Connor leaned back against the wall, watching as this famous rock star held his ex-wife – a woman he hadn’t even had the chance to divorce; it was a marriage that had just dissolved into nothing after any attempts to find her had failed. He watched as Mark Cassidy kissed her gently and whispered what he assumed were words of support in her ear as she clung onto him and cried. It was more than evident that whatever relationship they had was strong, any fool could see that, and Connor felt a slight pang of something he couldn’t explain. He’d never been able to comfort her like that, not when she’d needed him most, and that still hurt. That was still something he regretted to this very day because if he’d managed to do that, if he’d managed to make all that pain she’d been feeling go away how different would things have been? Would Luke have had his mum? Would he have had his wife? Because he’d loved her so much, more than he’d ever let her know. But she’d changed since then. She was still the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen but she wasn’t the same girl he’d known. She wasn’t Stefanie. The tattoos, the short hair with the bold coloured streaks, the heavy boots and torn jeans, she was most definitely a very different girl. But she was still Luke’s mum, and Luke wanted to meet her and Connor had to tell her that. She had to know how Luke felt. She owed her son that much at least.
“I think you need to talk to Connor,” Mark said, stroking her hair and kissing her gently one more time. “And don’t you worry about me, ok? All of this, we’ll sort it out, baby. I promise, we’ll sort everything out. But I’m gonna go see Johnny now, leave you and Connor to talk but…you know…you know that Johnny, he’s gonna be there for you, Stevie, just as I am. You know that, don’t you?”
She nodded, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. “I never meant to shut you all out, Mark, but that part of my life…”
“Hey, it’s alright. Baby, it’s alright. I understand.” He gave her one last, slow kiss. “It’ll all be ok, I promise. And this is one promise I’m gonna keep, you got that? I’ll call you later.”
She watched as he grabbed his jacket, saying something to Connor on his way out that she couldn’t quite hear, before Connor moved over to the sofa, sitting down next to her, pushing his hands through his dark hair.
He’d grown into an extremely handsome man with the same blue-grey eyes and the slight stubble on his chin that he’d always worn. He still looked like the Connor she’d once known, just a few years older and, she suspected, a whole lot wiser.
“I never meant for this to happen, Connor.”
He looked at her. “No. I know you didn’t. It’s nobody’s fault…”
“Yes, it is. It’s my fault, all of this is my fault, and it’s such a fucking mess!” She lay back against the sofa and closed her eyes, hugging her knees to her chest. “And in the middle of all of this is Luke.” Just saying his name made fresh tears well up behind her eyes and she threw her head back, determined not to let any more fall. Crying wasn’t solving anything.
Connor looked down at his hands, clasped together between his slightly open knees. “Did you ever think about him? Over the years?”
“All the time.”
He looked at her again, right into her eyes, and he knew she was telling the truth. She hadn’t missed a beat in answering that question; she hadn’t had to think for even a second.
“So, what’s going on with you and mister rock star then? I thought you were very much the partner of the P.M., hence all of this.” He picked up the newspaper then threw it back down onto the coffee table.
“Things with me and Daniel aren’t without complications, Connor. Especially now.” She sighed, pushing a hand through her hair. “We had a bit of a row last night because a million and one things had started to get on top of me, and Mark, he…he’s just someone I needed. Someone I need. We’ve been around each other for so long now, he’s a hard habit to break and I tried, y’know. I really tried.”
“So, what are you going to do about Daniel Madison?”
She stared straight ahead of her, still trying to take in everything that was happening. “I guess that’ll be taken out of my hands now.”
“You know they’ll probably get wind of this too, don’t you? That you spent the night with Mark Cassidy?”
She looked at him. “Are you still a journalist?”
He nodded. “Still based in Manchester. Never really hit the big time, but I know how this all works, Stevie…I still can’t get used to calling you that.”
“It’s who I am now. All legal and official. Stefanie doesn’t exist anymore.”
Connor looked down at his hands. “He wants to meet you. Luke. He wants to see you.”
“Oh, Jesus…”
She didn’t think she could handle much more today. It was only half past nine in the morning and she had yet to find out Daniel’s reaction to all of this, but that was something she knew she was going to have to face very soon.
The ‘phone ringing made her jump and Connor immediately leapt up off the sofa, running over to answer it.
“Let me do this, ok? Now it’s all out in the open it’s likely to be more journalists trying to get your side of things and I don’t think you should speak to anyone just yet. Not until we’ve got you sorted with some kind of representation.”
She had no clue what he was talking about but she was quite happy to let him handle it all because she was lost. She felt as though she’d been thrust into some kind of surreal nightmare and she couldn’t quite think straight just yet. Her whole other life had just been exposed and that was something she couldn’t really deal with right now, even though she knew she was going to have to, eventually. Whether she wanted to or not.
