by Lucy Parker
“It’s Freddy,” she said with reluctant amusement. He was an arrogant prick and a serial cheat, and if Lisa had mentioned he was cast for this, she’d have had qualms. But it was just Dylan. No point expending energy on getting annoyed with him. He never changed.
“I know who you are, Freddy.” He was all injured gentlemanly charm. It would be more successful if she hadn’t witnessed him getting absolutely rat-arsed at a wrap party, whipping his trousers off, and drawing a smiley-face on his willy.
Once you’d seen a bloke doodling on his dick with permanent ink, the mystique was gone.
She pushed her sleeves up and wiped the back of her wrist across her forehead. She was wearing too many layers. It had been raining and cool when she’d boarded the train in London. She hadn’t expected Highbrook to exist in a sunny alternate universe, like a reverse Narnia. “I didn’t realise you were doing this. What part are you playing?”
Fifty quid said it was Wickham or Willoughby. He would have to expend no effort whatsoever to play one of the sexy, unreliable rogues. He even had historical-romance hair, longish and draped artistically over one eye.
Pretty please, God, don’t say Wickham. One fictional marriage to Dylan was enough for a lifetime.
He preened. “Fitzwilliam Darcy, at your service.” A wink. “And I am at your service, babe.”
“Darcy?” Freddy repeated after an extensive pause. “They’ve cast you as Darcy?”
“Jeremy Bury had it originally,” Dylan said, and yes, she had been under the impression that Jeremy was confirmed for Darcy. She’d been stoked about it, too, because he was an absolute gent to work with.
Dylan gave his pretty fall of hair an emphatic flick. “But they’ve made some wise changes to the cast since the press release. Star of the show, yo.”
Firstly: highly debatable. The actor playing Elizabeth, whom she sincerely hoped was still Maya Dutta, could argue for top character billing if she wanted, and not everyone considered Pride and Prejudice to be peak Austen, so Emma, Anne, Elinor and the rest of the primary women characters would also give him a run for his money.
And additionally: insert confused face and unintelligible exclamation here.
What a baffling choice on the part of the casting team. She wondered how it would be received by the public. Dylan was delicious to look at and he had the acting chops, but his behaviour was notorious and even the most infatuated fangirls would surely struggle to envision him as the stoic, secretly soft lover. And his ex-wife was doing the reality show circuit and her legions of fans despised him, so there was a lot of hate aimed his way on social media right now.
Freddy would go double or nothing that the voting audience opted for an unexpected plot twist in the whodunit. Darcy dead in the library. With a lead pipe.
Dylan’s gaze moved over her head with the glazed change of expression that usually meant he’d spotted someone with larger breasts. He walked off with barely a murmur. She turned to see the attraction, and her stomach dropped like she was on a hundred-foot rollercoaster.
Slinking across the lawn to join the gathering cast, hips swaying, body moving with the fluidity of rippling silk, Sadie Foster gave her cat-with-the-cream smile.
Hell.
Freddy had successfully avoided working with Sadie for the past few years, which was no mean feat in the tiny inner sphere of the West End, especially when they were signed to the same agency.
She wouldn’t use the word hate. She didn’t throw that around lightly. She strongly disliked Sadie.
Strongly.
Lisa. Mate. A little heads-up on the final cast would not have gone amiss here.
Freddy pulled her phone out of her bag on the pretext of having to take a vitally important and nonexistent call, which could not be interrupted under any circumstances, and realised there were still twenty-five minutes until the scheduled cast meeting.
With this team, there were going to be enough provoking moments over the next few weeks. She wasn’t racking up the first ones in the boiling heat.
