Tilly Bagshawe 3-book Bundle: Scandalous, Fame, Friends and Rivals. Tilly Bagshawe

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СКАЧАТЬ when he called to tell him Wrexall’s pitch had been unsuccessful. ‘That was a strong pitch. You’ve been partners with us for over eight years, David.’

      ‘Yeah. And everyone I dealt with at Wrexall for the last four of those years is now at Ceres. I’m sorry, Bob. It’s nothing personal. But Sasha Miller really understands our goals.’

      It was after Westfield fell through that the decline in Wrexall’s stock price began in earnest. By that time they had belatedly rebuilt a retail division, hiring from all their key competitors (other than Ceres) and even bringing in fresh blood from other sectors, investment bankers and private equity guys. But it was too little, too late. If it hadn’t been for Jackson’s thriving hotels division and the gains they’d made in the residential sector, things might have got very bad indeed. As it was, they survived the year, bruised but still fighting and, at least in Jackson Dupree’s case, determined to bring Ceres down.

      ‘You know, they say the opposite of love isn’t hate. It’s indifference,’ said Lottie over dinner with Jackson one evening. They’d been dating for a year by this point, and give or take a few slip-ups in the first few weeks, Jackson had been faithful, a personal best that those who knew him well viewed as little short of miraculous.

      ‘You’re maturing,’ James Dermott told him.

      ‘Bullshit. I’ve always been mature. I just never had a reason to stay faithful before. Now I do.’

      This was partly true. Lottie had certainly played her cards well, firstly by refusing to move in with Jackson and secondly by quitting Wrexall Dupree and finding herself a new, highly paid job at a chic uptown art gallery. ‘We can’t sleep together and work together,’ she told Jackson, presenting her resignation as a fait accompli.

      ‘What do you mean? Of course we can. We’ve been doing it for six months, haven’t we? It’s been working out fine.’

      ‘Not for me it hasn’t,’ said Lottie. ‘You’re my boyfriend, not my boss. I’m my boss.’ Jackson pretended to be pissed off for a week, but Lottie completely ignored his cold shoulder so in the end he gave up. Besides, deep down he loved the fact that she was independent, that she challenged him. Deep down, he still occasionally worried that there was something missing between them. Sex was fine. It was regular and enjoyable, if a little on the straight side, at least in comparison to Jackson’s prior tastes. But it lacked the spark, the passion, the addictive adrenaline rush he’d spent most of his adult life pursuing.

      That’s why this relationship is working, Jackson told himself firmly. You like Lottie. You respect her. She’s the best friend you always wanted, the sister you never had, the business partner you always needed … AND she’s hot. Stop analyzing it to death and get on with it.

      Tonight, he’d taken Lottie out to Nobu in Tribeca to try to take his mind off of Ceres’s latest triumph – their quarterly results, published today, had hugely outperformed even the most bullish analysts’ estimates, and Sasha was once again riding high. As usual, Lottie did her best to calm him down.

      ‘Have you ever thought the best revenge you could hope to have on Sasha would be to ignore her? Indifference, that’s the key. Forget about Ceres. Focus on Wrexall, focus on your own business.’

      Jackson speared a California roll morosely with his chopstick, wantonly destroying the sushi chef’s work of art.

      ‘The more energy you waste on hating Sasha …’ Lottie continued

      ‘I don’t hate Sasha.’

      Lottie raised an eyebrow, as if to say not much. ‘Then why are you going after Raj Patel?’

      Raj Patel, once Sasha’s direct line manager at Wrexall, now worked for her as a key member of her senior management team at Ceres. Indian, Oxford educated, and devastatingly handsome in a softly spoken, intellectual Imran Khan sort of way, Raj had become almost as much the ‘face’ of Ceres as Sasha herself. The two of them were often photographed together, Sasha creamy skinned and seductive beneath her sleek black bob, and Raj dark and regal, his fine bone structure and strong aquiline nose belying his upper-class Indian heritage. If they ever got together sexually they’d make the world’s most beautiful kids.

      ‘That’s business,’ said Jackson. ‘At Ceres, Raj will always play second fiddle to Sasha. Back with us he could run his own show.’

      It sounded plausible. But Lottie didn’t buy it. Out of loyalty to Jackson, she’d quietly dropped her own friendship with Sasha. There was no big bust up, no announcement. Both women understood implicitly that, after all that had happened, it was the way it had to be. Ironically, it was Jackson who kept Sasha’s memory alive, to the point where Lottie sometimes felt, like Princess Diana, that there were three people in her relationship. Jackson hadn’t seen Sasha in person for a year, but he carried her with him everywhere, lodged in his chest like a tumour. His attempts to poach back Raj Patel was just the latest in a long line of stunts aimed at hurting Sasha, humiliating her the way that she had humiliated him. Lottie prayed it wouldn’t backfire as badly as all the others.

      ‘About Raj,’ said Jackson. ‘I’m thinking of flying out to Barcelona next week.’

      Lottie’s eyes widened. ‘You’re not serious?’ Forbes had reported only last week that Ceres was holding its first global off site at the Hotel Majestic in Barcelona, Spain. Sasha Miller was to be the keynote speaker at a real estate conference that would be attended by the biggest names in the industry. ‘You can’t hijack Raj there, it’s far too high profile. Remember what happened with Mr Cityfleet? If Raj doesn’t come back to Wrexall, you’ll end up with very public egg on your face. You’re supposed to be being discreet.’

      ‘I will be discreet,’ said Jackson, knocking back the last of his sake and ordering another. ‘I’ll discreetly get him to sign his offer in Barcelona. Then I’ll discreetly hold a press conference about it the morning of Sasha’s speech and pull the rug out from under her Manolos.’

      Lottie sighed. There was no reasoning with him in this mood: drunk and determined. She wished she could love away all the stress and anger Jackson seemed to carry around with him, like a backpack full of cement. Like him, in her darkest moments, she feared that there was something missing between them. There had to be, or he would have let go by now, given himself to her completely. But like him, Lottie put her fears aside. I love him, she thought. He’s already changed so much, come so far from the old playboy Jackson. This vendetta with Sasha is the last piece of the puzzle. He’ll figure it out eventually, I just have to be patient.

      Sasha stepped out onto her balcony into the warm, Spanish night air and sighed a deep sigh of contentment. Barcelona had been one of her favourite cities since she came here as a teenager, on a school trip with St Agnes’s. She remembered the wonder she’d felt back then, at the spectacular Gaudí architecture and the Plaça de Catalunya, not to mention the natural beauty of the ocean. There was a palpable sense of vibrancy in Barcelona, a feeling of life and youth and art that seemed to shimmer in the warm air along with the scent of jasmine and the mixed, mouthwatering smells of garlic and chorizo floating up from the tapas kitchens. As a school-girl, she and her friends from St Agnes’s had stayed in a grotty little youth hostel, but Sasha had still adored the city. Now, returning not just as an adult but as a millionairess, a success beyond her or anyone’s wildest dreams, she was staying in the most expensive suite at the Hotel Majestic, a neoclassical gem on Passeig de Gràcia that lit up at night like Harrods at Christmas time. Wealthy and famous visitors flocked to the Majestic to sample the Michelin-starred cuisine at the hotel’s famed Drolma restaurant, widely considered one of the finest in Spain, and to enjoy its dated grandeur СКАЧАТЬ