by Heidi Rice
‘You’re not listening to me.’
‘I don’t need to listen to any more of this. What could you possibly say that can undo this? It’s over, Alex.’
She hung up before she could break down. Waited for the phone to ring, for him to text, steeling herself to ignore him, not expecting for a moment that he would let things lie. Not Alex, who was used to getting his own way in everything.
The phone stayed silent.
Grief began to seep in alongside her anger. He was going to accept what she’d told him this time, without trying to manipulate what he wanted from the situation.
Maybe he was finally getting to understand her, after all. Now that it was too late.
CHAPTER TWELVE
SIXTEEN-HOUR days had kept Alex sane when his marriage had ended, and throwing himself into work now had its advantages. Funding was secured on three new films, and publicity for The Audacity of Death was frenzied. He tried to convince himself that his relationship with Jen had been a stupid mistake. A reminder that life for him worked best when he lived it alone. He turned back to the solace of work, the one focus that had always driven him, always given him a purpose, even in the face of Susan’s betrayal.
And now it wasn’t enough.
Somehow he’d managed to fall for her in a way he’d never fallen for anyone. Even Susan felt like a distant wisp of a memory now. The way she’d fleeced him had tortured him for the last five years and yet now it failed to raise so much as a stab of resentment. Work had slipped from being inspiring and satisfying to being nothing more than a way of occupying his mind, of shutting out the constant ache for her. What had she done to him? He could barely feel anything any more.
Dozens of times he went for the phone. He needed to hear her voice, to try and convince her how sorry he was. But he couldn’t call her because she had been right.
He’d agreed to the interview with Gossip! while he’d waited for her during her makeover at Marlon’s salon, thinking it might raise her profile a little at the magazine, smooth the way a bit for her. He hadn’t done anything to actively pull strings. But there was no point denying he’d probably had some influence. Mentioning that Jen was connected to him was never going to do her any harm, was it? Just as it hadn’t done Viveca any harm at the casting for The Audacity of Death. But while Viveca had been more than happy to take any opportunity that came her way, for Jen opportunity had to be made by her, not dropped in her lap.
He knew that now because he knew her better. They’d talked about her father, her past. He understood her single-minded ambition, her need to prove herself. But that had been later, when they were together. And by then the damage was done.
And now, more than a month on, work and the bachelor lifestyle were still not enough to block out the ache for her. He wasn’t sure they ever would be again.
‘Settling in OK?’
Jen turned from the counter. The coffee house was just around the corner from Gossip! HQ and she was addicted. No more Littleford Tea Rooms for her.
Angela West. Entertainment Editor. Whippet-thin. Super-intimidating designer suit. Jen had learned more about designer clobber in a couple of weeks living with Alex than she had in a lifetime in Littleford.
Oh, but it hurt to think about Alex. There was a raw ache deep inside her at the thought of never seeing him again, never being held by him again. In any other break-up situation throwing herself into work might have helped take her mind off it, but every move she made in the office was a bitter reminder of his betrayal. The constant wondering about whether she deserved this job at all crushed any joy she had in her work.
He’d not only broken her heart, he’d taken away the one thing that might have helped her get over it.
‘Great, thanks,’ she said. She took her full-fat latte and sprinkled it liberally with chocolate shavings. Added a white chocolate muffin to her tray. At least now she didn’t have to worry about her weight or her skin breaking out, since she intended never to get naked with another man. Ever.
‘And how’s the fabulous Alex Hammond?’ Angela asked, peering through the display cabinet glass, probably in search of something with zero calories. A plain rice cake, perhaps.
Jen felt as if she had been doused with cold water. Of course. Entertainment Editor. The penny dropped. The string Alex had pulled had apparently been attached to her.
‘I haven’t spoken to him recently,’ she said vaguely. ‘You two know each other, don’t you? Surely you must know how he is?’
Part of her, the part that hurt the most, wanted to ask this intimidating woman how he was. If he was OK. If he was getting on with his life as if she’d never existed. She refused to let that want take hold.
Angela West ordered a skinny cappuccino and duly decided against eating anything. Was this what it was like when you spent your working life interviewing celebrities? Did you become weight-obsessed in the face of all that glossy gorgeousness?
‘Unfortunately I can’t really say we know each other,’ she said. ‘Shame, I’d love to have him on my Christmas card list. I only spoke to him the once. He was doing the publicity rounds for that film he’d just made, with the awards season looming. He mentioned he knew someone who worked for Gossip!—that was it.’ She winked. ‘Lucky you! ‘
A spike of uneasiness slipped unexpectedly into Jen’s mind.
‘Did he mention my article at all? My internship?’ she asked, finding it hard to form the words because her mouth seemed suddenly dry.
‘Which article was that, honey? Is it something on him? I could use a bit of extra background.’
Jen ignored the slight in that sentence, the implication that something she produced wouldn’t be of any more value than ‘background’, because of the mounting feeling of cold awfulness in her stomach. She needed to clarify this. Right now.
‘The article I wrote at the end of my internship. As part of my permanent job application. How To Marry A Millionaire in Ten Easy Steps.’