She glanced uncertainly back at the main house, where a staff member had shown her to a bedroom in the left wing. Odds that she’d remember how to get back there without wandering into the wrong room and invading the Ford family’s privacy? Slim. The staircases were twisty and confusing, and she’d been distracted by some very questionable carvings on the railings. Highbrook looked like a typical posh, grade-II-listed mansion on the outside, but seemed to be full of small pockets of lurid eroticism, and she no longer had any trouble imagining Henrietta and the former Ford patriarch going mad for each other. Evidently, Sir George Ford had been more of a mirrored-ceilings-and-furry-handcuffs chap than a tweeds-and-pipe man.
That was the brilliant thing about life. It was never what you expected.
Freddy walked in the direction that was instinctively tugging her closer. Any theatre felt like a second home to her, but she was itching to see this one. The Henry was divided from the house by a thick line of trees, but she could hear the sounds of construction. Lisa had said the renovations would be complete before rehearsals began, which gave them about eighteen hours to wrap things up. Considering that redoing her London flat had taken five weeks longer than the builders had estimated, she’d be seriously impressed if the construction firm had cleared out by the morning.
Coming out of the shadow of the tall oaks, she stood for a moment, admiring the theatre. Amidst the fields and trees and wildflowers, the square stone structure rose into four turrets, the exterior walls dotted with arching windows. It was as if someone had shrunk the White Tower and plunked it down in the Surrey countryside. She half expected to hear jousting and trumpets rather than hammers and drills.
It was one of the most over-the-top things she’d ever seen. Photos didn’t do it justice. She loved it.
The entrance was still boarded up, but she found an open door behind a balustrade, and followed a winding corridor until she came back out into the sunshine in an open courtyard, and was hit with the full splendour of the stage.
It was wooden, and had been polished and varnished to a high shine. Stairs led up from the open stands in front, and ornate pillars held up the false proscenium. In her mind, she could already hear the echoes of feet stepping across the boards and projected words carrying up to the box seats above.
With her hand to her lips, she turned in a full, happy circle, taking in the atmosphere. It felt...warm. Comforting. Like good memories could be made here.
She could put up with a script the size of the Oxford English Dictionary and Sadie’s strychnine tongue for the opportunity to perform here. Breathing in deeply, she inhaled the weirdly attractive combined scents of paint and wisteria. She closed her eyes, feeling far, far away from the creeping stresses of the city and the weight of history and expectation. She just...enjoyed.
How lucky was the Ford family, to be able to come here any time they liked.
Her momentary peace was interrupted by a crash, followed by a very creative curse that she was going to steal and use at the soonest possibility. As the distinctive voice registered, her brows shot together and then lifted.
Ford.
No way...
Walking around a column, she peeped gingerly into a small room, the function of which was undetermined. There was some sort of cage situation going on in the corner, which suggested either a menagerie or a sex cave. Either seemed feasible on this property.
And, standing on a ladder, one of her very favourite things in life, a handsome man nailing stuff.
Apparently Highbrook was now owned by Sir George’s grandson, who had a reputation for being an uncompromising, despotic dickhead.
She ought to have made the connection based on that description alone.
After the initial surprise, Freddy recovered the ability to speak. “Did you accidentally take a wrong turn on your way to a meeting at the bank?” she a
sked politely, and the critic who had every performer in the West End shaking in their tap shoes turned his head sharply to look over his shoulder.
When he saw her, J. Ford-Griffin’s lips flattened and thinned, and his whole body seemed to withdraw with an intense, deeply psychological sigh, like a doom prophet steeling for the incoming apocalypse.
Look at that, her mere presence could make a man’s entire being go instantly flaccid. As superhuman powers went, she didn’t really rate it up there with invisibility and flight.
“The bank?” He eyed her like she’d just arrived to repossess the property.
He could breathe easy on that one. As much as she coveted his theatre and his flowers, she had a plan for her first proper house and it didn’t involve fellatio carvings on the stairs.
“I’ve never seen anyone do DIY in a tie.” Freddy glanced at the beam he was fixing, then walked over and bent to grab another handful of nails from the bag at the foot of his stepladder. She held them up for him, and after a pause, he took one and drove it into the wood with one vigorous bang of his hammer.
