Abby, wonderful work. I am truly grateful, whatever happens next. Without you, Meadowsweet wouldn’t stand a chance. P.
She almost stopped at Peacock Cottage on her way home, but she wanted a long, hot shower and a hug with her husky before she could contemplate seeing him. She needed fortification before she exposed her body, her senses, to Jack Westcoat, so when she found him sitting on her front doorstep, Raffle lying contentedly at his feet, she thought at first that she must be hallucinating.
‘Hi.’ He raised a hand in greeting.
‘How come you’re not inside my house, and my dog is outside? How long have you been waiting?’
‘Because when I appeared, approximately an hour ago, Octavia took pity on me and said I could talk to Raffle but that she wouldn’t allow me to wait in your house, because it was an invasion of your privacy. I completely agree, by the way. I didn’t even ask to be let in.’
‘And Octavia didn’t offer you a cup of tea?’ she asked quietly, bending to stroke a sleepy Raffle, aware that her neighbour could probably hear their conversation.
‘She did,’ Jack whispered. ‘But I declined, because I wasn’t sure she’d ever let me go. After I’d been sitting out here for forty minutes, I wondered if I should have accepted.’ He grinned up at her.
‘Come inside.’ She held out her hand and hauled him up, ignoring the burst of heat that she felt at the contact. He followed her into her front room while she dumped her bag on the kitchen counter and flicked the kettle on. He was wearing jeans and another T-shirt, this one black, with a small, indistinct logo on the right sleeve. His arms were tanned, and she wondered how much time he spent in the tiny garden of Peacock Cottage now that the weather was good, reading books or looking over his own words.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I promise I’ll get you a cup of tea, but if I don’t have a shower immediately I might turn into a pile of dirt. I’ll be super quick.’
‘Of course,’ Jack said. ‘I shouldn’t have turned up unannounced. Can I do anything?’
‘Make the tea?’ she asked. ‘And there are some biscuits in the cupboard. Please help yourself. I don’t think you’ll find anything terrifying, other than perhaps a Suffolk super spider lurking about somewhere.’
‘That sounds daunting, but I’ll brave it out. You go.’
She gave him a grateful smile and trudged up the stairs.
Her shower made her feel a hundred times better, even if she was hyper aware of Jack only a few feet below her. She put on a pair of denim shorts and a T-shirt, ran a brush through her damp hair and rubbed some moisturiser into her sun-kissed skin, before going back downstairs.
There were two cups of steaming tea on the coffee table, along with a plate of bourbons. He’d put just the right amount of milk in her cup, and she sank gratefully onto the sofa next to him and picked it up. She rubbed Raffle’s flank with her bare foot and turned her attention to her unexpected visitor.
‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘I wasn’t sure I’d be capable of speech, let alone anything else.’
Jack raised an eyebrow.
‘I meant making tea,’ she clarified, smiling. It turned out her pulse still had the energy to race, despite her tiredness.
‘That’s what I thought you meant,’ he said. ‘The event was incredible, by the way. I was honoured to be a small part of it.’
‘Stephan said you were amazing, and from the little I saw, I agree. Thank you for rescuing us.’
‘I was happy to. And they were a much more tolerant audience, whatever you might think. Which is partly why I’m here,’ he said, rubbing at a crease in his jeans.
‘Oh?’
‘I wanted to see you, of course. I mean – that’s all it is, really. But it’s selfish of me to turn up when you could clearly do with peace and quiet.’ He sighed, and his hand slipped from his knee to hers, fiddling with the hem of her shorts in a way that was so unconsciously intimate Abby’s breath caught in her throat.
He met her gaze and froze, snatching his hand away as if it was burnt. ‘God, I’m sorry—’
‘What is it, Jack?’ She pulled his hand back towards her, holding it between both of hers.
‘My agent, Leo, thinks it’s time for me to step back into the spotlight. My new book is close to being done, page proofs are imminent, and it’s due out in August which, well, it’s still three months away, but this is when the publicity machine has to start rolling. There’s a literary gala, a precursor to the Page Turner Awards, organized by the same people and – miracle of miracles – I’ve been invited. I’ve been exchanging emails and phone calls with Bob Stevens, the head of the Page Turner Foundation, and I think he’s close to forgiving me for what I did. If I still want a chance at being an ambassador, I can’t turn this invitation down.’
