She seemed to shrink into herself, balling her fists together under her chin and muttering, 'I don't care about her.'

'Well, you should. She's not discreet. Roza, you've got to understand we need each other now. You've got to help me.'

There was a short silence. Her face was suddenly bitter. 'If I created some scandal, if I disgraced you, shocked you, you would divorce me.'

He stared at her. 'No.'

'No?' she laughed, pacing, biting her nails.

'No.'

'But your ...' She stopped and picked up the brush, playing nervously with it, pressing the bristles hard into her forearm.

He looked extraordinarily tired. Turning up his palms he said, 'If you damage me, if you ruin me politically, well ...'

'What?'

'Well, we're very rich, darling. It's not like I need the salary. I'd find something else to do.'

Roza sank down on the bed and shook her head. 'I don't believe it.' She chucked the brush across the room. 'I don't believe you.'

He sat beside her. 'I love you more than anything. Can't you tell? I put up with everything.'

She screwed her head around, looked at him with a strange, intent expression. 'You put up with everything?'

'Yes.'

They sat side by side. 'You wouldn't divorce me?'

His voice was heavy, exhausted. 'Well, I can't keep you prisoner here if you want to leave. But I don't want you to.' He turned to her. 'I can't live without you.'

She thought for a moment. 'Even if I told you something strange or shocking.'

'No matter what. You're constantly strange and shocking.'

Roza fell back on the bed. 'Ohh.' Her laughter was wild. She sat up again, abruptly. 'I'm sorry,' she said.

'There's no need to say sorry.' He put his arm around her. 'I mean it. I can't live without you. I'd die. I'd have to take the children with me. It'd be a bloodbath.' He grinned; he always made a joke when he was serious.

Roza looked into his eyes, searching his expression, and he met her stare, felt the hunger in it.

She said, 'People have been spying on me. Trish Ellison.'

He shrugged. 'Don't worry about the Ellisons. They're a necessary evil.'

She gasped, laughed. 'A necessary evil? That's rich. They've got you to where you are.'

'Well, yeah. But I've got them to this point too. And it's us that matters. Us two.'

She looked at him. 'What a strange thing. Us two.'

He said gently, 'Shall we go down and face lunch? Us two, and fifty of our closest friends?'

'Yes.' She got up and went to the mirror, putting on make-up and fixing her hair while he sat on the bed and watched, and when she was ready they looked at themselves in the gla.s.s with an almost embarra.s.sed wariness and pleasure as if they'd only just recently met, and she said, 'Well, that's a ridiculous-looking couple,' and he put his arms around her, kissing her satirically on the cheek. He stepped back and gestured towards the door. 'At least you look lovely. Now, shall we get on with it?'

'Ready when you are.' She wiggled her toes into a pair of stilettos that added to her imposing height, and he followed her, limping down the stairs.

He watched her as she crossed the room to greet the group gathered out by the pool. He saw her talk and laugh, put a graceful hand up to hold back her hair as she bent to listen to Graeme, who was sitting in a chair with a rug over his knees; he watched her shake her head as wine was offered, clap her hands and smile when someone made a joke and the group all laughed with a slightly edgy heartiness. He saw how the men were strongly attracted to her but wary and cautious, how the women eyed her covertly, checking every inch of her tall, lithe figure and her costly outfit, how they hated her a little and were ready to pounce on any sc.r.a.p of gossip about her, yet yearned to be close and to claim her friendship.

He watched her from across the room as they a.s.sembled for the lunch, which was slightly chaotic, with Jung Ha marshalling the staff and an undignified scramble for the buffet food. Roza drank water and picked at her food. Trish sat next to her, a fond hand on Roza's arm, patting and stroking her.

Roza flirted and joked with the man sitting next to her. Her pallor and her air of wry, frozen amus.e.m.e.nt had gone, and she rolled up her sleeves and put her elbow on the table, resting her chin on her hand. As David walked past the table, on his way to a cigar outside, he raised his eyebrows at her, comradely, and she flushed and looked down, smiling.

Trish put down her gla.s.s. She caught David's eye. A look pa.s.sed between them.

Trish gave David a tiny, barely perceptible nod.

