Party Games (33 page)

‘Can I ask why you did that?’ He was gazing outside, watching as if there were something of great interest out there.

She sat down. ‘Did what?’

It happened so quickly she had no time to react. He sprang over and grabbed her by the wrists. ‘I said, why did you fucking do that to me?’

‘What? Conrad, you’re hurting me!’ She struggled helplessly. ‘I don’t know what you mean!’

‘Yes you do! Embarrassing me like that in front of that journalist. Humiliating me!’

She looked into her husband’s ice-cold eyes and became seriously frightened. ‘Conrad, I didn’t mean it. I know you’re frustrated about not getting good scripts at the moment.’

‘Do you? What the fuck do you know? How can you know what it’s like for me, a
talented
actor, to be associated with any of this shit? I know what people are saying: “Oh, Conrad Powell will put his name to a loo roll if they pay him enough.”’

His nails were digging into her. She began to cry. ‘Conrad, please.’

‘You of all people should support me,’ he hissed.

‘I do support you!’ she wept.

‘You’ve got a funny way of showing it.’ His breath was rank, a mixture of the all-protein diet and dark malevolence. ‘I’m sick of being married to a miserable cow who shows me fuck-all attention. What is it,
darling? Do you prefer girls? Boys? Ladyboys? We can get whoever in if it turns you on.’

She was wearing the most exquisite Erdem dress. She heard the material rip as he yanked it up. ‘Conrad! No!’

‘You’re my wife.’ He forced her face down on the bed. ‘I’ll do what I fucking like.’

It was over in less than a minute. Zipping himself up, he walked out and left her frozen on the bed.

1 August

Catherine had spent most of the night staring at the ceiling. By 5 a.m. she gave up, sliding out of bed so as not to wake John, who was breathing peacefully beside her.

The first smears of dawn were breaking over the hills. She curled up in the window seat and looked out. A ginger cat slunk across the back lawn, disappearing into the foliage. She gazed after the animal, envying its freedom. In a few hours’ time the Beeversham by-election would kick off. For the next three weeks, she wouldn’t be able to call her life her own. She would be eating, sleeping, breathing the campaign. In the still, peaceful dawn it was hard to believe such madness lay ahead.

The
Today
programme was on the radio as she walked into the kitchen.
‘The campaigning for the hotly anticipated Beeversham by-election starts today …’

Catherine went over and turned it off. She could throw up at any moment.

John was still in his dressing gown, dark chest hair poking out of the top. He came over and handed her a coffee.

‘Thank you,’ she said. His eyes were distant and devoid of their normal warmth. He was making an effort for her big day, but she knew he was still furious with her.

‘How are you feeling?’ he asked.

‘Pretty sick,’ she confessed.

‘You need to eat something before you go.’

‘John, I just told you I was feeling sick!’

The front doorbell went. She fled the kitchen to answer it. It was a delivery boy clutching a mountain of helium balloons. She read the accompanying card and felt a momentary lift.
‘Good luck, babe! You’ve got our vote already. Mel and Mike. Xx.’

John came down the corridor. ‘Someone having a party?’

‘More like my funeral.’

Her stomach was churning like a cement mixer. She smoothed down the new navy dress she’d bought online from COS. Chic, but not too expensive. ‘How do I look?’

‘Good, Cath.’

They eyeballed each other through the balloons. ‘Well, then!’ she said with a heartiness she didn’t feel. ‘I’d better get going.’

He put a dry kiss on her cheek. ‘Go get ‘em.’

The press were out in force, and Catherine got ambushed on the High Street. Everyone wanted the same questions answered: how nervous was she and was she worried about the legacy of Jonty? ‘Dead man’s shoes’ was how one reporter helpfully put it. By the time Catherine got to Tory HQ fifteen minutes later, she was ready to be sick in her handbag.

Kitty and Clive were waiting expectantly, along with half a dozen leaflet droppers Catherine had nicknamed the ‘Blue Rosettes’. She was strangely touched to see them all wearing ‘Vote Connor’ T-shirts. It was no surprise that Aubrey and co. weren’t there, but God bless him, Felix was calm and collected in chinos and an Oxford-blue shirt. ‘Sleep well?’

‘I slept, if that’s what you mean.’

‘First-day nerves. You’ll be fine once you’re out there.’ His eyes drifted down to Catherine’s Gucci heels. ‘Goodness, look at those!’