“Thanks.” He pulled another one from her raised hand. “The cast is here, then, are they?” His tone conjured images of empty chocolate boxes, and the aftermath of a party, and missing the bus by thirty seconds, and all of life’s fleeting moments of gloom.
“Dude. You might want to dial it down a notch there. The enthusiasm is embarrassing.”
He caught his finger with the hammer and swore again. She’d always thought he had a very inspiring vocabulary.
“If you’re going to be rude enough to visibly grasp for patience,” she said, “I would suggest keeping your eyes open. At least while you’re whacking nails into a board.”
Ford-Griffin shook the pain from his hand, set the hammer down on the stepladder, and swung himself down. Straightening, he moved his broad shoulders to settle his shirt back into place, and coolly adjusted the knot of his tie with a single jerk of his hand. The only concession he’d made to the heat was to roll up his sleeves, exposing muscled forearms, but there wasn’t a visible bead of sweat on him. The assassin persona was firmly in place. Suave, efficient movements, immaculate clothing, and not a hint as to what was going on beneath the surface.
Freddy quite fancied the impenetrable demeanour. She could imagine several occasions when it would come in handy. For example, when dealing with co-stars who probably sashayed home at night to their coven.
He returned his hammer to the toolbox. “I’m surprised you’ve signed on for this shitshow.”
He didn’t look surprised. She couldn’t imagine him ever looking surprised.
She bent down again to tidy the screws she’d just knocked with her foot. “This production is pure entertainment and escapism. It’s fun, it’s funny, it’s a bit of whodunit, a bit of snogging under the stairs. It’s exactly the variety of light comedy-drama that you’ve been suggesting is my spiritual home for the past five years.” She felt sorry for his staff. They wouldn’t get away with much, with Perceptive Pete here striding around. “If you’re going to make judgmental comments—and I realise it’s what you’re paid for,” she added with silky kindness, “at least be consistent with your own advice.”
The pools-of-mystery eyes narrowed.
She smiled at him from her crouched position. “What’s your name?” she asked suddenly.
“What do you mean, what’s my name?” he said with a slight edge. “If your memory is that bad, good luck learning your lines. The script makes War and Peace look like a novella.”
“I can’t at all tell your opinion of this production. I hope the baffling fact that you’re letting it be staged on your property doesn’t mean I’ll miss out on the joy of a written review. They’re useful to have around if I’m ever in danger of developing self-esteem.” She examined a strange tool with multiple prongs. “I realise we’ve met, but we never got around to using first names. I’m Freddy to everyone but Sadie Foster, who makes a point of using Frederica because she knows it grinds my tits. And since I’ve heard people call you Griff on TV, I’m assuming the ‘J’ in your name stands for something equally unacceptable.”
Sabrina had once offered a number of suggestions on that point, the politest being Jackass. Freddy assumed the obvious eccentricities in the Ford family didn’t extend as far as that.
Firmly, he removed the mystery tool from her grasp before she could follow through on her impulse to test the sharpness of the blades with her thumb. “James.”
“James?” She’d expected at least a Jehoshaphat. Her hand brushed his, and she curled her fingers against the fabric of her skirt. “But you don’t go by that?”
“My father’s name is also James.” The words still had sharp corners. “Apparently my parents didn’t foresee the inconvenience. My grandfather got annoyed by the time I was six months old and started calling me Griff. It stuck.” With derision, he added, “And when I was offered a column in the Post, the editor used the initial in my byline because I wouldn’t let him slap a ‘Dr.’ in front of my name. He thought J. Ford-Griffin sounded credibly intellectual.”
“Whereas, oddly, James Ford-Griffin sounds like both a 110-year-old antiquarian and a Mayfair playboy,” she probably shouldn’t have said out loud.
“Yeah, thanks for that,” he said after a moment. “Unfortunately, the initial bled over into my television work.”
