‘SHE’S STILL GOT her phone switched off.’
Jason looked up from his easel and nodded tersely before getting back to work with his charcoals.
‘Well, maybe we should go up to her dad’s after. Make sure she’s OK,’ he suggested, his focus intent on the paper clipped to the board.
‘OK.’ Jenna twitched, feeling the onset of pins and needles in her left hand.
‘Keep still,’ growled Jason.
‘I can’t. My arm’s starting to go to sleep.’ She shook her hand vigorously and propped herself up on an elbow, giving Jason an accusing stare. ‘I wasn’t born to be a life model. And I’m getting cold in this ridiculous rig-out.’
She was wearing Jason’s favourite black underwear set with all the cut-outs, reclining on her reconditioned eighteenth-century chaise longue amidst a pile of marabou-trimmed cushions.
‘Five more minutes,’ he said. ‘I’m almost done with this sketch, I promise. Now, lie back down and think of England, babe.’
Jenna, clenching and unclenching her hand to restore life to her fingers, grinned at him.
‘I didn’t think that was the look you were aiming for,’ she said. ‘Staunch and patriotic.’
‘No, that’s true,’ said Jason. ‘Don’t think of England. Think of what my hands are going to be doing once they drop these charcoals and get hold of you.’
Jenna slid back into her reclining position with a happy sigh. Yes, that was worth thinking about. Never mind that her nipples were starting to throb in the draughty air of the morning room, or that the marabou cushions were slippery and about to fall off the chaise.
Never mind anything except that she was dressed and arranged for Jason’s lustful gaze and he would soon be transferring all the fantasies she represented into reality.
‘Yeah, that look on your face, that’s what I want,’ he said approvingly. ‘Keep it just that way. Show me you want it.’
Immediately Jenna was overcome by self-consciousness. Was her expression so blatant? Did she look slutty? A silly question, perhaps, given what she was wearing, but she couldn’t help thinking that these sketches might be viewed one day, many years in the future, by art students and people in galleries. What on earth would they think of her?
‘No, what’s up?’ Jason put down his charcoal in dismay. ‘You’ve gone all prim and proper.’
‘Sorry. I just had this vision of people in the future looking at this picture and thinking I’m a right old slapper.’
Jason made a noise of frustration, then came over to her, crouching in front of the chaise and looking sternly into her eyes.
‘First of all,’ he said, ‘less of the old.’
‘I’m thirty-five. Practically middle-aged. This isn’t exactly dignified for a woman of my age.’
‘For fuck’s sake, Jen, thirty-five is not middle-aged.’
‘It is in Hollywood. Women my age are all over the Botox doctors and plastic surgeons, all looking for failsafe ways to defy gravity and time.’
‘Forget Hollywood. Forget having to be a teenage Barbie doll for your whole life. I wouldn’t want that anyway. You’re young, you’re gorgeous and all those people in the future will have the hots for you, just like I have.’
‘But … don’t you think they’ll think I’m a bit …’
‘A bit what? Sexy? Hell, yes.’
‘No, not sexy. Trashy. Easy. Whatever.’
Jason’s dark eyes widened and his face settled into what Jenna tended to think of as his ‘before the spanking’ look.
‘Did you really mean to call my work trashy, babe?’ he said.
‘No,’ she said quickly, her heart beginning to race. ‘Not your work. Me. Lying here in this slutty underwear with a come-hither look in my eye. You couldn’t really see the Queen posing like this, could you? Be honest.’
He spluttered into laughter.
‘I really, really don’t want to,’ he said. ‘But you’ve put that in my head now. Jesus, Jen. Thanks for that. But I’ve got a little bit of news for you. You’re not the Queen.’
‘Well, I know that, but I’m a public figure. I have to take care of my image, just like she does.’
‘I’ve told you, nobody’s going to see these until after we’re dead, unless you want them to. Besides, what’s wrong with the world knowing you love what I do to you? It’s the truth, isn’t it? Art and truth should go hand in hand.’
‘It’s the truth,’ she said softly. ‘But it’s private too.’
He pursed his lips, and she could see that he was deep in thought.
‘Don’t you think,’ he said, taking her hand, ‘that there should be more love in the world?’
‘What?’
‘Don’t you think it’s good to give the world this … this passion of ours? As an example. So people long after us will see what it was … in case it, I don’t know, dies out or something. In case the world changes into a place where there isn’t any love. Don’t you think it’s important to keep a record of …?’ He broke off, unable to find the words he was looking for.
Jenna reached out to touch his cheek.
‘Oh, Jason,’ she said. ‘You make me see things differently. I could never be without you.’
