Wildfire Read online

  As Rhiannon looked at him she could feel a distant yet unsettling sense of foreboding starting to grow inside her. She waited for him to look at her, then going to sit on the edge of the coffee table in front of him she said, ‘Let’s try to fill in some missing spaces, shall we?’

  His eyes came up to hers and he smiled faintly. Then draining his glass, he set it down on the floor beside him and linked his fingers beneath his chin. ‘I’ve told you about Theo Straussen,’ he said. ‘Who he is and what he means to me.’

  Though his voice and demeanour were relaxed, Rhiannon noticed that his eyes were piercingly intent as he waited for her to respond. ‘Yes,’ she said quietly. ‘He’s your mentor. The man who got you started, who gave you all the contacts.’

  He nodded. Then taking a deep breath he said, ‘I’ve been trying for a while now to break away from him. To go solo, become an independent.’

  Rhiannon frowned. ‘But I thought you were already that,’ she said.

  He shook his head. ‘No. Most of what I do is still done for Straussen. I’ve been working on ways of wrapping it up for months, but I’m tied to him in a way that’s almost impossible to get out of, that could very possibly ruin me if I try.’

  Rhiannon’s eyes were wide. ‘But you’re trying anyway,’ she said softly.

  He nodded. ‘I have to,’ he said. ‘For the sake of my own sanity, I have to.’

  ‘I don’t understand,’ Rhiannon protested. ‘I thought you two were as close as father and son.’

  His smile was bitter. ‘Not quite,’ he responded. Then putting a hand to his head as though to press back the anger, he said, ‘It’s true, Theo Straussen is my mentor, he set me up in New York and he’s opened doors for me that would never have been opened if I hadn’t had his backing. So, it’s thanks to him that I’m where I am today. I owe practically everything to Theo Straussen, the man who moves in all the right circles, contributes to all the right charities, supports his local synagogue . . . You name it, he does it, but none of it changes what he is underneath.’

  ‘Which is?’

  Oliver’s smile was grim. ‘A gangster,’ he replied.

  ‘You mean, like in the Mafia?’ Rhiannon breathed incredulously.

  Oliver nodded and pressed his fingers into the sockets of his eyes. ‘I mean, he’s not with the Mob,’ he said, ‘he’s Jewish, but the Jews, they’ve got their own kind of mafia and Theo Straussen’s right up there with the big guys.’ He sighed and let his gaze move to the middle distance. ‘I’m not going to try telling you I didn’t know what I was getting into when it all started, because I did. I knew exactly who Straussen was and what kind of an organization he ran. But he held the keys to a world I badly wanted into.’ He glanced at Rhiannon. ‘Diamonds, not crime,’ he explained. ‘So someone I vaguely knew set it up for us to meet, Straussen invited me out to his house a couple of times and then, just when I thought he was getting tired of me, he made me an offer I couldn’t refuse.’ His laugh was dry and mirthless. ‘Boy, what an offer. I couldn’t lose. He was giving me everything I ever dreamed of and in return all I had to do was keep my nose clean. He needed kosher businesses and the idea, as he saw it, of a well-connected, fancy-talking Englishman running the diamond dealership was one that strongly appealed to him. So we struck up a deal that, at least on the face of it, looked like it couldn’t fail. And it hasn’t failed. The dealership’s doing better than it’s ever done and Straussen pretty much leaves me alone to run things. But there’s never any question that I’m his man and that’s not something I’m finding so easy to live with any more. The trouble is, like with all these things, they’re a damn sight easier to get into than they are to get out of. I suppose I should consider myself lucky it’s happening this way round, because if it was him trying to get rid of me . . .’ His eyes came up to Rhiannon’s. ‘There’s no point going into that,’ he said. ‘The point is, Straussen’s sussed the fact that I’m trying to break loose and he’s letting me know that it doesn’t fit in with him.’

  ‘You mean the burglary at your apartment, the car, the credit cards . . .’

  ‘Are just small-time irritations,’ he said, ‘to remind me he’s there. And the ring turning up in your bag – my guess is it was done to make me suspect you and start driving a wedge between us.’

  She took a moment to digest that. ‘But why on earth would he do that?’ she said.