‘We did wonder about them,’ Kitty said. ‘I’ve got a spare pair of Crocs in my bag if you want.’

‘Don’t worry, I can climb mountains in these.’

They left the building armed with ‘Vote Connor’ leaflets, suncream and bottles of water. The first week of the campaign was to be spent canvassing target areas and meeting as many people as possible. As Catherine was a newcomer, it was vital they got her name out there.

They were going to start on Blackbird Rise, a long road snaking around the southern end of the town. The most densely populated part of Beeversham, it was perfect for hitting up lots of houses.

Catherine’s gang turned off the High Street and stopped dead. The road was a sea of red. Posters of
Tristan Jago cuddling the sodding duck were in every house window. An ‘I’m Cotswolds and I Care’ placard was sticking out of someone’s front garden. Tristan might as well have just cocked his leg against every door in the street to mark his territory.

‘Rats,’ one of the Rosettes muttered. ‘They’ve beaten us to it.’

The man himself was striding towards them, a red rosette the size of a cabbage on his lapel. A photographer was running to keep up in his wake.

‘Morning!’ Tristan cried. ‘Early bird catches the worm and all that.’

‘Can we get a picture of the two of you together?’ the photographer asked.

Tristan put an arm round Catherine and beamed into the camera. ‘May I take this opportunity to wish you all the luck,’ he told her. ‘We’ve never had such a novice run before; it must be very daunting for you!’

The rest of Tristan’s gang had arrived. They and the Blue Rosettes were facing off in a not entirely friendly fashion. ‘Come on, Tristan,’ one of them sniffed. ‘We’ve got Cotswold FM at nine a.m.’

‘Why aren’t I on Cotswolds FM?’ Catherine asked Clive as they walked off.

‘Let’s not run before we can walk,’ he told her.

A harassed woman opened the first door, a crying child attached to her leg.

‘Hello, I’d like to introduce myself,’ Catherine said. ‘I’m Catherine Connor, Conservative candidate for Beeversham and …’

‘I don’t do politics.’ The woman shut the door in Catherine’s face.

The living-room curtains were still drawn in the next house. After knocking for a good minute they were about to give up when the door opened, to reveal a yawning man with long dreadlocks. It immediately became apparent he slept in little more than the tribal tattoos covering 80 per cent of his body. The Blue Rosettes averted their eyes discreetly, as if they’d seen it all before.

‘Morning!’ Catherine said, desperately trying not to look at the huge piercing hanging out of the man’s appendage. ‘I’m Catherine Connor, Conservative candidate for Beeversham. I’m passionate about providing a good service, especially in regard to youth unemployment, domestic violence and equal opportunities for women in the workplace.’

The man tugged at his crotch. ‘Where do you stand on legalizing weed?’

‘Oh.’ She blinked. ‘Well.’ She thought desperately on her feet. ‘There is a legitimate debate as to whether we should change our laws. Some critics consider them too draconian.’

There was a collective intake of breath behind her. ‘I’ll look into it,’ she promised the man, handing him a leaflet.

‘We can’t condone drugs!’ Kitty squeaked, once the door had shut. ‘We’re not the Lib Dems!’

Next door Catherine repeated her spiel. An old man in a Pringle jumper with a West Highland terrier tucked under his arm eyed her suspiciously. ‘What about Ye Olde Worlde? You don’t care about that, then?’

She was so nervous she’d forgotten to mention the
most important thing. ‘Of course!’ she said. ‘That as well.’

‘Poppycock,’ the old man said and shut the door in her face.

By lunchtime they’d only covered a fraction of the surrounding streets. People either weren’t in, or pretended not to be. Of the ones that did open the door, Catherine now knew more about their haemorrhoids and spastic colons than could ever be healthy. There was no sign of the press; apparently they’d flocked to see Esme Santura the pagan witch conduct a Wicca circle by the church.

Under the unrelenting heat, she began to flag. Worried she wasn’t going to make it through the afternoon, Clive and Kitty dragged her in for an emergency foot rub at Buff Nail Bar.

‘Jesus.’ Mel stared at Catherine’s heel. ‘You’ve got a blister the size of Puerto Banus.’

‘I wish I was in Puerto Banus, Mel, I’m making a complete pig’s ear of it.’

Kitty sprayed her with some Rescue Remedy. Catherine picked up her phone. There was a text from John.

‘Still alive?’

‘Barely,’
she typed back.

