Do Not Disturb

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  A FEW MILES north of Mayfair, in the grounds of another mansion in St. John’s Wood, Sian Doyle crouched uncomfortably in the bushes, trying to calculate exactly how many minutes she had left before her bladder gave out and she was forced to pee right here in the rhododendrons.

  She wouldn’t have minded so much if it weren’t for Keith, the lecherous photographer crouched beside her. Watching her take her pants down would be the closest thing he’d come to a sexual experience (with something that didn’t take batteries or need blowing up with a foot pump) since high school.

  There were days when Sian loved working at the News of the World. Like this Monday, after one of her pieces ran, and Simon Davis, the features editor, told her it was “only slightly crap”—praise indeed from a man known affectionately to the rest of the desk as Satan. His wife had once berated a man for calling Simon a cunt on the grounds that it was an insult to women’s genitalia.

  But Monday’s praise already felt like a distant memory. Today was Thursday, and Sian was on the worst of all possible assignments—a stakeout. After the crappy pay (she was pretty sure trash collectors made more than she did per week) and even crappier hours (whoever scheduled her shifts had clearly been raised in a cave, by bats), stakeouts were the worst part of her job.

  This was the third day running she’d spent with Keith, knee-deep in foliage at the house of Sir Jago Wells, a Tory grandee that the paper suspected of having an affair with a stewardess. In thirty-six hours of mind-numbing surveillance they’d only seen the man twice, for a total of about sixteen seconds. Both times he’d been alone, hurrying to and from his Jaguar with a sheaf of papers under his arm. Given that Sir Jago must weigh about the same as a smallish hippo but with a markedly less attractive face, the absence of a girlfriend failed to surprise Sian as much as it did her editor.

  “It’s incredible he convinced one woman to do him, never mind two,” she’d told a seriously unimpressed Simon an hour ago. “He makes Jabba the Hutt look like George Clooney.”

  But Satan wasn’t in the mood for jokes. If she and Keith didn’t have the goods on his desk by the end of their shift tomorrow, they could both “sling their ’ook,” as he so poetically put it.

  Sian was under no illusions. He meant it. No pictures, no tearful interview with the wife, no job.

  “At this rate you’re gonna ’ave to sleep wiv ’im yourself, love,” said Keith, licking his lips.

  Sian looked at him witheringly.

  “What?” He tried to look innocent. “It’d make a lovely picture.”

  He had so many pimples on his face they outnumbered the patches of clear skin, and his round, owlish glasses were so grimy it was a wonder he could see anything at all. Sian’s mind wandered bitterly to Paddy, her boyfriend, who was on assignment in Dubai for the Telegraph. He was probably yukking it up with some billionaire sheikh and his harem right now, having a fabulous time. Paddy was an Irish racing journalist whose assignments always seemed to involve being sent to hot countries and/or luxury hospitality tents at race courses, swilling Guinness and eating strawberries until his stomach exploded, while Sian’s were all about bushes, perverts, and outdoor urinating. It wasn’t fair.

  “Why don’t you quit the Screws and get yourself a proper job?” he’d asked her in bed the other morning, after another of her hour-long moan-a-thons. “Show most editors a pretty face and a bit of leg and you’re in like Flynn. My boss’d snap you up in a heartbeat. I can see the interview now.” He fluttered his eyelashes coquettishly and put on his best Renée Zellweger voice: “You had me at hello.”

  “Oh, shut up,” said Sian, laughing and hitting him with a pillow. Paddy had an uncanny ability to see the funny side in almost any situation and to get others to do the same. Skinny as anything, with merry, dancing gray eyes and the same classically Irish coloring as she had—pale skin made even paler by his shock of black hair—he habitually looked as though he’d spent the previous night sleeping under a hedge. Not handsome, but definitely attractive in a roguish, new-romantic kind of way, he was as much her best friend as her lover. People often commented that they looked like brother and sister, which annoyed Paddy so much that Sian had never dared to tell him she sometimes felt that way, too.

  Given that they were in the same profession, it was ironic that they hadn’t in fact met through work, but through Lola’s boyfriend, Marti. He and Paddy had been friends for years, since Paddy’s days as an intern at the New York Post. Marti brought him over to the girls’ flat one night for dinner, and the rest, as they say, was history.

