Alison nodded, mounted the stairs at a snail’s pace, discovering that her legs were as heavy as lead.
Tony watched her disappear through the door at the top of the stairs, then swung his head back to Camilla. Although he had not said so to Alison, he was quite sure Camilla had broken her neck when she fell, and that she was no longer alive.
***
Maxim could not accept that Camilla was dead.
It was only after her funeral had taken place that it sank in. The finality of her death struck him a hard blow. He could not believe that the lovely, vibrant, gifted and loving woman he had so recently married was gone from him forever.
He was devastated.
It was his daughter Alix who helped him the most, although Stubby, Teddy and David Maines also tried to give him solace in his grief.
The day after the memorial service had been held for Camilla, Maxim and Alix were sitting together in his Mayfair house. Alix put her hand on his arm, and said gently, ‘I liked Camilla a lot, Daddy, and we became good friends. She told me she thought of me as the daughter she’d never had, asked me if I minded. I told her I didn’t, I was flattered actually.’
Maxim looked at her swiftly but made no comment.
Alix returned his glance, thinking how terrible he looked. Her father was grey under his permanent tan, and his dark eyes, usually so brilliant, were dulled by sorrow. Alix took a deep breath, went on, ‘After Mummy, Camilla really was the nicest woman I’ve ever known. I’m so sorry she had that hideous accident, and I want you to know I’m here for you whenever you need me.’
Maxim was still unable to speak. But he took hold of his daughter’s hand, held it tightly. At last he said, ‘Camilla was very special…’
‘Yes. And she loved you so much, Daddy.’
‘And I loved her. Not in the same way I love your mother… it’s just not possible to love two people like that in one lifetime. But I did love Camilla, in a different kind of way, and she was important to me, gave me a lot of happiness these last few months. She helped to make the loneliness go away—’ His voice broke. He was unable to continue.
After a few minutes Maxim regained his composure, and said softly, ‘I never told her I loved her, Alix. Not once. I’ll never forgive myself for that.’ Tears came into his eyes, and he quickly tried to brush them away with his fingertips.
Alix put her arm around his shoulders, rested her head against his arm. ‘I’m sure Camilla knew you loved her, Daddy.’
‘It was wrong of me, I should have told her,’ he muttered, his voice a harsh rasp.
‘A woman always knows whether a man loves her or not. Honestly she does,’ Alix soothed, her heart aching for him, going out to him in his pain. ‘She feels it in her bones. And anyway Camilla was so happy with you.’
He turned to his daughter, searched her face. ‘Do you really think she was, Alix?’
‘Yes. You made her very, very happy. She told me that only a few days before the accident.’
Maxim leaned back against the sofa and closed his eyes. His daughter’s words gave him some comfort, but not much.
***
Not long after Camilla’s death, Maxim disappeared from any sort of public life. He buried himself in his work more than ever before, curtailed his social life completely, saw only his colleagues, business associates and his immediate family. There had been a great deal of publicity about Camilla’s death, their marriage, her life, and his, before they had married. It all sickened him. He hired a battery of aides to keep the press at bay and his name out of the gossip columns. He did not relish speculation about his private life.
Maximilian West retreated and pulled the drawbridge up behind him.
PART 6
ADRIANA
NEW YORK
1987
Every wise woman buildeth her house: but the foolish plucketh it down with her hands.
Proverbs: The Bible
FIFTY-FIVE
Adriana Macklin West stood in the centre of the drawing room of their Fifth Avenue apartment, surveying it through jaundiced eyes.
She did not like it. She never had, not since the first moment she had set foot in it eighteen months ago. The proportions of the room were superb; it was airy, spacious and light-filled, with extraordinary panoramic views of Central Park. Unfortunately, it had been decorated by his first wife, and she found the furnishings abysmal—old-fashioned, outdated, washed out, and totally lacking in style. She had been itching to redecorate since her marriage to Maxim, but whenever she broached the subject he waved his hand dismissively, told her he liked it exactly the way it was. These days he cut her off every time she mentioned the word decorating, would not even listen to her reasons for wanting to make the changes.
