Sugar Secrets…& Scandal Read online

  Sugar

  SECRETS…

  … & Scandal

  Mel Sparke

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  CHAPTER 1 I SEE A TALL, DARK STRANGER…

  CHAPTER 2 ALL EYES ON OLLIE

  CHAPTER 3 BILLY GETS HIS HOPES UP

  CHAPTER 4 UNEXPECTED INVITATIONS

  CHAPTER 5 NUMBER ONE FAN

  CHAPTER 6 CAT PUSHES IT

  CHAPTER 7 HEARTS AND FLOWERS

  CHAPTER 8 SOMEONE’S WATCHING YOU…

  CHAPTER 9 PRESENT TENSE

  CHAPTER 10 DEVELOPING FEELINGS

  CHAPTER 11 THE COAST IS CLEAR

  CHAPTER 12 JUST THE TWO OF US…

  CHAPTER 13 SENSE AND SENSIBILITY

  CHAPTER 14 A TRICKY CUSTOMER

  CHAPTER 15 FREEZE FRAME

  CHAPTER 16 DOUBLE TROUBLE

  CHAPTER 17 COLD COMFORT

  CHAPTER 18 DOUBLE TAKE

  CHAPTER 19 HIJACKING MAYA

  CHAPTER 20 HAPPYISH ENDINGS

  Sugar SECRETS… …& Guilt

  ARE YOU A BOTTLER OR A BLABBER?

  SO, ARE YOU A BOTTLER OR A BLABBER?

  SOME SECRETS ARE JUST TOO GOOD TO KEEP TO YOURSELF!

  Copyright

  About The Publisher

  CHAPTER 1

  I SEE A TALL, DARK STRANGER…

  “No-I don’t want to.”

  “Oh, come on, Maya!”

  “No, Sonja - I don’t believe in that kind of thing.”

  “You don’t have to take it seriously, if that’s what’s bothering you. It’s just a bit of fun!” Sonja Harvey whined. Beside her, Kerry Bellamy gave a wide-eyed nod of agreement.

  “If Maya feels uncomfortable with this, then she doesn’t have to do it,” Anna Michaels interrupted, trying to be the voice of reason. Normally, that was Maya’s job, but since she was on the receiving end of Sonja’s wheedling at that moment, someone had to step in. Anyway, Anna felt responsible.

  “Oh, Anna, she’s just making a big deal about nothing,” snorted Catrina Osgood. “C’mon, Maya, put your camera down for once and stop being so boring and sensible.”

  Before Maya Joshi could splutter out any more protests, Cat had pulled her friend’s camera out of her hands and was propelling her towards a benevolently smiling woman, dressed in a cosy cardie, with a set of tarot cards in front of her.

  “We’re all in this together,” Cat whispered to Maya. “And if you don’t do it then Kerry’ll probably start getting the wobbles and pull out.”

  Maya glanced round and saw Anna, Kerry and Sonja making their way over to other benevolently smiling women dotted further along the large hall, although with their swirls of tie-dye and swathes of velvet, they seemed more spookily exotic than the psychic in front of Maya.

  “But if you lot are all getting your futures told, I don’t see why you need me to—”

  “Don’t be a hypocrite,” Cat hissed at her. “You can’t come along to a Psychic Fair and think you can ask all these people to pose for you if you don’t even give them a chance to show you what they can do…”

  The pressure on Maya’s shoulder was inescapable. Cat was pressing her down into the plastic chair across the table from the woman in the cardie. There was no way out.

  “Hello, dear,” smiled the tarot-reader. “Let’s see what we can do for you today, shall we?”

  Maya’s world revolved around logic and common sense, not around anything remotely supernatural.

  So why’s it sending shivers up my spine? she wondered silently.

  “You have a worry on your mind at the moment.”

  Anna looked at the runes and wondered how these small stones with their ancient pagan markings could spell that out. But it was true: she was worried. Worried that the other girls were going to regret giving up their Sunday to come to this fair in the city. It had been Anna’s idea, and now she’d seen what was on offer, she wasn’t convinced that it had been a very good idea.

