The Getaway – read the first 10 chapters for free

Chapter 1

I set off for the island by boat, knocking against crates of champagne and cool boxes full of black truffles. Just another import.

It had taken three planes and two ferries to reach this remote corner of the Caribbean. I hadn’t slept during the 32-hour journey, but I’d pushed through exhaustion into a jumpy alertness and now I leaned against the bow, searching out details of my new home. I had to squint against the early-morning sun, blazing from a cloudless sky.

Keeper Island was an emerald, small enough at this distance to seize in the hollow of my hand. A central peak rose up, covered in green forest. As the boat motored closer, I caught sight of a sandy shore; palm trees waving to me.

This was my safe haven. This was my escape.

I touched my cheekbone instinctively, then glanced at my fingernails. I couldn’t stop checking them, imagining there was blood underneath them. No. They were clean now. Everything was fine.

We were approaching a long wooden pier, but the man driving the boat showed no sign of slowing down. He was animated, head thrown back, telling a story (‘and she say, you too damn rude, ya sick, man’). The other three passengers were all muscular men, all Virgin Islanders, I presumed. They’d been polite as they’d ushered me on board, but there was a guarded quality to their expressions.

My hands tightened around the salt-sticky railing. The pier was rushing to meet us. With a whoosh of wake, the skipper slammed the boat into reverse. I stumbled against the railing, but my companions retained their balance. One of them kicked a couple of fenders off the boat and we bumped against the side of the pier.

As soon as the motorboat was tied up, the men jumped into action, unloading provisions. They lifted out my overstuffed purple suitcase and wheeled it away to a procession of waiting golf carts, along with the brie and Bluefin tuna. ‘It’s fine, you don’t need to,’ I called, but the suitcase had already gone.

The skipper extended a hand to help me off. He had springy hair and sleepy eyes.

‘Thanks.’ I stepped ashore. ‘Know where I can find Moxham?’

Mike Moxham. My new boss. The reason I was here – in more ways than one.

‘He around here somewhere.’ The skipper heaved a crate into his arms. He was already jogging after his companions.

I felt a reflexive need to help, but the provisions were gone from the pier. The men had disappeared, God-knows-where. I was alone. When I sought out the neighbouring island, I was surprised at how far away it looked. A rumble-and-splash out on the water caught my attention. Fifty metres from shore, a pair of red jet skis were skimming the waves. Now that looked like fun. Refreshing, on a scorcher of a day like today.

Jetlag was hitting me. I needed a shower and a meal and a bed and a brain transplant. I hoped this island could rustle up a cheese sandwich for me, at least. I scuffed along the worn wooden boards of the pier, inland towards a biscuit-coloured, paved path, edged with palms and spiky green foliage.

‘Hello, hello!’ A voice rang out.

Another golf cart had arrived. A slender woman, glamorous yet understated in a pink floral maxi-dress, glided over to me. I felt wrung-out, but gave my hospitality-smile. She looked ready to step into the Keeper Island brochure, her long black hair falling like silk and her lips a beachy coral. I presumed she was one of the people who paid thousands of dollars a night to be pampered on this private island.

‘You’re Lola,’ she said.

‘Uh, that’s the rumour.’

‘I’m Fizzy.’ She offered a limp handshake, almost like she didn’t want to touch me. ‘I’ll get you situated.’

Oh. So, she wasn’t a guest. Looking closer, I spotted a two-way radio clipped to her belt, along with a raft of keys. The radio crackled with distant voices, the volume turned low.

‘I was expecting Moxham?’ I said.

‘He’s busy-busy, like always.’

She flipped open a cooler in the back of the golf buggy and presented me with a rolled hand towel. It was ice-cold and smelled of eucalyptus. I passed it gratefully over my face, rubbing away the sweat, and then regretted it when my thumb hit my cheekbone. The concealer I’d reapplied an hour ago would have disappeared, revealing the bruise underneath.

When Fizzy’s gaze darted over my face, I produced a smile, hoping to distract her. ‘Thanks.’

 ‘You know, this is somewhat of a surprise.’ She had the shifting accent of a jetsetter, with straying vowels that mostly rounded down to American. Sometimes I could hear my own accent heading in a similar direction, but I normally managed to re-route it back to London, where I’d grown up.

‘Moxham only told me you were arriving an hour ago,’ she said. ‘I didn’t know we required a deputy manager.’

I tried not to wince. ‘Snap decision, I s’pose.’ I was feeling faint and it wasn’t just the jetlag.

‘Mox… I’m fucking terrified.’

‘Showgirl…’

Two nights ago, I’d been slumped on the bathroom floor, phone to my ear, begging for help.

‘You need to fix this. You’re the fucking fixer, so fix it.’

‘How about a new job? A fresh start.’

‘Where?’

‘Paradise.’

Out on the water, there was another roar of engines. The jet skis were back, closer to shore this time.

‘On behalf of us all… you’re very welcome.’ It didn’t ring true. Fizzy had the air of someone who used a fake-nice voice so often, she’d lost the ability to speak normally. It was a hazard of working in hospitality.

‘Thanks,’ I said again, but my eyes were on the jet-ski riders.

Two men, both bare-chested. One was dark-haired, one ginger. They were doing tricks. One cut a sharp turn left, then right, a cowboy on a bucking bronco. The other man leaned back, pulling the jet ski’s nose upwards, a plume of white water gushing out of the back like a rocket ship.

For a second, it was impressive. Then it was calamitous. The jet ski turned into a Catherine wheel, spinning out of control, and the dark-haired man was flung from his steed, hitting the water with a splash.

‘Oh, my God!’

The engine died, but the jet ski was still spiralling. The man hadn’t surfaced.

‘Shit… are they OK?’ I took an instinctive step towards the shore. Belatedly, I realised neither of the men were wearing life vests.

There’d been too much death this week. I couldn’t handle any more.

‘They’re just playing.’ Fizzy wasn’t even looking, concentrating instead on tidying away my balled-up towel.

A familiar hyena laugh drifted across the water. I’d know that laugh anywhere. Moxham. He’d surfaced and was swimming a lazy loop around his jet ski, which lay on its side in the water.

I pressed my lips together, a sharp breath escaping my nose. Of course he was fine. I didn’t want him to know he’d made me sweat, so I waved, but either he didn’t see me or he ignored me. Seconds later, Moxham had climbed back on the jet ski and he and the other man zipped away, out of sight.

‘You and Moxham know each other?’ Fizzy asked.

‘We used to work together. Before he came here, to manage this place.’

‘Then I assume you already know all about Keeper Island?’

‘A bit.’

Who didn’t recognise the name, even if most people couldn’t locate it on a map?

This private island, part of the British Virgin Islands, was owned by billionaire Kip Clement and he’d lived here since the 90s. When I was growing up, magazine spreads of him and his wife were a familiar sight. Our lavish life in the tropics.

Of course, since Kip had made his money in the hospitality industry, he couldn’t resist transforming his home into an exclusive resort, with a handful guests on the island at any given time and staff to cater to their every whim.

‘I’m Kip’s assistant,’ Fizzy was saying, in a tone of voice reserved for I’m related to the Royal Family. ‘Not as easy as it looks, corralling a great man like that.’

‘Bet you know where the bodies are buried.’

‘Ha,’ she said in lieu of a laugh. ‘Well, in you get.’ She gestured to the golf cart. There were half a dozen bracelets on each of her wrists that jangled as she moved. Along with the keys at her waist, the sound reminded me of a jailer.

‘First night on Keeper,’ she said as she settled herself in the driving seat, ‘we like to give new staff the rock star treatment. Stay in a villa, feel like a guest.’

‘I’ll take anything with indoor plumbing,’ I said.

Fizzy frowned; my response hadn’t been the right one. ‘Kip wants everyone to understand the ethos of the place. Luxury but laid back. Like the model who’s so gorgeous she doesn’t have to try.’ She pulled at her cheeks, imitating a face lift. ‘Don’t I wish that were me?’

Earlier, I’d pegged Fizzy for my age, but now I noticed the laughter lines at her eyes. Forties, maybe, with expert make-up to conceal any blemishes. I rubbed at my own face and winced when I aggravated my bruise.

In some weird twist of fate, I’d missed my thirtieth birthday. The date had been swallowed up by time zone shifts and delayed flights. I’d set out from Hong Kong aged twenty-nine, now I was thirty and one day.

‘Yes, it’s a resort,’ Fizzy was saying, ‘but it’s our little home away from home.’

We set off in the golf cart, barrelling along a paved path that followed the shoreline. Part of the inland forest had been cut back and I craned my neck to the right to see tennis courts and a putting green, perfect and artificial, nestled within the chaos of nature.

‘How long have you been on the island?’ I asked Fizzy.

‘Ohhh…’ She paused to think. ‘Fifteen years, for my sins. I keep thinking someone will tell me the world’s ended and we never noticed, out here in paradise.’ Her fingers twitched around the word paradise, brows arching. ‘The worst thing that will ever happen to you here is boredom.’

After the week I’d had, boredom sounded heavenly.

Another golf buggy approached from the opposite direction. The driver slammed on the brakes and motioned for Fizzy to do the same.

‘Big problem,’ he said. It was the guy with the springy hair who’d ferried me to the island. Fizzy introduced him as Reggie, but he only waved a distracted hello.

‘No Beluga caviar in today’s provisions.’ He pulled at his wispy moustache, clearly agitated.

‘Shhh-sugar,’ Fizzy said. ‘Did you call them?’

‘They say tomorrow.’

‘Not good enough. See if they can bring it in by jet to Beef Island.’

‘Yeah… OK, yeah.’ Reggie looked relieved. His golf cart jumped forward and he was off again.

‘We’ve got a party tonight,’ Fizzy said to me. ‘No caviar, all hell will break loose.’

I nodded, trying, and probably failing, to hide my surprise. Sure, sure, it was totally normal to send a private jet to pick up caviar because you needed it for a party. We continued to roll along in silence. The rocky outcrop to my left turned into white sands, deserted except for one stooped man. It took me a few seconds to figure out what he was doing: raking the sand in smooth arcs, getting rid of footprints and making it pristine again, before the guests rose for the day.

‘I forgot to ask,’ Fizzy spoke up, ‘where are you joining us from? England, I presume?’

‘Originally, yeah, but I’ve been in Hong Kong the last couple of years.’

‘We have a guest staying with us right now. Eddie Yiu. Does something terribly fascinating with finance in Honkers. The two of you must talk.’

I gave a noncommittal nod. I didn’t want to chit-chat about ‘Honkers’ with a stranger.

Before catching a taxi to the airport, I’d left a note for my boyfriend, Nathan, saying I was going away for a couple of days, a minibreak to Vietnam. That ruse wouldn’t stand for long. When my lease ran out at the end of the month, my white box of an apartment in Wan Chai wouldn’t be mine anymore. My hotel name badge would be binned, my office drawers cleared out by a janitor. I tried to remember what I’d left in there: coconut candy and a half-finished thriller. I guess I’d never find out how it ended.

I felt a stab of remorse. I’d left my colleagues at the Clement Hong Kong in the lurch. Nathan would probably punch a wall when he realised I was gone for good. The thought sent a shiver up my spine, despite the heat of the day.

I let Fizzy ramble on about all the ‘terribly fascinating’ billionaires who stayed on the island, while I concentrated on taking deep breaths. Onward we went, past what had to be the main complex: sloping thatched roofs overhanging the beach and a manmade pool that merged with the sea. It took less than ten minutes for us to arrive outside a white cube, built on the rocks above the sea.

‘You’ll be in Villa Queen Conch.’ Fizzy drew the buggy to a smooth stop. ‘One of my favourites, next door to Kip. You’re probably exhausted, poor thing, flying cattle class. Anyway, get some rest. Join us at the party tonight. Keeper Island does full-moon parties like nowhere else on Earth.’

I thanked her and shambled inside my five-star home for the night. It was air-conditioned cool, smelling of jasmine. From an outsider’s perspective, I’d landed a dream job. As long as everything from Hong Kong stayed in the past, I was safe.

Chapter 2

I was so exhausted I would have accepted a piss-dribble shower and a sleeping bag on the floor. Instead, Villa Queen Conch was pure luxury.

The colour palette was pale hues of sand and stone and everything had a curved edge, as if sharp corners were unbecoming. The fixtures and fittings were understated, but I was seasoned enough to know the value of everything in Villa Queen Conch. There was Italian marble in the bathroom, Scandinavian designer chairs in the living room, bespoke light fixtures everywhere, glass shimmering as it cascaded from the ceiling.

After a long, hot shower, I collapsed onto one of the white sofas and shovelled Iberico ham into my mouth like it was a Big Mac. I’d ordered room service via the villa tablet and it had arrived so quickly that the island was either over-staffed or run with military precision.

Mid-morning, there was a light tap at the door. My head snapped up. Moxham?

‘Come in!’ I lumbered to the door, feeling the ache of every hour of my long-haul travel.

The door opened to reveal a small, curvy woman with satin-dark skin. When she introduced herself as the masseuse, I let out a whimper of gratitude. ‘Yes, please.’

She gave a wry smile and began setting up her table. I complimented her dangly earrings, which were shaped like birds, but she didn’t seem in the mood to chat, so I went into the bathroom to strip off.

Minutes later, I was stretched out on my front, closing my eyes and breathing in the lavender scent of the oils. The moment the woman dug her thumbs into my shoulders, I began to weep.

Once I started, I couldn’t stop. I was crying for Nathan, for everything I’d lost. I was crying because here, now, I was safe, wasn’t I? In paradise, I could be safe.

The masseuse pretended not to notice at first, but when my entire body was racked with sobs, it was difficult to ignore. She drew the sheet up over me and murmured, ‘Would you prefer I leave you?’

‘Yes,’ I choked out, too humiliated to look at her.

After she’d left, I consoled myself by mentally listing all the weirdest guest encounters I’d had during my career. Snotty crying didn’t crack the top 100. I was comforted by the memory of  the guests who referred to their toy poodle as their son and required a twenty-four-hour dog-nanny. With any luck, it wouldn’t have cracked the masseuse’s weirdest guest encounters either. But unfortunately, I wasn’t a guest, and I’d have to see her again.

I went out onto the veranda to clear my head. The sun was inching to its apex, but a strong breeze whipped off the water. The vast decking, which protruded over the rocky shoreline, was bigger than my old apartment. Wicker chairs were arranged around the oversized bowl of a firepit. There was an outdoor shower, a pair of hammocks and a Jacuzzi.

I looked down over the railing. Five metres below, a shelf of rock stretched out to sea. It must have been low tide when I’d arrived, but now the sea was creeping in. At high tide, there’d be nothing but water beneath the veranda.

