Shopping With the Enemy (16 page)

‘Left? Is this the way we should go? We need map!’

‘We have a map,’ Annie reminded her, still trying to sound calm. ‘Carlo put a map into your car door. Now take it out and look it up. Left leads to the main road. I remember that from my trip in the taxi.’

‘Oh yes, your escape,’ Svetlana said darkly. ‘I am still angry that you run away from my all-expenses-paid spa visit.’

‘In my defence, I was delirious with hunger, I hardly knew what I was doing.’

Svetlana brought out a thick map book and immediately complained: ‘This is just for Italy.’

‘Well, find the motorway which will take us from here to the border and we’ll pick up another map on the way.’

‘The border,’ Svetlana repeated. She opened the book and began to look for the relevant pages: ‘we need the computer in the front of the car … the satnav.’

‘This is a vintage Bentley, I don’t think it does satnav. Have you heard anything more from Michael?’

Svetlana looked at her phone, held at the ready in her hand.

‘Nothing,’ she replied. ‘I’m frightened that when I sent him my reply it bleeped and the men guessed
what
he was doing. I’m frightened we won’t hear anything more.’

‘OK, you need to calm down, sweetheart. And I need to calm down.’

Annie took a deep breath in, let it out slowly then added: ‘Let’s try to trust in luck and good fortune and everyone doing all they can to find your boys. Let’s not freak out …’

Let’s not freak out
, she repeated to herself as she tried not to think about what she would do if she met another car on this tiny, twisty road. The Bentley seemed to take up every inch of available space.

Svetlana switched on the reading light and shone it into her lap because although the first palest hint of dawn was emerging on the horizon, it was still dark. After several minutes of study, she told Annie: ‘Is a long way to the border and we have to go over the mountains.’

Annie’s hands tightened on the steering wheel.

‘Mountains?!’ she repeated.

Mountains …
mountains
?! Who said anything about mountains? She was expecting a nice, wide-laned motorway between Italy and Austria. She was barely managing to keep control of this beast on a B-road.

‘Just drive, Annah, you are good driver, you will get used to this car.’

The little country road came to an end and as Annie nosed the Bentley along a wider, smoother main road, her tense shoulders began to lower from her ears. With each gear change she grew a little more in confidence, until at last she began to feel in control of the great purring luxurymobile.

Svetlana seemed more relaxed too. Ever since they’d been on the road, heading somewhere, doing something, her face had lost its terrible haunted look. It was obviously helping her enormously to know that each mile they drove was bringing her closer to her beloved boys.

‘Michael’s very clever to think of emailing you,’ Annie said. She knew that Svetlana’s relationship with her older son was a little prickly so she always did what she could to try and remedy that.

‘Yes.’

‘And he’s obviously brave. I mean, he’s been bundled into a car by strangers and he’s got the nerve to send an email he knows could get him into loads of trouble.’

‘He is afraid of no one – just like his father.’

‘Just like his mother,’ Annie said, with a sidelong glance at her friend.

‘Ha … maybe,’ Svetlana admitted.

She didn’t add anything else and for many miles there was a companionable silence between the two, broken only by map directions from Svetlana.

The early morning sky, pale apricot, dotted with dark blue-grey clouds, spread out before them as they roared along the motorway towards the border. The dark blue Italian Alps rose ahead of them, snow-capped, in the distance.

The mountain range separating them from where they wanted to be looked vast and Annie had a growing suspicion that the roads would be twisting and demanding. But she tried not to worry about the hours of difficult driving ahead.

‘I’ve never been to Austria, have you?’ she asked, when the silence in the car seemed to have been going on for too long.

‘Yes, many times,’ Svetlana replied: ‘the opera, the concert halls, always with Russians making deals – so many Russians in Vienna and in the big houses in the mountains all around. Is interesting country. Very formal. Very old-fashioned. Is one of last places left in civilized world where you can smoke in a café.’

‘I’ve known you for – how many years? – and I didn’t know you smoked.’

‘I don’t smoke any more.’

Annie was about to remind her about the box of gold-tipped, multi-coloured cigarettes inhaled just a few hours ago, but then, people did all kinds of strange things in a crisis.

