Nula was in the vast gold-and-purple master cabin of Lady of the Manor, which was moored up near the Beaulieu River. They’d been sailing around the Med for a week or so, calling in at St Tropez, then Palma, then back to England. The crew had pampered them, and Nipper and Sammy had been there too, to oversee security. Nipper had travelled back to Essex overland the day before yesterday, leaving Sammy here on the yacht, in charge of things.
Nula was trying on the dress for tonight’s party, clipping on her diamond drop earrings and worrying about ear sag. She’d been wearing drop earrings since she was twenty, and all these years of yanking down the flesh of her ear lobes had stretched them. She decided that once their ‘big occasion’ was over, she’d talk to her chap in Harley Street – he did all her work and he was very good, even if he did charge a bloody fortune – and get her ears prettied up.
She stared at her reflection in the floor-to-ceiling mirrors. Long ago, her horrible nose had been replaced by a neat turned-up retroussé and she’d got a set of bigger tits. More recently, she’d had her neck tightened up. Maybe a bit too tight? No, it was OK.
Nula turned back and forth in front of the mirrors, chewing on a hangnail. Then she stopped. Forced her hands to her sides. The full-length dusky pink Chanel gown she wore with its square shoulder pads and big puff sleeves was fabulous. Her hair was dark blonde these days – ‘mouse’ was long gone, a thing of the far distant past. She usually wore it loose, but for tonight it had already been dressed, sculpted up on top of her head in a retro ‘victory roll’ look.
Then the nerves kicked in. A big party. Her as the hostess . . . she raised her hand back to her mouth, then dropped it again. She took a deep, deep breath.
They’d made it, she told herself. They were rich. Successful. Loaded. Twenty years married and today they were going to celebrate their anniversary with a knock-’em-dead party back at the Essex place. But along the way there had been so many troubles. The business. The manor. All the shit that went with it. And . . . well, she’d had her troubles too. Mental troubles. Visits to hospital. Lots of them. Rotten, horrible times. Oh God, losing Jake. And Charlie himself. Her husband, the rapist. He’d attacked Jill, forced her to have sex with him. That disgusted her. Repulsed her. How could she celebrate their marriage when she knew the truth about him, knew exactly what he was?
And there were other things too. Harlan. All her suspicions about him, which had to remain unvoiced or Charlie would fly into one of his famous rages and pack her back off to the funny farm for further treatment. She was frightened of Harlan. The very thought of him made her pause, made a deep shudder run through her.
‘You ready then, doll?’
It was Charlie, bustling in, filling the cabin with his high-energy presence. The bastard. She knew he’d loved this past week, soaking up the sun, lying up on deck sporting a tanned beer belly, big Gucci shades and a red pair of budgie smugglers. Elegant was never going to be Charlie’s middle name.
‘Unzip me, will you?’ she said, and Charlie did. Nula slipped off the dress, putting it back into its protective coverall. She quickly dressed in her travel clothes: dark fitted trousers, white silk top and cream jacket. Then she picked up her bag, grabbed the dress for tonight’s ‘do’.
‘Ready,’ she said.
They were flying up to Essex in Charlie’s pride and joy, which was at this moment parked up on the upper deck – his blue Jet Ranger helicopter. Charlie would be at the controls. They would land to cheers and catcalls from all their friends, and Charlie would preen and look so pleased with himself, while Nula would just be glad to be back on solid ground.
There are no old bold pilots, she thought, remembering something Terry had told her once.
Well, Charlie was bold. Reckless. That headlong, crazy drive of his had got them where they were today. But the truth was, she hated flying, full stop. It terrified her. So she had to brace herself, put a smile on her face. This should have been a happy day. But it wasn’t, because of all the shit she’d been through with Charlie Stone. The day she’d met him, her life had started running down a long and unhappy path and Christ knew where she would end up.
But today she had to act the happy wife and mother. For this one day, she would force a smile and cut a cake and toast her husband in champagne; she would act out the lie that was her life.