The Show (47 page)

He hung up.

‘What was all that about?’ asked Louise, returning with two mugs of tea.

David looked at her blankly. ‘I have absolutely no idea. But I
think
Eddie Wellesley might be about to resign.’

‘But … he was only just re-elected.’

‘I know.’ David broke into a grin. ‘Marvellous, isn’t it?’

Magda was silent as the female guard led her down a long, windowless corridor. The staff at the detention centre had actually been kind, but the place itself was awful. Peeling paint on the walls, too-bright strip lights that buzzed like dying flies above one’s head and the smell of burned hopes in the air.

Magda was led into a room full of women and children. Part dormitory, part living room, it had metal bunks stacked against the walls and a television blaring in one corner that no one was watching. Nobody so much as glanced up at Magda.

‘This is your bunk.’

The stripped bed in the corner of the room had a blanket, sheet and tiny pillow wrapped in Cellophane at the end of it, the sort you get on a plane.

‘You’ll be interviewed in the morning. The Home Office will send someone down to talk to you. Supper’s at six, lights out at nine, toilets are through that door. Any questions?’

Magda shook her head.

Too numb to speak, she was still in shock. Somewhere on the long drive east to Folkestone, all the fight had drained out of her.

Deep down she’d always known this day would come eventually. As soon as Sir Edward Wellesley had decided he was going back into politics, she’d known it would only be a matter of time before someone found out. And yet she’d dared to hope, to believe, that if she kept her head down and herself to herself, that perhaps the storm would pass over her this time. That she’d be safe.

She’d thought about leaving many times. She
should
have left, for Sir Edward’s sake, if not her own. But she couldn’t do it. She realized with shame that Milo was the reason. Somewhere along the line, as ridiculous as it was, Magda had fallen in love with him. His laugh, his smile, his occasional kind words, tossed casually in her direction. In her loneliness, she’d allowed those things to mean too much. She’d allowed them to mean everything.

And now it was all over. Not just the fantasy, but her entire life in England, the life she’d worked so hard to build for so long.

She was being sent back to Poland. Back to hell.

Milo would never speak to her again.

I brought all this on myself.

Too tired even to cry, Magda lay back on the bunk and stared at the bed above her.

Violet Charteris was just heading out for lunch in Belgravia when Milo turned up at her flat.

‘Darling!’ She flung open the door and smiled, tossing back her newly washed blonde hair. ‘What a lovely surprise.’

In a sexy, dark green dress that brought out the colour of her eyes, and knee-high suede boots, Violet knew she looked good. Milo, however, was clearly in no mood to be charmed.

‘It was you, wasn’t it?’

‘What was me?’ Violet asked innocently. Leading him into the drawing room of her stunning flat, she sank down onto the antique Knole sofa and invited Milo to do the same.

‘You told immigration about Magda.’

‘Oh. That.’ Violet rolled her eyes. ‘I might have said something.’

‘You
did
say something, you stupid bitch!’ Milo shouted at her. ‘Why?’

‘Why not?’ Violet shouted back. ‘She was breaking the law, Milo. I guessed something was up when I saw you snooping around about Poland at work.’

‘You went on my computer?’

‘It’s not
your
computer. It’s the office computer. And you were the one doing something shady, not me. In case you hadn’t noticed, we work for the Home Secretary, Milo. We can’t go around protecting illegal immigrants just because you happen to have the hots for your parents’ cleaning lady!’

Milo stepped forward, looming over Violet like a giant oak tree about to fall. Looking down at her pretty, spiteful, doll-like face, he felt an overwhelming urge to smash his fist into it.

‘You have no idea what you’ve done,’ he hissed at her.

‘Actually, I do. I’ve done the right thing.’ Violet stuck out her chin defiantly. ‘And I’ve done you a favour. I love you, Milo. I want to be with you. This ridiculous obsession had to end some time.’

Bending down, Milo put his face very close to Violet’s. It took a supreme effort of will not to hit her.

‘I wouldn’t sleep with you now if you were the last woman on earth,’ he said venomously. ‘You make me physically sick.’

