Tough Love (26 page)

‘Yes,' Charly and Jodie said, in sulky unison.

‘Good. Now shake hands.'

Charly and Jodie turned to one another as if they'd rather amputate than shake them, but they did as they were told.

‘That's better.' Leanne felt firmly in control of the pair – and if she could control Jodie and Charly, anyone else would be a piece of cake.

‘Where's Kia? What time is it?' Tracy said, running her fingers through her matted hair.

‘You look like the Wreck of the
Hesperus
,' Leanne said, taking in her mum's stained nightie and cigarette-stained fingers.

Tracy began to cough, and then to retch, and before Leanne knew it her mother was over the sink, hacking up whatever her gut hadn't wanted to hang on to. ‘Nice,' she said.

‘Don't give me your sarcasm,' Tracy said, wiping her mouth on her sleeve. ‘Ever thought it could be cancer what makes me like this?'

‘Ever thought it might be too much booze and too many fags?' Leanne asked.

Tracy ignored her, grabbed her cigarettes and lit one. ‘So, where's Kia?'

‘She's at school,' Leanne said, confused.

‘Why did I think it was Saturday?' Tracy said, almost to herself.

‘Listen, we're going to stay at Tony's for a while until I get this new flat. It'll give you a bit more room.'

‘What's up with here?'

‘Nothing. But if we move out you'll have the house back. That's all.'

‘Well, I was trying to be helpful, but if you want to throw it back in my face …' Tracy said, leaning over the kettle and gazing out of the kitchen window.

‘Oh, God, Mum! I don't want to throw anything in anyone's face.' Leanne hated it when Tracy was like this. She was fine one day and unreasonable the next, utterly impossible to gauge.

‘Fine. You want a brew?'

‘Yes, please. Tea,' Leanne said, and sat down at the kitchen table. She looked at the piles of paper that were a permanent dust-gathering fixture, and noticed some airline tickets sticking out from the usual array of catalogues and Lidl special-offer leaflets. She pulled them out. Tracy was making a racket finding cups in her jumble-sale of a cupboard. ‘You off on holiday?' she asked.

Tracy didn't turn round, just slowed in her rummaging. ‘Yeah. Kent decided to treat me. Thought I deserved a break.'

Where had Kent got the money to pay for a holiday? Something dawned on Leanne that made her feel sick.

‘Yeah,' Leanne said carefully, trying to disguise what she was thinking. ‘You do need a break.'

‘I bloody
deserve
one. I've had a hard time of it with your dad. He's still coming round, you know, shouting the odds.'

‘You used him, though, didn't you, Mum? You thought he had some money and then when you found out he didn't you kicked him out. Isn't that right?' Leanne was angry now.

‘Why you getting all uppity?' Tracy said. When she faced Leanne her eyes had narrowed to slits. ‘Oh, I get it. You've put two and two together and got five, haven't you? Our Jodie was fishing the other night about the mysterious family member who's shopped you to the papers. And you think it was me, don't you?' Tracy was walking towards her menacingly. ‘Well, if you think I'd do that to my own flesh and blood, then you don't know me at all.'

‘I never said I thought it was you.'

‘You didn't have to. It's written all over your face. You think I'd stoop so low as to tell some snotty-nosed twat from a rag about you? About my beautiful granddaughter?'

Leanne felt terrible. Her mother was so adamant that she was now certain it hadn't been her. It had to have been someone pretending to be family, just to make some money, and now she'd all but accused her mum, had come straight out and accused Markie, and hadn't even had to bother accusing Karina – Jodie
had done it for her. Leanne's mind was racing. It definitely hadn't been Scott – he didn't have a bad bone in his body – but Charly might have seen the pound signs. Even that didn't make sense, though. If Charly had made a packet in the last few weeks she'd have been out spending it. She wouldn't have been able to stop herself.

‘I'm sorry, Mum,' Leanne said, ‘I really am. I'm just paranoid.'

‘Well, you can stick your paranoia. We're family. We stick together.' Tracy was shouting now, right in Leanne's face.

‘You've made money out of me before,' Leanne said.

