The Pleasure Quartet (18 page)

Noah was well aware that even the luckiest talent scout did well to unearth one major hit in a lifetime. If he only managed to keep things ticking over he would still leave the London office assignment with a better reputation than his predecessor had built, but nonetheless he felt obliged to make his mark in some way, to prove himself. The feeling wasn’t a new one, or particular to his current job. No matter what he achieved, professionally or otherwise, there was always something that drove him onward to seek out the next best thing. A faint shred of self-doubt that lurked in his subconscious which he was obliged to keep running away from.

His gaze alighted again on the Summer Zahova record. Classical and rock. A terribly unlikely combination to find commercial favour. Radio unfriendly. Even with his history of championing sounds that others glossed over and being proven right, he knew he would likely have to fight for it. And if he was wrong, his status would allow him some mistakes but he would have to endure gentle ribbing from the other execs at least. Then there was the possibility that a bad move would somehow affect his winning streak, knock his confidence, and he would lose his mojo for making the right decisions, for the constant gambling that his job required. And yet, and yet . . . there was something about that recording . . . surely others would feel it too?

He could not yet be certain that his feelings on the subject were strictly business, and therefore could be trusted. This strange attraction he felt towards the violinist whom he had never even set eyes on in the flesh was marring his professional judgement. Or was it? Damn it, if only he knew.

Another rap on the door. Sharper, this time. Rhonda did not appreciate tardiness.

‘Yes?’ he called out, the tone of his voice more acerbic than he had intended.

‘There’s someone here to see you,’ she announced. ‘A young woman. It’s not in your calendar,’ she added, when his brow furrowed in confusion and he glanced at his day planner to check if he had forgotten a meeting. Occasionally, hopefuls turned up on the record company’s doorstep, desperately seeking a route to getting themselves noticed, but unless they managed to convince Rhonda that they were the next Madonna or Rolling Stones they were always turned away.

‘A personal matter, apparently,’ she continued, not bothering to mask her disapproval.

‘Right,’ he said, ‘send her in then.’ He hoped that Magdalena hadn’t tracked him down here. If any rumours surfaced that he was allowing his professional life to be clouded by his personal interests, and sleeping with his potential new artists, he wouldn’t be able to sign her.

Rhonda swept out of the room, giving the person waiting outside a curt nod and holding the door open so she could come through.

It was Lauralynn.

Dressed casually, totally unlike the last time he had seen her, in a pair of faded denim jeans, ballet pumps and a wide-neck maroon-coloured sweatshirt that had slipped to one side and revealed a pale pink bra strap. Not a colour that he would ever have thought she would choose for her underclothes. He had imagined her in harsher hues of black and red, shades that registered danger and dominance.

‘Hi,’ she said. ‘Sorry for barging in on you like this at work without calling first. I hope I’m not interrupting. I was just in the neighbourhood and . . .’

She was visibly flushing as she glanced around at the burnished hardwood of his desk, the glass expanse of his office and vertiginous view out over the gardens.

‘It’s no problem, really,’ Noah assured her. ‘Please come in, take a seat. Can I get you a coffee? Glass of water?’

‘No, no, it’s okay, I won’t stay long.’

She showed none of her usual swagger, and her uncharacteristic bashfulness humanised her, in Noah’s eyes. It wasn’t that he hadn’t liked Lauralynn before, but just that her egregious confidence had made her seem somewhat arrogant, and a little too perfect. People were more interesting when they possessed visible flaws, he felt. He kept his expression warm and passive, but hoped, desperately, that she had come to provide him with further information about Summer.

‘How can I help?’ he asked her, deliberately business-like. Noah recalled that he had jotted his number down on a white Post-it note that Viggo had provided while he was at their Belsize Park mansion, and which he suspected would be instantly tossed into the pile of unopened mail on their counter to be forgotten about, but he had not given his office address. Of course, that information was readily available online, he knew, but the fact that Lauralynn had gone to the trouble of tracking him down indicated that she might have been completing some background checks of her own.

‘It’s about Summer.’

‘You know where she is?’ he asked, before he could stop himself.

