‘Do you want to wait here while I go and pick up the car?’ asked Marcus, rattling his keys.
Molly shook her head. ‘This is really a night out with my daughter. You’re just tagging along, Marcus, my dear,’ she teased, turning to kiss him lightly on the lips. ‘I’m going to see if I can tempt her with a nightcap at the Light Bar,’ she said, pointing over the road in the direction of the St Martin’s Lane Hotel. ‘And I will see you tomorrow,’ she said, purring into Marcus’s ear.
‘Please come for a drink,’ said Molly, as Marcus disappeared around a corner. ‘I only had a couple of glasses at dinner. Marcus hates me drinking too much.’
‘He knows what you’re like, that’s why,’ said Summer cynically. ‘No. I’m going home,’ she said with finality, sticking her arm out to hail a taxi. Summer rarely stood up to her mother, but the last thing she needed just then was more cocktails and self-pity.
Molly just shrugged and they climbed into the back of a black cab, trundling round Trafalgar Square past the National Gallery, lit up and stately, and watched impassively as lovers walked round the fountains.
‘You aren’t filming next weekend, are you?’ said Molly finally. She had seen the look of fear and confusion on her daughter’s face at the mention of Adam, and her instincts for intrigue told her something was wrong. ‘Why don’t you want to go on the yacht?’
Summer stared out of the window. The yacht. Where Adam had promised to take her. Since they had first made love, anchored in the Solent, Adam and Summer had barely been apart, their passion swelling in ferocity with each meeting. Now they had arranged to meet on The Pledge at Porto Ercole on the Wednesday before Adam went on to Capri. Just the two of them, alone, together, entwined. How could Summer then reboard their love nest two days later, with his girlfriend playing hostess? How could she sleep on the boat, knowing that forty-eight hours earlier she had been lying next to Adam, kissing him, feeling him inside her?
She knew what she was doing was wrong. Selfish, immoral. Many times, over the years, Summer had criticized her mother for willingly being ‘the other woman’, but now she was doing exactly the same. Even worse, she knew Karin; she owed her success to her. She hated herself for it, but the feelings she felt for Adam were too strong to deny – and, in truth, Summer felt she deserved this small ray of happiness.
She had never let anyone get this close before, and she didn’t need a psychiatrist to tell her that her fear of intimacy and abandonment lay with Molly. What Summer had seen as a child. What she had heard at night. It was why, when all her friends in Toyko were out at clubs and going on dinner dates with rich businessmen, Summer had kept her distance and always gone home alone. It was why at twenty-four she had never had a proper relationship, regardless of her beauty. It was why she needed Adam so badly now.
‘Come to Capri,’ said Molly softly. ‘Bring a friend if you want to. Marcus will ask Adam. Someone pretty. Pretty girls are always welcome on yachts,’ she said, smiling slightly.
‘I don’t want to go,’ said Summer, beginning to sob, the guilt, shame and sadness overcoming her unexpectedly.
Molly put her arm on her shoulder. ‘You’re being ridiculous,’ she said softly.
Summer looked at her through misty eyes. She was going to tell her. She had to. The burden of what she was doing was too heavy to bear alone. And out of anybody she knew, Molly would know that feeling, of being the other woman and its sweet burden.
‘I am seeing Adam,’ said Summer simply, hoping for
a second that her mother might not have heard her. ‘I don’t want to go because I’m already going. A few days beforehand. I’m meeting him in Porto Ercole.’
She held her breath and she looked at her mother, knowing that Molly wouldn’t judge her for sleeping with somebody else’s partner, but wondering for one moment if she would be angry for encroaching on her new wonderland, by bagging its prize.
Molly stared open-mouthed at her daughter, the glimmer of fury immediately softening as she realized with startling clarity the opportunity that had presented itself; wondering why she had not thought of it sooner. If Adam Gold was proving stubborn to her own advances, then having him as her son-in-law would be the perfect compromise. She smiled at Summer, one strap of her silk, crocus-yellow sundress falling off one shoulder, the curve of her rosy lips, slightly downturned with unease, and thought that she had never looked more beautiful.
She took her daughter’s hand and squeezed it lightly. ‘That’s perfect. It really is perfect. You and Adam are perfect for each other.’
‘Perfect. If it wasn’t for Karin,’ said Summer, a teardrop running down her cheek.
‘Give it time, honey,’ she said stroking her fingertips. ‘Hang on in there and just give it time.’
Erin was hiding in a toilet cubicle at the Midas Corporation, her face buried in her hands, thick sobs welling in her throat. Her worst suspicions had been confirmed and the last few days all began to make sense as the pieces of the awful jigsaw fell together. It was part of Erin’s daily routine to go through the trade papers for Adam: Estates Gazette, the property section of the New York Times, Construction News. In one building industry journal she had seen, to her horror, a news story about Julian. There, smiling at her, taunting her, was a head-shot of ‘renowned architect Julian Sewell’, accompanying a story that Julian had just been taken onto the board of Dreamscape Construction as vice president. She had known immediately how Dreamscape had got the information that had sabotaged the Midas pitch for the London Gallery. Every pitch, every development had its own file on her computer. Anybody accessing her computer would know exactly what Midas Corporation was doing – which developments they were pitching for, who they had been commissioned by and the intimate details of their costs and designs.
Erin tore off a piece of loo roll to blot her eyes and blow her nose. He’d used her, then discarded her. Had he ever really felt anything for her? When he whispered to her in bed, was it just his ambition talking? When his naked body pressed against hers was he simply going through the motions until he could get the information he wanted? Her mind flashed around every possibility – for all she knew, he might have manipulated that first meeting in the Piccadilly wine bar; hadn’t he been waiting for a friend that never showed up? Their entire relationship was a sham. A knot of pain stabbed in her belly.
Erin took a deep breath and sat in the Eames chair in front of Adam. The sun was shining in through the window and making her squint. She felt nervous and pressured.
‘What is it, Erin? I’m very busy today,’ said Adam with impatience.
‘I’ve got something, well, something bad to tell you.’
Adam glanced up. ‘It can’t be any worse than the news I’ve already had this week,’ he said.
‘Well, I think you should know that I’ve been dating Julian Sewell.’
‘Oh yeah?’ said Adam, looking up from a pile of contracts. ‘I hope he’s a better lover than he is an architect.’
He saw her crestfallen look and backtracked hastily. ‘Sorry Erin, uncalled for. I’ve just been in a bad mood all week after the London Gallery fiasco.’
‘Well, that’s why I’m here,’ said Erin, her voice wavering. She had his full attention now.