Dreaming of Mr. Darcy

by Victoria Connelly

  Kim nodded. ‘Yes,’ she said thoughtfully, dragging the single syllable out.

  Gemma was on immediate alert. ‘What?’ she said.

  Kim’s mouth narrowed into a nasty little line, and Gemma knew what was coming: criticism.

  ‘No,’ Kim said, shaking her head. ‘You won’t want to hear. You never do. You know what you’re like when I have some advice to give you—you get all upset and uptight.’

  ‘No, I don’t,’ Gemma said.

  ‘Yes, you do. You know you do.’

  ‘Just tell me, Mum!’ she said, knowing she wouldn’t get any peace until she had her say.

  ‘You want my advice?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You’re sure?’

  ‘Mum! Just tell me.’

  ‘Okay,’ Kim said, taking in a deep breath before sighing out slowly and dramatically, as if she were about to give a long-awaited speech on the world’s stage. ‘That scene you were doing with that woman who wasn’t your mother.’

  ‘What about it?’

  ‘There are just a couple of things I would’ve done differently.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Like the dialogue and the actions.’

  Gemma closed her eyes for a moment, refusing to respond. Instead, she walked towards the door at the end of the orangery and headed back outside, not caring if it was still raining. Anywhere—even the middle of a storm—was preferable to being in her mother’s company.

  ***

  Rain didn’t affect you much when you were a screenwriter, and Adam was in screenwriting mode that afternoon, his laptop open on his knee in his study up in the eaves of his nineteenth-century cottage. He was going to join the film crew later that day, but there was no point heading out to Marlcombe Manor now. He stopped writing for a moment and stood up, stretching his arms above his head and cricking his neck. He wished it would stop raining. The garden was glad of it, but any more and he would be worried the whole plot would be washed away.

  The garden was the main reason that Adam had bought Willow Cottage. It had come up for sale three years ago, and he’d driven by it on a balmy autumn day when everything was golden and glowing. He had been renting a small flat above a shop in Lyme Regis before that, splitting his time between there and a nasty little flat in Shepherd’s Bush whilst he decided where he wanted to base himself permanently.

  Nana Craig had then taken a nasty fall and had been laid up for weeks, and Adam knew he had to spend more time in Dorset. Besides, that’s where he was happiest, and the train service to London wasn’t bad. There was nothing really stopping him from putting down some roots.

  The evening he saw Willow Cottage, he pulled over at the side of the road and opened the little gate into an overgrown front garden. It looked as if the place was empty, and looking across at one of the downstairs windows, he noticed there was more cobweb than curtain.

  A side gate led around the old house to a back garden, and it was that which sold the place to him, although it had really been more of a plot of land when he first saw it and had been in no state to be called a garden for some time. It was just a very long stretch of overgrown grass interspersed with nettles, brambles, and thistles, but it was surrounded by peaceful fields and backed onto a tiny stream flanked by willows, and Adam could see its potential immediately, planning out the borders and vegetable patches in his mind’s eye.

  He made an offer the very next day, not batting an eyelid at the state of the old place. He would get around to sorting it all out. The rotting kitchen cupboards could be ripped out and replaced, as could the carpets. Wallpaper could be stripped, and the damp problem wasn’t insurmountable.

  For the first few months, he concentrated on the garden, cutting, clearing, and digging until his limbs were tanned, toned, and exhausted. Growing up with Nana Craig, he had always been encouraged to garden, but with flats in Lyme Regis and London, he hadn’t had much of a chance over the years. Willow Cottage was his very first garden.

  Nana Craig had been very impressed when she visited him. ‘What are you going to grow?’ she asked.

  ‘Happy,’ he said. ‘I’m going to grow happy.’

  She chuckled at that. ‘As long as there are a few tomatoes and courgettes too.’

  Looking out of the upstairs window now, he surveyed his little kingdom with pride. There was still a lot to do. He wanted to create some new borders and plant an orchard too. A garden was never static, but he liked it that way. He had grown lazy living in town, but the garden got him away from his desk and kept him fit.

  A sudden flash of ginger caught his eye, and a very hairy cat leapt up onto the windowsill, purring noisily.

  ‘Hello, Sir Walter,’ Adam said, his hand stroking the downy fur, sending a little ginger cloud into the air. ‘Don’t fancy the garden today, then?’

