This Careless Life

First published in Great Britain in 2017

by Electric Monkey, an imprint of Egmont UK Limited

The Yellow Building, 1 Nicholas Road, London W11 4AN

Text copyright © 2017 by Rachel McIntyre

The moral rights of the author have been asserted

First e-book edition 2017

ISBN 978 1 4052 7368 8

Ebook ISBN 978 1 7803 1644 4

www.egmont.co.uk

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

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For Tim

CONTENTS

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

1 LIV

2 LIV

3 LIV

4 LIV

5 HETTY

6 HETTY

7 HETTY

8 HETTY

9 JEZ

10 JEZ

11 DUFF

12 DUFF

13 LIV

14 LIV

15 LIV

16 EVANGELINA

17 LIV

18 CASSANDRA

1 July, 10 a.m.

When Olivia Dawson-Hill opened the front door she had no idea what she was letting herself in for.

‘I’m Cass,’ the woman on the step said. She held out a business card between elegantly manicured fingers. ‘And you must be Liv.’

Liv took the card. Read it. Frowned.

Cassandra Verity

Assistant Director

Pretty Vacant Productions

‘But I spoke to Tony last night. He said we were all fixed for this afternoon.’

‘There’s been a change of plan. He’s going to call you later.’

The woman smiled.

Liv assessed the visitor with an expert eye: flawless skin, discreet make-up, glossy deep brown hair. White linen dress, understated but expensive. High-end high street? Leather sandals, definitely designer, and by them a large black and silver case.

The woman pulled her handbag higher on her shoulder and Liv’s mouth, poised to utter, What change of plan? dropped open at the sight of the distinctive gold P dangling from the strap.

‘Oh. My. God. Is that a genuine Pandora?’ she said in hushed tones, reaching out a tentative hand. ‘I mean, I’ve been on the waiting list since it opened, but even so, they said at least Christmas. How did you . . .?’

‘Beautiful, isn’t it? I guess you could say I’ve got friends in high places.’ The woman held the soft tan leather up as though it were some holy artefact. ‘Now is it OK if I bring this inside?’

‘This’ was the large black case. Plastered in wasp-striped stickers that read Fragile Audio-visual Equipment. A dizzying flare of excitement shot through Liv.

This was it!

Right now, waiting inside that black vinyl box was The Future.

Tucking the business card in the pocket of her jumpsuit, Liv paused, holding it there for one . . . two . . . in an attempt to disguise the sudden trembling in her fingers.

Deep breath.

Smile.

‘Of course. Come in.’

Cass stepped forward, bringing with her a drift of some ultra-subtle fragrance Liv recognised. Like wild herbs and sea air and sunshine mixed up together. So familiar. What was it called?

But the answer dangled stubbornly out of reach, vanishing entirely as Liv caught sight of Jez’s precision parked BMW, and behind it . . .

Bloody Jez! He knew not to leave the gates open. She tutted, flipping the security panel open to key in the code. The gate mechanism groaned; two Rottweilers hurtled across the walled courtyard, clattering their long chains over the cobbles.

Beyond the high wall, glinting tractors and tiny stooping figures dotted the endless fields. Squinting against the sun, she could just make out a horse going round the training ring and a smaller dot that must be Mum. Good job she hadn’t seen the open gates. Liv waited until they clanged shut, cutting High Acres off from the surrounding farmland, then raised her voice above the ferocious barking.

‘Sorry about that. My dad’s super security conscious.’

‘It’s fine,’ Cass said, lifting the case over the threshold. ‘Wow. I remember thinking what a lovely space when I saw your application footage, but it’s even more impressive in real life. Love, love, love the staircase.’

Pride mingled with Liv’s fizz of excitement, although if she wanted to be picky, ‘lovely’ didn’t quite do the hallway justice. Presiding over the entrance, the show-stopping stairs, designed to her own vague specifications (‘wooden steps with glass up the side’) had featured in two interiors magazines, attracting adjectives such as ‘stunning’ ‘dazzling’ and ‘sublime’.

‘Spectacular,’ Cass murmured, brushing her fingertips lightly along the wall.

