Spray splashes my face as we bump across the waves, and I lick the delicious saltiness off my lips. I’m surveying the coastline as we pass and remembering all the little villages we explored back then, with their narrow cobbled alleyways and unexpected treasures, like that half-ruined marble statue of a horse we once came across in the middle of a deserted square. I look up to share this thought with Ben, but he’s engrossed in his iPad. I can hear rap coming from it and feel a flicker of irritation. Does he have to listen to that now?

“Do you think Arthur’s still there?” I try to attract his attention. “And that old cook?”

“Can’t be, surely.” Ben looks up briefly. “I wonder what happened to Sarah.”

Sarah again. Do I even know this girl?

The music seems to be getting louder, and now Ben’s rapping along. He really can’t rap. I mean, I’m being a dispassionate, loving wife here—and he’s crap.

“It’s lovely and peaceful out here, isn’t it?” I say with a meaningful edge to my voice, but he doesn’t take the hint. “Could we maybe not have the music on for a bit?”

“It’s DJ Cram, babe,” says Ben, and turns the volume up. Fuck yo brudder blares out across the beautiful sea, and I wince.

He’s a selfish git.

The thought lands in my brain with no warning and makes me panic slightly. No. I didn’t really mean “selfish.” Or “git.” It’s all good. All blissful.

I don’t mind rap music, anyway. And we can talk over the top of it.

“I can’t believe I’m going back to the place where it all changed,” I say, beginning a new tack. “That fire was, like, the turning point for my life.”

“Will you stop going on about that bloody fire?” says Ben irritably, and I stare back in hurt shock.

I shouldn’t be surprised, I suppose. Ben’s never been interested in the fire. He’d gone sponge-diving on the other side of the island for a couple of days when it happened, so he missed the whole thing and has always been chippy about that. Still, he doesn’t have to be so snappy. He knows how important it was to me.

“Hey!” he suddenly exclaims. He’s peering at his iPad and I can see he’s just got a text. We’re fairly near the coast, so there must be some random patch of signal.

“Who is it?”

Ben looks as though he’s bursting with pride and excitement. Has he won something? “Heard of someone called Yuri Zhernakov? He only wants a private meeting with me.”

“Yuri Zhernakov?” I gape at him. “How come?”

“He wants to buy the company.”

“Wow! And do you want to sell?”

“Why not?”

Already my mind is whirring. This would be amazing! Ben would get a lump of cash, we could buy an old farmhouse in France.…

“Yuri wants to talk to me.” Ben seems totally puffed up. “He asked for me personally. We’re going to meet on his super-yacht.”

“That’s amazing!” I squeeze his arm.

“I know. It is amazing. And Lorcan can—” Ben stops himself. “Whatever,” he says moodily.

There’s some weird vibe going on which I don’t understand, but I don’t care. We’re going to move to France! And we’re about to have sex, finally! I’ve forgotten my earlier irritation. I’m back to super-bliss. As I happily swig my Coke, I suddenly remember something I’ve been meaning to say to Ben for days.

“Hey, last year I met these scientists at Nottingham who were researching a new way to make paper. More eco. Something about a special filtering process? Have you heard of them?”

“No.” Ben shrugs. “But Lorcan might have.”

“Well, you should link up with them. Do some funding or whatever. Although I suppose if you’re selling the company …” I shrug too.

“Doesn’t matter. That’s a good idea.” Ben nudges me. “Do you have lots of good ideas like that?”

“Millions.” I grin back.

“I’m going to tell Lorcan right now.” Ben starts typing at his iPad. “He’s always going on about research and development. He thinks I’m not interested. Well, bollocks to that.”

“Tell him about the Zhernakov meeting too,” I suggest. “Maybe he’ll have some good advice.” Immediately, Ben’s fingers freeze and his face closes up.

“Not a chance,” he says at last, and shoots me a warning look. “And you’re not saying a word to anyone either. Not a word.”


20

FLISS

The morning after is always hell.

In Sofia, Bulgaria, after too many glasses of wine, an excruciating argument, and a night of sexual frustration, the morning after achieves fresh levels of hellishness.

From Lorcan’s expression, he feels the same way. Noah ran joyfully to greet him as soon as we entered the dining room, which is why I’m sitting with him, not through choice. He’s savagely buttering a piece of toast, and I’m crumbling a croissant. From our desultory conversation we’ve established that we both slept terribly, that the coffee is abysmal, that there are 2.4 Bulgarian leva to the pound and that the flight to Ikonos today hasn’t been delayed, as far as we can glean from the airline website.

