The St. Tropez Lonely Hearts Club (13 page)

Suddenly there was a fanfare of trumpets and the MC for the night – beloved Charlie Chalk – called for the guests to make their way to their tables. Charlie attempted to shush the throng, who were too busy talking to sit down.

‘Ladies and gentlemen –
mesdames et messieurs
– as the opening act for tonight I have the greatest pleasure in introducing to you a new young singer who I know you will take to your hearts and adore. Please – give it up for . . . Fabrizio Bricconni!’

‘Young!’ Khris the record producer snorted. ‘He could be Justin Bieber’s father!’

‘He’s twenty-nine,’ Maximus answered smoothly. ‘He has a big future; he just needs a little bit of training.’

A smattering of applause led by Lara followed Fabrizio as he strolled on to the stage and started crooning ‘
Volare
’ in his special Dean Martin voice. The audience, still milling about and drinking, was singularly unimpressed.

‘I don’t think Michael Bublé has to worry,’ Frick sneered to Sophie, who sneered right back. ‘Six bucks and my right nut bets he never even makes it to Moldova, much less Kazakhstan.’

Sophie was delighted to see Lara’s trumped-up gigolo making a fool of himself. ‘He’s a real horn-dog,’ she hissed to Frick. ‘You know, he even made a pass at me!’

‘Do tell,
cherie
,’ said Frick, expectantly.

‘Oh, it was a long time ago,’ Sophie said vaguely. ‘It was in Rome, twenty years ago.’

‘But,
cherie
, he would have been only nine years old then!’ Frick was usually careful not to upset his mistress, but this had knocked him for six.

‘Oh, well, it was someone who
looked
like him then,’ she snapped irritably. ‘All those Italian stallions look alike, you know,’ she shrugged.

As Fabrizio segued none too smoothly into a standard that had recently been re-popularised by Rod Stewart, Frick, Adolpho and Sophie started giggling and whispering amongst themselves as Lara hissed an angry, ‘
Shhhh
!’ from the next table.

Maximus was sitting between Carlotta and Lara, but he needn’t have worried about Carlotta, for, although she had mixed with the aristocracy of Buenos Aires, she was wide-eyed with wonder at the opulence of the flowers and the setting and the seemingly enormous combined wealth of the guests.

‘So many millionaires and magnates,’ she whispered to Max.

‘My dear, only a few millionaires here tonight. The majority of these capitalist pigs . . . ooh, I’m so sorry!’ he hiccoughed, realising that his pre-prandial cognac at his hotel and the two glasses of champagne at the terrace had made him a tad tipsy. ‘Most here tonight are billionaires, even a few multibillionaires.’

Lara was pulling at Maximus’s arm, annoyed that he was paying so much attention to the new girl in town, and by the fact that the dinner partner she had drawn on her left was an ancient billionaire wearing a bad brown toupee and too much orange Saint-Tropez tan on his wrinkled face. He had tried to engage Lara in conversation, but all she could see when she turned to him were several long black hairs cascading from his nostrils, not to mention the mat of grey chest hair peering out from his half-open Gieves & Hawkes silk shirt.

‘Isn’t Fabrizio absolutely fantastic?’ she whined at Maximus. ‘Don’t you just adore his voice? All those lessons were worth it! What do you think? Do you think he could have a shot at
The X Factor
in Kazakhstan?’

Maximus was now gently holding her hand, anxious to prevent her from picking up her fifth vodka.

‘He’s not bad, not bad at all,’ Max lied. If there was any time to sort out the pre-nup situation with the feisty Russian socialite, this was a perfect opportunity. ‘I think he has a good shot.’

Max was well aware that Fabrizio’s show-business sights were set a good deal higher than a gig in Kazakhstan. He had found out about the French TV show that had been secretly interviewing and auditioning Fabrizio for the Gallic version of
Dancing with the Stars
, which would be far more prestigious. Fabrizio had also been taking singing lessons in Paris and was trying to wheedle enough money from Lara to make a record.