  Sian liked being part of a couple, if only to give her something to talk about with Lola, who’d been blissfully loved-up with Marti ever since the Burnstein wedding. The two of them had been clocking up the air miles flitting back and forth from New York to London to see each other, and they were still revoltingly besotted.

  Last year, against Sian’s advice, they’d decided to go into business together, with the newly graduated Lola designing evening gowns and Marti selling them online, through one of his many successful Internet shopping sites.

  Happily, Sian’s fears about the wisdom of mixing business with pleasure had proved groundless. Their love remained as strong as ever, and Marti was now in London almost full-time. Trading under the name of Marla Fashions (as in Marti and Lola—sick-making, right?), the fledgling venture was already having remarkable early success. Only last month a famous British soap actress had worn one of Lola’s designs to the National Television Awards, and since then orders had been up a staggering 300 percent.

  Sian was happy for her. She deserved her success. But there were times when her own life—job, relationship, bank balance, you name it—looked pretty pathetic by comparison.

  Today, squatting on her aching haunches next to the most irritating sex pest on Fleet Street, was definitely one of those times. Swatting away a mosquito, she shifted uncomfortably from foot to foot. Her right leg was starting to get pins and needles from all the crouching.

  “Pass me one of your boxes, would you?” she whispered to Keith. “If I don’t sit down soon I’m gonna fall down.” Silence.

  “Keith?”

  Looking over her shoulder, Sian saw to her horror that her so-called partner was sprinting away through the trees as fast as his pudgy little legs could carry him. Moments later she realized why. Two burly men in overalls materialized out of thin air, grabbed hold of her roughly, and pinned her arms behind her back.

  “Let go of me!” she screamed, kicking her legs uselessly like a captured cartoon character as they frog-marched her to the front of the house.

  “Get off! This is assault!”

  “No it’s not, love,” said the larger of the men. “It’s a citizen’s arrest. You’re trespassing. And you’re caught. So be a good girl and sit quietly until the old bill gets here. All right?”

  Two hours later, stuck in a cell in Swiss Cottage police station, Sian racked her brains trying to think whom else she could call.

  Simon, her editor, who only hours ago had been plaguing her nonstop with phone calls, had mysteriously disappeared in her hour of need. Probably holed up with the paper’s lawyers somewhere figuring out how best to throw her to the wolves without getting his own hands dirty. Lola would have been her next call. She was a grand master at talking herself out of trouble. But unfortunately she was on vacation in Hawaii with Marti and totally incommunicado. Paddy was in Dubai.

  She was rapidly running out of options.

  “No one’s given me a lawyer, you know,” she shouted through the door to the duty sergeant. “I’m entitled to a lawyer. And a phone call. I know my rights. I’m an American citizen!” she added, more than a touch desperately.

  “This is a north London nick, love, not NYPD Blue,” said the sergeant, brilliantly managing to roll his eyes without looking up from his Sun crossword. “The DI’ll get round to you as soon as he can. In the meantime, there’s a pay phone in the corner there, and a paper if yo
u’re bored. You can ring whoever you like.”

  Feeling slightly deflated—partly because she had no one to call, and partly because being arrested was a lot more dramatic on TV—Sian picked up the copy of the Daily Express lying on the Formica table in her cell and gave it a desultory glance. Murphy’s law decreed that the first thing she saw, slapped across the society pages, was a picture of Ben and Bianca.

  It wasn’t the first time she’d seen them pictured together, of course. Being so showstoppingly stunning, Bianca was a natural favorite with the picture editors, and since becoming the new face of Marks & Spencer her profile in the UK had shot up even further. She and Ben were rapidly becoming an It-couple to rival Posh and Becks.

  Sian wished she could just ignore them, but working for a tabloid made it doubly hard. It had been three years since she’d last seen Ben in person. But she’d never forgotten the humiliation of that day, at his going-away party, when he’d walked out on her in front of all those people. Even now, thinking back to it made her flush with embarrassment.

