One of the Girls - Softcover

Clarke, Lucy

Softcover

ISBN 10: 059342266X ISBN 13: 9780593422663

Verlag: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 2023

Inhaltsangabe

A twisty psychological thriller from internationally bestselling author Lucy Clarke, One of the Girls is the delicious story of a bachelorette trip on a stunning Greek island... that ends in murder.

It was supposed to be the perfect weekend away. Six very different women travel to a sun-drenched Greek island for a bachelorette party. From the shimmering ocean views to the quaint tavernas and whitewashed streets, the vacation feels like the ideal escape. But dangerous undercurrents run beneath the sunset swims and midnight cocktails – because each of the women is hiding a secret, and soon their masks begin to slip. Someone is determined to make sure that Lexi’s marriage never happens – and that one of the women doesn’t leave the island alive.

This scorching thriller signals the arrival of a major breakout talent. One of the Girls examines the pressures and joys of female friendship . . . as well as the deadly consequences when a relationship goes wrong.

Über diesen Titel

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Lucy Clarke is the author of seven psychological thrillers. Her debut novel was a Richard and Judy Book Club pick, and her books have been sold in over 20 territories. Her most recent novel, The Castaways, was a Sunday Times bestseller.  Clarke lives by the sea with her husband and two children.

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

1

Lexi

Lexi unwound the taxi window. The warm wind was infused with pine and the arid scents of sun-baked earth. Tiers of whitewashed houses clustered close to the rising blue dome of a church.

The sky, Lexi thought. My God, how wide and cloudless could a sky be? It felt like a magician's trick, swapping the rain-slicked pavements of London for the shimmering heat of Greece. She couldn't quite believe that she was here.

"We're on a hen weekend," Bella was telling the taxi driver, oversized sunglasses pulled down, lipstick freshly reapplied. "Lexi's the bride," she said, swiveling around in the passenger seat to point.

"Congratulations," the driver said, warm, dark eyes flicking to hers in the rearview mirror.

"Thank you." Lexi smiled. The bride. She was the bride. She shook her head lightly, still a little stunned.

"I'm her maid of honor," Bella announced proudly. "You know: The best friend. The important one who organizes the hen weekend?"

"Self-appointed," Lexi added. "I wasn't going to have a maid of honor."

"Which I ignored since you weren't even going to have a hen weekend."

"True." Hen parties made Lexi think of twenty-something-year-olds dancing in cheap veils, shots slurped through phallic straws, blistered heels, and too-short skirts. In fact, had Lexi been twenty, she would have loved a hen party. She would have tossed back the tequila, danced on the podium in a wisp of a dress, and when her feet blistered, she would've kicked off her stilettos and danced barefoot. But she was thirty-one now-and done with waking in the morning with that queasy sense of regret and shame that had nothing to do with a hangover. She was finally-much to everyone's surprise, including her own-getting married to a man she loved.

I love you.

She'd actually said those words, aloud. Meant them. It happened over breakfast, the two of them sitting at his kitchen counter with sleep-ruffled hair, him laughing about his failed attempt at cooking lasagna the evening before. She'd begun saying the meal wasn't a total disaster-the wine was nice!-and then she'd added, I love you. Just like that. Three brand-new words. Settling between their pot of coffee and the stack of sourdough toast.

He had looked at her. Ed Tollock. Thirty-five. Thick, dark hair threaded with early silver. A low, deep voice. What was it about him? His calm confidence? The way he'd look at her for a long, intense moment, then shake his head, grin, as if he couldn't believe his luck?

He'd moved aside their mugs, reached for her hands. His fingers were tanned, with fine golden hairs on the backs of them, and he'd said, "I love you, too. And one day, very soon, I'm going to ask you to marry me." He'd smiled at her, so easily, so openly, that Lexi didn't snatch her hands away, grab her coat, and run. She met his gaze and said, "Is that right?"

Three weeks later there was a ring box. No extravagant candlelit dinner or down-on-one-knee ceremony. Just a simple walk along the banks of the Thames, hands held as they watched the white wake from a shelduck taking flight. His question, then her answer: Yes.

