Silk
Table of Contents
Title Page
Acknowledgments
Getting Ready
Part One - Autumn/Winter
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Part Two - Spring/Summer
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Part Three - London, Los Angeles, Tokyo, Milan
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Epilogue
Copyright Page
Rupert James is a celebrity and fashion journalist. He lives in
London and is married to a barrister.
He can be contacted via his website at:
www.rupert-james.com
Acknowledgements
Several people, all of them experts in their field, helped me with this book. I’m particularly grateful to Marcus Soanes, Ren Pearce of Pearce Fionda, Helen Moorhouse and Stefano Beretta. I would also like to thank my agent, Sheila Crowley of Curtis Brown, and my editor, Gillian Green, for their encouragement and advice.
Getting Ready
Christine stood in front of the mirror, composing her face into a suitably serious expression, what her ex-husband called her ‘legal look’. She wasn’t too displeased with what she saw. Her hair was still almost entirely brown, apart from the odd grey strand, dead straight, well conditioned and cut in a long bob; so many of her fellow female barristers were strangers to the salon, and looked as if they’d been dragged through a hedge backwards. Her skin no longer had the elasticity of youth – she was forty-seven, after all, and the only way to have tight skin at her age was the have the slack chopped off. But she didn’t sag or pouch, there were no double chins, no scrawny chicken neck either, just a softness and slight crinkliness that could be controlled and concealed with lotions, potions and powders. She took care with her make-up, as with every other aspect of her life. She wanted to appear subtle, high class, worth-the-money – not like some of the painted skulls that she saw rattling around the robing rooms.
Satisfied that she still looked the business, Christine put on her black legal gown – grasping it by the yoke, swinging it behind her shoulders and letting it settle – a move she’d perfected over twenty-plus years at the bar. She stepped back and surveyed the effect. It hung perfectly, accentuating her slim waist, her full bust, drawing the eye down to her legs, still her best feature, long legs encased in dark tights, disappearing up into the skirt of her well-tailored suit. It was always to her legs that men looked first – from clients to solicitors to counsel to judges. It didn’t do any harm for a woman in this profession to look sexy – discreetly sexy, of course, one didn’t want the clerks to gossip. But if there was one thing Christine had learnt since she graduated from law school and was called to the bar, it was that looks count. Many the promising career that had stalled, unaccountably, ten years after the call. It was easy to blame the men at the top, keeping the women in their place – but, Christine thought, bad grooming was just as much at fault.