‘Are you sure?’ he said with concern. ‘I thought you’d been signed off for six weeks.’
‘It’s my company, Lucian,’ she said firmly.
He didn’t press the point and Sasha was grateful. It wasn’t her body that needed to recover, but her heart, her mind. Sitting around in her apartment with only Sally and occasional visits from the physiotherapist, she had nothing to do but dwell on might-have-beens and she feared that if it went on any longer, she might not crawl out from under her black cloud. The truth was the company was the one thing in her life she could control. Yes, there were other forces at work – competitors, the economy – but it stood or fell by her own efforts, her own decisions. That was what she loved about it.
Sally brought in a tray of coffee and Lucian helped Sasha to the Venetian glass table, sitting opposite her.
‘You know the press office have been swamped with interview requests for you,’ he said. ‘No one’s saying it out loud, of course, but they all want the story on the crash. Everyone has heard the rumours.’
She groaned. ‘That’s the last thing I need.’
‘You should do it,’ said Lucian, reaching for the silver pot. ‘A bit of notoriety never hurt anyone.’
‘I don’t want this to be painted as some of sort of Ted Kennedy at Chappaquiddick.’
‘Don’t underestimate the power of your lifestyle, Sasha,’ said Lucian. ‘I might be old, but I haven’t lost my nose for this. I can’t remember when there has been so much excitement for a growing business. You are our greatest asset; people look up to you. Handled in the right way, this can help us. This is tragedy, not notoriety.’
‘I don’t want to make money from Robert’s death,’ said Sasha bitterly.
Lucian shook his head.
‘You’re not; you’re making money from your life, Sasha.’ He took a sip of coffee and gave a small smile. ‘And I think making money is something Robert would have approved of.’
She stared out of the window. ‘You should know that Robert left me his shareholding in the US business in his will,’ she said quietly.
‘When will probate clear?’
‘I don’t know yet,’ she said. ‘As you can imagine, I haven’t exactly got a hotline to the Ashford family any more.’
Lucian didn’t smile. ‘Well we need to get that moving as soon as we can,’ he said urgently. ‘Because Absolute Capital are looking to sell.’
Sasha looked up with alarm. ‘Because of the accident?’
‘No, because they’ve had their investment with us for four years and because they think it’s the right time to exit.’
‘Do you?’
She respected Lucian’s opinion. He was tougher than Philip, although she missed the sense of a shared journey she’d had with Phil, that they’d built it up together. But Lucian knew business better and he didn’t spare her feelings.
‘Yes. It’s absolutely the right time to sell. Share prices of luxury companies are rocketing. Plus celebrity is the new currency and you have it by the bucketload.’
Sasha thought of Robert and that evening in Canary Wharf when he’d first suggested getting private equity investment, how he’d told her he loved the way she took risks. It had been a risk ditching Ben, it had been a risk expanding into America. And it had been a risk loving Robert. But she had done it all and she was glad she had, even with all the pain it had caused.
‘Let’s do it,’ she said, feeling some of her fire return. ‘As soon as the shareholding comes through, let’s sell.’
Lucian smiled. ‘That’s my girl,’ he said.
Nine months later Rivera Holdings were taken over by another private equity company. The big fashion conglomerates of LVMH, Richemont and PPR had again refused to bite, but the one hundred and ten million sale price paid by Duo Capital more than made up for it. The agreement banked Sasha more than thirty million pounds, while also allowing her to keep hold of a small stake in the company and retain her position as president and creative director.
Steven Ellis, the new CEO installed by the owner of Duo Capital, was a sombre fifty-something Scot with sharp suits and even sharper business instincts, who had turned around a failing Swiss watch company and made it the horological must-buy for the new Russian money. He had a degree from Yale and an MBA from Insead, the French business school, and Sasha could tell from the minute she met him that he could do great things with her company. Six months later, after a few well-placed interviews and dozens of sessions of therapy, it was business as usual, the hole in her heart mended, a pile of party invitations on her desk. Sasha Sinclair was ready to face the world again. And this time, she thought, the world could take her as she was.
47
September 2003
Miles was enjoying being back in London. He walked to the window and peered out into the garden of his Notting Hill townhouse. The long sloping lawn was slightly unkempt and the rose beds were scattered with unraked leaves, but the very thought of having a garden made him smile. In New York you were lucky if you had a window box, but here you could smell flowers, hear birds, watch the changing seasons; he had forgotten how much he missed it. Since the growth of the Globe empire in the States, he had spent less and less time in England. He had a management team to deal with the Covent Garden club and gym while the concierge service was raking in hundreds of thousands with virtually no investment, but the real money had been in the States, where the Globe Country Club franchise was going stratospheric, with seven locations along with golf courses and spas. But that was nothing compared to the global reach of Ash Corp.
Sitting down at his heavy wooden desk – an antique the dealer had assured him had come from one of the Duke of Wellington’s residences – Miles flipped through a file showing all the businesses Robert Ashford had owned or had a significant interest in. There were literally hundreds, based in hundreds of cities around the world. Miles shook his head with dismay as he ran his eyes down the list. Alongside the manufacturing and commercial property wings, Ash Corp. owned a dry-cleaning chain, a business card supplier and a haulage firm which specialised in frozen goods. Frankly, it was a sprawling mess. Robert Ashford had been a shrewd investor, no question of that – and individually, Miles felt sure that most of these businesses would turn a good profit – but such a wide spread of interests had made Ash Corp. flabby and unfocused. Somewhere along the line, Robert Ashford had taken his eye off the ball.