by Jill Mansell
“He was married to you,” called out Roz as she made her way downstairs. “He should be used to it by now.”
Two minutes later, she was back. “The stupid little bitch!” she stormed, her dark-brown eyes narrowed with fury. Camilla pulled herself upright once more and wished for the second time that morning that she had decent eyesight, as yet another piece of paper was thrust into her hands. “She’s only run off to Zurich!” exploded Roz. “My daughter’s determined to ruin my life. What the hell am I going to do now?”
“Zurich?” Loulou, intrigued, abruptly forgot her own catastrophe. “Why on earth would she go there? What’s she looking for, anyway? A gnome?”
* * *
Heathrow Airport was chaotic with excited, height-of-the-season vacationers; lines were forming in every direction, the loudspeaker was blaring nonstop, and Natalie, sitting on her small suitcase, clutched her one-way Swissair flight ticket to her chest as if it were a rosary. For the first time she began to doubt the wisdom of her action. All she had was the name of her father and the city in which he lived. Most of her savings had gone on the price of the plane ticket; the balance on her credit card was pathetically small.
Now she was both hungry and thirsty but dared not spend any money. Realistically she knew that she could only afford to stay in Zurich for three or four days. And if she was unable to find her father within that time, she was going to be stuck: no money to stay and none with which to get back to England.
What the hell, she thought with mounting trepidation and excitement. This is it. No going back. This is real life!
She gradually became aware of a commotion at the other end of the great hall. A photographer ran past, cameras flapping against his chest, and she could hear young girls shrieking with excitement. Some kind of celebrity must have arrived.
Anxious for any diversion, Natalie rose to her feet and hauled her case into her arms, making her way across the crowded hall. Maybe it was Elton John—she was crazy about his music—or a film star heading back to the States.
By the time she reached the other end of the hall, a sizable crowd had formed, and several more photographers were flashing away with their cameras.
“Who is it?” she asked one of them.
He paused to glance at her. Pretty girl. Photogenic. Great legs. Shame about the clothes. “Nico Coletto, on his way to Jamaica,” he told her as he glanced at his camera screen to view the image he’d just captured, then looked up to see the expression on the girl’s face change.
“Nico!” she screamed, more loudly than anyone else, and cannoned through the crowd using her case as a battering ram.
“Nico, stop!” Natalie yelled again, pushing her way to the front and seeing that he had finished signing autographs. He was moving away toward the VIP lounge, and she knew he was her only chance…
“Please stop, I have to speak to you,” she bellowed, sweat breaking out on her upper lip. By the way he hesitated, but didn’t turn around, she knew he had heard her.
“It’s about my mother,” yelled Natalie in desperation. “You know her… It’s a matter of life and death!”
At last he turned, his gaze sweeping the crowd until it came to rest upon Natalie.
“Oh please,” she said, her knees almost buckling with relief and ecstasy. “We really, really have to talk…”
* * *
In the VIP departure lounge, Nico seated himself opposite Natalie, his green eyes watchful.
Unable to utter a word, she returned his gaze, breathing shallowly in her excitement and struggling to convince herself that she was really here. Nico, her mother’s lover and her own long-time hero, was sitting less than four feet away from her, his baggy cream linen jacket screaming Armani and his slender, suntanned fingers tapping against his jean-clad thigh. He was wearing white beach shoes, a sea-green T-shirt that matched his incredible eyes, and the most heavenly aftershave she’d ever smelled.
For a long moment he said nothing either, just watched her as if she were a puzzle he couldn’t quite work out. Glancing behind him, Natalie saw Caroline, his wife, speaking in an undertone to an overweight, middle-aged man who was pouring lager from a can into a slender champagne glass.
“So,” said Nico finally. “A matter of life and death. Was that a very over-the-top exaggeration or a downright lie?”
Natalie felt a hideous blush crawl up her cheeks. “A slight exaggeration,” she amended with an embarrassed smile. “But it is important.”
“Maybe you’d better tell me who your mother is,” he said slowly, tilting his blond head. “I think I can guess; it’s just very hard to believe.”
