After introducing audiences to the otherworldly affluence of Sex and Vanity and Crazy Rich Asians, Kevin Kwan’s latest delectable foray back into the lives (and lies) of the ultrarich focuses on the precarious state of Rufus Leung Gresham, future Earl of Greshambury and son of a former Hong Kong supermodel. The reputation and financial standing of Rufus’s family rest on his decision to either follow his heart or follow the money. Here, readers are transported to his sister Augusta’s Hawaiian destination wedding, the site of percolating drama just about to burst through to the surface.
Bellaloha Resort
SOUTH KONA, BIG ISLAND • COCKTAIL HOUR
Jackie had just successfully transported three hundred VVIP guests—many with their own security details—from a pavilion overlooking the beach at the Four Seasons Hualalai to another pavilion overlooking another beach at the Bellaloha Resort ten miles south. Here, these pampered pashas would be plied with Chilean wine bearing fake French labels till the chef informed her that dinner was ready. Since Arabella could not be convinced to stage the wedding banquet anywhere but in the rain forest of her beloved resort, the chef was forced to cook in a makeshift tent with generators, since the latest eruption had rendered the state-of-the-art kitchen kaput, and it could take a while before three hundred Dover sole filets could be poached, deboned, and plated. Jackie would also never understand why Arabella had insisted on Dover sole being flown in when they were on an island surrounded by some of the freshest fish in the world. Just as she was trying to make sure her team had lit all eight hundred of the paper lanterns hanging from the aerial roots of the great banyan tree in the center of the banquet site, the earl tapped her on the shoulder.
No sooner had Francis done this than he realized that his mind had gone blank. What was this lady’s bloody name? “Ah . . . Lee, isn’t it?”
“Excuse me?” Jackie replied politely. What now?
“Isn’t your name Lee?”
“It’s Jackie actually, but you can call me whatever you want, Lord Greshamsbury.”
“Jackie! My apologies. Ah, would you be able to do me a tiny little favor?”
“Yes?” He means a big favor.
“I need to find a place where I can, you know, be with Prince Julius.”
“Where you can be?” Does he want to shtup the prince?
“You know, two fathers having a celebratory toast. Someplace where we won’t be disturbed. Perhaps the wine cellar at the resort . . .”
“I’d love to get you the wine cellar but the fire department has chained the doors to every building on the property. No one has access until they’ve stabilized things.”
“How unfortunate. Can you perhaps set up a tent, like one of those fabulous tents that the Maasai Mara do, with zebra skins and oil lamps and campaign tables and whatnot?”
Yougottabefuckingkiddingme. “Lord Greshamsbury, I don’t have a single spare Maasai Mara tent at the moment, but you know, there’s a bunch of surf cabins overlooking the beach where we could set you up with a bartender with some drinks.”
“Oh,no,no,no. No bartender necessary. I know how short-staffed you must be as it is. But the surf cabin is a great idea.”
“So you’d like this cabin prepared for you after the wedding banquet?”
“Well, no . . . I’d like to do this right now.”
Of course he would. “I’ll see what I can do. It might take a little time to get things set up at the cabin.”
“Fabulous. Can you make it a little clubby, like the card room at White’s, perhaps, where I could offer the prince something to smoke and a good scotch?”
Fuck my life. “We’ll make it feel just like the card room at White’s. You’d never know the difference.” Google “card room at White’s.”
“You’re an angel, Lee, you really are.”
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Twenty minutes later, Francis found himself in a hipster surf cabin that looked like one of those sickeningly perfect Zen wabisabi spaces featured in Kinfolk magazine. The only nod to White’s was the tattered old Oushak rug Jackie had miraculously found, on which she placed a folding games table with a box of Cohibas, two whiskey tumblers, and a bottle of Gordon & MacPhail scotch (1). The scotch that Prince Julius now swirled through his teeth in great satisfaction.
“I have to hand it to you, Francis. You and Arabella have really out done yourselves. I haven’t been to an affair like this since the Earl of Palliser married that Colette girl and her rich Chinese father paid for everything. Even my dear cousin Margrethe told me she’s never been to a wedding this special, and you must know she gets invited to everything. I’m very relieved that I didn’t have to foot the bill, ho ho ho.”
“Well, funny you mention that. I’m sure you realize . . . ah . . . that the expenses have been adding up, especially since we were forced to change all the venues for the wedding at the very last minute.”
“For sure, for sure. Rather unlucky timing, that little jism of lava. But glorious to look at. Mother Nature at her best.”
Francis took a deep breath, deciding it was best to rip off the bandage quickly. “Might there be any chance . . . you could float me a little loan?”
