One Minute Later: Behind every secret is a story, the emotionally gripping new book from the bestselling author

As the fun died down and Vivienne sank laughing into the chair they’d reserved for her, she gasped and laughed again as Trudy pointed her to the pile of gifts at the end of the cushioned bench seat.

‘All for you,’ Trudy declared exultantly.

‘All for one, one for all!’ Sachi sang out, her engaging French accent resonating even in those few simple words.

Saanvi, whose stunning black hair and exquisite features made her as exotic as the Indian divinity she was named for, began passing the gifts along. Saanvi’s much older husband ran a global macro hedge fund, where Saanvi had recently been promoted to head up the quantitative risk management team.

‘How many carats did Greg manage?’ Shaz, their Australian derivatives lawyer, wanted to know. Though Shaz mainly worked out of Frankfurt, she was back and forth to London all the time.

‘I’m sure it’ll be at least seven,’ Vivienne shot back, causing another raucous uplift of glasses to toast the prediction.

They’d shared so much during their time at uni that sometimes it felt as though they hadn’t had a life before. They never judged one another in negative ways; they did everything they could to support each other, because they understood who they were and what power their friendship gave them.

These GaLs were her family away from home, the rock that kept her safe and strong; the exclusive network that made everything possible.

‘Are you in Singapore on Thursday?’ Trudy wanted to know.

‘I leave on Wednesday,’ Vivi told her.

‘Saanvi, did you hear that?’ Trudy demanded. ‘She is going to Singapore on Wednesday.’

‘Brilliant,’ Saanvi responded triumphantly. ‘Email me your details and I’ll make sure I’m on the same flight. Where are you staying?’

‘I’m not sure yet,’ Vivienne replied, ‘but I’ll put it in the email. Oh my God, what’s this?’ She pulled the softest, palest pink something from a satin-ribboned box with velveteen stripes and diamanté studs. ‘Oh, you’re kidding me. Myla silk pyjamas. I’ve always wanted a pair …’

Trudy threw out her hands. ‘How on earth did I know that?’ she demanded in amazement.

Vivienne pressed a hand to her chest as she laughed, then leaned forwards to embrace her friend. She coughed to try and clear the tightness in her lungs and sat down again to open more presents.

From Saanvi there were two tickets for a day full of treatments at the Thermes Marins spa in Monte Carlo. ‘Oh wow!’ Vivienne cried, completely blown away. ‘We haven’t been there since we graduated. This is amazing.’

‘Open this one next,’ Shaz insisted, pushing a small silver-wrapped packet into Vivienne’s hand.

Vivienne’s eyes widened with astonishment when she found more tickets, this time for a helicopter transfer from Nice to Monaco.

‘And in this one,’ Sachi told her, ‘you will find a voucher for two return flights to Nice – and a little something else to go with it.’

The something else turned out to be a night at the Hotel de Paris.

‘Now all you have to do,’ Trudi pointed out, ‘is decide which one of us you’re going to take with you.’

‘Oh for God’s sake,’ Vivienne protested. ‘How on earth am I going to do that? Can’t we get our diaries together and work out a time for us all to go?’

‘Best idea I’ve heard all day,’ Shaz concurred, refilling the glasses.

As Vivienne watched and joined in the bubbling excitement she pushed at her chest again, as though the pressure might disperse the ache. She really ought to eat something before downing the champagne, or she’d have another dizzy spell. She reached for a smoked salmon hors d’oeuvre and popped it into her mouth. Delicious, heavenly, so she tried another.

Shaz was asking her something, but for some reason Shaz’s voice seemed to be coming through water. It bobbed back to the surface with sudden clarity as she said, ‘Vivi!Are you all right?’

Vivienne laughed. ‘Of course,’ but the room was dipping away and lurching back as though she were on a ship in a storm, and when she tried to lift her glass she found she couldn’t move her arm. Everything hurt, she realized, her whole body, and the pain was clenching so hard into her chest …

‘Vivienne!’ someone shouted. She thought it was Saanvi.

‘Oh my God!’ Hands were closing around her arms. ‘She’s fainting. Get her some air …’

Vivienne’s face contorted as she tried to breathe. ‘I don’t … It’s …’ she gasped.

‘Her lips are blue … Oh Jesus! Vivienne!’

‘Help! Someone. We need help.’

Vivienne was still trying to breath.

‘Let me through. I’m a doctor, clear some space.’

A man’s face came into view, blurred and dark and moving close.

‘Call an ambulance,’ he barked. ‘Do it now. What’s her name?’

‘Vivienne.’

‘Vivienne,’ he said urgently. ‘I’m going to lie you down …’

She was trying to listen, even to laugh, because this was funny wasn’t it, or embarrassing … It couldn’t be real, but it hurt so much …

‘Deep breaths,’ he was saying, moving her roughly to the floor. ‘Come on Vivienne, you can do it. In, out. In, out.’ His fist was banging into her chest.

She tried. In … The noise was awful. Rushing, ripping, breaking … ‘Mum,’ she murmured weakly.

‘In, out.’ The world was going black. He was still banging her chest … ‘Stay with me,’ he shouted angrily. ‘Vivienne. Stay with me.’

CHAPTER TWO (#ulink_6d2b192b-7a7c-530c-a06f-f5ac1913c0be)

SHELLEY (#ulink_6d2b192b-7a7c-530c-a06f-f5ac1913c0be)

Summer 1984

It was a crackpot idea.

Everyone had said so.

Friends, families, even Shelley and Jack, whose plan it was, thought they were crazy, but hey ho, they’d gone ahead and done it anyway. Why not? They’d spent holidays at Deerwood Farm as far back as when they were knee-high to tadpoles, as Shelley’s uncle Bob used to call them. They’d continued to come as teens, helping out in the barns, running wild and loving every animal as if it were a pet – and every mouthful of Aunt Sarah’s home bakes as if they were the very best in the world, which they were.

Even when Jack and Shelley had started going further afield for their holidays they’d continued to count those halcyon summers at the farm amongst their happiest memories. The place was as special to them as any place could possibly be, for it was at Deerwood that their childhood friendship had blossomed during their teenage years into an embarrassed and fumbling romance, and was also where Jack, aged fourteen, had first asked Shelley to marry him. (He’d asked several times after that and she’d always readily accepted. It was just something they used to do every now and again for the sheer joy of it.) Jack even swore Deerwood was magical, and Shelley, whose aunt and uncle owned the farm, had earnestly assured him he was right.

Jack had grown up in the semi next door to Shelley on a shady, red-brick street in Ealing. They’d been best friends forever, so it was no surprise to anyone when they’d married as soon as their uni days were over. By then Jack was a qualified veterinary surgeon, and Shelley was already teaching at a West London primary.

With a little help from Jack’s parents they’d scraped together a deposit for a two-bedroomed house in Brentford, and their first child, Hanna, was born a year after they moved in. Their second, Zoe, came along eighteen months later on the same day that Princess Diana gave birth to Prince William. They were happy, blessed, had little to complain about, with Jack’s popularity as a vet growing and Shelley’s role as a full-time mum keeping her occupied, if not entirely satisfied.