All That Glitters (23 page)

‘She’s probably changed her number,’ Nash said, as he scrolled through his phone looking for the number of Freddie’s agent. ‘But if you give me a minute I can see if I can get it for you.’

Ella smiled faintly. It was all a bit déjà vu – her having to console Chastity over Freddie’s philandering ways – but this time it was even more serious. The papers had got hold of it, and Chastity’s humiliation had been amplified in the glare of the trashy media spotlight. Chastity needed a friend, and Ella could be there for her. After all, even though she’d been the ‘cheat’ she’d kind of just gone through it all herself. She knew how horrible it was to have your private life twisted and put on the front page of a newspaper.

‘I’d like that,’ Ella said, and after a few minutes Nash scribbled a mobile number on a scrap of paper and handed it to her.

Now all Ella had to do was ring her. She took a deep breath and punched the number into her phone.

Chapter Fifteen

‘And this is where you can sleep,’ Ella said softly, as she gestured towards the large squishy sofa in Nash’s living room. Chastity stared at it for a moment with dull eyes, and then sank into it without a word. God, Ella thought. She really was in a bad way. The Chastity she knew would have thrown a tantrum about not getting a bedroom of her own at the very least. But she supposed this was what happened when the man you loved got someone else pregnant.

‘Can I get you anything?’ she asked, as she eyed Chastity carefully. She was still tanned, still picture-perfect, but she’d lost her energy, her drive.

Chastity shook her head. ‘Thanks, but I’m fine.’

This was the first thing she’d said since she’d got there. Her driver had driven for hours, twisting and turning through the Surrey lanes to get rid of the paparazzi, and after circling the city a few times they’d eventually pulled up outside Nash’s flat. Chastity could have stayed in her mansion, could have checked into a luxury hotel, but she wanted to be with friends, and Nash had offered his sofa to her for a few days, joking that before long his flat would be overrun with heartbroken WAGs.

Ella hovered nervously, and then decided to pour them some orange juice anyway. She turned away from the kitchen counter in the open-plan reception room and noticed Chastity was crying silently. She walked towards her and hugged her as best she could.

‘I know it hurts,’ she whispered as she felt Chastity’s body shake in her arms. ‘But it will get better, I promise. You will start to feel better.’

Chastity pulled away from her friend and sat up. ‘What do you know about pain?’ she said angrily. It was like Ella had sparked a tiny flame inside her. ‘All you know is about causing pain. You did exactly the same thing to poor Danny.’

Ella bit her lip; to everyone apart from the few who were in Danny’s inner circle it was the truth. Superficially she
had
cheated on Danny. But she didn’t want Chastity to think badly of her. Not if they were going to be friends. Proper friends.

‘It wasn’t quite like what the papers reported—’ Ella began, but Chastity cut her off.

‘What, so you weren’t sleeping with Johnny Cooper?’

‘I was,’ Ella said quietly. ‘But it was more than that. I fell in love with him.’

Chastity shrugged. ‘It doesn’t excuse it. Danny loved you and he gave you the world – and that was how you repaid him.’

Ella struggled to find the right words. She couldn’t tell Chastity that Danny was gay, but she wanted her to know the truth.

‘That’s not strictly true,’ she began carefully. ‘Yes, he loved me, and I loved him . . . but in a platonic way. Our relationship was more of a good friendship than a romantic affair.’

Chastity laughed. ‘Don’t give me that – he bought you a Ferrari. Men don’t do that unless they’re in a red-hot relationship.’

Ella picked at her baggy Levis.

‘Trust me on this; it wasn’t that sort of relationship. We never even had sex.’

Chastity’s eyes widened. ‘What?’

‘We didn’t have that sort of relationship.’

‘Hang on a minute. I’m struggling with this. So you never had sex ever? Not even on your honeymoon?’

Ella shook her head.

‘I don’t understand.’ Chastity looked perplexed, but she was no longer angry with Ella, or thinking about Freddie.

Ella shrugged. ‘We just got on really well, and we decided to get married. We were the best of friends, and it just seemed less . . . complicated than having a “normal” relationship. It worked for us.’

Chastity trained her wide blue eyes on Ella. ‘So you basically had an open relationship?’

‘Yes, something like that. Danny knew all about Johnny and he didn’t mind.’

‘And you didn’t mind him sleeping with other women?’ Chastity asked incredulously. She couldn’t understand it. Ella had married one of the hottest men in football, and had actively chosen not to sleep with him. It was crazy.