She had even offered to pay for everything herself, but he had told her money was of no consequence, that this was hardly the issue.
Adriana’s dark brown eyes swept around the room again, carefully assessing each item as she had done so often of late. The problem with the room was that it was far too austere, almost cold in its overall feeling, with an over-abundance of pale colours, pale fabrics, pale woods, and delicate paintings. What it needed was vibrant colours, rich fabrics, expensive wall-to-wall carpeting, handsome Chinese porcelain lamps, exciting new paintings and eye-catching objects of art. Those things would give it the necessary pizazz, the feeling of glamour she wanted to create, the chic New York look which had always been a feature of her other apartments in the past. It was a look she adored, for it proclaimed to the world that the owner had money, power, success.
Dropping her eyes to the yellow pad she was holding, Adriana began to scribble down her ideas for the renowned international interior designer whom she had hired that afternoon. He had met her in the executive offices of the cosmetic company she owned, Empress Eugenia Beauty, of which she was president and chief executive officer.
She had liked Valentine Lubbock the moment he had walked in, and the feeling had been mutual. They had understood each other within the first ten minutes of meeting. She knew that Valentine had superb taste, since she was well acquainted with his work, and she had absolutely no doubts that he was going to produce the expensive and glamorous ambience she deemed appropriate for her station in life as Mrs Maximilian West.
Valentine did not come cheap, and there was no question that the apartment was going to cost a bundle of money, between four and five million dollars to redesign, revamp and redecorate to be exact. But she could afford it, since she was a millionairess in her own right. If money was of no consequence to Maxim, then certainly it was not to her either. Her second husband, Arthur Macklin, had left her a fortune when he had died four years ago, as well as the cosmetic company, which was one of the largest in the United States.
She had told Valentine Lubbock that she wanted him to redesign every room, not only this one where she now stood. The library, the dining room, Maxim’s study, her den, and all of the bedrooms were to undergo a complete overhaul. Valentine was meeting her here tomorrow with his design team, and they were going to spend the entire day going over every inch of this… this… mausoleum.
She was well aware that Maxim was going to object when she informed him of her decision tonight. But she would explain her reasons, talk him into it somehow. She had a knack of twisting him around her little finger, getting her way with him, especially when they had been in bed. He seemed more open, receptive and vulnerable to her then, certainly easier to handle. She had come to understand he was a difficult man, not easy to know, or live with, and secretive.
Adriana sighed. The problem was that they had not been to bed lately. His sexual interest in her had waned of late, and she did not understand why. When they had first met he had been like a young stud, going at her all the time, unable to get enough of her, and for the first six months of their marriage he had continued to be insatiable. But he had not touched her for months and months now. Of course, he had been away a great deal, travelling for business; she herself had had
to make several trips to California, Texas and Rome, so they had been separated quite frequently. However, he had now been in Manhattan for the whole month of March, and he had still not made love to her since his return from London. When she had tactfully hinted that it was time they went to bed, he had brushed her off politely with a variety of excuses: he was preoccupied with his latest deal, a major acquisition, exhausted, or not in the mood. And he always retreated to his own bedroom these days, or rather nights, never came to hers anymore. She had not liked the idea of separate bedrooms, had balked at it from the beginning, but he had insisted when they had arrived in New York after their marriage in France.
‘My hours are so erratic,’ he had said. ‘I get up at the crack of dawn to deal with my offices in London and Paris. It’s better this way. I don’t want to disturb your sleep.’ He had kissed her, flashed her his dazzling smile that always devastated her, and had murmured, ‘There’ll be plenty of nights when I sleep in your bed, Adriana, don’t make any mistake about that. But this is the way I’ve always lived. I need my own room, please don’t worry about it.’
