Chapter Thirty-Five
Back at my hotel, I’d just stepped out of the shower and was wrapped in a fluffy hotel bathrobe when my phone, charging by the bed, started ringing. Sighing, and raking wet hair out of my eyes, I answered. It was a video call.
Esme’s face swam before me: evidently hungover, pale-skinned, bedhead hair, smudged eye make-up, but somehow looking gloriously romantic.
I glimpsed sketches all around her, and my heart gave a little leap of hope: she was creating again.
Ajax was not next to her, but that enormous elaborate headboard was behind her.
‘Morning,’ I said.
‘Hey, babe,’ she said, sipping a drink. ‘I’m kinda disappointed you’re alone, if I’m honest. I heard you and Olly are getting friendly.’
Fuck. My stomach pitched as though I was in a boat and had hit a wave. I snatched the phone up from the bed where it had been resting and eyeballed her. ‘Where did you get that from?’
She gave a shrug and a little snicker. ‘I don’t reveal my sources unless you’re in the room with me.’
‘Right,’ I said tightly. ‘What can I help you with?’
‘I was thinking, about the speech, one extra dimension to bring up might be… hang on.’ She glanced at another phone, read a message, tilting her head. ‘I’ve got to go.’ She abruptly ended the call.
I swallowed down my annoyance, feeling vulnerable.
Over a decade in the industry and I’d always been calm, a brick wall, professional and nothing else.
There had been something gleeful about the way Esme had looked at me, a how-the-mighty-have-fallen cheekiness on her face.
I did not want my personal life to become a subject for discussion.
I walked back into the bathroom and pinched my cheeks, staring at my tired but animated face.
It had been a long night, and my body ached pleasurably.
The memory of being with Olly literally made me roll my head backwards and have to take a breath.
But I couldn’t ignore the fact that my heart was aching, too, and a vague, unresolved dread was haunting me. How could we possibly make this work?
I went back out and messaged Olly, wishing I’d never left his hotel room.
LIZZY: Esme just called. There are rumours about you and me.
I stared at the screen, waiting for him to read it, but he didn’t. Went to the wardrobe, dragged out black jeans, a white outsized shirt and some pointy boots. Selected (fake but impressive looking) cream-coloured pearls for my ears and neck, then checked my phone again. Nothing.
I’d just finished applying my eyeliner while listening to a weather-related voice note from Dad (a new development: one of the ladies at his retirement complex had taught him how to record one) when I heard my phone go off again.
I walked over to it and opened the message. It was from Esme, and it was written in block capitals.
ESME: COME TO THE HOTEL NOW. URGENT.
No kisses, no ‘babe’. I rang the number, but she didn’t pick up. Then I rang Olly.
‘Hi, Lizzy.’ His voice was all business.
‘Hi,’ I said. ‘Have you heard from Ajax?’
‘Yes, he said something’s just happened and we need to come to them right now.’
‘Esme, too. Do you have any idea—’
‘Nope, sorry. We should have stayed in bed, you know.’
I couldn’t help the smile that was stretching its way across my face. ‘I wouldn’t have wanted to tire you out.’
He gave a low laugh. ‘That’s fighting talk. I’ll meet you at the hotel and attempt not to look at you lustfully.’
I remembered Esme’s words, a flicker of alarm in my chest. ‘People are gossiping about us.’
‘I don’t care.’
‘I do. Maybe we should cool it?’ It was just a suggestion. But also a test. Because he should just say ‘no’, right? He should push me into us carrying on, because then it wouldn’t be my responsibility when my career crashed and burned because of a work affair.
There was a silence.
‘I’ll see you at their hotel in half an hour,’ he said.
‘Okay,’ I said. ‘See you.’
It was half past eight when I made it to Esme’s hotel, and Venice was bright and cold, the sky and the lagoon pale, heart-scouring blue, dotted with boats.
On my way I’d encountered a logjam of gondolas on one of the narrow canals, a sign of Venice’s reawakening out of winter.
On arrival I was directed to Esme and Ajax’s suite, and was shown in by a man in a maroon uniform.
They had their own butler, of course they did.
Their suite had a drawing room which would have suited an eighteenth century noble, all gold framed mirrors, glittering glass and velvety, jewel-coloured furnishings.
