Simon stood by the door, agitatedly rattling the car keys in his pocket. Piran had phoned five minutes earlier and told him and Penny to get down to The Dolphin, their local pub: ‘Sharpish, mind. We may have found some ammunition to stop those bloody coffee people and the council in their tracks.’
Penny raced down the stairs, trailing her coat behind her.
‘So what did he say exactly?’ She took a quick look in the hall mirror, and checked her hair.
‘Just what I told you,’ said Simon, hopping from foot to foot. ‘He says there’s a woman he wants us to meet. Now.’
The pair of them ran down the vicarage path in the low drizzle and jumped into Simon’s old Volvo. In the passenger seat, Penny shook the rain from her hair as she reached round for her seat belt. Simon turned the ignition key. Nothing. He tried again. Nothing.
‘This bloody old heap!’ Penny muttered under her breath.
Simon, who was very fond of his car, leapt to its defence. ‘A bit of damp in her connections, that’s all.’ He turned the key again. A brief cough and the engine turned over. ‘Faith, Penny. Faith can move mountains.’ He put the gear lever into reverse and the engine immediately cut out.
Penny shifted herself in her seat to direct a steely glare at her stubborn husband. ‘When will you see sense and get rid of this heap of rust?’
‘There’s nothing wrong with it. I’ll open up the bonnet and give her a spray of WD40. It’s all she needs.’
‘No,’ said Penny firmly, then continued in a slow voice as if speaking to a child: ‘We are getting out of this car. I am going back indoors to get my keys. Then we shall drive to Trevay in my car.’
‘But—’
Penny finally lost it. ‘Get out of this bloody heap and into my car!’
Knowing better than to argue, Simon meekly agreed.
Halfway to Trevay, behind the wheel of her scarlet Jaguar, Penny broke the tense atmosphere by reopening the conversation. ‘Why won’t you let me buy you a new car?’
‘I don’t need one.’
‘You do.’
‘I don’t.’
‘I’ve got enough money to buy you a really nice car. Something practical for you to get around the parish in. Something you can stuff the surfboards in. A Range Rover, maybe?’
‘No thank you.’
‘You are so pig-headed! What about our marriage vows? With all my worldly goods I thee endow? I’ve got the money. Let me treat you.’
‘It’s nothing to do with that.’ Simon turned to stare out of his window and missed the face Penny pulled behind his back.
*
The lights of the Dolphin shone warmly on the glistening path. Penny parked the car. She and Simon had barely spoken on the short journey. She hoped this bloody meeting would be worth it.
‘Penny, Simon!’ They spotted Piran and Helen immediately, but they weren’t alone. Piran stood up and welcomed them both. ‘Meet Brooke Lynne.’
Sitting on a comfortable armchair opposite the warm fire was the sexiest woman Penny had ever seen. Hourglass figure, tousled and highlighted blonde hair, glossy scarlet lips and smoky eyes. She turned her million-dollar smile at the two newcomers.
‘Hello, I’m sorry to have dragged you out on such a horrible afternoon.’
‘Not at all,’ said Penny, reaching for one of the two stools that Simon was now dragging over from an empty table. Being accustomed to dealing with famous faces, she took Brooke Lynne’s sudden appearance in her stride.
The same couldn’t be said of her husband.
‘Simon and I can’t wait to hear what the big news is, can we, Simon?’
She looked at her dear but stubborn husband who was fiddling with his dog collar while trying not to look too hard at Miss Lynne. He found her skin-tight black dress, tanned bare legs and ridiculously high stilettos way too much to take in all at once.
‘Simon!’ Penny barked at him. ‘Stop staring and sit down.’ She raised a quizzical eyebrow at Piran, inviting him to explain what was going on.
‘I think we may have found another lever to get the Council to think twice about selling the Pavilions,’ said Piran. ‘They’re already on the back foot after the coverage of Colonel Irvine’s connection. But just in case things get rougher still, we’ve got an ace up our sleeve. Miss Lynne here has something that they wouldn’t want out in the public domain.’
‘That’s right,’ said Brooke. ‘I’m sure you’ve heard that I was replaced as the face of Café Au Lait, but you probably don’t know why. When I saw the Colonel on TV and heard what was happening, I just couldn’t bear to sit quietly and let them get away with it. So I did a Google search on opposition to the Café Au Lait plans, and Mr Ambrose’s name came up—’
‘Ah, that will be Piran’s legendary diplomacy skills in action,’ observed Helen.
Piran shifted uncomfortably in his seat. ‘Can you just tell us what you know, Brooke?’
Brooke recounted her chance meeting with Colonel Irvine at the theatre, the day she’d come down to promote CAL. Then she told them what had gone on in her suite at the Starfish.
‘It was horrible. They treated me like some kind of prostitute. I was so lucky that I escaped. But Milo made sure I lost the CAL contract, my agent and my boyfriend.’
‘Who was at the meeting?’ asked Piran.
Brooke cocked her head to one side and ticked off the names on her fingers:
‘Rupert Heligan; Michael Woodbine, his PR man; Milo James, my snake of an agent, and a horrid little lech from the council – Chris someone.’
‘Bedford,’ growled Piran.
