Stuck On You Read online

  He’s walking down the steps from the mini lighthouse next to us. Following close behind him is his latest wife, Joanna, the one he married in the documentary. She’s smiling widely, until she loses her footing on the steps. It seems as though she’s falling for ages, in super-slow motion, until eventually Mackie grabs her wrist just in time to stop her falling to the bottom.

  ‘Whoa there, girl,’ he says, yanking her back up. He looks over at us in a sort of playful ‘did you see that?’ kind of way.

  I glance over at Damian. He has a low-key terrified smile on his face, as if maybe he thinks this was a mistake but, at the same time, he looks as if he’s struck gold.

  ‘Joanna sure does know how to make an entrance, doesn’t she?’ Mackie says as he extends a hand for Damian to shake.

  It looked more as though she was going to make an exit than an entrance to me.

  ‘Terry Mackie, nice to meet you,’ he says, practically yanking Damian’s arm off – a weirdly unnecessary power play, given how most of the world thinks he’s a murderer.

  ‘And you,’ he says to me, pointing almost accusingly. ‘You must be the one I spoke to on the phone.’

  ‘Sadie,’ I say as I offer him my hand to shake, instantly wishing I’d given him a fake name. I can feel my hand practically shaking as it hovers in front of me. The thought of Mackie’s maybe murderous hand about to take hold of it has me petrified.

  I’m expecting a warm, gentle hand to loosely take mine. Somehow, I get something far creepier. Mackie snatches my hand and brings it up to his lips, and as he plants a kiss on the back of my hand his razor-sharp stubble scratches my skin a little. Still, I’d take a world of that feeling over the horrible sensation of his soft wet lips. Surely only a murderous sociopath would kiss a woman on the hand like that, right?

  ‘Wow.’ Damian chuckles. ‘You’re quite the ladyki—’

  He stops mid-sentence. I glare at him. He was going to say ladykiller, wasn’t he?

  Mackie stares at him blankly. Damian theatrically clears his throat, buying himself a little time.

  ‘Excuse me,’ Damian eventually says. ‘I was just saying, you’re quite the ladies’ man, aren’t you?’

  ‘It’s been said before,’ Mackie says with a smile. ‘Anyway, listen, we can’t thank you enough for agreeing to take pictures at our darling Angel’s wedding.’

  ‘It’s my pleasure,’ Damian says. ‘Thank you, for agreeing to feature in my work.’

  ‘A fair exchange,’ Mackie says.

  ‘Hi, Sadie,’ Joanna greets me as the men chat between themselves for a moment.

  ‘Hello,’ I reply. ‘Joanna, right?’

  ‘Call me Jo,’ she replies.

  Jo is gorgeous. She’s wearing a pair of super-high heels, which, in addition to making her close to six foot tall, give her impossibly long legs. If I remember correctly, she used to be a model, until she became a kept woman/walking target. Her long blonde hair is perfectly straight, and intensely shiny, and her make-up is flawless. The only weird thing is her outfit. Jo, despite being in her twenties, is dressed more like someone in her fifties. She’s wearing a navy pencil skirt and matching jacket, teamed with a white blouse – she’s even wearing a pearl necklace, for crying out loud. She’s not so much a sexy supermodel any more, more like a matronly mother of the bride. Jo is not the mother of the bride, just in case that wasn’t obvious. She’s her stepmum.

  Poor Jo, I’m not sure if, behind her big smile, her eyes are screaming for help, or if I’m just projecting my preconceptions after watching the documentary.

  ‘Let’s get you two to your room,’ Mackie says. ‘Get you settled in so you can dress for dinner later.’

  ‘Rooms,’ I correct him.

  ‘What?’ he replies.

  ‘Rooms,’ I say again. ‘Our rooms. Two of them.’

  ‘Ohhhh,’ he says with a big grin. ‘Are you two not…?’

  I shake my head.

  ‘Sadie is my assistant,’ Damian tells him. ‘We asked for two rooms, didn’t we?’

  He looks at me for confirmation.

  ‘We did,’ I say firmly.

  ‘Well, you’ll have two rooms,’ Mackie says. ‘I just assumed. Someone less presumptuous than me will have already booked them, don’t worry. Do you need help with your bags?’

