Celebrity Shopper Read online

  Celebrity

  Shopper

  Carmen

  Reid

  BANTAM PRESS

  LONDON • TORONTO • SYDNEY • AUCKLAND • JOHANNESBURG

  Contents

  Cover

  Title

  Copyright

  Also by Carmen Reid

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-One

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Chapter Forty-Four

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  About the Author

  This eBook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

  Version 1.0

  Epub ISBN 9781409094678

  www.randomhouse.co.uk

  TRANSWORLD PUBLISHERS

  61–63 Uxbridge Road, London W5 5SA

  A Random House Group Company

  www.rbooks.co.uk

  First published in Great Britain

  in 2010 by Bantam Press

  an imprint of Transworld Publishers

  Copyright © Carmen Reid 2010

  Carmen Reid has asserted her right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the author of this work.

  This book is a work of fiction and, except in the case of historical fact, any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

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

  ISBN 9780593066287 (cased) ISBN 9780593062982 (tpb)

  This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition, including this condition, being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  Addresses for Random House Group Ltd companies outside the UK can be found at: www.randomhouse.co.uk The Random House Group Ltd Reg. No. 954009

  The Random House Group Limited supports the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), the leading international forest-certification organization. All our titles that are printed on Greenpeace-approved FSC-certified paper carry the FSC logo. Our paper procurement policy can be found at www.rbooks.co.uk/environment

  Typeset in 11.5/15.5pt Palatino by Falcon Oast Graphic Art Ltd. Printed and bound in Great Britain by Clays Ltd, Bungay, Suffolk

  2 4 6 8 10 9 7 5 3 1

  REASONS TO MEET ANNIE VALENTINE,

  Celebrity

  Shopper

  ‘You’ll be rooting for her as she battles family

  life … and the scary world of telly, while never looking

  anything less than fabulous.’

  Heat

  ‘A woman who was making makeovers hip long before

  Gok Wan came on the scene.’

  Sunday Herald

  ‘The world of TV fashion makeovers is given

  a hilariously warm send-up.’

  Daily Mirror

  ‘More heartwarming than an expensive round

  of retail therapy.’

  Daily Mail

  ‘A brilliant read that’ll be popular with fashionistas!’

  Closer

  ‘A sassy little number’

  OK!

  ‘A rollicking tale’

  Glamour

  Also by Carmen Reid

  THREE IN A BED

  DID THE EARTH MOVE?

  HOW WAS IT FOR YOU?

  UP ALL NIGHT

  Starring Annie Valentine

  THE PERSONAL SHOPPER

  LATE NIGHT SHOPPING

  HOW NOT TO SHOP

  And for teenage readers

  SECRETS AT ST JUDE’S: NEW GIRL

  SECRETS AT ST JUDE’S: JEALOUS GIRL

  SECRETS AT ST JUDE’S: DRAMA GIRL

  Visit www.carmenreid.com for competitions,

  exclusive content and Carmen’s blog!

  Chapter One

  On-screen Annie:

  Purple and white dress (Mango)

  Blue wooden wedge sandals (Chloé)

  Mighty beige control pants (Spanx)

  Belt? Yes? No? Can’t decide (Topshop)

  Heavy-duty anti-perspirant (Mitchum)

  Heavy-duty anti-shine powder (Clinique)

  Heavy-duty hairspray (Elnett)

  Total est. cost: £530

  ‘I think you’re going to cry …’

  ‘OK, here’s our shooting schedule for today,’ Amelia said, opening the file in her hands and bringing out two sheets of paper neatly stapled together.

  Amelia, in her white ankle-grazer jeans, chiffon top and pink suede wedges, may have looked as if she was about to go clubbing, but she was the most ruthlessly efficient PA Annie had ever met – which was of course why Tamsin Hinkley, producer and boss of Hinkley Productions, employed her.

  Our shooting schedule!

  Annie still felt a little inward thrill when she heard those words. Appearing on TV still wasn’t ordinary; it still didn’t feel humdrum, typical or routine in any way at all.

  For years Annie Valentine had worked as a personal shopper in The Store, one of London’s most glorious fashion meccas. Somehow, even though she wasn’t willowy thin, or under thirty, or married to a famous producer, she had managed to swap shop life for a TV-presenting job. Well, OK, her first TV-presenting job had been a thankless, penniless grind, but now … now she was filming her second series of How Not To Shop.

  The first six-episode series had been a surprise Channel 4 hit, steadily climbing the ratings charts to become one of the most popular slots on Wednesday night.

  A second ten-episode series had been commissioned, Annie’s generous wages had increased and now she was beginning to feel like a real, live, genuine TV star. She got fan mail! People waved at her in the street! Taxi drivers asked her: ‘Ain’t I seen you on the telly or something?’

