They were at the lift. David Gold pressed the button so he couldn’t be that dismayed that she was escaping. Ellie turned to him. He was dripping sweat onto the parquet flooring, which was disgusting. She assiduously avoided any activities that might cause her to sweat. ‘Look, the only reason you brought me here was because you think I’m in cahoots with the press.’
He shrugged. ‘It’s a logical assumption.’
‘No, it’s not! It’s an insulting assumption, especially when the other reason you want to keep me under surveillance is so you can pump me for my exes’ contact details so Georgie Leigh can use them for her own evil ends. Anyway, for all I know, you might be the one who’s in cahoots with the press.’
For once it was his face that flushed darker, and for a few seconds he stared down at his trainers. When he raised his head Ellie could see that she’d hit on some kind of truth. ‘We don’t know each other very well, do we?’ he said as if he wasn’t talking about this argument, but about them, about two unsure, distrustful people thrown together.
‘We don’t,’ Ellie agreed, as the lift finally arrived with a triumphant ping. It was the perfect moment to ask him if he was still the same man she’d met in the middle of a field on a hot Sunday afternoon, but she couldn’t bring herself to. ‘So, did you leak my location to the press, last night?’
He shook his head. ‘No, I didn’t. Did you tip off anyone?’
It was Ellie’s turn to shake her head. She made sure to look him right in the eye. ‘Then it had to have been Georgie.’
The lift doors suddenly began to close and Ellie threw herself at them, but David got there first, stepping into the lift to hold the button to keep the doors open.
‘You don’t know that it was Georgie for certain,’ he said, but Ellie did. She was sure of it.
‘My exes: why did you need to know about them? Who asked you to get the lowdown on them? What were you going to do with the information?’
‘Usually in these situations, I contact all parties involved and slap them with a pre-emptive gagging order and a lot of nasty legal threats. It’s largely nothing more than grandstanding. Not that they know that,’ he finished with a wry smile.
Ellie made sure her gaze was steady and true. ‘So, that’s what you were going to do, was it?’
‘It’s what I was going to do. I can’t speak for anyone else.’
She rubbed the back of her hand over her tired eyes. ‘None of this is fair.’
He made one of those fleeting gestures towards her that he always thought better of just before he touched her. ‘I’m sorry. I haven’t really appreciated how difficult this must be for you,’ he said very, very gently.
Don’t be nice. It will break me, she thought, and she was able to lift her shoulders half an inch and pull a face to convey that message.
He very deliberately pulled her suitcase away. ‘You’re not going anywhere tonight,’ he decided, and just as deliberately he took her wrist and though his hand was hot and sweaty, Ellie still shivered and she still followed him out of the lift and back down the corridor to his flat.
Camden, London, 1986
Ari was booked into the clinic – she wished she wasn’t as far gone as she was, but she couldn’t change that. It was Billy who was having trouble dealing with it.
‘It’s our baby,’ he murmured on the night before the termination was due, his curly head resting on her belly. Ari was too bloated with indigestion to push him away.
‘It’s not a baby,’ she told him for the hundredth time, the word making her lips curl. ‘It’s just a parasite squatting in my uterus. We agreed, Billy.’
‘We did. Anyway I’ve already got one and that hasn’t worked out so well.’ He changed position, so he was spooned in behind her. ‘I had this idea before Lara was born that I’d try to be a good father, but I’ve never been much of a father or a husband or any of the other things that people expected me to be.’
‘I’ve never expected anything from you,’ Ari reminded him because if she didn’t expect anything from him, then he’d never disappoint her.
‘I know you didn’t, but everything’s different with you, Ari,’ Billy said, cupping her chin so she had to turn her head to look at him. ‘Just think. It’s my genes, your genes. It’s our legacy just as much as the songs are, and the songs might never get heard, but this …’ His hand curved over the bulge that had started to make its presence felt and meant that Ari couldn’t get into her tightest dresses any more. ‘We made this. Our love made this.’
‘We weren’t in love when your sperm found a way to my egg.’ She knocked his hand away. ‘For fuck’s sake, I thought I was the one who was meant to be a slave to my hormones. I’m not keeping it!’