She grinned suddenly and shook her head in a manner that so reminded him of Roz that he knew he was right. Jesus, it was uncanny how much she resembled her.
“Say it,” commanded Natalie. “And don’t look so worried—I’m not going to tell everyone you’re my old man.”
“You’re Roz’s daughter,” said Nico with a faint, incredulous smile that lit up his face. “Does she know?”
This time, Natalie burst out laughing. “Of course she does! Yesterday, she told me who my father is. That’s why I’m here, to go over to Switzerland and meet him. Have you seen Mum lately?”
“Not recently,” Nico said, thinking fast. This was, without a doubt, the voice that had answered the phone yesterday afternoon when he had tried to contact Camilla, so she and Roz had to be staying with her in Belgravia.
He longed to ask this girl—Christ, those dark, slanting eyes were so like Roz’s—about Camilla, but it would only complicate matters. And right now, he was supposed to be getting away from all that. Asking questions would only make things worse…
“So what’s the emergency?” he asked, glancing at his watch and nodding at the blond waitress who was hovering discreetly with a pot of coffee.
“A favor.” Natalie held her breath for a second, then plunged in. “I’ve paid for my ticket, but now I’m broke. If you could lend me some money, I wouldn’t have to sleep in Swiss doorways.”
“Why didn’t Roz make sure you had enough?” intercepted Nico, outraged. Then he sank back in his seat. “Oh, don’t tell me. She doesn’t know you’re here.”
Cringing from the resigned expression and the disapproval in his thickly lashed, onyx-green eyes, terrified that he might be about to send her home under armed escort, Natalie said with a touch of defiance, “She knows I’m here because I left her a note. She just didn’t know about it beforehand, that’s all.”
Nico saw the determination that tautened every line of her slender young body and knew that nothing he could say would sway her. It occurred to him at that moment that if he had married Roz, this teenager would be his stepdaughter. Jesus, Roz could only have been about fifteen when she’d had her.
It occurred to him, too, that Roz had caused her fair share of problems for him over the years. When they had been together, she had treated him in the most offhand manner imaginable to keep his interest alive. And afterward, she had abruptly reversed tactics, using every dirty trick in the book to win him back.
Nico, with his family-oriented Italian blood, couldn’t think of one good reason why this girl shouldn’t meet her biological father, and it caused him some small amount of satisfaction to know that Roz was opposed to the idea.
What the hell, he thought, glancing across the tables to where Caroline and Monty were sitting, both studiously pretending not to be watching him. Let’s give the girl a break and show Roz that she can’t always have her own way.
“How much do you need?” he said to Natalie, and as he reached inside his jacket for his wallet the look of wonder and relief in her eyes melted his battered, emotionally scarred heart. His own life might be a god-awful mess now, he realized, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t still help to make someone else’s happier when the right opportunity arose.
Chapter Fifty
For three days, Roz had been like a cat on scalding-hot bricks, twitching each time the phone rang and snapping at anyone who tried to speak to her. Refusing to contact Sebastian and quite unaccustomed to being on the wrong end of a waiting game, her temper grew steadily shorter and she made heavy inroads into Camilla’s liquor cabinet.
Camilla reflected on the situation as she made a pot of coffee, bundled a load of wash into the machine, and cleared the kitchen table of breakfast debris. Sebastian must mean a hell of a lot more to Roz than she was prepared to admit. And while she herself was quite unable to comprehend the allure of a man who obviously disliked children so much that Roz had been forced to keep the news of his own from him for eighteen long years, she sympathized with Roz’s agitation now.
She was also deeply thankful that she didn’t have to work with her. From what Roz told her about the screaming rows she was having with her producer, with her researchers, and even with the director himself, the TV studios were not a happy place to be at the present time. At this rate, she decided, Natalie’s antics were in danger of bringing an entire networked show to an expensive, grinding halt.
* * *
Damn the little bitch, thought Roz that evening as she speared a buttered zucchini and realized that her fork was trembling. Why couldn’t she at least phone and let her know what was going on? This interminable waiting was playing havoc with her nerves.