Tracy slapped her daughter across the face. Leanne jumped to her feet, clutching her cheek.

‘Get out of my house!' Tracy shrilled.

Leanne fled. Outside, as she got into the car with tears rolling down her cheeks, a lone photographer was snapping away.

‘Have you nothing better to do?' she shrieked out of the window.

‘Live by the sword, die by the sword, love,' he said cheerfully, as he changed his film.

*

Even three thousand miles away on a desert island Lisa and Jay were not alone. The last couple of
days had been heaven, as far as Lisa was concerned. She and Jay had sunbathed, played with Blest and had even had a few frank conversations. For the first time in years he hadn't been out of Lisa's sight for more than two minutes.

The butler approached her in his sombre I-used-to-work-for-the-Royal-Family manner. ‘There's a call for you, Mrs Leighton.'

‘I'm not accepting any this week.'

‘It's from your publicist. He says he must speak to you.'

Lisa looked at Jay. ‘I haven't done anything this time, scout's honour,' he said. He was usually hopping all over the place like Rumpelstiltskin when Steve called, panicking about his latest indiscretion. This time he was so calm that Lisa was inclined to believe him.

She walked from the white sandy beach to the grand hand-carved entrance. The butler pointed her towards a beautiful airy room with a sea view. She picked up the ornate phone.

‘Steve?'

‘Lisa. I wouldn't call you on holiday if it wasn't serious,' he said.

Lisa's heart sank. ‘Look, Steve, just tell me …'

‘Some rent-boy has come forward with a video-recording of him and Jay. It's damning stuff.'

Lisa's knees buckled. ‘What sort of damning stuff?' she asked weakly.

‘Whatever you think two men might get up to in the sack. I don't want to go into details, darling.'

‘Oh, my God.' Lisa collapsed into a nearby chair and put her free hand to her forehead.

‘This is fucked-up, Lisa. When it gets out there's not much we can say to make it look better.'

‘Oh, my God,' Lisa said again.

‘Did you hear what I said, Lisa? Do you understand what I mean?'

‘Yes,' she whimpered. For the first time in her life, she felt she had lost the fight.

‘There's only one thing we can do,' Steve said.

‘Go on,' Lisa said. God knows what he's going to pull out of the bag now, she thought.

‘We go to Leanne Crompton, sign a massive deal for her to go public and you tell everyone you were going through a rocky patch at the time but now your marriage is as strong as ever. If we get a story like that we can whitewash some skanky little rent-boy and his money-grabbing antics, and you'll come out on top.'

Steve's words washed over Lisa. She was aghast at what her life had become. She was living a lie. ‘You know what, Steve?' She sighed. ‘I can't do it any more.'

‘Can't do what?'

‘This … this … bullshit.'

‘But “this bullshit” is what you're good at.'

Lisa digested his words. It was true. And
this
was
what her life had become – a long-running farce. ‘That, Steve, is not a compliment.'

‘Sorry, Lisa, but you know what I mean.'

‘I think I'm going to put Jay on. This is his shit. He can deal with it. I'll speak to you when I get home.'

Lisa put the receiver on the side and walked back to the beach, where she had left Jay sunning himself. ‘Phone for you,' she said quietly.

‘But I'm on my holidays!' Jay whined. When he saw Lisa's face he knew she was in no mood for his baby voice. ‘What's up?'

‘You've done some barrel-scraping in your time, Jay, but this takes the biscuit.'

‘What?' he asked, panicking.

‘Some
rent-boy
–' She spat the word ‘– has a very clear video of you and him shagging that he's touting round to the highest bidder.'

Jay leapt up as if someone had fired him out of a rocket. Disdainfully, Lisa watched him run inside. The butler came over to her. ‘Can I get you another drink, madam?' he asked.

‘No. But you could get me and the baby on the first available flight to the UK.'

‘Will your husband be travelling with you?'

‘No,' Lisa said, looking the man in the eye. ‘He can swim back for all I care.'