Then I saw her. A woman was laid out on the rocks. She was clinging on for dear life.

‘Jesus Christ…’

What was she doing out there? She was going to drown.

I had a mad urge to jump over the railing and help her. But when I blinked, the scene resolved itself.

The woman was a statue, alabaster pale. She reclined across the rocks, her back arched, her head thrown back, orgasmic. As the tide drew in, the waves would crash over her. Was she drowning or surrendering to the sea? I drew back from the railing, unnerved. I didn’t want to watch the sea claim her.

I’d planned to sleep for a few hours before the party, but I was wide awake. The indolence of pretending to be a guest didn’t suit me. I wanted to get out there and see what working on Keeper Island really meant. More than that, I wanted to find Moxham.

He was the only person in the world I could talk to about what had happened. Everything is fine. I kept repeating the words to myself, but until I heard them from Moxham’s lips, I wasn’t sure I’d believe them.

*

‘Hello?’ The restaurant, when I ducked inside, was empty. It was a Balinese-inspired structure, all natural wood and bamboo, with vented sides open to the elements. I wandered through to the neighbouring kitchen, which wafted garlic and something meaty sizzling in a pan.

‘Excuse me?’ The only person I could see was a muscular man with a buzzcut, elbow-deep in soapy dishes and wearing headphones.

I’d followed the coast road on foot, back the way I’d come with Fizzy. A ten-minute walk had taken me to the resort’s main complex, replete with swimming pools and tiki bars.

On my way, I’d flagged down a golf cart that was being driven by a woman, whose appearance was half-concealed by the piles of laundry she was ferrying around. Her name was Shirley and she was polite but brisk when I asked where I could find Moxham.

‘He bring me cakes at lunchtime sometimes.’ A quick smile flashed across her face. ‘Like to hear the gossip. But I haven’t seen him today. Must be busy with the party.’

I’d sensed I was holding her up, so when she’d told me to speak to the chef, I hadn’t pressed her for more details.

I took another step inside the kitchen. ‘Excuse me,’ I said again, and this time the dishwasher looked up. Before he could speak, a commotion erupted at the other end of the room.

‘I can’t! I can’t! I just can’t.’

It was a female voice, high-pitched. The dishwasher didn’t move, but I was pulled instinctively towards the fallout.

The kitchen was generously sized, with gleaming expanses of stainless steel. I passed what must have been 100 tiny jam tarts, cooling on racks.

‘He’s a creep. I’m quitting, I’m quitting, I’m quitting.’

A young woman was on the floor in a heap, blonde hair covering her face, sunglasses askew on her head. She tried to say something more, but all that came out were moaning sounds, like she had a mortal wound.

‘What’s going on?’ I asked.

Two men, both in chef’s whites, stood over her.

‘She is having a bad day,’ one of them said.

It was such a wild understatement, delivered in a flat French accent, that I almost laughed, but his face remained solemn. The first thing I noticed about him was his eyebrows, which were perfectly angled. They fitted with the rest of his model good looks: olive skin and chestnut hair.

He scrutinised me. ‘And you are…’

Before leaving the villa, I’d changed into a uniform that had been left for me. Black shorts, white T-shirt with a tiny key logo. ‘New deputy manager.’

‘Yeah, Moxham mentioned you this morning.’ The other man, stringbean-thin, a bandana holding back his black hair, narrowed his eyes at me.

‘Lola. London.’ He pointed finger guns. ‘Young hospitality person of the year but not so young anymore.’ His accent was South African.

They’d looked me up online. I would have done the same in their position. I smiled blandly. ‘That’s me.’

‘Hobbies include hiking and squash. Foot fetish. Actually, maybe I made that last part up.’ The South African bandana man smirked.

If a foot fetish was the worst thing they could conceive about me, well… thank fucking God.

‘Pleased to meet you, Lola.’ The model-chef dried his hand on a dish towel and shook mine in a portentous way. He introduced himself as Guillaume. Bandana man was Tyson.

‘We are having a small situation,’ Guillaume said. ‘Excuse us.’

As if on cue, the woman on the floor let out another might-be-dying cry. ‘It’s not worth it! No amount of money is worth this…’

These men, for all their efforts, were doing no good at all. I crouched down, touching her gently on the arm. ‘Sweets, let’s get you up off the floor.’ I looked up at Tyson, ‘Get her a chair. And a glass of water.’

‘Coffee,’ she sniffled, ‘with oat milk.’

I suppressed a smile. Evidently, she wasn’t actually at death’s door.

‘Get her a coffee.’

Over the next ten minutes, Tessa (Irish, twenty-one, humble beginnings, would-be model-influencer, but lately a host on Keeper Island – ‘I quit!’) emerged from behind her curtain of hair and told her story.

Tobias Ford, a tech bro with a cool billion in the bank and a moody trophy-girlfriend in tow, had arrived two days ago. The pair had stayed on the island a few months earlier and their reputation preceded them. Tyson had called them ‘The Cunt and Cuntess of Silly-Cone Valley’. Tessa and the other two hosts, Maria and Alex, had drawn straws to decide who would be assigned to their villa. ‘I lost,’ she said, her lower lip wobbling.

During their most recent forty-eight-hour stay, Ford and his girlfriend Carolina had complained about the Wi-Fi (not fast enough), they’d complained about the golf carts (not fast enough), they’d complained about the sloths (not friendly enough) –

‘There are sloths here?’ I asked.

Guillaume nodded.

– they’d complained about the food (him: not gourmet enough; her: too gourmet). An hour ago, they’d complained about the water sports team.

‘Mister was out on the jet ski and Missus was at a loose end’ – Tessa took a slurp of her coffee – ‘so we set her up with a paddle board. Then Mister comes back and pitches a fit because the guys were looking at her in her bikini. I mean, they were looking. They were making sure she didn’t drown. She kept falling in.’

Tessa, seated in a chair stolen from the restaurant, was pitched forwards, still on the verge of tears. Her coffee cup was nestled in her lap. I was rubbing her back in slow circles. It was a relief to be back at work, to have a catastrophe to focus on that was so easily rectified.

A small crowd had assembled, skiving kitchen assistants and a couple of waiters who had wandered in from the restaurant floor, but Guillaume shooed them away. ‘Will lunch prepare itself?’ His inflection was wrong, not sarcastic enough, only gloomy, but it had the desired effect. The crowd dispersed. Guillaume sighed. ‘This bunny party…’ he said under his breath.

Tyson banged a pan onto a burner and began flambéing something in a showy manner. ‘Let her drown, teach ’em a lesson.’ He raised his voice to be heard over the sizzle.

‘Yeah, wish I had,’ Tessa said. ‘He screamed at me, said I was a useless bitch.’ She covered her face. ‘My head is in bits, I can’t do this anymore. I was up at five because they tried to flush a banana down the toilet. This job is the pits.’

‘How did you leave it with Ford?’ I asked.

‘He wanted to speak to the manager.’

Guillaume nodded. ‘We should wait for Moxham. He will know what to do.’

‘I radioed, but I can’t find him,’ Tessa said.

I tugged on my earlobe reflexively. ‘We don’t need to wait.’

I met Tessa’s gaze. Her eyes were a washed-out grey, her eyelashes pale.

‘If you want to quit tomorrow,’ I said, ‘you quit. Right now, we’re fixing this situation. You’re going to get the water sports team to apologise.’

Tyson spluttered. ‘What?’

‘They probably were getting an eyeful. Even if they weren’t, he’s upset. When you’re upset, you get an apology.’

I stood up, snapping my fingers. ‘We’ll make it funny, in case she’s embarrassed by his hissy fit. Blindfold the guys, write I’m Sorry across their foreheads in marker pen. Make them ham it up. Then deliver a magnum of champagne, along with… Guillaume, what’s your fanciest dessert? Something chocolatey.’

Guillaume mumbled that the pastry chef quit last week and he was overburdened with food for ‘the bunny party’, but perhaps, possibly, at a stretch, he could make a triple-layer chocolate ganache cake.

‘OK.’ I clapped my hands. ‘So, we have a plan.’

‘You really think I should do all that?’ Tessa was clasping her coffee cup like a stress ball.

‘Yes’ – I eased the cup from her grasp, placed it on the counter – ‘and, in a few days, they’ll leave and give you a big tip because weren’t you so wonderful and understanding?’

‘Uh huh.’ Tessa put on her sunglasses. I noticed they were designer, Cartier. Must be getting good tips to afford those. Maybe Keeper’s guests weren’t that bad after all.

When she stood up, I steered her to the door. ‘You’ll be great. Just keep smiling.’

Tyson scratched his chin. ‘Shit, my only suggestion was to cut the electrics in his villa. See how he likes paradise without air-conditioning.’

‘We’re here to solve problems, not create new ones,’ I said.

Guillaume, whose brow was furrowed into an expression straight out of a moody editorial photo shoot, snapped at Tyson to get back to work.

‘Sorry to add to your workload,’ I said to him.

He shrugged, staring into middle distance. ‘It is only the job.’

I swallowed down a laugh. ‘Any idea where I might find Moxham?’

‘Try the control centre?’

*

I wouldn’t tell Moxham this, because it would give him a big head (a bigger head), but I learned everything I know from him. After only a couple of months of working together, the two of us developed a code. During fraught situations at the hotel, I’d yank my earlobe once. That meant, this guest is being particularly horrendous. He’d meet my eye and yank his earlobe twice, meaning, I know, they can go fuck themselves.

Mox never let his irritation show. He charmed even the most impossible guest. He found a way to laugh on the most stressful days. We kept each other’s morale up with gallows humour, pretending we’d pour cyanide in so-and-so’s champagne, or toss a toaster in such-and-such’s whirlpool bath.

Despite everything, I was looking forward to working with Moxham again. Yet I couldn’t, for the life of me, locate him. He wasn’t at the control centre, an insalubrious collection of buildings on the north side of the island, hidden from view of the guests, that encompassed the laundry, the desalination plant and the cess pit.

On my way back, past the guest villas, I glimpsed someone climbing a tree, shimmying up its slender trunk to cut down coconuts with a machete. But it wasn’t Moxham.

He was also missing from Main Beach, where a small army was lighting tiki torches and setting up huge trellises of white roses dripping red paint.

Eventually, as the shadows lengthened and my jetlag crept back in, I trudged to Villa Queen Conch to get changed for the party.

*

The sun set early this close to the equator. From the villa’s veranda, it was spectacular; oranges and reds reflected in the water. The marble statue had disappeared beneath the waves. In the distance, steel drums started up.

I was sweaty, after an afternoon of traipsing around. My eyes flicked to the Jacuzzi. A soak would feel good. What had Fizzy said? I should ‘feel like a guest’. One last luxury wouldn’t hurt. The bubbles felt heavenly as I slipped into the seething water.

*

I must have fallen asleep.

I sat up, water splashing as I clawed at the ceramic. My mother was always superstitious about drowning in the bathtub.

The music was louder now, reverberating across the sea. A scream made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. It resolved itself as laughter. Only the party. The veranda was dark, but at the edge of my vision, there were dancing lights.

‘Lola.’

I twisted my neck, not sure if I’d imagined the voice.

I shifted. The water had gone cold, the surface flat. I was buck naked.

‘Lola…’

My knuckles turned white as I gripped the edge of the Jacuzzi.

A figure wavered out of the blackness.

Chapter 3

‘Scared the shit out of me.’ I relaxed into a smile.

‘Nothin’ scares you, Showgirl.’

Moxham collapsed to his knees at the edge of the Jacuzzi. He didn’t bother to avert his eyes. I’d probably been naked in front of him before – skinny dipping in the hotel pool after-hours – but being nude came with a sense of vulnerability.

‘How did you get in here?’ Sleep was still clouding my mind. I’d locked the door to the villa (hadn’t I?). Moxham must have a master key. ‘What time is it?’

‘Ten, still early.’ When he shrugged, a top hat tumbled off his head. He raked a hand through his brown hair, making it stick up straight. ‘Good to see you, darl.’ A bottle of champagne sloshed in his other hand. He offered me a swig, but I shook my head.

‘It’s been too long.’ My tone turned teasing. ‘You got old.’

He snorted. I thought about telling him to turn his back, to make a palaver of retrieving my clothes from where I’d discarded them on the veranda. That would reveal my squeamishness, though, when I wanted to appear unruffled.

‘Y’know, I got a blister looking for you today,’ I said. ‘Where have you been?’

I reached for the Jacuzzi’s control panel, stirring the water to life. At least with the bubbles frothing I was partially covered.

He cracked a smile. ‘Just like old times, eh? Me bludging and you doing the real work.’ Moxham draped one arm over the ledge of the Jacuzzi. His breath smelled like sour wine and cigarettes. He was wearing a creased linen blazer in baby-blue, shirtless underneath.

I laughed. Moxham and I had always been our true selves around each other; there was a comfort in that.

‘What’s going on?’ I asked.

‘A lot.’ He punctuated the words by tapping his bottle against the ceramic. ‘A lot going on. I’ve missed you. Need your help.’

My amusement cooled. I shook my head.

‘Earn some pocket money?’ he asked.

‘I don’t want that.’

He dipped a hand below the surface of the water. My whole body tensed.

‘Course you do.’ He swirled his fingers and made a playful splash.

‘I don’t.’

I splashed back, but it wasn’t playful; aggressive enough to drench the sleeve of his jacket. It got my point across. He removed his hand from the water.

‘You and me, we’re realists. And the realest thing there is…’ He rubbed his fingers together, sending droplets flying. ‘Cold hard cash, Showgirl.’

Usually, his nickname for me, borrowed from the Barry Manilow song, made me smile, but today it was annoying.

‘What kind of scheme are you running now?’ I tried to lighten my voice, but the words came out tight.

‘I got the devil on my back,’ he muttered.

Sweat beads broke out across my forehead as the Jacuzzi water heated up. ‘What?’

He didn’t reply, only guzzled champagne. ‘What happened in Hong Kong?’ he said at last.

Earlier, I’d wanted to unburden myself, but Moxham’s nihilism was unnerving me. My story came out in stilted, incomplete sentences. Finally, I faded away into silence. In the distance, there were drums; closer, only churning water.

‘You fucked that one up, didn’t you?’ Moxham said.

His words were a gut-punch. No reassurance. No attempt to make me feel better. Pressure was building behind my eyes.

‘Still’ – he laughed, that distinctive hyena yelp – ‘you’re here now. Out of dodge. Might come in useful.’

I couldn’t find a response. It was taking all my effort not to cry.

He laboured to his feet, unsteady, dipping to retrieve his costume top hat.

