The Billionaire Banker (11 page)

Her voice is no more than a whisper.

‘Mum!’ Lana cries, shocked. ‘What are you saying?

Blake’s secretary bought all this for me and I brought some back for you.’

Her mother sinks weakly into a chair. ‘Sorry. Sorry, Lana. Of course, you would never steal. I’ve just been so worried about you. Everything is so different. I don’t know what to think anymore.’

The oven pings and she stands, but Lana pushes her down gently.

‘I’ll get it,’ she says, and donning the oven gloves takes the cake out. It smells divine and is nicely risen. She closes the oven door, puts the cake on the metal rack and leans against the sink. ‘Shall I put the kettle on? We need to talk.’Her mum nods and Lana sets about making the tea.

While the tea is boiling she lays cups and saucers. Everyone else in the estate drinks from mugs except her mother, who always uses a cup and saucer. She pours the boiling water into the teapot and carries it to the table. When the tea has brewed she pours it out into two cups. She opens a tin of biscuits from Fortnum and Masons and holds it out to her mum. Her mum’s thin, pale fingers hesitantly take one.

She bites into it and chews.

‘Nice?’ Lana asks.

Her mother nods.

‘You’re going to America on Wednesday, Mum.’

Lana’s mother puts the biscuit down beside the saucer.

She links her hands tightly under the table and faces her daughter.

‘I’m going nowhere until I know exactly what is going on. Exactly how you are getting all this money. And what you are doing for it.’

‘I explained last night. The man I am seeing has given it to us.’

‘Who is this man that has fifty thousand pounds to spare?’

‘Mum, he’s a millionaire many times over. He gave me double what I asked.’

Her mother stares at her aghast. ‘You asked him for money? I didn’t bring you up to ask men for money.’

‘Yeah, I asked him and so what? I didn’t force him or steal it.’

‘Well, I don’t want it. I’d rather shrivel up and die than use this money.’

Lana freezes. She stares at her mother in shock. Her mother’s face is set in the stubborn lines that Lana knows mean that her mind is made up. It cannot be changed.

Lana swallows the lump in her throat and stands suddenly.

‘You’d make me an orphan for your stupid pride,’ she accuses.

Her mother blinks suddenly, the wind taken out of her sails.‘Are you going to sit there and tell me that if I was dying and had a few weeks left to live you wouldn’t have asked a filthy rich stranger for a bit of money?’

Her mother says nothing.

‘High and mighty ideals and principles are all right when you are not utterly, utterly desperate, Mum.’

‘You didn’t just ask him, did you? Tell the truth. You prostituted yourself.’

‘Assuming that I did. And I didn’t.’ Lana says a little prayer for her lie. ‘Wouldn’t you have done the same for c 1 0 d

me?’Her mother begins to cry. ‘You don’t understand. You will, one day, when you have your own child. I am not important.’ She beats her chest with both her hands.

‘This is just worm food. I won’t have you sully yourself for this destroyed body. You are young. You have your whole life ahead of you and I am going to die, anyway.’

‘No, you’re not,’ Lana whispers fiercely.

‘But I am. And it’s time you accepted that.’

‘Remember when Daddy left and I swore to take care of you?’

Her mother’s eyes become bleak. ‘Yes.’

‘Would you have me break my promise?’

‘I going for another bout of chemo on Monday.’

‘What for, Mum? What for? That stuff is so dangerous it’ll probably kill you before the cancer does.’

Her mother’s lips move wordlessly. Then she covers her mouth with one hand. ‘Sit down, Lana,’ she whispers.

‘Please.’

Lana shakes her head. ‘No, I won’t. What’s the point?

In all the time I was trying to find a way to keep you alive I never thought that it would be you that would stand in my way.’

Lana turns away from her mother and begins to walk out of the house. She has sold herself for nothing. She reaches the front door and she hears her mother shout from the kitchen, ‘Do you like him?’

She turns around and her mother is standing there so c 1 1 d

frail and breakable. Now she can be truthful. ‘Yes.’

‘I’ll go.’

Lana walks towards her mother.

‘I’m sorry,’ her mother sobs.

Lana takes her poor wasted body in her arms and the tears begin to flow. Neither says anything. Finally, when Lana can speak, she chokes out. ‘I love you, Mum. With all my heart. Please don’t leave me. You’re my mum. I’d do anything, anything for you.’