  ‘Probably because I haven’t asked his permission to date you,’ Oliver answered bitingly. ‘Mr Straussen doesn’t like his people making independent decisions, he likes to be consulted – on everything. But the hell am I going to consult him about something like this. Everything I have, everything I own, has come courtesy of Theo Straussen, but my god-damned wife doesn’t come courtesy of him, no matter what he might like to tell himself. I’ve just got to raise enough money to buy myself out of the deal and set up on my own. It’s not going to be easy, but the alternative, the way Straussen’s got it planned, is unthinkable.’

  Rhiannon’s eyes closed as she took her time absorbing what he had told her. Then opening them again she looked at him in the dwindling light. Dropping to her knees in front of him, she rested her elbows on his thighs and took his hands in hers. He looked back at her and her throat tightened with emotion as she watched confidence and uncertainty eclipsing each other in his eyes. ‘What should we expect next?’ she whispered.

  He shook his head. ‘I’ve no idea.’

  ‘But you think it’s going to get worse.’

  He nodded. ‘Yes, it’ll get worse. Unless I decide to go on dancing to his tune.’ His smile was grim as he watched his fingers linking hers. ‘I don’t really care for myself,’ he said, smoothing a finger over her cheek. ‘It’s you I care about. You and our future and being able to share everything I have with you, everything I’ve worked for, everything that means something to me . . . I want it to be ours. I want to put Straussen and New York behind us, so that we can move forward together, make a good life together.’

  As his voice faltered Rhiannon put her arms around him and held him. His arms tightened around her and she couldn’t help wondering how much he was holding back in order not to frighten her any more than he already had.

  Chapter 7

  HEY, GALINA! WHAT do you think?’

  Lifting her head from the padded neck-rest of the make-up chair and peering through the bustling horde of beauticians, Galina looked across the room to where Verena, the costumier, was holding up a specially designed creation from Ralph Lauren.

  ‘Wow, it’s fantastic,’ Galina cried. ‘Has Maribeth seen it? She’s going to love it. It’s exactly right. Oh God, no more,’ she protested as Mimi, the chief beautician, pressed her head rudely back on to the neck-rest and struck a meaningful pose with a pointed brush.

  ‘Let’s have the tray of blues back over here,’ Mimi called to one of her assistants. ‘And did anyone get hold of Peggy Wilson yet?’

  ‘She’s on her way up,’ Verena answered, tucking the dress back inside its plastic covering and hanging it on a closet door as her assistant showed her the matching pumps. ‘Maribeth’s with her.’

  ‘Can I have some coffee?’ Galina wailed.

  ‘No toxins. Get her some water, someone,’ Mimi responded.

  ‘I want coffee,’ Galina insisted, knowing full well she wouldn’t get it. ‘Where’s Cornelius? Has anyone seen Cornelius? He should have been here ages ago.’

  ‘He’s downstairs romancing the PR guys,’ Verena answered.

  ‘And we won’t be ready to tackle your hair for at least another hour,’ Mimi added.

  ‘How long!’ Galina cried, sitting bolt upright and narrowly missing a prod in the eye.

  ‘Relax. Just kidding,’ Mimi smiled sweetly, pressing her firmly back in position.

  ‘Ouch! What’s going on down there?’ Galina demanded, craning round Mimi to get a look at her legs.

  ‘Got to pluck out those stray hairs,’ Sandy, the depilation artist, told her.

  ‘I
thought she was wearing flesh tights,’ Verena said, turning from the spare make-up mirror where she was spraying her face with Evian. ‘I’ve got her a dozen pairs of Dior flesh tights. What am I supposed to do with all those tights if you’re making her legs up for no tights?’

  ‘All right, keep your tights on,’ Sandy retorted. ‘She can wear tights. We just don’t want any stray hairs poking through, do we?’

  ‘You think someone’s going to notice one lousy blonde hair poking through a pair of tights?’ Verena cried.

  ‘What’s it to you if they do?’ Sandy responded haughtily. ‘Leg hair isn’t your territory.’

  ‘Ladies, ladies,’ Mimi interrupted, muttering the reprimand through the slender wooden stem of a lip-brush which was clamped between her teeth.

  ‘Do you think Maribeth’s going to approve of this colour?’ the manicurist wondered, tilting her head to one side as she pondered the pale mauve polish she was brushing on to Galina’s immaculately fitted and shaped nails.