  Just like its presenter, How Not To Shop was girlie but ballsy, frivolous but with feeling. It was a chat
ty but inspiring Girls’ Night In.

  Viewers didn’t necessarily watch at home alone. They rang their sisters and their girlfriends, opened a bottle of wine, brought along a bucket of popcorn and watched Annie together.

  Annie did makeovers on the show, yes, but always with a twist: what to wear to your ex-husband’s wedding, what to wear to ask for a promotion, what to wear to tell the plumber that his work was terrible and he wasn’t getting paid …

  The show also featured a high-street sweep, with Annie picking out all the best things from the mainstream stores. Plus, she did little thought-provoking strands, including a regular ‘Women and Money’ slot. She didn’t just want to be on TV encouraging women to part with their hard-earned cash, she wanted them to be careful and clever with it too.

  Annie tried to understand money, as did her partner in the slot, Svetlana Wisneski. Svetlana, a multipily married millionairess, would sashay on to the screen draped in a super-label dress plus jewellery worth ten times the average salary and huskily begin with something like: ‘Is a w-ell-known Russian saying: “Spending is short, but earning is long.” Don’t throw away your money, my darrrrrrrlings, choose and use your assets w-isely.’

  After twenty-plus years in England, Svetlana had finally learned to pronounce her ‘w’s properly, but she tended to over-exaggerate them.

  Since Annie had been signed up to do the programme, she’d gone through a series of radical changes. Her once trademark bright blond ponytail had been lopped off into a tousled, face-framing short cut which highlighted her delicate features, ready smile and friendly eyes in a different way. Annie had always been devoted to fashion and dressed to impress but now there was more clever camouflage work involved. Her figure, ever more curvaceous than she would have liked, had now curved right out of a size 12 into the dangerous fashion territory of size 14 and beyond. This had everything to do with her biggest change of all, the knock-out change, the one which had redefined her the most: she’d gone from being a mother of two to a mother of four.

  Annie still wasn’t sure how it was possible to be so busy and so tired at exactly the same time. Without her partner Ed currently taking an extended paternity leave and dealing with just about every aspect of family life, there was no way Annie could be the star of her own television show.

  Right now, Ed was downstairs coping admirably with breakfast for the thirteen-month-old twins: Michael and Minette. Or Micky and Minnie as Annie’s thirteen-year-old boy, Owen, had christened them as soon as he’d heard their official names.

  ‘So what are we going to wear on screen today?’ Amelia asked Annie.

  Annie closed her eyes, not to help her think, but to let make-up girl, Ginger, apply a careful coat of shadow, liner, and then mascara for the benefit of the camera.

  ‘These are the shoes and I think you’re going to cry,’ Annie replied. She pointed past Amelia to a pair of high wooden wedges adorned with a wealth of straps and buckles. ‘You’re going to be soooo jealous.’

  ‘Oh, to die for …’ Amelia agreed, ‘but that’s as far as you’ve got?’

  ‘The red dress?’ Annie asked hopefully.

  ‘No!’ Amelia replied, flipping through her file until she came to the outfit schedule. ‘Been worn four times already; even the viewers who think it’s great you wear things again are beginning to worry.’

  ‘I love that dress, it’s so flattering,’ Annie sighed, and then ventured: ‘The orange?’

  ‘Too like red,’ was Amelia’s verdict. ‘How about something blue? Or purple? Shall I look in the cupboard?’

  Annie wanted to say no, because she didn’t like people – even people as smart as Amelia – to leaf through her carefully chosen things. But this was her ‘office’ wardrobe. There was a clothing allowance for the show (as Annie constantly reminded Ed. Yes, but she definitely subsidized it, as Ed constantly reminded Annie).

  The BlackBerry on Annie’s desk, right beside her hand, began to ring. Actually, it began to trill, buzz, bleep, shuffle and jump, because she kept her phone on every possible setting so that despite the noisy chaos which tended to surround her – both at home and in the studio – she didn’t miss a call … well, not so many calls anyway.

  ‘Hi!’ she answered cheerfully, seeing the name of her sister Dinah on the screen. ‘How are you doing? I’m sorry it’s been—’

  ‘Exactly one week since you said you were going to phone me right back?’ Dinah sounded unusually frosty.

  ‘I’ve been busy,’ Annie protested. ‘The telly … the babies …’

  ‘Annie Valentine, you know perfectly well that you have a full-time, completely saintly nanny partner on hand twenty-four hours a day, so don’t you dare give me the I-was-too-busy-with-the-babies line,’ Dinah snapped.

  ‘I’m sorry. I should have phoned before,’ Annie apologized.

