Chapter 39
“God, I could totally live here,” sighed Zara as she and Ellie walked around Gold Hill Lake, licking ice-cream cones, Arthur at least half a mile ahead along the path, patting someone’s dog.
“There’s a tiny little hospital I could get a job at, and Arthur could go to that hippy school out in the hills.
Bet he’d turn out nicer if we could get him away from bloody Kyle. ”
“Everyone thinks they should move to the place they go on holiday,” Ellie pointed out. “But you only love it because you’re on holiday. Bet it’s different when you live here, bumping into the same handful of people every day, with the same three restaurants to pick from.”
“Holiday?” Zara raised her eyebrows sky high.
“That’s what you’d call fleeing your home under the order of a crime boss?
Good lord, those acting gigs must be harder than I thought if this is your idea of a holiday.
” She jerked her head not so subtly to emphasise the woman following in the distance behind them: a terrifying foot soldier that Estella claimed was called Vera.
“You’re literally getting put up in a lake chalet,” Ellie pointed out. “And eating ice cream in the sunshine on a Tuesday afternoon. Don’t even try to tell me you’d rather be at work.”
Zara stopped dead still. “Don’t be cute with me, Ellie. We’re here because you got tangled up in fucking mob business and nearly got yourself killed, so excuse me if it’ll take a little more than an ice-cream to distract me from that fact.”
Ellie sighed. “Okay,” she said, tugging her sister to keep walking, not least because she really didn’t want to find herself making small talk with Vera. “I know. I’m sorry. I guess I’m just trying to make the best of a bad situation. There’s worse places to run to.”
“No, you’re trying to make light of the situation, which is different. And what’s worse is that you really seem to believe it. You’re recovering from a head injury and you’re acting like you’re on cloud nine—”
“It’s a minor concussion—”
“I mean, wow, she must be really great in bed for you to find all this worth it.” Zara waved her hand around them, at Arthur not in class but throwing stones into the lake, at the most likely armed henchwoman walking protectively behind them.
Ellie went bright with shame. “Oh, you think I didn’t work it out?
” Zara narrowed her eyes. “How stupid do you think I am?”
“I don’t think you’re stupid—”
“Really? I mean, first you don’t tell me you’re confusing researching Estella Grant with stalking her, then you lie to my face and tell me that you’ve stopped.
Then you’re really obviously seeing someone and lying about that, then the next thing I know, Estella fucking Grant is on my doorstep letting me know some mob war psychopathy had broken out using you to send her a message.
” Zara was furious now, pointing right at her face.
“Not some member of her family; not someone who works for her; you, Ellie! Apparently the two of you were so unsubtle about your feelings for each other, that even her enemies knew that you are what’s precious to her.
I can’t tell you how much I love being somewhere down the line after Florelli henchmen when it comes to hearing about developments in your love life. ”
Zara had steam coming out of her ears, her face bright with fury. Ellie felt thoroughly chewed on, but she knew, ultimately, that she deserved every word of it.
“Are you done?” she asked her sister, trying to keep her voice level. “Or is there more?”
“Of course there’s more! How could you do this, Ellie?
! You’ve made us all a target! Not least yourself!
If something happened to you, we couldn’t…
we couldn’t bear it, okay? I had to tell Arthur that his aunt, who he adores, got beaten up.
How do you think he took it? Imagine if I had to tell him something worse had happened to you! You’re not thinking—”
“I’ve thought of nothing but what you and Arthur need for a decade and a half!” Ellie cried. “You know that! Can’t I have something for myself, just for once?”
There was a ringing silence, as the two of them stared at each other, white-cheeked and furious.
Ellie went cold. She’d broken their unspoken pact and actually named the elephant in the room: that Zara needed her and Ellie sacrificed.
The can was open and the worms were everywhere.
She’d told herself, over and over, to stay quiet, to never make Zara feel like she owed her, but oh how quickly the resentment had spilled the very moment Zara had pushed.
Ellie felt sick, afraid her sister was going to shrink or run or explode.
But right then and there, Zara burst into sudden laughter.
“Oh, fuck, I’m sorry,” she choked. “I’m so sorry, Ellie. It’s just… yes, I take your point, but did you really have to decide the one thing you wanted was to fall in love with a mob boss?”
