Rotten to the Core (43 page)

52

Kate
’s s
tomach
was
full and she felt clean after her long soak. She had closed her
eyes
the second she laid her head on her pillow and had no trouble falling asleep.

When she awoke s
he felt safe
,
and that was a good feeling, one that a few days ago she
hadn’t been
sure she would
have
again. She knew Billy had gone to sort
out
Jay
;
she was scared
about
what might be happening, but she didn’t want to know the details, she was just relieved that he
w
ouldn’t
be
harm
ing
her again.

Emma and Sonia
’s
voices float
ed
up
to Kate
from downstairs, just the normalness of the moment made her feel happy, she had been so terrified that she wouldn’t see her friend
s
and family
again
when she had been trapped in that dingy basement.

The
phone rang
on
her dresser and
,
as she pulled herself up and wrapped the duvet snugly around her, she got that fluttery feeling in her stomach as she looked at the caller
ID:
Paul.

             
“Hey
,
Kate, I just wanted to see how you are?
” Paul asked.
“
We didn’t really get much of chance to talk earlier with everyone around.”

Kate
smiled
.
T
hey had been surrounded by people, yet she had felt
that she and Paul were
the only two in the room. Had he felt that to
o
?

             
“Thanks
,
Paul
;
I’m feeling a lot better now I’ve had a sleep
.
”

             
“Well
,
in that case, how would you fancy dinner at my place? I can pick you up in a few hours
.
There
’
s someone here I
’d
like you to meet, if you’re up to it
.
”

             
“Okay
.
” Kate
felt
wary
;
dinner with just
Paul
would have been heaven, she
just
knew he felt the same way she did, surely she
hadn't got that wrong
. He wouldn’t want her to go
to his house for
dinner to meet a girlfriend, would he? Whoever it was must be important to him. Not wanting to sound stupid over the phone or question him further in
case she
heard
something that she didn’t want to, she agreed. He
then said he would pick her up in two hours.

P
utting
the ph
one down, Paul called for Sophia.
Running into the lounge
,
wearing
a
bright pink Disney princess dress that she
had
insisted on
wearing every day
since he had bought her the movie, Sophia threw herself onto her daddy’s lap. He hugged her
;
it was
hard to imagine that this
child
hadn’t been in his life forever, it had only been four short years, yet he couldn’t remember li
f
e before she had come along. She was his world.

             
“I have a friend coming over to meet you later
.
”
Sophia fiddled with her princess ballet pumps, he could see that she
felt
shy at the mere thought of someone else coming over. It was his own fault
,
he knew, Sophia was forever
at
home with the nanny while he worked. Apart from nursery in the morning, they
rarely
had visitors. Deciding to play it fr
o
m a different angle
,
he whispered
:

             
“My friend is very special
,
Sophia, I think that you are really going to like her
.
”
Looking up at him not quite sure what to make of
what he was saying, he continued:

             
“Her name
’
s Kate
;
she is a real
p
rincess
,
just like you
.
”

             
“
W
ow, will she be wearing a princess dress like me
?
”
Sophia seemed to be
excited now
;
she had always wanted to meet a real princess
.

             
“
S
he hasn’t got a lovely princess dress like you but she is very, very pretty, and she is very kind. Maybe we can have a look in your bedroom and see if she can borrow something of yours to wear, I bet she
will
love your dress
.
”

Bouncing off of her daddy’s lap, Sophia ran to her
bed
room as if her life depended on it, desperate to find something for her daddy’s princess friend
to wear
.

Smiling at her innocence, Paul couldn’t shake
an
anxious feeling. This was a
big
step. He had decided
,
years ago
,
that he would never let anyone close again, but then that was before he had met someone as special as Kate. He had never felt like this, not even about his ex
,
Caroline. Caroline hadn’t batted an eye
lid
when they
had
separated
;
she continued
to
go out partying and coming home at all hours of the morning.
She had treated
Sophia like she w
ere
a big inconvenience and it had broke
n
Paul’s heart to see his baby left to cry in her cot, ignored by her own mother.