  Why did she even care anymore? All that stuff had happened eons ago, back in another life when she was a lowly maid from Butt-Fuck-Nowhere, New Jersey. Now she was a reporter for a national newspaper, living abroad, with a nice boyfriend and an awesome apartment. She’d moved on, hadn’t she? Who gave a shit what Ben self-righteous Slater did, or who he did it with?

  “Know ’im, do you?”

  The duty sergeant, who was actually a kind man, came in with a cup of tea he’d made for her. They certainly didn’t do that on NYPD Blue.

  “Not really,” said Sian. “I used to. He’s a jerk,” she added, taking the tea gratefully.

  “He’s a rich jerk though, isn’t he?” said the sergeant. Sian shrugged.

  “Listen, love. A word to the wise,” he said. “If I had a rich mate like that, I’d get him on the blower, sharpish.”

  “You want me to call Ben?” Sian translated. She was getting quite adroit at deciphering cockneyisms these days. “Why would I do that? I told you, he’s a jerk.”

  They were alone in the cell, but the sergeant still looked around him and lowered his voice before he spoke again.

  “The DI hasn’t been in to see you yet because he’s still interviewing Sir Jago,” he whispered. “If the shouting’s anything to go by, I’d say the old git wants to make an example of you and your paper. You ’eard from your editor yet?”

  Sian shook her head nervously.

  “No. I thought not,” said the sergeant. “They’re hanging you out to dry, love. You need a decent brief and you need him right now. The bloke they’re sending you from legal aid is a muppet. Couldn’t argue ’is way out of a paper bag.”

  “But…but…you don’t understand,” stammered Sian. “I can’t call Ben. Certainly not to ask him for a favor. Uh-uh, no way. I’d rather die.”

  The sergeant shrugged. “Up to you, love. Of course, I don’t know the bloke. But if it were me, I’d swallow my pride. I’d say you need all the help you can get.”

  He returned to his desk, leaving Sian pacing the room, willing herself to think of someone, anyone else she knew in England who could help her. Surely somebody here owed her one? Or simply cared enough to get involved?

  But try as she might, she couldn’t dredge up a name, and panic was starting to get the better of her. Sir Jago Wells was an important man. What if he pulled enough strings to have her sent to prison? Or deported? That would be even worse. The thought of going back to her old life in New Jersey filled her with dread. She couldn’t do it.

  Her hand shook as she punched out the number for directory inquiries.

  “London, please,” she told the operator. “It’s a company called Stellar, in the City, EC I think. Yeah. You can put me straight through.”

  Honor watched as the last few passengers from the United LA flight straggled into the arrivals hall at JFK. Still no sign of Tina. Please, please let her not have missed the fucking plane. Not today.

  But no. Miraculously, there she was, floating through the double doors in a flouncy gypsy skirt and waist-length beads like a top-heavy Joni Mitchell, flashing a two-fingered peace sign to the ubiquitous paparazzi.

  “Hey.” Drifting over to Honor, she enveloped her in a photo-friendly hug. “Sorry it took so long. I had some trouble with one of the customs guys.”

  “I’m not surprised,” said Honor, reeling from the overpowering smell of marijuana on her sister’s clothes and hair. “How’d you talk your way out of that one?”

  Tina flashed her a wicked smile. “I didn’t need to talk.”

  Honor felt almost relieved. Evidently her Mother Teresa of Topanga makeover didn’t run that deep.

  “Thanks for coming,” she said, pulling out of the airport onto the expressway twenty minutes later, once the paps had finally let them leave, and swerving into the fast lane as soon as she got a chance. “I appreciate it.”

  They were on their way back to Palmers. Honor had arranged a dinner with a possible investor tonight, an Australian hotelier called Baz Murray, who was looking to link his small chain with a high-visibility brand in the US. He’d specifically asked to meet both sisters together. Evidently the Australian public was a lot more relaxed about sex scandals than their American counterparts, and it was the Palmer family connection that really interested him. Honor had put a call in to Tina with low hopes, but to her simultaneous amazement, relief, and terror, Tina had agreed to fly in for the meeting.

