Stephen Leather - Take Two

‘You’re incorrigible.’

He wagged a finger at her. ‘I knew there was something I had to tell you. Are you free on Friday?’

‘What have you got in mind?’

‘I’ve been invited to a charity do, making wishes come true for kids with terminal illnesses. We’ve got a table and they want to offer an auction prize of lunch with the stars. I thought you and I could do it.’

‘Lunch with a stranger? Oh come on, Seb. We might get stuck with stalkers.’

‘It’ll be all tightly controlled. And the guy I spoke to says they expect the prizes to go for thousands so that’ll weed out the nutters. Come on darling, I already said you’d do it. There’s a group from Les Mis doing a few numbers and the champagne’s going to be flowing like, well, like champagne.’

‘Seb…’

‘Pretty please?’ He pouted.

‘Okay, but your driver takes me from here and takes me home afterwards.’

‘Young Martin can drive you back.’

Carolyn’s jaw dropped. ‘He’s not going, is he?’

Seb laughed. ‘Your face,’ he said, ‘Of course not. It’s the stars they want, not the bloody network leeches. Yes, we’ll take you there and we’ll drop you home afterwards. And wear something sexy, we’ll see if we can get your price up.’

There was a knock on the door and a female runner appeared with Seb’s lunch, a plate of smoked salmon and a salad. Carolyn left Seb to his food.

Seb’s driver was a thirty-something Glaswegian with a shaved head and a small diamond stud in his left ear. Like Billy, he drove a Mercedes but, unlike Billy, he was an aggressive driver, cursing and swearing whenever anyone caused him to brake and with an unhealthy tendency to pound on his horn to voice his displeasure. Carolyn couldn’t understand why Seb put up with it. She would have been a nervous wreck if he’d been her regular driver. Seb patted her on the knee and flashed her a beaming smile. ‘You’re a trooper for coming,’ he said.

‘It’s for charity, and it’s Friday so I can have a lie-in tomorrow. But I’m a bit worried about this buy-a-date thing.’

‘It’s lunch,’ said Seb. ‘And you won’t be on your own. The charity sends along a chaperone, if you want one. And, like I said, the cost will be way out of the price range of any would-be stalkers. Last year some internet whizz-kid paid thirty grand for lunch with Patsy Kensit. He was a big fan of that movie she did, way back when.’

‘Absolute Beginners,’ said Carolyn. ‘David Bowie was in it. And James Fox.’

He patted her on the knee again. ‘Anyway, don’t worry. Seriously. The auction is usually about ten, so I can have you home by midnight if it’s all too terrible for you.’

Carolyn saw flashes off in the distance and she realised they were almost at the hotel. As always, the paparazzi were lined up outside but, thankfully, they had been herded behind a metal barrier. Several of the more enthusiastic photographers had brought stepladders with them so they could get a better view. She took a small mirror out of her Prada bag and checked her make-up.

‘Darling, you look lovely,’ said Seb, adjusting his tie. The car pulled up in front of the hotel. ‘Once more into the breech.’ He waited for the driver to climb out, walk around the car and open the door. He stepped out, grinned at the waiting photographers and held out a hand for Carolyn. The flashes intensified as Carolyn stepped out of the Mercedes. She was wearing a figure-hugging Alexander McQueen dress and Prada shoes that matched her bag.

She stood with Seb, moving her gaze from camera to camera. ‘Is Seb your new boyfriend, then, Carolyn?’ shouted one of the photographers.

‘Just good friends,’ said Carolyn.

‘Very good friends,’ said Seb, patting her on the arm.

‘Over here, Carolyn!’ shouted a female photographer at the side of the group and Carolyn turned to give her a full on smile. Her face was starting to ache, but it was part of the job and she knew she had to literally grin and bear it.

Another limousine pulled up, so Seb and Carolyn moved inside the hotel to give the new arrivals the limelight. There was a second area for photographs with a board filled with the names and logos of the event sponsors. There was a taped cross on the floor and Seb and Carolyn took their mark with no help needed from the flustered PR who was checking off names on a clipboard. There was a single photographer with a top-of-the-range Nikon. He took three quick snaps and winked. ‘Thanks guys,’ he said, clearly appreciating their professionalism.

The PR, a redhead with a Botoxed forehead and too much make-up, hurried over to them. ‘You’re at Table Two,’ she said. ‘And we’ll have goody bags for you on the way out. Enjoy yourselves.’ Her smile was as fake as her unlined forehead and before she’d even finished speaking, she was looking over her shoulder at the two actresses who were being photographed.

Carolyn was surprised at how much she had enjoyed the charity event. Seb’s table was a good mix — there was a young American actor who had a major role in Quentin Tarantino’s new movie and his very pretty girlfriend, a girl singer who had recently appeared on some TV reality show or another who had come with her father, a middle-aged guy who was chief executive of some computer supply company and his trophy wife, a TV chef and his wife, and two representatives of the charity that was benefiting from the evening.

The actor was hilarious and regaled them with tales of working on the American soap The Young And the Restless, and it turned out the father of the girl singer had once walked to the South Pole, pulling a sled. There was a half-hour performance of highlights of Les Miserables that was stunning. The food was surprisingly good and the organisers had laid on some very good wines, so by the time the auction came around Carolyn was feeling very relaxed. There were ten dates up for auction, including a Member of Parliament, a Radio One DJ, a former topless model who had married a well-known footballer, and a tennis player who had promised a lesson instead of lunch.

The tennis player fetched eight thousand pounds with the winning bid coming from an overweight woman in her forties who, from the look in her eyes, was hoping for more than coaching. The lowest was the MP, with just a thousand pounds offered, and that bid had come from the MP’s own table.

Eventually the comedian who was handling the auction pointed over at Carolyn’s table and a spotlight swung around to illuminate them. ‘And the big prize of the night, lunch with two of the biggest stars on television, Carolyn Castle and Sebastian Lawton. Let’s have a big hand for them, shall we?’

The audience burst into applause. Carolyn and Seb stood up and waved.

‘Let’s get them up on the stage, shall we, folks? Let the dogs see the rabbits!’

Carolyn and Seb threaded their way through the tables and joined the comedian on the stage. The lunch with Seb was auctioned first, and won by a silver-haired woman in a too-tight Versace suit who blew Seb a stream of kisses as the bidding went higher and higher. Her winning bid was just over twelve thousand pounds.

Seb went back to his table as the comedian started the bidding for lunch with Carolyn. The opening was a thousand pounds, from a bald-headed man in a shiny suit. It went up quickly in multiples of a hundred pounds, then five hundred pounds, and within a minute they had passed Seb’s figure. The audience went crazy when the bidding went past fifteen thousand pounds.

There seemed to be three main bidders. To Carolyn’s right was a forty-something woman with flame-red hair and a thick gold chain around her neck, to her left was a chubby square-jawed man with a sovereign ring who kept dabbing at his perspiring forehead with a napkin, and at the back was a dark-haired man in a black suit.