The Man Who Made Husbands Jealous (56 page)

    'Can't you read? This is private property, you stupid bitch. You're trespassing as well as stealing.' The words came out like rifle shots.

    'This is a public footpath.'

    'Was,' snapped Rannaldini. 'And the wall was always mine. I didn't know you were a thief.'

    Deliberately he stamped on half a dozen sloes, then, removing his shiny brown ankle boot, showed their wounded crimson flesh.

    Rachel winced. 'You bastard!'Looking down, she was appalled to see how transparent the wet grass had made her muslin shift and her cheap white rose-patterned trousers. She could see the moulded line of her breasts and sticking-out nipples, the pink flesh of her legs, and the dark GIVE way sign of her pubic hair. Rannaldini, however, had no intention of giving way.

    'Today I not bastard. I forgeeve them who trespass.'

    Rachel's heart pounded even more painfully, but she couldn't move as he reached out, testing the pudgy warmth of her breast through the drenched muslin.

    'Bra-less in Gaza,' he mocked. 'You certainly advertise your wares.'

    He couldn't tell if her thin face was wet with tears or rain, as his hand strayed downwards. 'No knickers either.'

    'I got up first thing to practise,' stammered Rachel, 'then rushed out in a hurry. I didn't want to be late picking up the children.'

    'You left plenty of time to steal my sloes.' Rannaldini clenched and unclenched his fingers.

    With his other hand he drew her to him, kissing first her forehead, then both her unplucked eyebrows, then her mouth.

    'No!' Suddenly aware she hadn't cleaned her teeth, and loathing herself for minding, Rachel clamped her lips shut.

    'No?' Rannaldini moved away slightly. 'Do you have any choice?'

    His hand slipped inside her sleeve, caressing its way up her arm, pulling at her long, silky armpit hair, before curling round to caress her breasts.

    Rachel gave a moan, trying to duck her head away, as Rannaldini ruffled the slight down on her upper lip with his tongue.

    'Leetle wild thing, eet will be like making love to an animal. A goat perhaps.'

    'I hate you.'

    'No, no, you 'ate yourself for wanting me so much, Mrs Levitsky.'

    Rannaldini relished calling women by the names of the husbands he was cuckolding.

    'I'm not Levitsky any more, I'm back to Grant now. Someone's coming,' gasped Rachel, hearing a snatch of 'For All The Saints' sung in a loud baritone.

    Rannaldini pushed her back on to the ground, crouching beside her, holding his hand, which smelt faintly of Maestro, over her mouth, until the vicar had gone.

    Then, when she tried to leap to her feet, mouth open in protest, Rannaldini plunged his tongue inside, until she forgot her uncleaned teeth and kissed him back. Rannaldini wanted to take her now, but the vicar might surprise them on his return.

    'The kids! I must pick them up!' said Rachel, fighting to-get free.

    Back in his tower, it was Rannaldini who got the number of the school by ringing Kitty. Then he rang the school.

    'Mrs Levitsky is stuck in traffic jam, and will be three-quarters of an hour late. She ask me to ring, she is very, very sorry. But she is not,' he added, switching off the telephone. 'You ought to get out of those wet things,' he said softly, then, sliding his hand down inside her trousers, 'and this is the wettest thing that I should eenstantly get into.'

    'Let me undress myself, for fuck's sake,' snarled Rachel.

    But so overjoyed was Rannaldini by the early conquest of something he thought would take him weeks, perhaps months, that his face assumed a quite uncharacteristic delight and tenderness. He also had a water diviner's skill in testing the depth of women's loneliness. He knew when to be kind.

   'You have been so sad and lonely,' he crooned, drawing her into his arms and stroking her hair. 'You deserve some happiness. This time it will be queek, because of your children, but the next time… it will be ecstatic.'In the long mirror, as Rachel lay back white and slender as a snowdrop against his mahogany chest, they looked wonderfully exotic. Some three inches shorter than her, perched on the back of a grey silk chaise-longue, it was simplicity for him to slide his iron-hard cock slowly in and out of her as he gently caressed her in front with the artistry of a Casals playing a cello concerto.