‘I’m not asking you to. We’re going somewhere and a kid would slow us down, but you could have it, couldn’t you?’ He shrugged, tried to make a joke out of it. ‘We could probably get Georgina to look after it if we paid her in chocolate.’
‘She would. She’d love that. It would be the ultimate Billy Kay fan artefact,’ Ari said sourly, but when Billy’s hand covered her stomach again, she rested her hand on top of his and she thought of the baby. A little boy with Billy’s dark eyes and sweet smile. Not his nose, though. Her nose. And, hopefully, a sweeter temper than both his parents.
Chapter Nineteen
Ellie perched on the edge of David Gold’s vast sectional sofa upholstered in a nubby oatmeal, while he was in the shower, and sipped very carefully from a mug of camomile tea. She dreaded what his reaction might be if she spilled any on his taupe upholstery.
There was the soft sound of footsteps and she looked up to see him coming through the archway into the kitchen. He opened the fridge and pulled out one of his sports drinks.
‘Isn’t it too hot to go running?’ Ellie asked. It was more to fill the silence than anything else, but she was curious to know why any sane person would want to hare around the Heath during what the weather forecasters were calling the worst drought in nearly forty years. ‘It can’t be good for you in this heat.’
‘You sound like my mother,’ he said with a grin as he walked into the living room. He was wearing jeans and a dark blue T-shirt, his feet bare, and her mind was reeling, shifting, adjusting its position on him yet again, because he wasn’t wearing a suit and, for once, his smile didn’t seem to have an agenda. ‘I’m running a marathon in Hawaii in September so I need to train when it’s hot. Don’t look at me like that. Lots of people run marathons.’
They did, he was right. But to go all the way to the other side of the world to run over twenty-six miles was excessive. ‘It’s not your first marathon, then?’
He shook his head. ‘Eleventh. No, twelfth. It becomes addictive after a while.’
‘Really? ’Cause I did a sponsored five-k run for charity and after that I swore that I would never go faster than a slow jog ever again,’ Ellie said with a shudder. There had been pulled muscles and cramp and lots and lots of sweat.
‘So you don’t get an exercise high? Pity.’ He slid back one of the glossy white cupboard doors to reveal the TV and reached up to one of the high shelves. ‘These unlock the windows.’ He held up a small bunch of keys for Ellie’s inspection. ‘There’s a shameful amount of M&S ready meals in the freezer, and I’m sorry that I snapped at you when I got in from work but it’s been a very stressful two days. Though I’m sure your two days have been much more stressful.’
‘More like four days,’ Ellie amended with a weak smile, because his apology had been very gracious and it would be churlish to ignore it. ‘And I shouldn’t have given out your address but I needed my work stuff.’ She was getting that throbbing note to her voice again, like the tears weren’t far off. Even more than washing and blowdrying her hair, Ellie was sure that if she could just cry it out, she’d feel a whole lot better. ‘I did need those things – well, I didn’t need the flowers – but I can’t sit around and do nothing. I have to keep busy or I’ll just … well, I don’t know what I’ll do
. At least I still have a job, just, and it’s about all that’s keeping me together at the moment.’
David slid back one of the windows. It was still hot, but there was the faintest, gossamer hint of a breeze. ‘What do you mean by you just have a job?’
Ellie sighed. ‘I got fired yesterday. Vaughn, my boss, he hates fusses and dramas, and he has a lot of top-drawer artists and clients who also hate fuss and drama.’ She rested her elbows on her knees and cupped her chin in her hands. ‘He’s always threatening to fire me and the rest of the staff, but usually he relents by lunchtime so I’m waiting to see if being sacked sticks or if he’ll change his mind.’
David Gold was heading for the other end of the sofa now and that meant that he was looking at her. Ellie shook her head so her hair was covering her face and would hopefully obscure any stray tears that might have the audacity to leak out of her eyes. ‘You’re handling this very well,’ he said softly.
‘I’m not. I’m really not.’ If she were handling this well, then she wouldn’t be on the verge of tears at least once every hour. ‘I’m trying to act like it’s business as normal, but my normal has completely disappeared.’
