Birthday Party, page 9
‘You don’t go through everything we’ve gone through and then give it up,’ was the only clue Delilah would provide.
Raf wasn’t as forthcoming. He played his cards very close to his chest. He always had. It was Delilah who was bubbly and effusive, who let slip intimate details, who let each journalist who interviewed her feel as if they had come away with a scoop.
Of course, it was all carefully orchestrated. Delilah never let anyone know anything she didn’t want them to. But by opening her eyes wide, and dropping her voice to a whisper, like a schoolgirl divulging a piece of salacious gossip, she could turn the most inconsequential nugget of information into a story, thereby deflecting attention from the truth. Tyger had seen her do it on countless occasions. Delilah was the mistress of media manipulation. She got away with it because she was gorgeous and charming and everyone adored her, even the most hardened editor of the most scurrilous red top.
Time and again she had traded off photos of herself for covering up the girls’ misdemeanours while they were growing up. Their publicist, Tony, spent his whole time horse-trading with the tabloids. A good photo of Delilah was usually worth more than a blurry snap of one of her daughters out on the town. The camera loved her and the public loved her, so it was valuable currency. Sexy, curvaceous, with that infamous cleavage and those tumbling chestnut curls, she worked a different look for every photo opportunity with the help of her tireless stylist. And no sooner was the look worked than it was copied by women all over the country. There had been a run on round-necked leopard-skin cardies, rope-soled wedges, multi-stranded strings of pearls, bandanas, berets, feather-trimmed evening bags – you name it, if Delilah Rafferty wore it, it would be sold out by the end of the week.
Thus Tyger had learned enough from her mother while growing up to know that she needed to order two limos for the trip to the airport, and that she and Louis should check in separately. The hotel had been discreet, because it had to be. But once they were outside, they were easy prey.
She looked over at her husband of three days and her tummy turned over. Delilah was right. You did know. Tyger remembered the feelings she had described and had felt them herself the moment she clapped eyes on Louis. Temporary inability to breathe, racing heart, butterflies in the stomach but at the same time a sense of incredible peace. A relief, almost, that the search was over.
That had been six days ago. Six days that now felt like a lifetime. And clearly he had felt the same, for here they were, Mr and Mrs Dagger. The thought still gave her a thrill. Tyger could feel desire bubbling up inside her even now. They hadn’t left the room for a day and a half. But time was ticking by.
Louis grumbled as she forced him to pack up his clothes.
‘Come on! You need to leave ahead of me. At least fifteen minutes.’
She didn’t trust him to follow on behind. She had to see him into the limo.
‘What’s the big deal? Why all the skulduggery?’
‘I don’t want my family to find out about us from the papers.’
Louis frowned. ‘We’re both grown-ups, aren’t we? You’re over the age of consent.’
Tyger’s phone went again. It was Polly. Chasing her about lunch tomorrow, no doubt. She let it go to voicemail, feeling a tiny bit guilty because she knew Polly would be stressed at not being able to get hold of her.
‘One more day,’ she pleaded. ‘We can tell them tomorrow.’
‘Do I get to sit next to you on the plane?’
He nuzzled his face into her neck and she felt her cheeks go pink as she thought of what he had done to her under the blanket on the way out.
‘I’ve checked us in online. Two seats together. We’ll have to board separately, though.’
They’d just have to hope and pray that there wasn’t anyone sitting near them likely to sell their story. There probably wouldn’t be. There was an unwritten code in First Class that most people seemed to adhere to.
The room phone went.
Tyger picked it up: their cars were waiting.
‘We’ll be down in twenty minutes,’ she promised the receptionist, knowing full well it would be more like an hour. But that was her life all over. She was a busy girl. She always kept people waiting.
‘Welcome aboard.’
The hostess smiled at Tyger as she took her boarding card, then directed her towards her seat. Louis was already in his, feet stretched out, eyes closed, earphones on.
Tyger glanced around the cabin before she sat down. No one seemed to have clocked her, and Louis wasn’t properly famous on this side of the Atlantic yet, only if you were into underground music. But it was only a matter of time. And really, the way he dressed, there was only one thing he could be. He oozed the dissolute decadence of a rock star; he reeked of glamour and groupies.
