Never Too Late (64 page)

man she’d thought she knew. No wonder she’d steered

clear of the male of the species for so many years,

preferring life as a single parent to the two-faced world of

dating. Simon had been the first man she’d Set close to

her. Max had been the second.

Well, one out of two wasn’t bad.

She swung her legs out of bed and sat down on the

balcony, her face bleak as she stared out at the sea and the

yachts dotting the shimmering blue horizon.

More than anything else in the world, she wanted Max

Stewart. She loved him with all her heart but he wasn’t

what he pretended to be. She wasn’t sure if he’d lied to

her or not, but he hadn’t told her the truth, that was for

sure. And the truth was so important to her. A wave of

guilt hit her as she remembered that she hadn’t told

Simon the truth.

Well, she would. From now on, she’d be the most

faithful, truthful wife ever and he’d never regret marrying

her. She’d make his life wonderful, be the perfect spouse,

go into Wife of the Year contests, anything to make things

the way they had been before.

The wedding was back on, she thought defiantly. And

Max Stewart could go hang! But not, she decided grimly,

before she saw what sort of women he really wanted to

spend the rest of his life with. She pulled the violet outfit

out of the wardrobe, broodingly aware that the infamous

Mia would be studying the opposition if she went to the

party. Well, Evie decided firmly, Ms Mia Koen wouldn’t

find her wanting.

‘How could you?’ Evie hissed, face proud and jewels

glittering in the firelight as she faced the dastardly Max. ‘How could you have another woman when you had my love?’

His swarthy face cruel and uncaring, Max advanced on

her, mouth set in a grim line. His eyes raked over her figure,

elegant in the amethyst ball gown, the corsets holding her tiny waist in to a slender eighteen inches. ‘Because I wanted you, I couldn’t help it. I admit it, she is to be my wife, but you and I can still be lovers. You want it, you know you do. You are the

most exciting woman I have ever known. Rut I must marry

her to save my family’s fortune.’

‘For your insolence, you deserve to die!’ hissed Evie, producing a tiny pearl-handled pistol from the folds of her silken

shawl. His cowardly face paled to the colour of his ruffled

shirt.

‘No!’ Mia ran in, heavily bleached hair piled up in a

ridiculous pompadour, wearing a vulgar, low-cut dress that

was a riot of gaudy colours, with paste jewels clustered heavily around her thick neck. ‘Don’t shoot!’

‘I must, he has dishonoured me,’ Evie said grimly, thinking

of the shame he could bring on her noble family.

‘No, Madame Evie,’ said a cool voice. I must shoot him for

dishonouring you.’ The Duke, elegance itself in his beautifully cut breeches, strode manfully into the room, his handsome face

making Max look overblown and coarse …

‘Mum,’ said Rosie, sticking her head round the door.

‘You missed a yummy lunch. I’m going to turn into a crab

if I eat any more of it. Are you coming down to the pool

for a last bit of sunbathing?’

Stretched out on her lounger, Evie turned the pages of her book listlessly and laughed as Cara and Rosie held races in the pool with Andrew doing the Olympic commentator

coverage:

And Cara Fraser has proved herself to be a champion swimmer today even though she stuffed her face with gambas pil pil at lunch,’ droned Andrew, in intense radio presenter style, ‘while Rosie Mitchell has just switched

styles into the … er, butterfly flop and is drowning everybody else around the pool.

‘Now, in a surprise move, ex-Olympic medallist Mrs

Vida Fraser is getting into the pool to show these youngsters

how it’s really done. Mrs Fraser, better known ;is

Esther Williams’s sidekick, has great hip movement …’

Andrew stopped when Vida and Cara managed to hit him

with the inflatable plastic whale Rosie had bought to

lounge on.

Despite all the high-jinks going on around her, Evie’s

misery never lifted. She kept her nose buried in her book

but didn’t manage to read a word all afternoon. Max was

out until six, when he walked down to the pool and threw

himself on to the lounger between Cara and Evie.

