White Wedding (46 page)

‘Your side, not his,’ said Luke.

‘Oh Luke,’ smiled Max. ‘You’re too nice. Why aren’t you married to someone gorgeous with loads of kids?’

‘Never got over my first love,’ Luke grinned while bashfully scratching his head. ‘I fell for her at college, she wasn’t interested and I never met anyone who could best
her.’

Max’s lips spread out into a long gossipy smile. ‘Who was that, then? No – wait – it’s obvious: Julie Armstrong. All the boys used to salivate over her.’

‘No,’ said Luke, locking his kind grey eyes on to Max’s. ‘No, you numpty, it was you.’

Bel drove far too fast over to her dad’s house. After checking her phone – which she had switched to silent during the meal because she wanted no distractions
– there were four texts from him, all saying the same.

That wasn’t like him. For a start, Bel couldn’t ever remember him texting her in his life. Trevor was notorious for never having his phone with him. It was nearly
always on charge in the kitchen. She had tried to ring him back but it went straight on to voicemail. And Faye wasn’t answering her mobile either. Or the house phone. Something was wrong.
She pressed her foot on the accelerator and wondered what it could be.

Richard was tailing her in his Porsche; she could see him in her rear-view mirror as her car turned into the Nookery’s private drive. Her father’s car wasn’t in its usual
parking space, but there was a taxi with its engine running and the driver reading the newspaper. And, to her annoyance, Shaden’s cocky little sports car was there as well.

Bel threw on the brake and crunched over to the taxi driver. Her first thought was that her father was ill and the taxi was here to take him to hospital.

‘Hi,’ she said, knocking on the window. The taxi driver wound it down. ‘Who are you waiting for?’

‘Didn’t get her name, love. I’m just sitting her biding my time like she paid me for.’

‘This is odd,’ said Bel, turning to address Richard, newly arrived. ‘What’s going on and why is Shaden here?’

Though Bel always rang the doorbell to gain admittance to her father’s house, this time she went straight to open it, but it was locked. She pressed her thumb into the doorbell
impatiently, over and over again, until she saw Faye through the glass in the door. Faye unlocked it but opened it only a few inches. She looked horrified to see Bel.

‘Faye, let me in, please,’ said Bel.

‘I’m sorry, Bel, not tonight. I’m busy,’ said Faye, attempting to shut the door in her face.

‘Oh no, you don’t,’ said Bel. ‘Where’s Dad?’

‘He’s not here,’ said Faye firmly. ‘Just go, will you, Bel?’

Bel threw her weight at the door. ‘He’s just texted me to tell me to come here. He rang me at the restaurant.’

‘He can’t have,’ said Faye, pushing back. ‘Please, Bel, don’t come in.’

Bel had never seen Faye like that before. She was cross and cold: proper fairy-tale stepmother mode. Well, something strange was going on, and if her dad was in trouble,
she
wasn’t
going to keep Bel from him.

Bel gave an adrenaline-fuelled charge at the door and knocked it fully open, flattening Faye against the wall. As Bel marched into the house Faye was at her heels, reaching for and finding
Bel’s arm and attempting to pull her backwards.

‘You get out of my house, Belinda. Now.’

‘I bloody well won’t. Not until I find out what’s wrong with Dad,’ said Bel, attempting to shrug off her strangely behaving stepmother.

‘Please, Bel,’ pleaded Faye, making one last tug. ‘I’m begging you, please go home.’

But it was in vain. Bel was now wondering if her dad was lying with an axe in his head on the carpet and the mystery woman whom the taxi driver was waiting for was some sort of backstreet
medic.

Bel pushed open the lounge door to find Shaden sitting on the sofa, Vanoushka pacing up and down on a rug with a fat bandage on her leg, and a rough-looking woman in red standing by the
fireplace with her arms folded. Bel tried to make sense of what was going on in front of her, while behind her she heard a car squeal up on the drive and Faye’s voice say, ‘She arrived
with no warning, Trevor. Thank God you’re here.’

‘Jesus Christ,’ said Trevor, entering the room.
This is what hell must look like
, he added to himself: Vanoushka, Shaden, Richard – and
her
.

‘Hello, Trevor,’ said the woman in red, smiling widely, switching her attention from Bel to Trevor. She sounded like she had just climbed out of the television when they were showing
Home and Away
.

‘Dad, what’s going on? Who’s this?’ said Bel.

Shaden took in a deep delicious breath to deliver the news. ‘I think she’s called your mother, Bel,’ she smirked.

‘Me?’ said Max with a gasp. Then she realized he was joking and broke into amused laughter. ‘You had me there for a minute, you daft sod.’

