Good at Games (4 page)

Douglas Hepworth came into the kitchen with Rory at that moment. Having overheard her words, he blinked nervously at Suzy from behind his owlish glasses and made the mini shrugging gesture he always made when he was anxious about something.

“Ah, to be honest, I'd rather get it sorted out tonight. Your mother specifically requested it… Ummm, there is a reason…”

More mini shrugs. Suzy decided it was his way of unsticking his polyester shirt from his plump, perspiring shoulders. Douglas wore the look of someone who'd really rather not be here this evening. Clearly, something was up. Determined to go out with a bang, Blanche had no doubt made some weird arrangements for her estate. Suzy could just imagine the terms and conditions her mother would have had such fun compiling. If Julia wanted to inherit her share of the money, for instance, she'd first have to roller-skate naked down Park Street…and Rory would have to drive around Clifton in a battered truck, wearing a knit cap and gorilla slippers…

Or would Mum make me do that?

Then again, maybe it wasn't anything to do with terms and conditions. It could be Douglas's unhappy task to inform them that they weren't getting anything at all, that their mother had left the lot to a tribe of Amazonian Indians.

Or a blind-donkey sanctuary.

Nothing was impossible where Blanche was concerned.

“It's nine o'clock.” Rory checked his watch. “Suzy's right; they can start making a move.”

“But that's so rude,” wailed Julia.

“Has she not left us any money?” Suzy asked Douglas, who was also surreptitiously glancing at his watch.

“Oh, no… I mean, yes… don't worry.” Shrug shrug. “It's nothing like that.”

One of the butch bridge club women popped her head around the door.

“Any chance of another couple of bottles of single malt?”

Julia, the perfect hostess, wiped her eyes and rose obediently to her feet. Suzy placed a hand on her shoulder and guided her back down onto the chair.

“I'm so sorry, did you miss it?” She smiled her most charming smile at the woman in the doorway. “We called last orders ten minutes ago. The bar's closed.”

* * *

One by one the guests kissed and hugged everyone in sight, told one another they'd given Blanche a send-off she would have been proud of, stumbled into an assortment of cars and taxis, and roared off into the night.

“I'll make some coffee,” said Rory when the last of them had been dispatched. He closed the front door and loosened his black tie.

“If you'd excuse me for just one moment,” Douglas said damply, pulling his cell phone out of his pocket, “I need to make a quick call.”

He retired discreetly to the conservatory. Julia, heaving a massive sigh of relief, said, “Give me five minutes to freshen up,” and headed upstairs in the direction of the bathroom.

The air in the drawing room was opaque with cigarette smoke. When Suzy flung open the French windows, it tumbled out like an avalanche of ectoplasm. In contrast, the night air was cool and clear, and a light rain pattered down through the trees.

Kicking off her high heels, Suzy stepped outside onto the paved terrace, felt the first raindrops land on her face and throat, and set off down the garden.

Just a quick circuit, to clear the industrial quantities of smoke from her lungs and brace herself for whatever Douglas had in store. And it gave her feet a chance to cool down too. It had, after all, been a long day spent in particularly ruthless stilettos.

In fact, now that she'd taken them off, her feet were so grateful they seemed to want to dance around like spring chickens.

Skip, skip.

Ah, that was better. You could almost say her feet were cock-a-hoop.

Skip, skip.

Free as birds,
skippety skip
, happy as—

CRUNCH.

“Oh God oh God oh God,” howled Suzy, feeling sick.

Cringing and holding her left foot as far away from the rest of her as possible, she hopped up and down on the path and hung on to the overhanging branch of a weeping cherry for support.

“What is it?” an alarmed voice blurted out of the darkness. A figure stepped out from behind the trunk of the cherry tree. “Are you hurt?”

A pair of warm hands grabbed hold of Suzy's arms. Which was lucky. Otherwise, she would have keeled over in shock.

“I'm not hurt. I stepped on a snail.” Suzy's heart was racing. “What about you? Are you a burglar?”

“No.”

“Who then?”

A moment's silence. Broken by “Can't you guess?”

