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  Back-up plan. Back-up plan. That was it. She chanted it like a mantra as she jogged to the car. It wasn’t customer services she needed. It was Kat.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Kat listened without comment to Bunty’s plan, as Bunty had known she would, particularly when confronted with a nibble platter of Sainsbury’s best and a large glass of what she had managed to salvage from the shattered wine collection.

  As Bunty drew to a close, Kat nodded, put her glass down, and said, ‘You’re kidding, right?’ in a tone that suggested she knew full well Bunty was entirely serious. Bunty gazed levelly at her, fixing Kat’s wide blue eyes with her own almond-shaped hazel ones. Unblinking, Kat stared back at her. She wasn’t really waiting for an answer, although she was hoping for one. Kat knew Bunty far too well for that. They had been friends since their early twenties, when Kat had worked briefly for the same company as Graham, and they had both run rings around him. She had the kind of sweet nature that would have made her a far more suitable partner for the trusty Graham, but at that time she had been focussing on her career. Unfortunately, that now meant that she was heading into her late thirties without a partner, desperate for children and contemplating the turkey baster. Matters had improved lately when she started a relationship with Simon Francis, but since he lived on the other side of the world, babies seemed somewhat off the agenda.

  ‘Go on then,’ said Kat eventually, topping up both their glasses. ‘How exactly do you think you’re going to manage Operation Sugar Daddy? Mmm, like the sound of that. I should get one,’ she added, far more keen on the ‘sugar’ element than the ‘daddy’ part.

  Operation Sugar Daddy. Bunty liked the sound of it too. She had worked it out in the car as she bounced the Mini off several kerbstones, driving home from the supermarket with the mobile attached illegally to her ear and her heart in spasms. It made sense. What was going to happen to her? Graham would trade her in for his newer model, and she would be cast aside like the weekend’s papers. What could she do about it? Very little, assuming that the vasectomy, weight loss and subterfuge over the squash games meant what most wives would try to ignore – that Graham was already test-driving someone new. So how was she going to live?

  That was the critical question. There would be alimony, of course, and Charlotte’s upbringing paid for. The courts would see to that. She’d probably get the house if she pushed hard enough, although for some reason, the prospect of downgrading rather appealed. A cosy terrace in Brighton, maybe. Close enough to commute, far enough away to start again. Less rooms to clean; less bland magnolia and beige tiles (beautiful, expensive, but still beige) in the double shower, which had never been used for more than one person – at least to her knowledge.

  But what could she actually do? She had no skills, no trade, no experience, not even any ancient qualifications. Breaking up with Adam had caused her such grief that she’d given up on her A levels, done odd jobs, and lived off her aunt’s legacy until Graham had stepped in and taken charge. Having spent the fifteen years trying out coffee groups, testing pottery classes, tennis and various other hobbies to fill in time while Charlotte was at school, and becoming the world’s leading expert on daytime TV, she had nothing to offer any employer. Nada. Nil. The only advantages she had that she could possibly utilise were her naturally skinny frame and long-lashed eyes that could be batted at opportune moments.

  Previously that had been purely for sport, to wind Graham up. Now she had to put those traits to good use. If Graham could trade up to someone newer, shinier, then she too could upgrade. To someone fun. Someone sexy. Someone … she hated to think it would come to this, but the truth was staring her in the face … someone rich. As Graham had pointed out after the Adam debacle, it was just as easy to fall in love with someone wealthy as it was with someone impoverished.

  Bunty took a slug of her wine. ‘I don’t know how to do it. That’s why I need your help. I don’t even know where to start. You did all that dating stuff, didn’t you?’

  ‘Me?’ Kat belched out a hollow laugh. ‘Yes, you see how successful it was for me. I couldn’t find anyone for myself. Had to have Cally’s cast-offs.’

  ‘Well, there’s a thought. Cally’s cast-offs,’ said Bunty with a grin. ‘You and me. The Cally’s Cast-offs club.’

  ‘Don’t even think about it.’