When he left
,
she had told him to take
Sophia
with him
;
she had dismissed Sophia as if she
were
nothing, as if
Caroline
had not a single
maternal bone in her body. Paul had
done that
. He had never heard fr
o
m Caroline
again
and knew in his heart of hearts
that
he never would. He had got over her, that was for sure, but it
hurt
that his little girl was growing up without a mummy. Since Sophia was nine months old he had b
r
ought her up, with the help of the nanny. S
ophia
was the love of his life; his sole reason for living. Building up a reputation and a business in the clubbing world was hardly a place for a small
,
beautiful baby
;
he had always kept them separate. He never spoke of his personal life
;
the less people knew about him, the less chance they would be able to
hurt
him.
But h
e had fallen for Kate, and he wanted her, and he knew that it was time to let someone in. Tonight
,
the two most important girls in his life would meet. And he just prayed that after tonight
,
Kate
would feel the same as he did.

53

There were moments when Tanya thought about her disloyalty to Jay,
but they were
so fleeting that they passed almost as quickly as they came
;
she certainly didn’t lose a moment
’
s sleep over it
:
far from it
,
as a matter of fact. Tanya had been living the high life. The life she was convinced she was born for. To some people
,
a quarter of a million pounds
would be
a lot of cash, the sort of money that would allow them to put a nice
-
sized down payment on a
l
ittle house
where they could
settle down, maybe buy
a
flash car and new clothes, and generally
be quite content with their new
-
found fortune. It was a
decent
start.
But Tanya wasn’t “some people”. She wanted five
-
star luxuries all the way
: a
penthouse in London, somewhere upmarket like Mayfair
,
a Bentley with a personalised number plate
,
and designer clothes. A quarter of a mill was just a taste of what she
thought she
needed in order to get by. It wouldn’t last five minutes with the plans she had, she needed to use it wisely.
Tanya had
always believed that money came to money, and now she had a little it was her chance to get more.
So she had come up with quite a plan. In order to find a nice rich man, she would have to go to where the rich men were and
to appear as if
she had come from money.
Tanya, never short of male attention,
expected to
catch the attention of
a
rich
guy
looking for
a woman on whom he could
spend his fortune.

Tanya
had checked into the Dorchester, a hotel she had always wanted to stay at
,
in the hub of London and she actually felt quite at home there,
she drank endless amounts of champagne and indulged in treatments at their top
-
class spa,
figuring
that she wasn’t
frittering
away the money, it was an investment
.
These rich men could be quite clued up on gold
-
diggers, there were plenty of them about
,
even she knew that, and
although
a young girl
may
think she was in with a chance
with a man
, often they would be on to them in a heartbeat, and they would get what they want
from
the girl, with no real intention of losing a single penny of their cash to her.

Tanya was acting
as if
she was loaded; spending her money
as if it were limitless
. That way
,
when she fluttered her eyes and flashed
her
cleavage at some unsuspecting old bore at the bar, they might actually believe that she
was
interested in them and not just after their hard
-
earned cash
;
her motive would be concealed
,
as she so obviously had enough of her own wealth.

So far, she had gain
ed
admiring glances from most of the guys staying there, single
and attached
, much to her amusement.
Men
were
so fickle
, she thought
.
Normally she play
ed
it cool, let
ting
men come to her
;
that way she wouldn
’
t come across
as if
she had initiated anything or seemed desperate. There had been a few men
who
had approached her, but they had turned out to be dirty old men with a wife in tow somewhere else in the hotel, trying their luck while they thought they might have a chance. One even hinted that he knew she was a call girl
:
top class
,
of course
;
it took a lot of
effort
not to get out of her chair and lump him one. She had decided to be very bold this afternoon and had taken it upon herself to
send a glass of champagne over to a very good
-
looking guy at the other side of the terrace bar
who
had kept catching her eye. She figured he must be shy as every time she had caught him staring, he had looked away, so she decided to take the initiative. Waiting for a rich, eligible bachelor wasn’t working out quite the way she had anticipated and Tanya decided that she would have to do a bit of catching and reeling in herself. She could see that the guy had been very surprised
by
the drink and had looked uncomfortable accepting it, but Tanya was sure that she was in for a chance with him,
he
had been watching her from the minute she came into the bar. Raising her
own
glass to him and smiling, she took a long sip of her drink and enjoyed the bubbles fizzing on her tongue whilst she thought about what a catch she had stumbled upon, he was much younger and much better
-
looking than the old farts around here that had been on her ‘hit-list’ so far.