Abby remembered something from the newspaper article Octavia had showed her, mentioning his promise as an ambassador had been all but lost. She nodded. ‘So you have to go?’
‘It’s a chance to move in familiar circles and see what happens. I won’t get my career back on track unless I sell books, and I won’t sell books unless I help promote them. Some people may buy it out of grim fascination, but I’d be the first to agree that I want the words to speak for themselves and, conversely, that will only happen if I show my face again, if I champion them. I need to go in with confidence and make the effort to put what happened behind me, even if it’s going to be excruciating.’
Abby picked up her tea, put it down again and took a biscuit instead. ‘And if you go to this … this event, will you come back?’
‘Of course I will,’ he said quietly.
‘When is it?’
‘In three weeks.’
‘I’m sorry you have to go. Is … is he going to be there?’
‘Eddie?’ Jack ran a hand over his jaw. ‘In all probability.’
‘Shit.’
‘The thing is,’ Jack squeezed her hand, wiggling it so that she met his gaze, ‘when I’m with you I’m calm, in control. It’s like I can be myself, and the person I am is … well, is OK. Before you, I hadn’t felt that way in a while.’
‘I feel the same—’ she started, and then her tired mind connected the dots. ‘Wait, do you—’
‘Will you come with me, Abby? It would seem less daunting if you were there. I know it’s a lot to ask. Sorry, I—’ He raked his hand through his hair. ‘It’s not fair of me.’
Abby pictured the candid paparazzi photo of Jack from the paper; his dishevelled evening suit, his grazed knuckles. ‘It’s posh, right? Black tie? I’d have to talk to people, schmooze and socialize?’
‘I wouldn’t leave your side unless I had to,’ he said. ‘And Leo will be there. We’d look after you.’
‘Doesn’t he make you feel OK?’ she asked.
Jack laughed. ‘Yes, of course he does. But …’ His voice dropped. ‘Not in the same way you do.’
Abby nodded, burying her toes in Raffle’s fur. She knew he wouldn’t have asked her unless it was important, unless he really felt he needed her. There was no other reason for him to do it – if he’d wanted someone glamorous to hang off his arm she was sure he could have asked Flick Hunter, and he hadn’t. He’d asked her.
‘Would we have to stay in London? You have a flat there, don’t you?’
‘I do, but … Leo would send a car, drive us down there and straight back, after the event.’
Abby nodded distractedly. ‘And I definitely couldn’t wear wellies or walking boots?’
‘Not on this occasion, no. Sorry.’ He gave her an apologetic smile.
She sighed and slumped against the sofa. ‘I’ll have to go shopping then, I guess.’
Jack’s grip on her hand loosened, and then tightened, his eyebrows shooting towards his hairline. ‘You’ll come with me?’
‘I will,’ she said quietly. ‘But I have to warn you, I’ve never been to anything remotely like this, and I’ll probably trip over the red carpet or say something unforgivable and make everything wors
e for you instead of better.’
‘Abby, God.’ Jack pulled her close, hugging her. His chin was on top of her head and she could feel the solid warmth of him, the strength of his arms, her cheek resting against his chest. She slipped her arms around his waist and lost herself in the moment. She wondered if that night would be worth it for this alone.
Then he gently pulled back, so that she was no longer pressed against him, but their faces were close and he was looking down at her.
‘Thank you,’ he said softly. ‘I’m aware how often I’ve said that to you over the last few months.’
He stroked his thumb along her cheekbone, and a shiver ran down Abby’s spine. She could see the hesitation in his eyes; they were searching hers, and she wondered if he was thinking the same thing. That if he kissed her now, it would seem like he was only doing it because she’d said yes, because she’d agreed to go with him. And in her exhausted state, if Abby kissed him, then she wouldn’t be able to stop, and her sister’s words still nagged at her: You’re walking over old ground, trying to save someone who isn’t worth it. He’s using you.
