There was the brutal option – I could unfriend him on Facebook, unfollow him on Twitter and Instagram, block his emails …
But that felt like overkill. Also, professionally we were obliged to remain cordial. So I replied to his email, telling him that if he had any future work queries to refer them to Alastair.
Almost immediately he texted: Does this mean what I think it does?
I waited a few minutes, wondering what exactly to say until, with a heavy heart, I clicked out: Josh, I’m sorry.
Moments later my phone rang: it was him and I didn’t pick up.
He left a message, which I deleted without listening to it. Then I quietly unfollowed him on Instagram and muted him on Twitter. Not as brutal as blocking and unfriending but it meant I didn’t stumble across reminders of what I’d been considering.
Even so, from time to time, I’d come across a re-shared post or a memory would flare, always followed by excruciating guilt.
50
Tuesday, 18 October, day thirty-six
Tuesday morning, 7.48 a.m. in a crowded, chaotic Heathrow, my phone rings. It’s not even eight o’clock, what the actual! The number is withheld but, half looking for a scrap, I answer anyway. ‘Amy O’Connell.’
‘Dan Gordon.’
Who? Oh! The rude man who hung up on me yesterday.
‘You in London?’ he asks.
‘What’s this in –’
‘You free to take a meeting with my client in the next hour?’
‘I’m free today at three fifteen.’
‘Needs to be earlier.’
‘I’m in meetings until then.’
Your man does an irritated tsk. ‘Okay. Where are you?’
‘Home House.’ Well, it’s where I’ll be in an hour’s time.
‘Sort out a private meeting room. Very private, right? See you at three fifteen. Prompt.’
Prompt? Who says prompt?
My day is busy. There’s a stream of disgraced or forgotten ‘celebrities’ looking for a relaunch, and I size up every single one of them as a potential EverDry ambassador because Mrs Mullen simply will not be talked down.
But it’s proving difficult.
Obviously, it would have to be someone well liked. But poor. Because no one is going to become an incontinence ambassador for the prestige, right?
So, well liked but poor, preferably desperate. And attractive, because no one wants to identify with a horror-show. In addition, they must be the right age, which means no older than fifty because people don’t like seeing themselves in the same boat as crocks. But realistically they can’t be much younger than fifty because no one would believe they were incontinent. God, it’s difficult.
Not a single one of today’s potential clients fits the bill and all my hopes are hanging on my mysterious three-fifteen appointment.
Dan Gordon looks like an accountant crossed with a hungry greyhound, or perhaps a lanky-limbed Harry Potter who’s just heard that Voldemort has won a Ferrari – bespectacled, besuited and aggressive. In our very private meeting room (which is exactly the same as all the other private meeting rooms), I stand up to shake hands. In reply, he opens a cardboard folder, whips out a non-disclosure agreement and slides it in front of me. ‘Sign it.’
‘I’ll read it first, if you don’t mind.’ I smile sweetly. Christ, what a knob. God only knows how awful the actual client will be. But I don’t have to take the job. Yes, business is always appreciated but with some gigs no money is worth it.
The contract is standard – basically the meeting with the mystery person never happened and if I monetized anything I learnt, I’d be sued into the poorhouse.
‘Okay.’ With a flourish, I sign as Minnie O’Mouse, and barely bother to disguise the words. ‘There you go. So, what happens now?’
Dan Gordon snatches up the contract and clicks out a text. Such rudeness.
‘This better be good,’ I say.
He ignores me, as his phone beeps with a message. ‘He’ll be here in fifteen minutes.’
‘So it’s a he?’
Dan Gordon clamps his mouth tight.
‘It doesn’t matter now,’ I said. ‘I’ll be meeting him in a few minutes. Is it Wayne Rooney?’
He snorts. ‘No.’
‘The leader of North Korea?’
He goes quiet.
‘It is the leader of North Korea?’
‘It’s not the leader of North Korea.’