  Crooking her fingers back, Galina strained her eyes downwards to take a look. ‘She’ll love it,’ she said confidently. ‘It’s a perfect match.’

  The manicurist beamed, for the painstaking efforts she’d gone to mixing the colours herself – using Conspiracy polishes, naturally – to get a match on the Conspiracy trademark mauve was second only to the trouble she’d had getting the Brazilian prosthetics girl to allow her to fit the nails herself.

  As the bedlam continued to ebb and flow around her with PR executives, product managers, stylists, beauticians and heaven only knew who else swarming in and out, Galina allowed her mind to wander out of the spacious suite at the Four Seasons Hotel to the grand ballroom downstairs, which was very likely even more hectic than the suite. When she’d called in on her way up none of the publicists or technicians or engineers or myriad assistants had even noticed she was there they were so busy supervising the construction of the presentation stand or the placement on each chair of a Conspiracy towelling robe and lace purses containing free samples of the new range of beauty products. It amused her to imagine what kind of pitch they might have built themselves to by now as the hour of the press call drew alarmingly closer and the reports that were finding their way into the make-up suite gleefully exaggerated the last-minute panic and disasters.

  Sighing contentedly and moving on through her imagination as if she was hunting through TV channels, Galina tried, not for the first time, to get some kind of picture on what her life was going to be like from midday today when Primaire USA announced to the world that she was to become the face to launch their Conspiracy range into the twenty-first century. To her it was incredible, inconceivable even, to think that she was going to achieve the kind of fame that Max and Maribeth Courtini had spent the past five days trying to prepare her for. Until now her only real recognition had come from being a regular visitor to the Romanovs’ Malibu mansion, particularly since Carolyn’s death, when she had been dubbed the beautiful and mysterious woman with whom Max Romanov might or might not be having an affair. Apart from that, there had been preciously few spaces cleared in the limelight for her – just a couple of modelling jobs back in the eighties, a small part in an afternoon soap and one night-club appearance in Venice that had got her name in the papers for the vicious attack she had suffered on her way back home.

  She had no need to work, for Max’s grandfather had taken care of her in his will. The old man had supported her and her grandmother, the Countess Katerina, for as long as Galina could remember, which was how Galina had come to attend the smart English boarding-school in Gloucestershire, England. It was also how her grandmother had afforded the spacious, fully-staffed town house in London’s Mayfair and the expensive Harley Street doctors she had needed in her final years. In fact, Mikhail Romanov’s generosity was such that Galina had often wondered if the old man had been secretly in love with the Russian Countess. Max didn’t think so, but then Max wouldn’t.

  ‘OK, a nice O with those lips,’ Mimi said, snapping Galina back to the present as she clicked her fingers for someone to wheel forward the lipstick tray.

  ‘It’s not going to be mauve, is it?’ Galina grimaced.

  ‘Mauvish,’ Mimi answered. ‘Let’s keep the noise down in here, shall we?’ she shouted. ‘Now sit still, there’s a darling, the boss is watching.’

  Galina’s eyes flew open as she turned to see the head of Primaire’s West Coast Operations, Maribeth Courtini, standing over her with Peggy Wilson, Senior Vice-President, Public Relations. ‘Maribeth!’ Galina cried, starting to get up. ‘How long have you been standing there?’ She gave a quick sigh of exasperation as Mimi shoved her back in her seat. ‘She’s a tyrant,’ she complained. ‘She won’t let me move and I’m going to scream if she doesn’t get her hand from around my throat.’

  ‘Be quiet,’ Mimi snapped.

  Maribeth laughed, aware that Mimi and Galina had struck up an instant rapport from the moment they’d met which appeared to be founded in some kind of humorous antagonism. ‘How are you feeling?’ she asked Galina.

  ‘Abused,’ Galina responded with a menacing glare at Mimi. ‘And nervous and excited and furious with Max that he’s gone off to New York.’

  Maribeth smiled. Her expertly hennaed chin-length bob was as unshakeable as her celebrated calm and her own carefully and liberally applied make-up erased several years from the fifty-three she had so far totalled. ‘You remember Peggy, I’m sure,’ she said, turning to the anxious-faced woman beside her with a honey-blonde earphone hairdo and an exquisitely tailored Donna Karan suit.

  ‘Of course I remember,’ Galina smiled. ‘How are you Peggy? How are things downstairs?’

