Friends and Rivals. Tilly Bagshawe

smoothing down his hair and removing lipstick marks from his face and collar with a damp flannel.

      Jack spoke first. ‘Are you out of your mind?’

      ‘I don’t know,’ drawled Ivan. ‘Am I?’

      ‘Anybody could have walked in!’

      ‘Indeed. But it had to be you who actually did, didn’t it Jack? You’re like an old housemaster, prowling the dorms looking for miscreants. And lo and behold, you found me.’ He held out his hand in mock supplication. ‘Go ahead, whip out your cane. I’m used to it.’

      Jack’s stomach turned. ‘You think this is funny.’

      ‘Well, I don’t think it’s tragic, let’s put it that way,’ Ivan shot back. ‘OK, so I’ve been a naughty boy. But nobody knows, so there’s no harm done.’

      ‘No harm?’ Jack spluttered. ‘She’s a client!’

      ‘So?’

      ‘She’s a teenager!’

      ‘Only just,’ said Ivan, cleaning up the cocaine remnants before swigging from a bottle of mouthwash and spitting into the sink. ‘It’s my birthday. Joyce was my present. Oh for God’s sake, stop looking so thunderous. It was a one-off, all right? It won’t happen again. Jack. Jack!’

      But Jack had stormed off down the corridor, ignoring Ivan’s shouts. The servants’ stairs were blocked by a kissing couple so he veered left, practically running down the grand main staircase, so eager was he to get out of there. Bloody fool. I should never have come tonight. So much for Ivan turning over a new leaf.

      ‘Oh, there you are.’

      Jack was so caught up in his own thoughts that he almost knocked Catriona flying.

      ‘You’re not leaving already, are you?’ Her face fell. ‘We haven’t even had the fireworks yet. You must stay for those.’

      ‘Sorry,’ he mumbled awkwardly. ‘Something’s come up. I have to get back to London.’

      Goddamn Ivan for implicating him in his bullshit. Now Jack was forced to stand here and lie to one of his oldest friends.

      Catriona tried to be understanding. ‘Oh. Well, I suppose if you have to. Anyway, before you go, I just wanted to let you know that I’ll look out for Kendall when she comes over. As you know, lots of Ivan’s clients come up here to stay when they’re burned out or stressed or whatever. We’ve become quite the heartbreak hotel, haven’t we?’ she laughed. ‘I doubt even Miss Bryce can get into too much trouble in the bright lights of Widford on a Saturday night.’

      ‘Thank you. Really. That means a lot.’ Jack looked at Catriona, then hugged her tightly, squeezing as if he might never let her go. ‘You’re a good woman, Catriona Charles. Ivan doesn’t deserve you.’

      Catriona smiled wryly. ‘He probably doesn’t deserve you either, Jack darling. I know he must be difficult to work with. But don’t give up on him. For my sake.’

      Speeding back towards London half an hour later, Jack Messenger felt as depressed as he had in months. Every time it seemed as if Ivan might finally have turned a corner and developed some scruples, he went and did something so shatteringly stupid and selfish it beggared belief.

      Jack wished he could give up on Ivan. But after fifteen years as partners in Jester, their lives and interests were irrevocably intertwined. Being in business with Ivan Charles was like walking through life with a bomb strapped to your chest. The unpredictability, the selfishness, all wrapped up in a lethally charming package.

      Come to think of it, Ivan Charles had a lot in common with the other giant headache in Jack Messenger’s life. But, he reflected with relief, at least she was safely ensconced in his Brentwood guesthouse under the watchful eye of her twenty-four-hour sobriety coach.

      Not even Kendall Bryce could get into too much trouble in those circumstances.

      CHAPTER TWO

      ‘Harder! Oh my God, what is the problem? Why do you keep stopping?’

      Kendall Bryce looked over her shoulder at her red-faced sobriety coach with withering disdain. Weren’t these sober health-freaks supposed to be fit? This guy screwed like a grandfather.

      ‘My electric toothbrush makes me come faster than this. Come on, Kevin. Do it!’

      Kevin Dacre closed his eyes and tried to recapture any of the sexual excitement he’d felt when Kendall Bryce, the Kendall Bryce, had opened the front door to him half an hour ago in nothing but a pair of Trashy Lingerie panties. Half an hour ago, Kevin was worried he might come before he got his pants off. Now, after being ordered into countless different positions, with Kendall berating him for his poor performance like a particularly ticked-off drill sergeant, all Kevin wanted was to be allowed to go home. That, and for Kendall Bryce not to tell his employer, Jack Messenger, what had happened this evening.

      The worst part was that Jack had warned him, in so many words: ‘She’ll try anything in the book to get you off her case. If she wants drugs or a drink she’ll stop at nothing to get them. She’ll probably offer to sleep with you, and let me tell you, Mr Dacre, Kendall’s offers can be tough to refuse.’

      ‘I’ve worked with Charlie Sheen, Mr Messenger,’ Kevin had replied confidently. ‘If I can keep him clean, I’m pretty confident I can handle Kendall.’

      Now Kevin Dacre knew better. Nobody ‘handled’ Kendall Bryce. She was a force of nature, as impossible to resist as a twister or a riptide. And she had him by the balls, literally as well as metaphorically. If Messenger heard about this – if anyone heard about it – Kevin’s career was finished.

      At last, with a wild moan and arch of her back, Kendall climaxed. Kevin Dacre whimpered with relief. Easing himself out of her, he slumped down on the bed, exhausted.

      ‘I’ll order some pizza,’ Kendall announced cheerfully. ‘We can wash it down with a couple of bottles of Jack’s Mouton Rothschild, and then we can go again.’

      Again? Kevin started hyperventilating. ‘Kendall, come on. This was fun but we both know it shouldn’t have happened. And we also both know I can’t let you drink.’

      Kendall laughed loudly. ‘Let me? I like that. That’s a good one. Besides, it was coke I went to rehab for. I’m not an alcoholic.’

      ‘That’s not the point,’ said Kevin. ‘You’re an addict and you’re in recovery. No substances means no substances. You know that.’

      Kendall’s eyes narrowed. ‘All I know is that you’re gonna break into the main house and raid Jack’s wine closet for me. Because if you don’t, you know I’m gonna pick up the phone and tell him about the great sex we just had.’

      ‘I thought you said the sex was terrible?’

      Kendall looked at him pityingly ‘It was terrible, Kevin. I was trying to be kind. But you know what they say: practice makes perfect. Now, how about that drink?’

      Kendall Bryce had first come to prominence in her teens as the breakout star of reality show, Hollywood High. Small but perfectly formed, her body had the exaggerated, pneumatic curves of a porn star. Her waist was waspishly narrow, her breasts cartoonish in both their size and gravity-defying perkiness, her butt was as high and tight as a male baller-ina’s. But it was Kendall’s face, a perfectly defined set of smooth planes illuminated by neon green cat’s eyes, as well as her attitude, that ensured her swift rise to fame. Kendall Bryce was brattish – certainly – and spoiled; Hollywood High was a show about movie-industry kids, so those two attributes were prerequisites. But Kendall could also be devastatingly funny. Her pithy put-downs of contemporaries rapidly became the stuff of legend and she was embraced as a sort of young, insanely hot Joan Rivers.

      What Hollywood High failed