Hens Reunited Page 4

  Georgia slammed out of there before she heard the rest of the conversation. She could predict it, though. Had heard it before.

  But why is he off-limits?

  Because he’s Georgia’s ex-husband, that’s why. Shat all over her. Not literally, but – well, you know. Done her up like a kipper.

  So? Doesn’t she want to print some dirt on him, get her revenge?

  Ahh. Yes. Well, she did that. Quite a lot of that. In fact, she dug up such dirt, Harry Stone got mightily pissed off and threw a great big lawsuit in her face. She won’t touch him with a bargepole now. Not even if he was caught giving Fergie one outside Buckingham Palace, snorting coke off her tits.

  God.

  Exactly.

  Georgia’s ears felt hot as she waited for the lift. She jabbed at the button. She hated people knowing her weak spot. Hated it.

  The lift arrived and she flung herself into it. She was not what you’d call in a party mood now. The celebs behaving badly had better watch out.

  Her mobile was ringing as she got into the cab. Georgia loved her phone. It brought her gossip, interviews, all sorts of interesting invitations. She fished it out of her bag and looked at the caller display. Mum, it said. She rolled her eyes and sent the call to her voicemail. Why oh why had she given her parents her mobile number? She should have known they’d be phoning her up every five bloody minutes. And what scintillating tale would it be this time?

  Eh, George, you’ll never guess, Mrs Bradstock has got new curtains. Ever so nice they are, from that IKEA at Warrington. I must take you there next time you’re home. When ARE you coming home, anyway?

  All right, Georgie, you missed a cracker on Saturday at the footie. The lads played a blinder! I took our Ned and he loved it. Proper little fan he’s getting nowadays, you should see him on the terraces!

  Georgie, Nan wants to know if you’re coming up for her birthday. Have you remembered it’s her eightieth? She’s hired the social club on the High Street and all her mates from bingo have clubbed together to put on a spread. Let us know, won’t you? You’re welcome any time …

  Gaaahhh. Welcome any time. Right. Like she wanted to go all the way up the M6 to sit in Stockport Social Club with her nan and decrepit Aunty Ada and the rest of the cronies. Like she wanted to suffer the million disapproving looks from her sister Carol and her smug hubby David. Like she wanted to have Carol’s tedious kids Ned and Elsie clambering all over her, leaking snot and other noxious substances on her designer clothes! Like she wanted to sit in Mum and Dad’s brown woodchip kitchen, drinking tea out of Dad’s Stockport County mug (Up the Hatters! ‘You watch yourself with that, Georgie, a family heirloom that is’), listening to tales from their dull northern lives in the same house, in the same street, in the same grim part of the world.

  Why – WHY – would she want to go there, when she lived and worked in London, had champagne-fuelled parties to go to every night of the week, had an address book stuffed with famous people’s numbers, her very own flat in Clapham, a job that she adored?

  Quite. No contest. So no, she wouldn’t be going to Nan’s party. And no, she didn’t want to go and see the flaming Hatters with her dad, David and snot-dripping Ned. And no, not ever, would she go to Warrington IKEA with her mum. Not unless she was having some kind of mental breakdown.

  Georgia had left The North behind her, thank you very much, escaping across the Pennines and down the motorway on a National Express coach, a letter from London University in her bag. And she’d never looked back, barely glanced in that direction again. She’d modulated her northern vowels, adopting an estuary London accent instead (although – annoyingly – every now and then, when pissed, she’d lapse into Lancashire far too easily). She never mentioned her family to anyone. It was easier that way. Travel light, was Georgia’s motto. No family baggage slowing her down. No husband or boyfriend baggage holding her back. She was happy to go it alone. Happy to be here in a taxi speeding through London on her way to somewhere fabulous and glitzy.

  So why didn’t her parents get the message? Why couldn’t she ram it into their thick skulls that she had shucked them off, like a coat that was too small for her? Too small and too unfashionable. She’d never be wearing it again. Couldn’t they see that?

  ‘’Ere you are, sweet’eart,’ the cabbie said, pulling up on Greek Street.

  ‘Cheers, mate,’ Georgia said, signing the expense slip with a flourish. She slammed the taxi door shut, tossed her hair back and strode up to the entrance of the bar. With a polite smile at the bouncer on the door (you had to be nice to these people, you never knew when you might need them on your side) and a flash of her invite, she was in.