A show-cone of macaroons in various pastel shades greeted me when I went in, and I suppressed the urge to pick a couple off and devour them – I still hadn’t had breakfast. Impassively, the butler poured me a tiny cup of coffee in a white and gold porcelain cup.
‘Babe.’ Esme entered the room and held her arms out to me in a way that brooked no avoidance. As I embraced her as briefly as I could, she was followed by a grim-faced Ajax. A minute or two later there was a knock at the door and the butler showed Olly in.
My heart stopped clean in my chest at the sight of him.
Back in his navy suit, but with rifled hair, he looked worried in a way I’d never seen before.
Was it us, or Ajax, who had put that look on his face?
I swallowed down my concern, went over to the cone, picked a pistachio green macaroon off it and ate it in two bites.
Ajax cleared his throat, looking uncharacteristically uncomfortable. ‘Hey, I appreciate you guys getting here so quickly, especially after such a heavy night, we all really tied one on.’ He tried to smile. Tried to smile? Ever-cheerful Ajax?
‘No problem.’ Olly had sat back in his chair, looking superficially relaxed. Somehow, though, I noticed the line of tension in his posture. After our night together I felt like my experience of his body had crystallised and I could read his body language to second-sight level.
I said nothing, but stayed perched on the edge of my seat.
The key thing I noticed was, Esme and Ajax were no longer holding hands.
Gone was the love-bunny, hearts-for-eyes vibe that had permeated all of their interactions since that first announcement.
They sat next to each other in separate chairs, both looking a little dishevelled but clear-eyed, purposeful.
Zero sentiment. Neither of them was smiling.
Esme looked as though she was waiting for Ajax to speak, but when he didn’t, she did.
‘There’s been a development,’ she said. ‘In the last hour.’
Olly and I waited, silently. Ajax had started to flick through his phone, his expression bleak. Then he held out the phone.
‘We need to make this go away,’ he said.
Both Olly and I got up and went to it, looking at it together, breathtakingly close, but I had no chance to focus on that.
The image was a grainy shot. A paparazzi shot. But perfectly legible.
It was of Ajax. Unmistakably Ajax. And he was kissing a young man, against a Venetian streetscape.
I gave my head a little shake, blinked several times.
I thought I’d never be surprised by anything, after my years in the business.
The affairs, the scandals I’d seen at one remove.
And yet, in this moment, I felt shock at the idea of this particular chessboard dissolving and rearranging itself. Shock, tiredness, and disbelief.
‘What is this?’ I looked up at Ajax’s awkward expression, at Esme’s impassive face. ‘You’re cheating on her?’
‘Lizzy.’ Esme’s voice was perfectly calm. ‘It’s not quite the whole story.’
I fixed my eyes on her face, and I saw her flinch at the gaze I turned on her. I forced myself to sit back down in the chair, straight backed. Glanced over to see Olly doing the same.
‘I suggest you give us the whole story right now, then,’ I said. ‘Everything.’
‘I agree.’ Olly sounded tired.
Esme rang the tiny, ornate jade table bell on the coffee table. ‘Of course. But first, more coffee? Or something stronger? Babe’– she brushed Ajax’s knee with her hand – ‘I’ve ordered you a serenity smoothie.’
I took another cup of coffee, as did Olly; Ajax had a green-coloured liquid which had obviously been custom-made for him, and Esme had a glass of champagne, ironically.
I noticed that she seemed dominant now, rather than Ajax; he kept his head down as he sipped his smoothie, dejected, and she patted his hand. What the hell was going on?
‘Right,’ she said, once the butler had slipped discreetly away. ‘Here’s all the news that’s fit to print. And some that isn’t.’ She tried to smile.
I kept my eyes fixed on her face.
‘The thing is’– she took a breath – ‘our relationship. It wasn’t entirely what it seemed. Not to start with.’
I narrowed my eyes and tilted my head.
‘Lizzy, Jesus, less of the evils please,’ she breathed.
‘Look. I’ll level with you both. Chroma has been floating in the air for a while.
Ajax and I came up with the concept a few months ago.
We met at a charity event last November and…
spent the night together. Had a long breakfast. Talked about collabs. ’
My astonishment must have shown on my face because Esme looked faintly embarrassed. ‘We’ve met over the years here and there… occasionally spent time together.’