‘I’m serious,’ said Luke, his eyes unblinking. ‘I think I’ve loved you since the first time you spoke to me. I even remember your exact words.’

Max was gobsmacked. ‘What were they?’

‘“Fuck off.” I was behind you in the dinner queue and you thought I’d nipped your bum.’

Max was still in a state of shock. ‘You did nip my bum.’

‘No, I didn’t. It was Stuart. He knew I fancied you, but you presumed it was me who’d done it and stormed off in a huff and he jumped in like a bloody white knight. Two minutes
later you were a couple.’

‘I can’t stand anyone pinching my bum,’ Max shuddered. ‘If only I’d known it was him. I wouldn’t have looked at him twice.’

‘If only I’d dobbed him in,’ said Luke. They looked at each other and then laughed.

‘All these years and I never knew,’ said Max, shaking her head.

‘I know it might be a bit weird if I asked you to dinner,’ said Luke, after clearing a nervous cough out of his throat, ‘but would you suck it and see?’

‘Bit forward,’ tutted Max.

‘Oh God,’ said Luke, dropping his head into his hands. ‘How long have we known each other and now I’m nervous. I was scared to ask you out in case I ruined our
friendship, or I upset Stuart, but sod it – I don’t care any more. I want to risk giving it a try because I really like you, Max. I think you’re fabulous. I want to take you out
on a date. I know it’s early days but sod it, I’m asking anyway. Do you think you could ever see me as anything other than a mate? Oh God, I just wish we were sixteen again because
I’d have told you it was Stuart who nipped your bum and claimed you for myself. What do you think? Help me, Max. I’m out of my depth here.’

Max looked at him, this dear sweet man who had stood in the background and loved her for all this time. The person she probably had most in common with in all the world. They had always laughed
at the same things, had the same work ethic, the same ambitions. And he still had a bloody gorgeous bum.

‘Okay,’ she said, feeling herself grow a bit quivery because it was early days but yes, she was already seeing Luke Appleby in a different light. ‘We’ll suck it and see,
shall we?’

Bel stood rigid in the middle of a vortex of confusion. How could this be her mother? Her graceful, statuesque mother was dead. This woman before her was blousy and broad, with
shoulders that would have made her a cracking tight-head prop for a rugby union side, and a hard, hard face.

‘Helen, what on earth can you possibly want after all these years?’ asked Trevor breathlessly as he rushed to his daughter’s side and put his arm round her, as if the woman was
going to suddenly snatch her away.

‘I think you might know,’ said this so-called Helen in a voice that sounded as if it was full of barbed wire.

‘Dad?’ said Bel. Her arms were prickling with anxiety. She could feel her heartbeat thumping madly in her eardrums. Trevor tightened his arm round her.

‘Oh God,’ said Faye, wringing her hands together. ‘Why did you have to come over today of all days, Bel?’

‘Dad texted me,’ replied Bel.

‘I don’t know how to text,’ said Trevor. ‘I didn’t even take my phone out with me.’

Ah. I bet the phone is in the kitchen, where it usually is, thought Bel. She narrowed her eyes at Shaden. It didn’t take a genius to work out what had happened. The shit-stirring cow.

‘Second wife, I presume?’ Helen thumbed at Faye. ‘Well, thanks for bringing up my daughter. Looks like you did a bonza job.’

‘
My
daughter,’ said Faye, her voice suddenly full of strength. ‘And I won’t let you upset her.’ She came to the other side of Bel, her chin jutting out as if
she meant business.

‘I don’t want to upset anyone,’ said Helen, as unruffled as could be as she inspected her long red nails. ‘I just want what is rightfully mine.’

‘Which is what, precisely?’ asked Trevor.

‘I heard about the wedding. It made the papers in Oz. I saw how much your company is worth. Treffé Chocolates? The same company that used to be Trevelen Chocolates once upon a
time?’

‘That company sank, as you well know,’ Trevor ground his words out. ‘You bled it dry. Thirty-three years ago. Treffé was a brand-new company I formed with Faye.
You’ve had all you’re getting out of me.’

Bel felt Faye and Trevor close into her side even further.

Helen looked at the touching family scene, then she swept her eyes round to the subsidiary characters. They settled on Shaden, sitting forward on the couch and enjoying the floorshow.

‘So you’re the “blonde beauty” who slept with the fiancé?’ She threw back her head and laughed as if the newspaper’s description was the biggest joke
ever. ‘Oh and that must be the “man in the middle”.’ She pointed over at Richard who was lurking by the doorway, not sure where to put himself.

