William Walton glanced up and took one last look at the long legs exiting his office. ‘Get them to call my secretary.’
Karnak was spectacular. Even though Tom had wanted a siesta after the enormous lunch and huge amounts of booze he’d had on La Mamounia, he was glad he’d made the effort to join the very small group of guests visiting the temple complex on the outskirts of Luxor. He wandered through the huge sandstone pillars, the long shadows dancing between the tall shapes stretching into a cornflower blue sky. He smiled to himself. Celebrity had a habit of making you feel so tall, so special, but here he felt like an inconsequential speck. He could stay here all afternoon, he thought. The last thing he wanted was to get back to Serena, even though it had irked him over lunch to see her talking to that slimy Yanky letch.
Serena. The first two years of their relationship had been wonderful. Tom had thought her cranky, dramatic ways were perversely adorable. Having had little contact with the upper classes before he’d met her, he assumed that’s how they were: self-obsessed and spoilt. He’d never once considered it might just be Serena’s personality. But now he was convinced that she had ice water running through her veins. While he understood it – the Balcon family were clearly seriously dysfunctional, irritation rather than affection was the overwhelming emotion he felt for her. He had even started fancying the barmaid at the Pig & Piper back in the Cotswolds village where he kept a house. He liked her wonky teeth, her fleshy breasts and the pink blushing cheeks when she served him his pint. Above all, he liked her warmth.
Then the Sheffield lad in Tom caught himself. Was he mad? He lived with Serena Balcon! One of People magazine’s Fifty Most Beautiful People, or so he had read at the airport newsagent. They were right, of course: she was stunning. From the moment he’d seen her on her trailer step reading a script, her feet bare on the ground, her fair hair blowing gently in the breeze, he had thought she was the most fabulous-looking creature he had ever seen. He would never tire of looking at Serena, but he was sick to death of listening to her – those plummy tones, the inane babble. Tom had struggled through a tough comprehensive, to university, to RADA, clawing his way up, desperate to improve himself, so he couldn’t quite believe he was living with a woman whose idea of current affairs were the party pages in Vanity Fair.
He flicked at a fly buzzing around his face. So why couldn’t he leave her?
The thought had crossed his mind a hundred times. But when he really imagined life without her, he was caught between a sense of sheer relief and horrible insecurity. What would happen to Tom without Serena? They were as inseparable as Siamese twins. He shuddered despite the heat.
‘Tom Archer! Come and join the group, you naughty thing.’
Jolene Schwartz was a brazen, heavily tanned fifty-something Texan who had married well and divorced better. She came sashaying towards him, twirling a frilly white parasol above her like a deep-fried Dolly Parton.
‘Just coming,’ called Tom, getting to his feet. ‘Are we leaving?’
‘We were supposed to meet at the Great Hall twenty minutes ago to head back to the boat.’ She wagged her finger at him at the same time as fixing him with a flirtatious smile. ‘I’m going to have to put you over my knee.’
Unconsciously, Tom found himself looking at Jolene’s legs and her unnaturally smooth knees – an obvious product of the latest surgery craze that was sweeping New York. He tore his gaze away and gave a weak, cracked smile.
‘I’d better get a move on then, hadn’t I?’
They walked as quickly as the hot sun would allow to the entrance, where a black Range Rover was waiting for them. Tom wedged himself into the cream leather back seat between Jolene and Roman’s boyfriend, Patric, a handsome, grey-haired, softly spoken architect from Provence.
‘So, who are you going to introduce me to on the boat?’ said Jolene playfully to Patric as the car began to weave through traffic towards the docks. ‘I haven’t worked out who’s single yet.’
‘What about Frédéric?’ suggested Patric playfully.
She spluttered, ‘But he’s queer!’ She looked at Patric’s mock-crushed expression and quickly corrected herself. ‘Sorry, sorry. I love gay men. I just don’t want to date one.’
‘What about Michael Sarkis?’ asked Tom. ‘I’m sure he’s not gay.’
Jolene looked at him and giggled. ‘Now honey, that’s where I draw the line. In New York they call him the cat burglar. Always after other people’s pussy,’ she giggled with a smoker’s rasp. ‘I don’t know anyone he hasn’t screwed.’
Patric shifted uncomfortably in his chair as Jolene smiled at him.
‘No, what I want is someone like this one,’ she said, squeezing the top of Tom’s knee.
Catching Tom’s frozen expression, Patric tried to change the subject. ‘Did you enjoy Karnak, Tom?’ he asked. ‘It’s sometimes good to get away from that boat, yes?’
‘Yes, the Mamounia was getting a little busy,’ said Tom diplomatically.
‘I know,’ replied Patric sympathetically, ‘I’m the less social one in our partnership, too. Roman, he loves to throw parties even when he should be working. But me …’ He trailed off.
‘Sounds a lot like our household,’ smiled Tom, trying to edge away from Jolene’s thigh.
‘How is life with you and Lady Serena?’ chimed in Jolene, keen not to be left out of the conversation.
‘She’s not a lady.’
‘So I’ve heard.’
Tom smiled thinly. ‘No, I mean that in England a baron’s daughter has the title “The Honourable”. A lady is like a duke or earl’s daughter or something.’
‘Lady or not, she’s so beautiful,’ said Patric approvingly. ‘I know Roman can’t stop giving her clothes. She wears everything so incredibly. I think she may be becoming the ambassador for the line this year.’
‘More clothes,’ laughed Tom, looking out of the window at the chaotic traffic. ‘Our house can’t stand any more clothes! I mean, did you know she has nearly a thousand pairs of shoes! They have their own room where they sit on these little carousels. Why does anyone need shoe carousels?’
‘If you were a woman, you’d know,’ laughed Jolene, touching his arm lightly.
‘This is life with the beautiful,’ shrugged Patric. ‘Wonderful, but high-maintenance.’
Tom laughed to himself. Patric didn’t know the half of it. Serena was broke and it was he who was supporting her jet-set lifestyle. She had got though a small trust fund left to her by her mother years ago and there was little obvious income from the Balcon family trust. Old money? No money was more like it, if you listened to the rumours about Oswald’s financial difficulties. And while Serena still earned something in the region of two million pounds a year in advertising contracts and film roles, her expenditure was enormous: the Cheyne Walk townhouse, the six-thousand-pound-a-year John Frieda highlights, the agent and publicist’s fees, the Dior couture clothes, the weekly manicures, pedicures and facials – the list was endless and her tastes were expensive. ‘Keeping up with the Jemimas,’ she called it. So it was left to Tom to mop up the bills for the Necker Island holidays, the Hermès bags, the San Lorenzo suppers and the brand new Aston Martin. Having been brought up in a house where everyone knew the price of a loaf of bread, and not knowing whether his movie career would last another three or thirty years, the level of spending was making him nervous. It was a high-maintenance lifestyle indeed – for both of them.
As they arrived at the dock, the sun was much lower in the sky, smudging the blue with purple and apricot, and