“A loan? What could I possibly loan to you that would actually make a difference? What I have is a drop in the hat compared to you people. You know Hanne and I are so grateful, so grateful . . .” Prince Julius selected a cigar from the box and began unwrapping the plastic noisily.
“Yes, thank you. All the same, Arabella and I would be dead chuffed if you might express some of that gratitude in the form of a little loan. Don’t ever tell her I asked, of course.”
“Of course, of course. Say I was able to help out, how much would you need?”
Francis rubbed his chin nervously. “Oh, nothing much. Say, fifteen to eighteen.”
“Fifteen to eighteen . . . million?”
“Yes. Or twenty to twenty-five. You know, whatever is easiest. Perhaps a round number like thirty is easier to remember.”
“Thirty million . . . American?”
“Or pounds sterling if that’s easier.”
Prince Julius stared Francis in the eye for a second. “Ho ho ho, you’re pulling my leg, aren’t you?” Francis laughed politely as the prince smacked him on the back. “Bastard! You had me going for a second there.”
“I did, didn’t I?”
“That was a good one! Skål! You know, we have been so worried about Maxxie. First he got kicked out of that hippie college for selling illegal mushrooms, and ever since then he’s been totally adrift. He has been nothing but a drain on me, a huge drain, and all his so-called social entrepreneur schemes have done nothing but hemorrhage money. Of course, he is a good boy, with the best of intentions. He hasn’t gotten himself in the sort of trouble that his little brother has.”
“Your son is in trouble?”
The prince took a puff of his cigar. “Don’t you know? My little Tassilo is a junkie.”
“Oh dear . . .”
“Yes, it’s all those new party drugs . . . NDA, YMCA, whatever they’re called. Much too addictive, I tell you. I should never have let him spend his summer DJ’ing at all the clubs in Ibiza when he was thirteen. He just came out of rehab in Switzerland—you know the rehab that’s nicer than the Hotel du Cap? Cost me three hundred fifty thousand euros a month. And he stayed for THREE months! My god, can you imagine if he was actually hooked on something truly addictive? I’d be flat broke.”
“You don’t say.”
“I say! And you know, I have not so much left in the kitty these days. I maybe have enough to see myself and Natalia through another ten, fifteen years, and then I’ll have to start selling o shit. I have a pretty decent Diebenkorn and one good Bacon left; the rest are nasty old Rembrandts and Flemish landscapes that no one wants anymore (2). Natalia wants to have a baby, and I said over my dead body. What are we going to live on if we have to feed a baby? Sell the Bacon? I can barely afford to pay my crew on the yacht. You know those Aussie yachties are so spoiled. You have to pay them top dollar. I might have to start hiring South Afrikaners.”
Francis stared at him in disbelief. “You’re really running out of money?”
“Of course. Why would I lie to you about such things? We are family now; we have no secrets. I might have to ask you for a loan someday.”
“But what about your wife?”
“My wife? Hahaha! What makes you think Hanne’s got any money? She has a flat in Oslo, one disturbing Munch she inherited from her great-aunt, and a ranch in Ojai, that’s about it. I’m footing all the bills for my whole clan.”
“I thought her family controlled all the oil reserves in the North Sea? For years every magazine has called her ‘the Norwegian oil heiress.’ ”
“You of all people should know those magazines are full of ca-ca. Her von Melke av Sjokolade cousins are rolling in billions, those little piggies, they hoarded all the Class A shares starting in the seventies. But Hanne Marit’s father, who ran the oil company for three decades and made his whole family so rich, was too decent to take a single Class A share. Didn’t want to seem greedy. The old fool only had about eight hundred million kroners left when he kicked the bucket, and you know there were four kids to fight over the crumbs. Hanne has barely enough to feed her alpacas. And you know, those alpacas can really eat. They’re worse than locusts, and when they spit, those bastards can blind you in the eye.”
“Can they really?” Francis said, feeling sick to his stomach. All this time, he’d thought Augie was finally safe, that she had finally married money.
Prince Julius poured himself another glass of scotch. “This is why we are so relieved that Augusta accepted Maxxie. My boy is just so goddamn lucky to marry into the Gresham family! That’s one big worry off my mind. He’s your problem now, ho ho ho.”
The wedding banquet was the pièce de résistance of the nuptial weekend. Upon arriving at Bellaloha, the dinner guests followed the torch-lit path into the rain forest, where they came upon one long curving banquet table for three hundred that snaked playfully between towering trees and verdant bushes. Not content with the natural beauty of the flo a, Arabella had demanded that each tree be festooned with flowers, and hovering over the middle of the table was a floral sculpture canopy composed of thousands of orchids, dahlias, and Icelandic poppies. At the very center of the banquet was a gigantic banyan tree with thousands of ancient roots descending from the branches, and hundreds of flickering lanterns were entwined in the roots, casting a magical glow onto everyone. As the guests supped on Dover sole à la Augusta on the eighteenth-century Greshamsbury Sèvres that had not been used since Edward VII had come to stay when he was still the Prince of Wales (3), Jackie was by the side of the stage, in the midst of fitting a remote microphone onto Rufus’s jacket collar, when Arabella came rushing up.
