Here Come the Girls (46 page)

Chapter 71

‘How do I look?’ asked Frankie, head to foot in white shimmering sequins.

‘Like a million-dollar glamorous snowman,’ laughed Roz in black silk. The others were also in black: a long figure-hugging crushed velvet number for Olive, a black strapless taffeta gown with a feather boa draped around the shoulders for Ven.

It was Black-and-White Night and, with a few exceptions, most people had stuck religiously to the monochrome theme.

‘Champagne, darlings?’ asked Ven, gliding into the Vista lounge.

‘No, let’s have some ice wine,’ purred Frankie, answering the disapproving look Ven gave her by adding, ‘not because it’s cheaper, just because I like it as much, if not more.’

She waved at Vaughan, pulling at his white collar, trying to find some space for his neck. He waved back shyly and made to come over.

‘We’ll meet you by the window,’ grinned Ven, and the three of them moved away to give the couple some space.

‘You look lovely,’ said Vaughan.

‘So do you,’ replied Frankie, trying not to sigh like a schoolgirl.

‘Didn’t you get my answering machine messages?’

‘Answering machine?’ said Frankie, puzzled.

‘I rang your cabin and left a message. Wasn’t there a flashing light on your phone?’

‘I never thought to look at it. Oh God, sorry.’

Vaughan looked visibly relieved. ‘Phew, I thought you were avoiding me,’ he said.

‘Why would I do that?’ said Frankie, giving him a wide grin.

‘Frankie, I know it’s hard on board . . .’

‘Well, it was in Gibraltar,’ she winked.

‘Let me finish, you minx,’ he said. ‘I know it’s
hard to meet
on board because you’re with your friends and I’ve got my family, but what do you think about . . . would you like . . . Okay, here it is.’ He coughed. ‘How would you like to come back home with me after the cruise? I want to get to know you.’

‘Yes,’ she said immediately. ‘That would be wonderful.’

‘Wow, that was easier than I thought it was going to be,’ said Vaughan, almost sweating with relief.

‘For an ex-Hell’s Angel, you aren’t half a wuss,’ Frankie told him. ‘So, what did you say on your answering machine message?’

‘Message-
s
,’ amended Vaughan. ‘You’ll have to listen to them.’ He waved them away bashfully.

‘No, tell me,’ said Frankie.

Vaughan started pulling at his collar again. ‘I said I really enjoyed myself with you – not just the sex,’ he said, ‘although that was pretty hot, if I’m honest. I just asked if you’d meet up with me for a coffee or something. I wanted to see you again.’

He was so adorably uncomfortable saying all this to her face that she wanted to grab him and start snogging him.

‘I can do better than coffee, Vaughan,’ said Frankie. ‘If you fancy some more wild rampant sex come to my cabin at eleven tonight. And wear those clothes, because I want to rip them right off you.’

Vaughan grabbed her, tilted her back Hollywood-style and kissed her full on the mouth.

‘There, that was me not being a wuss – happy now?’

‘Very,’ Frankie said through a breathless grin.

‘See you later then, Brown Eyes,’ imitating Humphrey Bogart. Both his party and Frankie’s were cheering in the background. Frankie joined the girls at the bar table wearing a smile as wide as the Straits of Gibraltar.

Five minutes before the call to dinner, Ven went to deliver her anniversary card to the Ambrosia restaurant for Florence and Dennis. She located tables five and four so she was in the right quarter, but when she looked around there were no tables with any balloons on them. She hailed a passing head waiter.

‘Could you tell me where table one is, please?’ she asked.

‘Table one? There is no table one, ma’am,’ he replied. ‘Table two is the first number. Who are you looking for?’

‘An old couple – Florence and Dennis. I don’t know their surname. She has white hair, if that helps.’ It obviously didn’t because the head waiter was shaking his head.

‘Not in first or second sitting in this restaurant, ma’am. Are you sure it is not the Olympia restaurant where these people are eating?’

‘Maybe,’ replied Ven, although she was sure that she hadn’t got her facts mixed up. She took a slow walk through the restaurant hoping to spot Florence taking her seat. Maybe the old lady had got her table numbers mixed up. Oh damn.

