Busy Woman Seeks Wife (34 page)

“Just wait.” Ella was panting and out of breath.

At that moment there was a rustling noise in Alex’s ear and the muffled tap of someone putting their fingers to a mike. “Alex,
it’s Frankie.” His voice came deep and clear through her earpiece and she jumped. “I know you can’t say yes or no so I’m just
going to have to assume you can hear me.” Alex nodded, then felt stupid. “It’s crap timing, I know,” he began and for a moment
Alex thought he was going to talk about what had happened on Friday night. Then he went on. “But I need you to listen to something.”
All she could hear then were footsteps, his presumably, going down a corridor and the squeak of a door opening. It shut with
a quiet thud behind him and she could hear his footsteps, though more lightly now, and the faint noise of the fabric of his
clothes rubbing as he walked. What was going on?

“Ah!” he said loudly and suddenly. “Camilla? What on earth are you doing?”

F
rankie stared at the pale figure in the shadows. From out on the dance floor he could hear a hum of expectation building.
The whole thing was about to start. He would have to be quick.

Camilla had jumped when she heard his voice and turned around to face him. She was smiling and he wondered for an agonizing
moment if he’d made an awful mistake, but then he noticed that she was concealing something behind her back and saw the way
her eyes kept darting to the side. “Frankie! There you are. Alex has been looking for you everywhere. You’re in big trouble!
You’d better go and find her, quick.”

Frankie moved closer, hoping the mike Ella had clipped to his shirt would be sensitive enough to pick up Camilla’s words as
well as his own. “I don’t think I’m the one in trouble, am I, Cam? What have you got there? Show me.”

She sidestepped towards the door, keeping her back to him. Frankie glanced at the floor and there were what looked like the
T-shirts Melik had given him. They were slashed to ribbons. “Did you do that, Cam?”

“What? What are you talking about?” Her expression was almost childlike, her eyes wide with innocence.

“The outfits there. They’re ruined. Did you slash the outfits, Camilla?”

Her eyes flicked to the pile on the floor and she looked almost manic. Frankie tried to sound gentle, as if talking to a frightened
animal. “Did you do it so that Bettina couldn’t go on? So that it would look like Alex had messed up, Cam?”

“Yes, I did!” Camilla hissed slowly, her teeth bared in an ugly snarl, and she produced a long pair of scissors from behind
her back. “I did, and I’m glad I did. She doesn’t deserve this job. She’d be nothing without my support. Gavin’s realized
it at last and now everyone else will too.”

“You’ve been very clever, Cam,” Frankie said, more calmly than he felt. “All those other things you did—hiding the phone charger,
sending the e-mail to Melik changing the delivery date.”

Camilla shook her head dismissively. “That was nothing. Just the icing on the cake, you might say. I’ve been working on this
for months. And she never suspected a thing!” She laughed shrilly.

“Oh, but she did, Cam,” said Frankie, but Camilla didn’t seem to be listening.

“You don’t know the half of it, Frankie,” she went on triumphantly. “There was the PowerPoint presentation in Toronto, the
flights in Milan. I even knew Maurice wouldn’t be able to cope with the catering and would back out. His references were crap!
He couldn’t make a bacon sandwich. But Alex was so trusting! She made it so easy. She even let me take her computer home with
me. I deleted files, changed dates, sent all kinds of e-mails. What a fool she is! And now this! I was so disappointed when
you arrived with the clothes, Frankie. I thought giving you the wrong address would stop you. It wasn’t very nice of you to
mess up my plans. But I’ve taken care of that too.”

“Ah, but you haven’t, Cam. That’s the thing. Bettina has the clothes. What you’ve just shredded was a present for me from
Melik. I left them around as bait. You’re not so clever after all.” Camilla’s smile faltered. “Listen!” They could both hear
music getting louder above them. “You’ve failed, Cam. And Alex has won—through sheer hard work and talent, Alex has beaten
you.”

The drumbeat above them was firm and rhythmic. “But,” Camilla faltered. “I don’t understand. You don’t even like her. I thought
you were on my side?”

Frankie took in her pretty face turned ugly now with spite and envy. “Well, you’ve got it all wrong. I like her. I like her
very much. It was Alex who asked me to come in and help. She suspected someone was out to get her. She just didn’t know who.”

“You bastard!” she hissed. “You stupid, interfering bastard!” And she hurled the scissors at him and fled through the open
doorway.

Frankie let out a sigh of relief. “Gavin, if you can hear me, you’d better alert door security. I hope you all heard that,
’cos I’m not doing another take.”

B
lissfully unaware of any drama backstage, Saff made her way among the growing crowd of people who had arrived, offering around
the plate of muffins in her hand. The guests, if that was what you called them, didn’t seem as friendly as those at the parties
she’d waitressed during teenage holidays. This lot were sour-faced and had the world-weary expression of people who had done
this many times before. The range of nationalities was extraordinary; there were Asian and Mediterranean faces, American accents,
and languages Saff didn’t recognize being spoken at high speed and even higher volume. As she approached with trays of food,
several gave her a look as if she’d crawled out from under a stone. She only hoped they weren’t treating Millie and Oscar
with such disdain. She peered around the various groups to see if she could spot them, but the crowd was too thick now. Max
swept past at one point and pinched her bottom surreptitiously. “Hey, cutie,” he leered into her ear. “Doing anything after
breakfast?” She giggled at him and moved on to wave Danishes under the nose of the Japanese delegation. Tentatively they picked
them up and peered at them suspiciously, not sure if they were meat or pastry, and then slowly tasted them. Saff waited, holding
her breath, until they nodded their heads in fervent approval and took more.

