Power Games (2 page)

One out of four isn’t bad.

The panes are faded and cobwebbed with age. Only
Voldan’s eyes betray the depths of his satisfaction.
It is done.

He backs away from his reflection and the shadows swallow him whole.

PART ONE

Six months earlier

1

New York

A
ngela Silvers was being fucked from here to infinity.

At least, that was how it looked. In the mirrored dressing room of Fit for NYC, the bijou latest addition to her chain of sought-after fashion boutiques, her image was fractured and repeated, chasing replicas of her naked body to vanishing point. Angela was flung against the sweat-slicked glass, her arms wide and her blood racing.

The man between her thighs was forbidden.

Noah Lawson.

Movie star, heart-throb, teenage crush—the man she wasn’t allowed to have.

Noah’s tongue circled with exquisite precision, tracing around, between and beneath, everywhere but the place she knew would ignite her like dynamite.

She grabbed his hair, tilting her hips, and gasped as fireflies swarmed in her belly, rising and rising until the world and everything in it diminished to the pure, clear pleasure of her approaching climax. Oh, how she had tried to forget him. Noah was her lover, her best friend and her constant: he was the magic in her heart.

She couldn’t help the rebellion. It had been in her since she was fifteen.

‘Keep going!’ she begged. ‘Don’t stop!’

Drawing her to him, Noah plunged deep, finally giving her what she wanted where she wanted it, and in a delicious, delirious flash she was there, slave to the surge, electric ripples tearing her apart. He kissed her lips, her neck, her collarbone, and whispered in her ear those three sweet words he saved just for her.

If only she believed them.

‘Ms Silvers?’ There was a knock at the door: a female voice, summoning her for the launch. ‘They’re ready for you. Is everything all right?’

Angela closed her eyes, throwing her head back to gasp her admission: ‘I’m coming!’

Fit for NYC was a walk-in wow-fest of everything retail could and should be.

The gallery was spectacular. Silhouetted mannequins were draped in lace and crepe. Champagne glittered on diamond plinths, embossed with the golden FNYC logo. The air was spritzed with an aroma of privacy, of secrecy, even of conspiracy. Couches sat plump as raspberries, their Milanese fabrics shimmering with hand-gilded leaf, and goblets of fizz drifted along with zingy morsels of antipasto: juicy baby figs, Parma ham as light as silk, salty
pepperoncini
and fleshy artichoke. The pieces were one-offs, painstakingly selected from the fiercest new collections; if not by Angela then by her trusted clique of buyers. Personal assistants were on hand to advise. Designers were commissioned for bespoke tailoring. Caskets housed the chicest of gems. Fit for NYC was set to become
the
shopping mecca of the super-rich.

Heads turned as Angela moved across the floor. Hers was
a potent sensuality that combined feisty Italian beauty with the self-assurance and class of an elite Bostonian heritage. In a tailored trouser suit with deep V neckline and heels that put her at a fraction under six feet, Angela Silvers was bracingly attractive.

She smoothed her curls. Sex hair. Her cheeks were still flushed, her knees weak.

Already she ached for Noah, her skin dancing from his touch and his kiss still alive on her lips. Why did they have to hide? Why couldn’t he be here, at her side?

Some days Angela convinced herself to throw it all to hell and stand in defiance of her father; others, it was career suicide. Donald Silvers was a powerful, domineering man, and he would not be moved when it came to his precious only daughter: if he found out she and Noah were together, he would take from Angela the one thing she had always craved—that one day, the family business would be hers.

Her heart or her ambition … Why did she have to choose?

According to her father, despite Noah’s fame and riches, he wasn’t one of them. He wasn’t from her stock. Girls in Angela’s position were expected to see and be seen with the right sort of man, to date wisely, to marry correctly.

She ignored the sliver of doubt that told her that wasn’t the only reason. Doubt that looped through a hole in her heart; a hole Noah himself had made years before.

The thing was, no one else matched up. No one looked at her in the way Noah did. No one listened, and cared, and made her laugh. No one held her hand and kissed her like it was the last kiss on earth. No one made love to her like he did.

‘
I’ll call you
,’ she had told him, as he’d slipped through the doors and into the night. His strong arms around her, his voice in her ear: ‘
Not if I call you first …
’

‘Where’ve you been?’