That evening they left the house in a large convoy. There was a crowd at the gate waiting to see them pull out, and as they drove through it Roza and David waved and then turned and said at the same time, wryly smiling, 'The royal wave.' They drove at a stately pace along a causeway and Roza looked at the city lights shining on the dark, br.i.m.m.i.n.g water of an estuary. She felt that their lives were ending, that it was the end of their old selves. She had resisted the idea of change, had wanted everything to stay the same, but now a fatalistic calm came over her and she felt as though she were letting go, allowing something momentous to happen to herself; it was, she thought, looking at the dark water beyond the lights, like being swept out there towards the sea, ceasing the struggle and letting the currents take her where they would. There was something exhilarating in the letting go. She wondered how David felt. After tonight, would he become a stranger? No, she thought, he would be no more strange than he already was - everyone was a stranger, even loved ones - he would simply be altered, and she would only have to add to her present idea of him. He had seemed to her, just in the last few hours, to have become calmer and steelier, and yet a furious energy radiated in his blue eyes, and she thought suddenly, But I can be equal to it. I can be equal to that power.

She remembered wondering whether marrying him had been just a way of surviving. What she'd always wanted was to be sure he wouldn't leave her. She wanted to know they would be together forever; she would have roped him to her if she could - and wasn't that love? Now they would truly be bound together, and she could face the future without worrying and hiding and subterfuge, and he would have to accept whatever facts she presented him with. In the darkness of the car, Roza smiled.

At the electorate headquarters they sat through the hours, watching the results coming in on the TV screens. The room was filled with blue balloons, the light was garish and the cheers went up in waves. Safe seats were falling. It was a landslide, a rout. Halfway through the evening it was clear that David's party had won; the only question now was by how much. Roza sat with the children, drinking lemonade and watching David as he moved around the room. She'd had a hairdresser come to the house in the afternoon, she was wearing a designer outfit and she looked more glamorous than she had for weeks. Her expression was dreamy and faraway. Trish's face had turned red with excitement and her hair stood up in blonde corkscrews. Graeme gasped and hacked beside her, a lock of grey hair falling over one eye, rising after each coughing fit with the same indomitable, gap-toothed grin.

At one point David sat down next to Roza, took a sip of her lemonade and squeezed her hand. A significant result was announced and the crowd in the room turned to them and cheered. Roza looked at a wall of hot, beaming faces. She saw open mouths, mad hair, wild eyes. The sound roared in her ears. She moved close to David, clutching his arm and he turned, concerned, saying something she couldn't hear; he looked at her, expecting to see panic - she was holding his arm so tightly he could feel her nails - but what he saw made him pause, surprised. She was smiling, and her expression was one of anarchic delight.

'You've done it,' she said to him, and her eyes burned. She looked ferocious.

David blinked. He stood and acknowledged the cheers, then glanced down at Roza and put out his hand, and she stood up too. The cheers intensified. Roza turned slowly, scanning the faces, and slowly put her hand up to her hair. In her beauty, in the way she appeared on the brink of an explosion of feeling, in the radiant way she acknowledged the crowd, drawing energy from it like a drug, David found something almost frightening. At the same time he was exhilarated - he'd done it, and look at Roza Hallwright, his wife, just look at her.

It wasn't long before he was ushered into a quiet room to take the call. He acknowledged the prime minister's concession, exchanged pleasantries, put down the phone and winked at Graeme. They went to the door, and Graeme stepped aside with a flourish to let David pa.s.s.

Outside in the hall, pandemonium. The cheering, red-faced revellers, stumbling among the squeaky balloons.

Roza and David went into a side room and stood looking at each other. Her expression was electric. 'You've done it,' she said again. 'You'll be prime minister, and for a long time - maybe three terms.'

'We've both done it,' he said, but she held up her hand and rushed on. 'I'm sorry if I've made any of it difficult for you but it's all changed now. I'll be with you, I'll help you, and I see now, I see how we're in it together. We're locked together - everything I do affects you. And there are things I want, things I have to have, if we're going to succeed. I want so many things. I want to be a mother. Not just a stepmother, a mother. And a good one.'

'A mother,' he repeated. They stared at each other and both smiled, as if at some savage private joke.

Trish appeared with a theatrical little scream. 'Roza, there you are, I've been looking for you everywhere, darling. Are you exhausted? Are you quivering with nerves? Come and sit with me while we wait for the cars.'

Roza turned.

'Thank you for all your help, Trish,' she said. 'David and I are very grateful. We'll be out in a minute.'

