The Chang party was strictly invite-only; I had my exquisite scroll of antique Chinese parchment in my floppy Saint Laurent clutch. A couple of paps and tourists were hanging around to gawp. I skirted them and walked up to the greeter. As she checked me off on the clipboard I looked beyond her to the long, bronze marble lobby of the hotel, opening onto the delicate Byzantine stonework of the terrace. Ranks of waiters with trays of the inevitable Bellinis stood between incongruous lumps of Shanghai street art.
‘Are you going in?’
‘Lorenzo! Ciao, bello. I wondered where I’d find you.’
Lorenzo represented the Other Place in Milan. He was Venetian, with the tawny hair and pale eyes of the lagoons. One of his great-grandmothers had famously given Byron the clap, or so he’d told me while I was fucking him in Kiev.
‘You know Rupert, of course?’
Rupert. Rounder and redder than ever, the perennial Englishman abroad in a crumpled linen suit and a jaunty Lock Panama. I looked him straight in the face.
‘No,’ he said, ‘I don’t believe we’ve met.’
‘Elisabeth Teerlinc.’ Lorenzo had already been whirled inside. We stood at the centre of a sudden caesura in the crowd.
He offered his hand, sweaty naturally. I scanned his eyes, searching for some flicker of recognition, but there was nothing. How could there be? This woman in her cobalt suede Celine shift, her impeccable pumps, existed in another dimension from Judith Rashleigh. One should never notice the servants. I hadn’t even bothered to change my hair in the end.
My hand was still in his. I let it rest there.
‘And you’re with?’
‘I have my own gallery. Gentileschi. I have a space in Dorsoduro.’
‘Ah. Gentileschi. Of course.’
I extracted my hand and fished in my purse for a card.
‘You should come to our opening tomorrow. I’m showing a group of Balkan artists. Quite amusing.’
‘I’d love to.’ He was leering at me. Rupert. Like he had a hope.
‘Are you coming in – Lorenzo’s waiting?’
His skin flushed a deeper red under the claret tan.
‘No, er, NFI actually.’
No fucking invite. Oh Rupert.
‘That’s a pity.’
‘Yes. Quite the crush. Well, see you tomorrow, Rupert.’
I offered him my cheek, and then turned my back as the greeter lifted the velvet rope. I felt his eyes on me as I walked tall through the bodies and out into the Venice twilight. The lapis lazuli water shone at my feet. I took a glass and stood alone at the parapet, and looked at the waves, and they lifted my heart.
TO BE CONTINUED
First published in Great Britain in 2016 by Zaffre Publishing
This ebook edition published in 2016 by
Zaffre Publishing
80-81 Wimpole St, London, W1G 9RE
www.zaffrebooks.co.uk
Copyright © L.S. Hilton, 2016
The moral right of the author to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN: 978-1-7857-6002-0
Hardback ISBN: 978-1-7857-6003-7
This ebook was produced by IDSUK (Data Connection) Ltd
Zaffre Publishing is an imprint of Bonnier Publishing Fiction, a Bonnier Publishing company
www.bonnierpublishingfiction.co.uk
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Table of Contents
Contents
Dedication
Prologue
Part One: Outside
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Part Two: Inside
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Part Three: Outside
Chapter 14
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Part Four: Outside
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Epilogue: Inside
Copyright