Boot Camp Bride (18 page)

‘You didn’t know Rafa before his trip to Colombia, did you?’ Vanessa asked.

Charlee was forced to admit that was true. She’d heard him mentioned, of course, as if he was the best thing since organic, wholemeal Poilâne bread - but they hardly moved in the same circles. Ffinch was in the stratosphere while she was firmly anchored to earth.

‘No, I didn’t,’ she admitted.

‘He came back from South America a changed man. Mood swings, dark moments, lapses in concentration. He hasn’t taken one photo since.’

Vanessa and Sally traded a look. If Charlee didn’t know better, she’d suspect them of raining on her parade. But she dismissed the idea as ridiculous, even they couldn’t be that mean - could they? Besides it couldn’t be true about him not having taken a photograph since - he’d taken plenty of the Prince and Anastasia Markova on Christmas Eve.

‘Well he would react like that, wouldn’t he?’ she snapped, deciding to put paid to their scheming. ‘He’s lucky to be alive and he knows it. It’s bound to colour his view of the world.’ Her nose began to prickle and her throat tightened as a wave of empathy washed over her. When she spoke her voice was rough with emotion. ‘The book, and raising money for the hospital boat is his way of repaying his debt to the people who saved him, and at great risk to themselves.’

She turned away from them, and was about to say ‘I don’t have the time for this’, when Vanessa made a grab for her sleeve.

‘Ask yourself this, Montague. How many people actually escape the Contras, or live to tell the tale if the ransom isn’t paid?’ She raised her eyebrows to her hairline. ‘How many?’ she repeated for emphasis.

‘I’m grateful for your concern but … I’ve got to pack. So if you don’t mind?’

‘Of course, we just wanted to be sure that you know what you’ve taken on.’

Charlee detached herself from Vanessa’s python-like grip and backed out of the kitchen before they could undermine her belief in Ffinch and her faith in her own judgment. She threw everything into her bag and hurried to the lift. Her heart was still beating madly when she reached the ground floor and stepped into
What’cha!
’s sunlit atrium.

Of course, Vanessa and Sally were pouring poison in her ear - she was smart enough to know that. They were jealous as hell that she had become engaged to Ffinch, even if neither of them had been in the running. However, once she was on the bus and heading back for the mews, she removed the piece of creased paper from the pouch at the back of her Moleskine diary and read through the list of forbidden topics again.

How many people actually escape from the Contras and live to tell the tale? Charlee didn’t know; but she’d make it her business to find out.

Chapter Twenty-three
Forget the Bucket and Spade

It was a frosty afternoon and the sun was burning low on the horizon as Charlee and Ffinch headed for north-west Norfolk.

Charlee was glad of the excuse to slip on her wrap-around sunglasses against the glare because they concealed her expression. She’d spent two days brooding over her conversation with Vanessa and Sally. And, despite all best attempts, some of their poison had dripped into her ear and seeped into her brain. She glanced sideways at Ffinch as he drove along the twisting road from Fakenham to Wells-next-the-Sea. He looked buoyed up and exhilarated, more than was reasonable given that their mission was to catch a Russian supermodel with mud on her plimsolls.

What was she missing? She tapped her teeth with her thumbnail and drew her brows together in concentration.

‘You’re quiet, Montague. Why does that fill me with
dis
quiet?’ Ffinch asked and, when she didn’t answer, added, ‘Anxious about the mission?’

‘I’m worried that Anastasia might recognise me from the nightclub,’ she prevaricated.

‘Take it from me, she won’t. She spends her life surrounded by her ‘people’ - gophers, hangers-on and the like. She probably wouldn’t recognise her own sister unless she wore a name badge and carried a backstage pass.’

‘Ouch. That was pretty cynical, even for you,’ Charlee responded.

‘Even for me?’ Ffinch gave her words some consideration before asking with deceptive quietness, ‘And what would you know about me?’

‘Nothing. Absolutely nothing.’ His words stung and Charlee returned to watching the bare fields sweep past, feeling cast down. Ffinch let out a breath and loosened the long scarf which he wore, muffler-like around his neck, as if he was suddenly too hot. Turning left at the junction, they skirted the top of Wells-next-the-Sea and headed towards Holkham.

‘What would you like to know?’ he asked resignedly, after a few miles of uncomfortable silence.

‘Okay, bite my head off if you must, but I want to know what happened on your trip to Darien.’ She turned in her seat to look at him. Like her, his expression was hidden behind sunglasses but she could tell from the way one corner of his mouth quirked in irritation that this information was being dragged out of him.

‘It’s something I’d rather forget, but it’s something …’ he paused, searching for the right words.

‘Something you can’t forget?’

‘That’s it,’ he sounded surprised that she understood. ‘Okay, long story short - I set out to take photographs while my research team took notes for the last chapter of my book. Chapter Ten - Darien.’ He glanced at her and when she looked back at him, blankly, gave her a dark look. Charlee’s crime was soon made plain to her. ‘You haven’t read the book, have you Montague? I might have known.’ Although he made light of her indifference to his magnum opus, she could tell that he was smarting just the same.