  Straight to the bar as usual, a brief glance about her to see who she recognized on the way. There was her snapper, Alan, already taking photos of the guests, swift and sure, clocking everything of interest. There were a couple of young footballers, excellent, they were sure to get drunk and disgrace themselves. A girl band sipping cocktails and giggling. Hopefully up for some mutual disgracing with the sports studs. A couple of record-company nerds – she wouldn’t waste time on them. Oh, and Candi’s PR people of course, sucking up left, right and centre. Air-kiss, air-kiss, mwah, mwah, darling! No sign of Candi yet, though, but that wasn’t a surprise. The birthday girl would have to make some kind of entrance.

  Hmmm. There was an interestingly broody-looking guy further along the bar. Georgia’s celeb radar was going overtime, but she couldn’t place him. Sexy and chiselled, she wrote in her head, filing the details away in case she needed them later. Thirty-something. Battered brown leather jacket. Designer jeans. Dark brown hair artfully tousled with a sneaky slick of product. An actor, perhaps? Indie band member?

  ‘Champagne, please,’ she said with a big smile at the girl who was serving behind the bar. ‘And …’ She leaned over the bar – mercifully not sticky yet – ‘do you know who that bloke is?’

  The barmaid gave Sexy Chiselled man a glance. ‘He’s from that programme, isn’t he?’ she said, setting a champagne flute in front of Georgia. ‘What’s it, again? Me boyfriend likes it. That horrible one where they cut up bodies.’

  Georgia didn’t watch a lot of telly. Too busy out partying. But she tried to keep up with the big programmes, the ones everyone talked about, as best she could, with the help of her Sky Plus box. ‘Silent Witness?’ she guessed. ‘One of those forensic things?’

  ‘Yeah, something like that,’ the barmaid said, wrinkling her nose in distaste. ‘Not my cup of tea, all those dead bodies, but …’

  Georgia pressed a fiver into the barmaid’s hand. ‘Be a darling for me and find out his name, will you?’

  The barmaid tucked the note into her jeans pocket. ‘Give me two minutes,’ she said with a wink.

  Georgia sipped her champagne, checking out what was happening elsewhere while she waited. The footballers were getting rowdy already, bless their moronic little hearts. The girl band were becoming screechy and giggly, in a look-at-us-we’re-famous sort of way. Très irritating. And …

  Her mobile was ringing again. Caller display: Mum.

  For God’s sake!!

  Georgia put the call to voicemail again as the barmaid came back. ‘Adam Tennant,’ she said in a breathy whisper. ‘Quite sexy, isn’t he?’

  ‘Thanks,’ Georgia said, sliding off her bar stool. She took her champagne glass and walked purposefully over towards Chiselled Adam. ‘Hi there, Adam,’ she said. ‘I love your work. I’m Georgia. How do you know Candi, then? Wouldn’t have put you two together.’

  Alan was there in an instant, with his camera. ‘This way, Adam!’ he called out, and Georgia slid her arm around the actor’s back and batted her eyelashes for the shot.

  Adam Tennant had been reading about England’s disastrous batting collapse in the sports section of the Standard (not a promising start; who brought a newspaper along to a party, anyway?), but folded the pages at Georgia’s introduction and laid the paper on the bar. ‘Hi,’ he said as she steppe
d away from him again, photo taken. ‘Candi and I have the same agent. I can’t stand these dos if you must know, but I promised Marcy I’d show my face, so …’

  He had a deep voice, a tinge of Scottish in his accent. Very nice. Shame he looked so bored and uninterested.

  ‘So, what are you working on at the moment?’ Georgia went on. ‘More episodes of …’ Should she say Silent Witness? What if the barmaid had got it wrong? ‘… of the show, or something new? I do love that programme, you know. I never miss it.’

  He gave her a strange look. ‘Never miss it, eh?’ he said. ‘Right. So you’ll have seen that last season my character was murdered by a vengeance-seeking hitman?’

  ‘Ahh,’ said Georgia. She flashed him her best girlish smile. ‘How could I have forgotten? So obviously you’re not making any new episodes—’

  He got to his feet. ‘Nope,’ he said. ‘If you’ll excuse me, I’ve just seen someone I need to speak to.’

  And off he went. Rude Adam Tennant. She’d keep an eye on him, then. Try and work in a dig for her party write-up. Who did he think he was?