‘C’mon, get dressed, come to the party… don’t be late, we got work to do.’

Moxham slipped away into the darkness. The glass door reverberated shut behind him.

*

An hour later, I was Alice in Wonderland. Barefoot on the sand, I weaved past a wooden sign, hand-painted with We’re All Mad Here. A glittery black dress had been left for me by some anonymous hand in my villa, along with my work uniform. The hem was too long and I almost tripped.

I’d organised themed parties at the Clement Hong Kong, but nothing as elaborate as this one. In addition to the painted roses I’d seen earlier, there was a fairy-tale tree, like something from the English countryside, made of real wood but with its trunk sawn off at the base. Enormous pocket watches hung on chains from its branches. It was rendered all the more strange when juxtaposed with the dark, rippling Caribbean sea and the sand glowing under the full moon.

A couple of dozen people milled around Main Beach, drinking, laughing, making unfortunate attempts at dancing to the DJ set. With everyone dressed in formalwear, it was hard to tell the difference between the guests and the staff.

‘Hi, honey!’ Fizzy gave an overhead wave. For unknown reasons, there was a plastic crown perched on her head. She swooped in to bestow air kisses, and then introduced me around to a bunch of high-fliers.

In addition to a condiments tycoon and a TV exec, there was an England footballer. A chic Italian woman, heiress to a beauty products fortune, was flirting extravagantly with him, despite the fact that his wife was standing right there. Perhaps she, like the rest of us, had heard of his extramarital affair, which had been in all the papers. None of the guests were particularly interested in me, so I was relieved when a blustering German man said, ‘A drink, please, sweetheart?’

Glad of the excuse, I went to find him a champagne flute. He thanked me warmly (‘danke, merci, thank you’), like I was an attentive friend. A friend who was paid to be here. A friend who always poured the drinks. He went back to ignoring me.

I wandered over to the food table, where the spread had been picked-over but there was still plenty left; more than would ever be eaten, surely? I had a vague thought that I should find a local charity and arrange to donate some of our excesses. I wasn’t hungry, but jetlag was making me woozy, so I figured I should eat if I wanted to remain standing.

Guillaume had created a gourmet take on a tea party. The tarts I’d seen in the kitchen were here (strawberry jam with a kick of rum), along with tiny smoked salmon sandwiches, earl grey shortbread and mini lemon meringue pies.

I scanned the throng. I’d anticipated seeing the famous Kip Clement, but I heard in passing that he’d gone to bed early with a headache.

From the tiki bar, I grabbed one of the miniature glass bottles labelled Drink Me. It didn’t make me grow or shrink, but the hibiscus-infused tequila it contained was delicious. I downed it before I had a chance to contemplate whether I was supposed to be drinking while working.

Moxham’s earlier words kept circling in my head. What was he up to? Had I been wrong to come to Keeper Island? Or was I overreacting? Either way, I didn’t want to leave our conversation hanging.

I sidled up to Fizzy. ‘Seen Moxham?’

‘No.’ There was a snap to her voice, which she sweetened with a smile. ‘But you must meet Eddie.’ She pushed me in the direction of a man dressed head-to-toe in what looked like brand-new athleisure wear. ‘Big in Hong Kong,’ she said, sotto voce, before she began introductions.

Eddie Yiu produced a wide, artificially-whitened smile that didn’t meet his eyes.  ‘Ah, here’s a familiar face,’ he said in an American accent, nudging me.

I frowned but couldn’t place him. Perhaps he’d been a guest at the Clement Hong Kong? Eddie Yiu was a few inches taller than me, puffed up with muscles turning to fat. Before I could ask what he meant, he launched into a long, boring story about ‘his time away’ and the spiritual quest he’d completed. (I guessed it involved ayahuasca and the desert.)

Fizzy floated off and I was trapped with Eddie. He, alone, among the one-percenters, seemed interested in me. Mainly because he was hitting on me, with all the subtlety of a man who’s never heard the word ‘no’.

Nearby, two women in jewel-toned dresses were playing croquet using plastic flamingos. I half-watched them, while Eddie launched into another anecdote about a recent big-game hunting trip (‘took down a big bitch, I did’). As he spoke, a drop of something – wine? ink? blood? – rolled down his arm and landed in the sand.

Before I could figure out whether I’d imagined it, there was a tinkle of broken glass. One of the croquet women had swung her flamingo so extravagantly, she’d sent her companion’s champagne flute flying.

‘I must go and clean this up,’ I said to Eddie. ‘It’s a hazard, really.’

Not a lie. Broken glass was the gremlin of beach resorts.

Without waiting for Eddie to respond, I scurried away, heading up the beach and along the paved path that led to the restaurant, with its Balinese sloping thatched roof. I gathered there were never more than twenty guests on the island at a time – often, far fewer – but the restaurant was large enough to accommodate twice that. It seemed further proof that Keeper Island was not a normal resort and operated according to the excesses of a kingdom.

With all the guests on the beach, the restaurant was dark, its vented sides shut. The door was locked. I was already failing at my new job, since I didn’t know where to find something as simple as a dustpan and brush.

No one was around, but I could hear rap music in the distance, a contrast to the electro-pop favoured by the DJ on the beach. I followed a path edged with ferns that skirted the back of the restaurant.

A low moan filled the air, like a wild animal. What was that?

Round the corner, I reached one of the guest swimming pools, surrounded by patio. Striped sun loungers were scattered with plates and half-empty glasses. The smell of weed itched at my nostrils.

The ‘wild animals’ loomed into view. A pair of guys were wrestling. One of them was dressed in a rabbit onesie.

‘Kneed me in the balls!’ the bunny shouted, in a familiar South African accent. ‘You dirty cheater.’

‘Never said there was no rules,’ came the reply. American.

The crowd assembled around them erupted into commentary about who was right and who was wrong. I got the sense there was some money riding on the outcome of the wrestling match. Everyone here was staff. They’d sneaked away to enjoy the facilities; to drink and smoke and skive and complain about the guests out of earshot.

That reminded me of my mission. ‘Need to clean up some glass.’ I said it even though everyone was caught up in settling bets. I was hoping I might find Moxham here, but when I craned my neck, there was no sign of him. I walked away down the path.

‘You the new girl?’ a voice said.

When I turned, I recognised the masseuse who’d come to my villa earlier. She’d been inscrutable then, but now she wore a rubbery grin, her dark skin sheened with sweat.

‘You don’t know what you got yourself in for.’ She dissolved into giggles.

‘What’s that?’ I assumed she meant long days and shit pay, but there was something disconcerting about her laughter.

‘Come have a drink with us.’ She lurched towards me, narrowly avoiding a fern, and clapped a hand on my shoulder. Her dangly earrings were red birds with open mouths and they jumped as she struggled to steady herself.

Now I was closer, I could smell the booze on her breath.

‘Sounds good,’ I said, ‘but I need to clean up some glass on the beach…’

She was staring past me, not listening, so I said, loudly, ‘Hey, you seen Moxham?’

‘Yeah.’ Something flashed in her eyes. ‘I seen him.’

She let go of me and took a step forward. Out came a great whoosh of laughter.

‘Are you alright?’

Her legs crumpled. She crashed into a fern next to us.

‘Shit!’ I tried to catch her, but she was already on the ground.

I kneeled down beside her in the earth. I didn’t know her name. ‘Hey! Can you hear me?’

She didn’t respond.

Chapter 4

I shook her, but it was no good.

How much had she had to drink? Was she breathing?

‘Help! I need help,’ I called, but the wrestling match had resumed nearby. People were cheering and booing.

I pushed my fingers into her neck, feeling for a pulse. That was when she moaned and rolled over. There were leaves stuck to her braids, earth on her white T-shirt.

‘You OK?’ I asked.

Her face had a seasick slackness to it, but at least she was breathing.

‘I want… I want…’ She slurred something that sounded like Elvis.

‘Oohman!’ A man swooped down next to me. ‘Party over.’ His voice was jovial, made more so by the Caribbean inflection that stretched out the words into pah-tee oh-vah. ‘Cinderella gotta get to her carriage.’

As he heaved up the woman under her armpits, I realised it was Reggie, the boat skipper. He gave me a nod.

‘She fine, she gon’ be fine.’

The woman was already coming back to life. She batted away Reggie’s assistance. Only when she wobbled on her feet again did she allow him to support her.

I watched them go. I’d seen it all a thousand times – someone drunk and messy and on the verge of doing harm to themselves – but after the week I’d had, it was hard to find levity in the situation.

The bunny (Tyson) helped me locate a dustpan and brush. When I retraced my steps back to the beach, the official party felt staid compared to the raucous one I’d left behind.

Some of the guests seemed to have gone to bed, including Eddie, thank God. Among those that remained, a card game had sprung up. On one of the tables, which was topped with fake grass, a group was wielding oversized playing cards. A muscular man with rumpled blond hair lounged with his feet propped up like he owned the place. He hailed me – ‘wanna play?’ – but I waved my brush at him. ‘Another time!’

I’d finished cleaning up the broken glass when Moxham finally appeared. He was glad-handing, leaning in to look at players’ hands during the card game, acting like this was a party in his honour. I saw the blond man glower and mutter something under his breath. Maybe he had a bad hand.

It must be close to midnight by now. I stifled a yawn. Villa Queen Conch was beckoning me. Before I called it a night, though, I wanted to iron things out with Moxham.

‘Mox, let’s talk a minute.’ I darted in close.

‘You got a drink? Have a drink.’ He was still holding his bottle of champagne, or perhaps it was a new one. His bleariness made it easy for me to guide him clear of the card game. Twenty metres away was a wooden beach hut, painted turquoise. I beckoned him inside and he followed. His phone pinged as he slumped onto a cushioned seat.

‘Bloody oath, these people couldn’t organise a piss up in a brewery.’ He swiped clumsily. ‘Stupid bitch. Needs me to do everything.’

I bristled. Who was the stupid bitch? ‘Listen to me a minute.’ I snapped my fingers and he looked at me.

‘Showgirrrl… you’re here now. My ace in the hole. You’re good at this stuff.’ He reached over and pulled on my earlobe twice. ‘A little whisper in the ear… all his secrets come out. Fuck me, he has secrets that would curl your hair.’

‘Who?’

Without replying, he levered himself up and bounded forward like he wanted to leave. I blocked his exit, filling the frame of the beach hut’s door.

‘Listen, I need this to be a clean slate.’

‘Course, course,’ he mumbled, eyes back on his phone.

I grabbed it from his hand. ‘Everything above board, I’m serious.’

He let out a hyena laugh. ‘But I got a nice big fish on the line.’

I shook my head. ‘No.’

‘Big fish. Enough to share. Sometimes that sucker thrashes around a while. They go quiet in the end though. Eyes almost popped out of my head when I found out. Drowned, my arse. More to that story, course, course. Don’t they know? This is my island now.’

‘Mox, you’re not making sense.’

For the first time, I wondered if it wasn’t drunkenness but actual madness.

His phone pinged again. I was still holding it. My eyes flashed automatically to the new message on the screen.

I’m sorry. I want to—

I didn’t have a chance to read the rest of it before Moxham snatched the phone away from me. There was a Gollum-like sheen to his face as he read the message.

‘I’m late, I’m late,’ he said.

‘What?’

He’d lost his top hat at some point during the evening, but he doffed an imaginary cap anyway. ‘I’m late. For a very important date.’

It took me a second to realise he was quoting the rabbit from Alice in Wonderland. Moxham nudged me out the way and ducked out of the beach hut.

‘Mox, please—’

‘Whatever you do, don’t trust these people, Lola.’

He was still grinning, but all lightness had vanished from his voice.

‘Why not?’

My nails were digging into my palms. These people? Who? My new colleagues? The guests?

Moxham was racing away, but he looked back and shouted, ‘They’re all backstabbers. You’ll see.’

Inside the beach hut, the smell of cigarettes and sweat lingered. I didn’t know what Moxham was rambling about, but I realised a bigger truth now. It had been a mistake to come here. It had been a mistake to trust Moxham.

I dropped onto the seat, fighting a wave of despair. My eyelids were drooping when a whoop from outside woke me up again. Through the open door, I glimpsed a figure streaking down the beach. It was too dark to identify much about the person, but they were tall, and running like they were being chased.

A few more minutes passed and I summoned up the energy to drag myself out of the beach hut.

Boom.

An explosion split apart the sky. It took me a second to realise it was only fireworks and not the end of the world.

*

The next morning, I woke up in a bed that felt like a cloud. I burrowed down under the Egyptian cotton sheets, tempted to go back to sleep.

I’d slept fitfully last night. At one point, I was sure I’d shifted out of sleep and seen a distant light out on the water, too bright to be the moon. Perhaps it was a dream.

Reluctantly, I threw back the covers. No more sleep. A to-do list was already forming in my mind. It was my first real day of work and item one was to talk to my boss. Surely, sober, I could have a normal conversation with Moxham.

It was still early, not yet seven, and I was ravenous. I ordered breakfast on the villa tablet, even though it made me feel guilty to still be acting like a guest. Delivered to my door, I received fresh coffee, scrambled eggs, crispy bacon and pancakes with maple syrup. A side of papaya was carved into a leaf pattern.

After breakfast, I showered and dressed in my uniform. In the vast bathroom off the master suite, I glanced at myself in the mirror and toyed with my thick, dark hair. Back in Hong Kong, Nathan liked to run his hands through it as we lay in bed, making dreamy strokes. I fumbled a pair of nail scissors from the dish on the counter. Holding out a hank of hair, I hesitated. Nathan’s warm brown eyes and broad smile filled my mind.

Snip.

I cut until the basin was full and my hair fell to my jaw. The nail scissors meant that the cuts were ragged, forming a staircase of sorts. I didn’t care. The woman who stared back at me in the mirror looked different and I liked it.

New job. New life. Whole new person.

I poured myself another cup of coffee from the cafetière and strolled out onto the veranda for one last moment of peace before I started work. After the air-conditioning, the hot sun was invigorating. I breathed in the air’s salt tang as I leaned against the railing.

Only the head and shoulders of the alabaster statue were visible this morning. Another wave lapped over the woman’s face. What a bizarre statue. But then, if I knew one thing about rich people, it was that most of them were certifiable.

I’d half turned away when I saw it. Red in the water.

The statue was bleeding.

I stood on tiptoes, stretching out over the railing. I hadn’t imagined it. The rocks were streaked with blood.

A wave crashed. A rag doll swirled in the current.

Another wave. More blood bloomed in the water.

The man floated face up, his eyes blank, a sting or welt across his cheek. His hairline was matted with gore. His jacket was wet-dark and bloodied, but I could tell it had once been baby blue.