Broodingly, she glanced across at Camilla, looking so calm and unruffled it wasn’t true. At least Loulou, who was only pretending to eat, was as rattled as she herself was; it comforted her to know that she wasn’t the only one going through hell at the moment, even if Loulou did only have herself to blame for her current ridiculous predicament. Roz hadn’t met Martin Stacey-Thompson, but he sounded exactly like the slimy sort of toad who could only ever cause trouble.
When the phone rang, everyone jumped. Roz felt her heart thumping unpleasantly against her rib cage, but it was only Christo ringing for Loulou. Glad of an excuse to abandon her dinner, Loulou disappeared into the sitting room with Roz’s cigarettes, obviously settling in for a long cheering-up chat.
“Who was that who phoned for you the other afternoon?” asked Roz idly, just to make conversation. “The man with the sexy voice who wouldn’t give Natalie his name.”
Camilla looked uncomfortable for a moment. “Nico,” she admitted finally, trying and failing to sound casual, and sensed rather than saw Roz’s raised eyebrows.
“Really,” drawled Roz, curious to know more. Despite everything, she still felt that Nico was hers and had never fully come to terms with the way he had rejected her. As far as she had been able to work out, Nico had dropped her simply because she had been an innocent pawn in the breakup of Camilla’s marriage to Jack.
“I thought he’d gone to Jamaica,” she went on with deceptive languor as she toyed with a piece of chicken on her plate. “Didn’t I see something in the papers recently?”
“He left the day after he phoned,” said Camilla hesitantly. “We were supposed to have lunch, but I got involved in that accident and didn’t make it to the restaurant.”
Right now, Roz observed, Camilla was trying hard to appear unconcerned…and failing abysmally. In a flash, it became apparent that she was still crazy about Nico, and Roz suppressed a small, triumphant smile. Maybe if her own situation had been different she would have let the matter rest in deference to Camilla’s hopelessly unhidden feelings, but after three days of torture and chain-smoking, her own emotions were jangling like prisoners’ chains. All the old jealousy rose up within her, along with anger as she recalled Nico’s summary dismissal. And she would never forget that terrible afternoon when he had destroyed her with his taunt that Camilla had been better in bed than she had. Whether or not it was true didn’t matter, but the fact that he had said it shot a great hole in her pride. Nobody, not even Nico, was allowed to say something as derogatory as that and get away with it.
“Oh dear,” she said sympathetically. “Poor you, you have got it bad, haven’t you?”
“Wha—?” began Camilla, her eyes horrified as she prepared to leap in with a denial. But Roz was too fast for her.
“And don’t think I don’t understand,” she continued smoothly. “God, I should know what it feels like, after all. But it really isn’t fair of him to involve you, Cami. You of all people don’t deserve that kind of treatment.”
“But I’m n-not…it’s not…” stammered Camilla, flushing pink.
“Naughty, naughty Nico. Up to his old tricks again,” said Roz with a sorrowful shake of her dark head. “I’m just glad I finally outgrew him. Do you know, he started chasing me again last year? We even ended up in bed together one night—it was at the end of his last concert tour and I’d had a little too much champagne. Anyway, I was drunk and he was persistent.” She smiled to herself and twirled her wineglass between her fingers, observing Camilla’s aghast expression. Poor thing, this was really crucifying her.
I’m a bitch, thought Roz without even the slightest pang of remorse. But I can’t help it, and Camilla has no right to Nico, anyway. He was mine first. And for what it’s worth—which is nothing—he’s married to Caroline now.
“I don’t know how his wife puts up with him, screwing around all over the place the way he has almost ever since the wedding. As far as I can make out, Nico was faithful to her for almost three weeks. And now he’s come back to you.” Roz paused and smiled sadly at Camilla. Then, in a conspiratorial tone, she said, “Well, of course, he is the most marvelous lover, but I just hope you don’t get hurt. I had to tell Nico that it was over between us—I simply don’t need the hassle anymore—but I can understand why you’re hooked on him. He can be irresistible when he sets his mind to it…”
“I’m not having an affair with him!” blurted out Camilla, breaking the spell of Roz’s low, mesmerizing voice. “There’s nothing like that between us; really, there isn’t.”