  Sir Walter stuck his little pink nose up in the air as if such things as wet gardens shouldn’t even be discussed. Adam grinned.

  He met Sir Walter the first week he moved into Willow Cottage. The back door had been open, and the scrawny ginger tom stalked into the place as if he owned it, meowing loudly. Adam gave him a saucer of milk and a share of his fish and chip supper, which seemed to go down well. The poor thing was all skin and bone and seemed happy to bed down on an old cushion in the front room. They had been housemates ever since.

  None of the residents in the tiny village seemed to know anything about the cat, and the notice Adam put up in the local shop went unanswered. They were stuck with each other. Adam had never owned a pet before. His lifestyle hadn’t permitted it, but if he really was putting down roots, a pet seemed as good an idea as any. And Nana Craig loved taking care of Sir Walter whenever Adam had to be away from home, although his habit of sleeping on her favourite candy-striped cardigan and adding a thick layer of ginger to it didn’t go down too well.

  He had been writing the first draft of his screenplay for Persuasion when he moved into Willow Cottage and met the cat, and the name Sir Walter seemed to fit perfectly. He had such an air about him, as if the whole world was quite beneath him, but Adam loved him to bits.

  Perhaps one of his favourite things about Sir Walter was the way he followed Adam whenever he set out to walk to Nana Craig’s. That had been another deal clincher for Adam—Willow Cottage was just two miles from his nana’s cottage, and he could get to it by way of a lacework of footpaths that crisscrossed the Marshwood Vale.

  ‘Maybe I’ll saunter over there as soon as this rain stops,’ he said to Sir Walter. ‘What do you think?’

  Sir Walter didn’t think much of the suggestion, choosing to lick a front paw instead.

  Adam was about to return to his laptop when the phone rang.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Adam!’

  ‘Nana! Are you okay?’ She sounded breathless.

  ‘I’ve just seen Kay.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘She was round here,’ Nana Craig said, ‘with that actor bloke.’

  ‘What actor bloke?’

  ‘That tall one. Great strapping fellow with too much blond hair.’

  ‘Oli? Oli Wade Owen?’

  ‘That’s the one.’

  ‘What were they doing at yours?’

  ‘He was taking her to lunch. That was his story, anyway.’

  ‘Lunch at yours?’

  ‘No!’ Nana Craig said. ‘He’d driven his flash car through some flooded lane. Probably racing it around like an idiot. Anyway, it’s stuck there, and he and Kay walked to mine to dry off. He’s got your T-shirt and raincoat, by the way. I told him you’d be wanting them back.’

  Adam shook his head in confusion. ‘Where are they now?’

  ‘Oh, they’ve gone. Got a taxi back to Lyme Regis. And what’s all this about some Gemma woman?’ Nana Craig asked. ‘Kay seemed to think you’re going out with her.’

  Adam sighed. ‘That’s just some misunderstanding.’

  ‘Are you sure? She seemed quite convinced.’

  ‘Nana, believe me
, nothing is going on with Gemma and me.’

  ‘Because you know what these actor types are like, don’t you? I don’t need to tell you again.’

  ‘No, you don’t need to tell me again,’ Adam said, rolling his eyes at Sir Walter, who had left the windowsill for the comfort of Adam’s armchair.

  ‘So you’ve not made a move on Kay, I take it?’

  ‘Nana!’

  ‘Don’t Nana me! If you like this girl, you should tell her. I don’t know why you haven’t yet.’

  ‘I’ve only just met her.’

  ‘Yes, and she’s only just met this actor too, but she’s having lunch and flirting with him all over Dorset already.’

  ‘She was flirting with him?’ Adam said.

  ‘In my front room. Disgusting! And he didn’t even have his trousers on.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘That actor bloke—his trousers were soaked. He had to take them off, and I didn’t have any spare to lend him.’

  ‘Right,’ Adam said, thankful, at least, that Oli hadn’t been making a move on Kay in his nana’s front room.

  ‘You’ve got to tell her, Adam,’ Nana Craig said. ‘You do like her, don’t you?’

  Adam raked a hand through his hair. ‘Yes, I do like her.’

  ‘Well, then?’

  Adam groaned. He knew his nana meant well, but he did often wish she would let him do things in his own time.

  ‘You’re not still put off by what happened with Heidi, are you?’

  There was a moment’s silence.