‘On the down-low,’ blurted Ajax, then returned to his smoothie.
‘Anyway. When we met again, on that Friday, we thought, let’s make a splash.
’ She swallowed. ‘Admittedly, a few class A substances may have been taken – in moderation. But we thought: let’s go for it, and why not do it together?
We would be an amazing combination, and launching an app while being a couple would give us lots of juicy extra publicity.
I know this sounds mercenary, I really do.
But the world is so competitive now. We aren’t the new kids on the block anymore. And hype is everything.’
Olly cleared his throat. ‘So the whole big romance is entirely fake?’
‘Yes and no.’ Esme looked regretful.
‘We have a spark in the bedroom.’ Another stellar input from Ajax.
I picked a blackberry macaroon from the cone and crunched it savagely. ‘And yet,’ I said to Esme, ‘you don’t seem worried that Ajax has been with someone else? When you said to me you were feeling vulnerable.’
Esme looked slightly shamefaced. ‘It’s true, I’ve had a lot of feelings recently. But the guy in this shot—’
‘It was just a casual hook-up,’ said Ajax, to me rather than Esme.
‘He’s easily bored,’ Esme said. She looked stone cold chilled about all of it.
‘And, honestly? I’d feel worse about it if it was a woman.
I knew Ajax was bi. And we both need excitement from…
various sources, every so often. But the bond between us’– she patted his hand again – ‘I feel like, genuinely, that’s on, like, a soulmate level? ’
Ajax nodded.
Silence fell. I made a note to put the word ‘soulmate’ on my list of banned terms.
Olly was the first to speak. ‘I think we just need to know – are you staying together, or not? Are you getting married? So we can work out what to do going forward.’
They looked at each other, in indecision. ‘We really need to talk some more,’ said Esme.
I glanced at Olly, but he wasn’t looking at me. ‘Right,’ I said. ‘We can give you some space. I’ll call Jacob and tell him he’s leading this morning’s brainstorming sessions with Amber.’
‘Texting Amber now,’ said Olly.
I bit my lip. I was being less than chill about this. No, don’t text Amber, she might lure you away from me. I gave myself a little shake. ‘Who’s got the picture?’
Ajax named one of the tabloid newspapers. I frowned. ‘How do you know about it? Why didn’t they come through me or Olly?’
‘I’ve partied with the editor in the past,’ said Ajax. ‘He wanted to give me a heads up.’
Or he wanted to enjoy making you squirm, I thought.
‘Can you make it go away?’ The way he was repeating the phrase showed the depth of his anxiety.
I shook my head. ‘Not entirely. But we could negotiate it to something else. Maybe you give a no holds barred exclusive interview, talking about your complex relationship with Esme and your regret at things you’ve done. Is it already on the record that you’re bi?’
He shook his head.
‘Well, you can explain that, too. Esme can either totally understand about this encounter and support you and be happy to marry you or you can split on good terms, whatever you decide.’
‘Right.’ Ajax looked dazed.
‘Darlings.’ Esme stood up. ‘We trust both of you implicitly. Give us a few minutes. Ajax and I will message you when we’ve decided.’
‘I’ll see you outside,’ I said to Olly, who was already walking towards the door.
He nodded. I turned to Esme. ‘Can I have a quick word?’ Ajax went back to their bedroom without a word, as Olly left.
Esme turned towards me with an indrawn breath.
‘Lizzy, I didn’t mean to lie to you – it didn’t even feel like a lie—’
‘I don’t care about that,’ I said bluntly. ‘I want to know who said there was something going on between me and Olly.’
‘Oh.’ She looked surprised by that. ‘It was your sweet little PA. What’s her name?’
‘Sasha,’ I said, trying not to grit my teeth at the fall in my chest. Sweet Sasha, who I’d spent time mentoring, who had been my team player, who in some way I couldn’t fathom, had become hostile to me. Whispering gossip into the ears of Esme and Ajax. ‘Thank you.’
‘She actually said it to me a couple of weeks ago,’ said Esme. ‘I just dismissed it but when I saw you two the other day, well, I thought I caught a frisson.’
‘Great,’ I said, trying to control my tone.
‘Just for the record,’ she said, turning, and I caught the scent of her expensive perfume. ‘If you were, I wouldn’t blame you.’
‘Thanks for your input,’ I said frostily.