Instantly, Evie got up and collected up her things. ‘Well,

I’m going to get ready to go out. We’re leaving at … eight,

is it? I’ll meet you all at the car then.’ She ran upstairs and locked her bedroom door, just in case he tried to follow

her.

By ten to eight she was dressed in the violet ensemble,

which was, she realised glumly, the most beautiful outfit

she’d ever owned in her life. Her bare legs were golden

thanks to some of Rosie’s fake tan, so that when the

skirt’s thigh-high side split parted revealingly, at least she

wasn’t displaying acres of white flesh. The off-the

shoulder cut to the clingy little top meant you couldn’t

really wear a bra unless it was strapless and, lacking one,

Evie decided to go braless.

Tough titty, indeed, Mr Stewart, she thought mirthlessly,

dusting her shoulders with bronzing powder and noticing

that the outline of her nipples was ever so slightly visible

when the top was pulled close down around her body.

Once she’d pulled Vida’s heated rollers from her head, her

hair sat in perfect glossy curls.

It was as if she’d been given a make-over from Heaven,

only tonight the man she’d wanted to look beautiful for

wouldn’t give a damn. He’d have eyes only for his bloody

actress girlfriend.

Grabbing her handbag, she stomped downstairs and

joined Andrew and Vida on the verandah, completely

ignoring Max and the look of admiration on his face when

he clocked her in the clinging violet.

If Max thought it was strange that the woman who’d

writhed under him in ecstasy the night before was barely

giving him the time of day now, he never got a moment to

say so.

Evie sat in the back of the car with Vida after waving

goodbye to Rosie and Cara, who were planning their own

girls’ night out, a night that involved Rosie borrowing half

a ton of Olivia’s eyeshadow and a lot of Evie’s Poeme

perfume.

Andrew, Vida and Max chatted idly as Max drove out

the coast road.

‘Wait till you see this place,’ Max said. ‘Franz is obsessed

with Westerns and says he fell in love with the ranch

because it’s half Spanish villa and half like something from The High Chapparal. When he took me there the other day, I almost expected him to strap on a couple of six guns

and a stetson when we got home so we could round up

some steers. He’s a decent bloke, very sweet most of the

time, but on set he’s incredibly demanding.’

The car swung off the main road and headed into craggy

mountains, rose pink in the setting sun. ‘When we were

making the Strauss biopic, we finished shooting early, which never happens.’

How thrilling, Evie fumed silently. Was that before or

after your affair with nympho Mia?

They drove through the mountains for another half hour

before taking a side road oft into a dusty landscape. They

passed a small village and then, to the right, perched

perilously on a hill, saw a sprawling villa, gleaming white in

the evening with lots of stables and outhouses extending

behind it and tubs of blossoming flowers to the front.

Various cars were parked haphazardly on the drive, one

a stretch limo so long Evie imagined you could play tennis

in it. Mia’s car, she figured, feeling her stomach knot with

tension. Half-expecting a group of show business harpies

who all bitched relentlessly and looked like extras from a

rock video, Evie was surprised when the huge wooden

door opened and Franz appeared. Their host was a short

bald man with an enormous belly and a friendly, welcoming

smile. After kissing Vida and Evie as if they were old

friends, he ushered everyone into a house decorated in

typical Spanish style and yelled, over a background of

opera, for Luisa, his wife.

‘The others are here and there,’ he explained, shouting

over the noise, ‘but they wake up when the champagne

corks go bang!’

Luisa was grey-haired, motherly, and wearing an apron

over a very sedate flower print dress. ‘I’m cooking paella and everybody keeps stealing nibbles,’ she groaned, waving a giant spoon. ‘Come on, come on.’