‘So … did that make any sense? Do you see what I mean?’
‘You want the world to know that you loved, and to feel it the way you felt it?’
‘Yes. I can’t keep quiet about it, Jen. It’s too important to me. But if you really don’t want to, then that’s … I have to respect that. We have to both want it.’
She swallowed a lump in her throat.
‘I do want it,’ she whispered. ‘I do.’
He kissed her hand, then her forehead.
‘And don’t worry about looking slutty,’ he said, into her ear. ‘Because that’s the way I like you best.’
He growled and bit her earlobe before returning to his easel.
‘Besides,’ he said, making delicate final touches with the charcoal, ‘what I really want is for people in the future to look at this and say, “Lucky bastard!” It’s an ego trip, basically.’
But Jenna wasn’t fooled. He liked to play the laddish rogue, but there was much, much more to Jason than met the eye.
She lay there for the final minutes of her modelling stint, seeing herself as those nebulous future viewers might see her. A woman adored, a goddess.
It was not an unpleasant feeling.
He put down his charcoal and threw back his head, taking a deep breath.
She watched him, fascinated by his post-creative behaviour. He was like a man who had just broken through the finish tape after a marathon. Less sweaty, but no less full of wonder at his own achievement.
He took a long look at the easel and then invited Jenna to come and see it.
She picked up her robe from the end of the chaise, but he abruptly told her to drop it, so she padded over naked to stand beside him.
He encircled her shoulders with an arm and pulled her into his side.
‘What d’you reckon?’ he said.
She couldn’t take her eyes from the sketch. How on earth could a few lines and shadings build up to something with such heart and soul? It was as if the charcoal had got inside her and read her thoroughly before returning to the paper to recreate what it had learned. But was she really like that? Was that really her?
She was immeasurably flattered, but was she really as beautiful as that?
None of the thousands, maybe millions, of photographs of her floating around the internet had ever quite dug so deep into her soul. She felt more than physically naked. If people saw this, they would know her. It was almost unsettling.
‘Well?’ Jason sounded nervous. ‘I mean, it’s just a sketch. The actual painting’ll be …’
‘No.’ The word came out as a breath. ‘It’s amazing. You’re amazing.’
‘You like it.’ He kissed her neck, burying his face in it to try and hide his pleasure, but it was obvious enough.
‘I like her. You’ve made me look … better than I am.’
‘No, I haven’t.’ He retracted his face from the crook of her shoulder and stared at her. ‘That’s what you look like.’
‘But it’s more than what I look like. There’s so much to see in the expression you’ve given me.’
‘I want to tell people about you. I want them to see every side of you at once – the part that’s strong, the part that’s soft, the part that’s a down to earth Bleddy girl and the part that’s a superstar. All of it in one. It wasn’t easy.’
‘I’ll bet. But I think you’ve done it.’
‘When I come to do the painting, I’m going to do what the old portrait artists used to do and put in a load of random objects that say something about you. Just a little nod to ’em, like, but in a modern way. So, I dunno, haven’t worked it all out yet, but maybe a lump of coal to show you come from Bledburn, lying on a copy of Hello! mag. Well, that’s a bit shit, but you know what I mean.’
She laughed. ‘It’s not shit. It’s clever. I like it.’
‘Nobody’s ever called me that before.’
‘Nobody really knew you, then. Do you know, perhaps you should paint yourself. And then they might.’
He smiled and kissed her.
‘That’s an idea. Or paint us both together. That’s a plan for another day. Once I’ve done all the dirty pictures of you.’ The kissing drowned out the conversation for a long while. ‘But that project might take a long, long time,’ he whispered. ‘Lots and lots of pictures.’
She stood on tiptoe, folded into him, enjoying the rough feel of his jeans and T-shirt against her bare skin. He was covered in wet paint, and she knew some of it was rubbing on to her, but she didn’t care. She liked it. It was a kind of symbol of their union.
She held on to the back of his neck with one hand, keeping his mouth pressed to hers, opening up for his tongue.
One of his hands, caked in flaking dried paint, moved down the curve of her back and over the swell of her bottom, while the other found a breast and toyed with it, examining every inch with an inquisitive thumb.
She trembled with desire, stroking his jeans-clad leg with her naked one, lifting her foot to hook around his calf and hold herself closer to him.
‘This is what I want to paint,’ he murmured, breaking off and looking deep into her. ‘Your lips all wet from kissing and your eyes telling me what they want. Keep telling me, babe.’
She slipped a hand inside the waistband of his jeans, eager to feel what was waiting for her.
‘Well, that’s definitely told me,’ he said, with a slight gasp as her fingertips found their target and squeezed.