Moxham.

Chapter 5

I ran from the villa.

Dead? Was he dead?

So much blood.

My eyes darted left to right. Spiky bushes, taller than I was, lined the path. Where the hell was I going?

‘Help,’ I gasped, even though there was no one to hear me. ‘Help me, please.’

Should I have dived in? Tried to save him?

No, the rocks. If he was alive—

The memory of his blank eyes swooned in front of me, making me stumble.

He was dead.

My stomach churned. I’d brought death with me to Keeper Island. My fault. Everything I touched turned to shit.

What should I do? Call 999? Was that even the emergency number in the BVI?

I laughed, a shrill, helpless sound. I didn’t have a phone with me. I didn’t have friends on the island. I didn’t know anyone.

Moxham’s parting words returned to me. They’re all backstabbers.

I could see the neighbouring villa, but I couldn’t figure out how to get there. I heard a noise. Screech-screech-screeeeeeech.

The tip of my toe caught on a jagged stone at the edge of the path. I wheezed out a scream. My legs buckled and I hit the ground, knees jolting against the paving.

‘Fucking help me, someone!’ I yelled at the sky.

A man loomed into sight. My vision was blurred with tears, but I recognised his tall, thin frame, his perfectly bald head.

‘What’s the matter, gorgeous girl?’

*

I lay on a striped sun lounger, with a Hermès cashmere blanket draped over me. Kip had brought me a glass bottle of water, frosty from the chiller, but each time I sipped at it, I imagined cold water closing over my head. I couldn’t stop shaking.

Mr Christopher ‘Kip’ Clement, hotel tycoon, number forty-four on the Forbes Rich List, was perched on the edge of my sun lounger, playing nursemaid to me.

‘A dreadful shock,’ he said.

‘Yes…’

‘Deep breaths now.’

Kip had driven me to the main complex in a golf cart. We were sat in the patio area that I vaguely recognised from last night’s staff party, although it was swept clean now. A few metres away, the bright blue of an oval swimming pool gleamed in the morning sunshine. Everything was too pristine; it didn’t feel real.

I’d expected Kip would want to know all about Moxham, but instead we were chit-chatting about my family back in London.

‘Tell me about Flora,’ he said.

‘I worry she’s… too much like me,’ I said of my niece.

‘No bad thing, surely.’ Kip’s wraparound sunglasses reflected my ashen face, but his upper-crust voice had a calming quality.

‘I was a bit of a wild child.’

Kip chuckled. I estimated he was in his sixties, but his easy smile and foppish demeanour made him appear younger. He rubbed his neck, thumbing a yellowish bruise above his collarbone. ‘I know the type.’

A gangly, dark-haired man arrived, head bowed. ‘The police are here,’ he said to Kip in an undertone.

Kip patted my arm and stood up. I had to bite my lip to stop myself from grabbing his hand and crying out, please stay.

‘Back soon.’

I watched him go, feeling abandoned. Pulling the navy-blue cashmere up to my neck, I let my eyes drift out of focus. I wanted to call my sister, hear a familiar voice, but I didn’t have a phone.

God, the blood. So much blood.

Had it been quick? Had he suffered?

‘Good morning.’

I started. ‘Hello…’

Another man, not Kip but perhaps the same age as him, was ambling towards me, carrying a leather satchel and leaning on a walking stick.

‘I’m Doctor Clarence Jeston, but everyone calls me Doc.’

He doffed his fedora and sat down on the neighbouring sun lounger.

I was so out of it, I forgot how to make small talk and instead stared at him.

His hand hovered over mine. ‘May I?’

‘OK.’ I choked out a laugh, because it sounded like he was asking me to dance.

He lifted my wrist and took my pulse. Over the next ten minutes, he checked all my vital signs, tutting over my bruised knees. ‘Took a bit of a tumble, eh?’

He had a baritone voice and there were deep laughter lines etched into his dark brown skin.

I gave a shaky nod. He dug around in his satchel and produced a red lollipop.

‘I used to work in paediatrics, but I find everyone likes a sweet treat.’ There was a plummy Britishness to Doc’s voice that overlaid the Caribbean accent.

I didn’t unwrap the lollipop, but I made an effort to echo his smile.

‘Do you know… what happened?’ I asked.

‘Not a nice thing.’ Doc settled himself on his sun lounger. ‘I went to see the poor fellow. Fortunately, I was on the island attending to one of the guests. Unfortunately, I was too late for Mr Moxham. Did the necessary, signed the death certificate.’

‘He was…’ I was alarmed at how easily it had all been wrapped up.

‘Friend of yours?’

‘Yeah.’

‘I’m sorry for your loss. It’s a tragedy.’

I fidgeted with the blanket. I’d gone from being chilled to the bone to being too hot. The sun was beating down on us, the drone of a mosquito nearby. We were close enough to the restaurant that I expected a steady stream of foot traffic, but there was none. Where was everyone?

‘How did he die?’ I asked.

‘Blunt force trauma. The speculation is that it was a jet ski accident. Crashed into the rocks.’

My stomach roiled. An accident?

‘The police are here?’ I asked.

‘They arrived a few minutes ago.’

I sat up straight. ‘I should speak to them. Tell them—’

Tell them what? That something about this felt wrong to me? Should I tell them Moxham was a scam artist and he’d been hoping to make me his accomplice in whatever scheme he was running? For that matter, should I reveal everything that had happened in Hong Kong?

No, it wouldn’t be smart to speak to the police.

‘I’m sure they’ll call you if needed,’ Doc said.

He pressed his palms together in prayer for a couple of seconds. I wondered how many deaths he’d presided over, how many people went home from paradise in a box.

*

I didn’t speak to the police. Perhaps because I was a new arrival, perhaps because they assumed I didn’t know Moxham, perhaps because of whatever Kip said to them.

I did glimpse the group of police officers outside Villa Queen Conch, clad in identical grey and black uniforms, from a distance as Doc and I sped by in a golf cart. We looped around to the north of the island and turned inland, past the cess pit and the control centre. As the road got narrower, it became a dirt track. Green forest – Doc called it ‘the bush’ – flashed past, accompanied by the chatter and whistles of birds.

As we arrived at a clearing in the forest, Doc bumped to a stop and killed the buggy. The journey from the main complex had taken less than ten minutes, yet this was a different world. The buildings here were small, shabby and concrete, half a dozen of them arranged around what had the look of a makeshift town square. Although the bush had been hacked back to make this clearing, there was evidence of it creeping back in to reclaim the space.

Overhanging trees made the light muddy. If I had to guess, I’d assume most of the guests had no idea the staff village existed. The servants were non-player characters; we disappeared when we left your sight.

‘Wha’ you hangin around here with that fool look on your face?’ a voice rang out.

‘Someone died, mehson.’

A knot of people were leaning against one of the buildings, smoke wafting upwards. The sunshine melody of soca blared from an open window, battling a hip-hop beat from another.

I slid out of the golf cart. I expected Doc to follow me, but he only gave a wave and manoeuvred the buggy back the way we’d come. Was he under the impression I knew where I was going? Keeper Island seemed to be built on that assumption. There were no signposts. Either you already knew or you didn’t belong.

A couple of heads turned as I shuffled across the clearing. It was sticky inland without the sea breeze. Insects itched against my bare legs and my knees throbbed where I’d fallen earlier.

‘The boss. The boss is fucking dead.’

It was Reggie who’d spoken. His springy hair was dampened with sweat. The scent of weed tickled the back of my throat as he exhaled a cloud of smoke.

‘Kip Clement is your boss and trust me, he still alive,’ a woman said. Her brown eyes flicked up to meet mine. It was the masseuse, the one who’d collapsed at the party last night. She showed no signs of a hangover, dressed in a clean white T-shirt and jeans, with her braids neatly swirled on top of her head. She adjusted her speech, flattening her accent. ‘Good morning.’

‘Good morning,’ I said.

‘I’m Diara,’ she said, giving me a strong handshake. As she pumped my hand, her dangly earrings, a pair of gold leaves, bounced up and down.

It was hard to reconcile this bustling, no-nonsense woman with the girl who’d drunkenly collapsed the night before. It seemed tactless to refer to it. For that matter, I didn’t want to talk about how I’d turned into a snivelling snot-monster when she’d given me a massage. Better to pretend this was our first meeting.

‘Oh, hey, it’s Lo-la,’ Reggie said, ‘you picked a day to join us.’ He offered me his joint, but Diara snatched it from his grasp and threw it on the ground.

‘Get to work,’ she said.

Reggie ignored her, peering at the ground as if contemplating retrieving his joint. ‘I knew it would be a bad fuckin day when the dead cow washed up.’

‘Dead cow?’ I said.

‘Stinking up Windy Beach… those eyes… all white and staring.’ He shuddered. ‘Bad luck come in threes.’ His accent was different to Diara’s. Jamaican, perhaps.

‘A dead cow is just a dead cow,’ Diara said. ‘You’ll burn it and it’ll be like it never happened.’

Apparently noticing my confusion, she explained that, in a freak occurrence, a cow had washed up on Windy Beach, presumably from a cargo ship transporting livestock.

There was a crackle and the two-way radio at Diara’s hip came to life, echoed by the one on Reggie’s belt. A garbled voice was speaking too fast for me to interpret.

‘Stand by, Shirley, stand by,’ Diara said into her mic, giving a tiny roll of her eyes.

She twirled the volume on the radio and said to Reggie, ‘She saying someone messed with her cleaning supplies. I don’t know why everyone lost the ability to deal with their own shit today.’

‘Threeeees,’ Reggie muttered darkly.

Diara gave him a light shove. ‘Go burn a cow.’

He ambled away, calling over his shoulder, ‘See you later.’

‘I think I’m supposed to have a room somewhere…’ I said to Diara, glancing around.

Through an open door, I could see a couple of people in what resembled a student common room, reclining on a faded-orange sofa.

‘You’ll be sharing with me.’ Diara beckoned me to follow her and strode to a concrete building fronted with decking. ‘Home, sweet home.’

The wooden railings were adorned with wet suits and bikinis, draped out to dry. There were flags too: the union jack and the shield of the BVI, alongside Jamaica, Philippines, South Africa. I climbed a couple of steps and the decking’s boards creaked, haunted-house-style, as we traipsed across them. The door, with black peeling paint, was unlocked.

‘Bathroom at the end.’ Diara led the way down a gloomy hallway. ‘Kitchen opposite, basically kettle and hot plate.’

There was a screech outside. I started, but Diara didn’t react. She pushed at the door on the right with her shoulder. Inside, apricot walls clashed with terracotta tiles on the floor. The room was furnished with two single beds and shabby wooden furniture. My purple suitcase was parked at the end of one of the beds; it appeared to have wandered home like Lassie.

‘It’s nice,’ I said blankly.

Diara snorted, though I hadn’t meant to sound sarcastic. I’d lived in worse. In my experience, the fancier the resort, the scummier the staff quarters.

‘Last girl only lasted a month,’ she said.

‘What happened to her?’

‘They never found the body.’

Horror must have registered on my face, because Diara cracked a wan smile.

‘I’m joking.’ She leaned over and patted me on the shoulder. ‘Went back to Idaho or wherever she wa’ from.’

I laughed. It was a relief to do so.

I sat down on the bed I presumed to be mine, because the other was unmade, clothes tangled up with sheets. Diara remained standing. She grabbed a set of keys from the chest of drawers and tossed them to me. ‘Yours.’

With both of us in the room, it felt cramped as a cupboard. Even when Diara flicked on the overhead fan, it remained stuffy.

Diara’s side of the room was papered with pencil sketches (her own?), while above my bed, there was only an ugly painting. Two white men, on board a ship, one scrutinising us through a telescope.

‘What are people saying about…’ I hesitated. ‘About Moxham?’

‘All jus’ chatter. We saw them dragging the jet ski out of the water. What was left of it. Now everyone sitting around, crying… or smoking… or wasting time. What that gonna achieve?’

Diara wrapped a silk scarf around her neck. It struck me as incongruous for the weather, but she was also wearing jeans, so she obviously didn’t feel the heat the way I did.

‘We here to work, so work,’ she said.

I wished I could be as practical. ‘You know, I found him,’ I said in a small voice. ‘On the rocks.’

Her face softened. ‘You OK?’

I was struggling to feel anything at all. ‘I have no idea.’

Diara hesitated. ‘You need anything? I hafta get back to the spa, but I can send someone over. Food or something.’

‘… A lie down, maybe.’

‘I’ll check on you later.’

The kindness in her voice made me want to cry, except my eyes were dry and scratchy. I was supposed to be grieving, but I was still expecting Moxham to pop his head round the door. (‘Oi, oi, fancy a drink?’) Each time I pictured him, I saw the froth of blood around his limp body.

Diara was at the door. I couldn’t stop myself from blurting out one final question.

‘Was it really an accident?’ I asked.

‘Yes.’ In Diara’s accent, the word stretched. ‘It was an accident.’

She turned away, her leaf earrings bouncing. Her voice dropped.

‘And if it wasn’t an accident,’ she said, ‘they’ll call it an accident anyway.’

She bustled out of the room before I could react. The door fell shut.

Chapter 6

In my dream, I was swimming, but the sea had turned to blood.

Moxham’s body floated towards me, a bloated starfish in a sodden baby-blue jacket. There was a sting on his cheek. I could hear the bzzzzzzzzzz of an insect. I tried to paddle away, but hot blood lapped into my mouth.

The corpse’s eyes opened.

I’d been wrong.

It wasn’t Moxham. It was Nathan.

I woke up drenched in sweat. The room was dark. What was the time?

Groping for the bedside lamp, I winced as it lit up the room. I expected Diara to wake up, but when I glanced at her bed, it was empty.

Outside, there was a screech. I tensed. I’d heard it earlier, but now it resolved as a strangled cock-a-doodle-doo. There must be wild chickens on the island. Not monsters stalking me, just roosters with a broken internal clock.

I pressed my face into the pillow. It smelled like synthetic flowers. I wished I were home.

I imagined Nathan pacing his apartment. His short black hair would be flattened from obsessively smoothing his hands through it. He wouldn’t have bothered to shave, stubble showing up on his jaw, making him look even more like a male model.

In reality, his hand would still be too injured for boxing, but I pictured him in sweats, returned from training. In my mind, I curled my arms around him and inhaled his scent. Musk and pine-resin. I was the same height as him, but he was all muscle. A tattooed wave crashed across his chest.

My first impression of him was as a broad-shouldered, swaggering security guard, his physique bulked out by a bulletproof vest. There was high demand for security in Hong Kong, with everyone skittish about anti-government protests. God forbid anything as gauche as democracy prevented guests from having a peaceful stay.

