“How do you even fit three people into a Ferrari?” Nigel asked.
Mr. Tin twirled his phone nervously on the lacquered walnut console. “Carlton Bao’s father is on a state visit to Canada with the premier of China, and nothing must interrupt him. My orders from Mrs. Bao are that no hint of any scandal must ever reach his ears. He must never know about the dead girl. Do you understand? There is too much at stake—given his political position—and it is an especially sensitive time with the big once-in-a-decade changeover in party leadership happening right now.”
“Of course, of course,” Nigel assured him. “We will say that the white girl was his girlfriend. As far as the father is concerned, there was only one girl in the car.”
“Why does Mr. Bao even need to know about the white girl? Don’t worry, Mr. Tin. I have handled much worse dealing with some of those sheikhs’ children,” Eddie boasted.
Nigel shot Eddie a warning glare. The bank prided itself on the utmost discretion, and here was his associate blabbing away about other clients.
“We have a tactical response team in place in London that I am personally directing, and I can assure you we will do everything to contain this,” Nigel said, before turning to Eddie. “How much do you think it will take to keep Fleet Street quiet?”
Eddie inhaled deeply, trying to do some quick calculations. “It’s not just the press. The policemen, the ambulance drivers, the hospital staff, the families. There’s going to be an assload of people to shut up. I would suggest ten million pounds for starters.”
“Well, the minute you land in London, you need to take Mrs. Bao straight to the office. We need her to sign off on the withdrawal before you take her to the hospital to see her son. I’m just wondering what we should say if Mr. Bao asks us why we needed so much,” Nigel pondered.
“Just say the girl needed some new organs,” Mr. Tin suggested.
“We can also say we needed to pay the boutique,” Eddie added. “Those Jimmy Choos are bloody pricey, you know.”
2 HYDE PARK
LONDON, SEPTEMBER 10, 2012
Eleanor Young sipped on her morning tea, crafting her little white lie. She was holidaying in London with three of her closest friends—Lorena Lim, Nadine Shaw, and Daisy Foo—and after two days of being with the ladies nonstop, she desperately needed a few hours on her own. The trip was a much-needed distraction for all of them—Lorena was recovering from a Botox allergy scare, Daisy had gotten into yet another fight with her daughter-in-law over the choice of kindergartens for her grandchildren, and Eleanor herself was depressed that her son, Nicky, had not spoken to her for more than two years. And Nadine—well, Nadine was appalled by the state of her daughter’s brand-new apartment.
“Alamaaaaaaak! Fifty million dollars and I can’t even flush the toilet!” Nadine screeched as she entered the breakfast room.
“What do you expect, when everything is so bloody high-tech?” Lorena laughed. “Did the toilet at least help you suay kah-cherng?”*2
“No, lah! I waved and waved at all the stupid sensors but nothing happened!” Feeling defeated, Nadine plopped down into an ultramodern chair that appeared to be constructed out of a tangled pile of red velvet ropes.
“I don’t want to criticize, but I think this apartment of your daughter’s is not only hideously modern, it’s hideously overpriced,” Daisy commented between bites of toast topped with pork floss.
“Aiyah, she’s paying for the name and the location, nothing more,” Eleanor sniffed. “Personally, I would have chosen a unit with a nice view of Hyde Park, rather than the view facing Harvey Nichols.”
“You know my Francesca, lah! She could care less about the park—she wants to fall asleep staring at her favorite department store! Thank God she finally married someone who can pay her overdraft.” Nadine sighed.
The ladies kept quiet. Things hadn’t been easy for Nadine ever since her father-in-law, Sir Ronald Shaw, woke up from a six-year coma and turned off the money spigot on his family’s free spending. Her profligate daughter, Francesca (once voted one of the Fifty Best Dressed Women by Singapore Tattle), did not respond well to being put on a clothing budget, and decided that her best solution was to embark on a brazen affair with Roderick Liang (of the Liang Finance Group Liangs), who had only just married Lauren Lee. Singapore’s social set was scandalized, and Lauren’s grandmother, the formidable Mrs. Lee Yong Chien, retaliated by making sure every old-guard family in Southeast Asia shut their doors firmly on the Shaws and the Liangs. In the end, a severely chastened Roderick chose to crawl back to his wife rather than run off with Francesca.
Finding herself a social pariah, Francesca fled to England and quickly landed on her feet by marrying “some Iranian Jew with half a billion dollars.”*3 Since moving into 2 Hyde Park, the obscenely expensive luxury condominium backed by the Qatari royal family, she was finally on speaking terms with her mother again. Naturally, this gave the ladies an excuse to visit the newlyweds, but of course they just wanted to check out the much-publicized apartment and, more important, have a free place to stay.*4
As the women discussed the day’s shopping agenda, Eleanor launched into her white lie. “I can’t go shopping this morning—I’m meeting those boooring Shangs for breakfast. I need to see them at least once while I am here, or else they will be terribly insulted.”
“You shouldn’t have told them you were coming,” Daisy chided.
“Alamak, you know that Cassandra Shang will find out sooner or later! It’s like she has some special radar, and if she knew I was in England and didn’t pay my respects to her parents, I would never hear the end of it. What to do, lah? This is the curse of being married to the Youngs,” Eleanor said, pretending to bemoan her situation. In reality, even though she had been married to Philip Young for more than three decades, his cousins—“the Imperial Shangs,” as they were known to all—had never extended her any courtesies. If Philip had come with her, they would surely have been invited to the Shangs’ palatial estate in Surrey, or at the very least to dinner in town, but whenever Eleanor came to England on her own, the Shangs remained as silent as tombs.
Of course, Eleanor had long since given up trying to fit in with her husband’s snobbish, insular clan, but lying about the Shangs was the only way to stop her girlfriends from prying too much. If she was seeing anyone else, her kay poh*5 friends might surely want to tag along, but the mere mention of the Shangs intimidated them from asking too many questions.
While the ladies decided to spend the morning sampling all the free gourmet delicacies at Harrods’ famed Food Halls, Eleanor, discreetly dressed in a chic camel-colored Akris pantsuit, racing green MaxMara swing coat, and her signature gold-rimmed Cutler and Gross sunglasses,*6 left the swanky building on Knightsbridge and walked two blocks east to the Berkeley hotel, where a silver Jaguar XJL parked in front of a row of perfectly round topiaries awaited her. Still paranoid that her friends might have followed her, Eleanor glanced around quickly before getting into the sedan and being whisked off.
At Connaught Street in Mayfair, Eleanor emerged in front of a smart row of townhouses. Nothing about the red-and-white-brick Georgian fa?ade or the glossy black door hinted at what awaited beyond. She pressed the intercom button, and a voice responded almost immediately: “May I help you?”