‘I’m
so
glad you encourage him, Lara, my dear. You are so unselfish.’

‘Unselfish? What do you mean?’

‘Well, don’t you see? He is so good – I think he’s almost as good as Harry Connick, Jr.’

‘What do you mean “almost”? He’s younger, better-looking, and much sexier than Connick! He could be a star.’ She smiled dreamily, remembering the early evening sexathon with Fabrizio. He never failed to turn her on, even if she was angry with him.

Max noticed the dreamy look and leaned in for the kill.

‘Yes, much sexier than Connick. You are so right. As usual you have a sharp eye for talent. Who knows what fame and success he might achieve?’

He almost could read the rest of his unspoken sentence writing itself on Lara’s face. It dawned on her that, if Fabrizio found fame and fortune, she would be left far behind.

Maximus decided to administer the
coup de grâce
. ‘How about marrying him now, Lara, darling? Forget about that silly pre-nup – no? I don’t believe that Mr Meyer cares
that
much whether you agree to that stupid rule to never marry again – don’t you agree, my dear? You deserve happiness, darling. Let’s have a wedding next week!’

Max released her hand so she could down another vodka, then he simultaneously signalled the waiter for another, and to Fabrizio, who was by now doing his strolling troubadour act around the room. Fabrizio swaggered over to Lara’s table and crooned softly into her ear: ‘You’re just too marvellous, too marvellous for words.’ His hand caressed her bare shoulders, and she shivered in anticipation of tonight’s delights if she could remain sober, and not get angry about watching other women lust after her property.

‘Like glorious . . .’ Lara preened. ‘Glamorous . . .’ Lara smiled. ‘And that old standby, amorous . . .’ Lara cast her ‘cat got the cream’ look towards the crowd, unaware that they were talking amongst themselves and not paying the least bit of attention to Fabrizio’s crooning.

Fabrizio finished his set, planted a tender kiss on Lara’s Botoxed lips, glanced at Carlotta, who seemed not to notice him, then took a bow to a smattering of giggles and applause – but Maximus was jubilant. As Lara tottered off to the Ladies’ room to repair her lipstick, Max clapped Fabrizio on the shoulders. ‘
Mio caro
, I think we’ve got it!’ he crowed. ‘The way you sang to her she was practically coming in her seat. She’s gonna forget about the pre-nup now, I know it! When I suggested you get married next week she didn’t disagree . . .’

‘Yeah, I guess,’ Fabrizio said gloomily. ‘But you know, Max, I still wanna live the dream. I have aspirations. I wanna become a great singer.’

‘Forget it,’ said Maximus brusquely, ‘you’re never going to live
that
dream. You got Lara now, for Christ’s sake – be happy, Fabrizio!’ He clapped the younger man on the shoulder and grinned. ‘You’ll be Mr Lara Meyer, and all the rest of my . . . er . . . boys for hire will be green with envy.’

In the Ladies’ room, Lara reapplied her cyclamen lipstick. Since she was short-sighted, she leaned forward towards the mirror, then to her dismay saw Vanessa Meyer standing behind her, Jonathan’s third and youngest trophy wife. Vanessa was hanging on to her marriage to Jonathan, whose roving eye was legendary, by the skin of her Hollywood-whitened teeth, which she bared now with a disingenuous smile.

‘
Daahling
, you look
maahvellous!
’ Vanessa lied, taking in the overtanned skin and last season’s too-tight Hervé Léger. They exchanged an indifferent
mwah-mwah
as Lara checked the younger woman’s almost flawless skin and the latest Dolce & Gabbana couture dress, which her Pilates-toned curves enhanced.

‘I didn’t know you were in town,’ Lara trilled.

‘We just managed to get a mooring in the port. Jonathan has business here; we arrived last night.’

