Secret Schemes and Daring Dreams Read online

  Rosie Rushton lives in Northampton. She is a governor of the local Church of England secondary school, a licensed lay minister and passionate about all issues relating to young people. Her hobbies include learning Swahili, travelling, going to the theatre, reading, walking, being juvenile with her grandchildren and playing hopscotch when no one is looking. Her ambitions are to write the novel that has been pounding in her brain for years but never quite made it to the keyboard, to visit China, learn to sing in tune, and do anything else God has in mind for her, with a broad grin and a spring in her step. Her many books for Piccadilly Press include Friends, Enemies and Other Tiny Problems; Secrets of Love and several series including The Leehampton Quartet and What a Week.

  ROSIE RUSHTON

  Piccadilly Press London

  First published in Great Britain in 2008

  by Piccadilly Press Ltd,

  5 Castle Road, London NW1 8PR

  www.piccadillypress.co.uk

  Text © copyright Rosie Rushton, 2008

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner.

  The right of Rosie Rushton to be identified as Author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

  ISBN: 978 1 85340 942 4 (paperback)

  eISBN: 978 1 84812 223 9

  3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2

  Printed in the UK by CPI Bookmarque, Croydon, CR0 4TD

  Cover illustration by Susan Hellard

  Cover design by Simon Davis

  Text design by Carolyn Griffiths, Cambridge

  Set in Goudy and Caslon

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  Cover

  About the Author

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  For Celia Rees, whose writing is inspirational and whose support for this book was unfailing; and for all those members of the Scattered Authors Society whose encouragement kept me going when none of the characters would behave themselves. Thank you. And to Vince Cross, for initiating a totally uncool author into the mysteries of the gig circuit!

  CHAPTER 1

  Secret scheme:

  Maximum street-cred for minimum effort

  EMMA WOODHOUSE HAD, FOR SEVENTEEN YEARS AND TEN months, had pretty much everything in life her own way (if you overlook the unfortunate death of her mother before she was out of nappies, and that large spot on her right cheek on the night of the South Downs Ball), and she saw no reason at all why the situation should ever change. She was of the opinion that, if you wanted something enough, you simply applied all your energies to getting it. She had no time for wimps, and even less for people who started sentences with ‘I can’t’. But she was above all a caring and considerate sort of girl, who was well aware of her own good fortune, stunning looks and talent for getting the best out of other people. Which was why, when she met someone with untapped potential, she put all her own interests to one side and set out to change their lives for them. Whether they liked it or not.

  Her most recent triumph had been the sorting out of her best friend’s love life. Lucy Taylor was the kind of girl who made choosing the wrong guy into an art form. She either got herself mixed up with total losers because she felt sorry for them and couldn’t say no when they asked her out; or else she fell dramatically in love with guys who were way out of her league, and hardly noticed her existence, with the result that she cried for days and went round with puffy eyes and snot on the end of her nose.

  So, when Emma discovered that India Hood from the tennis club had dumped the super-fit Adam Weston in favour of some geek she had met on a field trip to the Orkneys, she had seized the moment and organised a double date (even enduring the company of the slimy Simon Wittering for a whole evening for the sake of her friend’s future happiness, and that was sacrifice in anyone’s book). As she had expected, her ploy had worked. Adam was perfect for Lucy – he had a great bum and a cute smile; and while Emma would have found his intellect seriously unchallenging, she had reckoned – correctly, of course – that he was well within Lucy’s comfort zone. What’s more, he was doing a sports degree at Bournemouth, which meant that every weekend he bombed up the A27 in his lime-green Beetle to see her in Brighton. This was something of a relief all round, since by Thursday mornings, Lucy was pining big time and playing ‘he loves me, he loves me not’ with any unfortunate flower that happened to be within her grasp.

  They had been an item now for five whole months, which broke any record Lucy had ever achieved. She went around with a permanent grin on her face, even after a weekend of watching basketball, or cricket or whatever sport was Adam’s module for the month; she kept O2 in business with her constant text messaging, and repeatedly told Emma that she had never been so happy and owed it all to her.

