Winner Takes It All (2 page)

‘
Come on
Andrew,’ Tara said, stepping forward and taking his hand. ‘I think
you and Grandpa need some port to warm you up.’

Andrew hobbled off,
holding onto the young woman’s arm and Alex jumped when she felt an
arm go around her own shoulder. She looked up and realised it was
Tim, her boyfriend, watching the scene with a wistful look on his
face.

‘
Tara’s a
funny one,’ he observed. ‘She doesn’t seem to fit into this
family.’

‘
Don’t be so
spiteful,’ Alex snapped, although secretly she agreed with him. Her
cousin Tara was nothing like any of the Cusack descendants. The
fact she was mixed race had nothing to do with it. Wesley, her
father was a very charming, outgoing man. It was just Tara, she was
such a geek. Most of the Cusack girls today had turned out in their
smartest clothes, but Tara was wrapped up in a duffle coat, knee
length skirt and thick tights. Her thick rimmed glasses and hair
tied back in a bun just made her look like a librarian and ten
years older than her true age. It had been a natural progression
that she would go on to run the museum over in Claremont Hall.
Looking after old things seemed to come naturally to Tara - that
was probably why she loved Andrew so much. But that didn’t mean Tim
had any right to criticise her. He wasn’t family yet.

With the two older men
safely ensconced in Tara’s Ford Focus, setting off to Summerset.
Everyone else headed back over the hills into the neighbouring
village. People seemed to fall into their own little groups. Alex
walked with her cousin Jemima who pushed her son Antoine in his
buggy. She was pissed off because Jean, her husband had not made it
back from his conference in Paris on time, even though he knew this
memorial service meant a lot to her. They were joined by Tim, and
her cousin Dan with his partner Simon. It made Alex chuckle to be
near Dan Steadman. He was the first boy she ever noticed. This of
course, was a long time before he came out and in her dreamy
teenage mind, she convinced herself they would grow up and marry.
He was so good looking with his dark hair, brooding blue eyes and
tall, sinewy body. Had she been older and more experienced she
would have realised by his impeccable dress sense, sympathetic
nature and love of gossip that he was gay. Today they were still
good friends and even though she still thought he was gorgeous, she
knew she would never be his type!

Even though they were
accompanied by their spouses, the four Cusack children naturally
gravitated towards each other and walked ahead of everyone else.
What was even funnier was how they walked in order of their birth.
At the far left was Paula who, even at fifty eight, still retained
her natural beauty. Her dark grey hair was long and yet didn’t look
silly like it did on a lot of older women. Her face was wrinkled,
she was far too skinny and threw clothes on rather than wear them,
and yet she carried herself like an ageing fashion model. Alex
admired her aunt greatly. With looks like hers she could have gone
into modelling or acting, or some other glamorous profession.
Instead she’d worked as a housing officer before setting up Get Out
Now, a charity for women who were victims of domestic violence.
Despite her fey appearance, she was feisty and liked to get
results, refusing to take any passengers and that was just the sort
of woman Alex aspired to be.

Next there was Christian,
her father. With every day, he started to look more like Grandpa
Ben. Always so handsome, in the last few years he’d started to put
on weight and his blonde hair was thinning. But to Alex, her dad
was still the most important person in the whole world and she
adored him. He’d been running Sheridans for thirty-four years and
had turned it from a clapped out brewery to one of the biggest
leisure companies in Europe. When her mother had died four years
ago, Christian had been a tower of strength to his three children,
so much so that when he found love again with the much younger
Julie, they didn’t begrudge him a little happiness and gave the
marriage their blessing.

Uncle Hal came next and
he’d changed very little over the years. He was very chubby and his
ginger hair was thinning. Hal liked the good things in life and
this showed; although he’d never let Ben down in the day to day
running of Cusacks Publishing.