Exposed brickwork lined the way to the lounge, and the ceiling, stripped back during the renovations, arched high above them in a skeleton of beams. And even though her mum had tried to put her foot down over the inset floor lights Liv flicked on now, Liv got her own way in the end. She always did.

Mind you, every time she pressed the switch, Mum’s mocking voice rattled in her head: ‘Low-level lighting will guide you to the nearest available exit.’

Hilarious.

Just after the door – the locked door – that separated Liv from her parents in the main house, Cass paused to examine a gallery of framed photos: Liv with other pearly-toothed girls, lifting champagne flutes outside a grand marquee. Sleek hair streaming behind them, the same friends captured mid-shriek on a waltzer. Liv, alone, in front of a glowing Ferris wheel. Liv posing, arms in the air, against a vivid blue sky. ‘Stunning pics. I take it they’re recent?’

Liv nodded. ‘That one’s my eighteenth in April. That’s Greece at Easter. Those ones are from the prom. We had this 1950s theme with a proper fairground. The photographer works for Vogue; all the prom pics were amazing.’

Cass nudged the corner of a frame slightly to straighten it. ‘Lucky you. Only July and you’ve already had an unforgettable year.’

Unforgettable? Well, that was one way of looking at it, but not entirely for reasons Liv cared to remember. She swallowed hard. Do not think about HIM now. ‘It’s been eventful,’ she agreed, careful to keep her tone light. ‘Would you like a cup of coffee? Green tea?’

The woman shook her head. ‘Thanks, but we don’t have much time. It’s better if we just get straight on with the casting.’

‘Yeah, sure. Follow me.’

But Cass had turned back towards the front door. A shaft of sunlight streamed through the stained-glass panels, throwing kaleidoscope patterns on the wooden floor.

‘What a truly lovely home you have,’ she said.

‘The windows came from a church that was being demolished. And the floor.’ Liv pointed her toe at the patinated boards, worn to a shine by decades of worshipping feet. ‘You can see if you look closely.’

‘Amazing,’ Cass said, gazing down.

As they reached the end of the passageway, a thumping beat joined the click-clack of Cass’s sandals. She raised her eyebrows. ‘I’m guessing the others have already arrived.’

‘Yep. Everyone got here early.’

Liv twisted the circular handle on a carved door which, until the architect snapped it up, had apparently eavesdropped on a lifetime of confessions. She elbowed it open; the hinges gave a groan.

Tacky. That’s how Mum described the chandelier dangling from the beams, the aqua geometric print rug, white gloss furniture and huge L-shaped sofa Liv had chosen. Even the open-plan kitchen, with the sleek cupboards and cavernous pastel-pink fridge Liv literally worshipped, had only elicited a disparaging, ‘Not very practical, is it?’

On the rare occasions Mrs Dawson-Hill ventured through the door from the Land of Boring Bland, she screwed her face up like she’d accidentally stumbled into raw sewage.

Liv could have asked the designer for a Mum-friendly scheme: pine, flowery cushions and easy-to-clean flagstones.

But she didn’t.

With the door open, the wall-mounted TV was revealed as the source of the music. More specifically, the video of a suit-wearing male singer flanked by a flock of bikini-clad dancers.

Sprawling on the rug beneath, transfixed by the screen and tapping the remote control to the beat, was Declan Duffy.

‘Switch the telly off,’ Liv hissed at him.

‘What for?’

‘Just do it.’

Something of Liv’s irritation must have got through because he jerked upright, fumbling for the button. Although the music stopped, the dancers continued gyrating silently.

‘I said off, not down.’

Liv snatched up the remote control, killed the screen and stood in front of the TV.

‘OK, everyone, listen up. There’s been a change of plan. Tony can’t make it so he’s sent someone else. This is Cass.’

Three expectant faces gazed up and Liv, conscious of the woman’s presence, had the strange sensation she was seeing her friends for the first time.