‘I know, I know,’ her mother soothes softly.

‘Oh shit,’ Lana says.

‘What?’

Lana steps away from her mother. She puts her hand into her pocket and brings out bits of blue shell. ‘I brought you a blue egg.’

Her mother tries, she really tries hard, but a giggle breaks through. For a few moments Lana can only stare at the rare spectacle of her mother stifling laughter. Then she too cracks up.

‘Take that jacket off and go wash your hand,’ her mother finally says. ‘I’l make us a fresh pot of tea and we’ll have some of those nice biscuits you brought.’

‘They are nice, aren’t they?’ Lana agrees, slipping off her soiled jacket and walking towards the sink.

Lana is wiping her hands on a tea towel when her mother says, ‘And you’ll have to bring that nice man— Blake Barrington, did you say?—over to dinner.’

‘Uh, yeah… When you get back from your treatment.’

Her mother stops and looks at her. ‘I’m going to meet that young man before I get on the plane and I’ll have no more said on the matter,’ she says firmly.

While they are having their tea Lana tells her mother about the appointment she has made for a wig fitting in Selfridges.

Unconsciously her mother puts her right hand up to her scarf. ‘Oh,’ she says. ‘Will that be very expensive?’

Lana grins. ‘We’re not paying for it.’

And her mother laughs. For the first time in many months, her mother throws back her head and laughs.

‘That’s good. That’s very good,’ and while she is laughing she begins to cry. When Lana goes to hold her, she takes a deep, steadying breath and says, ‘I know what you have done for me. You have used your body as a begging bowl.’

For a moment Lana is struck dumb by her mother’s perceptiveness. Then her great, great love for her mother intervenes and she lies and lies and lies. ‘You only say that because you have not met Blake yet. He is beautiful and strong and kind. It was love at first sight. When I told him about you, he gave double what he knew I needed.’

Her mother sighs. ‘I pray to God that I will be alive for your wedding.’

Lana feels the hollowness spread into her body. It doesn’t matter, she tells herself fiercely. So what if her mother will be disappointed? All that counts is her mother will be cured. She will forget this one in time and marry someone else, another who will not consider her so lowly c 1 3 d

that she is only fit to be hidden away like a dirty little secret. Someone with a beautiful heart like Jack.

Yes, someone like Jack.

Fourteen

ana leaves her mother’s house and going past Billie’s Ldoor runs two floors down and rings Jack’s mother’s doorbell. While she is waiting for the door to be opened she looks down the railing, and sees Fat Mary browning herself into an uneven shade of lobster. Fat Mary is a big woman who lives in the corner downstairs flat and sunbathes topless in her garden even though it is overlooked by all the other flats in the block. Every Friday night she makes her hair big, stuffs herself into a tight dress and high heels, and goes to the Irish nightclub on Kilburn high street to find herself a bloke to bring home. Like clockwork they slip out of her door, all sheepish before lunch on Saturday. Al the little boys on bicycles always call out, ‘Hey, Mary, how’s your mary?’ Her fat face never alters as she shows them her middle finger.

Jack’s mother’s face appears at the kitchen window.

‘Oh, hello, dear,’ she says with a smile, before she comes to open the door. She has the same beautiful eyes fringed by thick sooty lashes as Jack.

‘Hi, Fiona. Mum sent you some cake.’

‘How lovely. How is she feeling today?’

‘It’s a good day today.’

‘That’s good. Would you like to come in, dear?’

‘Nah, I’ve got to run.’

‘Well, you run along, then.’

‘See you later,’ Lana says and turning begins to walk away.

‘Lana?’

She turns back around. ‘Yeah?’

Fiona hesitates and Lana hitches her bag higher up her shoulder and takes two steps towards her. ‘What’s the matter?’

‘I…um…heard…you…ah…found yourself…a…boyfriend.

A rich boyfriend,’ she says anxiously.

Lana shifts from one foot to the other. ‘I just met him, Fiona. I wouldn’t call him a boyfriend just yet. It might not work out.’