“Rufus,are you giving the first toast?”Arabella excitedly inquired. “That’s the plan.”
“Very good. Now, will you be saying nice things about a certain somebody?”
“I plan to say very nice things about Augie and Maxxie, yes, after I humiliate them for a few rounds, of course.”
“That’s not what I’m talking about. Will you have something special to announce in your speech?”
“Something special?” Rufus looked confused.
“About a certain entente cordiale, perhaps?”
“Mother, English please. I haven’t a clue what you’re talking about.”
“Oh come on, no need to be coy with me,” Arabella giggled. “I’m talking about your petit plaisir de l’après-midi? A little bird told me that you spent the better part of the day holed up in Solène de Courcy’s suite at the Mauna Lani.”
Rufus rolled his eyes. “Solène sprained her ankle and exposed her bleeding knee to water contaminated with flesh eating bacteria. Eden had her on so many antibiotics I had to make sure she didn’t have a bad reaction.”
“Is that what you were doing? Making sure she had no bad reaction?” Arabella sniggered gleefully.
“Precisely. And she spent an hour giving me advice on how to improve my art career—unsolicited, I might add.”
“How kind of her. She’s such a sensible girl. Now, you must repay the favor by saying something nice about Solène and her mother during your toast.”
“You want me to mention Solène and her mother during my toast to the bride and groom?”
“Why not? Haven’t the de Courcys been the highlight of your weekend?”
Rufus gaped at his mother. “Wait a minute. Have you been trying to set me up with Solène all this time?”
“I know it might be a little premature, but it would be so fun to give our audience a little preview of what’s coming next season.”
“Next season? Do you think we’re living in a television series? Let me make this very simple for you: Solène de Courcy is a very nice girl, but it’s never going to happen in a million years. She’s not my type.”
Arabella looked at her son in exasperation. “Not your type? What’s wrong with you? She’s one of the most beautiful women on the planet! She has an exclusive modeling contract with Chanel!”
“Mum, when will you realize that I don’t give a damn about any of that?”
“I don’t understand . . . Bea told me things were going perfectly!”
“How would Bea know what’s going on? I haven’t seen her for days.”
“I’m going to murder those silly girls! Bea’s too distracted by her photo shoots, and Eden has been an utter failure.”
“What does Eden have to do with any of this?”
“Bea and Eden are rooting for you to fall in love with Solène! They both adore her. Everyone adores her. Why can’t you?”
“Eden’s been part of your maniacal plans?”
“She was supposed to earn her keep, but it looks like she’s been far too distracted herself, sleeping with that Freddy guy.”
“Wait—what? Eden and Freddy are not sleeping together!”
“Of course they are. They’re having a torrid fling. Eden’s desperately been trying to catch Freddy since the moment he arrived on that ridiculous shark boat. And you don’t even know the half of it, that stupid girl has been so careless that she’s gotten herself—”
Rufus rushed off before she could finish.
At the other end of the banquet table, Nicolai Chalamet-Chaude (Wetherby/Dragon/Eton/Balliol) was in the midst of explaining to Eden how Hawaii had become quite the haven for billionaires (“You’ve got Larry in Lanai, Mark and Priscilla kicking it in Kauai, and Pierre over in Oahu”) (4) when Rufus came rushing up with an unmistakably urgent look. “Eden, may I have a word?”
“Of course. Baron, if you’ll excuse me for a moment,” Eden said politely.
Rufus grabbed her by the hand and led her down a pathway, cutting through a thicket of bushes until they found a quiet clearing in the forest.
A warm crimson glow filtered through the trees, making everything seem otherworldly.
“Everything okay?” Eden asked.
“Yes. Are you okay?”
“I am, now that you’ve rescued me from that man.”
“Good, good. I just need to know something . . .”
“Yes?”
“Are you sleeping with Freddy Farman-Farmihian?”
“What in the world would make you think that?”
“Er . . . I just . . . you’ve spent all afternoon with him.”
“And you spent all afternoon in Solène’s room, not that I’d ever ask what happened in there.”
“Nothing happened with Solène! Well, nothing I initiated anyway. She did lunge at me several times, but when I rebuffed her, she started ranting that I couldn’t get it up and was too intimidated by her success.”
“Solène lunged at you?”
“Like a raccoon on meth, but you know I’d never touch her even with a ten-foot pole.”