‘Smoking terrrrrrrrible for the skin,’ Svetlana added. ‘My first Botox was my last cigarette. Last
night,
a … a …’ she waved her hand as she struggled for the right word.

‘One-off?’

‘Yes. One-off. Never again, no matter how bad things get. My throat feels like is missing one layer of skin.’

‘It probably is.’

‘You never smoke?’

Annie shook her head: ‘I tried. When I was at art school all the cool people smoked. But I could never get the hang of it.’

‘I loved to smoke. I begin when I train to be army nurse.’ Svetlana gave a throaty laugh: ‘all the army nurses smoke because is stressful life. Army drills, living in tents in the cold, nursing very injured people. I leave as soon as I can and become model. In fashion everyone smoke, smoke, smoke, never eat. Want to be as thin as a greyhound …’

‘On a diet,’ Annie added, with a smile.

‘Thin as a greyhound on a diet, yes. I like this. Then I enter the Miss World competition – and then so many bad boyfriends who also smoke. You must worry about your daughter and the bad boyfriends. I wish Elena and Lana never meet even one boyfriend as bad as my many bad boyfriends. Elena’s father – tschaaaa – he was one of worst. I was so young, but determined, Annah, determined not to let him ruin my life.’

‘Is that when you left the Ukraine?’

‘Yes, I have to run away. I hide baby Elena with my aunty, deep in the countryside, and then I run away from this bad man and his bad friends. Ugly old politicians and pretty young girls … it was no good: drugs, abuse. I don’t like to talk about it.’

But then after a moment’s pause, Svetlana added: ‘The most important thing is that I get away. I did not let him ruin my life or my daughter’s life. But I don’t go back to Ukraine for long, long time. This is why I don’t see her until she has grown up and comes to find me.’

‘Where did you run to?’ Annie asked, longing to hear just a little more about Svetlana’s colourful past.

‘I hitch-hike to Paris and get job as model,’ Svetlana replied, matter-of-fact, ‘then comes catwalks and smoking, smoking, modelling and meeting rich men. Always I have my eye on a rich man because I think: I am no one. I have nothing. I know nothing except army nursing. But I have this idea that if I can marry rich man, I can be rich wife and maybe make something of my life.’

‘Your face really was your fortune.’

‘And figure,’ Svetlana reminded her, ‘but you know how hard I work for these things. People always think: is easy for her, she is born beautiful. Pah! I have first nose job, age twenty-four. I still do
gymnastics
for two hours every day. I will never look old and I will never be fat. This is my promise to myself. These are the things every woman needs to conquer, then she will make a much more interesting life for herself.’

‘Really … do you think …?’ Annie began dubiously.

‘I don’t think. I know. If you exercise and eat well, the energy will come. Then you must make more money to spend on yourself. The better you look, the more money you make. You are on television, Annah, you must know this. People want to look at beautiful women on television.’

‘But viewers like me!’ Annie protested. ‘They relate. They think I’m just like them. I make normal women look and feel better. There are lots of TV people who look normal.’

Svetlana was shaking her head. ‘Looking fat and ugly and learning to love yourself is almost an obsession in Britain. When I am sixty, I am going to look like forty.’

Annie couldn’t help laughing at this: ‘You’re admirable, babes, truly admirable. When I’m sixty, I’m probably going to look like a burst couch.’

‘No, Annah,’ Svetlana shook her head, ‘I will not let this happen. Now, service station in 15 kilometres. We need to stop, go to toilets, buy water, buy petrol and maybe satnav too.’

Annie looked at the Bentley’s fuel gauge. It was registering completely full. It hadn’t moved at all although they were now almost 200 kilometres from Villa Verdina. Either this was the most fuel-efficient limousine ever invented or the gauge was faulty. The Bentley was probably over twenty years old, it was bound to have developed a fault or two. It was probably carefully nursed along by its loving driver, who only ever took it from Villa Verdina to Milan airport and back at a sedate 50 m.p.h.

So she could start worrying right now about how long the Beast would hold out in the mountains, or she could do as she’d told Svetlana: try to trust in luck and good fortune.