  Petra had done her best to sabotage things by throwing an impromptu celebrity birthday party at the Herrick tonight and inviting Murray along. How she knew he was in town was anybody’s guess, but as the woman had more spies in the hospitality industry than the CIA, it was more of an annoyance than a surprise. In any case, to Honor’s great delight, Baz had turned her down, earning himself untold brownie points in Honor’s book. As long as Tina didn’t say or do anything too outrageous over drinks, things were looking good. God knew they needed a cash injection, and fast.

  “You are, er…you are gonna change before dinner, right?” Honor asked, glancing at Tina’s gaping peasant blouse disapprovingly.

  “You should talk,” said Tina, shooting her a look that was more pissed than peace.

  It was a fair point. Honor had been in such a rush this morning, she was still in her workout clothes: a pair of juicy velour sweatpants and a blue Nike tank top that clung to her small, sweaty frame so tightly that her nipples were clearly visible. Shit. What if they showed up in the pictures those photographers had just snapped at the airport? They were bound to, weren’t they, circled in the goddamn National Enquirer? That was all she needed.

  “So,” said Tina, changing the subject. “I heard about Lucas coming back to East Hampton. What do you think? Is he serious?”

  Honor bit her lip. How could Tina talk about Lucas’s plans as if they were nothing more than an interesting tidbit of local gossip? Had she forgotten that it was Lucas who’d tried to ruin them in the first place? And who’d damn near succeeded?

  But she had to try to stay on her sister’s good side, at least until tomorrow. Of course, if it weren’t for Tina’s feckless spending, they wouldn’t need to suck up to an outside investor. But that was beside the point now.

  “I doubt it,” she said, with admirable calm. “He’s probably just shooting his mouth off as usual. Trying to gain some publicity for Luxe Paris. But we’ll see.”

  For the rest of the journey, she steered the conversation toward safer topics, where they were bound to agree, like Lise and what a bitch she was and their dreadful, money-grubbing cousin Jacob Foster. “Did you see that interview he did with US Weekly about me discovering Jesus?” ranted Tina indignantly. “As if my spirituality could be confined by one religion. And as if that freak show even knows me!”

  By the time they reached the windswept outskirts of East Hampton, they were back on amicable terms.

  “That’s funny,” said Tina idly, watching a fire truck thunder through the dreary la
ndscape of marshland and empty holiday homes, and saying a tiny prayer of thanks that this place was Honor’s life and not hers. “That’s the second fire engine to pass us in the last five minutes.”

  “Probably got a call to come deal with the smoke blowing out of Petra Kamalski’s ass,” muttered Honor.

  They both laughed.

  But a few minutes later, their smiles disappeared. As they neared Palmers, a huge, gray mushroom cloud of smoke loomed in front of them. Soon it had all but filled the windshield, plunging the road ahead into darkness like a solar eclipse. Honor slowed the car. Moments later a cop emerged out of the gloom, waving at her to stop.

  Winding down the window, she was immediately hit in the face by a gust of acrid smoke so strong it made her eyes water. This must be quite some fire.

  “I’m sorry, ma’am, I’m gonna have to ask you to turn around,” said the cop. Honor didn’t recognize him. He was young and obviously new in town, and he had the intent, nervous look of someone seriously out of his depth.

  “No, no,” she said, nodding at the road in front of her. “You don’t understand. We have to get through. My hotel’s down there.”

  “You mean Palmers?” said the young man. He’d obviously mistaken her for a guest. “I’m afraid that’s where the fire is coming from, ma’am. There’s no need to panic,” he added, seeing Honor’s face drain of color and her hands start to shake. “Everyone’s been evacuated safely. We’re only talking property damage.”

  Honor shot out of the car. Pushing past the cop, she ran blindly through the makeshift roadblock and into the smoke.

  “Miss. Miss!” he yelled ineffectually after her. “You can’t go down there!”

  “Leave her.” Tina got out of the car more slowly and stared toward the beach in disbelief. She’d never seen smoke like it. “Trust me, officer. My sister can take care of herself.”

  A couple of the young cop’s colleagues, alerted by the shouting, ran after Honor. But years of training meant she was fitter than all of them and was easily able to shake them off in the maze of sandy alleyways that led to the rear of the Palmers complex.