The man takes it, reads it in silence, and his expression changes.

“Well,” he says. “I’ll let Mr. Andrews know you’re here.”

He retreats and we all face Alicia, who’s looking smug yet humble in that annoying way she has.

“What did you write?” I demand.

“Just a few words that I thought might help,” she says simply.

I can hear Mum and Janice agreeing in loud whispers that the name “Alicia Merrelle” is like royalty in the States and think how many celebrities she must have met at Golden Peace, not that she’d ever gossip, because she’s such a nice discreet girl.

A nice discreet girl? I have explained to Mum about Alicia Bitch Long-legs over and over—

Anyway. Whatever.

—

It’s only a few moments later that our friend in the linen suit appears again and ushers us silently toward the house—all except Luke, who stayed in the RV to talk to Gary. (There’s some big piece of gossip from the conference dinner, involving a junior government minister.) The house has a massive studded front door, and just for a moment I think a drawbridge is going to come down. But instead we skirt round the house/castle/mansion altogether and file between some immaculate hedges like in the maze at Hampton Court, until we come out onto a great big lawn with a gigantic bouncy castle and a table covered in food and five zillion kids running about and a banner reading HAPPY 5TH BIRTHDAY, PEYTON!

Ah. So that’s who Peyton is. Actually, you can’t tell who she is, because every single little girl is wearing a shiny princess frock. But it’s obvious who Corey is, from the way the guy in the linen suit approaches him deferentially and starts gesturing at us.

He’s quite amazing-looking, Corey. He’s very buff and tanned, with thick black hair and what look like tweezered eyebrows. He looks way younger than Dad. Next to him is a woman who I guess is Mrs. Corey, and when I look at her, the only word that comes to mind is “frosted.” She has shiny blond hair, a sparkly top, embossed jeans, diamanté sandals, zillions of rings and bracelets, and a jeweled clip in her hair. She basically looks like someone took the glitter pot and emptied it over her. She also has big tanned breasts and a very low-cut top. I mean, very low-cut. For a children’s birthday party.

At last Corey heads toward us and we all glance at one another. We haven’t decided who’s going to speak or what we’re going to say or anything. But, as usual, Alicia gets in first.

“Mr. Andrews,” she says. “I am Alicia Merrelle.”

“Mrs. Merrelle.” Corey takes her hand. “Honored to have you visit. How can I help?”

Close up, he doesn’t look quite as young. In fact, he’s got that over-tight, too-much-plastic-surgery look. And now I’m really confused. Is this Dad’s Corey or not? I’m opening my mouth to ask him, when Mrs. Corey appears by his side. If you put her in a cotton frock and wiped off all the shiny eye shadow, she’d probably look about twenty-three. Maybe she is twenty-three.