  ‘Oh, no, we can manage,’ Damian insists. ‘We’ve only got these few.’

  In addition to his camera bag, Damian and I packed an overnight bag each – well, I packed them both, obviously – with just enough stuff to get us through the weekend. I am definitely not sticking around any longer than I need to. I’d swim back to shore first.

  Mackie beckons an employee over with a wave of his hand.

  ‘Can we get these two checked in to their two absolutely separate rooms,’ he says with a wiggle of his eyebrows. I swear, it’s as if he doesn’t believe us.

  The employee nods before silently gesturing at us to follow him.

  ‘See you at dinner,’ Mackie says excitedly. ‘Can’t wait for us all to get to know each other better.’

  There’s something in his eyes that I can’t quite figure out. A sort of manic excitement that terrifies me.

  After checking in we are pointed in the direction of our suites – yes, there are two of them waiting for us, thank God. As we walk along a corridor, checking the numbers on the doors as we pass them, we finally have a moment alone.

  ‘I can’t believe you almost called him a ladykiller,’ I point out, hardly able to control my smile. I shouldn’t be laughing – it’s not funny, is it? Except it kind of is. Just a bit.

  ‘Oh, God, I know,’ Damian replies. ‘That was a Freudian slip and a half, wasn’t it?’

  ‘I don’t think he noticed,’ I say. ‘But, if he’s the evil genius everyone says he is, he wouldn’t let his smile slip, would he?’

  ‘At least we have an adjoining door between our rooms,’ Damian points out. ‘So, one of us can escape through the other’s room.’

  ‘Ah, but we’d still be on a tiny man-made island in the middle of the sea though,’ I point out. I’m only playing along but it’s enough to give me the creeps. Then something occurs to me.

  ‘While we’re on the subject, hand me that key,’ I insist.

  ‘What, the adjoining-door key?’ he asks innocently.

  ‘Yep, I’ll take care of that,’ I say, snatching it from him. ‘I promise to let you into my room if, say, Mackie is hacking his way into yours with an axe, but otherwise that door is not opening.’

  Damian just laughs.

  ‘This is us,’ he says, stopping abruptly.

  ‘OK, so…’ I glance down at the itinerary given to us at reception. ‘Dinner is in a couple of hours, so, I’ll meet you back out here about five minutes before?’

  ‘OK, sure,’ he says. ‘See you then. I’m weirdly looking forward to it.’

  ‘I guess I am too, now that I’m here,’ I admit. ‘Right, don’t be late.’

  ‘Yes, boss,’ he says jokily before disappearing into his room.

  The first thing I notice inside my suite is the adjoining door. I subtly check it, to make sure it’s locked, careful not to make any sounds Damian might hear on the other side. Thankfully it is locked. Hopefully it stays that way.

  Wow, this room is nice. I don’t know what I was expecting, being so deep down in the fortress, but they are stunning rooms with arched ceilings – they even have windows. It’s like being in a hotel on the coast. I can even see civilisation from my window.

  I love the exposed brickwork, coupled with all the black and gold furnishings. The super-king bed looks so inviting. Then again, most beds look inviting when you’re used to sleeping in such a tiny bedroom. To be honest, my bedroom in my flat isn’t even a proper bedroom, it’s behind a piece of semi-frosted glass. Just enough to make it technically a one-bed apartment, rather than a studio flat.

  My absolute favourite thing about this suite though, by a mile, is the large freestanding bath over by the window.
I don’t know what it is about the idea of taking a bath not in a bathroom that sounds so luxurious. I do have a bath in my apartment – a small, not very comfortable one – but it’s inches away from my toilet, which doesn’t exactly encourage relaxation. I can’t wait to jump into this one. In fact, I think I’ll do it right now. Well, look at it this way – it’s only a matter of time before Damian knocks on our shared door for something, right? I need to try and squeeze in some relaxation while I can. Especially because – call me over the top, if you like – something about sitting down to dinner with a man who women just can’t seem to stay alive around makes me think I’ll need to keep on my toes. Not that there’s anywhere for me to run to out here…

  11

  I can’t help but alternate between feeling exactly like I’m on a cruise ship and marvelling at how little this feels like a cruise.