“I was right,” Connor said, sitting back down beside her. “That’s probably going to be a regular occurrence now, and I’d also be prepared for the photographers and reporters outside your flat. It’s not going to be an easy time, Stevie, but I’ll help you. If you want me to.”
He was still that kind, caring man he’d been back then. Even after everything she’d done to him and their son he was still willing to help her and she didn’t deserve anything near that amount of kindness from him.
“Why would you want to help me, Connor? After everything I did?”
He looked away again as he spoke, not meeting her eyes. “It hurt like hell, that morning, you know. When I woke up and found your note. I hadn’t been able to protect you and that was the one thing I should have been able to do, and I couldn’t do it.” He looked at her. “I tried to find you, did you know that? I tried so fucking hard, for months…but I drew blanks, every corner I turned it was just another brick wall…nothing. You really covered your tracks, Stevie. You really didn’t want to be found, did you?”
She looked up at the ceiling, blinking back fresh tears as the memories continued to flood back. “I loved you, Connor, I really did. You have to believe that. And I loved Luke, I loved him so much but I just couldn’t…I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t stay. I’d have been no good.”
He reached out and took her hand, squeezing it. “You should have talked to me, Stevie. I really wish you’d just talked to me because I would have listened, I would have done anything I could to make it all better, I really would.”
“It wouldn’t have worked, Connor.”
“You don’t know that, Stevie.” He kept hold of her hand, looking at her fingers as they curled around his. “But…but as much as it was painful and confusing in the beginning it…it all turned out good in the end. I met a great woman – Caitlin – and we got married, and Luke he…he loved her, she was amazing with him. He had a great childhood, he grew up happy and loved and that’s all that matters, isn’t it?”
She looked at him. “Are you and Caitlin…?”
“We’re divorced. Last year.”
“I’m sorry.”
“It’s fine. It was pretty amicable. We’d just grown apart.”
“Is Luke ok about it?”
“He’s a very level-headed young man, Stevie. He’s
coped extremely well, with everything.”
She looked down at their joined hands. It was so weird, him being here, but then everything felt weird now, nothing felt real. It felt like everything was moving at a million miles an hour and she was struggling to keep up. “Have you got a picture of him?”
She still felt as though she was working on auto-pilot, but suddenly all she wanted was to see her son. She wanted to see how he’d grown up, see what he looked like. What she’d missed. Now that she’d been thrown head first into this situation she realised it was something she’d always wanted to know. It was just something she’d had to put to the back of her mind for the sake of her son, and the new life she’d needed to have in order to get her head straight.
Connor reached into his pocket and pulled out a photograph of an extremely handsome young man with short dark hair and eyes just like her own. He had a look of Connor about him but he seemed to have her smile, as well as the same piercing blue eyes, and just looking at that photograph made her want to cry again because that was her son, her baby, and she’d missed out on everything because she’d been weak. Too bloody weak.
Connor sensed what she was feeling and instinctively put his arm around her shoulders. This was tough for everyone, but especially for her, and especially now.
“He must hate me,” she whispered, leaning into him as he pulled her close.
“He doesn’t hate you. He’s very confused right now, as you can understand. But he doesn’t hate you…in fact; he really wants to meet you, Stevie. And I didn’t force him; he came to that decision all by himself.”
She pulled away, sitting up and looking at him as he continued to speak.
“I…I know that now isn’t the right time, and I’m going to try and make him understand that because too much is going on at the minute and things aren’t really going to calm down for quite a while yet but…he wants to meet you. You’re his mum, and I think he needs to do this, to get things straight in his own head, you know? He needs to make sense of this more than anyone. So, what do you say, Stevie? After fifteen years, are you ready to see your son?”
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
“No, don’t tell me I can’t see her, Angus, don’t stand there and tell me I can’t see her…”
“You need to calm down, Daniel.”
“I am calm! Jesus! I can’t believe I didn’t know about this…”
“She should have been truthful with you.”
Daniel looked at his Deputy, his voice slow and steady despite the shock of what he’d just discovered still sinking in. “Maybe she should have been. But this can’t have been easy for her, and right now I don’t even know where she is. I can’t even talk to her!” He was pacing the floor, pushing a hand through his hair as he walked. Agitated didn’t even begin to describe how he was feeling, not to mention confused. “Did she know this was going to happen? Is that why she’s disappeared?”
“She was with Mark Cassidy last night, Daniel.”
Daniel stopped pacing the floor and looked at Angus again, narrowing his eyes. “How the hell do you know that?”
“Oh, come on, Daniel. I can find out anything I want to, you know that. She walked out on you and straight back to him.”
Daniel thought back to how cheerful Angus had been that morning, how unusually upbeat and chipper his mood had been. And how he’d never really taken to Stevie, and as realisation dawned, Daniel couldn’t quite believe just how naive he really had been.