Turning on his heel, he stormed out of her flat.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Eddie stared out of the window of his first-class carriage as the train rattled through the wintry Sussex countryside. Last November had been nothing but rain, but this year the cold was back with a vengeance, plunging Southern England into a deep, almost Nordic frost. Bare trees shivered in the bitter wind, while stiffened blades of grass made the fields look oddly static, sparkling grey-white beneath an ice-blue sky.

Usually Eddie loved this sort of crisp winter weather. But today he was too worried to enjoy it properly. Neither he nor Annabel had heard from Milo in almost a month. Magda had been deported back to Poland in October. The next day Milo had resigned from the Home Office in disgust, precipitating a fairly spectacular row with his mother. Eddie had given things a few days to calm down before dropping in at Milo’s London flat. But Milo wasn’t in – not then or on any of the subsequent occasions Eddie called. His mobile phone went straight to message, and a few worried phone calls established that none of his old friends had heard from him either.

Panicked, Annabel had insisted on calling the police. But as Milo was an adult and there was no reason to believe he was in any immediate danger, there was little they could do.

‘He wouldn’t be the first young man to get a bee in his bonnet after a row with mum and dad and go off on his own for a bit,’ the policeman told Annabel. ‘He’ll turn up. Probably when he wants some money,’ he joked. But Annabel wasn’t in the mood for joking.

Eddie was worried about her, too. He’d resigned his seat back in September, as soon as it had become clear that the case against Magda was watertight.

‘She’s illegal. We employed her. That’s that,’ he said stoically. ‘Ignorance is no defence under the law, and even less of a defence in politics. It’s over.’

He waited for the feelings of anger and disappointment and loss to hit him, but oddly they never did. Perhaps because of all the ups and downs of the last few years, Eddie found he was strangely detached about this latest blow. But Annabel took it badly. Eddie watched with alarm as she began to lose weight and withdraw again socially. He’d come so close to losing her last time, the prospect of it happening again filled him with utter dread. He found himself becoming furious with Milo, for disappearing in a melodramatic sulk just when his mother needed him the most.

Ironically, as so often in Eddie’s life, while one area of his life was imploding, another had begun to blossom. He had barely given
Valley Farm
a thought for months, but now the lawyers had finally thrashed out a deal with Fox. Eddie was on his way to London now to sign papers that would make him a considerably richer man. Macy would move back to the States in January to front the new US show, and the search was already under way for a replacement UK presenter. If the American version was a success, plans were already afoot to roll out the format in other territories across Europe and Asia. There was so much to look forward to. If only Eddie could convince Annabel to look forward instead of back and to embrace their new future.

Outside the train window, grimy Victorian terraces had replaced the frosted fields. They were already in London, and Eddie hadn’t even noticed. Time seemed to race by so quickly these days. Blink, and everything had changed.

An unusually melancholy Eddie got off at Victoria and hailed a cab to Fox’s Shepherd’s Bush offices.

‘Didn’t you used to be Eddie Wellesley?’ the cabbie asked guilelessly.

Eddie grinned. He’d got into a frightful habit of taking life seriously. Hopefully seeing the lovely Laura Baxter again would snap him out of it.

Laura felt her stomach flip over with nerves and regretted not eating breakfast this morning. She’d been in a rush to get the boys off to school – every Monday morning was the same mad panic of missing shoes, lost reading books and Marmite-stained ties – but she was also too stressed to eat. Which was weird, as today’s meeting at Fox was a formality and a celebration more than anything. It had taken the best part of a year, but all the tough negotiating had been done. All Laura, Gabe and Eddie had to do today was sign their contracts and raise a glass to the next glorious chapter in the
Valley Farm
story.

Except that for Laura and Gabe, it meant more than that. Once they signed the Fox deal, their divorce could finally go through. Again, this was a good thing. This was closure, something they both needed. But, annoyingly, Laura’s body stubbornly refused to celebrate. In the lift at Fox’s offices, her palms were sweating as she pressed the button for the fifth floor. Her stomach was making awful noises, her heart was pounding and she had a horrible feeling that blood was rushing unattractively to her cheeks.

‘May I help you?’

The girl at the fifth-floor reception smiled politely as Laura approached the desk.

‘Laura Baxter. I’m here for a meeting with Steve Levenson.’