‘That was the deal. I agreed to it before we got married.’

Chastity slumped back onto the sofa. ‘I’ve never heard anything like it. But then again, why not? It’s probably an arrangement Freddie would like. I could be the trophy wife in the mansion, and he could sleep with as many wannabe WAGs as he wanted.’

She paused for a moment, and then let out a little bitter laugh.

‘What am I saying?’ she continued. ‘That’s exactly the arrangement we have. Or had. And even though he keeps saying he’ll change, he never does. Do you think if he got help – like, counselling or something – it would work? That he’d stop cheating on me?’

Her voice was so hopeful that Ella felt bad about telling her friend the truth.

‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘I don’t think so. If he loved you, really loved you, he wouldn’t cheat on you.’

‘But he says he loves me,’ Chastity muttered exhaustedly. ‘He says he just can’t help himself. That it doesn’t mean anything.’

Ella sighed again and rested her head on Chastity’s shoulder.

‘Isn’t that what they all say?’

‘Freddie really means it, though. He thinks he has a sex addiction or something. It really isn’t his fault.’

‘Chastity, this isn’t about him sleeping around any more. He got a girl – a seventeen-year-old girl – pregnant. And he’s going to be a father.’

‘He could probably just pay her off,’ Chastity said to herself. It was as if she couldn’t even hear Ella. ‘Give her a million quid and tell her to move abroad with the baby.’

‘Chastity!’ Ella practically yelled, and Chastity blinked.

‘But he says he wants to be part of the baby’s life,’ she continued. ‘That if this girl is going to keep it, he wants to know it. Help raise it. That sort of thing.’

‘And how do you feel about that?’ Ella asked.

‘How do you think I feel about it? It’s like he couldn’t give a flying fuck about me. He promised never to hurt me. He promised to respect me. But he’s going to have a baby with someone else.’ Tears began to slide down her beautiful face again, and Ella reached for her hand.

‘You don’t have to put up with this, you know,’ she said softly. ‘You can leave him. Properly.’

‘But I love him,’ Chastity sobbed.

‘But, babe, I don’t think he loves you.’

‘I can make him love me; I know I can.’

‘You can’t,’ Ella said as soothingly as she could, although she knew her words were cutting deep into Chastity’s heart. ‘And you can do so much better. You can be with a man who loves you so much he treats you like a princess.’

‘I don’t know if that man exists,’ Chastity mumbled.

‘He does,’ Ella replied. But she wasn’t thinking of Johnny as she said it. She was thinking of Nash.

‘So what do you think of this one?’ Ella said as her Pied a Terre boots – taken from Castle House because she loved them too much and couldn’t bear to leave them behind – clicked across the gleaming parquet floor. The three-bedroom apartment was beautiful, with exposed brickwork, beautiful Victorian-style cornicing, and marble fireplaces in every room. The apartment block was on top of a hill in leafy Crystal Palace, and the floor-to-ceiling windows took in a panorama of the whole of the city, from Big Ben to Canary Wharf. Flats didn’t get more luxurious than this.

‘It’s not exactly central London, is it?’ Chastity replied as sullenly as she could. ‘It’s practically Zone Ninety. We may as well be back in Surrey.’

‘We can’t afford central London. And as lovely as this flat is, we can barely afford it.’

‘We can afford whatever we want,’ Chastity said flippantly. ‘Freddie said he’ll pay for wherever I want to live. And I want to live in Central London. Like Chelsea . . . or maybe Mayfair. How much are apartments in Mayfair?’

Ella glanced quickly at the estate agent, whose eyes were as round as saucers. She knew he’d be going straight to the papers with this.

‘Can you give us a moment, please?’ Ella asked, and the estate agent did a funny little bow and ducked out of the flat.

‘Are all estate agents as weird as him?’ Chastity asked as she watched him shut the front door behind him. ‘He smells funny too. Like onions.’

‘Some are, but that’s not the point. You have to be careful about what you say in front of strangers. You know they’ll phone the newspapers as soon as they can and quote you.’

Chastity shrugged and walked towards the window to stare at Canary Wharf in the distance. ‘So what? What does it matter? My life’s over anyway.’

‘No it’s not,’ Ella said. ‘It’s the start of a new chapter, that’s all.’

‘It’s so easy for you to say,’ Chastity said tonelessly. ‘You’re not me. You haven’t been hurt.’