    But the moment she came Rachel's moans of pleasure turned into wild sobs.

    'Cry, leetle darling,' purred Rannaldini. 'Eet is what you need.'

    'No, no,' wept Rachel. 'It's the wrong person in the mirror. You should be Boris.'

    On Monday morning after Guy and Larry had left for the London train, Marigold and Georgie had got into a habit of ringing each other to grumble about their respective husbands their

    Moan-day session, they called it. As September dragged on with no break in the drought and the recession deepened, Marigold's complaints were increasingly of Larry's stinginess, Georgie's increasingly of Rachel.

    'He's stopped may account at Harvey Nicks,' announced Marigold indignantly the first Monday in October, 'and he's cancelled our box at Covent Garden and he won't let Patch have steak any more.'

    'Better than Guy who's trying to turn poor Dinsdale into a vegan,' said Georgie darkly. 'And he's rigged up a washing-line. I mean, he's never let me hang out clothes even in our brokest days; said it was horrifically suburban. Now his Turnbull & Asser shirts are waving in the lack of wind for all to see.'

    'He could be trayin' to save money.'

    'Rubbish, the only thing Guy is saving at the moment is the whale and the rain forests.'

    'But your marriage has been so much better since Laysander came on the scene.' Alarmed, Marigold detected the old obsessive rattle in Georgie's voice.

    'It was, until Guy started pursuing Rachel. I can't cope, Marigold, it's like going through chemotherapy, then finding another lump.'

    'Ay'm sure you're imaginin' things.'

    'I am not. Guy's started using organic toothpaste, andhe won't have white loo paper in the house, because the "bleach pollutes our waterways", and worst of all,' Georgie's voice rose hysterically, 'Dinsdale came back from a walk smelling of a quite different scent. I'm certain it comes from the Body Shop.'

    'Perhaps Guy wanted to test it on an animal.'

    'Don't make sick jokes. I've lost my sense of humour, and even, even worse, because Rock Star's selling so well overseas, your rotten husband's marketing Guy and Georgie T-shirts and key rings, and even Guy and Georgie balloons. What happens when people rumble how bad our marriage is?'

    'They won't unless you tell them.'

    'And to cap it all, Guy's off to the South of France for three days to look at some private collection, and he's picked the week of my concert so I can't go with him. I caught him admiring himself in the mirror in his new goggles and flippers yesterday. He jumped out of his skin. "Off to save the whales," I said. "The pollution's awful in the Med." He was livid and went into his "Are you mad, Panda? You must see a doctor" routine.'

    Two minutes after ringing off, she rang Marigold back.

    'Oh darling, I'm sorry to bang on. I must still love Guy for him to get so much under my skin.'

    Lysander was so worried about Georgie he bought her a diamond necklace, a beautiful black backless Lycra dress and a book of Fred Basset cartoons. Then, deciding she was barn sour, he tried to take her away for a jaunt to coincide with her concert and Guy's trip to France. Kitty had lost over a stone and could be left unsupervised for a few days.

    But Georgie was nervous of being recognized and only allowed Lysander to join her at the Ritz in her room overlooking Green Park where Catchitune had put her up for the night. Catchitune also sent a limo to collect her from Paradise. But, again to avoid the Press, she made Lysander drive up on his own to join her later in the day.

    Having stayed with Marigold in the Ritz in Paris, Lysander promptly rediscovered the joys of room service. Georgie once again realized how young he was, as he ordered smoked salmon with gauze-wrapped half-lemons, club sandwiches and vast Bloody Marys, then played with the telephone in the bathroom and all the bottles of shampoo and bath gel before discovering a television where he could watch everything from blue movies to Donald Duck.

    Most of all he wanted Georgie to romp with him in the big blue Jacuzzi and take advantage of a huge double bed, flanked by walls of darkened mirrors. But all Georgie wanted to do before a concert was to crash out with cold eye-pads, then spend an hour in trance-like silence making herself beautiful.