  Her only complaint was that she was strapped for cash.

  ‘Adam pays for almost everything,’ she had confided to Emma after she had been with Adam for six weeks, ‘but it’s not like he’s loaded and, somehow, it doesn’t feel quite right.’

  ‘Absolutely not!’ Emma had agreed. ‘You need to show him that you are an independent, self-supporting woman of the twenty-first century.’

  ‘I guess you’re right,’ Lucy had said reluctantly.

  ‘Of course I am.’ Emma had refrained from letting on that she was quoting, almost verbatim, her own father’s words. Despite being extremely wealthy and perfectly capable of funding Emma, he had refused to contribute to her gap year unless she earned at least some of the money. There had been a lot of talk about the world not owing her a living and the country going to ruin because of a lack of committed work ethic. Emma had nodded obediently and told him that she’d get a job just as soon as A-levels were over. She had then decided, quite firmly, that burger bars, department stores and seaside cafés were not on her agenda; but that, if she could find a job with good networking opportunities and hours flexible enough to accommodate all the social events that were already stacking up in her diary, she would give it her best shot. And then she put the whole thing out of her mind.

  Over the weeks since exams had finished her father had made a few ridiculous suggestions about jobs, all of which she had rejected out of hand. Who in their right mind would work eight hours a day dressed as a Regency housemaid and handing out guidebooks at the Royal Pavilion? And as for packing organic veggie boxes for the local farm shop, forget it: as she explained to her father, you don’t pay zillions for a French manicure and then deal with unwashed carrots. It was when he began talking about cleaning up graffiti on run-down housing estates and mending hedges in Northumberland that she realised she had to do something to get him off her back.

  So she was somewhat relieved when the perfect solution presented itself. Not only the perfect, and basically undemanding, part-time job for her; but more importantly, a little money-spinner for Lucy, who was in the throes of one of her ‘I’m so useless, no one would employ me’ premenstrual cycles. OK, so when Emma told her about the plan, she did seem a little distracted and less enthusiastic than she’d hoped, but she put that down to the fact that Lucy was hyperventilating over her upcomin
g driving test and, once that was over, she’d be speechless with gratitude.

  So the last thing that Emma expected at nine o’clock on the leavers’ evening of her final term at Deepdale Hall, the exclusive co-ed day school on the outskirts of Brighton, was to have all her carefully laid plans thrown into disarray.

  The evening had started so well: the in-crowd had met up on the roof garden of the Freaked Out Frog (which as anyone with style and savvy will know is just about the coolest place in Brighton to hang out on a hot summer evening) and Emma had instantly been the centre of attention. This had a lot to do with the fact that she had just dished out a batch of tickets for Shellshocked’s Gig on the Beach later in July, courtesy of her father. Her dad was the Seventies rock star, now turned eco-warrior, Tarquin Tee (he had never thought Woodhouse was a suitable name for him – ‘sounds too much like woodlouse’ he used to say). Although Tarquin no longer made the centre pages of MusicMaker magazine, or headlined at gigs, he was very much in the public eye, fronting TV’s Going Green programme, appearing in ads for energy-saving light bulbs and hybrid cars, and regularly lambasting MPs about their carbon footprints. In Emma’s set, having a parent with a name suitable for dropping into conversations was a decided asset, and Tarquin still had enough contacts to be able to get tickets for all the best gigs. Emma felt able to forgive some of his more way-out idiosyncrasies in return for being flavour of the month with the entire Sixth Form.

  ‘I can’t go,’ Lucy had said as Emma tossed a ticket in her direction. ‘I’ll be working.’

  ‘Working?’ Serena Middleton-Hyde fiddled ostentatiously with the clasp on her Gucci bag and stared at Lucy in amazement. ‘Whatever for?’

  ‘Money,’ Lucy retorted. ‘I need to save up for – well, things.’