No more groupies, Tyger hoped. She supposed that strictly speaking that was what she had been. Though your average groupie didn’t have an Access All Areas pass that allowed you to barge straight into the lead singer’s dressing room after a gig and tell him he was a genius, which is what she had done. Only last Saturday night, she realised.
She’d expected Louis to be disinterested. He had a reputation as a moody, arrogant twat. He’d looked her up and down once, then twice, and she saw a flicker of recognition in his eyes.
‘Your mum’s the cookery bird,’ was his reply.
Tyger rolled her eyes and sighed. Everywhere she went, men fancied her mother more than they did her. Delilah seemed to be the object of desire for every male in England from sixteen to sixty. Even, it seemed, the moody rebellious Louis Dagger.
‘Yes …’ She sighed.
He swaggered over to her. She could smell the post-gig sweat on him. It made her feel slightly faint.
‘Great … gig,’ she managed to murmur, feeling very self-conscious all of a sudden. Tyger was never tongue-tied. Never intimidated by anyone.
He surveyed her coolly for a few more moments.
‘Let’s get out of here.’ He picked up his jacket. She looked at him quizzically. He jerked his head towards the door. ‘You didn’t just come here to make polite conversation, did you?’
Actually, she had. Not in a million years did she think Louis Dagger would be interested in her. She had just wanted to tell him how much she’d enjoyed his performance. His songs were melancholy, bitter-sweet, but had somehow struck a chord with her. She’d come away feeling as if he had laid his soul bare. It probably wasn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but Tyger wasn’t one for mainstream.
‘Aren’t you supposed to be going to the after-show party … ?’ she asked, but he took her arm, leading her out of the dressing room and down the gloomy corridors until they reached the fire exit. She struggled to keep up with his loping stride in her five-inch heels.
‘Where are we going?’ she asked breathlessly.
‘My place.’
Outside the theatre a car was waiting. They jumped in the back. No paparazzi, thank God – the photographers were all inside, not thinking that any of the stars of the evening would be escaping yet. A wordless driver drove them through the streets of London, the tyres swishing through the puddles. Louis picked up her hand and held it, leaning his head back against the leather seat and shutting his eyes. Tyger didn’t know what to think or do. He was running his thumb gently up and down hers. The hairs on her arms stood on end. She shivered. Was it the air conditioning, or … ?
He opened his eyes and looked straight at her.
‘Sometimes you just know, you know?’
She gazed back at him, feeling like a rabbit trapped in the headlights. She nodded. She couldn’t deny her attraction to him for a second – why else had she gone to seek him out in his dressing room? But what did he see in her? Until ten minutes ago he probably hadn’t even known she had existed.
She wasn’t going to argue. She wasn’t going to break the spell. She leaned against him, snuggling in, breathing in his smell, relishing the warmth of his body.
His place blew her away. It was a warehouse apartment overlooking the Thames. Round the four walls of the main room ran a low shelf that held his collection of LPs. There must have been thousands, all pristine, all in alphabetical order.
‘Wow,’ breathed Tyger, pulling one out.
‘What do you like?’ he asked. ‘I’ve got everything.’
Tyger felt her mind go blank. Tyger, who was never at a loss for words, suddenly felt under pressure to request something hiply obscure. All she could think of was Fleetwood Mac, for some reason, which was neither hip nor obscure.
‘Surprise me,’ she managed finally.
He pulled out an album and went and put it on a vintage record player. Mellow jazz oozed out of hidden speakers. She was surprised at his choice. She’d expected something radical and discordant, but in fact the gentle tinkling of the piano and the lazy saxophone were perfect.
He was fixing drinks at a bar. He handed her a chunky tumbler of Cointreau and ice. Again it was perfect. Damn, this boy was good.
The only thing in his bedroom was a bed. A black wrought-iron four-poster, seven foot wide. Oh, and hundreds of fat candles in an open fireplace, their dancing flames the only light in the room. As he carried her across the room, Tyger wondered dreamily if he left them burning all the time, or if he had somehow phoned ahead to get some mysterious housekeeper to light them.