‘More tea?’ she said quietly, and Jack nodded, dazed.
She went into the kitchen and put the kettle on, while he sat on her sofa, lost in his thoughts.
Once the adrenaline had left her, tiredness took over, and even though she loved being in Jack’s company, telling him about the small calamities that had made the camping event memorable rather than disastrous, her eyelids began to flicker.
She wasn’t sure how quickly she’d fallen asleep, but when she woke it was after ten o’clock, the room was in shadow apart from the side lamp, and Abby was lying on the sofa under her purple and yellow checked throw. She could smell Jack’s aftershave in her hair and wondered if she’d drooled against his T-shirt.
The mugs and biscuit plate were washed up on the draining board, and Raffle’s bowl had fresh water in it and the remains of some food that she couldn’t remember giving him. Blinking and sitting up, Abby noticed that one of her notepads was open on the coffee table. Jack’s handwriting, in her purple biro, was slightly scruffier than usual, as if he hadn’t wanted to disturb her by turning on the main light.
Dear sleeping beauty,
Thank you, again, for saying you’ll come with me. I understand what a big ask it is, and that you agreed on the spot, so if at any point over the next three weeks you change your mind I will completely understand. Thank you, also, for the tea and the talk. I feel whole again, as if a part of me was missing and you’ve restored it.
Sweet dreams,
JW x
Abby knew that she could no more turn down Jack’s request than she could send Raffle back to the rescue home. That thought, the strength of her conviction, alongside his candid admission about how spending time with her made him feel, scared her more than anything had done in a long time.
Over the next couple of weeks, as the reserve settled back into something like normality, Abby turned her attention to her regular events, membership incentives, online dress shopping, panicking and, incredibly guiltily, Googling Jack Westcoat.
She had only dipped her toe in the water up until now, not wanting to risk reading something that would put her off him for good. Octavia’s retelling of the previous summer’s events had been as much as she could take at the time, and it was only her panic at the prospect of a high-profile London gala – with Jack – that was sending her into overdrive.
Most of the top news stories were about Eddie Markham’s original interview, the Page Turner awards and the aftermath. Eddie had done a follow-up with the same newspaper as the first inflammatory article a few days after the awards, complete with a posed photograph that showed in full the damage Jack’s fist had done to his face. It looked nasty, but then a photo could be manipulated as much as a story, with lighting, make-up and Photoshop.
Eddie was gracious, saying he didn’t blame Jack for lashing out once the truth about that sticky period in their past had been revealed, but he had felt it necessary to unburden himself, had become tired of covering it up when he’d never wanted to in the first place. As Abby read, her panic deepened. Eddie was clearly very clever, portraying himself as the wronged party when he was the one responsible for the alleged plagiarism, and emphasizing the reckless phase of their friendship to ensure Jack came across as conceited, short-tempered and, on some levels, dangerous, whereas he seemed affable – a naive young author who had been led astray by his wayward friend.
She reread a paragraph of his second interview:
I looked up to Jack from the beginning, when we were eleven years old, braving a new school together. He was smart and funny, with a magnetic personality, and I wanted to be like him. So I listened to everything he said, followed in his footsteps to Oxford, to some admittedly dark places, and into the literary world. He thrived on the attention, on being admired. When I tried to be independent, to stand up to him, that’s when it went wrong. He’d never made it physical before, but I always had the sense that it was possible. He wants to be in control and when I finally had the courage to reveal what really happened all those years ago, he realized he wasn’t anymore. This was the only way he could take back that control.
‘Oh, sod off,’ Abby whispered, but the nerves were creeping back in. Had Jack been the influence that had led to Eddie’s bad decisions, or was it the other way around? Raffle whined softly, placing his head on her knee, trying to nudge her iPad aside. It was late, and her hot chocolate had long since gone cold.
Once she’d read all she could about the incident – and several of the online news sites had picked up on the suggestion that Jack’s persuasiveness to get the journalist to bury the plagiarism story had gone beyond the financial – Abby started to read the older articles, from when Jack’s first book was published, when he was a young, talented author who looked like he would go far. There were a couple of fleeting references to his time at Oxford, the indiscretions dismissed as out of character with phrases like obvious anomaly, youthful recklessness and blemish on the landscape.