He braced his arms under her bottom and lifted her, forcing her hand regretfully from his underwear as she jolted up and wound her legs around his hips to balance herself. Clinging to him, she resumed their kiss all the staggering way from the easel to the chaise.
They tumbled together on to the slippery chintz, the cushions falling pell-mell to the floor.
Jason paused in the feast of kissing and caressing to remove items of clothing, one at a time, before falling back on her to take more from her mouth and her body.
Before taking off his jeans, he took out his phone from the pocket. Jenna was momentarily confused, thinking this was surely not the right time to call for a pizza, but he had something quite different in mind, as she discovered when he started clicking away at her dishevelled and paint-smeared body.
‘Perfect,’ he muttered, putting the phone down. ‘Just what I need. Jenna Diamond without all the polish.’
‘Shut up and get on with it,’ she said, surprising herself with her guttural tone. She reached up for his neck and pulled him back down without ceremony.
All remaining clothes were wrestled off and consigned to the floor in the shortest possible time.
Jason was all over her, devouring her, neck, breasts, belly and lower. When he reached her triangle, he pulled her thighs roughly apart and pushed his face into the middle.
Jenna bucked and arched her back, ready for the exquisite friction of his tongue in her most private parts. She reeled with pleasure, grinding her hips over and over as he used his mouth with devastating skill.
‘Ohhh,’ she moaned as he pulled her wider open with determined thumbs. ‘You can’t …’ It was too much, and her orgasm poured from her, once then again as he continued to lick without stopping.
Sated at last, he pulled himself up until he shadowed her body and, holding her shoulder tight with his eyes fixed on hers, he plunged inside her.
It seemed to be his avowed intention to wring her inside out with the number of orgasms he took from her. He kept at her, varying the speed and position so many times she lost count, until finally, after she had lost all sense of her body, her mind, herself, he finally released his own climax into her.
She was still floating, seeing specks before her eyes, when she became aware of the click click click of his camera phone once more.
‘Oh, Jase,’ she managed to whimper through rubbery lips.
What a picture she would make! Her hair was plastered to her face, her eyes unfocused, her body used up and shining with mingled sweat and paint, her whole demeanour punch-drunk.
‘Shh,’ he said, snapping away. ‘This is what I need for my last pic in the series. You look totally fucking done for.’ The rich satisfaction in his voice made her squirm and curl her toes.
Yes, there was some truth in his claim that it was an ego trip. What could be better for a man’s ego than the thought that people in the future would look at her ravaged body, and her face stupid and slack with satisfaction, and know that it was he who had produced this effect?
But she didn’t mind.
She liked the idea. It made her feel more his than ever, and when she experienced this sense of belonging, it gave her a paradoxical freedom from every other constraint in her life.
When she was Jason’s, she didn’t have to be Jenna Diamond any more. She was just Jen.
‘Look at you,’ he said, gleefully waving his phone in her face.
She made an enormous effort to come back to earth, blinking hard and working on her breath before looking at the photographs.
Good grief, she barely recognised herself!
‘I’m a hot mess!’ she exclaimed. ‘You can’t paint that.’
He scooped her into his side and arranged them both into a comfortable sitting position on the chaise – which would now need to be re-upholstered, given the terrible treatment it had just received. She still wasn’t quite able to control her body in the way she might wish, so Jason posed her like a doll, letting her settle and subside against his own worn-out frame.
‘I can,’ he said, smiling at her photograph. ‘And I’m going to. Hot mess is exactly what I’m after.’
‘I look half-dead,’ she objected.
‘More like three-quarters, babe. Yeah. That’s good for me. I want people to see you and suck in a breath at how sore you must be feeling inside.’
‘You’re a pervert.’
He stared at her pityingly, as if rebuking her for her ridiculous statement.
‘All right,’ she said, jabbing him with her elbow. ‘I know that’s obvious. But you really are.’
‘They’ll be jealous,’ he said gloatingly. ‘Jealous of both of us. Unless they’re getting similar themselves, of course. There must be people in the world with the same level of sexual chemistry as us … maybe.’ He sounded doubtful.
‘I’m not entering any competitions,’ said Jenna.
He chuckled.
‘There’s a thought. Wouldn’t you like a gold medal for your drawing room?’
‘My Emmy award for Talent Team is perfectly fine by itself, thanks.’
‘Ah well. It was an idea. If your judgey mates could see this …’
‘Never.’ She was quite firm.
‘I wonder what that Mr Nasty guy would have to say about it.’
‘Something nasty, obviously.’ She tried to swipe at the camera, to get it out of his hand, suddenly afraid he might press the wrong button and beam the image into all the social networks there were.