‘No, though I wish I did. Nothing that dramatic. I’ve been thinking about her since your visit, that’s all, and I wanted to ask you if you could please tell her that I miss her, once you find her. Have her call me. Please.’

‘Of course,’ he said, ‘though to be honest, I’m not sure I’m likely to stumble on her whereabouts, and if she’s disappeared, as you suggested, to get away from her music career, then her location isn’t of much use to me anyway. I can’t sign an artist who won’t play. Maybe it’s better that she’s left alone until she’s ready to return? An intervention of sorts might just drive her further away.’

Lauralynn had moved forward and was gripping the back of the tall black leather chair that faced Noah’s desk tightly.

‘Maybe you’re right,’ she said. ‘Then again, that girl can be so utterly frustrating, and half the time, she has no idea what’s good for her. The other half of the time, she knows perfectly well and doesn’t do it anyway. Believe me, if I had an inkling of where she was then I would be on her doorstep first thing tomorrow to drag her home.’

‘You’re not selling her to me, you know,’ he quipped.

‘Don’t pretend like you need any selling,’ she replied. Her eyes had landed on the copy of Summer and Viggo’s CD, still sitting within arm’s reach on his desk. ‘Besides, all the best artists are crazy, aren’t they?’

‘So they say,’ he replied. ‘Some are just good, and work hard, but that’s not nearly so romantic, is it?’

‘I suppose not. Look, I wanted to pass on an invitation. Viggo and I are attending a party tomorrow night. A gathering, if you will, of like-minded folk. I wondered if you would be interested. It’s an exclusive sort of affair. Not the kind of thing you can turn up at without an invitation, someone to vouch for you.’

‘You mean a sex party?’ His eyes widened.

‘Well, not exactly, though you might see a few people going at it, I suppose.’

She was so off-hand about the whole thing, that he nearly laughed.

‘It’s more of a kink thing. The two aren’t necessarily related, you know. Sex and kink. Not for everyone.’

‘Right,’ he said, as if he understood.

He had a flashback to his night with Magdalena. The way that he had suddenly lost interest and gone soft. Come to think of it, the same had happened, before that, with Clarice, although she hadn’t been aware of it, since he’d been able to slip into the bathroom and sort himself out before returning and finishing the deed. An unspoken benefit of having a woman tied to the bedpost. He hoped he wasn’t losing his touch. It was too early for the little blue pills.

‘Would I have to . . .’

‘Get involved?’ Lauralynn finished for him. A definite smirk lurked behind her mask of passivity. She was returning to her usual persona, enjoying his discomfort.

‘Not if you don’t want to,’ she continued. ‘Especially as you’re new, and most of the attendees will be with their regular partners. It’s not a free-for-all,’ she explained. ‘From our conversation the other day about Summer, I thought you seemed intrigued. And might be interested in seeing it for yourself. Understanding her better. Or the rumours around her, at least.’

He agreed.

Lauralynn promised to be in touch to arrange the details, and then left, refusing his offer to show her out of the building. He couldn’t help but watch the way her jeans hugged her form as she turned away from him and walked out of the door. She was one of the few women that he had seen outside of occasional trips to LA or meet-ups with April’s fashion-industry friends who managed to pull off low-riding denims without revealing an unfortunate muffin top. When modelled by a suitable figure, it was a style he always enjoyed. Casual, but with a not-so-subtle hint to what lay just a few inches below.

Enough thinking of women.

He gave his mouse a sharp wave across the mat to jolt his desktop back to life and get his mind back into work mode.

An email from April had popped into his inbox.

Frustratingly cheery, without even a mention of their parting in New York.

An assignment had come up in London that the magazine wanted her to cover. Their UK-based operative who would normally look after things had requested an extension on her maternity leave at the last minute, and they didn’t have another staff member available locally. They were cutting costs and only prepared to put her up in a cheap hotel in zone three, and she couldn’t bear it, for two whole weeks. She would be working most of the time, so would not be underfoot. She was looking forward to ‘catching up’ with him.

He read through her missive again, to check he hadn’t missed anything. No, typically vague. April was the kind of woman who would find a way to kill a man without letting him know in advance that she was even the slightest bit upset. She had even signed off with a kiss.