She found some photos of a younger Jack, his hair shorter and neater, and with a wide-eyed innocence, perhaps apprehension, that she didn’t recognize. It wasn’t that he’d lost his passion, she knew, but that he was now painfully aware of how brutal being in the public eye could be; how you could go from the golden boy to a villain at the turn of a page.
A couple of the articles mentioned past girlfriends – Hannah during university, and then a book publicist, Natasha, more recently – but there was nothing in-depth.
Abby pored over it all, losing sleep, wishing she’d never started. Her head and her heart seemed to be doing all-out battle. Was Jack like her past boyfriends, destined to hurt her? Her heart wouldn’t believe it, the reality of spending time with him was so different to the picture Eddie Markham had painted. All she could think was that it wasn’t like him, that some combination of factors must have made him lash out like that, and that his old school friend was full of shit. She wished Jack would tell her the whole story, instead of brushing it aside with comments about trying to do the right thing. Maybe one day he would.
In the meantime, all she could do was focus on the things she could control, and one of those was what she was going to wear to this crazy event.
Chapter Five
Once you’ve seen a kingfisher, you’ll never forget it. Flashes of brilliant blue and orange, they sit close to the water on a protruding branch or skim low over its surface. When they catch a fish, they will often take it to a perch and hit it repeatedly, stunning it, before swallowing it head first. Their call is a high, short ‘teee’ sound.
— Note from Abby’s notebook.
Abby finished work at lunchtime on the day of the gala. She had booked that afternoon, and Saturday and Sunday, as holiday. Rosa, Gavin and Jonny had told her that she would need at least two whole days to recover from an event like that, but all of them admitted that, in reality, they had no idea what it would be like; wh
ether the bar would be free, or extortionate because they knew everyone could afford it; whether it would draw sedately to a close at ten o’clock or continue into the small hours. Abby’s attendance at the event was the new sparkle of interest at Meadowsweet, though it was mostly restricted to the staff because Abby had told Rosa – and then Gavin, Jonny, Stephan and Marek – that they couldn’t tell anyone else on pain of a slow and watery death in the least appealing part of marshland on the reserve.
She had only ever intended to tell Rosa, but then Gavin had overheard something, and the inevitable ripples had rippled, and Abby had had to settle with only her immediate friends knowing. Even Octavia, whom she had confided in because she needed someone to look after Raffle for the evening, had promised that she would be discreet – after her initial explosion of excitement on Abby’s behalf.
Now, however, it was debatable whether she would even be going to the event, or if Jack would refuse to send the car because she’d spent the last three weeks bombarding him with terrified text messages:
If I buy three-inch heels will you promise to hold onto me all evening? How many stairs are there? Abby x
What if there’s someone really famous and I don’t recognize them? Abby x
Is there food? Should I eat beforehand? Abby x
How do we refer to each other? Friends, acquaintances? Abby x
What if someone asks me about the punch? Is ‘no comment’ too much like a criminal suspect? Abby x
Did you know that the collective noun for lovebirds is an orgy? No relation to the gala, but I had to tell you! Abby x
Is this really a good idea? x
Jack’s answers were unfailingly patient, and she now knew that it was a ground-floor event, three stairs up to the hotel entrance, two stairs down to the ladies’ WC. (She thought he must have had to ask his agent about that, or phone the venue himself, and she was touched at how much effort he was going to so that she would feel at ease). There would be posh but tiny nibbles, and they would grab something on the way down or back to fill the inevitable hole. ‘No comment’ was quite formal but fine if anyone was being irritating. There were hundreds of celebrities he didn’t have a clue about, so she shouldn’t worry about that. He’d had no idea about a group of lovebirds being called an orgy, but it made sense, and was the kind of fact he should try and get into a book – unless she was going to use it in hers? They were close friends – if she was happy with that description – and yes, Jack would most definitely hold onto her all night, it was the least he could do. In response to her last question, he had been less certain.
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