‘Most people in your position would have taken to their beds by now, so the fact that you’re even trying to get on with work is admirable,’ David Gold assured her. It was just as well that there was a huge expanse of sofa between them because Ellie suspected if he were close enough to pat her hand in a comforting fashion, it would be her downfall. ‘This won’t last for ever.’
Ellie managed to shrug. ‘Everything has changed now. There are seven, maybe eight people in the world who really know me and love me unconditionally. Then there’s everyone else who’s read all the stories in the papers and are now judging me and finding me completely wanting.’
Once the paparazzi had packed up their cameras and recorders and moved on to their next victim, Ellie would still be at the mercy of the general public, who were cruel and unforgiving. Men in white vans would bellow rude things about her sexual availability out of their windows, old women would glare at her in shops and mutter stuff under their breath and, even without being a tabloid sensation, she always dreaded having to walk past a gang of teenage girls or rude boys. Now … well, now, she might just as well walk the streets of London with the words ‘kick me’ stamped on her arse.
‘I will get through this,’ she said, and it wasn’t even for his benefit but as a vow to herself that she wasn’t going to fall apart. She was better than that. Ari had brought her up to be stronger than that. ‘It’s just going to take some time.’
‘Ellie? I really think you should stay here for tonight. But if you don’t want to, then I’ll drive you wherever you want to go.’
David Gold had changed. He was being kind, as if he had no ulterior motive, but was genuinely concerned about her emotional and physical wellbeing. Besides, the thought of having to take her chances on the mean streets of London made Ellie’s stomach hurt and she clasped her hands firmly together so they wouldn’t shake.
It was funny, really: up here, high in the sky, looking down at the world, Ellie felt safe. Or safer. ‘It is getting rather late,’ she said carefully, and he ever so slightly ducked his head in one of those almost imperceptible nods, like he was answering a question she didn’t have the guts to ask.
‘Stay here for the night, sleep on it and decide what you want to do in the morning?’ he suggested. Ellie wanted to sigh and sink back on the sofa in relief, but it wasn’t the kind of sofa you could sink back on; he didn’t even have any cushions and she didn’t know what was up with that. Still, this new understanding between them, the hauteur that had disappeared once he’d changed out of his suit and tie, made Ellie relax her guard, although …
‘Withholding your address was not at all cool,’ she told him as sharply as she could. ‘It was weird and serial killer-y. It might be a good idea if nobody knows my actual geographic location, but that’s my call, not yours.’
This time the nod was more decisive. ‘I’m happy to give you the address but as your ipso facto legal advisor, I would counsel you not to pass it to anyone else.’ He held up his hand as Ellie opened her mouth to dispute that. ‘I’m sure your friends and family wouldn’t divulge your whereabouts to the press, but addresses get written down on pieces of paper, which get dropped and left lying around or typed into phones, which get hacked.’
‘Well, OK, I suppose that’s a fair point.’
‘I’ll tell you the address and it’s up to you what you do with it, if you decided that you wanted to stay indefinitely.’ He wasn’t even looking at her, but staring down at his toes. The thought of other people’s bare feet, especially men’s bare feet, always made Ellie feel bilious – she’d even forced ex-boyfriends with particularly hideous feet to keep their socks on – but David Gold had quite nice feet. They were thin and narrow, like the rest of him, and there was no hair sprouting on his toes and his nails were neatly clipped. Now she was staring at his feet too, couldn’t tear her eyes away.
If she still got tingles when he was in a suit and doing his snake-oil salesman patter, then being around when he was doing casual with a grin would be the undoing of her. Not in a getting naked way either. ‘I couldn’t impose,’ she said.
‘I already told you that you wouldn’t be. Most nights I only come home to sleep.’
If his flat was nothing more than a very expensive crash pad, then surely there was no harm in staying for a day or so? ‘Do you really think that if the press don’t know where I am, they’ll stop printing stories about me?’ she asked hopefully.
‘Well, at least there won’t be any new stories, and as an added bonus I’ll give you a keycard so you can use the residents’ gym.’
Ellie didn’t do gyms. They were generally full of sweaty people making grunting sounds. ‘That’s very nice of you but—’
‘There’s also a swimming pool. In summer, they open up the skylights,’ David Gold said casually, like he wasn’t that bothered about the skylights.
