Heirs Book Two: American Lady (28 page)

“WWF and ASPCA,” she corrected patiently.
“And what I mean is a wedding between Charmagne Cassidy and Crown
Prince Maixent will make headlines all over the world. If I dropped
a hint to my editor he’d sell the story to the other tabloids so
fast paparazzi on a motorbike couldn’t catch him. Don’t you think
something like that will have an impact on Altobello?”

“Sure. It probably did when King Henri
married Leigh Taylor. So what?”

Charley twiddled fretfully with the straw in
her iced over glass. “But what if the kingdom was in some sort of
financial difficulty and Maixent thought that marrying me would
solve that? He loves his country so much, is so proud of it, and
has so many plans for when he takes over the throne that he’d
probably do anything to save it,” she said unhappily.

“Did he say that to you?” Declan felt his
brotherly hackles rising at the thought that Maixent might make
Charley miserable, even though when he’d met him his impression was
the prince was one of the good guys. “Maybe I should talk to him
mano a mano.”

Charley rolled her eyes. “I appreciate the
thought, but unless you’re going to do battle, that literally means
hand to hand not man to man, you dipstick.” Despite their mother’s
exhortations, Declan seemed to lack the knack of picking up foreign
languages and even when they were living in France had never
mastered more than a few basic phrases.

“Besides it wasn’t so much what he said, as
what he didn’t say about trying to sort out some major financial
crisis for the country. He wouldn’t give me any details, just told
me not to worry about it – that it was sure to blow over once we
were engaged. But his mother was dropping hints like confetti that
marrying me was the best thing Maix could do for Altobello.”

Charley trickled shaved ice into Oscar’s
drooling mouth and lapping tongue and watched Poppy sashaying
towards them over lawn as green and manicured as a golf course.

“Well, I’ve hauled my po’ old bones out here
with this here key lime pie and a bucket of buffalo wings.” She
deposited a tray laden with two plates of pie and what looked
suspiciously like his mother’s ice bucket filled with spicy chicken
wings. “I brought some extra pie just in case you changed your
mind, Miss Charley. Didn’t want to make another trip out here in
all this heat.” She made a show of wiping her brow. “Dig in now, I
don’t want to see this food go to waste. Hey, this cooking’s not
for you!” She moved a hefty thigh in front of Oscar’s hungrily
smacking lips to sideline him from the food.

Declan bent down and picked up one of
Charley’s white sandals. He lobbed it towards the blue cube of
water. “Go fetch, Oscar!” The shoe gave a gentle splash and Charley
gave an angry screech as Oscar launched himself after the
chewtoy.

Poppy gave a long, throaty gurgle of
laughter. “Mr Dec, you sho’ got more nerve than Carter’s got liver
pills, and that’s a fact.” Feathery purple earrings swinging
merrily, she tramped back towards the house.

“Damn, that was a good pair of sandals, Dec.
Why didn’t you throw that damn useless DynaTAC instead,” Charley
said, huffily settling back into her banana lounge.

Declan picked up the pie dish and tucked in
hungrily. “You going to eat that other piece?”

“No. I told Poppy not to bring me anything,”
she said irritably.

Several minutes of silence followed,
punctuated only by the sound of Declan eating and Oscar’s paws
scrabbling on the side of the pool as he hefted himself out of the
water. There were more sounds of squelching and chewing as Oscar
settled near his mistress, sandal ensconced between his paws.

“You missed out on some good buffalo wings
there, Charley.” Finally Declan sucked clean his greasy fingertips
and ran a tongue around his lips as he sat back, replete.

“I don’t want food, but I really could use a
second opinion. Lay it on me. What do you think I should do?”

Declan didn’t know whether to feel flattered
by his sister’s unexpected request for advice or irritated. “Look,
asking me for advice about your love life is probably as helpful as
consulting Boy George,” he shook his head uncomfortably. “Wouldn’t
you be better off asking Janie?”

“No can do. At the moment we’re still
keeping things hush hush. It’s more secret than the new designs for
mom’s winter collection. If I spill the beans to Janie she’s going
to hound me for an exclusive. She won’t mean to put me on the spot,
but you know she lives and breathes for that magazine.”