He laid her gently in the middle of the bed, and she felt as if she was sinking into a cloud. He undressed her as carefully as a mother with a newborn baby, and she didn’t resist. His fingertips glided over her skin. At times she couldn’t be sure if he was really touching her. She felt his lips on her breasts, his tongue flickering over her nipples. It was almost imperceptible but sent the most incredible feeling shooting through her. As she arched her back in pleasure she reached out to touch him, eager to explore him too, but he pushed her hands away.
‘Shhh … don’t move,’ he whispered, and she lay back obediently. She felt dizzy with the shock of it all.
When he finally slid inside her, she cried. And as they came together, she looked into his eyes, into his soul.
‘Marry me,’ he said.
How could she refuse?
It was insane. Of course it was insane. She didn’t stop to think for a minute about the practicalities or the consequences. To deliberate would be to stop this incredible roller-coaster. Tyger was used to making her mind up quickly and trusting her gut. It was why she was such a successful businesswoman. Besides, she was twenty-one. She had her own money and she knew her own mind.
By the next day she had booked flights to Las Vegas and a hotel, dug out the necessary paperwork, and just found time to dive into her favourite vintage shop where she found a perfect Ossie Clark wedding dress. She said a word to no one, existing in a bubble of excitement that was unmatched by anything she had ever experienced before. The rest of the time she spent with Louis in his apartment. He seemed unruffled by the turn of events. When she’d commented on the whirlwind nature of their relationship, he just shrugged and smiled.
‘Meant to be,’ was all he would say.
It was only now, as the captain welcomed them on board and announced the flight time, that Tyger realised she was going to be back on English soil in less than ten hours and that reality would be waiting for her. She couldn’t put off her family any longer. She couldn’t put off work any longer – she’d told them she was on a ‘research’ trip talking to buyers. And she suspected that she couldn’t put off the press any longer.
The butterflies fluttering at the bottom of her stomach weren’t the same ones that had been there all week. These ones were churning up anxiety and apprehension. She took a big gulp of the Veuve Clicquot the hostess had handed her. Instead of soothing her, it burned. Louis was sipping his quite happily, drumming his fingers on the arm-rest, singing something softly to himself.
She wasn’t going to say anything to him. Technically they were still on their honeymoon. She didn’t want to spoil it. She leaned back and closed her eyes, trying to relive every single second of the past crazy week, starting with the moment she had first set eyes on Louis on stage. And gradually, as she worked her way down the glass of champagne, her anxiety subsided.
It was going to be fine, she told herself. After all, everyone loves a wedding. Don’t they?
Three seats back, a delegate who had been attending a mind-numbingly dull conference peered with interest down the aisle. This was the highlight of his trip to Vegas. Everyone had told him the place would blow his mind, but it wasn’t nearly as interesting as the couple he had been watching since take-off. The stewardess was emptying yet another bottle into their glasses, and they were getting careless.
You’d have to be dead not to recognise Tyger Rafferty. She or one or other of her sisters was in the papers constantly. And that was definitely Louis Dagger, who was being cited by the press as Pete Doherty’s natural successor. It wasn’t hard to figure out what they’d been doing in Vegas – not attending the monumentally tedious conference he’d been at, that’s for sure. The way she kept looking at the hideous ring on her finger gave it away – it couldn’t possibly be real diamonds, could it? – as did the way they were devouring each other in between gulping champagne. He took several photos very discreetly on his mobile, ready to email as soon as he landed. They wouldn’t be printable quality, but good enough to guarantee a decent wedge.
It wasn’t in his nature to blab to the press but someone was going to do it, so it might as well be him. And although his company paid him to travel First Class, he was only on a short-term contract. A few grand in the bank could come in very useful. He thought about picking up the in-flight phone and calling a newspaper, but he couldn’t guarantee that he wouldn’t be overheard, and besides the rates were astronomical. He’d wait till he landed. The pictures he’d already got were worth a mint.