Trish opened her mouth. She looked at David, appealing to him, but he only raised his eyebrows at Roza, and turned indifferent eyes on Trish. Roza came forward. Her face was a mask.

'Thank you, Trish,' she said, and closed the door in her face.

They were due to leave for the City Convention Centre, where David would make his victory speech. The cars were lined up, and they waited for the signal from the big men in suits with wires in their ears before moving out into the courtyard. The wind had got up and the bushes at the edge of the asphalt tossed and tossed as the big car cruised out, and Roza felt a deep agitation and excitement welling up, as though she were emerging into the light after some long, dark, anxious vigil. Beside her David talked into his phone, tracing a line across the seat back with his forefinger. He said, 'Obviously. I'm going to tell them all the things they want to hear.'

Roza, dreaming, far away in her own thoughts, didn't listen but watched the streets flash by until they reached the edge of the central city, and now the convoy was slowed by crowds and cars, there were shouts, blasts of car horns, and as they got nearer to the convention centre they were suddenly surrounded by people clapping and pointing and even, as the s.p.a.ce got narrower, banging on the doors and waving placards; there were flashbulbs and a camera crew spilling off the pavement into their path. Roza straightened up, was that? - yes it was, Ray Marden, standing on the kerb, and Roza caught his eye and was going to put her hand against the gla.s.s but stopped herself as the light outside exploded around her with white camera flashes. And then they were through, and pa.s.sing down into an underground car park, where they waited until all of the convoy had arrived.

The children had ridden with Graeme and Trish; now they came across looking subdued and faintly terrified, in their best clothes. They walked up the stairs and stopped at a door, from behind which they could hear the roar of voices; there was a quick regrouping by the security men and the door was pushed open and the sound became deafening as they moved through the crowd that surged forward alarmingly, forcing the security men to link arms around them and push them through, Izzy frightened and clinging to David's arm and young Michael looking amazed as the streamers rained down, covering their shoulders, and the balloons went up and blew crazily over their heads and loud music thumped from a bank of speakers around the stage. It seemed as if they would never get through, but finally they were making their way up the steps and onto the stage, David standing at the podium and Roza, Izzy and Michael lined up behind him, each pulling the streamers off shoulders and sleeves and gazing, stunned and wondering, into the glare of a hundred blazing white lights.

Simon and Karen and the three children stood in the front row and listened to David Hallwright's speech. Karen whooped and cheered and clapped. At Hallwright's first sentence the crowd had gone berserk. The noise was deafening, and Simon barely heard the speech: it was the usual mangled phrasing and garbled words, but injected now with hoa.r.s.e triumph. Simon couldn't take his eyes off Roza. She stood behind Hallwright, her hands on the shoulders of his two children, and seemed to absorb the applause, her eyes shining, her expression radiant. She was calm and elegant but her eyes were exultant, burning. She squared her shoulders and tossed back her hair. She looked down, caught Simon's eye and inclined her head gracefully. Simon stared while beside him Karen bounced up and down, letting out thrilled shrieks.

The speech ended and the crowd surged forward. There was a long moment when the Lampton family was caught up in the crush and couldn't move, but gradually the crowd started to break up and they were able to move towards the Hallwrights, dragged by Karen, who had an iron grip on Marcus and Elke and was determined to offer her congratulations. Hallwright stood in a pool of bright television lights. All around him the blue balloons were popping.

Karen reached the group around Hallwright and began to wait to get through, but it was impossible, of course; he was surrounded by those big security men and would be occupied for hours with journalists and with his people, and she would have to wait for the after-party that would take place later on one of the floors above, for which David and Roza Hallwright had sent the Lampton family pa.s.ses, along with a handwritten personal note; Karen had it propped up on the mantelpiece and returned to it several times a day, to open and read it to herself, as though to make sure it was real.

Simon stood before a vast plate gla.s.s window, looking out at the city spread below him and beyond it the black water of the harbour, glittering here and there with reflected light. It was three o'clock in the morning, and the sky was crossed with long delicate skeins of black cloud. The waning moon seemed to turn its white forehead towards the sea, making Simon feel, dizzily, that the whole sky was tilting, and the cars flowed over the harbour bridge in streams of wriggling light. He was sipping a gla.s.s of wine, one of many; he had lost count. The party had been in full triumphal swing for hours, and showed no sign of slowing down. There was an elderly band that had started off sedate but had now moved into creaky rock'n'roll covers, and various overheated party people were making spectacles of themselves on the dance floor.