‘Aw, come on.’ I poke his leg with the toe of my boot. ‘Play with me. Is it Emma Stone?’
‘You know it’s a man.’
‘That was a trick question. Is it Terry Wogan?’
‘Terry Wogan is dead.’
Dan Gordon won’t say another word and I don’t like the silence: there’s too much time for thinking. Out of nowhere I wonder if Hugh is dead. But if he’d died, wouldn’t an embassy have contacted me? Unless he’d fallen into a river in Thailand and no one has found him. But why would he fall into a river? People don’t just fall into rivers … unless the crack on his head from the hairbrush I threw at him really had given him an aneurysm. Unlikely as this is, my spine goes cold with fear and I can’t keep my anxiety to myself. ‘Mr Gordon, can a person die from getting hit on the head with a hairbrush?’
He gives me a look. ‘Are you going to hit me on the head with a hairbrush?’
‘No.’ Suddenly I’m scornful. ‘Not everything’s about you. So, can they?’
‘I’m not a doctor. Google it.’
I need to stop this mad catastrophizing. Except obviously it’s about my genuine fears. It’s almost easier to accept that Hugh is dead in the Mekong, being eaten by vicious Asian fish, than that he hasn’t wanted to call me.
Dan Gordon’s phone beeps. He leaves the room and returns moments later with another man. Whom I recognize. In fact, I almost pass out. It’s Matthew Carlisle, Ruthie Billingham’s husband, who’s been cheating with their nanny, Sharmaine King! And he’s fucking gorgeous! Tall, like really tall, imposing tall. He’s got black hair, in a shortish buzz-cut, glasses with stylish black frames and deep brown eyes. Some famouses are far less impressive in real life but Matthew Carlisle is more, much more.
‘Thank you for seeing me at short notice,’ he says, with a tired smile.
‘Of course,’ I murmur. ‘Won’t you sit down?’
He takes an armchair opposite me and Dan Gordon sits beside him, like a guard dog who hasn’t been fed in some days.
‘Can I get you coffee?’ I ask. ‘Water?’
He shakes his beautifully shaped head. ‘No, thanks, I’m fine.’
‘Something stronger, maybe?’
Interest flares in his eyes. ‘No. I can’t start drinking in the afternoons.’
‘So how can I help?’ Two short days ago I’d wanted nothing to do with this painful story, but that was before Matthew Carlisle had treated me to a short burst of his industrial-grade charisma. Only fair to hear the man out, right?
‘Ruthie Billingham,’ Matthew says. ‘The actress? She’s my wife. Ex-wife. Well, not yet, we’re getting divorced.’
Gently I say, ‘I know who you are.’ Before he gets paranoid, I say, ‘Because it’s my job to know. You don’t have to fill me in.’
‘Oh, okay. She’s been having an affair with Ozzie Brown for two and a half years.’
Two and a half years? The story she’d given the press was that she and Ozzie had only been stepping out for a couple of weeks.
‘Ruthie can’t be seen as the bad guy, not in the eyes of the public.’
Of course. Ruthie gets all her work on her girl-next-door persona.
‘So she – well, her publicists – planted the stories about me and our nanny. So people will look the other way.’
But the question has to be asked. ‘Are the stories true? For me to do my job properly, I need to know everything. Without all the facts I can’t help you.’
‘Sharmaine’s a sweet girl,’ Matthew says. ‘She’s a great nanny. But nothing ever happened.’
My mind is racing, Ruthie’s publicists work at the most powerful agency in the UK – they could probably rehabilitate Jimmy Savile if they put their mind to it. ‘Why have you come to me?’ I ask.
‘Because no one knows who you are,’ Dan says. ‘We need to keep this quiet.’
‘Some people know who I –’
‘You did a great job with Bryan Sawyer.’ Matthew’s smile derails my ire. I am pathetic. ‘And Tabitha Wilton says you’re effective.’
‘What do you want from this process?’ I ask.