Finally there came Lucy.
Out of the four children, she was the one who resembled Lou the
most, the only difference being she had the fluffy, blonde, Cusack
hair. Lucy was an eternally young forty seven, with her blonde
curls and baby face. She was a successful author in her own right,
and also looked after Lou’s literary estate. She was wonderfully
arty and Bohemian; today wrapped up in a green velvet shall and
long, black skirt. She looked like some sort of Victorian heroine
walking across the desolate Summerset hills.

Today the conference room
at Claremont Hall had been converted back to its original use as a
banqueting hall. In typical Cusack style, the gathering after Lou’s
memorial service was informal and relaxed. No fancy caterers
offered inedible food. Instead, Mrs Ball, Andrew’s housekeeper and
Tara had made rounds and rounds of sandwiches and ferried in
endless bottles of supermarket bought alcohol. Ben held court at
one end of the room, bouncing Antoine on his knee while he spoke
with several of his grandchildren. The young ones all adored Ben.
He may have been eighty five but he had the heart and soul of a
child and kids could relate to him.

At the other end of the
room, Andrew was being fussed around by Tara and Alex’s sister
Joanna. Jo was a swot and studying Literature at Exeter and no
doubt Andrew was regaling her with his own tales of academia. Alex
had had her fill of academia
and
academics.

Talking of the devil, Tim
returned from fetching drinks and looked up at the fancily painted
ceiling – complete with angels and cherubs, and ran his hand
through his scruffy, spiky hair.

‘
Whoever lived
here before had some pretty far out tastes,’ he said. ‘That
ceiling’s something else.’

‘
That’ll be
the Sheridans,’ Alex practically spat. Although she’d had no
dealings with the ‘other side’ of the Sheridan family directly, it
was something of a Cusack family tradition to hate them. Lou
especially had despised them and it was quite strange how Andrew
had become an old friend of the family when he’d been married to
one of them - the middle sister who lived in Ireland. ‘From what
I’ve been told, they thought vulgarity equalled taste.’

‘
But aren’t
you a Sheridan?’ Tim frowned.

‘
Sort of, but
generations back. My great great great grandfather was a Sheridan,
but he was disowned for marrying a Catholic girl. Even though he
was the true heir, he was forced to live in poverty while the other
sods prospered. That was why gran was so determined to buy the
company for daddy – to get her own back on them.’

‘
Your gran was
such a tough old bird,’ he laughed. ‘I was petrified of
her.’

‘
She was
lovely once you scratched the surface. I think her tough shell was
a defence mechanism.’

They were joined by her
father, a rather fraught look on his handsome face.

‘
Darling can
you make a special board meeting tomorrow?’ he asked. ‘I’m counting
on your brother being back from Prague by then.’

‘
I certainly
hope so,’ Alex pouted. ‘I still can’t believe he chose a stag party
over his grandmother’s memorial service.’

‘
That’s
Michael for you,’ Christian shrugged. ‘Anyway, get to HQ for
eleven.’

‘
I
will.’

‘
Thanks
poppet.’ He kissed her upon the cheek. ‘I’ve got to fly; Julie and
I are seeing Radiohead at the O2.’

‘
Ooh get you,’
Alex laughed. ‘I remember when you used to moan at me for playing
New Kids on the Block!’

***

Back home in Hoxton that
night, Alex and Tim went straight to bed. Tim fell asleep
immediately - tired after driving back from Summerset. But Alex lay
awake in the dark, thinking. Her grandmother played heavily in her
thoughts. She truly had been a remarkable woman. She’d started her
life as no more than the daughter of a pub potman and had ended up
rich, successful and clever enough to dupe the Sheridans into
selling her the company because it was her rightful inheritance.
But she hadn’t wanted it for herself, she bought it for Christian,
feeling him to be the true heir. Trouble was, being an old
fashioned, Catholic family, men tended to take precedence and so it
was taken for granted that Michael would inherit Sheridans one day.
It made Alex’s blood run cold to imagine her grandmother’s precious
company in the hands of her feckless brother. He would ruin it
within months.

