Belle briefly recoiled from her puffy-eyed, bird’s-nest-hair reflection, but had no time to worry about it. She certainly didn’t waste time blow-drying her hair into her new style, just fingered it into place and left it to look after itself.
Her evening bag was on her bed where she’d thrown it last night when she’d stripped off her dress. She dug out her BlackBerry and switched it on, scrolling swiftly through a load of texts, all of them congratulations on her award. There were voice mails too. And a couple of emails.
Nothing from Daisy.
Well, what had she expected?
She opened the next best thing, an email from Claire. They’d had a lively exchange of text messages at the weekend; Claire had been putting off the moment when she faced her own demons and Belle had applied the cyber equivalent of a boot to her backside. She was hoping this would be good news.
It wasn’t.
It was an email to Simone, copied to her:
I can’t say I’m happy that my dirty laundry will soon be hanging out to dry in public…
What?
She flipped to Simone’s email and she let slip a word she hadn’t used in years. The lost diary had been picked up by a Sydney-based journalist who’d had no trouble in identifying all of them and had called Simone, inviting her to meet him. No chance that he hadn’t read it, then. Every word.
She sat down, quickly thumbed in:
Simone, I’ve just picked up your email and can scarcely comprehend how difficult this must be for you. I’m with Claire-you can tell Mr Tanner from me that Belle Davenport thinks he’s lower than a worm’s belly-as if he’d care! As for me, Ivo knows pretty much everything so, as far as I’m concerned, you can tell him to publish and be damned. Not so easy for you…
She thought about mentioning Daisy. Decided against it.
Then she returned the call from her agent. She owed him for taking the trouble to leave the celebrations to deliver her bag to Belgravia.
‘Babe!’ He was mellow. ‘Anything for my favourite client. I had a couple of calls from the diarists, but they bought the family crisis. One of the benefits of being a good-living girl. If anyone else had pulled a stunt like that, the press would be staking out The Priory even as we speak. You might want to think up something credible for public consumption, though. The press being what they are.’
‘I’ve got credible. Whether you’ll like it is something else.’
‘Well, that depends. If it’s something really shocking, I could squeeze the publishers for another one hundred advance on your biography,’ he offered hopefully, ‘and the papers would be fighting for serial rights.’
‘My financial adviser said I should keep that as the pension plan,’ she said.
‘What about
‘That’s a risk I’m prepared to take. Look, I’ve got to go. I’ll call you later to fix up a meeting-’
‘Come over now and we’ll have lunch at The Ivy. Celebrate the award. Better still, bring your financial adviser. He can pay.’
She laughed. ‘I’ll call you later, Jace.’
She was still smiling when she walked into the living room. Ivo, hair damp, was standing back from the window, looking down into the street.
‘You’re still here? Haven’t you got a corporation to run?’
‘The shower was on a go slow.’
‘Sorry. It’s on my list of improvements.’
‘It doesn’t matter. I don’t suppose it will collapse if I miss a morning.’ Then, ‘You might want to get your car keys.’
‘What?’
He indicated the street below and she crossed to the window, standing beside him. Below her, on the pavement, standing next to her convertible, stood Daisy.
‘Purple hair today. Oh, right, here we go,’ he said as she looked up, and realising that she was being watched, took hold of the door handle and gave it a shake.
Belle was already running for the door when the klaxon sound of the car alarm rent the air. Was at the bottom of the stairs when Ivo caught up with her.
‘Don’t!’ she warned, arm extended, palm face up as she held him off. ‘Stay away. I want to do this.’
‘You forgot the car keys,’ he said, taking her hand, turning it over and placing them in her palm, wrapping her shaking fingers around them so that she wouldn’t drop them.
‘Oh…’
‘She came back, Belle. She wants to see you. Needs to talk to you.’
‘I…Yes…’
‘Do you need me to stay?’
‘I…’ Despite her warning for him to stay away, she was suddenly scared.
He laid his hand briefly on her arm, then leaned forward, touched his lips to hers. Barely a kiss and yet it fizzed through her like electricity-pure energy-and for a moment all she wanted to do was reach out and grab him by the lapels of his jacket, pull him close, bury herself in his warmth until the world outside went away. ‘You’ll be fine.’
‘Yes. Of course I will.’
‘Call me if you need anything. You’ll need someone to talk to. Someone you can trust.’
‘Ivo, about last night…’ As he opened the door, her words were drowned out by the car alarm and he turned to look at her. ‘Thank you,’ she said. He nodded once, stepped out on to the footpath, left her.
Then, drawing in a deep, shuddering breath, she followed him out into the street where Daisy was leaning on the car, all aggressive angles as she watched Ivo remove a parking ticket from his windscreen-he’d overstayed the night-time parking limit-climb into his car and drive away.
The noise from the car alarm was deafening and Belle didn’t attempt to speak above it, but unlocked the car, turned off the alarm, then relocked it.
‘Neat car,’ Daisy said. ‘Can I drive it?’
‘Have you got a licence?’
‘Oh, forget it,’ she said, stuffing her hands deep into her pockets and turning to walk away.
Belle, instinctively taking a step after her, was brought up short by Ivo’s voice in her head.
‘I’m going to make breakfast,’ she said and, hard as it was, she turned around and walked back inside, holding the door open. Then, ‘A bacon sandwich.’
Bacon sandwiches had been dream food. Thick white bread, layers of bacon, ketchup…She’d been drawn by the scent to a small cafe that made sandwiches for office workers. Her mother wouldn’t beg, but Daisy had been hungry and she’d picked a place, just out of sight of the cafe staff where she could lie in wait for customers, carriers stuffed with expensive calorie-laden sandwiches, coffee or hot chocolate in cartons with lids, huge muffins. Had learned to hit them for change while they still had it in their hands.
Guilt had done the rest.
It had been a great pitch, but it hadn’t lasted long.
Someone had called Social Services. Or complained to the cafe staff. Only her street-sharpened survival instincts had stopped them from being picked up but, even now, when she caught the scent of bacon cooking she felt something very close to pain in the pit of her stomach.
After a pause that felt like a lifetime, Daisy turned around and walked right by her and up the stairs without a word and was already standing in the centre of the living room looking around by the time her own shaky legs had carried her up.
‘This is a mess,’ Daisy said, looking around.