  Cally, the third member of their trio, the three musketeers, had gone from closeted single-motherhood with daughter Paige to unmarried bliss with her sort-of father-in-law, via a near miss with his son, her ex, Alan, and with the delicious Simon Francis. Kat now had her talons into Simon, though admittedly at rather a distance. And Alan … Well, Bunty didn’t want to think about that too much. It had been revealed on the eve of Cally’s wedding to Alan that Bunty and the groom had once snogged at a party when Alan was already involved with Cally and Bunty, to her shame, was married with a young baby. It had only been a kiss – a sad, desperate, clinging-to-a-life-raft type of a kiss that had led to nothing. Bunty had cringed about it throughout her marriage. Infidelity did not come naturally to her. And yet Graham seemed to have taken to it with ease. In fact, with considerable skill and forethought, the vasectomy enabling him to have sex with impunity.

  ‘Oh my God,’ she blurted, squirting wine through her teeth. ‘I just thought of something. You know last year when we were in Fiji for Cally’s wedding – nearly wedding? Do you think it started then? I bet Graham started shagging around as soon as my suitcase was in the taxi.’

  Kat cocked her head sympathetically. ‘You had just left him, Bun-Bun. He might have even … had a right?’

  ‘It was a trial separation. One month. And … oh, bloody hell, he’s got a nerve.’ More memories flooded back to her. Graham looking all persecuted and wounded when one of their many arguments had led to her confession of the Alan-snog. It had been meant to reassure him, let him know that that was the very worst she’d ever done; instead, he had informed her their marriage was over and she ought to move out. ‘He was looking for an excuse. He actually wanted a little holiday from our marriage. Think about it – he had the perfect excuse for heading off to look for someone else. He was hurt. I’d cheated on him. I’d left him. He was rethinking our future.’

  ‘Exactly the time he’d start an affair with someone. A sympathetic work colleague. Someone who ‘understood him’.’ Kat was away, thoroughly enjoying the Cosmo psychobabble. ‘Just one drink too many and one thing leads to another. It’s actually quite romantic.’ She caught Bunty’s eye and swallowed hastily. ‘Sorry. I’m sure none of that happened. He took you back, didn’t he?’

  He had taken her back. That much Bunty had to concede. She’d come back from Fiji, chastened by the exposure of her past tiny indiscretion and the near loss of her cherished friendship with Cally, bewildered by the fact that she could ever have been attracted to Alan in the first place – such an Adam-type – and begged Graham to try again. ‘It was only because he had such a hard time with Charlotte,’ she said. ‘He had no idea what it was really like to deal with a truculent nearly twelve-year-old, day-in day-out.’

  Charlotte had started her periods while Bunty had been away, and Graham’s handling of the situation had been of the chocolate teapot variety. Both Charlotte and Graham had fallen on her with cries of delight when she’d returned from Fiji with an olive tan and collection of raffia ornaments. Mum was home. That was what they’d both thought, she was sure. Mum was home. Not Bunty. Not Graham’s wife. Just someone who could deal with hormones, menstruation and homework logs.

  Bunty’s eyes filled up and she almost rejoiced. At last – some sort of regret! ‘I can’t believe I was so taken in,’ she said softly, waggling her empty glass at Kat. ‘Of course he’d need me here. He couldn’t go off to all those, ahem, squash games with Charlotte hanging around his neck, could he? It’s probably been going on all this time.’

  ‘I’m afraid you’re probably right,’ said Kat. ‘The signs are all there.’

  ‘So what do I do?’
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  Kat smiled, patted Bunty’s hand and sauntered over to the computer. ‘Operation Shug D begins. That’s code, so Graham doesn’t know what you’re up to and chuck you out first.’

  With a few agile taps of the keyboard, she brought up Match.com. Page after page of photographs panned across Bunty’s eyes. ‘They all look like convicts,’ she said. ‘I can’t meet any of them. I might never get home to Charlotte. They might actually be after Charlotte.’

  ‘They’re not that bad, really. Most of them take their own photograph, and it always looks terrible, like they’re looking in a hub-cab, or the back of a spoon. But the ones you want to be careful of are the ones with professional photos. Usually idiots. Big egos.’

  Bunty drew in a deep breath. ‘I don’t care about the size of their egos. Just their wallets. How about that one?’