  True, her friends seemed genuinely interested in the stalls and demonstrations - with everything from books on How To Find Your Inner Angel to aura reading - but Anna knew they were all (apart from Maya) mostly excited about consulting the real-live psychics who could give them a glimpse into their futures.

  But I hope the other psychics are doing a better job than this one, fretted Anna, or the girls will be demanding their entrance fees back from me…

  Much as she was fascinated by all things spiritual, Anna hadn’t admitted to the other girls beforehand that she was apprehensive about getting a reading done. There had been too many painful events in her life that might be revealed-the destructive relationship with her ex, the terrible rows with her mother, the baby… No one but her brother Owen knew about any of her past and that’s the way Anna wanted it to stay. But would some mind-reading, soul-searching stranger have the ability to expose these old, hidden wounds, she worried?

  But she needn’t have. So far, the rune-casting woman had told her that she had a warm and loving bond with her mother, a great boyfriend and a job with fabulous prospects. The last one made her laugh the most: much as she was grateful to have come across Nick and his offer of a job with a flat thrown in, being a waitress at the End-of-the-Line café was hardly the start of a high-powered career.

  “I think I know what you’re worrying about,” the woman nodded sagely. “You sense a conflict between your love-life and your career.”

  “Actually, that’s not really something I’ve been too bothered about,” Anna smiled.

  Considering I don’t have a love-life or a career…

  “Ah, I see that you have Scandinavian blood,” mused the henna red-head as she pored over Sonja’s palm.

  Don’t know why she needs to study my hand for that, thought Sonja sceptically. She just has to look at the rest of me.

  Sonja tossed her honey-blonde hair back and fixed her sky-blue eyes - both attributes inherited from her Swedish mother-on the woman across the table. She became so engrossed in the psychic’s ornately beaded, dangly earrings that she wasn’t really concentrating on what the woman said next.

  “…he has blonde hair too.”

  “Who has?” Sonja demanded.

  “The one you love.”

  Owen had brown hair. And he was the only one Sonja loved. She was about to tell the woman that she couldn’t be more wrong when she caught a glimpse of the earnest look on the not-so-psychic psychic’s face. Sonja didn’t have the heart to contradict her, so she just smiled non-committally.

  “You and he are very close,” said the woman, scrutinising the lines in Sonja’s hand once again. “The two of you are never apart if you can help it!”

  We’re never together and we can’t help that! Sonja sulked to herself, thinking of Owen sitting in the flat she’d never seen, many long, lonely miles away from her.

  “He works with animals.”

  He’s a web designer, Sonja mentally corrected her.

  “And I see that you are interested in the field of medicine.”

  Public relations, actually.

  “You’re the oldest child in your family…”

  I’m the youngest.

  “…and the only girl.”

  What, apart from my two older sisters?

  “How does this all sound?”

  “Great,” Sonja lied. “Worth every penny…”

  Shoving her purse back in her pocket, Sonja ambled over to the cafeteria area where the girls had all agreed to meet after they’d been ‘done’.

  So that’s where I’ve been going wrong, Sonja laughed to herself. There I was thinking I was having a long-distance fling with a dark-haired web designer, when I’ve actually got a blond vet boyfrien
d. Bet all the little brothers I’m supposed to have just love him…

  Kerry felt her heart pitter-patter its way through a lambada of palpitations.

  The woman in front of her had been silent for what felt like an awfully long time, her electric-blue streaked eyelids eerily closed. A large pink crystal pendant hung around her neck, reflecting the overhead fluorescent lights as her ample chest heaved in and out with concentration.

  That’s a rose quartz, Kerry noted, her eyes drawn to the crystal.

  She’d seen big chunks of the stone earlier, piled up alongside a myriad of other semi-precious stones on stalls round the hall. Kerry also had a tiny fragment of rose quartz in her chakra necklace - a birthday present from Anna last year.

  In fact, the necklace-a fine, black leather strip interspersed with tiny pieces of uneven, semiprecious stones - was what Kerry’s psychic was holding in her hands, trying to use this favourite possession to tune into the fortunes of the girl who owned it.