She glanced at her engagement ring now, the emerald-cut diamond glittering wildly. She was intent on keeping the wedding small: a gathering of family and friends taking over an old mill licensed for ceremonies. Simple, intimate. She didn't want the big dress, the hairstylist, the photographer. She just wanted him.

"I hear you: low-key," Bella had said when Lexi explained her wedding plans. "But don't think for one minute that exempts you from a hen party. You are getting married once, which means we are going on a hen weekend, and that, Lexi Jane Lowe, is that."

So here they were, the tiny Greek island of Aegos. They'd left behind the tourist hustle and a strip of noisy bars as they drove west from the airport. Now the road had emptied and narrowed, carrying them over a scrub-lined hillside where the music came from the tinkling of goat bells and a donkey braying in the lengthening shade of an olive tree.

She'd told Bella that she wanted to spend the weekend lazing in the sun, reading, swimming, and eating. Bella had nodded earnestly for about two seconds, before the corners of her lips curled upward and she wiggled her eyebrows, meaning she had other plans entirely.

Bella was saying something to the driver now, gesturing expansively, while he quaked with laughter. Lexi smiled. God, she loved this woman. Bella was her yes person. The one whom you could call day or night and pitch any outlandish idea, and Bella's voice would sparkle as she'd say, Yes!

Fen-Bella's girlfriend-was the calm to Bella's storm of energy. She was gazing from the taxi window, wind fingering her razor-short, bleached hair. The small tattoo of a swallow on the back of her neck looked so crisply drawn that it, too, might take flight. Her brow was furrowed and a ball of tension worked across her jaw. It was an expression so at odds with her usual relaxed, easy smile that Lexi touched her arm, asking, "Fen? You okay?"

Fen startled. The tension slid away as she smiled. "Fine. Sorry. Miles away."

Lexi had sensed an atmosphere between Fen and Bella at the airport, something weighted in the pauses before they responded to one another. She'd ask Bella about it when they were alone.

"Thank you again for letting us stay in your aunt's villa," Lexi said.

"It's a good excuse to return to Aegos."

"Bella said your aunt designed the place."

Fen nodded. "Originally for a client. Halfway through the project his finances imploded. He couldn't fund the rest. She was so in love with the place by then that she bought the plot from him."

"Has she lived here?"

"For a couple of years, but she found the winters hard. The villa is very isolated. There are no neighbors or even passing roads. She prefers to come in summer, bring a crowd. I think the remoteness unnerved her."

Fen's gaze returned to the window as the road unwound ahead of them.

There would be six of them staying at the villa. The second taxi carrying the other hens had detoured into town to stock up on provisions. Lexi had offered to go with them, but Bella said she'd do no such thing. "It's your hen party."

Lexi had a feeling she'd be hearing those words more than once this weekend.

"Almost there," the taxi driver said, changing into a lower gear as the tarmac gave way to a stony track.

Lexi gripped the door as they bounced over rutted ground, tires kicking up clouds of dust. They swung wide around rock-strewn potholes as the track drew them closer to the edge of the island.

When they crested a hilltop, for a moment Lexi could see nothing but the glittering blue kiss of sea. Then suddenly the villa appeared, stone-white with a Greek-flag-blue roof. It stood like a crown on the clifftop, reigning over a tiny, jeweled cove below.

Lexi could only stare.

Bella clapped her hands together. "Oh! Wow!"

Dust billowed behind them as the taxi descended steeply, brakes complaining. Lexi leaned forward, peering through the windscreen as she caught the climbing tangle of bougainvillea framing the side of the villa in a riot of pink.

The taxi came to a halt, engine ticking.

In a low whisper, as if speaking to herself, Fen said, "This is it."

Lexi pulled down her sunglasses, then stepped from the taxi. Even this late in the day, the heat was something solid, weighted, pressing against her skin. She took in the whitewashed villa with its fastened blue shutters. She could smell the first notes of the sea: salted and clean.

Stones crunched beneath sandals as the three of them fetched their cases from the trunk of the taxi. Bella waved away Lexi's attempt to pay...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: G. P. Putnam's Sons
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2023
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 059342266X
• ISBN 13: 9780593422663
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 449
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: preigu; mail@preigu.de; ; Lengericher Landstr. 19; Osnabrück; 49078; Deutschland