Baffled, Suzy said, “Of course I can't guess.”

“OK, look, why don't we sort you out first?” It was a female voice, husky and awkward. “I'm sorry, but I can't concentrate on anything while you've got bits of snail stuck to your foot.”

She had a point, whoever she was. Hopping around in the blackness, Suzy managed to unclip her suspender and peel off the sheer stocking in one go. Shuddering with revulsion, she flung it—snail remains and all—into a nearby hydrangea bush. Then, leaning back against the rough trunk of the cherry tree, she peered more closely at her intruder.

It was too dark to see her face, but there was certainly something familiar about the silhouette.

And the long coat.

“You were at the funeral this afternoon.”

She saw the head dip in agreement. “Yes.”

“You left before the end.”

“That's right.”

“Why?” Suzy was fascinated by the clicking noises made each time the girl nodded—what was she wearing, maracas for earrings? “And why didn't you come back to the house afterward with everyone else?”

“I didn't think I should.”

“I'm sorry; I don't get this at all.”

“I didn't want to cause any trouble, upset you any more than you were already… I mean, the last thing any of us needs is a big dramatic scene in front of an audience.”

The girl's voice was unsteady, almost fearful. Totally flummoxed. Suzy ran through a few unlikely scenarios in her mind. Suddenly recalling the plot of a movie she had seen the other week, she exclaimed, “Good grief! Are you trying to tell me my mother was a
lesbian
?”

This question was greeted by an astonished silence. At least, Suzy hoped it was an astonished one. It was possible, of course, that it was the kind of disappointed silence emitted by someone who didn't expect you to guess the right answer so soon.

Eek, Blanche a lesbian. Surely not.

The mysterious clicking noises began again, but this time, the girl appeared to be shaking her head from side to side.

Well, that was a relief anyway.

“I can't believe this. You must know who I am.”

“Well, I'm sorry,” Suzy protested, “but what am I supposed to be—Psychic Suzy, Mind Reader Extraordinaire? Look, we could do it with charades if you want. You start with your name. First word, how many syllables? Hang on, somebody's coming…”

At the sound of approaching footsteps she swiveled around. The next moment a bright flashlight shined directly into her eyes. Dazzled and blinking, Suzy held up one hand to shield herself from the light.

And a stunned male voice said, “I don't believe it.
Jesus!
”

This situation was fast becoming too weird for words. Suzy felt her heart begin to flap like a parrot in a cage. She might be blinded by the flashlight, but she recognized that voice at once.

“Harry?” Shock made her babble. “Heavens, of all the gardens in all the world you had to walk into this one. Harry, I haven't the faintest idea what you're doing here, but you're interrupting a
really
important game of charades. You can be on my team, OK?”

This had to be some kind of elaborate setup, Suzy decided. A ploy to meet her again. Unless…and bearing in mind that he was, after all, a policeman…

“Hang on, is this an undercover operation?” Suzy swung back to face the girl. “Do you work with Harry?” She smiled. “Or are you an international drug smuggler?”

Harry held up a phone.

“I've been waiting for you to come back to the car.” He was addressing the girl, Suzy realized. “He just called a couple of minutes ago. It's time to go in.”

Going in, that definitely had an undercover ring to it. Maybe the girl was a fellow officer after all.

Next to her, Suzy heard the girl take a deep breath.

“Right.” She turned to face Suzy. “I'm Lucille.”

“What?” Suzy mentally ran through the possibilities, charade-wise. Loo. Seal. Well, that would have been dead easy.

“Lucille Amory.”

Suzy gazed blankly at her. It was clearly meant to mean something, but she couldn't for the life of her imagine what.

“I'm sorry, I'm usually terrific at names. Could you…?”

“Your sister,” Lucille said awkwardly.

Suzy laughed. “What?”

Her sister's name was Julia, for heaven's sake.

Harry, clearing his throat, said, “I think maybe we should go in.”

It wasn't until Suzy was standing aside to allow Lucille through the French windows ahead of her that she realized where the clicking had been coming from. Hundreds of tiny beads, threaded among the dozens of plaits in her hair, made contact with one another every time the girl moved her head.