The Hallwrights had been for some time in the corner furthest from the band, and there was the usual queue that pretended not to be a queue waiting to see and congratulate them. He had tried half-heartedly to get in, but had given up after a couple of attempts, and had returned to the window. The various children and teenagers had formed their own circle on a group of chairs in another corner, and were conferring and flirting over their soft drinks, although one little pair, a boy and a girl, had fallen asleep together on a couch, their mouths stained with something bright orange and their hair speckled with glitter.

He felt a hand on his shoulder and turned, 'Roza. Congratulations,' he said.

She offered her cheek and he leaned forward. In her heels she was nearly as tall as he was.

'He's done it,' she said.

'We knew he would. Although,' he said, surprising himself, 'I voted Labour.'

She was unmoved. 'You told me you would, remember?' She added, sardonically, 'Anyway, it doesn't mean much, since you're here.'

He was stung by her tone, but she was right. Here he was. And he'd given so much money ...

She said, 'Why should I care if you said you were going to vote Labour? It made me like you - you were different from all these people.' She gestured carelessly at the room. 'I always liked you, and now, you're part of ... the people I love.'

'The people you love,' he repeated. 'Roza ...'

He thought, I loved you before I met you.

She said, 'Everything's going to change. I came to tell you I've made a decision. I'm going to speak to Karen, about Elke.'

He dipped his head, bracing himself. 'We'll have to think about this. How to manage.'

'I want to do something now.'

He grabbed her wrist. 'Now? No.'

The feeling swelled in her eyes. She moved close to him and said rapidly, 'We have to face up to it. And when we do we'll always be connected. We'll have each other.'

He had her firmly by the wrist. 'You need to think about it. You can't say anything now. Elke is part of our family. Karen will be ...'

She broke in, 'If you and I act together you'll always have Elke. You'll never lose her. I told you, as soon as the election was over, I'd be able to do something. Look at Karen. We've won. And now I'm going to give her more.'

He could see it seemed to her completely logical: she'd promised it would come out after the election, and now here they were and she was elated, as if David's win had made everything possible and she could have anything she wanted.

He said, 'What are you going to do to us?'

They were surrounded by people, it was hot, the band was pumping out music, the noise in the room was jangling and loud. She spoke in his ear; he was close to her cheek, her face, her hair. He listened, and every time she pulled away he gripped her wrist harder but she kept talking and eventually he stopped protesting and just listened and then, quite suddenly, she pulled free.

He saw her reach Karen, saw Karen turn and stand on tiptoe to kiss Roza, beaming, congratulating, flattered to be singled out, and Roza's pale face as she bent and began to talk rapidly in Karen's ear.

Karen's expression went glazed. Roza carried on talking; she was consumed with energy, she was the Fury again, the beauty with the pitiless eyes. Karen stepped back, smiling vaguely. Roza advanced on her, still talking. Karen listened, nodding automatically, then Roza moved away, and Karen began pushing through the crowd towards Simon.

He came to meet her.

'I suppose we'd better go,' she said.

'What did Roza say?'

She gave him a patronising look. She hesitated.

'Oh, nothing,' she said.

'Karen!'

She raised her eyes. 'Nothing to do with you. She's invited me to their house, that's all. She's got some proposal, an idea. As soon as we can get together.' She hid an excited smile behind her hand.

With difficulty they rounded up the children, quelled the girls' arguing and moved to the door. The music pulsed around them; as they pa.s.sed the dance floor they were b.u.mped and buffeted by the crowd. Karen had Marcus by one hand and an arm around Elke's shoulder. Simon took Claire by the elbow and towed her through the crush of bodies.

He thought of himself the moment before, holding Roza's wrist, Roza talking then pulling away. He thought of the things she'd said to him and how he'd leaned close to her cheek and her hair, and closed his eyes and felt her body almost touching his, and how he'd listened to what she was telling him, to all the things he wanted to hear.

And he wished, and would always wish, that he'd held onto her, that he hadn't allowed himself to let go.

Also by Charlotte Grimshaw.

Provocation.

Guilt.

Foreign City.

Opportunity.