“Okay, then, from a male perspective, women
often seem to jump to conclusions, especially wrong ones. Why don’t
you just ask him straight out the next time he rings?”

Charley groaned. “What am I supposed to say?
Are you marrying me for my money and my name because I can help
Altobello out of a tight spot? If he were, he wouldn’t say so. If
he won’t tell me what the kingdom’s problems are, how can I trust
him? And if I can’t trust him, how can I marry him? Maybe after
everything mom was right – he’s not the man for me. She’s always
been right about my boyfriends in the past,” Charley wailed glumly.
“I love him so much and I never thought anything could come between
us.”

“Well, I’m not in any position to be giving
romantic advice,” Declan said flatly. “I’ve fallen for the wrong
girl myself. She’s seems unable to pull herself away from a smug,
self-satisfied asshole who thinks he’s God’s gift to women.”

“You don’t mean that timid little redhead
that St John dragged along to Cannes do you?” Charley momentarily
forgot her own problems. “What ever happened to Chase Elliott?
She’s much more your style – older, slicker, bitchier supermodel.
That redhead looks like the girl next door, except she must be
pushing thirty.”

Declan squirmed uncomfortably as his sister
put his dating choices under the microscope.

“I’m sure Chase is fun to go to bed with,
but I can understand you might not enjoy sharing other aspects of
your life with her, like conversation. Maybe the redhead will make
you happier.”

“I thought she did. She seemed different. Or
at least I thought she was until she snuck off with that lowlife,”
Declan’s fists clenched instinctively.

“Well, you can’t blame her for being
hypnotized by St John – he has to be the most gorgeous-looking man
I’ve ever seen and that includes Maixent, much as I love him.”

“Thanks for the compliment,” Declan said
bitterly. “Sounds like we’re both losers not lovers. So what are
you going to do about Maixent?” Declan eagerly switched topics,
which wasn’t hard given Charley’s current obsession.

“I really don’t know. I feel so confused and
betrayed that I haven’t been able to have a conversation with him
since coming home. Just as well Lorenzo didn’t buy me one of these
cell phones or I’d have no excuse not to answer Maix’s calls.”
Poppy and Declan had taken several messages for Charley, who had
kept herself busy with photographic assignments since returning to
New York as a means of avoiding Maix’s phone calls to the house. “I
don’t know whether to call off the relationship before it goes any
further. Although he’s already had a major impact on my life.”

Oscar put his paw up on her thigh,
whimpering sympathetically. Charley stroked his head
reassuringly.

“Well, at least you had a life to impact,”
Declan consoled her. “My life feels as useless as tits on a bull. I
flunked out so badly at the end of semester that I’ll be lucky if
my summer school grades cover for me,” he said morosely.

“Aren’t you enjoying law?” Charley feigned
curiosity.

“I know an interest in the law is supposed
to run in the genes but it seems to have missed this particular
Cassidy,” he sulked.

“Well, maybe corporate law is too dry for
you. What about international law? Or even environmental?” Charley
suggested helpfully.

If he changed to environmental law and
fought for Peppermint Vale would Jazz Bradley view him more
favorably? Would it score him Brownie points over St John?

“Dry is the operative word. I feel like my
brain has been packed in sawdust trying to remember who did what to
whom and what the point of X versus Y was. Rory’s been hounding me
about helping with his campaign, but I feel like I should be
concentrating on my studies,” Declan grumbled.

“He only wants to get you involved because
he’s hoping you’ll up the ante for the press coverage,” said
Charley shrewdly.

“I know, but to be honest I wouldn’t mind
getting involved behind the scenes in his political campaign. I’m
tired of studying. I want to do something practical for a change.
Pulling the strings is what does interest me,” Declan revealed.

“Why don’t you swap to studying politics?
NYU must have a political science faculty.” Charley pushed Oscar’s
slavering head away, throwing him one of the leftover chicken
wings. “Or you could defer studies. Go help Rory with the campaign
over the next couple of years and find out how much you like
politics.”

“So far I’ve avoided politics because I
don’t want everyone anticipating my next move and wondering when
I’m going to run for the presidency,” Declan objected.