Unlike the hotel’s other security guards, who adopted a permanent glower as part of their tough-guy persona, Nathan was a smiler.

‘Good morning, beautiful,’ he’d said, the first time we met, opening the hotel’s lobby door for me. The only hint of a Cantonese accent was the clipped quality to his speech.

How could I have known then what he was capable of?

I returned his smile, my eye contact deliberately hazy, and neglected to reply. Sorry, bud, not interested. I strode across the vast, grey-flecked marble of the entrance hall, past the walls hung with enormous Chinese silk paintings of egrets and cherry blossom.

Nathan was too young for me, too handsome. I liked ’em with grit, with scars, both real and emotional.

(That’s the reason you’re alone.)

However, Nathan was persistent. Always there, always smiling.

‘Pick a card,’ he said, a few weeks later, fanning a deck in my face.

‘No.’

In clippy heels and a black skirt suit, I was on my way somewhere, or back from somewhere; busy, busy, busy. I did not have time for magic.

‘Don’t you want to be amazed?’ he asked.

I laughed in spite of myself. ‘No.’

‘I think you do.’ His dimples deepened. ‘Secretly.’

Here, now, in the cramped little room on Keeper Island, the memory of his smile twisted into a sneer.

I got out of bed and unzipped my suitcase. I’d packed in a fever, everything inside jumbled up. My phone had died during my journey, somewhere around San Juan, and it had been a relief to stop checking it. Now, I scrabbled around until I found my charger.

A few minutes later, days’ worth of messages unfurled across the screen. Most of them were from Nathan.

I’m sorry, OK? I should’ve told you.

Let’s talk. Tonight?

I know you’re not in Vietnam. Where are you?

I checked at the hotel, no one knows where you are.

Please. Let me know you’re OK.

Where are you???

I hunched over. The final message settled in my chest with a crushing weight.

I don’t care where you’ve gone, I will find you.

My thumb jabbed at my phone screen. Block. Nathan vanished.

There were other messages of concern from friends in Hong Kong. If I told them where I was, Nathan would find out. Even to dash off an I’m OK, don’t worry message risked Nathan tracking the send location.

I had run to the other side of the world. There was no way for Nathan to get me here. Yet I couldn’t shake the feeling there was someone lurking behind me. What had Moxham called it? The devil on my back.

Delete, delete, delete. I turned Hong Kong into a black hole. Every friend, every colleague, every acquaintance – gone.

There was heat behind my eyes, but no tears would come.

My annihilation spree left Moxham as the most recent person to send me a message. The day of my arrival, he’d texted me a Lord of the Rings meme. One does not simply walk into Keeper Island.

Loneliness yawned inside me. I’d always prided myself on thriving in my own company, but now I felt stranded at sea. I calculated the time difference – London was four hours ahead – and scrolled through my phone until I found my sister.

‘Hi.’ The voice that answered was muffled.

‘Allie!’

‘It’s Flora.’ She emphasised her name hard and I imagined her small mouth sinking into a pout.

‘Hi, baby. What are you up to?’

My six-year-old niece told me about a planned excursion to the river to feed the ducks. Not with bread, which ‘made their tummies hurt’. They were taking them kale and pumpkin seeds because apparently these were bougie birds.

If Flora were with me, she would have hurled herself onto the bed like a puppy, her dark curls in my face, smelling of baby shampoo. I smelled it as strongly as if she were really here.

‘There’s a naughty pigeon at the park,’ she was saying, ‘his name is Charlie and he has one eye—’

The voice on the phone changed. ‘Where have you been?’ Allie asked. ‘I tried calling you.’

‘Sorry, I was… travelling.’

‘Oh. You’re on holiday?’

I rubbed a hand over my face. My skin was greasy with sweat, my cheekbone still throbbed.

‘No, I… got a new job. New continent.’

Part of me wanted to tell Allie everything, about Nathan, about Moxham. I wanted to be soothed with platitudes, even if they weren’t true.

‘I thought you liked Hong Kong,’ Allie said. Even from four thousand miles away, I could intuit the edginess in her voice.

‘I did.’

I imagined her wafting around the flat on creaking floors. Her wild hair, the same dark brown as mine, would be tangled; a flush showing in her cheeks. Was she eating? I tried to picture her plump, but worry nagged at me. I could still remember the way her rib cage once poked out, the waxy look to her olive skin. I pushed the image away.

‘This new job… it’s a great opportunity.’ I tried to make my voice enthusiastic. ‘Really high-end resort. Caribbean island. It’s beautiful.’

For Allie, I embroidered my picture-postcard lie. Obviously, I couldn’t tell her the truth. I was the big sister. I protected her.

‘Wow,’ she said, her voice relaxing. ‘Lolo, that’s so cool.’

‘Tell me what’s going on with you.’

‘There was a butterfly in the hallway this morning.’

I smiled in spite of myself. ‘Oh, yeah?’

‘I think it’s a sign.’

‘A sign you left a window open, sure.’

‘Never seen one like it before, I’m going to paint it…’

I let her voice wash over me, her rapid speech, her overexcitement filling my heart. My sister and I couldn’t be more different. Different mothers, different upbringings, different outlooks on life. But I loved her fiercely.

Allie was only a year younger than me, but I hadn’t met her until I was nine. That was the year the phone call happened. I was the one who answered the landline. ‘I know who you are,’ the voice said, ‘a slut, just like your mother. Put her on the phone. Put her on the phone!’

My dad had come clean. Or he’d been caught. Either way, the Real Wife had found out about us. Mum was jubilant, which made me think she’d left a trail of breadcrumbs. Mum thought Dad would divorce the other woman and we’d get him full time. The opposite happened. He decided to make it work with the Real Wife and ditch my mother, the mistress.

After the phone call, we had a strange period of détente, when everything was out in the open and Dad was interested in being a father to me for the first time. He’d take us on Saturday outings, me and the real children. There were two brothers, who were slouching, older, wary of me. They were both intent on going into the RAF, for reasons that escape me. Maybe they wanted to get the hell away. Then there was Allie. She was smaller than me, petite, with big eyes. Her mother must be beautiful too, I remember thinking, although I never met the Real Wife.

One Saturday, Allie dropped her teddy bear off an escalator. A teddy bear? At that age? I should have scoffed, but instead I ran down and got it for her. I didn’t like to see her cry.

The year of the détente, we went to the aquarium, bowling, ice skating. I liked to begin sentences with ‘my sister…’ I’d do it at school with friends, sometimes even randomly, with sales assistants. I did it at home once and my mum scoffed. ‘She’s not your sister.’

Not long after, the détente ended.

I zombie’d across the room and flipped on the ceiling fan, though the air still felt heavy around me.

Allie broke off from her story about the butterfly. ‘Flora, don’t!’

Flora’s voice was muffled. ‘I’m feeding the ducks!’

‘You’re spilling everywhere.’ There were sounds of a struggle. ‘Baby, give me the cereal box. You can’t do that. We’re inside, bubs.’ Then, to me, ‘Sorry, I might need to go.’

‘Where’s Charlotte? Can’t she help?’

‘Charlotte couldn’t come today.’

I drummed my fingers against my thigh, mentally berating Charlotte. I paid her well above market rate because Flora was so fond of her. What was she doing, skipping work?

Wait. Shit. Had I paid her this month?

I grimaced. No. With everything going on, I hadn’t made the payment.

‘Oh, God, Allie, I’m sorry. I’ll sort it.’

‘Don’t worry, you don’t need to—’

‘I’ll sort it. I want to make sure everything’s good with you. You’re getting the right treatment and everything.’

‘Art is my treatment.’

‘Yes… but you’re still going to see Rowan, right?’

‘Mmm.’ Allie’s voice was distant; there was a flick-flick-flick sound, like she was fiddling with something. Finally, her voice resolved. ‘Why did you switch jobs?’

‘It’s a step up. You and Flora can come visit once I’m settled. You’ll love it.’

In the background, Flora was singing. Something from Disney.

‘Sorry, Lolo, I have to go, I said we were going to the park…’

She rang off before I could say goodbye. Whether it was because she was in a rush or because she was annoyed with me, I couldn’t tell.

When I moved overseas in my late teens, it was easy to lose touch with my parents. My mum married a new bloke. I’ve met him a couple of times and he could cure insomnia. My dad finally divorced the Real Wife, but he never said sorry for any of it. Narcissist. Last I heard, he was living in Dubai. My family now was Allie and Flora, and that was it. The thought of anything bad happening to them made my insides shrivel.

I couldn’t believe I’d forgotten to pay the babysitter. Tapping at my phone, I transferred money from savings and paid Charlotte’s salary. It wasn’t cheap, paying for Allie’s therapy, paying for Flora’s Montessori school, paying for their flat in London, the one with the ‘great light’ and the room for an art studio. These expenses stretched my wages, but they kept Allie’s life on an even keel. I remembered too vividly what her life looked like without stability.

Maybe I should go back to London, see for myself how Allie was doing? The idea filled me with unease. London had never felt like home to me. It was also – and this thought snagged at me, like a fingernail scratch down my back – the first place Nathan would look for me.

Grey light was creeping into the room. It must be almost dawn. Time to start work. What was my job, without Moxham? Who was my boss?

I’d slept all last night and most of yesterday, but my limbs still ached with tiredness. I lay down and closed my eyes, tempted to go back to sleep. Another rooster squawked.

When I opened my eyes again, there was movement.

With a yelp, I scooted away, half-falling off the bed.

A rat! It was a rat.

Could rats really climb like that?

I grabbed one of my shoes to use as a weapon and saw the thing crawling up the wall wasn’t a rat.

It was a lizard, speckled greenish-brown. The crest along its back and its darting feet reminded me of a tiny dinosaur. Though it was no longer than my hand-span, it had a malevolent glint in its beady eyes.

I banged the wall with my shoe. The ugly painting of the men on a boat skewed sideways.

Whack.

The second time, the lizard got the message. It scurried down the wall and out of sight, behind the chest of drawers. Actually, now I thought about it, the idea of a lizard hiding in my room was more horrifying than a lizard in plain sight.

I was about to shift the furniture to try and find it when—

I saw it.

There was a tiny lens attached to the top of the picture frame.

I stood on tiptoes, lizard forgotten, and reached for the thumbnail-sized camera. A wire sprang loose, dangling a battery pack.

A camera. In my room. Above my bed.

I’d worked in hotels where you couldn’t move for CCTV, but those cameras were fixed and obvious. This one was well-concealed. If I hadn’t banged on the wall and dislodged the painting, I never would have found it. This had Moxham written all over it.

‘Motherfucker,’ I said out loud. You’re spying on me?

I wanted to slap him – except he was dead.

I examined the spy-cam. My thumb flicked at the slot and a micro-SD card jumped out.

It took me a few minutes to retrieve my laptop from my luggage and power it up. Sitting cross-legged on the bed, I jammed the SD card into the laptop’s card reader. A list of video files appeared, automatically labelled by date. There was only three days’ worth of footage. Moxham must have installed the camera ready for my arrival.

I picked the most recent file and let it play. The footage showed the room empty, my bed made. I skipped through at random. Diara appeared and then disappeared. With a jolt, I saw myself, taking a seat on this very bed.

What a creep. Moxham wanted to keep tabs on me. He was gathering collateral. If he was harvesting footage of me, he could be secretly filming other people too. Was this how Moxham kept an iron rule over his staff?

I yanked the SD card from my laptop and took a deep breath. I was being paranoid. Moxham was the king of practical jokes. ‘Wanna see something funny?’ he’d asked me once, shoving his phone under my nose. It was a video of me snoring with my mouth open. He’d told me, in between sniggers, how he’d sneaked into my room while I was drunk.

The spy-cam could be one last prank. If he’d lived to tell the tale, he would have laughed it off.

I bundled clothes from my suitcase into an empty drawer. At the same time, I shoved the camera and the SD card into a sock and jammed the drawer shut.

I needed to get to work. Earn some money. Move on from the past.

Chapter 7

Ford and Carolina, the Cunt and Cuntess of Silly-Cone Valley, were now my problem. Their host, Tessa, had not quit after all, but she was now ‘sick’. The other two hosts, Maria and Alex, had also made themselves scarce. I noticed that, among the staff, yesterday’s malaise lingered. (‘We don’t really have to work, do we, since the boss is dead?’)

Through my brand-new, handheld radio, I was now plugged into the network of Keeper Island staff. I learned that Ford and Carolina had revved up their complaints to eleven. Guillaume’s Michelin-star-quality food, made with the best ingredients, was pigswill. Nothing else about this paradise island was good, either.

There aren’t enough towels.

The beach is too windy.

Where are the fresh flowers?

The water’s too rough.

Oops, the vase is on the floor in pieces.

It was mid-afternoon and I was crawling on my hands and knees under the bed in Villa Mangrove, looking for an earring Carolina had misplaced.

‘Don’t worry about that.’ Ford strode into the room. ‘Turns out it was in her ear the whole time.’

I stood up and allowed myself a brief internal scream, before conjuring my best smile for him. ‘That’s great news.’

Despite the heat (which he’d complained about), Ford was dressed in a yellow hoodie and army fatigues which swamped his scrawny frame. He fixed me with beady eyes and rubbed a hand through his cropped red hair.

‘Small matter,’ he said. ‘I’ve decided to propose.’

I bit back the inclination to make a joke. But we just met! What a whirlwind. Yes, yes, a thousand times yes.

‘Excellent,’ I said. ‘I’ll have the Dom Pérignon on standby. I hear Carolina likes the 2006 Rosé.’

‘Yes… I’ll need a few other things too. Red roses, make it two dozen. A ring.’

‘You don’t have a ring?’

‘Whaddaya take me for, some cuck who carries around his grandmother’s wedding ring in a velvet pouch, right along with his shrivelled balls? No, I don’t have a ring. You can pick one out.’

What a lovely, romantic gesture, to have a stranger pick out your beloved’s engagement ring.

‘No problem at all.’

‘Oh, and I need a plushie unicorn. Like, a soft toy. Caro’s nuts about them.’

‘Right.’

That was a completely normal gift for a grown woman. And it was definitely something I could buy on a rock in the middle of the ocean.

Perhaps Ford noticed my face had tightened, because he leaned in to squeeze my shoulder. He smelled like cheap ocean-splash body spray.

‘I don’t need them immediately,’ he said. ‘I’m not that much of an asshole. Tomorrow is fine.’

We weren’t in London or Hong Kong, where I could get hothouse flowers at a moment’s notice or drop $500k on a solitaire diamond. I was new to this part of the world, but as far as I could determine, the British Virgin Islands consisted of small towns, populated by regular people.

