It had taken time, but gradually West Oddford Organics had become a byword for good quality, a favourite of the wealthy Cotswold Boden wives brigade. As its dashing figurehead, Dillon had rather unexpectedly become a spokesman for all things foodie, organic, seasonal and British, with a regular column in a Sunday supplement and radio and television shows often clamouring for quotes.
Dillon was at last taken seriously by those erstwhile harsh critics – his neighbours, particularly neighbouring farmers and nimbys. His passion and zeal were acknowledged as great things. His farm shop, which had quickly outgrown its modest quarters in a converted milk parlour and relocated from the farm itself to retail premises in picturesque Morrell on the Moor, incorporating a café and deli, was a mecca for foodies and star-spotters alike. Everyone assumed Dillon was cashing in. But the process, with its vast set-up costs and very narrow margins, had in fact almost bankrupted him and he was faced with a very real dilemma of selling the London house – something he felt he couldn’t do to Fawn and the kids – or make some real money at last. He had even contemplated such horrors as the
Strictly
dancefloor to score a quick, much-needed cash injection.
It was at that point that he’d first heard ‘Two Souls’, in the most unlikely of settings – a local auction house where its writer and composer, nineties pop icon Trudy Dew, had played it on a grand piano that was up for sale and Dillon, like everyone there that day, had been bewitched. He’d persuaded his record label to buy the rights to it. Now the world was enjoying the haunting, uplifting, unforgettable song. Rather too much. It was currently playing in every shop and mall, was aired hourly on radio stations, was being used as lead-in music on TV and downloaded on to every iPod the world over.
Although he still rated the ballad as the best he’d ever come
across, Dillon would quite gratefully not hear, play or sing it again for several years. He was fed up to the back teeth of it.
Today, a hot summer’s day, it was playing out of the open windows of a hundred cars crawling along the sticky tarmac of the motorway.
Normally insistent upon leaving the air-con switched off and fresh air allowed in as a vague gesture towards shrinking his carbon footprint, Dillon irritably told the driver to close all the windows.
Nell had fallen silent now, moving away from him to snuggle up to a big leather armrest and stare sulkily out of the window at newly planted fir trees sliding by, her fingers tappity-tapping on the glass. With her slim, tanned limbs, hollow cheeks and great, black oversized glasses, she suddenly reminded him of a fly. She’d certainly been buzzing around like a maddened bluebottle in the past few days, but he supposed he had kept her shut away in hotel rooms day after day while he worked. This was her first long trip away without Giselle and it must be trying for her, however much she denied it.
‘I’m sorry,’ he sighed, reaching out to take her narrow, long-fingered hand, stopping the nails from tapping. ‘I meant for you to have a better time.’
‘I had a great time,’ she lied gallantly, ‘I just don’t want it to end.’
He squeezed her hand, wondering if he could explain to her why West Oddford was so important to him, to his sanity and why he so badly needed to get back there – with her, whom he so adored and with whom he longed to have a relaxed, family relationship as opposed to the show-stopping media love affair they appeared to have tripped into. He had fallen for a local girl, after all. She’d seemed made-to-measure for him from the start; like him, Nell was a city–country hybrid who combined partying with London’s fashionistas with the shooting, tweed and mud splatters of time out country life. She understood the seasons, both the social one and the farming and bloodsports calendar. She knew the valley and the ridgeway better than anyone he had yet met. Her family were an Oddlode dynasty. On top of which, she was a mother struggling to keep her child’s life as normal as possible despite separated parents. If anyone could understand him, she could.
It also helped that she looked so good, easily out-classing the leggy girls rented from model agencies by the ton to fill music industry parties, and who were consequently very thick on the ground in
more than one sense. Nell was beautiful, bright, sharp-tongued and self-aware. She was also more adventurous than any lover he’d had, certainly any lover he could remember which, given than a lot of his past sex life, including the conception of his children, had been conducted while he was too stoned and pissed to remember a thing, wasn’t perhaps as great an accolade as it first appeared. But she
was
his first long-term lover since cleaning up, and she was amazing. She could turn him on in an instant; she had him hooked. He just needed the time to appreciate her more.
‘I’m better at home,’ was all he could lamely muster. ‘I’m a nicer person at West Oddford.’