  Peggy’s kohl-rimmed eyes flooded with purpose. ‘We’ll get there,’ she answered, with cheer-leading fervour. ‘But the important thing now is that you feel free to share with us any zero hour anxieties you may be experiencing. I want you to know that we will all be there for you, Galina. We’re pulling together for you to make this work because you’re a very special person and we all love you and want you to succeed and I just know that you’re going to make the whole world believe in Conspiracy . . .’

  ‘Ooooooooh,’ Mimi trilled, making ready to descend with her lip-brush.

  ‘Peggy, I’m sure you’d appreciate some time alone to go over your presentation one more time,’ Maribeth suggested, her hazel eyes twinkling with laughter.

  ‘Oh hell, here comes Sweeney Todd,’ Mimi warned as Cornelius, Galina’s hairdresser, sauntered in. ‘We’re not ready for you yet, cutey-pie.’

  Cornelius’s pinched little nostrils flared as he pressed a finger to his cheek, saying, ‘The woman is a Venus and you take three hours to make her look like a Venus?’

  ‘Get him out of here before I do something I’ll enjoy,’ Mimi muttered to no one in particular. ‘Galina, I know it’s hard not to think of a blow job when your lips are like that, but try not to dribble, honey. It’s not polite.’

  Laughing, Maribeth turned to watch Peggy walk stiffly out of the room. ‘Bad news, I’m afraid,’ she said turning back. ‘Susan Posner’s turned up.’

  ‘The Poisoner!’ Verena cried from where she was lying on the bed, flexing her upper arms. ‘Who invited her?’

  ‘She’s covering for the Enquirer,’ Maribeth answered, looking down at Galina. ‘I just wanted to remind you of what we talked about yesterday,’ she said. ‘Peggy and her team will be there to field questions you don’t want to answer. With Susan Posner in the audience we now know that situation is likely to arise.’ Behind her the door had opened and an enormous bouquet of white roses was swaying dangerously into the room. ‘Is that you behind those flowers, Krystal?’ Maribeth asked, searching for her secretary.

  ‘No, it’s me, Ula,’ Max’s personal assistant panted. ‘Someone take these, please. I’m experiencing death by a thousand cuts here. God-damn men, why don’t they use Teleflora like the rest of the civilized world? Galina, how are you doing, sweetheart? Max sends his love, he also send
s these roses and says to tell you he’ll be at Primaire in New York to watch the video link-up. He’ll call you right after, he says. Any chance of some coffee anyone?’

  ‘Mimi’s banned it,’ Galina told her through circular lips. ‘But if you can find any I’d love one. Who’s that massaging my feet? It feels wonderful. Are my nails dry yet, I’ve got an itch.’

  ‘Where?’ the manicurist demanded, pinning Galina’s hands to the arms of the chair. ‘I’ll scratch it for you.’

  ‘In my ear,’ Galina answered.

  ‘Use a cotton bud,’ Mimi said, handing her one. ‘Verena, did you show Maribeth the dress yet?’

  ‘I saw it last night,’ Maribeth told her. ‘It’s perfect. Is that mauve on Galina’s eyes a tad dark, Mimi . . . No, no, of course it isn’t,’ she corrected herself as Mimi turned dangerously affronted eyes upon her. ‘It must be the light.’ She looked at her watch. ‘You’ve got another forty-five minutes in here,’ she said.

  ‘Cornelius!’ Mimi snapped. ‘Stop hovering that way, you look like you’re trying to hold in a fart. You can have her in ten minutes, now beat it.’

  ‘Did I see The Poisoner downstairs?’ Ula said, coming out of the bathroom where she and a couple of others had deposited the roses.

  ‘You did,’ Maribeth confirmed.

  ‘What’s she doing here so early?’ Ula demanded, leaning her gangly frame towards a spare mirror. ‘What’s she doing here at all? She’s not a health and beauty hack.’

  ‘She’s doing a piece for the Enquirer,’ Maribeth told her, ‘and she’s here early in the hope of catching a quick five minutes with me, so I’m told.’

  Ula snorted. ‘She can’t seriously think you’re going to give her anything on Max. I mean, I take it that’s what she’s after. Send her back to the nut-cruncher over in Burbank.’

  ‘The what?’ Galina said.