She was telling the truth, Roz realized with satisfaction, but from her distraught expression, the words had hit home nevertheless. She had achieved what she had set out to do…and it made her feel just great.
“Well, thank God for that,” she said, changing tack and raising her glass in salute. “Good for you, Cami! Men like Nico need to be rejected now and again…it brings them back down to earth and makes them realize they can’t always have everything they want. Nico’s been an absolute bastard where Caroline’s concerned. Maybe now he’ll sort himself out and make a real go of it with her. Cheers, Cami. I only wish I’d had your strength of character years ago. Well done!”
* * *
Until this moment, reflected Natalie with a shiver, it had all been a marvelous adventure. Her happy but uneventful life back in the north of England seemed insignificant now, having been tumbled out of the way by the sheer thrill of finding Roz and coming down to London, where everyone her mother knew seemed to live in vast, glittering houses, drink champagne, and speak beautifully. Even Loulou, who had no money, was still inherently glamorous, bearing no relation whatsoever to the downtrodden single parents who lived sometimes in appalling squalor in the least attractive parts of Natalie’s own hometown.
And meeting Nico, of course, had been one of her all-time great moments. Probably the greatest moment, she decided, with only a slight sense of shame that it should rank above meeting Roz. But then there were an awful lot of mothers in the world; they were everywhere and almost everyone had one, whereas real-live rock stars of Nico’s caliber were a different matter altogether, a far rarer commodity. There was only one Nico…how could meeting him not be the greatest thrill of her life?
But now, as she sat in the Bergstrasse café stirring her frothy hot chocolate and gazing through the steamy windows at the bank opposite, she was preparing to fit the last piece to the puzzle. And remembering Roz’s overheard conversation with Camilla, she wasn’t expecting the afternoon to be particularly
pleasant. Certainly not thrilling.
The force that had brought her here was an inherent compulsion, and she had to go through with it. But she was prepared this time for rejection. Coming to Zurich had been exciting, as well as an act of defiance. Bumping into Nico at Heathrow had been brilliant. Checking into one of the city’s smartest hotels had been a new experience too, and she had reveled in it, deliberately shrouding herself in dark glasses and mystery for the benefit of the superior receptionist at the front desk. And settling down on her bed with a bottle of wine, a packet of foreign cigarettes, and a copy of the Zurich phone directory had seemed a wonderfully adult thing to do. Natalie had felt like some glamorous spy in a Bond movie, calling each bank listed and asking—in French!—whether M’sieur Sebastian Adams worked there.
When, at the seventh attempt, the operator had replied, “Oui, madame,” she had felt dizzy with triumph, dropping her cigarette into her lap and slamming down the receiver before the operator could hear her shriek, “Oh shit.”
It had all been good fun, tracking him down. Now, thought Natalie with a touch of panic quelled only by her utter determination to go through with it, she had to brace herself to accept the worst. She knew Roz well enough to be pretty sure that she wouldn’t have contacted Sebastian to warn him. He would still be quite unaware of her existence.
She cleared the misted-up window beside her and peered once more at the bank’s rather grand entrance and the clerks and secretaries who were now beginning to trickle out into the rainy street. This, she thought grimly, was the ultimate cold call.
Sebastian Adams, this is your daughter.
* * *
Having endured a particularly gritty meeting with an important but nonetheless difficult client, Sebastian Adams was not in the sunniest of moods. When he emerged from the bank at five thirty with his sports bag and briefcase, he was even less amused to find that it was still raining. The wet streets glistened, a sea of multicolored umbrellas bobbed erratically along the pavements, and the rush-hour traffic was crawling along at less-than-walking pace. It would be six o’clock at least before he reached the Sheraton, where he went three times a week to swim, take a sauna, and work out. Eight thirty before he returned home. At nine o’clock, he was supposed to pick up Danielle, the sleek trilingual secretary he was currently seeing, and take her out to dinner at a much-recommended new restaurant in the Bahnhofstrasse. The thought left him cold; a far more inviting idea was that of calling Danielle and explaining apologetically that he was caught up in a business meeting that was likely to drag on until midnight.
