Kiss Heaven Goodbye (66 page)

‘I don’t think you should be too hard on Steven. As you’ll see from the figures, we’re on course for a fifteen per cent sales uplift this year, so while Steven Ellis isn’t my favourite person in the world, his presence is not actually harming the company. Perhaps if we could find some other role . . .’

‘No,’ said Simon firmly. ‘One of you has to exit the company and sell your stake. It’s the only way forward.’

‘Well then your choice is made.’ Sasha smiled. ‘I am the founder of Rivera. It needs me.’

‘I’m not sure that’s the case any more,’ said Assad.

‘I beg your pardon?’

‘Rivera needs to expand globally and I want someone to lead this label who has the international experience to do that. Steven has worked in Hong Kong, Paris, New York.’

Sasha tried to speak, but found the words failed her. She had never considered that Simon would push her out. She was Sasha Sinclair, for God’s sake, a style icon!

‘So you’ve made your decision?’ she stuttered. ‘You want Steven and not me? Steven is just a number-cruncher.’

‘We both know that’s not true.’

‘I can’t believe you don’t understand the principal allure of Rivera,’ she said. ‘People are buying into my lifestyle, Simon. The fantasy I have created.’

‘Sasha, please. Do people buy Chanel because they want to look like Karl Lagerfeld?’

‘No, but Stella McCartney gave her label rock and roll chic. Tamara Mellon gave Jimmy Choo its glamour . . .’

‘Sasha, I’ve made my decision.’

A waiter hovered, holding menus, but Sasha knew she wouldn’t be needing one. She could feel her hands trembling. It was inconceivable to think that Simon would choose an accountant over Rivera’s founder, the beating heart of the company.

‘This is insane. I won’t stand for it,’ she said.

‘I don’t need your approval to make this deal happen, Sasha,’ said Simon.

He was so casual, so off-hand, as if this was just another day at the office. But this was her life, a company she had created with her own hands, a company she had imagined into being. It was part of her.

‘Fuck you, Simon,’ she said in a low, hard voice. Then she stood up and walked out on to Brook Street, her head held high.

Getting into the car, she sat silently for a few moments trying to collect her thoughts. Had that really happened? Had she really just been fired from her own company? Was she really unemployed?

‘Where to, Miss Sinclair?’ asked Matthew, her driver.

She held up a finger to indicate ‘one minute’.

Think, Sasha. Think
.

She took out her mobile and dialled Randall Kane.

‘Randall, where are you?’

‘London,’ replied her chairman cautiously. ‘Why?’

‘I need to see to you urgently.’

‘I can switch a few things around tomorrow so we could do breakfast. ’

‘Too late,’ she said, feeling her heart beating hard. ‘I need to see you now.’

‘Sasha, I can’t tonight. I have dinner guests.’

‘Ten minutes of your time, that’s all I need.’

He paused for a moment. ‘At least tell me what it is.’

She was not going to give him the chance to make excuses.

‘I can’t discuss it now,’ she replied with a sense of urgency.

He sighed heavily. ‘If you must. You know the address. And it’s ten minutes, Sasha.’

Long minutes later her car drew up next to one of west London’s most prestigious addresses. Randall owned a huge white stucco house at the Notting Hill end of Kensington Park Gardens.
What an incredible place to live
, she thought, looking up at the double-fronted building. As she climbed from the car, she wondered how much it would cost her to buy a place like this. Too much, she decided. London might be in a recession, but super-prime properties like these were still selling for sixty, seventy million, fuelled by foreign money and the huge bonuses still awarded to the biggest City players. Light jazz drifted on to the street, and from the shadows of dozens of people at the windows, Randall was having more than a quiet dinner party. As a uniformed maid let her in, Sasha craned her neck to see inside the reception room which was crammed with at least fifty people. Any other time she would have been piqued not to have received an invitation, but for once, she had no desire to socialise.

Randall appeared at the door holding a tumbler of cognac. ‘Sasha, why don’t we go outside,’ he said, leading her on to a terrace at the back of the house. There would have been a time when she would have found this intoxicating; alone with a handsome, successful man in one of the finest homes in London, but now all she felt was anxious and out of control. She took a deep breath.