    Bewildered that he hadn't satisfied her properly, Lysander took her face in his hands.

    'Georgie darling, please leave Guy and marry me.'

    Georgie smiled. 'That is the sweetest offer I've ever had, but can you imagine what The Scorpion would make of me and my child bridegroom?'

    The concert was a massive success. Georgie sang all her old sixties songs which had just been issued as a CD and were racing up the charts, and then ended with 'Rock Star'. Having got well tanked up beforehand and during the interval in the private Catchitune box, Lysander nearly died of pride. Here was his darling Georgie, who had lain warm and naked in his arms a few hours ago, caressed now by thousands of coloured lights, skipping, dancing round the stage, with a great waving cornfield of clapping hands saluting her. It was so sexy the way her red hair tumbled down her bare back each time she threw back her head and how she seemed to suck, lick and even drink out of the microphone as she belted out these glorious heartbreaking songs hi her yelping, husky, smoke-filled voice. In his diamonds, with her lovely suntanned shoulders rising out of his blackdress, she looked stunningly beautiful and about twenty-five.

    She was backed by the same musicians who'd made Rock Star and a good deal of money in the past six months, and who were delighted to be on stage with her again.

    Lysander liked it least when she sang 'Rock Star'. He barracked noisily and had to be shushed when Guy's handsome manly face was blown up on a screen for Georgie to sing to. The audience, however, cheered and yelled so much she had to sing it again and

    still they wouldn't let her go.

    Here is a talent that can cradle an audience in its hands, and hold them spellbound and captive for two hours, thought Lysander. How dare Rannaldini, Hermione and most of all, Rachel, patronize her.

    She was going to do an encore. As she sat down on the edge of the stage with a guitar slung round her neck, a hush fell on the hall. One spotlight illuminated her; everywhere else was in darkness.

    'Ladies and Gentlemen,' began Georgie in her soft voice with its faint trace of Irish, 'I'd like to try out a new song I've just written this week, which I hope will be part of my new album. At home I have an old dog, whom I love dearly. Like anyone in this situation, I dread the day he dies so I dedicate this song to Dinsdale.'

    Oh, she's so clever, thought Lysander, downing another glass of Moet. 'I never knew she could play the guitar so well.'

    'Old Dog,' began Georgie, in her husky voice, 'you break my heart.

    How many days have I left with you?

    Your muzzle whitens, your steps go slow,

    But your tail still wags and your heart beats true.

    Lie in in the morning, guard your strength,

    Live as long as you possibly can,

    For guys have come and guys will go,

    But you've loved me more than any man.'

    The haunting beauty of the melody redeemed the sentimentality of the words, and at the end, when Georgie bowed her head and waited for the storm of cheering, Lysander wasn't the only one who mopped his eyes.

    It was after midnight before Georgie managed to tear herself away from the well-wishers in the green room. Larry was particularly ecstatic.

    ' "Old Dog" is going to be bigger than "Rock Star",' he said, chewing on his cigar. 'Naughty girl to jump the gun, but if that's anything like the rest of the album, we'll make a killing. We could rush it out as a single. I'll call you tomorrow.'

    'Pity Guy wasn't here, he'd be so proud,' said Marigold.

    'Better change that bit about Guys have come and Guys will go,' said Larry sardonically.

    'That was my best bit,' muttered Lysander.

    'Substitute the word "boy" or "man",' said Larry. 'But it's a great number.'

    'And just the way Ay feel about Patch,' said Marigold, whose mascara had run.

    After a concert, Georgie felt absolutely drained and preferred to go out for a gentle dinner with her agent, or people from the record company who'd talk shop, praise her, and go through every note of her performance, just as Lysander went through every stroke after a polo game. Instead, because she felt momentarily sky-high on adrenalin, adulation and champagne on a very empty stomach, she let Lysander bear her off to a party given by some of his friends.

    'Won't it be over?' said Georgie as they drove through a recession-darkened Knightsbridge.