  “Mmmmmmm…” intoned the psychic suddenly.

  Kerry started imperceptibly on her uncomfortable plastic chair.

  “There was an event recently…”

  She must mean the crash, Kerry thought, her heart thudding. It had been a month since the accident; she’d been in the back of Mr Gladwin’s car when his son, Joe, having his first driving lesson, had swerved to avoid a deer on the road. Her broken collarbone and cracked ribs were still giving her niggles of pain, but she didn’t let on in front of Joe-he felt guilty enough as it was.

  “It was a happy event,” the psychic continued.

  Not the crash then, obviously, Kerry realised. “Er, well, I’m pretty happy most of the time, but I can’t think of one particular event…”

  “No one got married? Engaged even?” The woman fixed her with a penetrating look.

  “No.”

  “No one close to you had a baby recently or announced they were pregnant, perhaps?”

  Kerry racked her brains and tried to be helpful. Her mum’s friend at work had had a baby, but surely that was too distant?

  “No,” Kerry was forced to respond.

  “No matter,” said the woman, before taking another deep and meaningful breath.

  “I see…” she began again, “that you are a twin.”

  Kerry flinched; well, that was wrong for a start.

  “Um no…” she said warily. “But my boyfriend is a twin.”

  “Ahhh… that’ll be it,” nodded the woman, her crystal reflecting the light. “This boyfriend, he is quite a lot older than you…”

  “Um, only about three months older than me actually.”

  “I meant he is older than you in spirit terms, not in years.”

  “Oh,” replied Kerry, feeling well and truly chastised, if a little confused.

  “This boy,” said the psychic, closing her eyes again and taking a deep, reflective breath, “he’s a very serious young man.”

  Ollie? Serious? Is she serious? thought Kerry, visualising her boyfriend’s smiley face and twinkling eyes.

  “Well, I wouldn’t exactly say he was serious,” Kerry tried to explain. “He’s always fooling around…”

  “Ah, the clowns are always the ones who are crying on the inside,” the woman said enigmatically.

  “I see,” muttered Kerry, although she didn’t.

  “You must take care of this boy. He and his twin brother—”

  “Sister,” interrupted Kerry.

  “—sister, are very, very close and he worries more for her than for himself.”

  Kerry opened her mouth and closed it again without saying anything. She thought of Ollie and Natasha’s relationship; they weren’t particularly close, especially since Tasha’d moved away to London to work. Even back when she was just a pretty girl in Winstead, as opposed to a well-paid model jetting off to various exotic locations, they hadn’t been anything other than a typical brother and sister, who fought and teased each other and rubbed along OK.

  “I see,” repeated Kerry, for want of anything else to say.

  “Now this boy has another love apart from you…”

  Kerry gulped. OK, so nothing else had been very accurate so far, but maybe the psychic was just warming up. Maybe the amazing - and alarming - insights were just about to start.

  “His other love is his hobby, which is… sport, isn’t it?”

  “Er, music.”

  “Music-exactly.”

  Kerry looked expectantly at the big-bosomed woman and waited for more.

  “Well, the two of you will be together for ever and be very happy,” she finally rattled off brusquely. “Sorry, dear - that’s all I’m getting today. It sometimes just works that way.”

  “Er, thank you,” said Kerry dubiously as she fumbled in her purse.

  She’d had more insights from the red plastic fortune-telling fish in her cracker on Christmas Day than she’d had here today.

  “What do you see?” demanded Cat, staring mystified at the three old coins she’d just thrown down.

  “Interesting…” said the psychic whose card said she specialised in I Ching readings. “I have to consult my book for one moment.”

  Cat tapped her long, metallic, lavender-painted nails on the table. The tension of waiting to find out the answer to the question she’d just asked made her feel like having a cigarette, but red-ringed No Smoking signs loomed all around her in the bustling hall. And anyway, these days she only ever smoked when her friends weren’t around; their narking disapproval always did her head in.

  “Ah, now, in answer to your question, your future is to look to the wisdom of others and not just to your own counsel.”

  “What?” said Cat, crinkling her nose up in confusion. “What does that mean when it’s at home?”