“What made you think I was sleeping with Freddy?”
“My mother told me.”
“Your mother?” Eden grimaced in disbelief, not comprehending how the countess could have come to that conclusion. “Either your mother’s deranged from all the stress or someone’s been spreading vicious gossip.”
“No, you’re right, Mummy’s deranged. But I was watching the two of you all weekend . . . dancing at the ball, laughing like old friends during our excursions . . . I’m not sure . . . I got worried.”
“Worried? Rufus, I’m perfectly capable of taking care of myself. I told you, Freddy’s a sweet soul underneath all that swagger.”
“So you do like him. Today when I saw how intimate you were with him down by the pool, I just—”
“Intimate?”
“You were caressing his hand . . .”
“I was comforting him. He was telling me about his mother, she died when he was twelve.”
Rufus suddenly felt very foolish. “Oh god, I’m sorry. I’ve gotten everything all wrong, haven’t I? I was sure he fancied you, and I thought that you were trying to make me jealous.”
“Why on earth would I do that?”
“Because . . . bloody hell, I’m so confused . . .” Rufus found himself fumbling his words. He took a deep breath and gazed deep into Eden’s eyes. “It’s just that I’m in love with you.”
“Whaaat?” Eden stared at him in utter shock.
“I’m utterly, crazily in love with you, Eden. This entire week has made me realize how special you are to me, how special you’ve always been. Remember how I told you in Tintagel that you were the only girl I’d ever want to marry?”
“We were so young then—”
“I meant every word of it. And after you spent the night in Puako, after that shower under the moonlight, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you. I can still smell you on my sheets, and seeing you tonight, looking so unbelievably beautiful, I just needed to—”
“Stop. Please stop before you say something you’ll regret,” Eden pleaded.
“I’m not going to regret this.” Without any warning, Rufus pulled Eden into an embrace and kissed her.
Eden could hardly process what was happening, but she found herself yielding to his passionate kiss. She found that she could not stop kissing him, she found that her lips were on fire and the ground beneath her feet was spinning out of control but she couldn’t make it stop even though she wanted it to stop. “STOP! STOP!” It took Rufus a second to realize that it wasn’t Eden speaking.
They parted and looked up to see Jackie rushing toward them through the bushes. “DON’T SAY ANOTHER WORD!” Jackie shouted breathlessly as she reached behind his waist for the microphone remote pack that was clipped to his belt and turned it off. “You’ve got a hot mic! You must have brushed up against something—the mic was on the whole time. Everybody at the banquet could hear you! Even the queen of Denmark!”
Rufus and Eden looked at her in horror.
“Actually, Rufus, they could only hear you,” Jackie clarified
“I’m not sure if that’s better or worse,” (5) Rufus said, grimacing.
“My god—Solène!”
Jackie nodded slowly. “Yeah, Solène heard you loud and very clear. I’ve never seen anyone on crutches run off so fast.”
Eden stared wide-eyed at Rufus, too shocked by everything that had just happened to say anything. A beam of light suddenly hit her face, and then more lights began to shine on all their faces as five
firemen wielding bright flashlights emerged from the thicket. “Everybody out! We need to clear this entire site now.”
“Clear? What do you mean ‘clear’?” Arabella cried.
“We’re evacuating everybody. Party’s over.”
Jackie shook her head vehemently. “That’s not possible, sir. We are in the middle of a wedding banquet, and Bonnae Gokson’s wedding cake hasn’t even been served yet. Do you know who our guests are? The governor is here, Senator Mazie Hirono is here. The Weeknd is about to perform.”
The lead fireman snorted. “The Weeknd’s going to have to find another weekend to perform. Don’t you people see the orange glow over there? A big new fissure vent has opened up and the lava’s moving downhill fast. Your lives are in danger! We need to get everyone out NOW!”
Excerpted from Lies And Weddings © 2024 by Kevin Kwan. Published in the United States by Doubleday, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.
1. Forbes calls this seventy-five-year-old Generations Mortlach single-malt scotch a “bargain” at $30,000 a bottle.
2. At Christie’s Post-War and Contemporary Art auction in 2013, Francis Bacon’s Three Studies of Lucien Freud sold for $142.4 million.
3. The request for a royal stay from Edward VII was considered both an honor and a curse by many of the English aristocracy, who would go to such elaborate lengths to make sure their great estates were up to the royal standard (knowing the king’s legendary appetite and penchant for luxury) that they would sometimes go into debt renovating, redecorating, and hiring new chefs before the royal visit. Pity there wasn’t a Best Western in those days.
4. Ellison, Zuckerberg, Omidyar.
5. Go back and read just Rufus’s lines again if you wish. It was far worse if you could only hear one side of the conversation.
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