Angela laughed out loud. ‘Good grief—is that the kind of thing they’re commissioning now in the Features Department?’
The laugh wasn’t light-hearted or friendly. Jen liked her less and less.
‘No, honey, he never mentioned you really at all, except for saying he knew you and you worked here. Sorry.’
The catty flash in Angela’s dark eyes gave away what she was thinking. Starstruck kid, thinking Alex was into her.
‘Don’t worry about the extra background if you don’t know him that well. I’ll call him up myself, cover some more ground.’
Jen barely noticed her sashaying away, tray in hand. She put her own tray down untouched on one of the empty tables on her way out.
She felt physically sick. She’d been so convinced he’d swung the job for her and now it turned out he hadn’t even mentioned her article. Dropping her name into conversation wasn’t the same thing as pulling strings, was it? Would he have passed it off as nothing more than—what had her editor called it?—networking, if she’d given him the chance to explain? Which she hadn’t. She was so prejudiced by her useless father that she hadn’t wanted to listen.
What had she done?
Rule #10: If you do manage to land your millionaire, always, always agree to a pre-nup. This is your payment, your insurance that all your hard work will pay off. You weren’t in it for love, anyway, right?
‘I can’t understand why you didn’t let me come to stay with you,’ Elsie grumbled for the hundredth time. ‘We could have gone clubbing in London—maybe one of those clubs where the footballers go. We could have really washed that man right out of your hair. But instead you think pie and chips at the village pub is going to cut the mustard.’
She looked questioningly into Jen’s face.
‘I just fancied a quiet weekend away,’ she said, because she had to say something. How could she tell Elsie that the job she’d aspired to for years now made her feel miserable and bitter. And that living in London, which had filled her with excitement while she did her
internship, now felt lonely. The friends she’d made at Gossip! just reminded her of the mess she was in, cruising along rudderless because she now had no clue what she wanted from life.
Elsie waited, apparently for something more, then gave an exasperated snort and stood up.
‘I’ll get another round in. Might as well get plastered. There’s nothing else to do.’
‘I’ll have a pint.’
Broken though it might be, Jen’s heart was apparently still capable of beating crazily at the sound of Alex’s voice, the sight of him.
Elsie’s eyes were practically on stalks.
Hollywood Alex had come to Littleford. What a scoop that would be for the Gazette.
‘Jen? Do you want to talk to him? Or shall I …?’ Elsie paused, clearly fighting the urge to fall at Alex’s feet. ‘Get him out of here?’
Jen looked up at him. He looked tired, drawn.
Because of me, her mind whispered hopefully. She crushed the thought. He’d flown in from the States. He was jetlagged. It didn’t mean anything.
‘Elsie, could you give us a minute?’ she said.
His green eyes held hers steadily and she suddenly realised Elsie hadn’t moved an inch, apart from possibly dropping her jaw even wider.
‘Elsie?’ she hissed through gritted teeth.
‘Hmm? Right. No problem. Leave you to it.’
Elsie backed reluctantly away towards the bar. Alex slid onto the bench opposite her.
‘How did you find me?’ she asked.
‘I went to your house and your mum told me you were at the pub. There’s only one in the village. It wasn’t hard.’
She took a deep breath.
‘Why are you here?’
‘I want to make things right between us,’ he said.
‘Have you got a time machine?’
He didn’t answer.
‘I know you didn’t pull strings,’ she said. ‘Not intentionally, anyway. I want to tell you I’m sorry for not believing you, for thinking you’d undermine me like that, but when you didn’t get in touch again I thought you’d just put us behind you and moved on.’
‘I tried,’ he said. ‘But it didn’t work.’
Her heart gave a half-skip but she ignored it. Nothing mattered now apart from making him understand.
‘I’ve never criticised my mum for taking that payoff when I was a baby. She had her reasons. It meant she could buy the cottage in Littleford and at least not have to worry about having a roof over our heads. But it made me wary of anyone like my father, who has money and power, and it made me determined to make something of myself—an achievement that I could call my own, without help from anyone like that.’
‘You wanted to prove that you never needed him, anyway?’
She gave a wry smile, thinking that somehow he’d managed to get closer to the hub of it all than she had.
‘Yes, I suppose I did. And that’s why I overreacted so badly. I thought you’d taken that chance away from me.’
‘Jen—’
She held up a hand. ‘Please. Let me finish. Let me explain.’
He leaned back against the bench.
‘I found it hard at first to take any help from you, but then, as I got to know you, I began to realise there’s a difference between offering help and trying to control someone. I should have trusted you and I’m so sorry that I didn’t.’
‘It’s OK,’ he said.
‘Is it?’
He put a hand over hers and she felt sweet relief. Even if they couldn’t go back to how things were, maybe at least she hadn’t lost him altogether.
‘It isn’t your fault,’ he said. ‘I should have thought what it meant when I offered that interview. Just being connected with me opens doors—and I’m not saying that to be arrogant. It’s just a fact. You’re the first person I’ve come across that wanted those doors left shut.’