  On the one hand, the entire thing is man-made, so you’re on the good side of the metal fence or you’re in the water, but then there’s the obvious fact that the fortress doesn’t move, and moving was probably the feeling I hated the most on the albeit brief cruise I took from Cardiff to Dublin to Liverpool with my parents, years ago. It was spring when I went, and supposedly the Irish sea is one of the worst of chop, so I’m really relieved to feel so still right now.

  The dining room, however, has a strong ‘cruise ship’ vibe. A large room with decadent decorations, big tables of mixed groups, serving staff doing the rounds with bottles of wine – there’s even a seating plan. It turns out Damian and I are sitting at the same table as Mackie, Jo, their daughter, Angel, her fiancé, and various other members of the wedding party – people far closer to the happy couple than the photographer and his assistant, that’s for sure.

  Damian and I stare at each other for a second.

  ‘Top table,’ I point out with a grin. ‘I wonder if it will be the same for the wedding. He must be excited about you being here, if he wants you to sit with him at his table.’

  ‘I’m not sure if I should want him to love me or hate me,’ Damian muses. ‘Which one keeps me alive?’

  ‘Not coming here at all,’ I say emphatically. ‘Coming here is how you get mur… Mackie! Terry Mackie, hello!’

  Oh, God, he always rocks up when you least expect him. I think I got away with that – he looks positively charmed by my enthusiastic greeting.

  ‘Sadie, Damian, hello – you both look divine,’ he sings.

  I shuffle on my heels awkwardly. It sounds strange but I hate that he can see me. Not just being in front of him, being in the same room as him, being in his eyeline – I mean he really sees me. He acknowledges me. He knows my name. He’s complimenting me.

  He’s not wrong about Damian though, he does look really good. He’s wearing a dark blue suit with a black shirt. When I met him in the hallway, he had a handful of ties in his hand, which he held out to me like a wilting bunch of flowers. I told him I didn’t think he needed a tie, so he tossed them through the door, clapped his hands and said, ‘Let’s go.’ It’s a good job I don’t get off on power because Damian pretty much always listens to anything I say. He says I’ve never led him wrong before. He trusts me. It’s nice, to be valued like that. I just wish he didn’t rely on me so much. I’ve almost made myself too valuable.

  ‘I want you sitting with me and my family tonight,’ Mackie insists. ‘Tonight, you are my family.’

  Well, that’s pretty much the last thing I want to be.

  ‘Great,’ Damian says.

  ‘Come, come,’ Mackie instructs. He wraps an arm around Damian, as if they’re old friends, and leads him through the dining room. I follow close behind them.

  It’s weird, watching Mackie walk through a room; it’s as though everyone always has one eye on him, just in case.

  ‘Everyone, this is the great Damian Banks and his assistant, Sadie… Sadie… Sadie what?’

  Mackie turns to me.

  ‘Oh, don’t worry about it,’ I insist. ‘I’m not important enough to have a surname announcement.’

  I am so relieved he’s forgotten my surname already.

  Mackie laughs.

  ‘OK, well, Damian, Sadie, this is my darling daughter, Angel, and her soon-to-be husband, Ryan – you’ll probably know Angel from the papers, and Ryan for almost winning us the World Cup. He just didn’t try hard enough, huh, Damian?’

  Damian hates sport. He isn’t really a manly man at all in a lot of ways. He doesn’t like to get his hands dirty, he’s terrible at DIY, and he hates watching and playing pretty much all sports. He won’t even play FIFA games, and, given that Damian is a bit of a gaming nerd, a staple game like FIFA is a big gap in his gaming CV.

  I watch as Damian makes a face – his best attempt at bro-ing down, I’d imagine. He just looks constipated.

  ‘Right,’ he replies. I swear his voice gets deeper.

  Angel is gorgeous – exactly what you’d expect a socialite to look like. I don’t feel as if socialites are a thing, not like they used to be, not without a stint on a reality show or something. I feel as if she would be right at home with the Kardashians, with her glossy dark hair, and that exact face everyone seems to have these days, courtesy of a combination of either filling things in or sucking things out.