“Should I call you Griff, then?”
“If you have to.” The fervour. The passion. “Although as I will not be reviewing the show, thank fuck, I’ll be steering clear as soon as I’ve made sure the theatre will stay intact for a few weeks.”
“That’s very conscientious of you.”
“I own the property deeds and therefore the responsibility for anything that happens here. And as much as it would be a blessing for British theatre if a beam fell on Dylan Waitely, I’d prefer not to cop the blame for it.”
She finished tidying the mess she’d made of his materials and stood up. He was closer than she’d realised and she ended up seriously invading his personal space. She shifted position so she wasn’t actually breathing into his neck.
“So, your grandfather was Sir George Ford.” And when she thought about it—surely her father would know that, and he could have bothered to drop it into conversation. For all his grumbling about the reviews, he’d never mentioned that the “puffed-up, short-sighted, poisonous bastard” at the Post was the grandson of Henrietta’s lover. She nodded at their surroundings. “If this is the standard for gifts in your family, you must be very popular at Christmas.”
“Your grandmother’s influence must have been potent.” Griff rolled his sleeves back down and cast a critical glance over whatever he’d been doing to the roof. “My grandfather was a notoriously tight old bastard before—and after—that affair.”
“Maybe my father’s right,” Freddy said lightly, setting her fingertips to a wall beam with a gentle touch. “Henrietta is the goalpost in all aspects of life. She must have been an impressive lady.”
And a daunting one. Freddy had looked up to Henrietta for as long as she could remember, but she was almost glad that their lifetimes hadn’t coincided. She somehow didn’t see her as the sort of granny who handed out sweets and hugs.
Griff’s eyes flicked over her as he started to gather his tools together. “Is that the idea? To guide your career along a similar path to Henrietta’s?” His tone was neutral, but she could guess at the thoughts underlying the bland façade.
“My father has always fancied the idea of producing a Henrietta 2.0.” She scuffed her foot against the wooden floor. “I don’t think it’s going to plan.”
Griff’s sudden narrowed scrutiny poked at a vulnerable spot, and she gave herself a little shake and changed the subject. “I am surprised that you’d agree to let us perform here. Given your side gig with the Post, I’d have thought you’d prefer your name
wasn’t professionally associated with any particular production. Might look like you have financial interests swaying your reviews.”
“Yes. It might.”
“Not great for your reputation in general.”
“No.” He closed his toolbox with a distinct click.
“Even worse if we bomb,” she added with great sympathy, and after a few more grim seconds, she saw a flicker that might have been a puny, barely there smile, but was probably muscle tension. She wondered what he looked like when he laughed.
She wondered if he laughed.
Slightly pointedly, he held the door open for her, and she half expected him to close it in her face once she’d passed through, but he followed her back out into the stalls.
“It’s a beautiful stage.” She really wanted to get up there but didn’t want to fall through the floorboards if the construction team hadn’t signed off on that bit yet.
“It’s safe.” At the creepily intuitive comment, she twisted her head to look up at Griff, and he inclined his towards the stage. “Go on up.”
She almost fell up the stairs in her hasty scramble and, with an unnecessarily heavy sigh, he caught her outflung fingers and steadied her. As she reached the top and walked forward, he took several steps back and stood watching her, arms folded.
Her footsteps echoed through the resonant timber as she paced, measuring the space, looking out and up. “This is so wicked.”
Her voice carried, clear as a bell. The acoustics were fab. Her smile grew.
“You have nothing to worry about,” she said confidently. “We’re going to sweep the ratings. Even with the more dubious casting choices.”
“Waitely?”
“Amongst others.” She slipped her hand over one of the pillars, tracing the intricate carvings. Sir George had restrained his personal tastes here and just decorated them with berries and fig leaves. At least—were those berries? “If the plan is to bugger off back to London and pretend that none of this is happening, I expect things will come off without tarnishing your reputation.”