  She pointed to an Onassis-looking chap half-silhouetted against a soft background, billowing chins flowing down his chest like the ruffles on a dress shirt.

  ‘Eeuw,’ said Kat. ‘You are not that desperate.’

  ‘Not yet,’ said Bunty darkly. She drained her glass.

  But after a hysterical half-hour trawling through the pages, Bunty had to agree that she really was not that desperate. It was fine to imagine that all she was really interested in was income, but when it came down to it, it simply wasn’t true. The ones who specified that their income was substantial tended to sound like arrogant pricks; the ones who looked good appeared either to be car mechanics (and not the garage owner) or police officers with ‘very open minds, looking for fun’.

  ‘This is hopeless,’ she said, after ‘ROByoublind’ had outlined his spiritual journey on his yacht and included details of his many experiences of Tantric sex. ‘They all sound like pervs, or no-hopers. I can’t go meeting them all in the hope of finding one who’s looking for a … well, a wife.’

  It was all she knew how to be, and yet most of the characters on the screen seemed to be searching for fun, or friendship, or possibly relationship after friendship (‘they’re the ones that are just shagging anything that moves,’ Kat had told her knowledgeably).

  Kat looked up thoughtfully. ‘You’re absolutely right. You’re after something quite specific. Someone looking for marriage, with a good income. Let’s say … six figures as a minimum?’

  ‘Sounds good.’

  ‘Well, they might be there on these ordinary sites,’ said Kat, pulling the keyboard towards her, ‘but I’m betting they go somewhere more exclusive. Why don’t we look up … um … ‘wealthy males searching for love’.’

  Bunty shrugged. ‘Are they really going to be listed on here? I did see something like that on Doctor Phil once – ‘Millionaire Marriages’ or something. But that was in America, Hollywood even. There won’t be anything like that here.’

  ‘Google will find them.’ Kat smiled mysteriously and started to type in ‘wealthy’ with a flourish.

  Before she’d got as far as the ‘e’, a drop-down menu appeared before their eyes, and the images of hopeful Matchdotcommers shimmied out of the way for some new pictures.

  ‘Oh my good God!’ screamed Bunty. ‘Turn it off. Off!’

  Kat fumbled with the mouse. ‘I didn’t … How did that …?’

  ‘Christ, if Charlotte ever saw that lot …’

  They watched, horrified, fascinated, as the noughts-and-crosses board filled with images of a variety of penises faded away, along with the photo of Prince William (his face, not his penis) and, inexplicably, a bearded older man who apparently was writer and comedian Willy Rushton.

  ‘How the hell did they come up? What’s that got to do with ‘wealthy’?’

  Kat peeked through her fingers at the screen. ‘Are they gone? How disgusting. I don’t know how they got there. I’d only typed in “w” …’ She peered more closely at the screen. ‘Oops!’

  ‘What?’ Bunty thrust her head over her friend’s shoulder. ‘What does ‘oops’ mean?’

  Kat pointed to the drop-down menu that had appeared with the insertion of the letter ‘w’. Every item beginning with that letter that had been searched for over the last few months was listed there. Wealth management – that was probably Graham. Wicker chairs – Bunty, looking to replace the ancient Lloyd Loom in their bedroom. And top of the list: willies.

  Bunty felt sick. ‘Jesus. Was that Charlotte?’

  ‘I’m guessing … yes.’ Kat grimaced, then tried not to giggle.

  ‘What else has she been looking at?’

  They spent the next fifteen minutes thinking up rude words that might have been keyed in by a thirteen-year-old girl and her friends, striking out with most but hitting gold with ‘people having sex’, ‘viginas’ (which, amazingly, had over four hundred entries despite the misspelling) and the one that finally floored them under the listing for ‘b’– big wiggling bums.

  Bunty smacked Kat in the side. ‘It’s not funny.’

  ‘Big wiggling bums? It’s hilarious.’ Kat’s cheeks were pink with constrained giggles.

  Bunty’s face broke too. ‘Maybe she meant ‘Buns’? Something to do with me?’

  ‘Since when did your arse look like that?’ shrieked Kat, unable to hold it in any longer.