  ‘Yeah, you should have.’

  Annie decided to change the subject. ‘How’s work?’

  ‘That’s what I’ve phoned to tell you. I’ve been laid off and I’m just gutted …’ Dinah began.

  But the words didn’t get nearly as much of Annie’s attention as they should have done because, just then, Amelia held out a monstrous shiny purple wrap thing which Annie must have bought when she was drunk or maybe blinded by the glare of the sun – what other explanation could there be? Plus, the call-waiting signal began to bleep in her ear.

  ‘No, no, no. No way!’ Annie exclaimed, which was right for Dinah, but she was actually talking to Amelia about the dress.

  To Dinah, she said: ‘Babes, will you hang on for one tiny moment? Just for me? Pleeeeease. I’m expecting a call from my boss any second.’

  She pressed a button.

  ‘Annie!’ came the warm, fruity voice of her best friend, Connor McCabe, actor.

  ‘Hello, honey,’ she greeted him.

  ‘We’re supposed to do lunch,’ he reminded her.

  ‘I know, I know, I’ve been terrible. How many times have I put you off now?’

  ‘Three. One more refusal and that’s probably it, I’ll have to strike you from my contacts book.’

  ‘Connor! We go way back, doesn’t history count for anything?’

  ‘Errr … no.’

  ‘I knew you when you weren’t famous,’ she reminded him.

  ‘I can now say the same thing about you,’ he reminded her.

  ‘I’m not famous,’ she immediately protested, mainly because the idea of being famous was terrifying.

  Annie loved doing the TV show, she loved the programme’s growing success, but she tried to think of it as doing what she’d always done in the changing rooms of The Store: giving people good advice about how to make clothes work for them. It was just on a bigger scale … the latest viewing figures were close to two million.

  Annie didn’t want fame. Imagine having photographers posted outside your front door, there to snap you on the way to the supermarket all covered in dog hairs and baby sick. Imagine being sniped at in gossip columns. Or having to endure your bikini shots on a magazine cover. It was too hideous even to think about.

  Annie had decided that if she didn’t act famous, if she still went on the underground and still hung out in the same places with the same people as she’d always done before, then she couldn’t possibly become famous. Fame was a nasty, inconvenient disease that she didn’t want to catch.

  Whereas money … now that was a different matter altogether. Annie wanted all the money that could possibly be had, because to her, money represented security. She’d not had nearly enough of it for most of her adult life and somehow, even though she was very well paid, she still didn’t seem to have enough now.

  On her desk, buried under all the other cuttings, magazines and bits of paperwork, was Annie’s bank statement for this month, greeted as usual with horrified shock. It wasn’t just the clothes, it was the mortgage, the school fees, the groceries, the taxis, the gym subscription, all the multiple expenses of life. If you worked hard, you seemed to have to spend just as
hard. Maybe she would cancel the gym subscription …it had been five months since she last set foot in the gym.

  ‘So when are we doing lunch? I need a date,’ Connor insisted. ‘I want to go somewhere incredibly cool and show off to everyone who’s anyone that hot new telly star Annie V is my oldest and dearest best friend.’

  ‘Aha, so it’s not about me, it’s all about you,’ Annie pointed out.

  ‘It’s always all about me!’ Connor told her. ‘You’ve known me long enough to know that.’

  ‘True …’ Annie was still shaking her head at Amelia’s dress options. She was also sucking in her cheeks as instructed by Ginger, who was now dusting on rouge.

  ‘How about a week on Thursday?’ she suggested, glancing about for her planner, but unable to locate it. ‘I don’t think there’s anything happening lunchtime that Thursday; I’m sure I can get away for a couple of hours. Where shall we go?’ She did manage to locate a Post-it note on her desk and a Biro to scribble down the details.

  ‘I think we have to go to De Soto’s; it’s where all the Soho power people go these days. It’s the place. The powerhouse.’

  ‘OK, you book the table and I will see you there a week on Thursday, one p.m. I will call you immediately if I have a problem with that. Love you,’ she added.

  Connor hung up and Annie flicked back over to Dinah’s call, while instructing Amelia: ‘Yes! That one, that will work with the shoes, we’ll open it right up, put a white vest top underneath, very fresh, very summer-is-on-its-way.’

  ‘It’s February,’ Amelia reminded her.

  ‘I know, darlin’, but we have to give people hope. Hope is what we are all about.’

  She spoke into the phone: ‘Dinah, babes?’

  The line was dead.

  ‘Oh no,’ Annie said out loud.

  Annie would have called Dinah straight back, her finger would honestly have hit redial, straightaway, but just then Ed popped his head round the door and all activity in the room ceased, because he had Micky and Minnie in his arms.