“Did you do this? Did you find all this out about her then give everything you knew to the lowest possible tabloid newspaper you could find? Was this all done deliberately to try and split us up? Those pictures of her, they were just the start, weren’t they? Did you know the whole bloody story but choose not to tell me? You chose not to let me make my own decision about her but rather discredit her in the most despicable way possible…she has a child, Angus! Jesus, this is going to affect him too, don’t you care about that?”
Angus should have known Daniel would put two and two together but he’d been so consumed with getting this story out that he hadn’t really thought about the consequences. He’d just wanted Stevie out of Daniel’s life and he’d been stupid to think he could prevent everything leading back to him. Maybe he could have done, if Connor Franklin had taken up his offer, but Daniel was an intelligent man and Angus had underestimated him. Again.
“This would have come out anyway, Daniel, and you know that. The media were never going to let your relationship with her continue without trying to dig up as much as they could about whoever you were with, and surely it’s better that it’s happened now rather than later, when there may have been so much more to lose. But this way…this way we can weather this storm, we can get through it, I promise you that.”
“I thought you were my friend, Angus.”
“I am your friend, Daniel, that’s why I’m doing this, don’t you see? She isn’t the kind of person you need around you, she has too much baggage, a past that won’t make her popular with our voters. She is everything that is wrong for you. You are a successful politician, an extremely popular Prime Minister and that needn’t be ruined because of this one mistake…”
“Mistake?”
“You’re the victim here, Daniel. You had no idea…”
“You want me to get rid of her?”
“She was with Mark Cassidy last night, do you understand that? And what do you think they were doing back at her flat, Daniel? Because I doubt very much it was just a cup of cocoa and separate beds.”
Daniel looked at Angus, his head spinning with it all. He couldn’t believe this was happening. He’d known Stevie had had doubts but had Mark Cassidy always been there, at the back of her mind? Had she always been waiting for the opportunity to go running back to him? And would these revelations about her past mean he’d now lost her for good? Because he was finding it hard to see a way back from this.
“Leave this chapter of your life behind, Daniel. Please. Forget about it. Look at what you’ve achieved, look at what you have. Stay with her and all that is in jeopardy but if you come out now, and give a statement that tells the world she’s out of your life, you can get through this.”
Daniel sat down, putting his head in his hands, the feeling of helplessness and defeat washing over him so quickly he felt dizzy. “I love her, Angus. How do I just stop doing that?”
“You have to try, Daniel. I’m advising you not only on a professional level here, but as a friend. Stevie Stone needs to be history. Samantha needs to be your future.”
Daniel looked up sharply. “Samantha?”
“Take her back, Daniel. Then all this Stevie Stone business will just look like some kind of mid-life crisis that you’ve suddenly woken up from, with your wife by your side and your political career back on an even keel.”
Daniel couldn’t get his head around this. Things were being bombarded at him from every angle and he felt completely out of control.
“You’ve got this all worked out, haven’t you?” he said quietly, still staring at Angus.
“It would never have lasted, Daniel.”
“It would have been nice to have had the chance to find that out for ourselves.”
Angus poured them both a drink. “Sever all ties, Daniel. Immediately.”
“Without seeing her?” Daniel didn’t know if he could cope with that, with not seeing her again. He missed her already, despite everything that was happening around him. He missed her, he missed everything they’d had, and to think that he was never going to get it back was heartbreaking. To think she’d ran straight back to Mark Cassidy was almost soul destroying. Even if it did now seem to have been an inevitable outcome.
“We can’t risk you being seen together, not now.” Angus handed him the small shot of whisky. “It’s too dangerous, Daniel. The press are all over this, they’ll be watching both of you like hawks so…I’m sorry.”
Daniel stared into his drink, feeling like his whole world had just come to a painful,
crashing end. “So, that’s it then? Just like that? It’s over?”
“I’m afraid it is, Prime Minister. It’s all over.”
***
Samantha Madison couldn’t believe what she was reading. Angus hadn’t told her exactly what was going to happen, just to keep her eye on the press, but this was beyond anything she’d expected. There was no way Daniel could possibly stay with Stevie Stone after this, it would be far too damaging to his political career. Whatever damage had already been done she knew Angus could deal with, he could get them through it, but as far as Stevie Stone was concerned, surely she was history now? And that was a thought that could only make Samantha Madison smile.
***
“Is she ok?” Johnny asked, trying to get his head around everything Mark had just told him.
He hadn’t actually had the chance to see any newspapers or watch any TV before his friend had turned up on his doorstep with the news of Stevie’s secret past, so to hear what Mark had to say shocked him, to say the least. And it was very rare that anything ever shocked Johnny Jackson.
See You at the Show Page 26