‘You’re a wonderful person,’ she reached down to lower the zip of his flies, a naughty smile dancing on her lips, impatient to be the ultimate groupie with an Access All Areas pass.
Dillon immediately felt his groin tighten as his band member leapt in response.
Sometimes he might struggle to get to a place with Nell mentally that was as good as their relationship on paper, but that was never the case physically, whether they were in London, LA, the Cotswolds, the Caribbean, New York or somewhere on the M25.
Much later, having nodded off soon after the Stokenchurch Gap, Dillon woke with a start to find that the car’s engine had been switched off and it was parked on a familiar, weed-strewn square of gravel in front of the large American barn at Overlodes Equestrian Centre. It certainly wasn’t West Oddford Farm. His driver was lurking about fifty yards away, smoking a sly cigarette behind a large rainwater butt. Nell had disappeared.
He stretched and tumbled groggily from the car to go in search of his errant girlfriend.
She wasn’t hard to track down, sitting coquettishly on Rory Midwinter’s desk in the yard office having just staged a very emotional reunion with her Chihuahua, Milo.
‘You’d rather come here to collect your dog before seeing Giselle?’ he balked.
‘Gigi will be in the middle of her afternoon nap,’ she pointed out pragmatically. Her mother Dibs, with whom Giselle was staying, was an old-fashioned Irish stickler when it came to strictly enforced regime.
‘Besides which, Nell knew you’d want to check on your best-ever
investment,’ drawled a lazy voice as Rory came through from the tack room carrying chipped mugs of tea, that unique, cloud-partingly sunny smile on his face. ‘Not to mention the fact that you are both no doubt gagging for your first proper brew since touching down. It must be weeks – here!’ He thrust a steaming, grubby-rimmed mug of stewed tea at Dillon, who tried not to think too longingly of his big, homely kitchen with its Earl Grey and comforting earthenware mugs.
Feeling ungrateful, he took a hefty swig and burned his tongue.
‘So how
are
the horses going?’ he asked tiredly, wishing he felt more interested. He struggled to remember their names and only returned Rory’s calls or checked how he was doing when Nell reminded him to, which was usually when she wanted to pick a fight with him or manipulate his diary for her own ends.
‘The horses are not going that great,’ Rory grimaced apologetically. ‘We have a technical hitch in the wham-bam-Grand-Slam masterplan.’
‘To what plan?’ He had totally forgotten that one of the challenges he had set Rory, upon investing in him, was to win the famous Rolex Grand Slam. This consisted of taking the title in the top three international three day events in succession.
‘Burghley’s probably a non-starter. Sid looks like he’s back in the locker room early this year. He’s lame again.’
‘Rory must go to Burghley!’ Nell protested over Milo’s head, ‘You must go to Burghley, Rory. Mustn’t he, Dillon?’
‘Must he?’ Dillon sighed, gazing solemnly at the photographs that crazy-paved the walls, almost all of them Rory hurtling across country on a horse, most of them photographer’s proofs. It looked much more fun than sitting in hot studios under too much pan-stick and powder, telling a caring daytime television anchor about your nervous breakdown and addictions, and the beauty of organic brie. He was feeling increasingly jet-lagged. ‘Why is Burghley important?’
‘He owns a four-star horse and has never heard of Burghley,’ Nell teased, threading her arm through his.
Dillon in fact knew Burghley Horse Trials was one of the ‘big three’, a top-ranking autumn three day event akin to playing Reading Festival in musician terms, but he couldn’t be bothered to protest. There were so many horse trials at so many country houses he lost track. Like rock festivals.
‘It’s a beautiful place,’ Nell insisted. ‘We must go. Is the horse really not up to it, Rory?’ She keyed him with her eyes.
Rory could be bullied on most things, but not his horse’s welfare. ‘The vet scanned his front legs yesterday. Might never compete again, if I’m honest.’
Dillon tutted under his breath, seeing fifty thousand pounds going up in smoke, or more accurately, retiring into a field.