Well, she did worry, and she was not sure she believed him when he implied that he had had his own bedroom with his other wives. And he certainly had been coming to hers less and less. If she didn’t know him so well, she might start suspecting he had a mistress. But that was not his style. He was such a workaholic he surely did not have time for another woman.
A painting which was slightly askew on the wall caught her attention and she walked across the Aubusson rug, intending to straighten it, but paused when she came to the Louis XV console, stood staring at the silver-framed photograph of herself and Maxim on their wedding day in September of 1985. They had been married in the town hall of the fourth arrondissement in Paris because he had been detained there on business. She had worn a pale-blue outfit by Givenchy and afterwards Maxim had given a dinner for ten at Lasserre. She picked up the photograph, thinking how well he looked at fifty-one, the age he had been when they married. So lean and handsome and tanned from the summer sun.
When her investment bankers had tried to buy Marianna Monteveccio from him in 1984, and had failed, she had dropped the idea of expanding Empress Eugenia for the moment. Instead she had gone after Maximilian West, finding him a fascinating and exciting man, not to mention an eligible bachelor. In the summer of 1985 she had managed to manoeuvre an introduction to him in Monte Carlo, through a friend who knew him. To her immense delight and gratification he had fallen for her at once, obviously stimulated by her keen business mind as well as her beautiful face and perfect body. They had had a whirlwind courtship of six weeks, and to the stunned surprise of his family and friends they had married at the end of that summer. She was aware his son and daughter did not particularly approve of her or like her, and she was not overly enthusiastic about them either, considered them to be stuck-up little prigs. As for that ex-wife of his, Anastasia, she was a real pain in the rear end. Always wanting to talk to him about something, or needing to see him about something. And off he trotted, like an obedient pet dog. She had tried to put a stop to those excursions, only to incur his terrible wrath, and he had told her, in no uncertain terms, never to mention the name Anastasia again. That bitch had some sort of hold on him although she had no clue what it was. The children most likely. She often wondered what a man like Maximilian West had ever seen in that faded, wimpish, mealy-mouthed blonde. His second wife, the actress who had fallen down the basement steps and broken her neck, had not been much better looking either.
Adriana placed the frame on the console, stepped over to the small painting by Manet and straightened it, then glanced at her watch. It was almost six o’clock. Maxim had told her that he would be home by seven, and wanted to eat in the apartment. It was Thursday, and both the cook and the butler were off. Usually Maxim took her to Le Cirque, La Grenouille, La Caravelle or the Four Seasons, or some other smart New York restaurant. But before he had left for the office this morning he had explained that he had a mountain of work to get through by tomorrow. And so she had had the cook prepare a cold supper of salad, smoked salmon, cold meats and chicken, cheeses and fresh fruit—the things he enjoyed the most.
Hurrying out of the drawing room, Adriana went down the corridor to the kitchen, opened the refrigerator door, checked that there were several bottles of Dom Perignon on ice, plenty of caviar, then raced back along the corridor to her bedroom.
She took off her dark business suit, hung it in the wardrobe, stripped off her expensive underwear, and went into the bathroom. After flinging handfuls of her own brand of bath beads into the tub, she turned on the faucets, stepped over to the mirror and pinned up her hair, wondering what to wear tonight. Something sexy. She must make herself look tempting and irresistible for her husband, get her own way with him tonight… in every way.
***
Her mind stayed focused on Maxim for a few minutes as she lay luxuriating in the hot perfumed bath. She considered her marriage to him to be the coup of the century. And it was. She was the wife of one of the richest men in the world, a billionaire who happened to be in the prime of life, and gorgeous as well as brilliant. Not bad for a rather ordinary middle-class girl from Westchester, who had had a typical middle-class upbringing, a boring first marriage to a childhood sweetheart, a second slightly less boring marriage to a rich, older man.
Her thoughts veered to Arthur Macklin. She had been married to him for ten years before he had died in 1983 of complications following a stroke. He had been seventy, she had been thirty-one. She had been extremely fond of Arthur. He had been her stepping stone into a whole new world.