  They held onto each other, sobbing with laughter, until a horrible thought occurred to Bunty. ‘Kat, what if they’re not all Charlotte? I mean, I can see the willies and what have you being her doing, but ‘big wiggling bums’? Like you said, my arse has never looked like that.’

  At which point, Kat looked rather green. ‘Oh. Sick bastard. Most men would be overjoyed with your pert little tush. They certainly prefer it to my chair-wobbler.’

  The picture of the woman Graham was involved with was becoming ever more clear. It might even, she thought with horror, be pictorially clear to Charlotte. Getting Netnurse, or whatever it was that stopped children looking up ‘willies’, might not be enough. Not nearly enough.

  Bunty swallowed back bile and reached past Kat to the keyboard. ‘Millionaires looking for love’ she typed.

  At the top of the list was the Croesus Club.

  ‘Are you sure you’re ready?’ Kat’s fingers hovered over the enter button as she stared anxiously at her friend.

  Bunty nodded across the keyboard. ‘Hit it,’ she said.

  *

  To: [email protected]

  From: [email protected]

  Profile:

  Club Name: Sugar Bun

  Sex: F

  Age: 35

  Income: n/a

  Appearance: I’ve been told I look like Audrey (Hepburn or Tatou, take your choice). Photo attached. Obviously I’m older than one of them and younger than the other one (or, at least, still alive).

  Seeking: I am a traditional lady who likes to be at home seeing to the domestic affairs (and that does not mean AFFAIRS) of my busy, professional husband. Seeking a kind, handsome, athletic man who appreciates that in a woman. Non-smoker preferred. I love art galleries and museums, fine wines, and fencing. Please, please, please – utter discretion. My husband doesn’t know I’m doing this.

  Payment by: VISA. It’s being used for all sorts these days.

  From: [email protected]

  To: [email protected]

  Thank you for your query and payment for membership of the Croesus Club, where the wealthy can also find love.

  I’m afraid we have very strict membership rules, and one of those is that our members be single. Of course, we apply the strictest discretion at all times, but we cannot accept you as a member if you are, in fact, married.

  Perhaps you could confirm this point for us before we investigate your membership further.

  Kind regards

  Priscilla.

  To: [email protected]

  From: [email protected]

  Dear Priscilla,

  Oops. That was meant to be a joke! Of course I’m not married. As if I’d be looking for a new husband while I still have the old one. I was trying to display my GS
OH, but obviously that fell a bit flat. My SOH is temporarily AWOL. Many, many apologies, and I hope that you can look into my membership again.

  Yours very sheepishly

  Bunty

  To: [email protected]

  From: [email protected]

  Of course. We have deducted four hundred pounds from your credit card, and look forward to a long and happy relationship – ours, and yours. Our consultant will call in the next couple of days with details of your first rendezvous.

  Best wishes

  Priscilla

  CHAPTER THREE

  For the next couple of days, Bunty skulked around like someone with a body buried in the garden. Even her dreams ran along the same lines: she crept around corners, avoiding the police, knowing that somewhere, recently, she had inadvertently killed someone and stowed them under the patio. Graham, smirking, would hint that he knew, that he was calling in forensics, that she would suffer endlessly for what she had done … CSI had nothing on him. Having had quite a lot of time on her hands to look into these things, via the horoscope pages and panoply of self-help and self-development books she had collected over the years, Bunty instantly assumed, waking up in a clammy sweat, that she was manifesting the guilt she felt about going behind Graham’s back. What must Graham’s dreams be like, she wondered. Waco massacres?

  When she looked up ‘I’ve murdered someone’ in her dream dictionary, however, she was amazed to discover that this was the most common dream of all:

  In the past, you buried some part of yourself, never allowing the real you to surface again. Now your subconscious is prompting you to free that element of your spirit that you have been denying yourself. It’s time to be you again.

  ‘But I don’t know who me is,’ she said to the curlicued page, before slamming the book shut and shoving it back into the bookcase, as if Graham might find it and somehow read her mind. Pearl and Finn of On the Sofa were chatting away in the background, and, not for the first time, Bunty found herself sitting across the studio from them, knees elegantly crossed on the slick leather couch, pushing her hair winsomely behind her ears as Pearl beamed at her.