There was a table one in the Olympia, but it was for eight people and the head waiter in that quarter also shook his head as Ven described the old couple. As she weaved her way through the tables to their own, she could see Frankie’s grin a mile off. She envied her friend that look on her face and her budding relationship with Vaughan, who really was a bit of top totty now he had got all that hair off his face. He had kind eyes, like Nigel’s.
Nigel
. She should have grown out of all this holiday-romance stuff at her age. It didn’t get any better and she knew she was in for a rough ride when she got home, dreaming about what snogging Nigel would have been like and knowing she would never find out. Okay, so life would be fun looking for a new house, but it wouldn’t make her knees go weak like a whiff of Nigel’s aftershave did. Money didn’t keep you warm at nights or make your heart gallop.

Nigel pulled the chair out for her and tucked her underneath the table.

‘What a beautiful dress,’ he said over her shoulder. She felt the heat of his breath on her skin and gave a delighted little shudder.

‘Thank you,’ said Ven. ‘It’s out of the shit shop, Ship Shot . . . SHIP SHOP!’ Bang goes my class act yet again, she thought, cringing inwardly.

‘Bit of a tongue-twister, “ship shop”,’ said Irene kindly, although she managed to say it without making a total prat of herself.

‘Good job your dress sense is better than your control of the English language, gel,’ said Royston. ‘Doesn’t our Ven look lovely tonight, Captain?’ And he gave a big juicy wink to Ven.

‘Indeed,’ said Nigel diplomatically. ‘As do all the ladies on this table.’

Ven turned to Frankie and whispered through gritted teeth, ‘I hope none of you lot told Royston I fancied Nigel.’

‘Don’t be daft,’ she replied. ‘Although I might have let it slip out to Stella.’

‘Great!’ said Ven. As if things weren’t bad enough with her verbal Tourettes, now she was going to have to endure Royston’s amateur matchmaking. He was about as subtle as a sledgehammer with a self-playing vuvuzela attached.

‘This is my favourite night,’ said Stella. ‘I love to see all the variations on black and white.’ Then she cast an exasperated glance at her husband, who was wearing a white jacket, matching white trousers and shoes, black shirt and piano tie. With his tan in full bloom he looked like a photo-negative.

Ven was still blushing and shaking her head at herself. She was looking at the menu but not reading it because her brain was too busy calling her a total berk. Nigel gave her a gentle nudge to alert her to the fact that Buzz was waiting to take her order.

‘The ham then the halibut, please,’ said Ven. At least there was nothing to mispronounce with those two.

‘Are you all right tonight, Venice?’ asked Nigel. ‘You seem a little . . . distracted.’

Too right she was distracted. The way Nigel said her name echoed in her head. ‘Venice . . . Venice . . . Venice.
Come to bed, Venice, I have things to do to you
. . .’

She coughed. ‘Yes, I’m fine,’ she said. ‘I’m just not looking forward to going home. I think I’ve enjoyed myself too much.’

‘Join the club,’ said Stella. ‘You want to book yourself another holiday at the future-cruise desk by Reception. You’ll get some on-board spending money included if you do.’

‘I just might,’ said Ven, trying to gee herself up to be a bit more cheerful. After all, she could afford it now – she was a millionairess.
A very lonely millionairess with a major crush on the guy sitting next to her
. If that wasn’t a mix of emotions, then she didn’t know what was.

‘I did most of our packing today,’ said Irene, as if Ven wasn’t depressed enough that she’d have to pack tomorrow as well.

‘Oh no.’ Stella waved a perfectly manicured hand to dismiss that thought. ‘Last-minute for us. I don’t even want to think about packing.’

‘What are your plans when you get home?’ Nigel asked Ven.

‘House hunting,’ said Ven with a loaded sigh. At the moment, all the hassle of moving wasn’t thrilling her.
Not even with all that money in the bank to spend on a country pile
.

‘Sometimes they have spare cabins on following cruises and you can pay and just stay on,’ said Royston. ‘We’ve done that a couple of times, haven’t we, Stell?’

‘Alas, not on the next cruise on this ship,’ announced Nigel. ‘We’re docking for a few days for some decorating before we head up to Iceland.’

‘Will you stop off at Morrisons?’ Eric quipped, proud that everyone joined in with his laughter.

‘Are you staying aboard, Captain?’ asked Royston.

‘I’m making a flying visit up to Ayr to see my mother and stepfather actually,’ replied Nigel. ‘I haven’t seen them for over six months and I’ll be in trouble if I leave it any longer.’

As dessert was served, the waiters began to gather at a table of eight nearby and sang ‘Congratulations’. Olive noticed they were serenading the couple who had got married earlier on. The snow-haired bride was in the most beautiful white suit, the groom in a white tuxedo. Even the little boy had a mini-tuxedo on.

‘Did you marry that couple this morning?’ Ven asked.