‘Oh, and if I throw in an extra C-note, could you get a professional haircut, doll? You look like a scarecrow.’

My fake smile threatened to crack my face open. I burbled all the standard lines – yes, sir, three bags full sir – and left the villa in a daze. I could see how these people might have driven Moxham over the edge.

*

No, believe it or not, it wasn’t my childhood dream to grow up and cater to billionaires’ whims.

At eighteen, I got a place studying physiotherapy at uni. I’d barely moved into the halls of residence before the problems started. My dad promised he would pay for everything. He paid for nothing. So, I did what anyone would do. I applied for a credit card. My application was denied. It turned out Dad had taken out credit cards and loans in my name and not paid them back. When I called him, he apologised and said he’d take care of it. He didn’t. I borrowed money off friends, I took out payday loans, to get through till Christmas. At Christmas, Dad told me I was spoiled and should learn to look after myself. Later, I found the term ‘financial abuse’ online, next to a picture of a haunted-looking woman in a woollen green cardigan. I x’ed out of the tab without reading it.

I’d been invited on a girls’ trip to Spain. Even though I couldn’t afford it, I wanted to get away. That was where I met some women working as promoters. It looked like easy money. My friends returned to London; I stayed in Spain. What was the point in going back, when I was being turfed out of halls?

The life of a promoter was not as glamorous as it seemed. The money wasn’t as free-flowing as promised and the apartment-share was borderline unsafe. Still, the drinks were free, the weather was hot and the beaches were beautiful.

It was day-to-day living; I didn’t need to think about the past or the future. I got connected to a network of nomadic girls who moved countries the way other people changed clothes. I became a club rep for a while, a stewardess on a superyacht. I cleaned villas, worked night shifts on reception, practiced my fake smile as a host.

If there was one thing I was good at, it was working in hospitality. Ford and Carolina would not defeat me. I would handle them with grace; I would prove myself outstanding at this job.

On my way out of Villa Mangrove, I scrabbled for my phone. Over the last few years, I’d built up a network of high-end forwarding agents who could source almost anything, at a price. Even they were stumped by the prospect of delivering everything Ford wanted within twenty-four hours.

Moxham would have known how to deal with this. He’d tug his earlobe twice, but he’d come up with a solution. He had to have a contact list of his own here in the BVI. One of his agents would know where to find this godforsaken plushie unicorn.

*

I crunched along the white shell path, the rocks and pebbles arranged at the edges echoing a zen garden. Guillaume had told me I would find Fizzy here, behind the pink door. The office, and its adjoining storeroom, was near the restaurant kitchen, tastefully shielded from the view of any guests ambling past. How terribly tacky, to imagine that work was required to keep everything on the island running smoothly.

‘Knock, knock.’ I peered through the open door. ‘Hello?’

Instead of Fizzy, I found Kip, his tall frame folded into a desk chair. There was a nasty bruise on his neck. He was squinting at a laptop screen, but when he spotted me, he closed the lid. ‘Hello!’

‘Sir… I was looking for Fizzy.’

He pantomimed sadness. ‘Ah, no one ever wants to talk to old Kipper.’

I laughed, taking a couple of steps into the small office. Its terracotta floor was an echo of my room at the staff village. There were two desks. The one where Kip was seated was strewn with chewed biros and half-crumpled Coke cans. Opposite, the other desk was regimented with rows of Post-its in pink, green and yellow. A mottled pink crystal the size of a fist sat beside a spider plant.

‘I’m trying to get up to speed,’ I said. ‘With my job.’

‘Want a job?’ In an instant, Kip’s expression went from cartoonish sorrow to joy. ‘You’re that lovely girl from Manchester, aren’t you? Big in real estate. Quite a firecracker.’

‘Uh… I’m Lola, the new deputy manager.’ Remember? Yesterday? The dead body?

Kip’s brow furrowed. ‘Sure, sure.’ A look of consternation passed across his face. ‘Of course I remember, not senile yet.’

I didn’t know how to reply, so I circled the desks and dropped into what had to be Fizzy’s chair. Tacked to the wall, there was a series of inspirational statements. Cursive fonts, pastel backgrounds. Kindness costs nothing. A smile can change the world. Put the ‘I’ in mindful.

I cleared my throat. ‘Have the police said anything?’

‘The police?’

‘Do they know what happened… exactly?’

‘It was an accident, my girl.’

I wondered how the system worked, in this sleepy Caribbean nation. Technically, Keeper Island was private, which had to give Kip some kind of control. Diara’s comment returned to me: if it wasn’t an accident, they’ll call it an accident anyway. Who were ‘they’?

‘Surely there’ll be an investigation?’ I said. ‘Actually, I’m surprised you don’t have private security.’

I’d half expected Kip to be trailed by a bunch of men in dark suits with holsters.

‘No, no, never liked people buzzing around. Anyway, look where we are.’ He gestured, although it was to a blank wall, not a beach scene. ‘Never had a lick of trouble out here.’

‘Right… but now there’s the issue of…’

Kip looked at me like he didn’t understand my meaning.

‘We’re a family here.’ When he spoke, a querulous smile appeared on his lips, like a grandfather making a toast at Christmas. ‘We deal with things like a family.’

Before I could wrap my mind around that one, there was the crunch of footsteps. Fizzy appeared, a plume of white smoke trailing her, as she wafted a lit bundle of leaves like an oversized joint.

‘This young lady’s working for us, don’t you know?’ Kip said to Fizzy.

She looked at me gauzily, as if she couldn’t quite place me. ‘And what a moment to step into the fray.’

I laughed awkwardly. ‘I’m used to it. Constant chaos.’

‘Hrm.’

She made another sweep of her arms, rattling her bracelets as she sent more smoke drifting across the room. I’d seen Allie use sage a few times; apparently it was good for psychic cleansing, whatever that meant.

‘I’m happy to be acting general manager,’ I said. ‘Already doing it, really. Just need access to Moxham’s devices and I can be up and running.’

‘Right…’ Fizzy frowned.

Belatedly, I remembered I was sitting at her desk, so I stood up. She brushed past me and dropped the sage into a pale-pink ceramic bowl. When she sat down and patted her hair, I flushed. Perhaps it was done unconsciously. Ford might be a dick, but he was right that I could do with an appointment at the hairdresser’s.

‘The main thing is making sure the guests are happy,’ I said, sounding overly hearty.

‘Yes!’ Kip rose from his seat. ‘This one’s got her head screwed on.’

Fizzy, however, continued to frown. ‘Kip…’ She trailed off, eyes sliding sideways to fix her gaze on him. In a matter of seconds, it was obvious that an entire silent conversation passed between them.

‘I get a sense of people.’ Kip strode to the door. In passing, he dug an elbow into my ribs. ‘Look at her,’ he said to Fizzy, ‘she’s raring to go. Firecracker.’

‘Sir,’ I said, ‘I’d still like to talk to you about—’

‘About what?’ He checked his watch. ‘Time and tide wait for no man.’

‘I’ve always looked up to you,’ I improvised. ‘From afar, I mean. Like a mentor.’ And I’d like to find out, I added silently, exactly what you know about Moxham’s death.

Kip’s blue eyes lit up. ‘Come sailing with me!’

‘Kip,’ Fizzy said sharply, ‘she’s working.’

‘Tomorrow, then.’ He gave a salute and was gone.

I had to laugh at the absurdity of it all. Kip seemed like a doddery old man; easily confused, easily swayed by compliments. Yet, of all the rich people on this island, he was the richest. Brick by brick, acquisition by acquisition, Kip Clement had made himself a king. You didn’t do that by being stupid.

Fizzy bustled around to the desk Kip had vacated, the untidy one, which must have been Moxham’s. I noticed the laptop bore a sticker featuring a tanned woman, busting out of a neon-pink bikini. She had a T-Rex head, baring a line of deadly teeth. A smile can change the world, I wanted to say. It would’ve made Moxham laugh.

Fizzy yanked a curling edge of the dino-babe sticker and ripped it off. ‘Let’s get rid of that.’ She tapped at the keys with manicured fingers. ‘We keep all the passcodes as 1-2-3-4… too many new staff were resetting theirs and forgetting.’

I leaned against the wall and let her work. The sweet-burning smell was giving me a headache.

‘My sister swears by sage,’ I said, in lieu of the truth, which was, I think it’s a load of old bobbins.

‘Gets rid of negativity,’ she said. ‘It makes me feel better, anyway. And we’re all just trying to feel better.’ She squeezed out a tear. ‘I miss him already.’

‘Me too.’ Oh, God – my chest tightened – I was going to cry as well; real, ugly tears. I took in a big gulp of air and concentrated hard on the laptop’s loading screen.

Fizzy summoned a courage-under-fire smile and handed me a phone. ‘Here’s your work phone, and – yes, here we are – all fresh and clean and ready to go.’ She nudged the computer in my direction.

‘Thanks.’ I sank into Moxham’s chair and brushed a hand across my face. My bruise was fading, but wasn’t completely gone; I had to be careful that my make-up stayed put. Fizzy was hovering over me, her bracelets making music as she tidied away the debris from the desk.

I loaded the email program on automatic. It was empty. I clicked on Documents. Also empty.

‘Where are all Moxham’s emails? His files?’ I asked.

Fizzy’s face was impassive. ‘I think Kip had the tech people deep clean it all.’

‘What? Why?’

‘It’s a tech issue or a… legal issue. Kip will have had his reasons, I’m sure.’

‘But I need–’

‘Everyone here is so happy to help.’ She slid back into her own desk chair. ‘Just ask if you have any questions.’

I turned on the phone, but that was back to factory settings as well.

How was I supposed to take over Moxham’s job with no record of his past work and none of his contact lists to help me? It was impossible. To erase everything he’d done was an overreach of the most insane proportions. And why was Kip getting involved in the minutia of tech stuff?

‘I need to buy a fucking unicorn.’ I wanted to cry again, but this time out of frustration.

‘Excuse me?’

‘Never mind.’ I batted the laptop lid closed.

Neither Kip nor Fizzy had been outright rude to me today. But they were putting barriers up in front of me. Anything I did to disrupt the status quo of the island would be shut down by Kip and His Girl Friday.

It was a cover up.

When Diara had dropped her hint, I hadn’t wanted to believe it. Now, for the first time, it hit me that Moxham’s death wasn’t an accident at all.

Across the desk island, Fizzy pressed a finger to her radio earpiece. ‘Ah, I think this one’s for you.’

‘Sorry?’

My hand went to my own radio, twirling the volume knob.

It was Diara’s voice. The connection crackled, before resolving.

‘Carolina going crazy in the spa, over.’

Chapter 8

After Carolina had complained about the windiness of Windy Beach, I’d arranged for her to have a relaxing afternoon of spa treatments. What could go wrong? A lot, apparently.

Diara’s was the first face I saw when I arrived at the spa. She burst out of the glass doors. ‘I am going to murder that girl. She threw my oils across the room.’ Now she mentioned it, I smelled an overwhelming lavender scent on the air. ‘Then she clawed at me.’

‘I’ll deal with it,’ I said, but Diara was already stalking away.

The spa was located on the east of the island. From the main complex, it was a twelve-minute golf cart ride, but guests were rewarded with a sanctuary hidden amid thick bushland. Nestled among the trees, the building’s green roof merged with the surroundings like a hobbit house.

‘Hello?’ I pushed through the doors.

I hadn’t been inside the spa before. Everything was decorated in corals and oranges. One wall shimmered gold, as if it had been laced through the brick. The lighting was low and moody, creating an effect like a permanent sunset. I circled the water feature in the spa’s foyer. The Buddha at its centre, golden and serene, had been knocked off its plinth.

I thought the foyer was empty, until I heard a cry.

It was Carolina, crumpled in a corner, wearing a fluffy white robe. I crouched down beside her. She smelled like the essential oils she’d flung, but when I got closer, I caught the stench of booze.

She was trembling. Make-up was smeared around her green eyes.

‘Hi, honey,’ I said in my baby-bird voice, ‘how are you feeling?’

‘… The other girl was mean to me.’

I brushed her matted white-blonde hair off her face. ‘Aw, I’m so sorry.’ The only way I could keep my tone sweet was to pretend I was comforting my six-year-old niece.

‘She should be fired.’

‘You won’t need to see her again.’ I suspected Diara would refuse to be within a hundred metres of Carolina, so it was an easy promise to make.

‘I wanted a massage, but she kept touching me,’ Carolina mumbled.

‘I’m sorry. Why don’t we get you back to the villa?’

‘No!’ Carolina’s hand turned to a fist, which glanced off my shoulder. ‘Don’t want to see him.’

‘You two have a fight?’

‘He’s going to ask me to marry him. I heard him talking to you earlier.’

‘Don’t you want to marry him?’

‘… He wears socks with sandals.’

My mouth twitched, but I kept a straight face. ‘Unforgiveable.’

‘And he goes through my phone.’

Ahh, so the self-aggrandising arsehole was also a possessive creep. What a surprise.

‘We’ll take you to a different villa.’

‘I want’ – Carolina’s voice rose as she tried to stand up – ‘I want a plane! I want to go home!’

‘OK…’ I put my hands on her shoulders to steady her, but she shrugged me off, her legs kicking out. In the process, she knocked me on my arse. I yelped as I hit the floor.

‘Everything OK?’ It was a man’s voice. I half-turned to see a guy in a towel had appeared in the foyer.

‘Everything’s fine,’ I said, as Carolina lurched forward and vomited down my front.

*

It could have been worse. She could have vomited in my hair. Really, my shorts and T-shirt had borne the brunt of it. The worst part of the whole incident was the man in the towel had rushed to my aid. The gorgeous, gorgeous man, with tousled blond hair and the body of an Adonis, was handing me paper towels and frowning at me in a sweet, concerned way. Forevermore, his first impression of me would be: Vomit Girl.

The silver lining was that vomiting had taken the fight out of Carolina. I radioed for assistance and Reggie arrived. Five minutes later, the two of them had gone (Reggie propping up Carolina, trying not to look grossed-out by the smell of sick). I slumped onto the floor where Carolina had sat.

To my surprise, the blond man was still here. Still gorgeous. Still in a towel.

‘You look like you could use a massage. I’ll get Helena to come out. She’s a diamond.’ His grin was so earnest that I didn’t know what to say.

No, Helena would not be giving me a massage. I levered myself up. The man shot out a hand to help me. His grip was warm and strong. My hand, I was humiliated to realise, was sticky with vomit.

‘I’ve interrupted you,’ I said robotically. ‘I’m terribly sorry, sir. Please, return to your treatment room.’