Noah let out a loud sigh.

It had been one of those days.

Before tonight, Noah could not recall having ever felt the slightest concern over what he should wear. Perhaps he had weighed up options before attending job interviews or dates, sure, but he had always done so with a purely practical outlook and a strong feeling of certainty that he would reach the right decision.

In the end he gave up and called Viggo. Lauralynn had only advised that they would collect him at 9 p.m., without even telling him where they were going.

‘Hi. It’s Noah. No, no, I’m still coming – look – is there some kind of dress code?’

He hoped like hell that he wouldn’t be required to put on some kind of all-over leather or rubber number. Too late for that, anyway, since the party started in a couple of hours.

Lauralynn was chortling loudly in the background.

‘Tell him I’ll pack something for him if he likes!’ Noah heard her shout out.

Viggo’s voice was calmer. Noah took a long slug of the bourbon and coke he had poured earlier. He didn’t usually drink at home – the bourbon had been a welcoming present from his new London team that had sat on his side table for weeks, untouched, still with a ribbon wrapped around the bottle’s neck – but tonight he had needed something to settle his nerves.

‘Don’t worry about it, mate. You’ll be fine in your jeans.’

‘You’re sure?’

‘Absolutely. We’re nearly done here. We’ll see you soon.’

As it turned out, Lauralynn was the only person among all the attendees at the modernist home in Holland Park hosting the event who was kitted out in the manner that Noah had anticipated, wearing a fire-engine-red latex catsuit, polished to such a shine he could just about see his face reflected back at him every time he glanced at her.

The others were dressed in variations of what he imagined swinger’s clubs would deem as sexy but kink chic. A look Noah found was usually anything but. Half a dozen women in tight micro dresses that threatened to reveal the twin moons of the wearer’s butt cheeks the moment she bent forward, sky-high heels, long, ostentatious earrings that dangled from their lobes like the sort of thing fly fishermen use to lure trout with. The men were mostly dressed like he was, in designer jeans and shirt, with the exception of a good-looking duo whose short haircuts, carefully trimmed facial stubble and muscled physiques gave them the appearance of Bond villains, and were clad in mesh T-shirts that only half-covered their smooth, tanned chests. They wore matching leather belts with large, silver skull-shaped buckles, each the size of a fist, accessorising black denim trousers so tight they surely didn’t need any help staying up.

Noah didn’t smoke, but he wished that he did. Anything for a distraction. So far, besides the mesh shirts and the multitude of bare legs on display, it felt like any other ordinary gathering. A bunch of people standing around sipping from wine glasses and making small talk, filling up all the awkward silences with inane chatter. There was a lingering tension in the air though, as if everyone was waiting for something to happen, for a fuse to light. Noah had no wish to be there when that happened. The thought of seeing others bare their innermost selves in public made him uncomfortable. He asked the host, a bottle-blonde named Amanda, to direct him to the bathroom. Her husband was out of town, apparently attending a conference, ‘and a girl’s got to have a little fun, doesn’t she?’ she had said to him by way of introduction.

Noah had been informed by Viggo of at least half of the guest’s proclivities in advance. The rocker loved to gossip. ‘Manda and Tony only play away,’ he was told, as they rolled to a stop at the traffic lights by White City and its monstrous mall, learning that each of them turned a blind eye to the other’s conspicuous infidelity, while being fully aware of and even aroused by what they knew was happening in their absence, or at least their imagination’s glamourised version of events.

Manda sported lime-green painted nails and conspicuously large fake breasts that bulged out of the tight lacy purple push-up bra strapped to her tiny body, the only garment she had on besides a matching mini-skirt that revealed her panti-less state and could have passed for a belt in other circumstances. Her voice quavered with high-pitched regularity when she spoke. She was already aroused, he realised, just by the circumstances of her transgression, her fantasy complete without any sex having even occurred.

The first lavatory was in use. He continued down the wide hall to the en suite in the master bedroom, towards which Amanda had pointed him.

As he approached, he heard a rumour of faint whimpers and low growls. He paused and peeked inside, wary of proving himself an unwelcome interruption if any of the guests had disappeared to seek some privacy. Then again, they had left the door wide open.