To My Best Friends. Sam Baker

      SAM BAKER

       To My Best Friends

      To my best friends Nancy, Clare, Catherine Jude Shelly And, above all, Jon

      Contents

       Cover

       Title Page

      Prologue

      Chapter One

      Chapter Two

      Chapter Three

      Chapter Four

      Chapter Five

      Chapter Six

      Chapter Seven

      Chapter Eight

      Chapter Nine

      Chapter Ten

      Chapter Eleven

      Chapter Twelve

      Chapter Thirteen

      Chapter Fourteen

      Chapter Fifteen

      Chapter Sixteen

      Chapter Seventeen

      Chapter Eighteen

      Chapter Nineteen

      Chapter Twenty

      Chapter Twenty-One

      Chapter Twenty-Two

      Chapter Twenty-Three

      Chapter Twenty-Four

      Chapter Twenty-Five

      Chapter Twenty-Six

      Chapter Twenty-Seven

      Chapter Twenty-Eight

      Chapter Twenty-Nine

      Chapter Thirty

      Chapter Thirty-One

      Chapter Thirty-Two

      Chapter Thirty-Three

      Chapter Thirty-Four

      Chapter Thirty-Five

      Chapter Thirty-Six

      Chapter Thirty-Seven

      Chapter Thirty-Eight

      Chapter Thirty-Nine

      Chapter Forty

      Chapter Forty-One

      Chapter Forty-Two

      Chapter Forty-Three

      Chapter Forty-Four

      Chapter Forty-Five

      Chapter Forty-Six

      Chapter Forty-Seven

      Chapter Forty-Eight

      Chapter Forty-Nine

      Chapter Fifty

      Epilogue

      Acknowledgments

      About the Author

      Praise

      Also by Sam Baker

      Copyright

       About the Publisher

      Prologue

      That navy Prada suit, the one with the nipped-in waist you wished you’d never bought? Trust me, get the skirt taken up two inches and wear it with my red Marc Jacobs mary-janes. The ones with the blue trim. They always fitted you better than they did me, anyway. You’ll look a million dollars . . .

      Slipping the lid back on the cartridge pen, Nicci dropped it on the duvet beside her and let her head fall back onto plumped pillows. She closed her eyes and felt the bedroom spin. It was a familiar sensation now, almost comforting, in a sick sort of way.

      Three and a half lines of writing. Five sentences. Fifty-five words. How could fifty-five measly words be so exhausting? They weren’t even the important words. Those were still to come. These were just the preamble, the housekeeping. Nicci risked opening her eyes and the room sped up.

      Damn it, she thought, and let her lids drop, feeling the spinning recede. This wasn’t her. Illness didn’t suit her. Nicci Morrison didn’t do sick, just as she didn’t do sitting around at weekends, chilling or downtime. And she didn’t do lying in bed in the middle of the afternoon. At least not since she was twenty-one and had met David. Then they’d done nothing much other than lying in bed all afternoon when she should have been writing a ten-thousand-word dissertation on the way clothes reflect women’s place in society in nineteenth-century literature. Well, not so much lying, but bed had figured prominently. Bed, the floor, the bath . . .

      Nicci smiled at the memory. Half sad, half glad they’d had that then, and the rest.

      Come on, she urged herself. Get a grip. One down, three more letters to go.

      The trick was catching her morphine at the right stage: long enough after her injection for the pain to have eased, but not so soon the opiates dulled her capacity to think straight. Pulling herself up, Nicci rummaged around her for the pen while trying to find her train of thought. Light shimmered at the edge of her vision, brighter than she could stand.

      Jo wouldn’t refuse, Nicci was sure of that. Especially not when she opened the parcel containing the red mary-janes, which David would deliver with the letter. How could she – how could any of them – when Jo knew only too well what Nicci had been through in the past year? Biopsies, mastectomy, chemo and radio. None of which, ultimately, had worked. Wasn’t wearing an old navy-blue suit the least a girl could do for her best friend?’

      Looking at the sheet of thick cream paper resting on a magazine on her knee, Nicci smiled. She would have the last laugh. And her business partner would thank her for it. In the weeks to come, the last thing her friend would want to think about – the last thing any of Nicci’s friends would want to think about – was what to wear.

      Now, that’s the outfit sorted. And don’t argue, Jo. Remember, on the wardrobe front, Nicci knows best!!!

      Just think of it as one less problem to worry about. After all, you’re going to have enough on your plate with Capsule Wardrobe once I’ve gone.

      But that’s not the point of this letter. No, what I’m really writing about are my twin babies, my darling girls, my Charlie and Harrie, your goddaughters. And you’ve been such a good godmother, Jo, the very best. Which is why I want you to be more . . .

      Chapter One

      There were few things in life Nicci Morrison had not been able to control. But being buried on a dank, drizzly day in February was one of them.

      It was not yet two o’clock, and the dirty grey cloud hung low over the church, obscuring the spire, making the hour seem closer to dusk.

      ‘There you are!’ Jo Clarke called out as a tall thin woman, hair frizzing from the bun at the nape of her neck, picked her way along the muddy path. She was clad head to toe in black – hardly unexpected at a funeral – but her spike-heeled ankle boots would have looked more at home in a bar.

      ‘Let me guess,’ Jo laughed, eyeing the Jimmy Choo boots. ‘The person responsible for you buying those in the first place is to blame for you wearing them now?’

      Mona Thomas raised her eyebrows and looked pointedly at the red mary-janes on Jo’s feet. ‘Takes one to know one,’ she said.