It’s her, not you. She’s going to learn one day, and then it’ll be too late.’ He wandered off, and left her staring after him, bewildered.
RECOUNTING ALL THIS back at home to her brother that evening, Elle was still in shock.
‘So I spilled coffee over her, and she didn’t even seem to mind too much! She didn’t shout or anything. I thought I was going to get fired, and then she asked me what I thought of a manuscript!’ She poured Rhodes another glass of wine and drained her own. ‘Honestly, Rhodes – well, you have to meet her to see what I mean, but she’s an amazing woman, really remarkable. Her husband died when she was thirty, left her alone with a small son, and this company to run, and she’s done it – she knows everyone, she’s always going to the most glamorous parties. Last week, she went to the Women of the Year lunch, and Joan Collins was there, can you believe it?’
‘Right,’ said Rhodes, stuffing his face with Twiglets. ‘So then what happened?’
His tone suggested polite boredom but Elle, wanting to make her older brother see how wonderful her new world was, couldn’t stint on any of the details. ‘Well,’ she said. ‘So … We have this really great conversation, you know, about literature. About all these really interesting things.’
From the battered old sofa in the corner of the kitchen Libby chimed in. ‘Elle, that’s rubbish. You talked about romance novels and then she stitched you up. If you ask me she played you like a Stradivarius.’ She threw some peanuts in her mouth and crossed her legs, as Rhodes watched her admiringly.
‘… Anyway,’ Elle ploughed on, ‘Rory was really cross with me, he said I was the one who’d stuffed everything up.’ She remembered Rory’s grim face as he stood over her. You’re a snob, Elle. She hated him thinking badly of her.
‘He’s playing you too,’ Libby said. ‘The pair of them. Sometimes I think I can’t wait to leave that place. It seems all cosy-cosy, but the politics will ruin them in the end.’
‘Mm.’ Elle didn’t like it when Libby talked like that. ‘Supper’s nearly ready.’ She drained the pasta and stared at it, desperately, not sure what to do next.
‘I’m starving,’ Rhodes said, as though he could read her mind.
‘Just applying the finishing touches!’ Elle trilled, slightly too loudly.
If Sam was here she’d have bought some four cheese pasta sauce from Sainsbury’s just in case. Sam planned her meals in advance. But Elle liked to wing it, with mixed results. She grabbed a glass of red wine that she happened to know had been there since the previous day, and chucked it into the pan, then some basil leaves from the withered plant on a saucer by the sink. It didn’t look like much so, rather desperately, she shook some soy sauce and vegetable oil in after them.
‘Who’s hungry?’ she said, clapping her hands and trying to sound like an Italian mamma. ‘Hey? Come and get it!’
Rhodes sat down at the tiny table and stared at the pan, and Elle felt a flash of weary despair. They had a whole evening to get through. Her own brother, and he was a stranger to her.
‘Mm,’ Libby said. ‘Smells delicious. Is Sam coming back?’
‘No, she’s out tonight.’ Sam had gone to Kensington Palace after all, taking Dave with her. Elle was glad she wasn’t here. There was a guilelessness about her that made Elle fear for her at Rhodes’s hands. She knew he’d be vile about Princess Di, for starters. She handed Libby and Rhodes each a bowl. The winey-soy-oil had gathered at the bottom, leaving a faint red sediment on the pasta. ‘So,’ she said. ‘Sorry for going on about work, it’s just been a crazy day. It’s brilliant, but it is weird. You know.’
‘Not really,’ said Rhodes. Elle opened her mouth, but he carried on. ‘Ellie, you didn’t do anything wrong. They’re the ones using you, not the other way round.’ He took another mouthful and stopped, then waved his fork in the air. ‘Hm. What’s in this pasta?’
‘Yes, it’s delicious, Elle,’ Libby said, cutting across him. ‘Rhodes is right, don’t let them mess you around, Elle. Just be careful next time. Rory’s out for himself, you know, so’s Felicity.’
‘Rory’s not out for himself.’
‘Ya-hah,’ said Libby, sardonically. ‘Right.’ She turned to Rhodes. ‘So, what do you do? Something with money, then?’
‘I work at Bloomberg. Analyst,’ Rhodes said. ‘In New York – went to college there, stayed on to do an MBA, got the job at Bloomberg after that. They love the Brits.’
‘Hm. Isn’t New York dangerous?’ Libby said. ‘My dad wants to go, and my mum’s always terrified. “No way, Eric! I’m not setting foot in that place! Who wants to be mugged and shot, eh?”’ she said, exaggerating her Northern accent. Elle knew she was deliberately provoking him; Libby was always going on about how they should go to New York for a few days. She was obsessed with the place.
‘What? No way is it dangerous,’ said Rhodes. He seemed incensed by this. ‘Typical small-minded Brits, that’s what it is. You know, it’s bollocks, this is 1997, those were problems in the eighties, they’re long gone. It’s a fucking great place.’
He pushed his plate away.
‘Sorry, Ellie. I can’t eat this. I think it’s the jet lag. Have you got a pizza menu?’
Elle stared at him, a red flush of fury mixed with embarrassment creeping up her chest to her neck. ‘No, I bloody haven’t!’ she said.
‘What’s that on the fridge?’ Rhodes pointed to a takeaway menu.
She hated the way he wound her up, she wished she didn’t care what he thought, didn’t want to try and make him like her, be impressed by her. It was pathetic. Something inside Elle snapped. ‘You’re not having a fucking pizza,’ she shouted.
‘Why?’
Elle was practically gibbering. ‘You can’t just rock up here and be all, “Oh you’re being stupid and I work in New York and I’m sooooooooooo amayyyyyyyyyyzing.” You always have to be the coolest person in the room, don’t you?’
‘I am cooler than you,’ Rhodes said, blankly. ‘I mean, Jeez, Ellie—’
‘Don’t call me Ellie! It’s babyish!’
Rhodes watched her impassively. ‘Look, don’t go mad,’ he said. ‘I only wanted to see how you were and find out about your job. Ellie.’
Elle wiped her nose with her arm. ‘No, you don’t! You come because you have to, you never ask about Mum and how she is—’
Rhodes interrupted. ‘Hey! You haven’t asked me a single question about how I am. You rabbit on about your job and these people I have no idea about, you serve some kind of soy sauce pasta mulch, and then you start throwing stuff around and shouting at me.’
Elle stared at him. It was horrible how much she let him wind her up, always had done, how they wouldn’t ever talk about the stuff that lurked just beneath the surface. ‘Don’t you understand –?’
‘Yes,’ said Rhodes, nodding, as though he was trying to be reasonable. ‘I