*

Leanne was dreading the interview with the
Globe
. What had seemed like a good idea at the time was now looking like something that might spell the death of her private life. She had ordered a Chinese takeaway, and she and Tony were going to talk to Kia about the three of them. Then Leanne and Tony were going to discuss the article and how she should best play it in order to be left with some dignity.

‘Kia,' Leanne said to her daughter, ‘me and Tony want to tell you something.'

She let Tony take over. ‘You know how you were saying that other people have a daddy and you haven't and that you'd really like one?'

‘Yes,' Kia said, nodding.

‘Well, I'll be your daddy, if you like.' Leanne could see how terrified Tony was as he waited for the little girl's response.

‘Will you?'

‘I'd love to be. I can train you up to play rugby league and everything.'

‘Girls can't play rugby, silly!' Kia said, giggling.

‘My girl can.' Tony winked at her.

‘So do I call you Tony or Daddy?' Kia asked.

Leanne laughed. Her daughter liked to have things straight in her head.

‘You can call me Dad if you want.'

Had it been any other man, Leanne might have thought she was rushing things, but now she
knew that things between her and Tony were meant to be.

‘OK, Tony – I mean Dad.' Kia giggled, and Tony kissed her forehead.

Leanne looked at him with her daughter. She was so glad he was back in her life.

Leanne had spent the morning in Markie's office. She had promised to man the phones and train an agency temp. As it turned out the young woman who arrived could have done the job standing on her head so Leanne was left to get on with organising some things of her own.

She had received the contracts from Jenny and was surprised by how soon they had appeared. Now she was leafing through them and trying to work out which one related to which job. There were few surprises, she thought. From what she could see, Jenny had represented her fairly and well.

‘My brother's got that poster of you on his wall,' Jacinta, the temp, said.

Leanne rolled her eyes. ‘Oh, God, which one?'

‘The carwash one. I used to go off my head about it. ‘‘Do you think anyone seriously washes their car with their knickers up their arse like that?' I used to say, but it was only because I was pissed
off that he was allowed to have a picture of a girl he fancied and I couldn't have lads on my wall.'

‘Sorry I caused some hassle.' Leanne grinned.

‘Don't worry about it. He's a div, anyway, my brother. If you met him you'd be like “Er, I don't think so in a million years, thanks, love.”'

As Leanne was putting her contracts into files she remembered that she hadn't seen one for the carwash picture. She riffled through the paperwork again and when it became obvious that it wasn't there she picked up the phone and called Jenny.

‘Oh, it was so long ago, darling. I'm not even sure I kept it. Don't worry, though. You got what was due about six years ago, didn't you? One-off payment, wasn't it?'

‘Yeah …' Leanne said, suddenly doubtful. ‘That's right.'

‘Well, there you go. I see that bucktoothed sister of yours finally got down the gym – she looked all right.'

‘Thanks. Bye now.' Leanne put down the phone and silently congratulated herself on not being a walkover where Jenny was concerned. Then she called Maurice.

‘I've got all my files back from Jenny except one, and when I questioned her about it I thought she was fobbing me off.'

‘Which assignment was it?' Maurice asked.

‘The big one. I got a flat fee for it but it's been syndicated.'

‘Right,' Maurice said. ‘Give me the details of the publisher, how much you were paid and when, and I'll do a bit of digging. I thought it sounded a bit odd that you got so little at the time.'

‘I was just starting out.'

‘Even so, knowing that a picture is going to be syndicated means you've a fair idea it'll sell. Why would she agree to a one-off fee?' he asked.

Leanne didn't know the answer to that. Maurice promised he'd get back to her as soon as he knew anything. Leanne didn't hold out much hope. She was just glad to be regaining control of her life.

*

Jodie looked in the mirror. She had lost more than half a stone since her photo had appeared in the paper and she wanted to get down further if she could. She had told her mum that she was going out but she had sneaked back into the house for a last up-chuck – as she liked to call it – before she went to meet Leanne.

Jodie had throwing up down to a fine art. She only had to put her finger into her mouth and her brain thought it was going down her throat and handily did the job of telling her stomach it was time to evacuate itself. She felt terrible, but she
thought she looked great. She loved it every time someone said to her, ‘Have you lost weight?'