At twenty eight, Alex was
already Head of Public Relations for Sheridans. The only act of
nepotism on the part of her father had been to take her on when she
left uni, but that was only as an office junior in the PR
department. It had been through her own imagination, hard work and
tenacity that she had moved rapidly up the ladder. She was on the
board of directors because Christian had given her some of his
shares in the company for her twenty first birthday but Tim had
called it compensation for being left out the race to run
Sheridans.

The fact that Michael was
male and somehow considered more suited to running the company
rankled with Alex. Her brother was almost thirty years old and all
he had to show for his time on earth was a half completed degree
and a trail of devastation. There had been several girls paid off
after claiming to have become pregnant by him. There was the stint
in rehab in 2002 when he became dependant upon cocaine. Christian
rewarded him by making him Head of Corporate Affairs; thinking a
‘proper’ job might tame his wayward son. All it had done was give
Michael a salary to enable him to continue living his hedonist
lifestyle. For Alex, today had been the final straw. He’d chosen to
attend his best friend’s stag weekend in Prague rather than
celebrate the life of the woman who’d bought the damned company he
would be inheriting, in the first place!

Sheridans HQ was on the
Embankment, taking up a ten storey, modern glass building. Alex
occupied an office on the fifth floor. Arriving that morning, she
felt shattered and hoped no one would try to strike up a
conversation as she wasn’t sure she was capable of speaking
coherently. After a stressful day, and a pretty sleepless night,
when she finally did drift off, Tim had awoken her, pawing her and
demanding sex. Now, this morning she felt like a zombie and just
about managed a mumbled hello to Sally, Diane and Clare, her
assistants.

Slumping down in her
chair and reaching for the mirror in her handbag, she almost
shrieked in horror to see herself. Her naturally wavy blonde hair
had formed itself into knotty clumps and her usually bright blue
eyes were rimmed with dark circles, her cheeks puffy. She sometimes
wondered where Alex Cusack had gone. At university, she’d been so
sexy with her big hair, blue eyes, fabulous pout and curvy figure.
Every boy had been after her and she’d taken full advantage of it.
Now, less than ten years later, the hair was straggly most of the
time, lines had started to appear at the corner of her eyes and the
pout was quickly turning into a scowl. Maybe it was the
responsibility of her job; maybe it was Tim’s’ influence, she
wasn’t sure, but she didn’t like the thought of facing the board of
directors looking like this.

A bit of Mac foundation,
pink lipstick and a brush through her hair and she hoped she looked
good enough. She collected her notepad and made her way up to the
boardroom on the top floor. She arrived and was shocked to discover
her brother had actually made it. If she thought she looked bad,
Michael looked a hundred times worse. His dark blonde hair was
tousled and hadn’t been brushed, his suit was hanging off him and
she guessed the redness of his nose was down to over-consumption of
cocaine and alcohol. Joining him were the other directors, Hugh
Fairclough, Adam Isaacs, Maurice Bannerman, Waleed Khan and Alice
Evans. Most of them were old Harrow chums of Christian who sat on
the boards of various companies, except Alice who’d been headhunted
from Guinness to oversee the installation of the Bowled Over
bowling alleys throughout Europe. With her auburn geometric bob and
immaculate Armani suit, she just served to make Alex feel even more
of a mess in her Karen Millen two piece and Marks and Spencer
shoes.

Alex sat opposite her
brother and scowled at him for being such a shambles and he just
laughed and looked the other way. They were finally joined by their
father who came rushing into the room, no doubt from another
meeting. He sat at the top of the table close to Alex and went
straight into business.

‘
Thanks for
attending this emergency meeting,’ he began. ‘We’ll save all other
matters for the AGM next month but I wanted to make this
announcement now. As you will be aware, my mother, Louisa died last
month and her passing has caused me to take stock. I’ve been
running Sheridans since I was twenty two years old and I do feel as
though I’ve missed out on life somewhat. So, Julie and I have been
talking and we’ve decided that when I’m sixty in 2011, I am going
to step down from running the company.’

There was an audible gasp
around the room and Alex’s heart sank. The thought of just four
more years until Michael took the helm, was frightening.