Lucille's skin was the color of Taster's Choice made with double cream. Her eyes were chestnut brown. She looked nervous but stunning, like a young model making her debut on the catwalk.

“This is a joke, right?” Suzy glanced from Lucille to Harry and back again. “Did Jaz set this up?” Far-fetched, admittedly, but Jaz may have thought they could do with a practical joke to lighten the mood.

But if he had, wouldn't Lucille be screaming with laughter by now instead of trembling uncontrollably and looking as if she'd quite like to burst into tears?

She's got eyelashes like Bambi
, thought Suzy.
Now how fair is that?

The door was flung open, and Julia appeared. Her gaze shifted from Suzy's legs to Harry to Lucille. “Who are these people?”

Glancing down, Suzy remembered that she had one bare leg and one stockinged one. When she moved, she felt the redundant suspender flapping attractively against the back of her thigh.

“This is Lucille. Our sister, apparently. Technically, she's a half sister. And all this time we thought darling Daddy was such a saint. Oh well, good for him. That's what I say.” Suzy paused briefly and gestured at Harry. “And this is Harry. He's a policeman. I'm afraid I don't have a clue what he's doing here. Unless, of course, he's our brother.” Eek. “Oh God, you aren't, are you?”

Harry was giving her an odd look.

“Lucille's my friend. I'm just here to give her some moral support. Believe me, when we came here tonight, I had no idea I was going to see you.”

“Daddy would never have an affair,” Julia quavered, outraged. “
Never.
This girl's lying through her teeth!”

“Your father didn't have an affair,” said Lucille. “Blanche was my mother. Look, I'm sorry; this isn't easy for me either.” Catching her breath, she looked with ill-concealed longing at the drink clutched in Julia's thin hand. “I really thought you knew.”

* * *

Suzy realized it was true the moment Douglas Hepworth broke the silence. Bustling past them into the drawing room with his briefcase clutched importantly in his pudgy hand, he ignored Julia's thunderstruck expression, plonked himself down in the leather armchair, and said brusquely to Lucille, “Good to see you, glad you could make it. Right then, if everyone's here, I'd like to begin.”

It was will reading in the style of a smash and grab. Douglas, keen not to let himself become embroiled in the repercussions of finding out that one's family was…well, bigger than you'd always thought, confirmed in less than three minutes that Lucille Amory was indeed Blanche Curtis's daughter and that the estate was to be divided equally between her four children.

Then like Superman—
whoosh
—he was gone.

Well
, thought Suzy,
like Superman, only fatter and without the red panties. Then again, who am I to talk, with one seven-denier barely black leg and one simply bare one? Talk about uncoordinated.

“This is ridiculous. I don't believe this is
happening
,” sobbed Julia.

“Me neither.” Lucille laced her fingers together in her lap. “I mean, I wasn't exactly expecting a wild welcome, but…” Her voice trailed away.

“You hadn't expected to have to break the news to us yourself,” Suzy supplied, feeling sorry for her. “Let's face it; it was pretty amazing news to have to break.” Although it was, at the same time, absolutely typical of Blanche. “Ummm…if it isn't a rude question, how old are you?”

“Twenty-six. And a bit.”

“You were born when I was eight.” Rory had been the diary-keeping type as long as he'd been able to write. He thought for a moment. “Mother took off on one of her trips then. I remember she was away for six months.”

“So much for adventuring through the South American jungle,” Julia interjected bitterly. “She wasn't up the Amazon at all, was she? She was knocked up. Oh, for heaven's sake, Rory, are you going to fill up my glass or do I have to drink straight from the bottle?”

Suzy felt as if her brain had grown too big for her skull. There were a million questions to ask. “Where do you live?”

“Here.” Lucille was clutching Harry's hand for support. “I mean, in Bristol. Bishopston.”

Just a few miles away.

God, imagine!

“And you were adopted,” said Suzy.

“No. My dad brought me up. Mum just…ummm, visited us every now and again.”

“Your father's black?” Julia looked horrified.

“No, pale green. Of course he was black.”