‘Oh, yes. If you’d like to come through? Your colleagues are here already. Steve’s on his way.’

Laura’s ‘colleagues’, Gabe and Eddie, both smiled broadly when she walked into the meeting room. For the first time all morning, she found herself relaxing a little.

‘Laura!’ Eddie hugged her first. ‘You look divine, as ever. I can’t quite believe this day has come, can you?’

‘No.’ She hugged him back. ‘Where’s the fat lady? And the singing?’

‘I’ll sing if you like,’ said Gabe, kissing her on the cheek. ‘The hills are alive, with the sound of mon-eee!’

In a dark wool suit with a navy-blue shirt and striped silk tie, he looked unusually formal and disarmingly handsome. Laura wondered slightly desperately if she would ever stop fancying him.

‘When Levenson gets here, let’s play a game. The first one of us to get the word “discombobulate” into a sentence has to buy the other two lunch at the Connaught afterwards. With very, very expensive wine.’

He seems so happy
, Laura thought. The mischievous twinkle in his eye was back, the one she hadn’t seen since the old days, before
Valley Farm
, before the cameras and the fame and Macy Johanssen, before it all went wrong.

‘No games,’ she said sternly. ‘And no discombobulating the Americans. Let’s for God’s sake just sign the papers, take our cheques and get out of here. Before they change their minds!’

‘Hear, hear,’ said Eddie.

‘Spoilsport,’ said Gabe. ‘You do look lovely,’ he added, throwing Laura completely and making her blush crimson at the very moment that the Fox executives walked in.

‘Hello everybody.’

Steve Levenson, a humourless individual at the best of times, looked even more po-faced than usual this morning. Wearing an ugly, double-breasted suit and smelling far too strongly of cologne, he was followed into the room by a string of lawyers, like so many bald ants silently following their leader. Laura noticed that no one was carrying any papers.

‘I’m sorry to have kept you waiting.’

‘Not a problem,’ Eddie said smoothly.

‘We’ve waited a year,’ Gabe said drily. ‘A few more minutes isn’t going to discombobulate us.’

Laura shot him a dirty look.

‘I’m afraid I have disappointing news.’ Steve Levenson looked at each of them unblinkingly. ‘We no longer feel the show is right for us.’

A stunned silence descended.

Gabe was the first to break it. ‘This is bullshit. We had a deal.’

‘We were in the advanced stages of negotiations, which we entered into in good faith,’ Levenson replied carefully. ‘But in the final analysis we don’t feel that this format is quite what we’re looking for.’

‘It was what you were looking for last week,’ said Eddie. ‘What’s changed?’

The lawyers exchanged uncomfortable glances.

‘You’re doing your own show,’ Laura said quietly. ‘You’re ripping off our format, giving it a new name and cutting us out of the deal. All those “consultants” on set this season, taking notes … all the legal delays … You never had any intention of signing with us, did you?’

‘That’s a ridiculous accusation,’ said Levenson, blushing furiously.

‘
Do
you have another show?’ Eddie asked bluntly.

‘We have a number of scripted reality projects in the works,’ one of the lawyers piped up. ‘Some of them may appear to bear some superficial resemblance to
Valley Farm
. But that’s purely coincidental.’

Gabe stood up. ‘This is bloody fraud, that’s what it is! You’ve strung us along for a year, a year in which we could have found other partners, made other deals. And now you think you can steal our format from under our noses?’

‘No one’s stealing anything, Mr Baxter.’

‘Oh, yeah? Well, a court will be the judge of that. If you think we’re letting this lie, you’ve got another think coming, you prick.’

‘There’s no need for name calling,’ the American said primly. ‘I can assure you, we’re as disappointed as you are that this didn’t work out. We’ve devoted considerable resources—’

But Gabe wasn’t listening. Pushing back his chair in disgust, he walked out of the room. Laura and Eddie followed him.

The three of them took the lift down to the reception area in stony silence. Outside on the street, the cold November air hit them like a slap in the face.

‘Fuckers,’ Gabe brooded. ‘They won’t get away with this.’

‘They will,’ Eddie said quietly. ‘Intellectual property rights are notoriously difficult to defend in court. And their pockets are a lot deeper than ours. A protracted legal battle could ruin us.’