In the afternoon it went from bad to worse. Catherine was single-handedly blamed for the pension crisis, starving orphans in Africa and the downfall of the NHS. Her saving grace was Olde Worlde, but she drew a blank on the rest. No one was interested in her pledges. Domestic violence was a dirty word. Stressed mothers
didn’t have the time to talk about whether they were getting a fair deal at work. Stay-at-home workers were just irritated that she had interrupted them. All the pensioners wanted to talk about was dog shit, why so-and-so down the road had got planning permission for
their
extension, and whether capital punishment was coming back. Forget green and pleasant lands; she had no idea the Jam and Jerusalem contingent were quite so bloodthirsty.

At eight o’clock, after nearly twelve hours of canvassing, they headed back to Tory HQ. Demoralized and defeated, Catherine shuffled in wearing Kitty’s bright green Crocs. To her relief Felix was waiting there with a reassuring smile. She wasn’t quite so pleased to see Aubrey Taunton-Brown.

‘How did it go?’ Aubrey asked smoothly. ‘We caught you on the news.’

He gave her a look. Catherine had gone over on her ankle and mouthed the word ‘shit’ whilst being interviewed live by BBC Gloucestershire.

‘Marvellous,’ she said sarcastically. ‘Hitler would have got a warmer reception.’

She and Felix went next door for a debrief. ‘Don’t look so glum,’ he told her. ‘These things happen.’

He didn’t look very convinced. Catherine sank down despondently in a chair. ‘Maybe Aubrey’s right, Felix. People don’t care about the same things I do.’ She sighed. ‘Maybe I’m the one who’s out of touch.’

‘You just have to win them over. People worry about their leisure centre closing, or bus routes being cancelled so they can’t get to see a loved one in hospital. It’s local issues every time.’

‘But I care about the bigger issues!’ she protested. ‘That’s why I’m running.’

‘These are big issues to the people round here. You have to start at the grass roots, Catherine. Get it right there and the rest will follow.’

The Prime Minister had made it all sound so easy. Catherine was again struck by the niggling doubt that her husband was right.
I’m the sacrificial lamb
, she thought glumly. Only this slaughter was going to last another three weeks.

Fleur found Beau stretched out by the pool. He was oiled and hard in a minuscule pair of black bathing trunks.

‘Hello, you.’ He got up to kiss her, his hands moving round to cup her bottom. ‘Are you wearing knickers?’

‘Of course I am!’

‘Mmm. You won’t be for much longer.’

The flames started fanning between her legs again. She was disappointed when he released her.

‘What can I get you to drink?’

‘Whatever you’re having.’

‘Mojito it is, then. Take a seat, angel.’

He came back over with the drinks and sat down next to her on the sofa. ‘There you go.’ His eyes held hers. ‘To us.’

‘To us,’ she mumbled into her glass.

His face softened. ‘It’s good to see you, Fleur. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you.’

She glowed with happiness. ‘Me neither.’

They smiled at each other. He put his drink down
and dropped a kiss on her shoulder. ‘Come on. Let’s go for a dip.’

‘Now?’

‘Right now.’

He strode over to the pool and executed a perfect dive, popping up like a muscular blond seal moments later. ‘What are you waiting for?’

‘Um,’ she said, panicking. ‘I’m not wearing a swimming costume.’

He wriggled under the water and waved his black bathing trunks in the air. ‘Neither am I now.’

‘Someone might come round!’ she protested.

‘Stop being so bloody English!’ he roared.

With great reluctance, Fleur stood up and started to take off her shorts. His eyes gleamed. ‘And the rest.’

Her T-shirt was next. ‘We’re really going to have to get you some new underwear,’ Beau told her, as she stood in her bra and knickers. ‘I’m sure they stopped making knickers like that after the Second World War.’

After that, it took some cajoling to get the offensive garments off. Fleur stood in her naked glory, feeling horribly exposed. ‘Come on then, what are you waiting for?’ Beau yelled.

It was now or never. She took off like Usain Bolt and skidded on a puddle at the water’s edge. In slow motion her legs flew up in front of her and she landed on her back in the pool, making the most colossal splash.

Beau was killing himself laughing as he rescued her. ‘I’ve never seen Tom Daley perform that manoeuvre. Are you all right?’

Water was cascading out of her nose. So much for being sexy. She clutched on to his shoulders until she
got her breath back. Her boobs were bobbing merrily between them. ‘Your tits look fantastic,’ he told her. ‘Have you ever thought about having sex in a pool?’