‘Yes, that’s him. Small, full of himself, with a nasty smug face. I must say, Piran, it was awfully satisfying to see that your fist had connected with that face.’ An amused smile played around her full lips. ‘Anyway, at the time I wasn’t paying too much attention to what they were talking about in this meeting. It seemed to drag on for hours and all I wanted was for it to end so we could eat. But one thing I did hear was Heligan reminding Bedford that they were paying handsomely for his “interventions” and he expected him to sort out the opposition to the scheme.’
Piran clenched his fists and his face darkened. ‘I knew that little toe-rag was a crook.’
‘I had to come down and help. I’d like to use whatever public profile I have to save the Pavilions. So now I’m here, use me.’
‘Do you have any proof?’ asked Penny.
‘Well, two lovely guys at the hotel – Toby and Marc – helped me out. They saw the cocaine on the table, and the booze. They must still have the photos.’
Simon cleared his throat and spoke first. ‘The photos won’t prove anything. This is blackmail, Piran. We can’t play as dirty as them. And you did punch Councillor Bedford and knock him down. You’re lucky he hasn’t pressed charges.’
Piran’s face darkened. ‘He deserved it. In any case, weren’t you the one who dragged me into this in the first place? I don’t even care about saving the Pavilions – but I do care about our town being run by corrupt, tin-pot, greedy, small-minded dictators.’
‘Hear hear!’ said Penny.
Simon was about to say something else, but Piran shushed him. ‘The point is, not only is Bedford in league with these coffee people, he’s obviously being paid by them to push the deal through and to nobble other members of the council.’
Penny frowned. ‘When is the final decision due?’
‘Ten days.’ Piran turned to Brooke. ‘Could you get hold of these photos?’
‘I’ll try. In the aftermath of the whole episode, Milo convinced me that the photos wouldn’t be worth anything – that no one would believe a has-been like me. But if you think they’ll be worth something …’
Simon was a gentle man, but he was first and foremost a man of God. What was being suggested seemed to go against everything he stood for. He swallowed hard. ‘That is blackmail.’
‘It’s the truth!’ Piran raised his voice in frustration.
‘We’re playing with fire.’
‘Simon, there are times when you have no choice but to fight fire with fire. These are sleazy men who want to line their own pockets, take drugs and have casual sex with pretty actresses,’ argued Penny.
‘That may well be the case, but I can’t be a party to this.’
‘But you’re chairman of the Save the Pavilions action group – you have a responsibility, dammit.’
Both Simon and Piran were standing now.
‘I also have a duty to my parish and to my faith. I’m sorry, Piran, but if this is the route that you are going down, then you’ll need to find another chairman. Penny, it’s time we went, I’m needed at a funeral first thing tomorrow.’
With that he grabbed his coat from the back of the chair and set off for the car park. Helen and Penny could only exchange anxious looks as Penny trailed out after him.
*
The following morning over at Gull’s Cry, Helen voiced the same argument. ‘It all sounds a bit tricky. There’s a danger Brooke could just be out for revenge and ready to say anything – regardless of the damage it might do to the Save the Pavilions campaign.’ She passed Penny a large mug of strong black coffee and sat opposite her at the scrubbed kitchen table.
Penny sighed. She hadn’t slept well, knowing that Simon was lying wide awake beside her feeling wretched. He’d had an awful time of it yesterday, what with her laying into him about the car and then Piran putting him in such an awkward position after listening to Brooke’s extraordinary story.
‘Why did we bother to get involved?’ she groaned. ‘I can’t let Simon put his neck on the line. Nothing is that important. Certainly not that hideous pile out on the headland.’ She crossed her arms on the table and rested her aching head on them.
Helen had seen Penny in this mood before. When everything was going well, Penny was a powerhouse of positive energy. But one blip and that energy drained out of her like water from a broken fish tank. Looking at her friend’s tired and worried demeanour, she decided it was time for a pep talk.
‘We’ve come this far, Pen, we can’t give up now and let that odious Chris Bedford have it all his own way. If he gets away with this he’ll be selling off the village green next, in exchange for a backhander from some burger bar!’
Penny’s lifted her head, horrified at the prospect.
‘In just over a week the council will make a decision – this is our last chance, Pen. We need to put everything we’ve got into galvanising the community into action. I admit I have reservations about Brooke Lynne, but if we went to the Cornish Guardian with the story I’m confident they would investigate properly and not just rush to print her photos and allegations. I’ve got to know the editor a little since I started doing my column and I’m sure he can be trusted. I was also thinking of approaching Brian Simpkins, to see if there’s anything he can do to help the cause.’
‘Simpkins … isn’t he that solicitor friend of Piran’s?’
‘That’s right. They’re fishing buddies – sometimes Piran takes him and a few of his mates out on boat trips. You know, the kind where they take a fishing rod and six cases of strong ale. He’s like a walking encyclopedia of Cornish law – I was thinking that if we could persuade him to take a look at the stuff Piran’s dug out of the archives, Brian might be able to find a legal argument against the sale going ahead. It’s worth a try, right?’
Helen’s pep talk seemed to be doing the trick. The spark was back in Penny’s eye and she was reaching for her BlackBerry. ‘If we can find a way to save the Pavilions without resorting to sleazy underhand methods, Simon won’t have to resign from the action group – I’m going to call him now and let him know you’re enlisting Piran’s lawyer friend to save the day …’ Her fingers paused over the keypad as her eyes turned to Helen. ‘Well, what are you waiting for – time is of the essence: get onto your editor chum this instant!’