Chapter Twenty-One

New York

Elena’s brunch outfit:

White broderie anglaise dress (Perfect Dress free sample)

Natural leather gladiator sandals (Brooklyn Leather)

Orange tote bag (Coach sale)

Tiny gold hoop earrings (gift from Seth)

Total est. cost: $130

AS THE WAITER
set Lana’s latte in front of her on the outdoor café table, she looked down the street for any sign of Gracie. It was early on Sunday morning, but Gracie had already texted, desperate to meet up for breakfast and discuss last night.

Lana had agreed and arranged a meeting place just round the corner from her apartment, but her
stomach
was clenched at the thought of the news Gracie might bring. Surely the only reason to meet up so urgently was that Gracie wanted to talk about how amazingly her night had gone with Parker?

Lana looked down at her coffee cup and admired the way the beige and white foam swirled together. For a moment, she was distracted enough to take a quick photo, ping it to the Perfect Dress ideas blog and write underneath: ‘A silky beige dress with cream coloured swirls? A beige dress printed with white and brown coffee cups?’ That would be cute: she smiled at the thought. She was happy to do anything to take her mind off Gracie and Parker and the death of hope on the dance floor.

‘Hi! You’re already here! But I’m not late, am I?’

And there was Gracie, practically skipping towards her table in a bright green and pink dress with her hair curled jauntily out, rosy pink blusher and lip gloss already in place.

‘Hi Gracie, no it’s fine, I just got here.’

Gracie pulled up the chair beside Lana’s and gushed: ‘Wasn’t it awesome?! Wasn’t it the best night out ever?! Immense! Did you see all those cool people? And famous people too: Blake Lively was there! I didn’t even see her until like way late on. I stayed till four in the morning, but I’m so wired, I woke up early and just had to see you.’

‘It was a great night,’ Lana agreed, but she felt a
growing
sense of dread at Gracie’s happiness, ‘it was so nice of Parker to invite us … and you guys were … well … really getting to know each other, weren’t you?’

Lana didn’t want to know. But yet she totally did. It was like pulling off a plaster or waiting for the injection at the dentist: it would be best to get the pain over with quickly.

Gracie set her basket, yes straw basket, complete with appliqué flowers, down on the table, then folded her hands under her chin and gazed off into the distance, in the style of the truly smitten.

‘He is great, isn’t he?’ she said. ‘I mean, he’s funny, he’s smart
and
he’s into fabric design! We talked for the longest time about our favourite vintage stores. I mean, how many guys would do that? He likes vintage leather jackets; ones so beat up you know they’ve lived. He says leather only starts to get interesting when it’s five years old. You know his leather bag? It’s a proper English satchel and he’s been carrying it since Grade School, since he was nine! How many guys are like him? I’m just thrilled to have him as my brand new best friend.’

Lana smiled, agreed, did everything she could to make out she was delighted for her friend. But inside, she sagged with unhappiness. This was not good. Gracie would ditch Bingham, then she would go out with Parker. And for how long?! Would
Lana
have to watch from the sidelines for months?

Maybe Gracie and Parker would be together for ever and Lana’s life would be ruined. She’d have to move out of New York with her broken heart to get away from them.

And he had asked her out first, she reminded herself, with a rush of injustice.

‘So when are you going to see him again?’ Lana asked, trying to fill the question with encouragement, ‘Have you guys already got plans?’

‘Ummm … well …’ Gracie turned to her basket, searched about, brought out her phone and checked the screen.

Lana sort of didn’t like herself for feeling a little burst of hope at this hesitation.

‘He said there was an art show opening next weekend,’ Gracie went on, ‘and maybe I’d like to come along. So he said he would let me know: send me a message.’

‘Sounds really interesting. So new best
friends
?’

Gracie looked at Lana, with a sweet little frown between her two pale, perfectly tweezed eyebrows.

‘Friends, yeah, just friends,’ she said airily, with a little shrug.

‘OK …’

Lana hoped this hadn’t come out wrong. But Gracie saying ‘friends’ … and not mentioning any other plans, despite the weekend art show, gave her
a
flicker of hope. Gracie already had a boyfriend, she reminded herself, and hadn’t she and Parker almost kissed? Hadn’t he asked her to be his girl tonight? Cheesy, but he’d made it very sexy too.

Not that she wanted to hurt Gracie. Not in any way at all. But she felt a little comforted by ‘friends’.