Fiona’s timid face falls. It is obvious she has been hoping that the rumor going around is not true. Her voice is very tiny. ‘You will be careful, won’t you, my dear? I wouldn’t say anything normally, but you’ve always been such an innocent thing. And I thought to myself, even if I come across as an interfering, old busybody, I’ve got to say something.’ She takes a deep breath. ‘You know, I’ve always said you are the most beautiful girl on this estate, if not in all of Kilburn, and you should have become a c 1 6 d

model, but rich men are greedy. One is never ever enough for them.’

Lana puts her rucksack on the concrete floor and leaning forward hugs the woman. ‘Thank you for caring, Fiona. I don’t know how I would have coped all these years if not for Jack, Billie and you.’

Fiona hugs her tightly. ‘Oh, child, you are like my own daughter to me. What you did for Jack; I’ve never thanked you.’

Lana untangles herself from Fiona. ‘What I did for Jack? It is I who should thank Jack. He’s taken care of me and fought my battles since the day I arrived.’

‘He will never talk about it, but the year you arrived was the year his father died. And he became quite unmanageable and surly. He began to run with a gang who stole, carried knives and drank alcohol across the railroads. I was afraid for him, afraid that he would turn out like all the other boys on the estate—jobless drunks and drug addicts. But then your family moved in and suddenly he changed. He took over the job of being your older brother, and suddenly I got my caring, beautiful son back and now he’s going to escape this terrible estate and become a doctor.’ Tears filled her lovely eyes.

‘If I was useful to him then I am glad, because I don’t know what my life would have been like without him.’

Fiona smiles proudly at the thought of her good son.

‘I’ve got to go, but I’ll be around tomorrow with a box of biscuits like you’ve never tasted before.’

‘Oooo.’

Lana laughs. ‘More like oo la la… They’re French.’

‘Goodbye, dear girl.’

Lana waves, and runs up the stairs. Her phone rings and she stops to answer it. It is Mrs. Arnold calling to say she has booked an eight thirty table for Lana and Blake at The Fat Duck. She reminds Lana to be ready by 7.30pm.

‘Thanks,’ says Lara. She ends the calls and thinks, ‘I’ve been reduced to another appointment in his diary.’

Halfway up the second flight of stairs she hears Kensington Parish call out to her. She pops her head over the side railing and sees that he is standing at his bedroom window at almost eye level to her.

‘What’s up, Kensington?’

‘Hey, Lana,’ he says. ‘Do you think your man will let me have a ride in that car of his?’

‘Unlikely,’ she says and carries on running up the stairs even though she hears him shout pleadingly, ‘Oh! Come on, Lana. You haven’t even asked. It’s a 0-77. It’s custom made, Lana. Come on… Lana?’

Billie’s door is open and her mother is outside watering her hanging baskets of colorful plants.

‘She’s in her bedroom,’ she says, by way of greeting.

‘Thanks,’ Lana says, and runs up the worn blue carpet.

She knocks once and enters. Billie is using up a can of hairspray on her hair. The room is choking with the stuff.

‘Jesus, how can you bear to breathe this stuff?’

‘Open the window if it bothers you.’

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Lana opens the window and takes a deep breath before facing the synthetic smell in the room. Thankfully, Billie has finished. Her white hair has now been sprayed into a stiff man’s pompadour that will survive the greatest gust of wind. She looks at her reflection with satisfaction. Then she turns away from the mirror, switches off her small telly, and goes to sit on the bed. She pats the space next to her. Lana sits next to her and puts her bag down.

‘Well, spit it out then. What was it like?’

‘It was awful.’

‘What? Sex with the loaded hunk was awful?’

‘Can we talk about it in a minute? I need to talk to you about some important stuff first.’

‘No problems.’

‘You are still OK to travel to the States with my mum, aren’t you?’

‘Of course. Are you kidding me? I’d never get another chance like this. All paid.’

‘Good. I’ll sort the tickets out so you travel out on Wednesday. And Mum has an entire day to recover before her appointment on Friday. You don’t have to babysit her the whole time. Go out sightseeing and do the touristy thing. You’ll have to accompany her to the doctor, though.’

‘Cool.’

‘Oh! Before I forget. I brought something for you.’

She digs into her bag and fetches the jar of blackberry jam.

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Billie takes it from her. ‘Posh jam? Wow, I’ve never had anything like this before.’ She reaches over, opens a drawer and gets a spoon. She twists open the lid and dips her spoon into it. ‘Wow, you get to have awful sex and I get to go to America and eat jam from Harrods. Brilliant.