Weston breathed deeply, uttering through clenched teeth, ‘Shit, why am I such a sucker for the young ones? And why do I always want heterosexual women; what am I trying to prove?’
Scraping her hair back, she moved closer to the mirror. Time for a face lift, she thought, then instantly rejected the idea. Her mother had recently had her third: a seventy-one going on fifty-something femme fatale, who reminded Weston of a lamp she’d had in her hall – tall and wooden with a parchment shade that looked best at night when lit. The last time she’d visited Annette Sinclair, Weston had been shocked to discover a pack of tampons in the bathroom. When questioned, Annette had given one of her prim, ‘Nothing to do with you, dear,’ looks and giggled girlishly without making any comment. The thought had made Weston feel physically sick; her seventy-one-year-old mother still menstruating, presumably with the aid of hormones. Grabbing a couple of extra-strength painkillers, and a 1000 gram Vitamin C tablet, she washed them down with a slug of Evian, then went back to bed.
Three hours later Weston woke feeling infinitely better, and ready to face lunch with Rob Steiner who ran the LA office of Avesta. She had met him only a couple of times since the recent merger of her own Summit television with Avesta, but each time she’d renewed her first impression of Rob. Extremely bright, enthusiastic and intuitive, with the sort of incisive brain that could cut through the crap and stay on track. She liked him, and intended to offer him a fat pay rise to head up her proposed Pacific Rim operation. She showered and dressed in a long-sleeved simple brown wool dress, draping a camel cashmere sweater over her shoulders in preparation for lunch at Le Cirque, where the super-efficient air conditioning almost required fur coats in summer and sleeveless shifts in winter. Armed with her bulging briefcase, she left her bedroom and walked briskly down a wide hallway, heels clicking on the polished ash floor. The first thing she saw as she entered her vast living room was her maid Carmita who was coming out of the kitchen, her head obscured by a large floral arrangement covered in crisp cellophane wrapping.
‘Morning, Miss Weston, these just arrived.’
‘Morning, Carmita. Or afternoon, almost …’
‘I careful not to vacuum, I think that you ’ave a late night.’
‘I had an early morning, Carmita. I feel a little worse for wear, could you make me a strong coffee? Use that Colombian blend you got last week.’
‘All gone, your friend Taylor drank most of it at the weekend.’
Mildly irritated, Weston snapped, ‘Use any kind of coffee, Carmita, just make it.’
Muttering under her breath, Carmita left the room. Weston poked her nose into the cellophane wrapping, jumping back with a sharp intake of breath when she saw all the flowers were dead and shrivelled, brown-stained lilies. She hated lilies. They reminded her of death, and of her father’s funeral when her mother had filled the house with them. Nonchalantly she tore the accompanying card off, thinking that Martin the commissionaire had probably forgotten to deliver the flowers to her apartment. It wouldn’t be the first time, and she made a mental note to question him about it on her way out. Slowly she moved towards a large white sofa situated in the centre of the room. As she did so, her eyes wandered over the pristine elegance of her apartment, checking for dust. Moving a vase a millimetre as she passed a table, she registered the absence of the Aubusson rug that was supposed to have been delivered from the specialist cleaners two days ago. Weston loved order, was fastidiously tidy and obsessed with her own inimitable sense of style: understated and expensive. Whenever her friend Beth came to the apartment, she always said that she was afraid to sit down in case she looked too messy, or not colour-coordinated with the beige on white, and shades of eau de nil and pewter. Weston was just as unaffected by these playful jibes as she was by her mother’s resentful taunts. It had long been her dream to live on Central Park West, an aspirational thing, something she’d promised herself at eighteen when she’d stayed in a similar apartment owned by the family of a friend from college. It would have been very easy, too easy, to have let her father help her climb the property ladder. Sinclair Kane could well afford it. But Weston had wanted to get there on her own. Setting herself goals and meeting challenges were meat and drink to Weston. And the day she’d moved into the nine thousand square feet of lofty space high above Central Park, she had felt very good indeed. Her only regret? Her father hadn’t lived long enough to witness her achievement.
When Carmita returned with the coffee, Weston was standing next to the vast floor-to-ceiling plate-glass window, the top of her head glowing like a ball of fire in a sudden burst of brilliant sunlight. The maid busied herself moving a pile of glossy magazines to make room for the tray on the coffee table. ‘Will that be all, Miss Weston?’
When Weston twisted around, Carmita was shocked to see her employer’s face. ‘You all right, Miss Weston? You look like you saw a ghost.’
‘Ironic you should say that,’ Weston whispered almost to herself, then without another word she walked past her maid and out of the apartment.
Carmita shrugged, poured herself a cup of coffee and was about to drink it when she spotted a white card on the floor, close to where Weston had been standing. Dropping to her knees, she picked it up and read the message: Freedom is a precious gift.
Carmita propped the card up against the dead flowers before leaving the room.
An hour before Weston received her flowers, Beth also had a gift. She was in her office on Wall Street, a fortieth-floor eyrie with far-reaching views out to Staten Island; on a good day she could see the tourists peering out of the viewing platform high up on Liberty’s crown. On a bad day she tried not to look out of the window.
Five years previously she had commissioned an English interior designer to transform the large floor space. The brief was simple: lived-in, old English money, but not stuffy. And the result was a pseudo turn-of-the-century style, more suited to a crusty old barrister in London than a high-flying female banker in Manhattan. But Beth loved it. She loved the mellow oak-panelled walls, specially distressed to look old; the painted faux bookshelves and the original Chesterfield she’d found by accident in a funky little shop selling Indian artefacts in the Village. It was her inner sanctum, giving her a feeling of such calm it was almost spiritual. It was the only room she’d ever inhabited that’d had that effect. Most of her English childhood had been spent to-ing and fro-ing between a rambling, elegantly shabby country house near Cirencester, St Mary’s Wantage boarding school, and her father’s smart Cheyne Row townhouse in the fashionable end of Chelsea. Until 1968, when her mother had met and married an American TV producer and had dragged Beth, at fourteen, kicking and screaming from her English school to the East Coast American equivalent. The transition had been much easier than Beth could have hoped for. Her American counterparts had welcomed her like a long-lost sister, and she was forced to admit it would not have been as easy if it had been the other way round.
Beth was drinking her fourth double espresso of the day, and thinking that she should give up all toxic substances, when her secretary Julia buzzed.
‘Special delivery for you, Ms Morgan; shall I bring it in?’
‘What is it?’ Beth asked.
‘No idea, it was delivered by Fed Ex, it looks like a gift.’
‘Sounds intriguing, wheel it in.’
A few seconds later Julia entered the office, carrying a box the size of a wine case. It was expensively wrapped in dark brown paper, tied with black ribbon and raffia. Beth exhaled smoke, as her methodical mind started to eliminate the reasons why she should be receiving a gift.
‘It’s not my birthday, thank God, and I can’t think of any good turns I’ve done recently. My husband is pissed with me, so I doubt he’s bought me a present. And I don’t have a lover.’
She began to undo the wrapping, a smile of mild anticipation directed at Julia who looked on eagerly awaiting the revelation. With some ferocity, Beth tore at the paper, standing back with a pant when she pulled