  Her phone was ringing. Caller display: Mum. Again! She switched it to voicemail, jabbing at the button with a rising annoyance. For crying out loud! Mum might not have anything better to do than sit her big arse on the brown corduroy sofa and chit-chat on the blower all evening, but Georgia had to work!

  She slipped her phone away again. The music from the club seemed to have been turned up and was booming around her. Someone jostled her, spilling her drink.

  ‘Are you Georgia? Knight On The Town?’

  She turned at the voice, a shout above the thumping bass. There was a Page Three girl, huge creamy boobs jutting out of a ridiculously small white cropped top. SLUT was written across the straining material in bright pink letters. Classy.

  Aimee Morello, Georgia reminded herself. Former girlfriend of Warren Blake, Arsenal’s latest wunderkid.

  ‘Yes?’

  She had a fleck of coke dangling from one nostril, did Aimee. Chewing gum at the side of her mouth. Her eyes were glazed, and when she talked it was on super-speed. ‘Well, don’t say I told you this, right, but take it from me, Warren has got the tiniest dick I’ve ever seen. And I’ve seen a few, d’you know what I’m saying? But his is like a chipolata. And he don’t even know what to do with it. Oh yeah, and get this, he’s been paying all these call girls. Not for sex, right, he just wants them to spank him. Pervy like that, is Warren. Make sure you get it all in your column, yeah?’

  Ahh, the woman scorned. Always wanting Georgia to run these ‘crap-in-bed’ snippets about their cheating exes. Sleazy as anything. Georgia felt jaded. She wasn’t in the mood for this tonight.

  ‘Sure,’ she said, turning away. ‘Leave it with me.’

  She made a few cursory notes, eavesdropped on a couple of guys from a boy band slagging off their manager, and then a juicy confessional conversation in the ladies’ toilets about a certain supermodel’s latest tantrum, all the while noting the copy in her brain. The soundtrack, the outfits, the canapés, she was hot on the specifics, Georgia. It was what kept her readers hooked.

  Her phone was ringing again. The caller display read: Number withheld. Ahh, the old number withheld. Usually an anonymous tip-off.

  She pressed the button to accept the call. ‘Could you hold the line, please? I’m just going outside where it’s quieter,’ she said into the mouthpiece, walking quickly out of the front doors. It was dark in the street now, and getting chilly. ‘Sorry about that,’ she said. ‘Georgia Knight here. Can I help you?’

  ‘It’s Mum,’ came the reply. ‘I’m at the hospital. Bad news, love.’ Her voice broke into a sob. ‘It’s your nan.’

  Alices Hen Weekend

  November 2002

  Alice Johnson lowered herself into the pool and leaned back against the tiled surface. Jets of water bubbled up beneath her Lycra-clad bottom, pummelling her thighs, making her insides feel as if they were vibrating. Let’s hope they break up the cellulite before the wedding, Alice thought to herself, crossing her fingers under the water.

  She closed her eyes and inhaled the warm, faintly perfumed air, trying not to think about how many bottoms had sat there before hers. Bubble, bubble, pummel, pummel. Quite uncomfortable after a while. Like having your legs in a washing machine on the tough-stains cycle, she imagined. Still, she was forking out enough cash for this place, she felt obliged to kid herself it was perfect.

  ‘This is bliss,’ she murmured dutifully, wondering how long she’d have to sit there before she could return to dry land.

  ‘Mmmm, heavenly,’ Katie said, from across the jacuzzi.

  Alice wondered if there would be a jacuzzi at their honeymoon hotel. If there was, Jake was sure to want to have sex in it. He said all that spurting water turned him on. Mind you, anything turned him on. Just the word ‘spurt’ was probably enough to give him a semi.

  Jake seemed to think about sex every other second. He was fond of telling Alice how often she gave him ‘the horn’, as he so charmingly phrased it. Bending over to put a video in the machine – that gave him the horn. Rolling over in bed at night – that gave him the horn. Whenever Alice was in the shower – oh yes, that really gave him the horn. She’d have only just squirted the shampoo onto her palm (squirt – another word that did it for him) and he’d be in there with her, cock at a right angle, telling her that God, he just couldn’t resist joining her …

  It was flattering that he wanted to get her knickers down constantly, really. A compliment that he was always attempting to feel her up when she was getting dressed, or making a cup of tea, or trying to watch Coronation Street.