‘Come on Ffinch, be fair. When have I had time? It’s been full on since we met at your book launch … ’

‘As if I could forget.’ His tone seemed to imply that he would gladly forget every second of their contentious partnership, and that hurt. ‘You strike me as the sort of person who recycles presents she doesn’t want - or value. Gives them to a brother, for example?’ Charlee blanched; so he had seen his book on the kitchen table on Christmas Day and had been waiting for the right moment to bring it up. Oh, he was cute, very cute, and had her bang to rights.

‘Never mind all that. You can give me another one,’ she said cheekily. ‘Carry on with your story.’

‘Very well. I wanted to photograph the indigenous people of the rainforest - write about how the twenty-first century had impacted on their lives: trees being cleared for logging or cattle ranches, strangers bringing in viruses for which they had no immunity, guerrillas forcing them to work in the marijuana fields and using them as drugs mules.’

Drugs. Charlee glanced up, sharply. Maybe there was some truth in Vanessa and Sally’s words. A photo journalist like Ffinch could pretty much go as he please, slipping over borders - his camera and passport his only credentials.

‘Go on,’ she urged. They travelled on with Holkham beach just visible through the trees, and, on their left, deer could be seen grazing in the woods behind a brick wall which marked the Earl of Leicester’s land. But she couldn’t afford to be distracted by the view; this moment might never come again.

‘We set off, well prepared: guides, native speakers, two undergrads keen to help with my research. Two armed guards.’ He let out a long breath, removed his scarf and unzipped his coat as if he was uncomfortably warm. ‘Foolishly, arrogantly, I thought - with my father being Brazilian and my South American connections - I’d be …’ he struggled for the word.

‘Safe?’ Charlee supplied.

‘Safe-r.’ He stressed the last letter and shook his head at what he now perceived to be his folly. ‘No one’s really safe there.’

 ‘You were wrong?’

‘Very wrong. The first night we camped on the edge of the rainforest - it was a fabulous experience, listening to the animals calling to each other in the darkness. I couldn’t wait to make contact with the indigenous people; it had all been prearranged through interpreters and the Ministry for the Interior. Then …’ he paused. Plainly, recalling the moment it all went wrong was distressing. ‘In the middle of the night - gunfire, chaos, confusion. We were dragged from our tents, roughed up, our belongings rifled - all the good stuff, cameras, mobiles and medicine, taken. Then they marched us through the rainforest. For days.’

‘All your team?’ She felt uncomfortable probing for more details, but in order to understand him, she needed to know everything that had happened.

‘No, our armed guards and our guides disappeared into the jungle in the confusion. Or maybe that’d been agreed upon - as payment for alerting the kidnappers to our presence. Who knows? Only I, my camera crew and the two students from Colombia University were taken.’

‘You were the cash cows,’ Charlee put in. ‘Europeans.’

‘Exactly. The idea, I believe, was to hold us for ransom and when the money was paid they would release us.’

She frowned. ‘You believe - don’t you know for sure? Isn’t that what the Contras do?’

Ffinch laughed harshly. ‘Everyone says we were kidnapped by the Contras but the truth is less romantic and more prosaic.’ He pulled a face at romantic, showing that he considered the notion ridiculous. ‘We were kidnapped by one of the many illegal armed groups operating around the coca, marijuana and opium poppy fields. The Aguilas Negra - the Black Eagles - or the ELN, probably working in collusion with our native guides.’

‘Ejército de Liberación Nacional - The National Liberation Army,’ Charlee added, taking the opportunity to remind him that she’d studied Politics as well as Languages at university. He shouldn’t underestimate her simply because of her current lowly position at
What’cha!
She was worth more than that. She deserved more than that.

‘You’ve got the accent down to a tee.’ He nodded his approval almost absent-mindedly. They were bowling along the road to Thornham but Charlee knew that he was back in Darien. ‘There was a problem with communication. The patois which the kidnappers spoke was so far removed from the Bogotá Spanish spoken by the undergrads and myself that we could barely understand them.’

They drove along in silence for several minutes while Charlee assimilated this information. She glanced over the low hedges and dun-coloured fields stretching towards the salt marshes where the sea was a black line on the horizon. The landscape perfectly suited their sombre mood.

‘What happened next?’ she prompted.

‘It started to rain and didn’t let up for days. They marched us through the rainforest stopping only to feed us basic rations or to let us sleep - while they smoked dope or chewed coca leaves. Elena was the first to fall ill. She was so young …’ his voice wavered, as if the memory was more than he could bear. Then he coughed to clear his throat and changed the subject, signifying that Charlee would learn no more that day ‘The sea goes wa-ay out when it’s high tide, then it gathers itself and rushes forward, like a mini tsunami. In certain places where the water is funnelled, it comes rushing in almost as fast as a man can walk.’