Nine
It was half past ten on Saturday morning, and The Bower was already crawling with people. Raf stood at his bedroom window looking out onto the garden and stretched with a yawn. All he wanted to do was to go down to his own kitchen and enjoy a pot of freshly brewed coffee and leaf through the Independent in his boxers, but he knew there was no point. The kitchen would be a hive of activity. The bell had rung three times already with deliveries – flowers, organic vegetable box, wine and ice …
He could see Delilah gesticulating in the office adjacent to the house, talking to Tony, their publicist. He supposed he should be in there, as it was his new venture they would be discussing, but he wasn’t bothered which bloody rag got the scoop or when. As far as he was concerned, he just wanted to get on with the job and bugger the hoo-ha that went with it, but that wasn’t the deal in this house. No one in the Rafferty family could blow their nose without a press conference. That was the price of being successful, photogenic and high profile.
They were valuable, that was the problem. You couldn’t just give your stories away. Each headline had a price, and it was Delilah who made sure that it went into the Rafferty coffers. She wasn’t by nature particularly attention-seeking or money-grabbing, but she had cottoned on to the fact that there was money to be made for doing not much more than you were already doing. But it involved military precision and planning.
Every week was a constant trade-off. Interviews, photo-shoots, public appearances, guest slots. If it wasn’t Hello! rummaging around their knicker drawers then it was a personal appearance on some chat show or compe`ring a charity auction. They had to be seen at every glittering occasion in the social calendar, from Ascot to Glastonbury to the Serpentine summer party. Polo at Windsor. Harry Potter premieres. And none of them was ever seen in the same outfit. Admittedly they got a lot of the clobber for nothing – designers were desperate for their clothes to be seen on the back of celebrities – but Raf did find the nation’s obsession with what they were wearing, well … wearing. He liked to look good, but he didn’t want to be neurotic about wearing the same shirt twice. So he had favourite items of clothing – why shouldn’t he get good use out of them?
There was a large lever-arch file in the office with Polaroids of what they had worn to every public event. Their stylist, Karen, completely freaked if they didn’t keep it up to date. He liked Karen, he really did, and it was thanks to her that he had his Best Dressed Man accolades, but honestly … it was almost immoral, the time and attention and not least money that were spent agonising. At least today he could wear what the hell he wanted. Jeans, and a black-and-white floral Paul Smith shirt that should have looked ridiculous on a man of his age but somehow didn’t.
He wished fervently that it was just the girls and close friends coming today. Although in theory it was a social occasion, they were all on parade. They couldn’t just kick back and relax. Raf wanted to chill with his daughters, catch up on their gossip, make sure they were each all right. It was why they had established this monthly ritual, otherwise the weeks just slipped by and any one of them could have a serious problem that was overlooked because the wheels just kept on rolling. It was very difficult for the girls to be themselves with strangers in the camp. They wouldn’t let their guards down.
He felt a flicker of annoyance at Delilah. Why did she have to turn everything into a bloody three-ring circus? After yesterday’s momentous decision, they should have just relaxed amongst themselves, not least because they hadn’t actually told the girls about the movie yet.
Oh well, he thought. Maybe the hangers-on would have the sensitivity to bugger off and leave them alone after lunch. Though Raf knew from experience that this was unlikely. Delilah’s über-generous hospitality, the endless bottles of wine, the appearance of yet more food just when you thought you couldn’t eat another thing, meant they were probably in it for the duration. Maybe he could persuade the girls to stay the night, and they could have brunch tomorrow, catch up, chew the fat. That was unlikely too – the chances of them not having to do something on a Saturday night were remote.
He thought wistfully back to when they were little. It was always a painful memory. He had wasted so much of their childhood in a drunken haze. He remembered Violet finding him crashed out on the trampoline one morning. He’d gone to sleep there the night before after a skinful, wanting to look at the stars. She’d been delighted to find him. She wanted him to bounce with her. He’d struggled to his feet reluctantly, managed three bounces, then thrown up spectacularly over the edge, to Violet’s joint alarm and disgust. He remembered the look of horror on her face, and her concern – her sweet, innocent, childlike concern that her daddy was ill.