Orlando, the elder of her two brothers, swiped a chalice of Louis Roederer and drank lustily from it. At thirty Orlando was a polished, complacent kind of handsome, as if his looks and status were assets he had won on merit, not by chance.

‘Shouldn’t you slow down?’ Angela commented. Unable to resist stoking the fire of sibling rivalry, she added wickedly: ‘Anyone would think you were jealous.’

‘Jealous?’ He snorted. ‘Hardly.’

But she didn’t believe it. Orlando and Luca existed on the soft plush pillow of their father’s wealth like cats in the sun, safe in the assurance that they had to do very little to merit his attention. Angela, on the other hand, had had a fight on her hands since day one—and it had forced her to succeed. As the only girl and third in line to the Silvers throne, she was long accustomed to a role in the shadows. Why should a world-famous heiress to immeasurable fortune be getting involved in the tough stuff when there were more frivolous things to be doing, like getting her nails done, or partying, or visiting their private Hawaiian retreat for a week of sun and spa?

Angela didn’t give a shit about any of that. She had the balls and the brains of any man—bigger, better—and had demonstrated she could easily trounce her brothers when it came to business. Setting up Fit for NYC by herself was testament to that.

‘You’re drunk,’ she said, switching seamlessly to a smile for their guest of honour, supermodel of the moment Tawny Lascelles. Tawny was blonde, wide-eyed and sultry. She was four years younger than Angela but the gap felt wider—the way Tawny behaved in the press was naïve to say the least, snorting coke, flashing her knickers (or lack of them), creeping into cabs with married men … It hadn’t stopped her snagging contracts with Burberry, Mulberry and Chanel—and her
attendance tonight was surely to make certain that Angela’s brainchild was next.

‘Tawny, how great to see you, thank you for coming …’

The model delivered a tight air-kiss, sniffed the air and moved on.

Orlando smirked. ‘Why are models always baked?’

‘Yeah, well, at least one of us is on top of our game.’

‘Which is why you’ve been AWOL for the past half hour?’

Angela conceded that her pre-party dalliance with Noah hadn’t exactly been the height of professionalism. She couldn’t help it. Snatched moments, hidden trysts, each second savoured to carry them to the next encounter, always an eternity away. Both public figures, a glimpse would be splashed across the web in a nanosecond—already rumours simmered dangerously. Noah had implored her, but still she said no.

Damn!
She could not live beneath her father’s jurisdiction for ever.

‘Well?’ Orlando pressed. ‘Gonna let me in on your vanishing act?’

‘It’s none of your damn business.’

He raised an eyebrow. ‘Want me to tell Dad?’

‘Tell him what?’

‘You know what.’

‘I know you can fuck off.’

‘You’re a shitty liar, Angela.’

She wanted to hit him. ‘And what makes you such a saint?’

Orlando shrugged. ‘Nothing. Guess I’m better at hiding it than you.’

It had been too much to hope for her brother’s support. Only Noah had believed she could do this. Only he’d had faith. Despite the way her family had treated him in the past, Noah had been adamant that victory was in her blood—and if
the men could do it, why couldn’t she? Ever since her great-grandfather had founded a modest Boston department store, through the decades growing it from strength to strength, winning had been the name of the game. On the crest of success her father had expanded into wider markets still: hotels, casinos, fashion labels; on to the Middle East, Tokyo and Singapore …

Today the Silvers brand was a worldwide lifestyle force. Angela was dead-set on running the ship one day. In the meantime, if her father wouldn’t stake her a role, she would simply go up against him. She had to prove herself one way or another.

Gianluca joined them. Together, the Silvers brothers reeked so strongly of a Harvard Business degree it settled like fog.

‘Dad’s got an announcement,’ said Luca, with his irritating I-know-something-you-don’t-know pout. Luca’s wide, thick-lashed eyes and high brushstroke cheekbones were trademarks of the family. Women went crazy for him.

‘Isn’t it obvious?’ Orlando took another drink. ‘He’s retiring—and you know what that means. Silvers is coming straight to me, baby.’

Luca arranged his jacket. ‘Yeah?’