“I’m not—”
“You couldn’t have picked like, anything else?
Literally anything. But no, your hill to die on is Estella Grant?
Your adorable, peeved little face, like I’m getting in the way of you of starting tennis lessons!
” Zara had tears running down her cheeks as she laughed, and Ellie couldn’t help a splutter of laughter too, at the absurdity that was her life.
“I mean, I’m not in love with her,” she defended herself, her head swimming slightly as she wondered if that too, was teetering on the edge of a lie. “We’re not in love.”
“Then Estella needs to tell that to her face, because she sure as hell looked like her fucking world was ending knowing you were hurt.” Zara sobered, but she rolled her eyes. “Ellie, I adore you, but what in the hell have you gotten yourself into?
So. Not a holiday then. But oh it felt like one to Ellie all the same.
Watching Zara and Arthur look so surprisingly relaxed — with Arthur’s previously tense mood seeming to evaporate slowly the longer he was away from school and his phone — it made her heart sing.
Getting to watch Hugo belly laugh and flirt with Harry, singing with his famous baritone voice as he collected chicken eggs and picked roses from the garden felt like watching someone she loved get everything he loved. And then, there was Estella.
Estella felt like a different person in Gold Hill.
Red lipstick and heels were switched out for sneakers or bare feet, t-shirts draping off her perfect collarbones and mouth-wateringly small shorts.
Her body seemed loose and relaxed, her smile quick and blinding, her words softer and less spikier.
She was, however, still very much, Estella Grant, the woman who liked Ellie helpless in her bed, supplicant on her knees, and their conversations still held landmines where Estella absolutely refused to go.
And yet, Ellie knew she was seeing a glimpse behind the armour, the woman behind the mythology.
Universe Below seemed impossible out here in the peace of Gold Hill.
Filming was scheduled to start in just over ten days’ time which disorientated Ellie to the extreme.
What the hell was real life, and what was art?
Estella Grant was in her bed every night and they had an upcoming dinner invitation to Alison Hartmann’s home.
In less than a fortnight Ellie would put on a blonde wig and act out some kind of version of these women’s real damn lives.
The only thing she could tell herself was that it was better, at least, that it was her, than someone who didn’t care about anything more than the drama of it all.
Was that comfort enough? If not Ellie, someone else would do it anyway?
Estella refused to tell her what, precisely, was happening back in Melbourne to make her seem so confident, but she was crystal clear nonetheless that Ellie would be safe to be back on set in time.
It felt impossible to press her — please let me know I’m safe so I can go and make money exploiting your life on TV, and also, please don’t kill anyone for me to make that happen — so Ellie simply closed her eyes to the layers of absurdity and moral grey, accepting simply what Estella was telling her.
“You’re oddly quiet,” Ellie said in the backseat of the car, as Vera drove them the short distance from Harry’s hillside home to Alison’s lakeside mansion. Estella sighed heavily.
“Of course I am. Alison Hartmann has invited us to dinner. Black is white and night is day. I cannot stress enough the fact that this is a trap.”
“Maybe she wants to clear the air?” Ellie tried. She couldn’t figure it out either. Alison’s disdain of her — of her job and her relationship with Estella — was enough to make the invitation thoroughly unlikely, let alone everything that had gone down between Alison and Estella in the past.
“Cute,” said Estella. “I suspect I’ll be tied up in her basement by nightfall. I figure her as the type.”
Ellie couldn’t even begin to touch that one.
When they arrived at the epic wooden door of the oversized glass-and-stone house on the lake verge, the sun was just starting to sink behind the hills, splashing hot pink across the water.
A number of cars were parked in the gravel drive, including Harry’s Porsche, since he and Hugo had left ahead of them.
Estella sucked in a deep breath as she raised her hand and pressed the doorbell.
“Well, well,” said Alison, as she pulled open the heavy wooden door to greet them.
“It’s unlike you to knock,” she observed to Estella, who rolled her eyes in response.
Estella was back in full force for this dinner: every inch the city crime boss — heels, red-lip, skin-tight designer dress — and her attitude matched perfectly.
Ellie couldn’t help but find it fascinating, the way Estella could so completely put herself on as a disguise.