Oscar came up beside her. “We’re clean out of coconut-and-raisin, Mum!” he squealed. “I told you it would be a winner.” Then
he was off again to collect another tray.

The volume of noise in the hall increased, helped by the constant thud of music from the huge speakers. Lasers began to flash
across the roof and a deep and rhythmic drumbeat began. As the tension was cranked up, the gathered audience began to focus
its attention on the stage. The lights overhead were dimmed and Saff began to search more seriously for Millie. There had
been so much movement of people, she was worried her daughter might have gotten lost. Over on the other side, Saff spotted
Alex coming through a swing door from the backstage area. Her eyes were on the stage but her expression was blank. Saff squeezed
her way across to her side.

“I know you don’t need this right now, but have you seen Millie?”

Alex started and looked down at her friend. “Sorry?”

“I’ve lost Millie.”

Alex waved her hand vaguely. “She’ll be fine. The staff on the door wouldn’t let her leave.” Her eyes looked completely startled.

“Are you okay?” Saff put her hand on her arm. “Has something gone wrong?”

“Yes, but I think it’s sorted now.” Alex looked at her and smiled. “It’s fine. In fact everything makes sense now. It’s all
falling into place. And Saff…” She gave her friend a warm kiss on the cheek. “You’ve been wonderful.”

Anything more she may have said was drowned in the sudden gust of sound from the stage and they both turned as the show burst
into life. What followed was so awe-inspiring that Saff forgot that she had been awake all night, that she hadn’t sat down
since seven o’clock yesterday evening and that it was breakfast time in Brixton. Accompanied by a pounding beat that Saff
recognized from one of Oscar’s CDs, a swarm of dancers cascaded onto the stage in a mass of color and clothing that cleverly
mixed sportswear, casual wear and what Saff imagined people called urban. They spun and cartwheeled, swayed and strutted,
all flat stomachs and legs up to their armpits. Some of it was so sexually electric Saff looked about quickly to see the children’s
reactions, only to spot Oscar’s face lit up in wonder. It was not as awestruck, though, as his father’s behind him. Max was
almost drooling.

Images of the Zencorp logo, swooping and diving, lit up the screen behind the dancers, ramming home the branding. The words
urban active flashed on the screen. This, thought Saff, was unashamed hard selling and she watched as the assembled audience
scribbled on pads and flicked through the press pack looking for more information. Flashbulbs momentarily lit up the catwalk
even more, and photographers crawled about to get interesting positions and angles. Then onto the stage came figures dressed
entirely in white. No skin was showing, not even their faces, which were hidden behind fine white mesh, but on their feet
was a glorious array of footwear in the colors of summer fruit. Not sneakers exactly but not fashion shoes either. Something
in between, in pink and lemon, mango and lime green. So delicious you would want one pair in each color. Saff spontaneously
clapped her hands in glee and then realized she was the only one doing it. Alex put her arm around her gratefully and to cover
her friend’s embarrassment.

Next came models—boys and girls, black and white—wearing alternately jeans or beautifully cut trousers, skirts and even business
suits together with items from the new range. Saff could almost see herself in them, though she might be ten years too old.

“What do you reckon?” Alex bent down and whispered loudly in her ear over the music.

“It’s so clever, Alex. So clever. Millie will be nagging me to death about it. The punters will love it!”

“How can you tell?” laughed Alex nervously. “This lot seem to be distinctly underwhelmed.” Saff looked at the amassed journalists
and Alex was right. They were all staring at the stage, that was for sure, but their expressions were unreadable. One small
woman in black with short bobbed hair and half-moon glasses was talking into some kind of Dictaphone. It could even have been
her mobile. At an enormous whooshing sound Saff’s attention was snatched back to the stage, where a fountain of silver fireworks
had gone off at the back, and through the smoke came Bettina Gordino.

“God, isn’t she gorgeous?” Saff gasped as the rake-thin model made her way like a pedigreed feline up the catwalk. The photographers
went mad, catching every angle of her beautiful face, made up now with the lightning-like flash of the Zencorp logo, her back-combed
hair transformed with gold and bronze highlights. The crop top she wore clung like cling film, and on her hips were the briefest
belted white shorts cut somewhere between athletics shorts and a fashion item from the sixties. They looked as if they had
been sprayed on. Saff nudged Alex. “How in God’s name did she get into
them
?”

Alex snorted with laughter in reply. “She didn’t have as much trouble as Frankie did!”

More dazzling variations on the theme pranced onto the stage, including a hip-hop posse who danced to a jerky track, the climax
of which saw the enormous Sanferino strolling onto the stage in livid yellow. He was clearly not used to appearing as a model
but, despite his size, he managed to be graceful and exude an almost intimidating presence. Bettina followed, transformed
again by another outfit. The energy coming off the stage was extraordinary, and Saff could feel herself dancing along to the
beat. The models and dancers seemed to be enjoying themselves, Bettina even managing to wave at someone in the audience, but
Saff couldn’t see who. Then, as the music reached a massive crescendo, there was another explosion of fireworks and lasers
and they all froze, their arms held out in a position of celebration.

There was silence. Saff glanced up quickly to Alex, whose face was a picture of tension, her eyes trained on the audience.
It occurred to Saff then just what this meant to her. Just how important this event was. Then there was another explosion
but this time of thunderous applause. People stamped their feet and whooped, and Alex threw her arms around Saff in an embrace
that almost stopped her breathing.