The party was in full swing in a large room with a

balcony off it, although Evie reckoned by the state of some

of the guests that they were still partying from the

lunchtime session. They all looked very ordinary, no rock

star types or movie moguls waving cigars and Rolexes

around: just happy people red-faced from the sun, some

still in Tshirts and shorts, others more formally dressed in

summer dresses or polo shirts and casual trousers. Evie felt

as overdressed as a strippergram in an Eskimo suit.

Max was immediately swallowed up by the crowd,

delighted to see him and shouting ‘Max, over here!’ in a

variety of languages. Nobody was glamorous or desperately

exciting. Instead, they all looked like Evie had after

her first few days in Spain: tired but utterly thrilled to be

away from work and in a place where the sun shone

every day.

She soon found herself chatting to Franz’s favourite

cameraman, Lippo, who was supposed to be going home

the next day but had decided that he and his makeup

artist wife weren’t going back for another couple of days

because they were too worn out after a four-month

production on location in the Black Forest. ‘He works

non-stop,’ shrugged Lippo’s wife, Helene, before getting off

the couch to phone home and tell their teenage twin sons

the news that they’d return on Wednesday.

They’re nineteen and I’m afraid the house will be

wrecked by their partying when we get back home,’ Lippo

confessed mournfully.

‘I know the feeling,’ Evie said. ‘My daughter’s seventeen

but she’s with us on holiday. She’s out for the evening.’

Evie accepted a glass of water from Franz, despite his

attempts to get her to take alcohol. After her Martini

debacle, she was determined to remain as sober as a judge.

‘I worry myself sick about her but I think she’ll be all right

tonight. She’s with my sister who’s nine years older than

her and should be in charge, though when they’re together,

it’s like having two teenagers.’

The twins don’t sound too upset,’ remarked Helene

arriving back with a bowl of olives. The vacuum is broken

apparently, and I ask how they know because they never

use it!’

Marvellous paella smells coming from the balcony proclaimed

that Luisa’s dinner was finally ready.

‘We’re eating outside because the dining-room table

disappear when we move,’ Franz announced, leading

everyone out to the enormous balcony where places were

laid on two vast wrought-iron tables. Sitting with Lippo

and Helene, chatting and laughing and eating enormous

black olives, Evie began to relax and stopped worrying

about whether she was overdressed or not.

Max was chatting to Franz about work the whole time

and kept shooting her almost pleading glances, as if to say,

What have I done wrong?

Evie was on the verge of smiling back to say, Nothing, I

was just fretting about something that happened a long

time ago, when something caught Max’s eye. Or someone.

The chattering and laughing continued unabated as

Evie followed Max’s gaze and saw a woman slip quietly

into the room from the balcony and pick up a packet of

Marlboros from a coffee table. Her lustrous chestnut hair

was tied up in a casual knot and her heart-shaped face

dominated by the most perfect mouth Evie had ever seen

outside a lipstick commercial. Slanting, cat-like dark eyes

were ringed with thick dark Sashes and practically no

other make-up. Lighting up, she put the cigarette between

her perfect lips and inhaled deeply, with the finesse of a

young Bardot.

Mia wasn’t movie-star tall, the way Evie had imagined

her to be. In fact, she was petite and so delicately slim as to make every other woman in the room look like a 2,000passenger

cruise liner beside a sleek racing yacht built for

two. A minuscule white T-shirt stretched across her tiny

frame had ‘I’m Purr-feet’ written on it and she’d tied a

white sarong around her bronzed waist as if she’d only just

got out of bed and had flung on the first thing to hand in

order to cover herself. But Evie reckoned Mia would have

no problem sashaying around clad just in a bikini no

matter what time of the day or night it was. She looked

stunning and, from the way she gazed around the room in

predatory silence, she knew it. Evie loathed her on sight.

She glanced quickly towards Max, watched his Adam’s

apple contract as he gulped at the sight of Mia, and felt as

if she’d been punched in the stomach. Nobody could

remain unmoved by somebody as beautiful as that. And

Max almost certainly was moved. His gaze flickered back