“Well, at some point you’re going to have to
live your life doing what you want and not caring what anybody else
thinks or says or writes about you,” Newt Kincaid snuck up on them,
then dropped to the grass beside his friend, handing out open
bottles of Budweiser that he’d cajoled out of Poppy. “Otherwise
you’re going to trap yourself in limbo.”

“And limbo competitions are never easy,”
Declan mocked as he took a swig out the bottle. He sat up,
brusquely swiping the law books off the table. They clattered to
the ground, startling Oscar who leapt up and trotted back to the
house. “Damn it, Newt, you’re right as usual!” He looked across to
his sister. “Let’s make a pact to do what’s best for us and to hell
with the consequences,” He locked eyes with her.

“To hell with the consequences,” Charley
said distinctly as the three of them clicked bottles.

With Lorenzo flying off to Altobello to sort out the
final contract for the documentary with King Henri, St John found
himself with sufficient free time to call in at his old
Sunday
Signal
offices tucked away in a dreary laneway off Fleet
Street. St John’s boss, Kevin Twomey, was just walking out the door
for a convivial lunch with one of his compatriots when St John’s
taxi arrived. Twomey roundly berated St John, who had left him in
the lurch when he ditched his reporting job for a place as
Lorenzo’s polo manager.

St John held up his hands playfully warding
off the verbal blows.

“Don’t think you can come groveling back
here for a job. I’ll never trust you again!” Twomey shouted in his
harsh Australian accent, his squashed pumpkin face now turning beet
red with anger.

“I’ve just come to say hello to some of the
boys,” St John insisted. “I wouldn’t dream of asking for my job
back unless I came to you with an exclusive scoop.”

Twomey’s beady black eyes glared at St John
over his puffy sallow cheeks. “And do you have a scoop for me?” he
enquired shrewdly. St John could almost see his pugnacious nose
twitching, trying to sniff out a story.

“Not yet, Kevin, not yet,” St John didn’t
want to trap himself into a corner.

“Well, I wouldn’t expect it of you. You’re
certainly no Vino,” Twomey snorted disgustedly, referring to the
Daily Express’s
famous New York correspondent, Brian Vine
who was as notorious for his liquid lunches as his famous
scoops.

“I was certainly a hell of a lot cheaper on
the payroll though,” St John said amiably. He had no great opinion
of himself as an ace reporter or even a gossip columnist. He was
happiest scribbling about sports, one of the lowest paid rankings
in the field of Fleet Street journalism.

“Well, stop holding me up then!” Twomey
snapped. “I’ve got a lunch appointment!” and he stalked off towards
the Savoy.

St John wandered through the
Sunday
Signal
offices, greeting people he knew, but avoiding their
invitations to step out for lunch. He was on a mission to satisfy
his curiosity and wended his way slowly towards the newspaper
library and filing room, better known as the morgue. He had never
previously used this facility but knew it was a useful research
tool for many of the journalists at the paper.

He was hoping to do his digging in private
but when he walked into the library he found Miles Miriklis, the
Sunday Signal’s
chief gossip columnist and celebrity
interviewer, and known affectionately as “Miracle Mile”.

“Why if it isn’t our gorgeous Mr Rhodes-Ross
– just returned from Cannes?” Miles looked up and leant his chin on
his hand, a trick he used to stretch out the wrinkles in his neck.
“How is the lovely Jennifa and your dear old dad?” Miles was quite
familiar with St John’s family having written about them and
interviewed them for several decades. His long aristocratic nose
trembled. “What brings you into this particular neck of the woods?”
He waved an airy hand around the grim prison green walls lined with
banks of filing cabinets.

“Just paying a visit. I told a friend I’d
look up some information for him,” St John prevaricated,
consternation setting in as he looked around at the rows and rows
of blank-faced filing cabinets. Where in hell did he start?

“It’s always great to be able to check on
someone’s past to know if they’re telling you porky pies. Like our
dear boss, Kevin two-faced Twomey.”

St John pulled out a chair and sat down near
Miles at one of the tables where Miles had spread out clippings and
photographs and was obviously in the process of sorting through
information for what he needed.

“What about Twomey?” St John asked. Miracle
Mile was always good for dishing the dirt. That was great if you
wanted the information, not so good if you were trying to keep
secrets.