Ella laughed incredulously. ‘
I
haven’t been hurt? Johnny Cooper loved me and dumped me, and the papers all think I’m a gold-digging bitch who used the great Danny Riding.’

Chastity blinked. ‘But that was ages ago, and it was all your own fault anyway.’

Ella struggled not to snap. Despite softening since the exposé about Freddie came out, bits of the selfish, self-centred Chastity Taylor still appeared.

‘Chastity, it was only two months ago, and I still can’t get a job and I still don’t know what I’m going to do. And you know what? It hurts. Johnny doesn’t want to know me, and it hurts me every single minute of every day. I don’t feel like I’m ever going to get over it, but you know what? Life moves on, and you have to go with it. You have to.’

‘I’m not getting a job,’ Chastity said sullenly. ‘I don’t see why I should. If I can’t be with Freddie then I’m going to divorce him and milk him for all I can.’

Ella sighed. ‘But what will you do with yourself?’

‘Go shopping, go to the gym, get a new famous boyfriend who will make Freddie jealous?’ Chastity shrugged. She hadn’t really thought about it.

‘I think you’ll be bored,’ Ella said, and Chastity laughed.

‘I don’t see why. I didn’t work when I was with Freddie and I was perfectly happy.’

Ella knew the estate agent was lingering by the front door, and that now wasn’t the time for a proper heart-to-heart with her friend, but she couldn’t let what Chastity had just said pass.

‘I don’t think you
were
happy,’ she said bluntly, and Chastity’s eyes widened. ‘You were so caught up in looking perfect and behaving perfectly that you lost yourself. You forgot how to have fun, how to let your guard down.’

‘That’s not true,’ Chastity said defensively.

‘Babe, it is true, because I watched you do it. And I think that working will help you find yourself again. And give you a reason to get up in the morning.’

Chastity sighed heavily. ‘You’re not going to let this go, are you?’

Ella shook her head.

‘I can’t get a job though,’ Chastity said.

‘I know. Nor can I. Which is why I’m thinking of starting a company, just like Nash is. And maybe we can use that third bedroom as an office; it’s big enough for two desks, you see . . .’ Ella’s voice trailed off, and she watched Chastity carefully, hopefully looking for signs that her friend would agree to helping her set up a business. It was a big ask – but Ella really did believe Chastity needed a purpose in her life that wasn’t based around shopping and looking good.

‘So getting this flat and using the third bedroom as an office will help me get on with my life?’ Chastity asked. Her voice was flat, and she wasn’t overjoyed by the idea. But she could see Ella had a point. ‘Fine. Let’s get it then. Let’s get this Crystal Palace flat and move out of Nash’s place and let’s just get on with it. We’ll take it. I won’t bother with a mortgage since it’s so cheap – I’ll just pay cash.’

‘But it’s seven hundred and fifty thousand pounds!’ Ella said incredulously.

‘And it’s the least Freddie Taylor can do.’

‘So now what?’ Chastity asked as she wiped tiny beads of sweat from her forehead. They’d spent the last few days moving all their belongings into the Crystal Palace penthouse, and after lots of hard work and late nights, the place was coming together. Even though she thought of the flat as Chastity’s – as there was no way Ella could contribute to the purchase price without blowing all her savings – Chastity had generously put her name on the deeds too. Ella had tried to talk her out of it, but Chastity was having none of it. ‘If your name’s not on the certificate it won’t really be your home too – and I want it to be,’ she’d said as they sat in the solicitor’s office. And Ella, touched beyond belief, found that as much as she tried to say no, Chastity wouldn’t let her. The flat was theirs. It was their new beginning.

‘Now we relax,’ Ella said with a grin. She had a smudge of dirt on her cheek, but she looked great – the best she had in a long time. She was lean, sparkling, and radiated energy. In comparison Chastity still looked drawn and depressed, but Ella knew it would take time. Chastity had truly loved Freddie, and the fact that he had got a teenage girl pregnant was almost too much for her to bear. It took every ounce of strength for her to get up in the morning, and if she didn’t keep busy she dissolved into a puddle of salty tears.

‘You know, I’m not sure about this colour scheme,’ Chastity remarked, as she flopped into a purple velvet chair. They’d repainted the room a bright white, and then had bought statement pieces to show the space off – a fuchsia sofa, a turquoise coffee table, and a red leather rocking chair – so the room was like one big pop-art canvas. Ella loved it, and didn’t think anyone could be depressed when they walked into their home.