Getting Bridget’s mobile number had been easy. A journalist friend had given her the number of a dodgy contact who specialized in ‘pulling’ phone bills – give him the name, date of birth, address of anyone and the chances were he could get not only their mobile phone number but their credit card details too.
Max had then bought a cheap pay-as-you-go phone. Armed with a new anonymous number – the last person she wanted to have her real number was the ghastly Bridget – she considered for some time what she would text.
There was no doubt in Max’s mind that Bridget was behind what had happened in Scotland. She worked on the assumption that Bridget had paid the photographer. Lucy had told Max he had a thick London accent. He would hardly have travelled all that way for free – and Bridget could afford to pay him handsomely through the Bank of Beames.
Max could also assume that Bridget had sworn this man to secrecy – she could never be linked to the incident. Max’s hunch was that Bridget had not so much as divulged her name to the man, for fear of him ever blabbing. But Bridget’s control-freakery would have made it impossible for her not to bark commands at him by phone to ensure the job went exactly as she had planned.
Max played with the wording of her text before settling on: ‘This is my new number should you need me again. Your photographer friend.’
Max knew it might amount to nothing. Bridget might suspect something was up and call the snapper’s old number. But this trick had worked for Max before. She had bought a pay-as-you-go a few months ago and texted a Cabinet Minister she suspected of having an affair with a pretty student. ‘This is my new number, Cheryl x’ it had read and… bingo! He had replied with: ‘I wish I was buried in your breasts right now.’ Ha! That had made the front page and a double-page spread inside. Cheryl had pocketed twenty grand, the politician – who professed publicly to being a devout Christian and family man – had been uncovered as a hypocrite and Max had been the toast of the newspaper. Everyone was happy – apart from the politician, of course, though he had managed to keep his job and his wife.
Sure, Bridget no doubt thought of herself as intellectually superior to almost everyone. But those who, like Bridget, had had everything given to them on a plate rarely possessed the cunning of those who had had to work for results.
Max’s text was general enough for Bridget not to worry that it would catch her out – it was vague and ambiguous.
Max relished the task of trapping Bridget because it stopped her being consumed by thoughts of Luke. He had texted again. ‘Max, you OK? Would love to see you xx’
Poor Luke. If he had experienced half of what she had felt on their date, he must be bewildered as to why she was ignoring him. More than bewildered: utterly devastated. But it had to be this way. It would be disloyal to tell him Lucy was behind her decision to stop seeing him. He might blame Lucy, and Max would not risk coming between them. As her sister had said, family is everything. It was better for everyone if nothing was allowed to happen. He would soon forget.
Max was determined Lucy would never know how much Luke meant to her and resolved never to talk to Lucy about him. But she had had to confide in someone for fear of going mad, so she had called her mother a few days ago.
Marj had been quiet on the other end of the line. Max wished she could see her mother’s face, to read her thoughts.
‘I know I have to step back, Mum. It’s just, well, I really liked him. But it’s complicated.’ Max had chided herself – her words made her sound childish, like a schoolgirl with a crush. She hoped her mum couldn’t hear the hurt in her voice.
‘What do you mean, complicated?’
Max didn’t want to make her worry. The last thing Marj needed was to be burdened with the knowledge that one of her daughters had fallen for her other daughter’s half-brother.
‘Oh I’ll tell you another time, Mum.’ Max hoped she sounded more positive than she felt.
‘Darling, what is meant for you will not go by you,’ Marj told Max, sensing her daughter didn’t want to tell her more.
Max smiled. Her mum’s clichés normally helped. But not this time.
And now, as she remembered that conversation, Max was so relieved that she hadn’t told her mother any more: she’d still be reeling from Max’s news when she was hit with the shock of today’s newspaper article ‘uncovering’ Lucy’s murky past.
Murky, my arse, thought Max as she rubbed Clarins Beauty Flash Balm on her face in the hope of masking another late night.
Their childhood had been idyllic compared to half the girls Lucy had boarded with. Being sent away so their parents could do exactly as they pleased, or even move to another country, had left many of them miserable, with eating disorders and insecurities that followed them like a dark cloud for life. Max and Lucy had been loved by their mother and father – for that’s what Dad was to both of them. Their mother would have stood for no less, but Fergal did it because he was a strong, decent man. God knew what his reaction to the article had been. He had hardly been mentioned – the only comments were that he was a carpenter, not one with a successful business, and that he was a ‘hard-drinking Irishman’, which was a stretch of the truth given he enjoyed a few pints with workmates once or twice a week at his local and dinner out over a bottle of wine with Mum on Saturdays. Compared to most of the Irishmen she knew, that pretty much qualified as teetotal.
He was every inch the Alpha Male, seeing his role as providing for and protecting his family. He would be furious to think his girls had been hurt by the article. True to his Irish roots back in Armagh, on the country’s borders, family was everything. And he was strong, so heaven help the reporter who was to blame for the story should he ever bump into Fergal Summers.
Her thoughts were interrupted when her specially purchased phone buzzed.
Max experienced the thrill of victory. The text was from Bridget. It simply said, ‘OK.’ It was enough, if not to prove her guilt, to point strongly towards it. Max hoped it would also be enough to make Hartley see how wrong he had been.