‘Assad wants me out,’ she said simply.

‘I know.’

‘
You know?
’

‘He told me yesterday.’

‘Has this always been the plan? To push me out?’

‘No, Sasha. There was never a plan. But there are management issues, even you must admit that. We’re lucky that Assad is even interested in buying the company with a president and CEO wanting to kill each other.’

‘I am not stepping to one side, Randall,’ she said, her voice fierce.

He looked at her for a moment. ‘Why?’ he asked.

‘
Why?
’ she said with a laugh. ‘Why would I?’

‘Because you’ve been working full throttle since you were twenty-one years old,’ said Randall. ‘Because you’ve made yourself a very rich woman; because you have the respect of the entire industry and should be confident enough to take a break, look at other options, have a baby . . .’

‘A
baby
?’

Randall pressed on.‘How old are you, Sasha? Thirty-eight, thirty-nine? You are one of the most beautiful women in London, yet you are alone.’

‘Don’t patronise me, Randall.’

‘I’m talking as a friend, Sasha. Why not cash in now, why not make a fortune? Then you’ll have time for a relationship, family.’ His grey brows knitted together with fatherly concern.

‘What I want is this company,’ she growled, feeling her eyes prick with emotion.

She blinked angrily. Now was not the time for a show of weakness. The worst thing was that there was a whiff of truth in what he said. Recently she’d seen a picture of Grace Ashford and her children at the Cannes film festival; the smiling photograph of a successful woman with her two teenage children and glamorous artist partner had filled her with a crushing sense of loneliness that had lasted for days. But she couldn’t let sentiment like that overcome her. She was Sasha Sinclair, one of the contry’s top business-women. She lived for the cut and thrust of business.

‘I’ll fight it, Randall,’ she said, a note of desperation creeping into her voice.

‘Don’t make trouble, Sasha,’ he said. ‘I know how much you love the business and I know how hard it must be to let go, but do the right thing and step aside.’

She left without another word and walked down Kensington Park Gardens towards the High Street. To her left, smoky lilac dusk was setting across the park. Fleetingly she considered speaking to Randall again, but she couldn’t bear the humiliation; she knew they had made up their minds. To them it was just another deal, just another line of numbers on a spreadsheet. They had no idea what she had sacrificed to get to where she was; they had no idea what she had put into that company. And now they were yanking it out from underneath her. Slowly she walked back to the car.

‘Just take me home,’ she said.

Matthew was just about to move away when an Aston Martin coming from the other direction pulled up at the kerb. Two men jumped out, crossed the street and began climbing the steps towards Randall’s front door. At first, in the dark, she wasn’t sure it was him, but then she recognised the pale camel jacket he had been wearing at Claridge’s: Simon Assad. But it was his shorter, slimmer companion that made her catch her breath. It was Miles Ashford.

Miles slapped Simon on the shoulder as the door opened and they stepped inside. Matey, familiar, celebrating their good fortune. And finally the last piece of the puzzle clicked into place. What had changed Simon’s mind so suddenly? Why had he chosen to replace her instead of an interchangeable number-cruncher like Steven? The answer was right there in front of her: Miles Ashford. Coming along to destroy all her hard work on a whim, just as he had done twenty years ago. For a moment back there on the terrace, Sasha had felt defeated; she had even begun to think that perhaps Randall was right, it was time she took her foot off the gas, settled down and started a family. But not now. Now she was going to fight. And if that was what it took, she was going to fight dirty.

68

Back in the comfort of his Manhattan office, Miles Ashford held his copy of
Forbes
magazine aloft and allowed himself a smile as he read the words on the cover: ‘Going The Extra Miles: How Ashford Conquered New York’ read the headline over a very flattering David Bailey portrait of himself.

Although the Big Apple was no longer his home, Miles still felt a great attachment to the city and was glad of this visible and prestigious recognition of his achievements. Not that he had any plans to rest on his laurels. The New York Globe was still incredibly popular, but Andre Balzas’ Penthouse bar at the top of the Standard was generating the sort of excitement the Globe had drawn at the start of the decade, and if there was one thing Miles hated it was other people stealing his thunder. There were residential opportunities to exploit too: two landmark buildings were coming up for sale downtown and Miles was determined to have them for his own.