“Did
our
father know?” said Rory.

Lucille shook her head.

“But you thought we knew.” Suzy was struggling to understand.

“I was curious. After your father died, I asked if I could meet you. Mum said she'd told you all about me”—her gaze flickered in Julia's direction—“but you decided it would be easier all around if we didn't meet.”

Indignantly, Suzy said, “Well, that was a big lie. We hadn't any idea!”

“I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I just don't want this to be happening.” Julia flapped her hands in distress. “We're talking about a whole double life here. Our mother has spent the last God knows how many years involved with a…a…”

“Black man,” Lucille said evenly. “Dad came to this country from Mauritius thirty years ago.”

“Couldn't be bothered to come to the funeral, though, could he?” Julia retaliated bitterly.

“That's because he's dead. Otherwise,” said Lucille with a flash of spirit, “I'm sure he would have
bothered
.”

“Look, I'm sorry about my sister.” Suzy rushed to make amends. “She's a bit…you know. Cares a lot about what the neighbors think.”

“Are you calling me a snob? I am
not
a snob.” Julia was by this time quivering with outrage.

“Oh, yes you are.” Suzy smiled at Lucille. “She is, she's horrendous. Julia tried to bribe a TV crew once because they'd caught her on camera coming out of Walmart. She almost died of shame when it appeared on the local news.”

“I was taking a shortcut,” Julia insisted through clenched teeth. “You can't seriously imagine I'd
buy
anything from Walmart.”

Suzy beamed. “See what I mean?”

“This is ridiculous; we aren't here to discuss me.” Julia seethed visibly; she hated being made fun of. “Let's face it, Lucille's here for one reason and one reason only. The moment she gets her hands on the money, that'll be it. We won't see her for dust, will we?”

This was what Julia clearly hoped would happen. Embarrassed by his sister's breathtaking insensitivity, Rory said awkwardly, “Hold on now. That's entirely up to Lucille.”

“If that's what you want to happen,” Lucille said stiffly, “then fine. It really isn't my mission in life to embarrass all of you and bring shame on your family.” There was an edge to her voice as she uttered these last words. There were also tears in her eyes. Suzy impulsively reached for her arm as Lucille rose to leave.

“Please, you can't go. Julia doesn't mean to be rude.” Well, she probably did. “It's been a shock, that's all. And I don't even know why any of us
are
shocked, because this is so bloody typical of Blanche. A bit of drama, a good old showdown—wasn't that all she ever wanted? So long as it was one where she wasn't around to take the flak.”

“Don't you dare talk about her like that,” Julia burst out. “You mustn't speak ill of the dead!”

“Why not? It's true. If she's watching us now, she'll be loving every minute of this. And why
didn't
she tell us we had a sister?” Suzy demanded hotly.

Except they already knew the answer to that one. Julia's horrified reaction was all the proof they needed. Blanche had always reveled in being the center of attention, but only on condition that it showed her in a flattering light.

* * *

“And then she left.” Suzy finished telling Jaz and Maeve the next morning, in the kitchen at Jaz's house. Reaching across the table, she helped herself to a handful of grapes. “It was a bit embarrassing actually. I tried to give her a hug to make up for Julia being such a cow and got one of my earrings caught up with some of the beads in her hair. Harry had to untangle us.” She pulled a face. “And then it got more awkward because it felt like the end of a disastrous date. I asked Lucille for her phone number and she said, ‘Look, you don't have to try to be nice. Why don't we just leave it to the lawyer to sort out.'”

“Sounds more like one of my disastrous marriages,” Jaz observed with a grin.

“But I
do
want to see her again. I mean, imagine, all this time I've had a sister I didn't even know about! I always wanted a nice sister, not a bossy, neurotic older one like Julia. And think what it must have been like for Lucille, growing up in the same city and thinking that we didn't want to meet her.”

“What's she like?” Jaz looked interested.

“Beautiful.”

“Nothing like you then.”

Suzy kicked him efficiently under the table.

“Ouch.”

“You know I'm gorgeous. She's just got it in a different way. Taller, thinner, real cheekbones, that kind of thing.”