  ‘Oh don’t worry, I’ll get you the time off,’ Emma assured her hastily. ‘I’ve got loads of influence with the Knightleys.’

  ‘The Knightleys?’ Chelsea Finch had exclaimed, turning to Lucy. ‘You’re going to be working at their hotel? Donwell Abbey?’

  ‘It’s not a hotel,’ Emma informed her sharply. ‘It’s a Country House Experience. And yes, Lucy and I have got jobs to die for – right, Lucy?’

  ‘Well, yes, but actually . . .’

  ‘What? You as well?’ Serena interjected, draping an arm seductively around Angus MacKenzie. ‘How can you bear to spend the summer slogging your guts out for a pittance when you could be partying on the beach at Rock like us?’

  Emma, who had absolutely no intention of slogging for five minutes let alone a whole season, pushed her shades on to the top of her head and gave Serena one of her most withering looks. ‘Why would we waste the summer getting trashed with a load of airheads when we could be mixing with celebs?’

  As she had hoped, her words had an immediate effect.

  ‘Celebs? Like who?’ Serena demanded suspiciously.

  ‘All sorts,’ Emma declared. ‘Donwell attracts the A-list’ (it wasn’t a complete lie – a Blue Peter presenter had stayed there only a month ago) ‘and besides, Today TV are going to be filming an episode of Going Green in the village. Dad reckons Lucy and I might get filmed too.’

  ‘I get split shifts at Happy Hamburger – you get a manor house, champagne lifestyle and instant fame!’ Tabitha Baxter burst out.

  ‘That’s because some of us won’t settle for second best,’ Emma commented calmly. ‘Right, Lucy?’

  ‘What? Oh. Yeah, right.’ Lucy seemed nervy and out of sorts and suddenly Emma realised why. Clearly the thought of the new job was suddenly getting to her – she had always been a bit on the shy side, and a Grade One worrier. Donwell Abbey was the ancestral home of the Knightleys, who were close friends of Emma’s dad; the house stood halfway up a hillside above the village of Ditchdean, four miles from Brighton, its mullioned windows catching glimpses of the English Channel in one direction and the South Downs in another. Emma’s home, Hartfield, stood in its extensive grounds and had once been the Dower House of the estate. Emma had played with the Knightley boys, George and John, since she was in nursery and, as a result, treated the whole place as if it were her own.

  Thirteen generations of Knightleys had lived at Donwell, but sadly the first ten had spent money like water, and Guy and Candida Knightley, the eleventh generation, had died within a few months of one another, which thrilled the men at the Inland Revenue who were in charge of death duties, but did nothing to ease the way for their descendants. Emma had still been a little kid, riding her pony in the Knightleys’ paddock, when the deer park was turned into a golf course, and the lake on which she and George acted out Swallows and Amazons when it was stocked with trout and leased out to local anglers in the hope of raising money. The tack room became a tearoom and the orangery was turned into a small health club, much to the delight of the middle classes of the surrounding villages and the local suppliers of Lycra bodywear. The extensive gardens were open to the public every weekend and children were kept occupied on the Woodland Walk and Nature Trail complete with Tarzan-style rope swings and hollow logs for hide-and-seek. Despite all this, the upkeep of thirty rooms and the remaining twenty acres was a huge burden and so, when George’s father, Max Knightley, overheard a visitor to one of his Open Gardens days the previous season remark that it ‘wouldn’t half be good to live like the gentry for a bit’, he had the brainwave of turning his home into a place where social climbers could live out their fantasies while paying handsomely for the privilege. It was, he declared, to be very tasteful: just a dozen or so guests for a long weekend and the atmosphere of a nineteenth-century house party. Emma thought it was hilarious; but clearly Lucy was totally intimidated by the whole thing.

  ‘Look, you guys,’ Emma announced as Lucy’s nailbiting frenzy increased, ‘I need to check some stuff out with Lucy – catch you later, OK?’