‘I’m the eldest.’ He swigged. ‘But hey, don’t worry, I won’t fire you.’

Luca smirked. Then he said: ‘May the best man win.’

‘Or woman.’

‘Forget it,’ Luca dismissed, waving a hand about, ‘haven’t you already got this … sideline?’

‘Which is a damn sight more than you’ve got,’ Angela shot back.

A tinkling glass put paid to the dispute. Angela seized the platform, welcomed the sea of guests and press and
recounted her journey, from a teenage summer in Paris that had ignited her passion for couture, to the first flame of her Fit for NYC idea; from the funding she’d secured—independently from her father—to the glory of this opening night. She imagined Noah next to her, encouraging her and urging her on.

When the applause died down, echoes of light still dancing from the raft of cameras, she invited her father, as arranged, to offer his congratulations.

As Donald Silvers approached, she fixed her determined gaze on his.

In spite of it all, Angela knew that he believed in her. She had never been the daughter he’d anticipated—she’d been more.

He shook her hand, equal to equal.

Now was her chance to prove it.

2

Los Angeles

K
evin Chase was watching his manager’s mouth. He noticed for the first time that it was a small mouth, the teeth crowded, and the jowly cheeks bolstering it brought to mind a yapping dog wedged between two cushions. The mouth was moving, but no sound was coming out. In the years since becoming America’s biggest solo artist—scratch that, the world’s—and the definitive pin-up for a squillion screeching tweenies (when was his fan base going to
grow
?), Kevin had honed the art of appearing to concentrate while actually not listening to a single word.

‘Kevin, are you paying attention? C’mon, buddy, this is serious.’

‘Yeh.’

‘Well, what have you got to say for yourself?’

Kevin slumped further into the squishy leather couch in Sketch Falkner’s downtown office and grudgingly lifted his shoulders.

‘Dunno,’ he grumbled. ‘One of those things, I guess.’

Sketch contained his exasperation and came to the front of the desk. He had been in this game thirty years. He had seen it all. As the industry’s top talent spotter and head of the board
here at Cut N Dry Records, he knew how to handle his clients.

‘What in hell were you thinking?’ he encouraged.

Kevin folded his arms, stared ahead and refused to reply. His gold FNYC cap was wedged on sideways. His slouch jeans were massive, gangsta style despite his suburban upbringing, and strapped partway down his ass. He wore a white vest adorned by hefty chains, and on his feet were his cherished purple SUPRAs, one of which was jiggling up and down as if he needed the bathroom. Several tattoos were splashed self-consciously across his upper arms, the biggest depicting his ex-girlfriend, pop princess Sandi—and, as if having Sandi’s image branded onto his skin for all eternity wasn’t bad enough, the artist had given her some weird-ass dangly skirt that made it look like Kevin had a thing for chicks with dicks. His frame was slight despite rigorous gym sessions, and the wisps around his chin refused to mature beyond fuzz. The overall impression was one of a junior who had raided his big brother’s closet, or else a snowman that had melted in the sun, leaving only a jumble of clothes behind.

Eventually he said: ‘I want another Coke.’

‘
Please
,’ put in his mother Joan, seated at his shoulder like a parrot.

‘Please,’ Kevin grunted.

The truth was that a kid in Kevin’s position didn’t
need
to pay attention. Not really. Kevin Chase had three platinum albums to his name. He was the most talked about performer of his generation. He had scooped a raft of awards: Best Artist, Best Male, Best Single, Best Pop Act, Best Dance Act, Best Video, even Best Hair, which was only right because he took fucking good care of his hair, damn it. He was the ultimate twenty-first-century poster boy. He had close to sixty
million followers on Twitter. His adoring fans, referred to as the Little Chasers, treated him like the Second Coming of Jesus. He blew up the media. He played sell-out gigs across the globe. He had his own fashion line, his own fragrance and produced his own movies. He had waxworks of his image in five major cities. He owned a chopper and a mega-yacht and so many properties that half the time he didn’t even know what countries they were in. He was a phenomenon, a philosopher (who could forget the profound opener to ‘Touch My Kiss’?
Girl, this life can get so serious
) and a poet (
You make me so delirious; I’m on this like mysterious
)
.
He owned a dachshund named Trey.