pulling especially crazy hours, trying to make up for the late arrival here after the fallout of the fight; but more than that – a party boy like him wasn’t what she needed right now.
They were approaching the top station and he effortlessly pushed the safety bar above their heads. They both stood and glided away down the exit ramp. He stopped beside her.
‘Listen, it’s not a big deal. There’s a band playing at M+M Bar tonight. They’re good,’ he said, buckling his boot. He straightened up. ‘You should come along. I’ll put your name on the door – you know, in case all this snow you’re under thaws.’
He grinned and gave her a wink, pushing his visor back down and setting off, leaning forward and back in languid arcs. He looked back once, giving her a salute.
Clover laughed, thinking how sexy he looked, how fun. She had completely forgotten that she was standing there, looking back at him with baguettes sticking out of her pockets.
‘Anything?’ Clover shrugged off her jacket and collapsed onto the sofa with a groan. ‘Ugh, my feet. I’ve been in ski boots all day.’
Matty, sitting at the small kitchenette table, wiggled her cashmere-sock-clad feet in return. ‘Actually, yes.’
Clover’s head lifted up with a jerk. ‘You have something?’
‘Yup.’ Matty got up and walked over with a sheet of paper in her hand. ‘Her name’s Amy Killicks. She’s twenty-eight, lives in Sydney now but was in LA at the time she was engaged to Kit.’
Clover took the printout and stared at it. It was a model’s bio sheet: height, 1.79 m; weight, 57 kg; hair, blonde; eyes, blue; measurements, 36–23–35.
She squeezed her eyes shut for a moment, not sure she needed or wanted this information.
‘Biggest gig was the Pirelli calendar in 2016. She mainly does swimwear shows, catalogue shoots.’
Johnny came over to have a look, leaning on the back of the sofa. He gave a bark of laughter. ‘Holy cow! There she is – my dream woman! My future wife!’
Matty stuck her tongue out at him. ‘Already taken, I’m afraid. She’s married to some tech zillionaire now.’
‘Course she is,’ he groaned, pushing himself back onto the sofa.
‘How did you find her?’ Clover murmured, feeling sick.
She was stunning. A regular doll.
‘You were right. There was a picture of them walking – I assume – her dog. Little, yappy-looking thing.’ Matty had grown up with German pointers. She had no time for yipsters.
She showed Clover another sheet. The image was grainy, mainly due to the printer quality: a tall woman in denim cut-offs and a black strappy vest, walking in Birkenstocks. Her hair was caught up in a messy bun, hoop earrings in her ears. Even ‘undone’ like this, she looked like a model. Kit was walking beside her, holding her hand. His grip was firm and he was smiling at her as she said something. He didn’t look anything like the hulk of festering anger Clover knew.
She handed the sheets back, not wanting to look at them. ‘And when was this?’
‘Well, this shot was taken in 2016 but it looks like they were together just over a year. There’s not many photos of them together because they were both always working – she’d be on location, he was on tour. You know, the usual tribulations of a power couple.’
‘How do you know all this?’
‘Her agent. Fabulously indiscreet, darling.’
‘Why did they break up?’
‘Pressures of work.’ Matty shrugged. ‘. . . You look disappointed.’
‘No, I’m not. I . . .’ She sighed. ‘I guess I was just hoping there was more to it. We have precious few inlets into his private life. None of the A-listers’ PRs will let us within a country mile of their clients and we don’t know who the other women are.’ She bit her lip. ‘D’you think she’ll talk to us?’
Matty shrugged. ‘I’ve asked, but the agent didn’t think so. Amy’s quite the lady these days. She’s stopped modelling. Likes to be seen at all the right places now, and with the right people. Her agent didn’t think she’d want to drag up her history with a surf rat, especially now – he’s hardly riding high in the popularity stakes.’
‘Well, keep on at her and see what else you can get. Even if it’s just the name of the next woman he dated after her. One could lead to another? There must be someone willing to go on the record about him in a private capacity. Both his parents are dead and Beau is . . . Beau. All we’ve got so far is Kit Foley, the sports star. Nothing on the man.’
‘Okay, I’ll do my best,’ Matty sighed, walking over to the small sofa opposite and sinking into it. ‘And how did you guys get on? You’ve been gone all day.’
‘It was great up there. Not a cloud in the sky,’ Johnny murmured, scrolling on his phone.
‘Ugh, don’t,’ she tutted irritably. ‘You have no idea how painful it was being stuck indoors while you were out on the slopes.’
‘We were working too! Werk-werk-werk and no play – Johnny is a dull boy,’ he muttered.
Clover heard his weary tone. He never complained, never threw a tantrum, but the hours he’d been pulling for months now were unsustainable. She bit her lip, staring out at the town through the window. The stars were already out, Christmas lights flickering gently in chalet windows across the street. Life was happening on the other side of the glass. People were settling down to watch a film, or eat dinner, or go dancing. While they busied themselves with poring over the minutiae of someone else’s life, their own lives were being neglected.
‘I don’t suppose anyone fancies a quick drink?’ she asked.
Matty’s head whipped up. ‘Speak,’ she commanded.
‘Well, there’s a band playing tonight at this bar. My name’s been put on the door.’
‘Just yours?’
‘We’d all get in, trust me.’
Matty frowned. ‘Who put your name on the door?’
Clover hesitated. ‘Mikey Schultz.’
‘Mikey?’ Johnny echoed.
‘Yep. I rode a chairlift with him on the way back from buying lunch, and we got chatting.’
‘You got chatting? Or chatted up?’
Clover laughed. ‘Look, it’s no big deal. I didn’t say we’d go.’
‘But you wanna,’ Matty said, peering at her more closely.
‘Well, I could do with a little fun,’ Clover shrugged. ‘Things have been pretty shit recently.’
‘Is this including or excluding the hot sex with the target?’ Matty held her hands up defensively even as she teased.
‘Stop! I am not ready to joke about that. I mean it.’
‘Well, in that case,’ Matty drawled, ‘. . . you’re going to need more than one drink.’