‘So Jonathan is here?’ In spite of herself, Lara’s heart started to thump. She couldn’t help but still harbour a longing to be back with him, queening it up in his gorgeous duplex on Park Avenue and being invited to all the best social events in Manhattan and The Hamptons. Mrs Jonathan Meyer had a great deal more cachet about it than plain Lara Meyer. In spite of her sexual obsession with Fabrizio, Lara still longed for those days when she was the undisputed queen of New York society; when she was on the boards of all the best charity events, and photographs of the fabulous couple frequently appeared in
Woman’s Wear Daily
and the
New York Post
, while layouts of their Connecticut and Palm Beach mansions were featured in
Town and Country
,
Vogue
and
Bazaar
. Shot by the likes of Mario Testino and Terry Richardson they caused envy amongst the super-rich. She’d even made
Vanity Fair
’s best-dressed list for two years in a row. Not bad for a poor little chorus cutie from Minsk.

How could I have thrown it all away just because of my stupid jealousy?
thought Lara, applying another coat of gloss. She remembered that day on the slopes of Gstaad too well. She had been skiing with Valentino, having celebrated New Year’s Eve the previous night at his chalet, when they had decided to take a hot chocolate at an out-of-the-way inn off one of the pistes. She’d spotted Jonathan’s distinctive black parka with its yellow lining immediately. He was standing at the bottom of the piste, his parka open and his arms enclosing a lissom blonde, his lips locked with hers. Without further ado, Lara had marched over to them, spewing a stream of abuse in Russian. The girl, no more than eighteen and one of the contestants in the Miss Teen USA contest that Jonathan sponsored on TV, had turned around, shocked. Lara had grabbed her long blonde hair and punched her hard on the face, breaking her pretty little nose. As if by magic a photographer appeared, eagerly snapping pictures of the melee. The teenager began screaming as blood dropped from her nose on to her baby pink ski jacket, and Jonathan started yelling at Lara. She screamed and began pummelling her husband, ‘I
vant
a divorce – I
vant
a divorce, you cheating bastard!’

‘Well, you can have one!’ he bellowed, rushing her away. ‘It’s time I got you out of my life, you nagging Russian bitch!’

This caused Lara to explode even more. She stopped hitting him and grabbed at Jonathan’s shiny black toupee, whipping it off his bald pate and waving it in front of a bemused Valentino and a crowd of interested onlookers while crowing, ‘Now you know he has no hair! Ha ha ha!’

The photographer was gleeful. ‘I’m in pap heaven!’ he thought as he continued snapping away until a security guard came and escorted an incandescent Lara away.

Jonathan attempted to replace his wig – another photograph that hit all the papers and went viral. The girl sued, her hopes of becoming Miss Teen America shattered like her nose, and Lara’s apologies and entreaties to remain Mrs Meyer fell upon Jonathan’s deaf ears. The divorce was a quickie; a few months later Jonathan married the Honourable Vanessa Anstruther-Formby, the twenty-one-year-old daughter of an English aristocrat whom he had been banging for the past four months. Six months later, Vanessa gave birth to the apple of Jonathan Meyer’s eye, his first child, a son whom they named Jonathan Junior. Lara never got over it. She hid her sorrows in the vodka bottle and latched on to a selection of gigolos, the latest of whom was Fabrizio.

‘Nice to see you again,’ Lara muttered to Vanessa, and stalked out of the powder room with her head held high.

Carlotta had been surreptitiously watching the two women and noting their obvious dislike of one another with interest. In San Miguel she had had one loyal girlfriend and she had never really been aware of the animosity and jealousy that seemed to fuel these jet setters’ lives. They all had so much
stuff
, she thought as she nodded a greeting towards Vanessa and started touching up her make-up.

Yes, Nicanor had been profligate, but they had only owned one home, the villa in San Miguel, and just two or three cars. These people had multiples of everything. They all owned at least
five
homes, some of which they hardly visited, even though they kept them fully staffed. They all had yachts and the men competed each year to see who could acquire the biggest one. Carlotta smiled to herself as she remembered what Maximus had told her.