Svetlana at the door:
Cashmere robe (Harrods)
Beige sheepskin boots (Ugg)
Unbelievable underwear (Myla)
Pearls (Tokyo)
Perfume (Givenchy)
Total est. cost: £1,800
‘Why you here?’
‘Ohhhh, no, that’s tooooo bad,’ Harry groaned in genuine pain. He pressed his face back down into the black sheet and breathed in Svetlana’s richly exotic perfume.
Meanwhile Svetlana sat on top of him in one of her favourite lingerie ensembles: knickers made of pink silk and black lace with a matching quarter-cup bra.
‘Nooo!’ he protested with a gasp, ‘No! No!’
But still she sank her fingers in deeper.
‘It’s too much,’ he groaned.
‘No!’ she insisted, ‘Is good. Is very, very good!’ She leaned further into him, feeling for the hidden, tender places.
‘Aaaaaaargh!’ he complained when her fingers found and manipulated them mercilessly.
‘Is good,’ she insisted, moving into the muscle fibres at the very base of his neck.
In Svetlana’s opinion, as well as regular sex, every man of Harry’s age needed a vigorous bi-weekly dose of Swedish massage to stay healthy.
Ed parked the Jeep in the street.
‘Right then, here we are,’ he announced and reached over to open the driver’s door.
‘Coming, Elena?’ he asked. Elena nodded in reply and stepped out.
Lauren looked up sleepily at Ed. ‘Are we home?’ she asked.
‘No. Not yet, just stay put, I’m dropping off Elena.’
Lauren didn’t argue with this, just nodded and closed her eyes once again.
Ed walked with Elena to the door and rang the bell long and loud. Within moments, Maria was opening the door. Her eyes widened in surprise when she recognised Elena.
‘Hello,’ Ed began, ‘I’d like to see Svetlana. I’m dropping off Elena.’
Now the maid’s eyes were as wide as an owl’s.
‘I see…’ she said and closed the door in their faces.
Elena looked at Ed as they waited and said: ‘She not want me.’ And Ed detected the deep note of sadness in those words.
‘She needs to get to know you,’ Ed told her. ‘I want to give her the chance.’
‘She won’t want it,’ Elena pointed out.
‘Well, sometimes the things you don’t want turn out to be good for you,’ was all Ed could think of saying.
The door opened and Maria was standing in front of them once again. In a whisper, she said, ‘Now is very bad time, can you please visit tomorrow?’
‘No,’ Ed replied, ‘tomorrow is not convenient. I need to speak to Svetlana now. Elena is coming to stay here.’
Closing the door, the maid scurried off again.
‘Now what?’ Ed wondered out loud.
His question was answered when the door opened and Svetlana herself appeared on the threshold, hair ruffled and wearing only long sheepskin boots and a belted cashmere robe. Maybe she’d been in bed. More likely she was lounging about having some minion do her nails or something, Ed guessed.
She looked put out, to say the least.
‘Why are you here?’ she’d demanded, looking from Elena to Ed, then back again. ‘Not now! Not here!’ she insisted.
‘Yes,’ Ed insisted: ‘now and here.’
Keeping his voice low and controlled, he explained briefly: ‘Elena can’t stay with us. Elena doesn’t even want to stay with us. We have a sixteen-year old girl. I’ve just found her drunk and sick in a bar with your daughter and a crowd of seedy men.’
When Svetlana said nothing to this, Ed went on. ‘Your daughter, Elena, who’s thinking about becoming a dancer, by the way. A nightclub dancer. Don’t you care what happens to her?’ he asked. ‘Aren’t you interested? Don’t you want to help her at all?
‘She’s not my problem,’ Ed went on, flinching inside as he said this, because it wasn’t in his nature to turn away from young people who needed help, but somehow, he had to get Svetlana involved, ‘she’s your problem. You have to deal with her.’
Ed suspected that Svetlana wasn’t used to not getting what she wanted from the people she considered beneath her. She did look genuinely surprised at his words. But Ed didn’t work for her. He didn’t need anything from her. He couldn’t benefit from her in any way. He and Annie had been keeping her daughter as a favour! She had no control over them.
Now Svetlana gasped in surprise because she could hear the door at the top of the stairs opening, and footsteps descending rapidly. Harry was coming into the hall behind them in a hastily assembled outfit.
‘What the dickens is going on?’ he demanded.
First of all, he saw Ed at the doorstep, then his eyes fell on Elena. With her pale skin, blonde hair, proud upright posture and light grey, defiant eyes, she almost didn’t need to say the words that now came from her lips.
‘Hello, I am Elena. I am Svetlana’s daughter.’