Declan Duffy, stubble scuffing his chin and dark circles, almost bruises, ringing his currently red eyes. On most guys you’d think knackered. On Duff they weirdly added another dimension to his apparently irresistible bad-boy appeal. (Irresistible to other girls, that is. Not Liv, who’d known him since primary and therefore knew exactly what he was like.)

Perched on the edge of the sofa: Hetty Barraclough, brown hair tugged back in a ponytail, knuckles whitening around an iPhone. Hesitant smile hovering on her scrubbed face even as she shrank inside her baggy grey sweatshirt.

Liv suppressed a sigh. A sweatshirt. What exactly was Hetty thinking? Liv wouldn’t use that rag to clean the floor, let alone audition for a TV show in it.

Not that Liv had any intention of cleaning this or any floor.

Finally, Jeremiah Livingston, almost-but-not-quite touching Hetty. Not a crease wrinkling that immaculate shirt, not a smudge on those blinding trainers. Owlish behind Harry Potter glasses, with thick eyebrows that were currently lowered in a frown as he asked, ‘Sorry, what do you mean by a change of plan?’

Cass set the heavy-looking case down by the side of the coffee table. Taking the actual Pandora off her shoulder, she placed it on top then swept her gaze across the three seated friends.

‘Hello, Jeremiah – Jez, isn’t it? Nice to meet you. And Hetty too and . . . you must be Declan.’

‘Call me Duff.’

He unfurled himself up off the rug in a single fluid movement, stealing the opportunity to not-so-subtly check himself out in the oversized mantel mirror. ‘And you are . . .?’

Oh please. Liv raised her eyes to the ceiling. Like the dogs going mental over the screech of the gates, Duff ’s flirt offensive was so depressingly biological. Every interaction he had with a female started with that cool up-down once-over; the instinctive, preening hey hey hey.

But the woman fixed her attention not on him but on the retro clock above his head and the white digits that flipped to 10.08 before she replied in a neutral and distinctly non-flirty way.

‘Hello, everyone. Great to meet you all in the flesh; I’ve been hearing so much about you. My name is Cassandra Verity, but please call me Cass. I’ll be taking you through the casting for This Careless Life today.’

Duff didn’t even appear to register the slight; instead he rocked back on his heels, unselfconsciously watching the visitor snap the tabs on the black case, tip the lid and extract several smaller, squishier bags.

That was the thing about Duff. His ego was galactic. Like a constantly inflating ball of vanity expanding beyond the earth, beyond the solar system, it bounced through wormholes, emerging in parallel dimensions where billions of super-cocky identi-Duffs blatantly sized up anything woman-shaped.

As always, Liv felt torn between admiring his self-confidence and massively wanting to give him a slap.

A sharp intake of breath caught her attention. Hetty. Mouth open, about to speak and nervously turning the phone around in her hands.

‘What? ’ mouthed Liv.

Hetty positioned her lips into the determined smile Liv recognised from school functions. ‘Sorry, Cass. Hello. I, er, thought the audition wasn’t till two? Are we still going to have time to rehearse?’

Twist, twist, twist went the phone.

Cass rasped a Velcro strap and straightened up. ‘I’m sorry about the short notice. I’ve had to juggle the timing because I’ve got a plane to catch this afternoon. I know you’ve been dealing with Tony, but something urgent cropped up so I’m taking over. But if you really want Tony to fit you in after he’s seen the other candidates, I’m sure he would –’

‘No,’ Liv cut in before Hetty could. ‘Today, now, with you is fine. Totally fine. Beyond fine. Awesome.’

Cass grinned. Her teeth really were lovely: very straight, very white against her olive skin. Bending her shiny dark head over the table, she unzipped the various bags and set a selection of silver and black tech on the coffee table. Tripods, cameras, a fuzzy-headed microphone . . .

‘Fantastic. Does mean we’re on a super-tight schedule though, I’m afraid. We need to set the equipment up asap so we can make a start.’

‘Can we help?’ Jez asked.

Cass, expertly screwing a stand into one of the cameras, used her head to indicate the white gloss bookcase, crammed as always with an avalanche-in-waiting of fashion magazines.

‘Sure. Can you put this . . . there?’