“And this Harry fellow—the one you were so keen on—he's her boyfriend?” Maeve was standing at the head of the table, briskly chopping her way through a mountain of tomatoes.

Suzy shook her head.

“Just a friend, apparently. They grew up next door to each other in Stockwood. I did manage to tell him that I hadn't run out on him at the Avon Gorge the other week, I explained about being kidnapped and mentioned in passing that I wasn't seeing anyone else at the moment. I was rather hoping he'd ask me out.” Suzy popped another grape into her mouth. “But he just frowned and said, ‘I hardly think this is the time or the place.' Which was a bit of a bugger. Still, never mind,” she concluded brightly. “He can always get my number from Lucille.”

“So subtle, so shy, so retiring.” Jaz eyed her with amusement. “You really should be a real estate agent.”

Suzy glanced at her watch.

“Speaking of which, I'd better make a move. I'm showing a gynecologist around that new apartment in Guthrie Place at nine fifteen.”

“What does she do for a living?” asked Jaz.

“I just told you.” Suzy was busy tucking her pink shirt into the waistband of her white skirt. “Gynecologist. Funny kind of a job for a woman”—she mimed peering up something with an imaginary flashlight—“but there you go; I suppose it takes all sorts.”

“I meant Lucille.”

“Oh.” Hurriedly, Suzy smoothed her skirt over her hips and reached for her jacket. “No idea. She didn't say.”

* * *

Nobody had been more amazed than Suzy herself when she had taken to selling property like a Scot takes to porridge. Having plowed her exams in spectacular fashion—because who needed exams; she was marrying a rock star!—she had emerged two years later from the wreckage of her marriage to Jaz dazzlingly ill-equipped for…well, pretty much anything. Taking pity on her, but not at all sure that it was a smart business move, Rory had offered her a job at the agency, and—not at all sure that it was her cup of tea, but touched by his concern—Suzy had accepted.

Happily, they were both proved wrong. Meeting prospective clients and matching them to the perfect home came so naturally to her that within three months Suzy was outperforming the senior agent—who promptly threw a tantrum and left. Rory promoted Suzy, crossing his fingers hard and praying she wouldn't get bored.

She didn't. The buzz of successful selling had Suzy in its grip. She made the clients laugh, startled them sometimes with her honesty, charmed them so naturally that they half fell in love with her, and never for a moment lost her infectious enthusiasm for the job.

* * *

“Well?” said Rory when she erupted into the office at ten thirty.

“Sold to the gynecologist with the creepy rubber gloves.” Waving her cell phone in triumph, Suzy threw herself onto the nearest swivel chair and did a victory twirl. “She offered two three five, and the Clarksons accepted.”

“She wasn't bothered about the bathroom?” Rory was impressed; the Clarksons' poky bathroom had put off a number of clients. “I thought she'd go for that second-floor apartment on Pembroke Road.”

“She was going to, but I told her that if she bought Pembroke Road, she'd be living above a family with three teenagers. She doesn't need a massive bathroom, but she definitely wants peace and quiet.” Suzy beamed. “I said, OK, this one costs a few grand more, but think what you'll save on earplugs and expensive psychiatric treatment. And she laughed and offered me a job as her receptionist.”

“Dr. Witherton?” Donna looked up from her computer. “Actually laughed? My friend Hazel works on one of her wards at Frenchay. According to her, Esme Witherton is seriously scary. Rumor has it, she hasn't laughed since nineteen seventy-six.”

“Tuh, only because nobody's told her any good jokes. She loved my one about Bill Clinton and the tea bags.” Rory looked horrified, and Suzy shrugged modestly. “I'm a genius, that's all. So”—elaborately casual now—“any messages while I was out?”

“The agent from the Halifax wants you to call him back.” Donna consulted her notepad. “And the Ferrises want to see the house on Bell Barn Road this after—”

“I meant nice messages,” protested Suzy. “
Interesting
messages. Date-type messages from gorgeous men, preferably policemen. With bright blue eyes. Named Harry. Come on,” she wailed, “he must have called!”