‘Couldn’t she have worn a smaller bikini?’ said Juliet, peering over the top of her sunglasses.
Amy looked up from her sunlounger. She had spent the morning working on her application and she was practically buried under a pile of magazines; luckily Claire had every issue of Mode from the last year. It had been a quiet morning: Amy, Juliet and Claire sitting on the terrace reading, while Josie played with the children in the pool. Amy had been vaguely aware of splashing and laughter, but hadn’t paid much attention. Now she followed Juliet’s gaze down to where Josie was just leaping into the water, to the squealing delight of the girls.
‘Ah, it is pretty dinky, isn’t it?’ she said. She couldn’t help but admire how good Josie looked in the tiny bikini. Her figure was long and lean, her stomach flat and toned, and after just a few days in Provence her skin was soft and golden, making her cat-like blue eyes even more striking than usual. Amy wondered if she knew how attractive she was, or whether she took her perfect youthful figure for granted. ‘We didn’t have much choice, unfortunately,’ she said. ‘Josie had packed for a week in an office in London, so we had to do a smash-and-grab at Monsoon at the airport.’
Claire put a tray of cocktails on the table between the sunloungers.
‘Iced tea on the right. Boozy version on the left.’
Amy went to the left, taking a glass that smelled of rum and left a pleasant burning sensation on her lips. She was on holiday, after all.
‘So are you staying all summer?’ she asked, settling back in her lounger.
‘I might as well.’ Claire shrugged, slipping off her kaftan. ‘Although I have been asked to do some consultancy work for Hunter wellies in the last week of August.’
Amy nodded encouragingly. Claire had been a successful fashion stylist before she met Max, appropriately enough on a shoot for her future husband’s fledgling fashion brand. She had stopped work as soon as they had married, devoting all her energy to renovating their houses and bringing up the twins. But Alex and Hettie were now seven, at school for a big chunk of the day, and Claire had confided to Amy that she wanted to get back into the workplace, beyond the odd days’ freelancing.
‘Stop myself from getting boring,’ she’d quipped. ‘Don’t want Max running off with someone with something more to say than a run-down of school-gate gossip.’
‘It’s good that people haven’t quite forgotten about me yet,’ she said now. ‘But still, it’s hard to tear myself away from this place.’ She tilted her head towards Amy. ‘Listen, I feel a bit cheeky asking, but if we don’t come back to London at the same time as you, I wondered if maybe Josie could stay another week here and help out with the kids.’
‘Why cheeky?’
‘Well, if Claudia’s still off her feet, won’t you want Josie stepping in back in London?’
Amy had to admit that she hadn’t given much thought to childcare beyond their three weeks in Provence, but Claire’s question had concentrated her mind. If Claudia was unable to come back to work at the end of August, perhaps she’d have to ask Josie to help out.
Juliet dipped her sunglasses again. ‘Aren’t you worried about having such a pretty young thing around the house with Max in residence?’
Claire smiled ruefully and shook her head. ‘I was actually thinking of that as a positive. Max has been talking about getting back to the office, but if Josie hangs around, so might he.’
‘Now why would he look at anyone but you?’ said Juliet admonishingly.
Amy shook her head. ‘Max is too busy looking at his own reflection to pay any serious attention to attractive young women, however tiny their bikinis.’
Claire looked as if she was about to respond when Amy was distracted by Tilly running over, showering water everywhere.
‘Mummy, Mummy!’ she cried, beaming with excitement. ‘Watch me! Josie is going to teach us how to cannonball into the pool.’ Off she dashed, leaving little wet footprints in her wake.
‘Not sure you’d get that with a Norland nanny,’ said Juliet archly, turning back to her book.
Amy smiled, which turned into a soft laugh. Here she was working herself into a frenzy about the Mode application when the sun was out and her daughter was getting the purest pleasure from simply jumping into the pool. Besides, she thought, looking down at the magazines spread out in front of her, she knew this stuff inside out. She didn’t need to study for this particular test because s
he’d been cramming for it for ten years. Every time the latest issue landed on her desk, she’d think about the tweaks and changes she’d make: who she would have used for the cover, how the features could have been improved, which fashion and beauty photographers were bold and innovative. The perfect issue of Mode had been in her head for the last decade.
‘Darling, is that your phone that keeps buzzing?’ said Juliet, sipping her iced tea. ‘If you don’t bloody turn it off, I’m going to have to throw it in the pool.’
‘Sorry,’ winced Amy, reaching for her handbag. She had put it on silent, but the vibrate mode was rattling the glass table. Strictly speaking, the terms of the pact with David said that they had to turn their phones off completely, but you never knew when someone might need to get in touch with you.
Call me, said the message on her screen. Pretty urgent. It was from Tracey Jones, her deputy.
Amy got off her lounger and walked to a quiet spot under a cypress tree, a bad feeling in her stomach. Tracey was usually very capable, but this was exactly why Amy couldn’t relax when she was out of the office.
She tapped in the number and Tracey picked up on the first ring.
‘Hi, boss,’ she said. ‘Hate to disturb you on holiday, but I thought you should know right away. We have a major date clash with the Fashion 500 gala.’
‘Another event?’