I suspected Helena – whoever she was – hoped she could knock off early, due to the carnage, but I had no intention of letting her. It was bad enough that we’d had a death on the island this week. I didn’t want the guests bothered by a rampaging trophy girlfriend. I wanted them relaxed and oblivious.

‘My pops taught me to never leave a damsel in distress,’ he said. ‘Gimme a minute to make myself decent, then I’ll help you out.’

I was too exhausted to argue, which was how I ended up on cleaning duty assisted by an investment banker named Brady Calloway.

‘We’ve met before.’ Brady pushed a mop across the floor. He was dressed in a linen shirt and trousers now, and (I didn’t like to judge, but) he handled the mop like someone who thought houses cleaned themselves.

‘Don’t think so.’ I crouched down, scrubbing at the tiled floor.

‘You look awful familiar.’

I squinted up at him. ‘You say that to all the girls.’

His laughter was a low rumble. ‘You’re onto me.’

There was admittedly something vaguely familiar about him, although that might have been because he was an actual Ken doll.

‘Hey, sorry to hear about that guy,’ he said.

‘What?’

Brady snapped his fingers. ‘Meekham.’

The way Brady was looking at me was too intent. Or was I imagining it?

‘Moxham,’ I said.

‘So it was some freak accident?’

‘Mm.’

‘Crazy. You don’t expect it.’

I murmured ‘Yeah, crazy,’ and busied myself propping up the Buddha on its plinth. Brady was the first and only guest to comment on Moxham’s death. I’d told the hosts we shouldn’t mention it, because nothing ruined a holiday quicker than death. So far, it hadn’t come up in my conversations. Not even Ford, chummy enough to be jet-skiing with Moxham on the day I’d arrived, had acknowledged his absence.

Most guests must have assumed Moxham was sick or had been called away, if they’d noticed he was missing at all. Brady was sharp enough to have discovered the truth. It probably didn’t mean anything, but this fact lodged in the recesses of my mind.

With the clean-up concluded, it wasn’t hard to guide the conversation away from death and into lighter realms. Brady gave the impression of a foodie who spunked his cash on daily fine dining. I persuaded him to go to the restaurant for dinner, where Guillaume was cooking roasted pork belly with sweet potato purée.

‘Sure you won’t join me?’ he asked.

‘’Fraid I can’t.’

As he sauntered away, I almost regretted my refusal. It had been drilled into me, from my first hotel job, that fraternisation with the guests was cause for immediate dismissal. Yet on Keeper Island, more than any other place I’d worked, the line between guest and staff was blurred.

There was a line though. While Brady could enjoy his evening in peace, I still had to source a plushie unicorn.

*

The next twenty-four hours, Monday blurring into Tuesday, were frantic with work-work-work. On Tuesday morning, I magicked up a perfect engagement tableau for Carolina and her Prince Charming, in between dealing with one of the swimming pools turning a lurid green colour, due to a broken filter. If I weren’t so curious about Our Benevolent Dictator, I might have found a way to put off my sailing engagement with Kip. In case I’d forgotten, a handwritten note on heavy Clement Hotels stationery was delivered to me. Hidden Cove, 5 p.m.

As the bush trail opened up onto sands, I kicked off my trainers. True to its name, Hidden Cove was a bit of a secret, on the eastern edge of the island, far from the restaurant and the well-trodden Main Beach. It was also inaccessible by golf cart.

The crescent of pale sand, edged by rocks, was deserted. My footprints joined Kip’s solitary trail. It had the echo of a place that might never have been discovered by a human soul until now.

When I spotted Kip in the shallows with his boat, two words nagged at me. Big. Fish.

Moxham had bragged about having a ‘big fish on the line’. He was targeting someone on the island, in whatever scheme he was running. And who was the biggest fish of all? Kip Clement. If Moxham had crossed Kip, Kip might have retaliated. This was my suspicion, yet it was hard to hold onto it as I waded into the bathwater-warm sea.

Kip seemed ecstatic to see me. ‘Ever sailed before?’ he asked.

‘On a yacht with a toilet brush in my hand.’

‘Then you’re an old hand.’ He laughed and slapped the water. ‘Choppy today, but that never stopped me.’

A swell broke against my legs and I had to dig my toes into the sand to keep upright. Kip began explaining to me the particulars of dinghy sailing; the size of the boat (10ft), how to steer and what to do if it capsized. I asked if I should change my clothes; I was dressed in cotton shorts and T-shirt, in contrast to Kip’s gloves, board shorts, and black water-repellent turtleneck.

‘Pah, she’ll be fine.’ He threw me a rope. I fumbled but caught it.

When I’d heard the word ‘sailing’ I’d imagined Kip and I punting along in still waters, sharing a sun-warmed bottle of wine. It would be the perfect opportunity to ask a few casual questions about his working relationship with Moxham and what he was doing the night of the Alice party.

‘Seriously, sir, I don’t really know what—’

‘Call me Kip, dear girl.’

He pulled at the highlighter-yellow sail of his boat. I could see in his eyes, in the jut of his jaw, that he was leaving. And, if I wanted his respect, I was going with him.

I plunged forward, my toes skating across sand as I skipped-swam to the sailboat. Kip hauled me on deck, and without another word, we were off.

We arced out of the cove, into open water. My legs were cramped up beneath me. The boat was scarcely big enough for the two of us.

‘Duck!’

I had to dive under the boom as Kip sent the sail slamming towards me.

We were racing now. Waves slapped against the hull, soaking me, the wind deafening as it thwacked against the main sheet. The sun, scorching earlier, didn’t feel so hot anymore. A shiver ran through me; my wet clothes clinging to cold flesh.

Should I be wearing a life vest? I recalled Moxham, shirtless, fearless, as he’d roared across the waves on a jet ski.

‘The party!’ I half-shouted, dispatching any thoughts of creating a neat conversational segue.

Kip’s face was stony with concentration. ‘What?’

‘Did you go to the party on Saturday?’

The rumour that Kip had gone to bed early with a headache struck me as too convenient.

‘Don’t lean back,’ he said.

I wasn’t aware I’d been leaning back. I tried to hold Keeper Island in my sights – it was worryingly far away now – but Kip changed direction again and I had to duck to avoid the boom.

‘It was a great party,’ I tried again.

‘Didn’t get to see much of it.’

‘None at all?’

‘Busy.’ The wind wrenched away the word, so I had to lip-read.

Busy with what, Kip?

The boat reared in the water as sickness lurched in my stomach.

To make matters worse, Kip grabbed my hand and put it on the tiller. He stood up and began toying with the main sheet.

Jesus. I clutched the tiller in a vice-like grip. What if I died? It would be so easy. A jab of the elbow was all it would take to tip me into the water. Another accident.

Would anyone bother to investigate my death?

Kip, still standing, tugged at the sail. His arse wiggled close to my face. I looked away, but something snagged at the edge of my vision. My head snapped back. There was a dark stain on Kip’s board shorts. It was on the back of his thigh, the size of a handprint, smeared at the edges. He could have put on his shorts this morning without ever realising there was a stain.

I could see the motion now. A hand, wet with blood. Reach back, wipe it on the seat of your shorts. Maybe it was unconscious. He’d forgotten he did it.

Kip sat down with a thump. I leaned back automatically, my eyes scanning his face for—

What? Some trace of guilt only I could intuit?

His hand shot out. My heart plummeted to my stomach.

He was going to push me in. Leave me for dead.

I curled away from his reach. ‘Don’t—’

The world dropped away. The sea engulfed me, water filling my airways.

With a clunk, the hull flipped on top of me, blocking out the sun.

Chapter 9

Kip thought the whole thing was hilarious.

‘Like a kitten in the bathtub, she was.’ He mimed scrabbling.

I gritted out a smile. As it turned out, I wasn’t a murder victim. Just an idiot who’d capsized the boat. Kip had straddled the upside-down hull and scooped me up out of the water.

‘She was burbling, no, no, no,’ he said, courting laughter from the length of the table.

A waiter arrived at my elbow, refilling my glass with wine. Before I could thank him, he slipped away into the dark. Across from me, Ford let out a guffaw of laughter. Beside him, Carolina’s head was bowed as she cut up her eel into tiny pieces.

‘Never sailed before?’ Ford asked.

I shook my head. We were seated on the veranda of Kip’s villa, the clamour of the waves a backdrop to the conversation. I craned my neck and caught a glimpse of the marble woman out at sea, drowning yet again.

Following my near-death-experience, Kip had invited me to dine at the big table. That wasn’t what he called it (although the long stretch of mahogany was certainly vast), but I’d picked up the staff slang during my first couple of days on Keeper Island.

In the evenings, the staff typically ate simple fare, delivered to the staff village by Guillaume’s team. Dining at the big table, where Kip gathered together a dozen of the island’s guests for an impromptu salon, was ostensibly a treat. If I weren’t so wrung-out, I might have enjoyed the opportunity to visit Kip’s villa, which I’d previously only passed by. Perched on the rocks, at the northwest tip of the island, it was apparently built on the lighthouse ruins that gave the island its name. The white circular tower, imposing against the dark sky, marked it as distinct from the other cube-like villas. Sprawling in size, it seemed built for a family, although as far as I could tell, only Kip lived here.

‘This chef’s not bad for a fairy,’ Kip said, smacking his lips. ‘Hell, this eel is so good, it should be illegal!’

At the other end of the table, a paunchy man in a salmon-pink shirt pantomimed a belly laugh. ‘I’m off duty.’

The man in pink, I recalled, was the BVI Commissioner of Police, who was apparently a good friend of Kip’s. The footballer and his wife were also here, along with the chic Italian woman, not eating because she was on a detox. Creepy Eddie Yiu raised a glass in my direction. Brady, my knight-in-a-towel from the spa, was at the opposite end of the table. He’d shot me a flirty look as I’d arrived, but he was seated too far away for conversation.

I didn’t love sitting beside Ford and Carolina, especially when we were only on the third course of ten. Smiling and nodding at first world problems (‘you wouldn’t believe the tax those bastards want to charge me’) was giving me a headache.

I was still in my salt-stained shorts and T-shirt, and Kip was still in his water sports gear. (There was no dress code on Keeper Island, apparently.) I’d had no time to reapply my make-up, so I was sure the shadow of my bruise stood out on my cheek. I was not the only one with bruises though.

Kip pushed up his sleeves and raised a finger. A blotchy-purple bruise covered his forearm. The waiter reappeared, wordlessly refilling glasses. Kip’s arm came to rest on the table as he chatted with Carolina about her horses. The bruise looked a few days old. I leaned in, pretending to reach for the salt. There was a bruise on his other arm as well, and the one on his neck I’d noticed a couple of days ago.

He looked like he’d been in a fight.

If I hadn’t seen the blood stain on his shorts, I might have dismissed this thought. It was blood, wasn’t it? Not oil, or paint, or shit? Kip caught me looking at him and grinned. I gave a queasy smile in return.

‘I have an announcement to make.’ Ford stood up, tapping his wine glass with a fork. ‘Carolina’s going to marry me.’

There were whoops and cheers. Kip wrung Ford’s hand like they were on a game show and Ford had won a million dollars.

I turned to Carolina. ‘That’s exciting.’

She ignored me, reaching out a hand to present her diamond ring to the guests at the other end of the table. She also hadn’t acknowledged me when I’d sat down. Maybe the events at the spa had been a particularly erratic version of cold feet. Maybe she and Ford would live happily ever after. Maybe.

The next course arrived. Wagyu beef with oyster mushrooms and wild garlic.

‘Get married, stay married.’ Kip thumped a hand against the table, making my plate shudder. ‘Best advice I ever got.’

‘Oh, yeah?’ Ford cocked an eyebrow. (I suspected he was planning to trial Carolina for a four–six-year period and then trade her in for a younger model.)

‘Love, love, love, all you need.’

Easy for a billionaire to say. I took a bite of my steak.

‘Secret to a happy marriage?’ Carolina asked Kip, her eyes glassy.

‘Never let yourself get angry with each other. People who say couples fight… pah! Relationships are easy with the right person. My lovely wife… we enjoy each other’s company. We’d be happy in a shack.’

‘Where is she?’ Carolina asked.

Kip’s face crumpled. ‘She passed.’ When a tear rolled down his face, he didn’t wipe it away, just let it fall into the jus on his plate.

There was an excruciating silence. I ate just for something to do.

Now I thought of it, I’d heard something on the news a few years ago about the death of Kip’s wife. Cancer or something.

Eventually, the conversation revived, returning to the subject of business (Kip was semi-retired, but still on the board of Clement Hotels). As the steak dishes were being cleared away, Fizzy appeared.

‘Join us, my darling!’ Kip said.

She demurred, but when he offered her his wine glass, she took a sip. Her hand came to rest in the crook of Kip’s arm, as she leaned her slight frame against his back.

‘Everything OK?’ I asked. I was half-hoping for an emergency to get me out of the remaining six courses.

‘No, no, I fixed that problem with the hinge,’ she said to Kip. Now I noticed she was holding an electric screwdriver.

I frowned. ‘I would have got maintenance to—’

‘Isn’t it funny how we ever managed before Ms George showed up?’

There was acid in Fizzy’s voice, but Kip laughed like it was a joke. ‘Fizzy looks after me well.’ He patted her arm. ‘She’s my right hand.’

Scalded, I took a swallow of wine. The waiters arrived with the next course. Fizzy leaned in to whisper something in Kip’s ear and then she wafted away.

Across the table, Ford was back to talking about the proposal.

‘I wanted to fill the house with red roses and all I got were a few sad, drooping things.’

I tensed, expecting him to confront me. Prick.

Ford turned instead to Kip, clapping him on the shoulder. ‘You got quite a place here, my man, but still room for improvement. Trust me, I’ve been to the best resorts. We’ll sit down, man to man, give you some pointers.’

A muscle in Kip’s cheek jumped. Kip Clement owned a hotel in every major city in the world. A tech upstart weasel was going to give him pointers?

‘Mmm.’ Kip shrugged off Ford’s hand.

The dinner ground onward. Course number six arrived. Miso-glazed aubergine with pickled radish.

‘What the hell is this shit?’ Ford picked up a radish from his plate and pitched it over Kip’s shoulder. ‘The sloths can have it.’

Kip glanced behind him at the radish lying on the wooden boards. He opened his mouth, but instead of a reprimand to Ford, he seized upon the subject of the sloths. They were his pet project, no pun intended. A rare breed at risk of extinction. He’d introduced them onto Keeper Island some fifteen years ago.

‘Isn’t that, like, fucking with nature’s plan?’ Ford asked.