  ‘Adam? That was just one unlucky—’

  ‘I know,’ he interrupted.

  ‘And you can’t let it stop you from meeting other women.’

  ‘Nana, I’ve got to get back to my work,’ he said, hoping she’d take the hint.

  ‘All I’m saying is that you’d better make your move if you want to stand a chance with that girl. I saw the way she was looking at that Oli, and believe me, I know that look.’

  ‘All right!’ Adam said. ‘I’ll tell her.’

  ‘You will?’

  ‘I will,’ he said, knowing it was the only way he was going to get any peace.

  ‘When?’

  ‘What do you mean, when? You want written notification?’

  ‘I know you, Adam Craig. You’re a procrastinator.’

  ‘No I’m not.’

  ‘You jolly well are, but let me tell you, this one isn’t going to hang around and wait. You’ve got to make your move.’

  ‘I’ve said I will.’

  There was a pause. ‘Adam?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Give me a call as soon as you tell her.’

  ‘Good-bye, Nana.’

  Chapter 26

  The taxi ride back to Lyme Regis was one of the strangest journeys of Kay’s life. Oli was silent at first, his head bent down and his blue eyes hidden behind his dark glasses. Kay felt horribly conspicuous in her bright green cardigan and yellow hat and had seen the double take the taxi driver had given as they got into the car.

  ‘Where’s the fancy dress party, then?’ he quipped. ‘Dreadful floods at the moment,’ he said, peering at them through the rearview mirror. ‘Would avoid driving round here if I were you.’

  ‘It’s a bit late for that, I’m afraid,’ Kay said and then received a nudge in the ribs from Oli.

  ‘Shush,’ he said.

  So this was the life of a movie star’s girlfriend, was it? Being made to dress incognito and being told to shush all the time? Kay wasn’t impressed. In fact, she was just about to tell Oli, when he did something quite unexpected.

  He picked up her hand and gave it a squeeze. ‘I’m sorry today turned out like this,’ he said, leaning in towards her and whispering in her ear.

  ‘It’s okay,’ Kay found herself saying.

  ‘No, it’s not,’ Oli whispered. ‘I wanted it to be—you know—special.’

  ‘Did you?’

  He nodded, and his fingers traced a tiny circle in the palm of her hand, which gave her the most delicious goose bumps. ‘Of course I did.’

  Kay felt her body heat up and was quite sure her face was too, as she looked into his eyes.

  ‘We were sitting in the back of a taxi when he proposed to me,’ she would tell journalists in the years to come. ‘He was wearing only a T-shirt and an old raincoat,’ she would say with a giggle. ‘It’s a long story.’

  ‘Oh, tell us, Kay!’ they’d beg.

  ‘All I’m going to tell you is that I said yes.’

  Gazing into his eyes now, she wondered what he had planned for their lunch together. ‘Oli?’ she said, but she didn’t get a chance to ask him anything, because a phone rang with a blast of Wagner. Kay recognised ‘The Ride of the Valkyries’ and grinned.

  ‘Ah! We’re back in civilisation,’ Oli said, finding his phone. ‘Hello? Yes. I’m heading back to Lyme.’ There was a pause. ‘Nowhere. Just out to lunch. I don’t know where—we didn’t get that far. What?’ he said. ‘Kay. I was with Kay. In the car. No, I’m in a taxi now. The car flooded.’ There was another pause, and Kay could see a frown on Oli’s face. ‘I don’t know. About an hour? I’ve got to get back to Lyme and get changed. Okay. Yes. I said I will. All right, then.’

  ‘Everything okay?’ Kay asked after he put his phone away.

  ‘That was Teresa,’ he said.

  ‘She didn’t sound happy,’ Kay said.

  ‘You heard her?’ Oli looked anxious.

  ‘Only her tone of voice,’ Kay said.

  Oli looked relieved. ‘It’s a good job I didn’t tell her I didn’t have any trousers on.’

  ‘Have you got to get to the set?’

  ‘I’m afraid so. Teresa’s panicking. They’ve moved a lot faster than she thought, and she needs me to get out there as soon as I can.’

  ‘But you’ve not had any lunch.’

  ‘Neither have you.’

  ‘But I can get some at home.’

  ‘I’ll grab something somewhere,’ he said. ‘Don’t worry about me. Hey, mate,’ Oli said, leaning forward in the taxi as they took the road into Lyme Regis. ‘Can you hang around for me? I have to get to Marlcombe Manor.’