  She seized Lucy by the arm, picked up her drink and dragged her to the one available bench overlooking the crowded street below. It was the warmest evening of the summer so far, and the fountains in the square were a magnet for slightly inebriated holidaymakers and snogging couples. This was the Brighton Emma loved: its seafront tackiness, the fading splendour of its Regency architecture and the constant swooping and squawking of the seagulls as they hunted for discarded ice-cream cones and decaying bits of doughnut.

  ‘Listen, there’s something I’ve got to tell you.’ Lucy began speaking before Emma had the chance to launch into her impromptu pep talk. ‘And I know you won’t like it . . .’ She looked as agitated as she had on the day she had confessed to losing Emma’s favourite shirt.

  ‘It’s OK, I know what you’re going to say,’ Emma assured her.

  ‘You do?’

  ‘I guess it’s about the job.’

  ‘Well, yes, it is actually. You see, the thing is . . .’

  ‘Look, you don’t have to worry!’ Emma butted in, sipping her Summer Cooler. ‘It’s not even like you’ve got to live in at Donwell – you’re staying at my place, and you’ve done that enough times!’

  ‘Yes, but listen . . .’

  ‘Honestly, it’s going to be so cool. You only have to waitress for breakfast and dinner . . .’

  ‘Will you just shut up a minute!’ Lucy burst out, her freckled face flushing. ‘I’m not taking the job.’

  ‘Not taking it?’ Emma stared at her open-mouthed. ‘What are you on about? Of course you’re taking it – you can’t let nerves get in the way of an opportunity like this.’

  ‘It’s got nothing to do with nerves. I applied for another job a couple of weeks ago, and this morning I heard that I’d got it,’ Lucy admitted, sipping her drink and avoiding eye contact with Emma.

  ‘Oh, is that all?’ Emma shrugged. ‘No probs – you can back out of it. We’ll think up a really good excuse and, if you want me to write the letter, that’s fine. I’m good with words.’

  ‘I don’t want to back out of it,’ Lucy protested. ‘I’m over the moon about it. See, it’s with Adam. At the Frontier Adventure Centre. H
e’s got a job as sports instructor and I’m going to be a lifeguard and swimming coach.’

  ‘Lucy, what are you on?’ Emma demanded. ‘What’s that going to look like on your CV?’

  ‘I don’t care about my CV.’

  ‘Well you should – you need to be more ambitious,’ Emma retorted. ‘Besides, you can’t back out now. Not with George’s dad at death’s door and him coping single-handed to keep the place afloat.’

  When push came to shove, Emma regarded exaggeration as a perfectly legitimate tool to getting her own way.

  ‘Death’s door?’ For an instant, Lucy looked guilt-ridden.

  ‘Well, pretty much. And you know what that family mean to me,’ Emma added, with what she hoped was a pitiful sigh. It wasn’t a lie: all the time Emma and her sister, Bea – who was four years older than her – had been growing up, Sara and Max Knightley had been like second parents to them, having them to stay regularly, helping with fancy dress costumes, period pains and all the other things that motherless girls worry about, and even, as they got older, taking them on holiday with them to their house in Provence. George’s older brother, John, was totally besotted with Bea (and had been for years, even before they went off to do voluntary work together in somewhere unpronounceable in South East Asia), with the result that George had somehow adopted the big brother role in Emma’s life.

  ‘And besides, I’ve already told George you’ll be there,’ Emma finished.

  ‘Well, you’ll just have to un-tell him,’ Lucy said emphatically, scooping her ash-blond hair into a ponytail. ‘I’m going to be with Adam and that’s that.’

  ‘Oh, so now he’s on the scene I don’t count, right?’ Emma snapped, unexpected tears pricking behind her eyes.

  ‘It’s all about you now, is it?’ Lucy replied, a flush spreading across her freckled face. ‘Anyway, who was it that got Adam and me together in the first place? You!’

  ‘I know but . . .’