‘Allow me,’ Duff said, leaping up to take the camera. Jez snorted softly and Liv bit back a tut. So predictable.

‘Thanks. And these two . . .’ The woman pointed first at the worktop of the (shiny, untouched) kitchen and then at the corner desk stacked with Liv’s (shiny, untouched) revision books. ‘There and there should do it. And camera number four. Let’s see . . .’ She scanned the room. ‘There.’

With a flash of irritation, Liv scooped the scattering of jewel-bright lip glosses, nail polishes and random earrings along the sideboard and into a drawer. What a total mess. She’d have to talk to Dad about . . . was it Martina or Marina? She couldn’t remember. Whatever the new cleaner’s name was, she was a joke.

Yesterday, Liv had caught her vacuuming around a pair of cerise Victoria’s Secret knickers in her bedroom. And when Liv suggested that maybe she could, you know, pick them up first? Martina/Marina had stared blankly at her with eyes ringed in glittery blue liner, then carried on.

Absolute joke.

‘Lens caps off and angled at the sofa, please,’ Cass continued. ‘Have a wiggle, check the tripod’s steady. Press the green button on the top. And don’t worry about not rehearsing, Hetty; spontaneity gives the best results. Makes the whole process more . . . honest.’

She placed her bag on the counter that divided the kitchen from the living space. The gold P chinked against the granite as Cass rifled through, pulling out first a mini laptop case and then a black gadget studded with tiny buttons. From her position by the door, Liv had a perfect view of the computer screen Cass was now adjusting to suit the light filtering in through the blinds.

‘Nearly there, guys. Duff, may I borrow you to check the angles?’

‘Sure, what do I need to do?’

‘Look pretty,’ Cass said, flicking her gaze between the sofa and the screen.

Liv’s eyes automatically followed, tracking across her friends. Jez’s watchful, relaxed expression giving nothing away, hands clasped in his lap.

Then Duff. Every inch of that six-foot-plus gym-toned, buffed and waxed body currently squeezed between Hetty and Jez radiated natural-born poser. Liv would not be at all surprised to learn that Mrs Duffy had an ultrasound image somewhere of foetal-stage Duff pouting like a pro.

Unlike acute photo-phobe Hetty who, even when she smiled, gave the impression she would rather be facing a machine gun than a lens. At the prom she had avoided the crush of the booth, ducked to the back for the group shots. And now, hugging a velvet cushion to her chest, she was playing the part of person most unlikely to audition for a TV show to perfection. Liv damped down a surge of exasperation. Hetty had promised she would go along with it.

‘Hets?’ she said in an undertone, miming dropping the cushion.

But if Cass noticed Hetty’s nerves, she didn’t seem bothered. One final tap on the keyboard and four LEDs blinked on; a red eye staring from each of the cameras placed around the room. Four Duffs materialised on the quartered screen, each fiddling with his phone from a slightly different angle.

‘Duff, can you say something so I can test the sound levels?’ Cass said, setting a microphone on the table.

‘Anything in particular you’d like me to say?’

A line spiked into jagged peaks in the top left of her screen.

‘That’ll do, thanks.’

She moved the microphone a few centimetres closer to the sofa and wagged a finger at Duff ’s phone.

‘Sorry, no devices. They interfere with the equipment. Disabled Wi-Fi or switched off, please.’

Duff swiped his thumb over the screen and placed it on the table. ‘No worries.’

Liv quickly slipped hers out of its case and touched the little aeroplane icon. Wi-Fi Off. When she looked back up, Jez’s domed forehead had loomed into shot. The light caught his glasses and the lenses flashed opaque white.

Lines zigzagged in the corner of the screen as he asked, ‘Do we need to sign anything? Contract? Disclaimer?’

Cass clicked her fingers and pointed her index finger at him. ‘Excellent question. Yes, I have paperwork. There’s always paperwork.’

She reached inside the Pandora, drawing out a document wallet containing a sheaf of A4 sheets attached to thin plastic clipboards, each with a printed label.