  ‘Jo, my darling wife, you already know – and no, you can’t have her,’ he says with a theatrical laugh. Everyone at the table laughs. Are people too scared not to laugh at his jokes?

  ‘This lovely little creature is Lottie,’ Mackie says. ‘She’s one of those influencers.’

  ‘Lottie Loves,’ she tells us proudly. ‘Influencer and model.’

  She sounds extra squeaky.

  Lottie is practically a clone of Angel. This is what I mean: everyone has the same face. The celebrity look that involves jaw fillers, lip fillers, nose jobs, Botox, etc. Though Lottie is on the edge of taking things too far. Everything is blown up just a little more than looks natural.

  Each to their own, I guess. Everyone should be able to look the way they want to look; no one is obliged to look ‘natural’, just as no one should feel the need to replicate the ‘extreme cosmetic intervention’ look, but when you are literally an influencer, your job is telling people how to live their lives, encouraging them to be just like you. So when you’ve got millions of young women looking up to you, and you’re telling them they need lips the size of scatter cushions, well, we’re telling people not to look like people any more.

  Sorry, I suppose I’ve just got a bit of a bee in my bonnet about Lottie because I have heard of her. She’s always in the press, always in trouble, because she pitches herself as a lifestyle influencer, and talks a lot about clean living, but she works with ‘skinny’ shake companies, and pushes appetite-suppressing lollypops on her Instagram, and given that she’s already in unrealistically good shape, it’s not something she should be telling people to use so they can be just like her.

  ‘Great to meet you,’ Damian says warmly.

  I can call it now. Lottie is going to be all over Damian. Models always are. People think that if he takes their picture they’ll be on the road to stardom, and they probably would be, but Damian doesn’t take pictures of just anyone. He takes a lot of pictures for fun – he almost always has two or three different cameras to hand – but the pictures he takes for fun are almost never of people.

  ‘Oh, you too,’ she replies, kind of casually.

  ‘And this gentleman – this fine specimen of a man who could turn the head of even the straightest man – is Hunter O’Meara, male model. Hmm.’ Mackie pauses for thought. ‘I wonder why it is that we call women models and men male models. I suppose it’s because all women are models.’

  Eesh.

  He’s right about Hunter, he’s a beautiful man. I’d be surprised if he wasn’t modelling himself on Thomas Shelby, because almost everything about him screams Peaky Blinders. He’s even got a bit of a look of Cillian Murphy, with his chiselled cheekbones and his bright eyes. He’s got that iconic haircut, the disconn
ected undercut with no fade, the one that makes your hair look as if it’s just sitting on top of your head. He’s very sharply dressed in a three-piece suit – in fact, he’d look fresh out of the TV show if it weren’t for one thing. Hunter is absolutely jacked. His arms are thicker than my thighs – and that really isn’t something I get to say all that often.

  ‘Ah, you’re too kind, Terry,’ Hunter replies. Oh, God, even his voice is sexy. He's got a deep voice and an Irish accent that I wasn’t expecting.

  ‘Damian, you sit here, next to me,’ Mackie insists, which puts Damian in the space between him and Lottie. This leaves a space for me, on the other side of the table, between Jo and Hunter. Is it bad that I’m happy I get to sit next to him?

  ‘Good to meet you, Sadie,’ Hunter says as I sit down next to him. I feel all the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.

  ‘You too,’ I reply.

  ‘So, Damian, what do you do?’ I hear Lottie ask him on the other side of the table.

  It’s practically a cutlery-clatter moment.

  ‘There’s no way she doesn’t know who he is,’ Hunter whispers to me. ‘This is all part of her act.’

  ‘I’m… I’m a photographer,’ Damian replies.

  ‘Oh, wow, good for you,’ Lottie says patronisingly.

  ‘Next she’ll ask if he’s ever sold anything,’ Hunter whispers again. His face is so close to mine I can smell his aftershave.

  ‘Have you ever sold any of your pictures?’ Lottie asks.

  ‘Erm… one or two,’ Damian says. He looks bemused and, annoyingly, almost charmed by the fact she seemingly doesn’t know who he is. Well, how do you make yourself appealing to someone who is terrified of being used for their fame? Pretend you don’t know who they are.

  ‘What do you like to take pictures of?’ Lottie asks.