“I’m afraid I had no choice this time,” Estella drawled. “My gun is in my other purse.”
“Oh, my fucking god.” Ellie felt lightheaded. “Hi Alison, thank you so much for having us.”
“The pleasure is mine,” Alison said, her tone so icily polite, Ellie almost withered right there on the spot. Alison gestured to the stairway just inside the front door. “You know the way, Estella,” she said drily.
“Mm, you know, I do,” Estella practically purred.
She sashayed up the stairs with utmost confidence, which was how Ellie knew she was most definitely drowning in discomfort.
She placed her hand on Estella’s waist as they reached the top, entering a massive open plan kitchen-dining-living area, glass plate doors open to an expansive stone balcony.
Estella slipped her own hand around Ellie but let it drift down to squeeze her ass.
Ellie knew full well that the grope was at least half intended for Alison’s benefit behind them so she swatted Estella away.
So much for solidarity. “Now this is a party…” Estella murmured at her.
Ellie took her point: this was an extremely strange combination of humans to walk in on.
Alison stood to their side and pointed out who was who.
Zara and Arthur were out on the balcony, Arthur involved in an earnest conversation with Dr. Prisha and her partner — a pretty blonde named Camille — both of whom were nodding at him seriously.
Zara, on the other hand, had a glass of wine in her hand for the first time in a long time, laughing and looking relaxed, while a handsome younger man seemed to be flirting with her.
Alison told them, with a slight wince, that it was her son, Jac, visiting from Melbourne.
Hugo was standing next to the kitchen, both obeying Harry’s orders and gazing at him with heart eyes as Harry flittered about fussing over the salad bowls.
A handsome bespectacled hipster couple seemed to be taste-testing wines in the living room: a local lawyer named Flynn and his architect boyfriend Magnus.
“How perfectly cosy,” Estella told Alison, her voice droll.
There was a strange air about her that Ellie was struggling to get a read on.
Estella’s eyes were flitting about the living room, not quite landing on anyone, something like anxiety sparkling in the air.
Just then, another pretty blonde arrived, sliding her arm around Alison’s waist. This, then, must be Hope.
“Oh wow,” she said to Estella by way of greeting. “Now this is a reunion.” Her voice was bright, her teeth sinking into her pink lower lip. “I’ve had literal therapy involving you standing in this exact living room. You look wonderful, by the way.”
Estella seemed quite uncharacteristically lost for words, her lips parting and her eyes narrow.
“Oh my god.” Ellie felt sick. “This was… this was where… it happened?” She somehow hadn’t put all the pieces together until they all stood right here: Alison, Hope and Estella Grant. In the living room of Alison’s lakeside house.
“It being Ali and I nearly being murdered by one of the Grant goons?” Hope confirmed. “Yes. Estella put an end to that, but she held us at gunpoint for a while on the couch right there.”
“Well, we had to chat,” Estella said defensively. “Glad to see you still looking so pretty and happy and loved up and alive.”
“It was great not being murdered,” Hope acknowledged, her voice cheerful, though no one could have missed the flash of heat in her eyes. “We appreciated it so much.”
“We shouldn’t be here,” Ellie said, the realisation rushing over her. “I don’t know why we came, this is insane. Do you want us to go?”
Three sets of eyes turned towards her, all of them faintly surprised.
“Oh no,” Alison said, with an elegant wave of her hand.
“We’re just getting the necessary pleasantries out of the way.
You’re invited guests, the two of you.” She looked them both in the eye; then, to Ellie’s total shock, reached out and squeezed Estella’s forearm.
“Thank you for coming,” she said. “You’re welcome here, but please keep your other guest from joining us. ”
“Me?” Ellie flinched and all three women tittered together, making Ellie feel like she was in the twilight zone. Estella slid her hand back around her waist.
“Vera,” she confirmed. “I’ve left her in the car. Don’t worry, I’ve rolled the window down and left her with a few puppies to gnaw on.”
“That’s not funny,” Hope said, even as she was clearly trying not laugh. “Never bring puppies into it.”
And just like that, Eloise Silver — the upcoming star of Universe Below — and Estella Grant the villain, were neatly welcomed to Alison Hartmann’s Sunday night dinner party.