‘Here we are. Jeremiah . . . Henrietta . . . Olivia . . . Declan. These are the agreements you submitted with your initial applications. Legal tells me I have to read through the section marked “Audition” to make sure you know what you’re getting into.’

‘Sounds ominous,’ Liv said on her way to sit down. Then laughed to show she didn’t mean it.

She curled up next to Hetty, tucking her feet under her. Hetty grinned and flexed her eyebrows in a this-is-it! kind of way, which immediately made Liv feel like an evil bitch. But honestly, that sweatshirt! Liv had a photo of Hetty aged fourteen wearing the exact same garment on a school skiing trip. Which, in clothing years, made it older than the actual Pyrenees.

‘It’s just to make sure we’re all completely clear,’ Cass said.

Draping one arm along the leathery back of the sofa, Duff fanned himself with his copy. ‘No need. We trust you a hundred per cent, Cassandra.’

A lion on the scent of a zebra. That’s what he reminded Liv of. A lion too full of itself to realise this particular zebra was way, way out of its league.

‘That’s good to know but have a quick look to refamiliarise yourself,’ said Cass, her brown eyes trained on the laptop.

Jez curled his shoulder away from Duff ’s loosely dangling hand and studied the contract, one side, two sides before taking Hetty’s copy. He flapped his fingers, offering to do the same for Liv but she shook her head and pulled the contract to her chest.

Cass looked up expectantly. ‘Got a pen? Great. Any questions, fire away, otherwise please tick the boxes after each point.’

She began to read in a can’t-put-your-finger-on-it accent. Posh, yes, but with a hint of something under it. Something not entirely English?

‘I understand I am auditioning to take part in a vehicle for Pretty Vacant Productions with the working title: This Careless Life.

‘By agreeing to participate in the audition process, I confirm I am eighteen years of age.’

Tick.

‘I understand this audition will never be broadcast or made publicly available.’

Tick.

‘I give Pretty Vacant Productions permission to continue to obtain and research my online presence including accessing my social-media profiles.’

Tick.

‘I understand that participation could have a profound impact on my life and those around me.’

Tick.

Pause.

Bookcase. Kitchen. Sideboard. Desk.

‘One . . . two . . . three . . . four.’

Cass jabbed her pen at each camera in turn. ‘Audiences expect full disclosure, guys. In this job, festering skeletons have a nasty habit of tumbling out, sooner or later. And it will be much better for you if you’re transparent from the start. So think carefully now – is there anything you need to tell me?’

Duff spread his arms wide. ‘What you see is what you get with me. No skeletons, no secrets. Guaranteed.’

Cass laughed softly.

‘Everyone’s got secrets.’ Her deep brown eyes met Liv’s. ‘Everyone. ’

Then she raised one perfectly shaped eyebrow a tiny fraction and panic jolted through Liv.

Wait. Did she know about –?

No.

No way.

It was impossible. Apart from herself, only two other people knew: Hetty (who would never blab) and him, and he’d been careful to the point of paranoia. No names on texts, separate SIM cards, no likes on each other’s posts . . . literally nothing to give away that they were anything more than vague friends of friends.

A rustling interrupted her thoughts. Cass had turned to the next page in the contract, but her gaze still rested on Liv.

Liv’s heartbeat speeded up. Oh God. Please don’t.

But then Cass’s thoughtful face broke into a warm smile. ‘No one wants to unload their burning confessions? OK, so if we’re all happy with the Big Brother stuff, let’s move on.’

As Cass carried on reading, Liv’s nerves gradually unknotted. No. Absolutely no way Cass knew about him. Part of the test, wasn’t it? A lucky guess to put her on edge. Like those TV psychics who cast a million generalisations in the air and wait for the audience to bite.

Liv’s mind floated out of the room, up the stairs and into her dressing room to pull open a few drawers, rifle along the hangers . . . Oh dear. A terminal crisis loomed on the clothes front that a trip into Manchester couldn’t cure. Two, maybe three hardcore shopping days in London with Dad’s credit card would do the trick. Should she invite Hetty along? Persuade her to slip into something a little less comfortable for once? Maybe even brave a manicure?