After her divorce from Larry Tucker, her first husband, she had moved to Manhattan, found a small apartment, and become a model.
Her grasp on success had been swift. After being photographed by Scavullo and becoming a cover girl with her face on every magazine from Vogue to Mademoiselle, Arthur Macklin had noticed her, had instructed the advertising agency he used to hire her to be the Empress Eugenia Girl. Six months later her face had suddenly been on hoardings, on television, in magazines and newspapers, and displayed on giant posters in department stores. Her arresting, exotic movie-star looks had been the exact image Arthur Macklin had been seeking to promote his beauty products. Those looks also captivated the owner of the company. The Empress Eugenia Girl became his girl. He pursued her, paid court to her most attentively, lavished her with gifts, from jewellery to furs, divorced his wife of thirty years, and married her before she had had time to catch her breath, or shake the Westchester dust off her feet.
She had continued to be the Empress Eugenia Girl for a couple of years, and became the spokesperson for the company. Arthur, a shrewd self-made man, rapidly discovered that his great beauty also had brains. Since he had no children, he brought her into the business, personally trained her to be his successor, and bequeathed the company to her in his will. When he had been felled by the stroke in the spring of 1983 she had looked after him tenderly, diligently, and with kindness, and run the company as he would have done himself. But after his death she had charted a new course, steered Empress Eugenia into the big time. After buying up several smaller cosmetic companies and merging them with hers, she had repackaged the products, had perfumers in France invent several new scents for her, and hired chemists to create a whole line of herbal and natural products. She had called this new line Body Beautiful, had opened Body Beautiful Boutiques all over the country. In the process her company had outstripped many of its competitors, including Marianna Monteveccio, a division of the Allandale Group, which Maxim owned. Once she had wanted to acquire that company, to merge it with Empress Eugenia, but she had no desire for it any longer. The odd thing was, Maxim had lately started to accuse her of being competitive with him, and at first she had laughed, believing him to be teasing her. But she had begun to realise that he was serious. She was competitive by nature, she couldn’t help herself, and of course she competed with the Monteveccio line just as s
he did with Lauder and Arden and Revlon. It was nothing personal. He apparently thought otherwise. Six months ago they had each gone after the same small house that manufactured a variety of products for the hands. It was a sort of friendly rivalry on her part, and she had thought it to be a wonderful joke. He had not. The head of his acquisition team in New York, Peter Heilbron, had been furious.
She sat up with a little start in the bath. Was Maxim holding a grudge? Surely not. She laughed out loud. Surely he wasn’t depriving her of sex in the manner of a disgruntled wife who seethed over some imagined insult. No, that couldn’t be. He was far too big a man for such silly games. He was not sleeping with her at the moment because of his preoccupation with his current deal. Passionate and highly sexed though he was, he could be remarkably disciplined when he so wished. And he could abstain for months, indeed, years. He had told her, in one of those rare moments when he had chosen to confide in her, that he had been celibate for two years after his second wife’s death. It had not only startled her, but had illustrated to her the extraordinary will power of the man. My man, she added under her breath, and pushed herself up, climbed out of the bath, grabbed a towel, and dried herself quickly.
Walking over to the floor-to-ceiling mirror which she had installed on one of the bathroom walls, she stood regarding herself for a long moment, turning from side to side, checking out her figure. It was still perfect, without an extra ounce of flesh, yet she was not a walking skeleton like some of the New York women she knew. Most of them made her shudder, especially those who put little or no food into their mouths, starved themselves into wraiths.
She had a decent covering of flesh on her bones, yet without being fat. Because she was quite tall, just over five feet eight inches in her stockinged feet, she did not have to panic if she put on an additional half pound now and then. She turned slowly once more, glad that her exercise trainer came twice a week to put her through her paces. She was in good shape. Her breasts were a little heavy, in her opinion, but well shaped, and voluptuous enough to excite Maxim. She had realised when she lost weight last year that he had been turned off by her boniness.