Tipping his chair back, he looked around his office at the trappings of success: the Francis Bacon that hung above the leather sofa; the collage of photographs of Miles with assorted luminaries – Obama, Clinton, Mandela. He wasn’t about to give any of this up. Yes, the recession had shaken him badly, but things had to be on the upturn, especially since he’d gone in with Anil on the Mumbai deal – on a personal level as well as professionally. Randall Kane’s get-together the other night was the sort of macho back-slapping party he usually found boring, but Simon Assad had made it much more interesting. Firstly because he had told Miles that he was forcing Sasha out of the company – exactly the sort of thing to perk him up – but mainly because of Assad himself. He intrigued Miles, excited him. That night in his penthouse when Miles had cracked open his best whisky, he’d wanted to carry on the evening and show Assad
exactly
why all work and no play made Simon a very dull boy. He smiled to himself. There would be plenty of time for that. He swivelled his leather chair so he could see the New York skyline in front of him. First he had a city to conquer.

There was a knock at the door. Irritated, he turned back towards the office. ‘Enter.’

Michael Marshall came in and took a seat under the Bacon, and immediately Miles noticed the troubled expression on the lawyer’s face.

‘Trouble?’ he asked.

Marshall nodded. ‘It’s about Angel Cay.’

The warmth seemed to disappear from the room. Miles’ skin felt cold and his mouth dry.

‘Angel?’ he repeated as steadily as he could.

The Fairmont hotel group who were buying the island were keen for a quick sale – as far as Miles was concerned, he couldn’t get rid of the place quick enough. But any sale was dependent on a detailed survey to see whether it was suitable for the required level of construction for the proposed two-hundred-room resort.

Michael put his hands up. ‘I don’t think it’s anything to worry about just yet, but I have just got off the phone with the Royal Bahamian Police.’

‘What on earth about?’

Michael pushed his lips out as if he were pondering a difficult problem. It was a gesture that always unsettled and yet excited Miles – no one was better at finding solutions to problems than Michael. Over the years, Miles had come to rely on him to find ways out of tight spots. Michael was by far his most trusted and valuable member of staff – the one most like him. But if Michael Marshall was troubled, Miles knew it was serious.

‘I’ve been speaking to our contact at Fairmont. Apparently surveyors have been on the island for about a week. They’ve been taking soil samples from around the island. Suitability for building work and so on – I understand they were planning on building the spa at a place called West Point Beach on the far side of the island?’

Miles realised he was gripping the edge of his desk and deliberately relaxed his fingers.

‘Miles, they found a body.’

His heart was thumping. ‘A human body?’

Michael nodded. ‘Well, decomposed remains anyway. Of course, the first thing the surveyors did was call the police in George Town. Second thing they did was call Fairmont, and they called me.’

‘So the police are on to it?’ He could feel sweat collecting at the back of his neck, dampening the collar of his shirt that felt suddenly too tight around his throat. He’d dreamt about this moment before – in distant nightmares of his youth – but had never actually prepared for it, never really believed that it could actually happen.

‘Two officers from the Royal Bahamian Police force are on their way to Angel Cay now,’ said Michael.

‘Have you spoken to them?’

‘Not the investigating officers. I’ve left three messages.’

Miles tried to compose himself and think more rationally. ‘Do we know how long the body’s been there?’

‘No idea. I’m sure forensics in Nassau will be able to date it.’

Michael sat forward slightly, and Miles could feel him searching his face.

‘Miles, you don’t know anything about this, do you?’

‘What the fuck are you suggesting?’ snapped Miles.

Michael shrugged. ‘As your lawyer and adviser, I have to ask the question.’

Miles knew he had to be convincing. ‘Look, I’m as surprised and horrified by this as you are,’ he said. ‘My family has owned that island for thirty years and I can assure you I know nothing about any body. Anyway, we have no idea how old these remains are, do we? It could be the bones of bloody Blackbeard for all we know.’

Michael nodded, his eyes still searching Miles’ face. Did he see something there? wondered Miles.