He’d first encountered Rory not long after he bought West Oddlode Farm, when country life was a hobby and every weekend was a house party. Determined to learn to ride, he’d block-booked lessons with Rory and later brought along gangs of friends to ride out around the valley, falling off regularly. One such tumble had smashed Dillon’s leg so badly that he was still lame, and had no desire to ride again. But Rory and his talent remained an inspiration, as did the wonderful horses he produced. When Rory’s only top horse had been injured so badly that his career was thought to be over, everybody surrounding Rory thought that meant his competitive dreams were washed up too. His most loyal fan, Faith, had even given him her own horse to ride, but it was never going to be enough. Then, as Dillon’s fortunes were revived through a new album deal and his career looked set to rocket, he’d stepped in as benefactor. He’d always adored shopping for beautiful things, a trait inherited from his father, and so it had been no great trial to buy a string of event horses, particularly as one of his oldest friends was well-connected and had led him straight to the veteran four-star campaigner Snake Charmer, known as Sid, and the younger, three-star Egley’s Opposition, aka Humpty, who was popularly believed to be a superstar in the making. He’d also funded a clutch of cheaper novice horses, bought by Rory off the racetrack at bargain prices and schooled on to event. Some were successful, but most failed, either too untrainable or too unsound to get close to the big league.
Eventing was a very hit and miss affair, as Dillon was learning. The big gatherings at grand country houses weren’t the only parallel with the music industry. For every successful rider there were tens of eager young wannabes waiting in the wings, along with groupies and teenage fans. Being a professional event rider meant a life lived on the road, a horsebox in place of a tour bus, setting up camp and performing at different venues week in, week out. Only the very lucky few ever made it to the big time. When they did, they
spent even more time away from home, far from the acres of familiar turf they loved.
As with so many of his financial decisions, Dillon had sponsored Rory on a whim – and after rather a lot of bargaining and arm-twisting from one particular quarter – but his interest in eventing had dwindled dramatically in the light of his own punishing workload and prolonged absences from the Lodes Valley. Eventing seemed a very toffee-nosed, elitist sport, and Dillon had recently begun to suspect that Rory was too spoilt and self-indulgent to really make a success of it, however much cash he put in to bankroll him. True, he was a genuinely amiable character and was reputedly in possession of a tremendous riding talent, but Dillon had yet to see much evidence of it. His horses were always lame or sick. And Rory was always drunk.
Illogically, Dillon suddenly found himself envying Rory his booze-laden failure.
Dillon missed drinking. Every day of his life he missed drinking. He didn’t feel the same way about the drugs, the same sense of loss or the triggers that made his hands and throat twitch for the weight of a full glass, the slake of scotch or red wine against his throat. Even cigarettes no longer haunted his dreams in the way that alcohol did. Sometimes he still craved a drink so badly that it blotted out reason – and there was only one place where he was truly safe from the craving.
His heart felt as though it was trying to beat its way out of his chest and bounce down the three miles of criss-crossing bridleways and footpaths that separated Overlodes Stables high on the escarpment from West Oddford Farm deep in the lush valley.
Burning his mouth even more, he drank his tea in record time while Rory and Nell gossiped about mutual acquaintances.
‘Aunt Bell made me give pony rides at the Oddlode village fête – can you imagine the shame? I had to miss Stockland Lovell trials to do it. Poor Spurs had it even worse because she forced him to oversee the cow-pat grid …’
Suddenly unable to bear it any longer, Dillon let out an infuriated bellow, slammed down his mug and stormed out to the car.
Rory jumped back in alarm. ‘What on earth was that all about?’
Nell took it all in her stride. ‘He gets like that sometimes. He says he finds it hard to express himself.’
‘He should try saying a polite “goodbye”.’ Rory kissed Nell
farewell on both cheeks and Milo on the top of his head and walked them to the car.
‘What does this little chap’s namesake make of your moody rock star?’ he asked in an undertone, nodding at the dog.
Nell pulled a face. Her on-off married lover, also called Milo, had been very much off lately. She didn’t like to admit how much she missed his company, his wisdom, his devotion to her and their simpatico humour. Casting around for a change of topic, she saw all Rory’s tack trunks piled up by the horsebox ready to be loaded and, remembering that he was setting off for Scotland the next day, wished him good luck for Bloneigh Castle.
‘Thanks.’ He grinned, crossing his fingers and his eyes at the same time. ‘I wish you were coming. You’re my mascot now. I can’t believe you’ve made this happen for me, N, honestly. I know it’s not Dillon’s horse in the big class, but I’ll still ride it for my guardian angel.’ He dropped another grateful kiss on her cheek.