‘Never mind who is who,’ said Trevor. ‘I think you should leave. Get out, Helen. You’ve caused enough damage. You were always very good at that.’

‘No, don’t go,’ cried Bel, rushing forward. She threw her arms round Helen, but the woman stood unyielding and straight, her hands remaining by her sides.

‘Look, love, it’s all a bit late for the grand reconciliation,’ Helen stepped back out of her daughter’s embrace. ‘I didn’t come here for this.’

‘So it’s true, you really are my mother?’ said Bel, sobbing now. She whirled round to Trevor and Faye, but she directed the question more at her stepmother. ‘Why did you
tell me she was dead? Why did you lie?’

Trevor stepped forward. ‘That’s the way she wanted it.’ He addressed Helen. ‘Tell her the truth at least, for God’s sake, Helen. I’m begging you.’

Helen was born a hard nut and the years in Australia being married to a man whose fortunes were up and down as much as his trousers in other women’s bedrooms had made her harder still. She
needed her own independent means and seeing as her ex-husband was so incredibly wealthy these days, and no doubt would pay anything to keep her away from screwing up his daughter, it was more than
worth attempting a little extortion. Unfortunately that stupid newspaper and even stupider Lydiana Bosomworth-Greaves had grossly overstated the fortunes of the Treffé Chocolate company, it
seemed. And then, as if that knowledge wasn’t bad enough, in walks her daughter – tipped off by someone in this very room.
Bye, bye, blackmail
.

‘Ten thousand pounds and I’ll tell her the truth,’ said Helen. At least she wouldn’t walk away empty-handed then.

‘Give it to her,’ said Faye. ‘Trevor, the cheque book is there in the drawer.’

Shaden wished she had brought popcorn. This was better than a movie. It had everything in it – drama, pathos – just a shame there was no violence.

Trevor scrabbled in the drawer, hurriedly wrote out a cheque and then ripped it out of the book. ‘I’ve left it blank. I don’t know what your name is these days.’

‘Eleanor Swindell,’ she said, holding up her hand to stem any comment. ‘Please, save your breath.’ She examined the cheque. ‘I should have asked for twenty,
shouldn’t I? That was too easy.’

‘It’s not easy,’ snapped Faye. ‘We’re having to batten down the hatches like everyone else in this economic climate.’

‘Helen, please,’ said Trevor.

‘Okay,’ Helen turned to a totally and utterly numb Bel. ‘I didn’t want kids. You were an accident. We’d filed for divorce and then I found out I was pregnant.
Trevor begged me not to have an abortion. We struck a deal that he would take the baby and I’d go home to Australia. It was my idea that he told you I was dead. I didn’t want anyone
coming searching for me hoping for the big family reunion.’

‘Don’t forget the bit about taking every single penny Trevor had as well,’ snapped Faye. ‘He had to buy the life of his own daughter.’

‘What about the wedding dress?’ gulped Bel. It was all she could think of.

‘What wedding dress?’ said Helen. ‘I got married in a trouser suit.’

The tears sliding down Bel’s cheeks increased in volume. She felt warm arms round her. Faye’s. And heard her gentle voice trying to soothe.

‘So our business is really concluded, then,’ shrugged Helen. ‘Still, interesting to see what the kid turned out like. I think we did a good mix, Trev.’

‘You didn’t just do “good”,’ said Faye with iron in her voice, ‘you did brilliantly and you’ve missed out on some very precious years. She’s a
wonderful daughter.’

‘Sorry, love,’ said Helen to Bel. ‘I didn’t plan on you being here.’

Vanoushka tried to get to her feet and called for Shaden to help her. She saw an opportunity to ingratiate herself with Trevor and get back in his good books.

‘Get out,’ she said. ‘Get out of my sister’s house, you cruel bitch.’ She hobbled towards Helen, using Shaden’s arm as support.

The silly woman with the paralysed forehead didn’t even show up on Helen’s radar. She ignored her and turned to face the daughter that she had never thought of in all these years.
Bel noticed they had identical moles on the side of their jaws.

‘I tell you what,’ Helen said, leaning close and whispering as if imparting a great secret, ‘there is a gift I can give you that you will always remember.’

Bel waited for her real mother to kiss her cheek. She didn’t bargain on Helen twisting on her heel, pulling back her head and nutting Shaden in the nose – a direct hit on the bridge.
Shaden screamed and blood oozed through the fingers clamped over her face. Vanoushka threw herself at Helen, missed and fell over, then all attention shifted to Richard, who was bent double in the
doorway, holding his nuts and uttering a string of profanities in the direction of the retreating iron-kneed Helen.