‘Ah, no, that’s the thing.’ Kip gestured with his fork. ‘They could have been here originally. The science indicates that, at one point, there was a land bridge from here to South America. A thousand years ago, this place would have been teeming with sloths.’

‘They’re cute, but they’re vicious,’ Ford said. ‘Tried to feed one a Dorito and it slashed at my hand.’

Kip made a sound in the back of his throat. He lifted his white cloth napkin and wiped at his mouth. I was feeling faint with tiredness at this point, wondering if I could make an excuse and skip the final four courses, when Kip stood up.

‘My dear, could you arrange for a boat to be at the pier in ten minutes? I’m afraid it’s a little late in the evening for a helicopter.’

It took me a second to realise he was talking to me.

‘A boat. Yes, sir.’ My hand went to my hip, but I must have left my radio on the beach at Hidden Cove.

‘Well’ – Kip extended his hand to Ford – ‘I’d say it’s been a pleasure, but we both know that’s a lie.’

Ford shook Kip’s hand. There was a confused smile on his lips.

‘Let’s leave it at… safe travels,’ Kip said. ‘Lola will escort you to your villa to pack your belongings.’ He gave a slight bow in my direction. ‘Thank you, dear.’

I stumbled to my feet, still processing what was happening. Kip was kicking them off the island.

Ford faltered for a moment, before he found his voice. ‘Not fucking leaving.’

‘We paid for three weeks,’ Carolina said. She had certainly paid for nothing.

‘I’m sure we can rustle up a refund.’

‘I don’t want a refund,’ Ford said. ‘I want you to honour the contract. I’ll sue your ass.’

‘Oh, I do love a good lawsuit.’ Kip’s blue eyes actually lit up. ‘But I’m afraid you’ll lose. You see, this island is my home. I am a hotelier at heart, so I couldn’t resist the idea of turning it into a little resort. But it is still my home. And an Englishman’s home is his castle.’

‘What?’ Ford’s nostrils flared.

‘Get out of my castle before I tar and feather you.’ Despite his words, Kip’s voice remained genial. He cleared his throat. ‘So to speak.’

I was still in shock. Beside me, Carolina had begun to cry, her hands crushing the unicorn.

A waiter was standing behind Kip and another appeared at his elbow. Brady rose from his seat and approached Ford, holding up a placating hand.

‘Hey now, bud, time to go,’ Brady said.

‘Fuck off, you meathead cunt.’ He elbowed Brady out the way.

Brady’s face darkened. ‘Lola, would you like some help escorting our friends to their villa?’

‘That would be very kind,’ I said.

‘I’m not going anywhere.’ Ford’s face was bright pink.

Carolina plucked at his shirt sleeve. ‘Baby, don’t—’

‘Listen to your lady.’ Brady squared up to Ford.

‘I’m not listening to that bitch.’ He was several inches shorter than Brady, but he bumped him with his chest. ‘Not listening to any of you!’

Ford took a swing at Brady. It glanced off his cheek. A moment later, Brady wrestled him into a headlock.

‘Sue you too.’ Ford was gasping, clawing at Brady’s forearm. ‘Assault.’

‘Funny,’ – Brady winked at me – ‘I don’t see any witnesses.’

In the end, Ford and Carolina were as meek as drowning kittens. Half an hour later, they were gone.

It was contrary to everything I had ever experienced in the hotel trade. If a guest was an arsehole, they got more bowing-and-scraping from the staff. As long as you had money to grease the right palms, you were untouchable. Nothing, short of murder, could get you booted from an upscale hotel..

Murder. My thoughts returned to Moxham, blood in the water.

‘I just didn’t really care for him,’ Kip told me mildly, when I returned to the villa to tell him Ford and Carolina had departed. In my absence, they had finally reached course number ten. Wild strawberry sorbet with sorrel granita.

Was there enough evidence to point to Moxham being murdered? As Kip resumed his conversation about sloths with the Italian heiress, I realised for the first time that I didn’t want to believe it. I grabbed a bite of sorbet and licked my spoon clean. I wanted Kip to be benevolent. I wanted Moxham to have died accidentally. I wanted to have found my dream job, out here in paradise.

Chapter 10

Time seemed to accelerate on Keeper Island. The days slipped away from me and suddenly, it was Friday. I’d been here almost a week. Even after Ford and Carolina departed, my workload didn’t diminish. There was always a disaster to avert.

‘I got a craving for McDonalds,’ Eddie Yiu said.

‘I’ll have Guillaume make you a burger,’ I said.

‘I want McDonalds.’

Every time I’d seen Eddie in the last few days, he’d been on his laptop or his phone. Apparently, he was working on a new business venture. Yawn. He’d been frosty with me since he realised I wasn’t going to have sex with him, but now I produced a dazzling smile.

‘I promise you, our chef will make something even better. It’ll be fifteen minutes.’

OK, it would be forty minutes, because it was just before dinner service and Guillaume would probably pitch a fit, but I wasn’t lying about the burger being great.

‘It’s gotta be McDonalds.’

I gritted out a smile. ‘… Absolutely.’

I might have understood it if he wanted authentic Chinese food, but American junk food? Really?

When I asked Tyson where the nearest McDonald’s was, he told me it was two hours away by boat and I’d need a passport. Jesus. I dispatched Reggie on this errand (he was bleary with weed, so didn’t complain too much) and, four hours later, Eddie got his Big Mac. I microwaved it, which only made it look worse, but the guy acted like it was nectar of the gods.

By the time I clocked off, it was past midnight. I traipsed into the staff village. I’d developed muscle memory that meant, like most of the staff, I could make it along the half-mile bush trail from the main complex without needing a torch in the dark.

My sore muscles were compounded by a streak of sunburn across my shoulders. I was ready for a beer and a game of cards. Late at night, when normal people were asleep, you could always find a crew in the team bar. Tyson was a notorious bad loser; Tessa was a hustler; Reggie had once cried over a bad bet and no one would let him forget it. They usually only played childish card games, but I’d seen a table flipped upside down two nights ago.

To my surprise, it wasn’t only the card sharks who were awake tonight. A bonfire blazed in the middle of the clearing, flanked by a crowd of twenty or more people. I recognised bartenders and groundskeepers, a couple of the housekeeping team.

‘Lola!’ Guillaume beckoned me.

Over the last couple of days, I’d figured out the best times to scavenge cordon-bleu leftovers from the kitchen. (Pumpkin and crab bisque, grilled mahi mahi, rabbit tortellini – and that was just Thursday.) In the process, I’d become something of a confidante to Guillaume. He worried his long-distance boyfriend in Lyon was growing too close to a man he’d met at the gym. He worried his temper was getting out of hand. He worried about worrying.

On a fold-out table in front of Guillaume, a paper banner was stretched out. It read: We’ll miss you, Mox. He scrawled a message in French, then offered me the marker pen. ‘You want to write something?’

I rubbed my neck, aggravating my sunburn. It wasn’t only a week since my arrival; tomorrow, it would be a week since Moxham’s death. I scribbled, Cheers to the man who could fix anything.

My comment felt inadequate, but how could I describe Moxham? In Hong Kong, he’d taken me out to the karaoke bars. We screamed 90s pop songs at the top of our lungs for catharsis. The city was a culture shock to me. The outdoor markets that smelled of death, the cramped pavements with workshops spilling out, the pollution, the loudness of everything. It was a whole world crammed onto a tiny island. Moxham showed me around, shared with me the best places to eat, taught me bits and pieces of Cantonese (mostly the swear words).

I turned away from the banner. He would have hated all those maudlin comments. The bonfire, on the other hand. Yes, Moxham would have approved of being memorialised with a big, fuck-off blaze.

Grey smoke wafted into the dark sky, the column of fire creating a wall of heat. I edged around it, towards the team bar. Inside, Tessa was slumped in one of the squashy orange chairs looking morose, while a bartender (I vaguely recalled he was named Ethan) was shooting darts at a board that bore a pockmarked picture of Kip’s grinning face. Diara and Fizzy were at the end of the pinewood bar that ran the length of one wall. Fizzy was murmuring intently, Diara was angled away from her.

‘Why are you always so—’ Diara spat the words.

Fizzy shot back, ‘I’m just trying to—’

They stopped talking the moment I drew near. There was an awkward pause, then Fizzy said loudly in my direction, ‘You’ll need some aloe for that sunburn.’

‘Thanks, I’ll get on it.’

She shot me a fake smile and pushed away from the bar. I rescued a couple of beers from the fridge and handed one to Diara. Considering she was my roommate, I’d seen little of her in the past week. She was absent from our room on as many nights as she was there. I wanted to be her friend, but she’d been noticeably standoffish with me.

I told her about Eddie Yiu’s McDonalds as the two of us ambled back to the bonfire. I was courting her laughter, but she only raised her eyebrows and said, ‘Seen it before.’

‘Supposed to be a celebration!’ Kip strode into the staff village, his plummy accent ringing out. ‘Let’s get some real wood on this pyre.’

The chatter around me died down. It was a bit like a schoolteacher showing up at our clubhouse. (What did Kip think of the dart board?) He hauled some more lumber onto the fire, tutting and exclaiming, as if he were more than just a business mogul, he was also a true survivalist. As the bonfire grew, a tickle of smoke lodged in the back of my throat. I took a swig of beer.

Kip clapped his hands. ‘We’re here to honour our dear friend, Michael Moxham. Who’d like to say a few words?’

There was a hush. Some people bowed their heads; nobody spoke. Fizzy was staring into the flames with a faraway expression. Diara was on her phone. Guillaume was whispering something to Reggie.

I stepped forward. ‘I will.’

Kip beamed at me. ‘Please, please.’

I moved to stand beside Kip. The firelight flickering across the faces of my new co-workers made them look distorted.

‘You don’t know me that well.’ I cleared my throat. ‘But Moxham is the reason I’m here. He wasn’t always the easiest person to get along with.’ When I raised my eyebrows, there was scattered laughter. ‘But he made me laugh.

‘He was the first person on the dancefloor – we’ll forgive him for that, because Mox should never, ever have been dancing.’ More laughter from the crowd. ‘A couple of times, he pulled me out of a hole.’

My voice dipped. I’d begun speaking without processing what I was going to say. It was almost eighteen months now since I’d got the call from one of my sister’s friends. Allie was back on the pills, not eating, not looking after herself. Not looking after Flora. That day, I’d broken down in Moxham’s office, heaving out sobs. He pulled me close, smelling of cigarettes. I got snot all over his tailored Italian jacket, but he didn’t complain.

I’d been prepared to quit my job on the spot and fly home to London. Moxham told me I could take paid leave for as long as I needed. He lent me money to get Allie into a private clinic. There, I spent weeks seated in a sunny day room, knotting friendship bracelets with my niece, as I hoped and prayed Allie wouldn’t succeed in starving herself to death.

Moxham was a big part of the reason Allie pulled through.

Tears made my voice thick. I mumbled my final words, raising my beer bottle. ‘He was my friend.’

Reggie let out a whoop. ‘Whatta man!’ It came back in an echo from the rest of the crowd. Whatta man!

My eulogy unstopped the dam, as people rushed in to tell their stories about Moxham. Reggie imitated his dance moves. Tyson told a convoluted story about a series of dares he and Moxham had set each other, culminating in him running naked through the restaurant during dinner service.

When the laughter died down, Fizzy tottered up to the front. ‘When I first met Mikey, he said to me, “you’ll either love me or you’ll hate me, there is no in between.” Of course I loved him. We all did.’

There was a snort behind me. I half-turned to catch a look of disgust on Diara’s face.

‘We’ll miss him so deeply,’ Fizzy said. (Was she drunk?) ‘A chasm in our hearts has opened up.’ She dropped her head, her shoulders shaking. Kip swooped in, squeezing Fizzy close as she collapsed into theatrical sobbing, and escorted her away from the gathering.

I shuffled backwards and shot Diara a look.

‘Should I start polishing the Oscar?’ I slapped a hand over my heart, eyes fluttering shut. ‘The chasm—in my heart—’

Diara’s face remained blank for a second, then a small smile spilled onto her lips. ‘She means well.’

I shrugged. It was probably true. But there was something about it I didn’t like. A grab for attention, perhaps. If you knew it would get you the limelight, why not exaggerate your relationship with Moxham? Play the role of the most devastated?

‘Were they close?’ I asked.

‘They worked together a lot.’ Diara squinted at me. ‘Kip puts Fizzy in charge most of the time. When Moxham came in last year… he thought he should be in charge.’

‘Turf war?’

‘Yeah, a turf war.’ Diara shot me a weird smile. ‘But Fizzy won. Fizzy always wins.’

I mulled this over. ‘The power behind the power.’

Diara didn’t reply and our conversation cooled. Following Fizzy’s exit, Tyson was telling a dirty joke to uproarious laughter. Guillaume was hacking at what looked like young coconuts, lining up a dozen of them on the ground.

Kip returned, prowling the edge of the bonfire. ‘Moxham is with his people in Australia now, but his spirit remains here.’ He flourished a bow at the bonfire. ‘He deserves a send-off. A true funeral pyre.’

He grasped the paper banner and let it flutter down into the fire.

Someone bumped into me. ‘Coming through!’ There was a squeak as Reggie manoeuvred a wheelbarrow through the crowd.

Kip retrieved a brown fedora from the wheelbarrow and held it up.

‘Ride on, fierce warrior, ride on.’ He tossed the hat onto the fire. It landed with a pop, hovering for a split-second before it dipped, puckering into the flames.

I peered over Tyson’s shoulder at the contents of the wheelbarrow. Clothes were clumped together: a white button-down, a leather jacket, a logo tee in green. There were comic books. An action figure in moulded plastic.

 ‘A true Viking ritual for a chieftain would involve a sacrifice,’ Kip was saying (although I was barely listening, my eyes fixed on the wheelbarrow). ‘A slave girl would climb aboard a mighty ship and mount the dead chieftain. Ride off into the afterlife as the ship is set alight.’

A couple of men in the audience chortled, but Kip only bellowed out a command.

‘Let’s send our dear friend to Valhalla! Let’s burn his grave goods. Send our warrior on his journey!’

Kip sent a cascade of pages onto the flames. A few people applauded, but I was speechless. Moxham had been fanatical about his comic books. He was a collector.

Tyson scrambled forward and pitched a balled T-shirt into the fire, as more people got in on the action, flinging clothes and shoes. Someone lobbed what looked like a rugby ball into the air and it landed in the blaze.

What the fuck? I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. Up until that moment, I hadn’t thought about Moxham’s belongings. I’d subconsciously imagined them crated up and shipped back to his parents.

Instead, we were burning them. We were destroying them.

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