  ‘No problem,’ the taxi driver said, looking at him through the rearview mirror. ‘You’re that actor, aren’t you? I’ve seen you on the TV.’

  Oli gave a little nod.

  ‘I thought it was you. You can’t fool these old eyes. You were in that—what was it called?’ He took a hand off the wheel and clicked his fingers as if he might summon the title. ‘Parisian Nights. Am I right?’

  Again Oli nodded.

  ‘Bit saucy, that, wasn’t it? I was watching it with my wife and mother-in-law. Now that was embarrassing!’

  Kay grinned as she remembered the scene the taxi driver was referring to.

  ‘Still, must all be in a day’s work for you, eh? All that rumpy pumpy! Now ain’t that something—getting paid for that. I tell you, I’m in the wrong job!’

  ***

  The taxi dropped them off and the driver promised to wait for Oli. The two wet travelers walked along Marine Parade towards the bed and breakfast.

  ‘I guess that happens to you a lot,’ Kay said.

  ‘Now and again,’ he said.

  ‘So the disguise didn’t work.’

  ‘I’m afraid not,’ he said. ‘But at least he’ll never recognise you.’

  ‘Oh, nobody would ever recognise me,’ Kay said.

  Oli stopped. ‘Well, they should.’

  Kay turned around to face him, and he took off his sunglasses.

  ‘The whole world should recognise you,’ he said.

  Kay wasn’t sure what to say, and so she said nothing at all. She was so glad that she didn’t when he moved towards her, closing the brief space between them and leaning down to kiss her. It was what she’d dreamed of, but she never expected it to really happen. Now it was. She felt suspended, as if she were dreaming, and if she opened her eyes, Oli would evaporate and she’d be staring int
o space like a fool. When he took a step back and she opened her eyes, though, he was really there, all six foot four of him, and he was looking at her with such intensity that she couldn’t speak.

  ‘You okay?’ he asked.

  She nodded, and he laughed.

  ‘What?’ she asked.

  ‘You! You’re so funny!’

  ‘Why am I funny?’ she asked, not at all sure he was paying her a compliment.

  ‘Because your head is full of fluffy clouds.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘You’re a romantic, aren’t you? You believe in princes on white horses and happy-ever-afters.’

  ‘How do you know that?’

  ‘It’s written all over that face of yours,’ he said. ‘That gorgeous, dreamy face.’ He grinned and reached out to stroke her cheek. ‘I’ve never met anyone like you,’ he said. ‘I’m afraid the acting business usually knocks out any romantic notions I may have about the world.’

  ‘That’s awful!’ Kay said. ‘Especially when you’re playing some of the great heroes.’

  Oli shrugged. ‘You mustn’t think we’re all like the heroes we portray. I’m not Captain Wentworth, you know.’

  ‘I know that,’ Kay said, secretly dismissing his protestation, because she knew that the man standing before her was the perfect hero.

  ‘It’s just a job like any other.’

  Kay shook her head. ‘But you need sensitivity and passion to play a part, don’t you?’

  ‘I guess,’ Oli said.

  ‘When you played Sydney Carton in A Tale of Two Cities, I cried myself to sleep that night.’

  Oli laughed. ‘But I’m not Sydney. I wouldn’t have given up my life like him. I’d have left Paris at the first opportunity and put that silly woman, Lucy, out of my mind.’

  ‘No!’ Kay said. ‘I don’t believe that.’

  They walked towards the bed and breakfast, the sound of the sea in their ears.

  ‘I’m a no-good, selfish actor,’ he said. ‘I’d be wary of getting involved with me if I were you.’

  Kay’s heart skipped a beat. So he wanted to get involved with her? Was that what he was saying? ‘Are you challenging me?’ she dared to ask.

  He smiled and held her gaze. ‘Perhaps I am.’

  Kay was about to reply when she looked ahead to Wentworth House and saw two figures sheltering in the doorway of the bed and breakfast. ‘Who are they?’ she asked. One was a young woman with short-cropped hair. She was wearing a white cap and skinny jeans and looked as if she’d be more at home in Kensington High Street than Lyme Regis. Standing next to her, holding her hand, was a girl no more than five years old. She had bright rosy cheeks and the longest, blondest ponytail Kay had ever seen.