  “Well, as it says - the wisdom of others in conjunction with your own wisdom will show you the way forward,” repeated the black-clad woman.

  “But what’s that got to do with anything?” blustered Cat. “Am I going to be famous or not?”

  “Only the wisdom of others can tell you that,” intoned the woman with infuriating patience, “as well as your own—”

  “—my own wisdom. Yeah, yeah,” said Cat sarcastically. “Listen, can we dump that one for a second and try another question?”

  “By all means.”

  The psychic seemed unruffled by Cat’s blunt tone and watched serenely as Cat rattled the coins in her hand, ready to ask her question and throw them for an answer.

  “Right-will I get married?”

  The woman noted the configuration of the fallen coins on a small pad and considered her answer.

  “Only when you begin to see the light will darkness lift and your heart be free. Listen to what your heart is saying…”

  Cat sighed and stopped listening altogether.

  Maya pressed her hands tightly together to stop them from shaking. They’d started quivering when the cardie-wearing woman had gazed up at her from the intricately illustrated tarot cards and said that she could see that Maya was a private person who kept her emotions very much to herself. That much was true.

  Her hands had continued to shake when the smiling woman pointed out that friends were very important to Maya, that she often acted as referee between them, that her home life was sometimes a little bit oppressive, that she was academically gifted but that her real passion was for something artistic, and that she’d only just found this outlet in the last few months.

  This accuracy was getting spooky.

  Of course, she could have seen me taking photos before Cat snatched my camera away, Maya tried to tell herself. But that didn’t explain how this woman could be so spot on about all the rest. Spooky wasn’t a word that Maya used a lot, but it was definitely the one that was most appropriate now.

  She’d been particularly interested when the woman said she saw that Maya was very fond of a young boy (it had to be Ravi, her sweet little brother), but there was also a younger girl around, one who seemed to bear her malice
. (“Always keep an eye on her; for some reason she likes to see you fail,” the psychic had said. Maya already did watch her thirteen-year-old sister, Sunny, like a hawk - the warning seemed apt.)

  “Now this is an exciting card,” said the tarot-reader, pointing to a dark-cloaked figure whose face couldn’t be made out, and nodding wisely. “The death card.”

  Maya’s nails dug into her palm in an involuntary spasm. That couldn’t exactly be good news, could it?

  “The death card doesn’t have any bad implications, you know,” the woman assured Maya, registering the alarm in her face. “It just means the end of one phase of your life and the start of a new one. It’s all about change.”

  Maya smiled nervously.

  “And the way it’s positioned beside this card…” the tarot-reader tapped a neighbouring card with a fairy-type figure on it “…is very significant. Yes, there’s a change coming and it’s all to do with love…”

  “Maya’s taking for ever,” moaned Cat.

  “Well, it gives you more time to stuff your face, doesn’t it?” said Sonja.

  Cat gave her cousin a narrow-eyed glare across the canteen table, then helped herself to another chunk of carrot cake from the paper plate in front of her.

  “Mind you, she has been there a long time…” Kerry muttered looking down at her watch.

  The other girls had all had time for coffee (and cake, in Cat’s case) and commiserations over their various lacklustre glimpses into the future, and still there was no sign of Maya.

  “I’ll go and have a nosy out in the hall-see what’s happening with her,” Anna suggested, rising from her chair.

  “No need,” Sonja nodded towards the glass-panelled door that opened into the main hall. “Here she comes now.”

  “Uh-oh,” mumbled Cat through a mouthful of carrot cake. “By the look on her face, I think she needs to sit down - sharpish!”

  CHAPTER 2

  ALL EYES ON OLLIE

  “Don’t look now, but I think we’re being eyed up…”

  Although the wonky clock on the wall of the End-of-the-Line café said it was ten to eight, it was actually 2.40 pm, and Nick was twenty minutes away from closing up this Sunday afternoon. In the background, the wonky jukebox was vibrating to the sound of some ancient Rolling Stones track, even though Joe had actually pressed the buttons for a Blur tune, which was just about the most up-to-date band Nick had deigned to put in his prized, original ‘50s Wurlitzer.