Hiding her frustration at the swift change of subject, Charlee looked where he was pointing. She wanted to know more about what had happened in Darien - not be treated to a learned exposition on tide tables. But she knew it was best not to push it.

 Tides.

She sat bolt upright, remembering the conversation she’d overhead in the mews kitchen. What had Ffinch said …Yes, the night of the high tide; I’ve checked the tide tables and the internet - twice. Stop worrying, it’ll be fine. You’ll be there? Good. No, she has no idea and that’s how I intend to keep it . . .

Charlee racked her brain but couldn’t see the connection between high tide, a boot camp for brides, a Russian supermodel and a mysterious phone call conducted in Spanish in the middle of the night. One glance at Ffinch’s closed expression showed he did not intend to elucidate further on the matter, or to return to the subject of his kidnapping. Sensing that, she slid lower in her seat and remained silent as the camper van ate up the miles. God, Norfolk was bleak, especially in the fading light of a January afternoon when the sun was setting, taking its meagre warmth with it. She was going to freeze to death at the boot camp. Fact.

But compared to the vicissitudes that Ffinch and his team had faced in Darien, freezing to death in Norfolk would be a walk in the park.

It was properly dark by the time they reached Thornham and The Ship Inn. As Ffinch parked the VW in the car park across the road from the inn, birdwatchers returning from the marshes with cameras and binoculars strung round their necks bade them good evening. They consisted mainly of retired couples in matching waterproofs, woolly hats and muddy boots. Ffinch took the heavier of their bags out of the back of the camper and left two smaller ones for Charlee to carry. Even so, she walked stiffly after the long drive from London and almost dragged them behind her.

‘Have a care, Montague, those cases are vintage Louis Vuitton,’ Ffinch said. Charlee couldn’t tell if he was joking or not, that was the trouble with him. But she guessed that he was. He’d showed scant regard for material possessions during the short time she’d known him. It was as if he’d reached a place in his life where objects held no intrinsic value for him. But, maybe that was because he had - or could have - everything he wanted?

‘You are such a poseur,’ she said under her breath, but meaning it as a joke.

‘I heard that,’ Ffinch said, holding open the heavy door of the former smugglers’ inn. ‘Glad you’ve recovered your sense of humour and your enthusiasm for what we have to accomplish. I know you’re on top form when you make plain your low opinion of me. I was beginning to think I would have to send for Sally to replace you, but you’ve bucked up and - here we are.’

Charlee didn’t have a low opinion of him, quite the reverse. Actually, the more she learned about what had happened in Colombia, the greater her respect for him. It was the knowledge that he was withholding information from her which was seriously pissing her off.

Didn’t he know that he could trust her with his life?

They walked into the dark interior and Ffinch deposited their bags by the reception desk. A huge fire was burning in a fireplace which almost filled one wall of the square, flagstoned hall. Low lamps had been lit and people were strolling through into the low-ceilinged bars for their first drink of the evening. There was a nice buzz about the place; it was all very welcoming and just what Charlee needed. She let out a sigh of relief and her shoulders, which had been practically pinned to her ears all the way here, relaxed and dropped.

‘Fonseca-Ffinch and Miss Montague,’ Ffinch announced to the receptionist.

True to form the woman gave him a bright smile, almost purring as she handed over his key. She passed Charlee’s key to her almost as an afterthought, but her gaze rested briefly on Granny’s ring and her eyes widened. Then her polite, corporate expression fell back into place. But it was easy to tell she thought any woman who had the opportunity to share Ffinch’s bed, but chose not to, was either a fool, a close blood relation - or Amish.

‘Up the stairs and turn right. Your rooms are next to each other, as requested.’

‘Thank you, Susanne.’ Ffinch read the name on her lapel badge and gave her a smile that made her come over all unnecessary. ‘And we are booked in for dinner?’

‘A table for two at eight o’clock, Mr Fonseca-Ffinch.’ She tripped over his name but then remembered to ask: ‘Do you need any help with your luggage, madam?’

‘I think we’re okay. Can you manage, darling?’ Ffinch asked, smiling down at Charlee like she was indeed his beloved fiancée.

‘You know me, ever resourceful,’ she retorted, adding ‘sweetie.’ The receptionist looked as if she was trying to puzzle out their relationship. Sweetie? Darling? Two separate rooms? Then, clearly deciding it was none of her business, she shrugged.

Ffinch led the way up the wide staircase with its faded tartan carpet and uneven treads. The old inn was so atmospheric that Charlee had no trouble imagining it as the haunt of smugglers who had navigated the creeks at high tide and landed brandy, tobacco and lace when the revenue men weren’t looking. Was Ffinch a modern-day smuggler, she wondered? Vanessa’s list of his alleged illegal activities echoed in her tired brain: gun running, drug smuggling, money laundering.