  All the same … it was exhausting. Would marriage calm him down? she wondered. Would being a husband tame the rampant horn? Somehow she doubted it.

  ‘Where’s Georgia, by the way?’ Katie asked drowsily. ‘I haven’t seen her for a while.’

  ‘She went off for her massage ages ago,’ Alice said, opening her eyes and glancing around the room for a clock. No clock. Of course. People here were meant to be relaxing, not clock-watching. Georgia had been gone a long time, though, Alice was sure. Knowing Georgia, she was up to something. She’d probably lucked in with a fit male masseur who was giving her a very special rub-down. ‘Any extras?’ Alice could imagine Georgia asking in that throaty purr of hers. No doubt she herself would get a skinny bitch for her massage, who’d sneer disapprovingly at Alice’s wobbly bits while Alice had her eyes shut. ‘God, I had a dumpy one just now,’ Alice could already imagine the woman saying to her colleagues afterwards. ‘Legs like marshmallows, no muscle tone whatsoever!’

  She tried not to dwell on that. Or on Georgia and her masseur, having a bunk-up in the towel cupboard.

  Actually, now that she came to think about it, Georgia was probably on the phone to someone from the paper. Alice was amazed that Georgia had come all the way out of London, to the Cotswolds, for her hen weekend. Originally she’d said no, sorry, she was too busy with work and Alice had felt crestfallen because she’d only invited Katie and Georgia, and what good was a hen night with only one other hen?

  Luckily, Georgia had called back to say that actually she could come, but she could only stay the Saturday night and she’d have to get the train back early-ish on Sunday, okay?

  Alice didn’t mind the conditions. She was so grateful that Georgia was coming at all, she’d said yes, fine, thank you to everything. She couldn’t help wondering if Katie had leaned on Georgia a bit, talked her into coming. Probably. Katie was nice like that. Or perhaps Georgia had had a tip-off that one of her celebs was checking in for a weekend too. She could never resist a sniff of gossip.

  It still seemed something of a dream to Alice that she was having a hen night in the first place. A miracle that she, quiet Alice Johnson, was having a wedding, getting married to sexy, charismatic Jake Archer. A lot of the time, she found herself checking the ring on her finger, making sure she hadn’t imagined the whole thing. But it was tru
e. And he was so gorgeous. So funny. And such a good actor, even if Hollywood hadn’t realized that yet. (Or Theatre-land in London, for that matter. But give it time. They were sure to realize he had talent with a capital T soon.) And oh yes, he loved her! He wanted to marry her! She could hardly believe her luck.

  The bubbling and pummelling had turned her legs to jelly. She clambered out of the pool and wrapped a soft white towel around herself. ‘I’m going for a swim,’ she told Katie, who still had her eyes shut. ‘See you in a bit.’

  She was having a lovely time, she told herself as she wandered down to the main pool, cocooned in white fluffiness, hoping her legs weren’t looking too much like gooseflesh. A hen weekend here in a spa, with a salt-scrub back massage to look forward to later this afternoon (she hoped it wouldn’t be too painful) and an evening of good food and wine with her two best friends tonight. Best of all, she had a bed of her own upstairs – clean crisp sheets and duvet, and nobody pestering her for a shag in the middle of the night.

  Not ‘pestering’. No. That sounded as if she was moaning. And she wasn’t, of course. Why would she moan about Jake? He was absolutely perfect. And, in just three weeks’ time, he’d be her husband.

  ‘So, not long to go, eh?’ Georgia said that evening over dinner. ‘Are you all sorted for the big day?’

  Alice swallowed a mouthful of rocket salad (she’d barely eaten a single calorie for weeks) and smiled. ‘Nearly,’ she said. ‘It’s all just about coming together. I’ve finished the dress, pretty much—’

  ‘Ooh, what’s it like?’ Katie put in, spooning more potatoes onto her plate and slipping a few onto Alice’s.

  ‘Well, the dress itself is quite ordinary – it’s strapless and very tight on the waist, which is why I’m dieting like mad,’ Alice replied, putting the potatoes straight back in the dish. ‘But I’ve also made this gorgeous fluffy faux-fur muff and …’ She bit her lip. ‘I’m thinking about a cape as well. I’ve found this beautiful red velvet fabric, but I’m not sure if it’s too much of a Superman vibe. Or Little Red Riding Hood.’