‘Yes, indeed I did,’ replied Nigel. ‘Lovely people. Actually, they’re from Yorkshire too. He’s a dentist.’

‘Do you do lots of weddings, Captain?’ asked Irene.

‘It’s becoming very popular,’ said Nigel.

‘There you go, Venice,’ began Royston, and Ven closed her eyes against what embarrassing thing he was going to come out with next. He didn’t disappoint. ‘Any chance of getting you married off before we dock? You married, Captain?’

Oh God, I am going to kill my friends and their big mouths, thought Venice and leaped in to change the course of the conversation before Nigel ended up as red-faced as she was becoming.

‘Is there any way of trying to find a pair of passengers just by their first names, Nigel?’

Nigel asked her to elaborate and Ven explained about Florence and Dennis and being unable to find table one in the Ambrosia restaurant.

‘There is no table one – the head waiter wasn’t making it up,’ said Nigel. ‘It was considered unlucky after what happened.’

Eric was nodding, looking like a little kid in class with his arm raised to breaking-point, desperate to tell Teacher the answer.

‘We were on the maiden voyage of this ship, weren’t we, Irene?’

‘Yes, we were,’ affirmed Irene. ‘And in the Ambrosia restaurant, first sitting.’

‘The couple on table one were both dead before we got to Gibraltar, which was the first port of call on that cruise.’

‘Such a shame. They were due to celebrate their Diamond Wedding on the Black-and-White Ball night, but she had a stroke on the first night.’

‘And he had a heart-attack when they told him she’d died,’ continued Irene.

‘Ships are fraught with superstition,’ said Eric. ‘Which is why there’s no thirteenth floor on a lot of them. The powers-that-be decided that table one would be unlucky so they don’t have one in that restaurant. Because of what happened to that poor old couple.’

Ven was confused now. ‘What were they called?’

‘Haven’t a clue,’ said Eric. ‘I dare say there will be a record of it somewhere. Internet maybe?’

‘Someone’s spinning you a yarn, girl,’ Royston grinned at Ven. ‘Either that or you’ve been talking to ghosts.’

‘I don’t believe in ghosts,’ said Ven. She took a loaded spoonful of her ice cream, but it wasn’t that which made her shiver.

The ship’s photographers then approached and announced they were doing table shots.

‘Oh yes, we’ll have one of those!’ Royston spoke for them all. The girls were expertly arranged behind the two couples, Nigel standing in the middle, his arms around Ven and Olive. Soon that’s all she would have left to remind her of him – a wispy memory of his arm around her and this photograph and two handkerchiefs that she kept promising to return to him.
Chuffing hell, Ven, cheer up, will you?
said a voice inside.
You aren’t half a miserable cow, considering you’re on a cruise ship with a couple of million quid in the bank!
She drew a little comfort from the fact that the posed party seemed in no rush to disassemble. Nigel’s arm stayed around her for seconds longer than it did around Olive, though it felt much longer.
God, you’re a saddo, analysing everything like this, Ven Smith!

During coffee, Royston asked, ‘Will you be dining with us tomorrow night, Captain?’ Ven waited for the answer, heart in her mouth.

‘I very much hope so,’ replied Nigel. ‘I can never say for definite, alas. It all depends what is happening up on the bridge.’

‘Oh, it would be a shame not to see you on the last night,’ said Irene.

‘It most certainly would, wouldn’t it, girls?’ said Royston, giving Ven a big juicy wink. It was like having an embarrassing uncle hell-bent on trying to make her blush.

Nigel stood to go. ‘Well, have a very enjoyable evening, everyone. I hear the theatre company’s production tonight is very, very good.’

‘Aren’t they all?’ said Royston. ‘That little gay-boy dancer is an absolute star. I could watch him all night.’

‘You can’t say “gay-boy dancer”!’ shrieked Stella. ‘You don’t even know he’s gay for a start!’

‘Oh, come on, love,’ said Royston. ‘Poncing about on stage like that, he makes Larry Grayson look like Bruce Willis.’

Everyone was laughing – even Nigel, though he was trying not to. Royston was a dear maverick both in his speech and dress. Ven, especially, found that she was going to miss him very much, despite his rubbish attempts at matchmaking.

‘Come on.’ Frankie nudged Ven, watching her watching Nigel leave the restaurant. Her friend had it bad and Frankie wished she could do what they did when they were younger – tell the boy in question that ‘my mate fancies you’ and force the issue out into the open. But all the money in the world couldn’t take them back into the past.