Ellie did do swimming pools, though. She’d even packed a couple of bikinis just in case. ‘Well, if it’s not too much trouble I’ll stay for tonight, then see how it goes.’
They were still staring at his feet. He wriggled his toes. ‘Do you like Thai food?’ he asked suddenly. ‘It’s just it’s late and what with my run and our little spat …’
‘I do like Thai food, and now you mention it, I am quite hungry,’ Ellie admitted. ‘Pad Thai?’
‘Pad Thai,’ he agreed.
Come Thursday evening, Ellie was still in residence. She suspected that she’d outstayed her welcome but David was never around to serve her with an eviction notice and, besides, she didn’t really want to go.
In hiding on the fifteenth floor of a luxury flat development, where no one was able to lurk with camera waiting to steal a piece of her for posterity, she’d settled into a nice, comfortable routine. In the mornings she’d sleep in to a very decadent quarter to eight, then as the sound of the front door closing penetrated her subconscious, she’d get out of the very comfortable bed in David’s spare room, the mattress firm but with just enough give, and open the patio doors so she could breakfast on the balcony.
Ellie spent most of the day camped out there, slathered in suncream and peering over her laptop at the lush green acres of Hampstead Heath in the near distance. The BBC and the Met Office kept promising rain but the rain never came, and though Ellie knew this was global warming and global warming was generally a very bad thing, her tan was coming along beautifully. Her limbs were now the exact same colour as Brûlée, which was the fake tan shade that she normally had to work up to. She’d stay outside until noon, then the fierce midday sun would force her inside and she’d set up shop on the dining-room table.
Spending so much time solo wasn’t easy. As well as questioning her commitment to a minimalist lifestyle, Ellie was also questioning her ability to eventually live on her own. At home, if Tess or Lola weren’t around, Ellie
often went downstairs to the restaurant to sit at the bar and drink a glass of wine with Theo. At work, even though she huffed at the constant interruptions, someone, usually Piers, was always coming into her office to look things up in her reference books or borrow her stapler, but mostly for a chat.
Now Ellie worked to the accompaniment of property shows. In the afternoon she switched to programmes about people finding tatty bits of junk in their lofts to sell at auction, which was a bit more work-orientated. When Ellie found herself shouting things like ‘Any fool can see that’s not Ming dynasty,’ or, ‘You haven’t checked for an artist’s mark, you bow-tied buffoon,’ it was time to down tools.
She’d change into a bikini, pull on the thick towelling robe that David had lent her and take the lift to the residents’ gym on the top floor. Ellie usually had the pool to herself so she could spend an hour alternating breaststroke for ten lengths and front crawl for ten lengths with her head held at an odd angle because she feared the damage that chlorinated water could wreak on her hair.
Then she returned to the flat for a shower and was back on the balcony with her laptop to soak up the late afternoon sun, even though air-drying made her hair go wavy. At seven, she’d have dinner, then do some more work, Skype her loved ones or catch up on the last season of Mad Men. Just before ten, Ellie would do a thorough sweep of the apartment. Cups and plates went in the dishwasher, not the draining board, and she now knew what was rubbish and what was recyclable, and discarded things as appropriate.
At any time between ten thirty and eleven, David would arrive home. Ellie wasn’t sure if that was usual; if he had client dinners or a Wednesday night poker game, or if he was out every night flirting with a succession of sleek, effortlessly elegant, go-getting thirty-something women at some hip pop-up restaurant or other, but she stuck around long enough to say goodnight, before retreating to the guest room.
All in all, staying in David’s flat wasn’t the ordeal that Ellie thought it might be, but she’d never been so mind-numbingly, climb-the-walls bored in her life. She got why he was avoiding her, and being on her own for hour upon hour was better, safer, than being around him. Not when she still didn’t trust him not to be working some elaborate double-bluff on Billy Kay’s behalf. Nor did she want to be one of those sad women who panted after a man in the face of zero encouragement, especially when the man in question was out of bounds. Boredom was preferable to making a complete fool of herself or being caught as she came out of the bathroom with a towel precariously wrapped round her like something out of a Benny Hill sketch.