She gave a small smile. ‘That makes me an idiot, doesn’t it?’
‘No, it makes you different. You’ve never wanted anything from me. It’s never been about what publicity you could get, never a mutual benefit thing. When we’re together it’s about us, nothing else. All the help I gave you I had to bargain with you to take, and I loved that attitude. I would never have consciously screwed around with it and I’m truly sorry.’
The green eyes were full of remorse and her heart turned over softly.
‘It’s OK.’
‘It isn’t OK. After my divorce I fell into the habit of keeping control over every aspect of my life—to protect myself, I suppose. And because of that I messed with yours. None of this is down to you. It’s the fallout from my damn marriage, and I should have let it go years ago.’
He squeezed her fingers.
‘You saw what my family is like,’ he said. ‘There’s never a dull moment, always someone to talk to. When I was a kid there was always someone to play with. I wanted that in my future, and that’s what my marriage to Susan was about. I was building my work reputation up from scratch, giving it everything I had. It was all for us—for Susan and me and the family we’d have one day.’
He frowned.
‘Things were easy at first, when we were both students. But when my career took off and I got serious studio backing that’s when it started going wrong. I was away a lot and she didn’t like it. Then when we were together things began to be strained. There was press interest even then. I was pictured out with people I worked with. There was never anything in it, but she just didn’t have that level of trust in me that enabled her to let it go. By the time we broke up I’d made good money. I’d bought my parents that house, bought a place for us in London. I’d reached a point where I could start to pick and choose projects to work on. And then she took me to the absolute cleaners.’
‘Maybe she thought she deserved a decent settlement,’ Jen ventured. ‘It can’t have been easy with you away so much.’
‘I offered her a decent settlement,’ he snapped. ‘It included the London house. But she got some good advice. She refused my offer and went to court to take as much as she could. I’d worked for that money from nothing. I’d poured my heart and soul into it to get where I was. And in one court judgement fifty percent of it was gone. Just like that.’
‘It must have hurt.’
‘I was furious. Absolutely livid for a very long time. I made the decision then that I wouldn’t get involved again. That was it for me with relationships. If I couldn’t trust someone who’d known me when I had nothing, how could I trust anyone?’
‘But what about the family you wanted?’
He dropped his eyes briefly.
‘That’s what hurt the most. The papers went on about the financial cost of my divorce, but it cost me a lot more than that. If I couldn’t give enough time and commitment to Susan because of my work, how the hell could I hope to make it work once children were thrown into the mix? My whole future crumbled when she left me the way she did.’
He looked back up at her, his gaze clear and unapologetic.
‘So I made a new one. I was rich, I was successful, I had plenty of pretty girls crossing my path, so I decided to enjoy the bachelor party lifestyle without letting anyone get close. And for a while I thought I’d made the right decision. I had a scream of a time.’ He paused. ‘It’s just recently that it’s begun to feel like not enough.’
‘Recently?’
‘I began to wonder just who the hell I was slogging away like this for. And when I met you I began to understand.’
‘Understand?’
‘I’m still a family man underneath it all. Depriving myself of my family couldn’t change that. For the first time in so long I started to think my life could be about more than just work. You make me want that, and if you give me a chance I promise we will always be an equal partnership. I will never do anything to undermine you again. I love you too much to want to restrict you.’
Jen was distracted from delicious shock at the fact he’d used the L-word by Elsie’s gobsmac
ked gasp from across the bar as he put a tiny blue velvet box on the table in front of her.
‘Is that …?’
‘A proposal? Yes, it is. But before you say anything there’s something I want to mention.’
She stared at the box on the table between them. In that box was the moment her life diverged. Two paths. One way with him. One way alone. And suddenly she knew what was coming.
The caveat.
She didn’t blame him. She understood his reasons perfectly. And yet there was disappointment. That he thought she would be interested in half a fortune she’d had no part in earning and that her life was to be overshadowed by yet another contract. She’d thought he knew her better than that.
‘You want to talk about a pre-nup,’ she said.
He looked at her for a long moment.
‘Why? Do you want one?’ he asked.
She stared at him, unsmiling, and he dropped the light-hearted tone.
‘You probably think a pre-nup is a given with me, right? Based on my past.’
She nodded slowly.
‘Based on everything. You don’t leave anything to chance, and that’s something I’d have to try and work on if we were to go with this. Make you fly by the seat of your pants a bit more.’ She offered him a smile. ‘I don’t blame you for being that way after what happened with your marriage.’
She glanced down again at the box in front of her. Give up Alex because of a principle? Could she do that? Her heart twisted at the thought of being without him again.
She could let all the prejudices her father had given her slide and just be with him. What did she care if there was a pre-nup, anyway? If they ever broke up she knew perfectly well she wouldn’t want anything from him that she didn’t deserve.
She could forgive him for giving Gossip! the interview, because despite all the angst and bitterness he hadn’t swung the job for her. Not really. Just being connected to him opened doors, and if she wanted to be with him that was something she’d have to swallow however hard it stuck in her throat.
The choice was simple. She could be lonely and feel victorious or get rid of her stupid pride and be happy.