Areas we haven’t touched on: Ben, Lottie, their marriage, their sexual conduct, Bulgarian politics, the state of the world economy, my attempts to sabotage my sister’s honeymoon and thus risk losing my relationship with her forever. Among others.

The restaurant is adjacent to the bar we were in last night, and I can see a pool attendant dabbing at the pristine water with a filtering net. I’ve no idea why they bother. I expect Noah is the only person to have swum in that pool all year. Although, to be fair, he might well have peed in it.

“Can I swim?” he says, as though reading my thoughts.

“No,” I say shortly. “We’re getting on the airplane soon.”

Lorcan has his BlackBerry to his ear again. He’s been speed-dialing all through breakfast but never getting through. I think I can guess who he’s been calling, and this is confirmed when he says, “Ben, at last,” and pushes his chair back. I watch in slight resentment as he walks right away, to the side of the pool, and perches in front of the sauna entrance. How am I supposed to eavesdrop now?

I try to ignore my tension by slicing up an apple for Noah. When Lorcan returns, I force myself not to grip his lapels and demand information. Instead, I ask, with only moderate urgency:

“Well? Have they done it?”

Lorcan gives me a disbelieving look. “Is that all you’re interested in?”

“Yes,” I say defiantly.

“Well, they haven’t. They’ve just arrived at the guest house. I guess they’re planning to do it there.”

The guest house? I stare at him in horror. I can’t get at them there. There’s no Nico. It’s out of my power zone. Shit. Shit. I’m going to be just too late—

“Your sister is quite something,” Lorcan continues with animation. “She’s come up with a great idea for the company. We’re far too weak on the research-and-development side, and I’ve known it for a while. But she’s suggested we tie up with a research project in Nottingham she knows about. It’s a tiny team, which is why I hadn’t heard of it, but it sounds as if it’s directly relevant to us. We could get some joint funding going. It’s brilliant.”

“Oh yes,” I say, still preoccupied. “She’d know about that. She works for a pharmaceutical company. She meets scientists all the time.”

“What exactly does she do?”

“Recruitment.”

“Recruitment?” I look up to see that his eyes have lit up. “We need a new head of HR! This is perfect!”

“What?”

“She could head up HR, keep the good ideas coming, get involved with the estate.…” I can see his mind working hard. “This is just what Ben needed! A wife who can be a business partner too. A helpmate. Someone to stand at his side and—”

“Stop right there!” I plant a hand on the table. “You’re not poaching my sister to go and play a game of Happy Families in Staffordshire.”

“Why not?” demands Lorcan. “What’s your problem with it?”

“My problem is it’s nonsense! It’s ridiculous!”

Lorcan stares at me silently for a moment, and I feel the briefest of shivers under his gaze.

“You really take the biscuit,” he says at last. “How do you know you’re not ruining your sister’s great love? How do you know this isn’t her chance for a fantastically happy life?”

“Oh, for God’s sake.” I shake my head impatiently. I’m not even going to answer that question, it’s so stupid.

“I think Ben and Lottie have every chance of being happy,” he says firmly. “And I, for one, am going to encourage them.”

“You can’t switch sides!” I glare at him in fury.

“I was never on your side,” retorts Lorcan. “Your side is the nutty side.”

“The nutty side.” Noah picks up on this and decides it’s hilarious. “The nutty side!” He falls about in laughter. “Mummy’s on the nutty side!”

I glare at Lorcan, stirring my coffee viciously. Traitor.

“Morning, everyone.”

I look up to see Richard approaching the table. He looks about as cheery as the rest of us, i.e., suicidal.

“Morning,” I say. “Did you sleep well?”

“Terribly.” He scowls and pours himself some coffee, then glances at my phone. “So, have they done it yet?”

“For God’s sake!” I take out some of my resentment on him. “You’re obsessed!”

“You can talk,” mutters Lorcan.

“Why do you keep asking if they’ve done it?” says Noah alertly.

“Well, aren’t you obsessed too?” counters Richard.

“No, I’m not obsessed. And, no, they haven’t done it.” I put him out of his misery.

“Done what?” asks Noah.

“Put the sausage in the cupcake,” says Lorcan, draining his coffee.

“Lorcan!” I snap. “Don’t say things like that!”

Noah has exploded with laughter. “Put the sausage in the cupcake!” he crows. “The sausage in the cupcake!”