Christopher hugged Emma then stepped back, holding her by the shoulders.
‘You stay strong, young lady,’ he said. ‘Saul gave you the company for a reason. Saul was many things, but he wasn’t a fool and he chose you to carry on his legacy – not any of those vultures in your family. I, for one, think he made a splendid choice and I know you’ll make him proud.’
He pulled down his hat and tipped a salute back inside the house, then he was away into the darkness and gone.
Emma stood there on the doorstep, feeling a distant wave of hope.
‘Who was that?’ asked Ruan, coming behind her with a glass of wine.
‘Milford’s lifeline,’ said Emma.
‘She is such a bitch!’ said Stella Chase indignantly. ‘Have you seen this shit?’ She thrust a copy of US Rive towards her friend Tash, stabbing a finger at the page. Moments earlier, the two girls had been sitting quietly in Venice Beach’s Fig-tree Café, eating frozen yoghurt and idly leafing through the latest fashion magazines. Then Stella had come across a twelve-page photo story on handbag designer Cate Glazer. Alongside a series of sumptuous photos of her palatial Hamptons home, the article gushed about Glazer’s life: how she had started as a bit-part soap actress, fallen in love with and married Hollywood producer Lance Glazer, then launched her must-have range of bags and purses. The cherry on the cake, said the article, was Glazer’s recent triumph, being crowned CFDA Accessories Designer of the Year.
‘Which bit are we referring to?’ asked Tash, taking a lick of double-berry yoghurt while she scanned the feature. ‘The photo of their new forty-million dollar home in Sag Harbor or the roll-call of her former boyfriends? There’s some pretty cute guys in that list, you know.’
‘This bit,’ said Stella, pointing at the page so hard her fingernail almost went through the paper. ‘That entire section boasting about the “Beverly” bag. How the design came to her in a dream. A dream!’
Stella jumped up, grabbed her things and barged out from the air-conditioned cool of the café into the bright heat of early spring afternoon in Los Angeles. She dumped the paper sack bulging with groceries she had bought from Whole Foods that morning into the basket of her bicycle as Tash tagged along behind her, the magazine fluttering in her hand.
‘Are you going to bring it up with her?’ asked her friend.
‘I won’t even be seeing her until Wednesday. You know it’s the Oscars tomorrow; she always takes the next two days off to recover.’
‘Cate loves to party,’ said Tash weakly.
Stella stopped dead on the boardwalk, causing a muscled in-line skater in only shorts and headphones to swerve dangerously to avoid her.
‘Three years!’ she said. ‘Three bloody years I’ve been working for that company! And what thanks do I get?’ she continued, determined to get it off her chest. ‘I work fourteen-hour days. I design every purse, dress and shoe for that company and she tells the world the idea for her latest It-bag came to her “in a dream”.’
‘What you need is a good night out,’ replied Tasha, putting a reassuring hand on her friend’s shoulder. ‘Apparently there’s this great party in the Hills tonight. Like an unofficial pre-Oscars party. I hear Brad’s gonna be there and …’
‘You know Lance is gay, don’t you?’
Tash threw her frozen yoghurt in the trash.
‘Stella, honey! Let it go! It’s bad for your karma.’
Stella didn’t seem to hear her, starting to push her bicycle along the beach again. Across the wide expanse of sand, the sea twinkled in the distance.
‘Maybe I’ll go to that good tarot reader on the boardwalk on the way home,’ mused Stella vaguely, ‘I think I need some psychic intervention to tell me what to do.’
‘What you need to do is come out tonight,’ said Tash firmly. ‘Go home and get ready.’
Stella shook her head. ‘I’d love to, but I can’t.’
‘What’s more important than a party on Oscars weekend?’ asked Tash seriously.
‘Oh, a friend of the family is in town,’ she said.
‘So bring her to the party.’
Stella grimaced. ‘I really don’t think she’s the partying kind.’
‘Orlando is going to be there,’ persisted Tash.
‘Well, I’ll think about it,’ said Stella already on her bike, ‘call you later.’
‘Brad! Orlando!’ called Tash after her, ‘that guy out of the OC?’
Stella just turned back and waved, knowing that not even the cutest boys in Hollywood could lift the black cloud surrounding her today.
The two-mile cycle ride back to Santa Monica did little to clear Stella’s head. The Santa Ana winds were blowing making it artificially warm for an early spring day. To her left the Pacific Ocean sparkled silver while in the distance, as if to welcome her home, the pier jutted out into the sea looking every bit as magical as it had the first time she had seen it almost four years earlier. And look how far I’ve come, she thought, with just a hint of irony. She had come to California six months after she had graduated, ostensibly to be nearer her mother who had moved from Cornwall to Montecito to ‘reinvent’ herself as an aromatherapist. But within weeks Stella had drifted down to LA, got a flat in Santa Monica and a job in a boutique on Melrose. Her wage was a pittance; the trade-off for them turning a blind eye to her lack of a green card. The boutique was hip and Stella was pretty which meant that she was often invited to parties. She went along for the free food and drink, but even at the most chic Hollywood Hills soiree, Stella was always the most stylish person there in the little dresses she customized from thrift shop finds or rolls of spare fabric from the shop. It was at one of those parties that Stella had met Cate Glazer, wife of the famous movie producer Lance, who had ambitions to be LA’s answer to Kate Spade. Cate Glazer had been knocked out by the beautiful blonde Brit, but was more knocked out by the white jersey T-shirt dress she said she had run up that afternoon. It was simple but chic, cleverly using the material to show her figure off to best advantage. The kid clearly had talent.
‘Can you design handbags?’ Cate Glazer had asked her.
‘I’ll try anything once,’ smiled Stella. What the hell, why not? She shrugged. And it was that easy: the next Monday Stella began work as ‘design executive’ for fledgling LA fashion house Cate Glazer. She hadn’t realized when she signed on, however, that it was a workforce of two: Stella designed the bags which were produced by a company in Mexico, Cate handled the PR. Their first venture involved Stella making 100 totes from white sail canvas. Cate gave them to a selection of Lance’s actress friends each of whom had been photographed carrying them. The photos ran in every magazine from US Weekly to Vogue and suddenly Cate Glazer was on the map. The orders poured in so fast that within six months they had to open a factory in Mexico. Three years later, Cate Glazer was one of America’s hottest lifestyle labels, a multi-million-dollar business, branching out from accessories into fashion and interiors, while Stella was in pretty much the same place. Sure, she had an office with ‘Design Executive’ on the door, but despite her talent, she had never received a single job offer because everyone believed Cate Glazer was the talent behind the stylish Cate Glazer merchandise.
The sky was beginning to darken by the time Stella pushed her bicycle through her apartment