Jason held it away from her, tutting, but she got hold of his arm and grappled with him.
‘Put it down,’ she begged. ‘I’m afraid it might …’
They fell into a struggle, Jason heaving with laughter at her pathetic attempts to take the phone from him.
In the chaos of their play-fight, the phone was knocked from Jason’s hand and sent clattering to the floor. They both dived for it at once, falling in an ungraceful tangle on to the rug.
Jenna got hold of it first.
‘This isn’t the phone I gave you,’ she said, noticing for the first time the different casing and the more sophisticated screen.
‘No, sorry, it’s an old one of yours, the one you said you were getting rid of ’cos too many people knew your number. Takes better pictures …’
He trailed off, noticing her appalled face.
‘Oh God,’ she said. ‘Oh God, it can’t have done that.’
‘What?’
‘While we were fighting over it … I think one of us touched the screen at the wrong time and …’
‘What?’
‘It’s on fucking Facebook!’
‘No way. Give it here.’
But Jenna leapt up, staring at the screen as if she expected it to speak all the essential truths of the universe.
‘It has, you know,’ she wailed. ‘Oh sweet Jesus.’
‘Well, delete it then,’ said Jason.
‘It’ll be too late,’ she said, her eyes wild as she jabbed manically at every possible button. ‘Probably shared and tweeted and God knows what all over the world by now.’
‘Are you sure?’ said Jason doubtfully. ‘Don’t you need to press post or something?’
‘I think I did. Accidentally.’
The screen came up. The picture was indeed taking top billing in Jenna’s Facebook feed. It had already been shared twelve times.
‘Oh God.’
She pressed delete, but it seemed a bit pointless now. The picture was out there.
‘After all my efforts,’ she said after a long period spent with her head in her hands whining like a kicked dog. ‘After everything I’ve done to keep the press off our backs, I go and do this, all by myself.’
‘Is it that bad?’
Jason had got up and was pacing, somewhat moodily, around the room.
She stared up at him.
‘Is it that bad?’
‘Well, what does it prove? That you’ve got a sex life. Big deal.’
‘I’m going to report myself to Facebook,’ she said feverishly. ‘But it’s too late again. This’ll be saved all over the place by now. The fucking thing will live forever.’
‘But what difference does it make, in the end?’ blurted Jason, sounding exasperated. ‘It’s not like you’re committing a crime.’
‘Oh yes it is,’ she said hollowly. ‘A PR crime. I’ve tarnished my image and I might never recover. This could spell the end of Talent Team. The Jenna Myatt Diamond brand is finished.’
‘Don’t be so daft. You’re overreacting, love. And besides, you’re not a brand. You’re a person. The only way you’ll ever be a Jenna Myatt Diamond Brand is if you marry Russell Brand. And I’m not having that, trust me.’
She laughed despite herself.
‘He’s a nice bloke, actually. You’d be surprised,’ she said.
‘Sex scandals never did him any harm,’ observed Jason.
‘No. But I’ve never made shagging around a part of my public persona, have I? I can’t get away with what he can.’
‘Double standards,’ said Jason. ‘Victorian values, still alive and kicking.’
‘No, it’s not that. It’s just … Oh, why would I expect you to understand?’
Jason, who was standing by the window, suddenly smacked the wall so hard it sounded like a pistol shot.
Jenna jumped up from the bed where she had subsided in despair.
‘No, right,’ he said tightly. ‘Why would I understand anything, eh?’
And he marched out of the room.
Before she could follow him, Jenna’s phone rang. It was her PR person. Damn it. She had to take this call.
Sighing, she clicked the button and said, ‘Yes?’
Deano Diamond nearly choked on his Old Fashioned.
‘What the …? Is that photoshopped? It can’t be real.’
He turned to Lawrence Harville, who had showed him the picture on his mobile phone.
‘All too real, if you ask me,’ said Harville. ‘I’m sorry. It must be embarrassing for you.’
Deano contemplated this thought. Embarrassing? Not really. Maddening? Yes. But also potentially grounds for optimism. Another scandal was exactly what Jenna didn’t need right now. Who was to say she wouldn’t welcome a little bit of support and … well … a nice feel-good story about a marital reconciliation might just be on the PR cards after all …
‘Embarrassing for her, more like,’ he said, looking around the cocktail bar as if he expected everyone to be staring at him and whispering about it.
To be fair, everyone was staring at him, but then, they always did.
‘Shall we get out of here?’ he said, suspecting that the thing was about to go viral and wanting to be somewhere private when it did.
‘My place?’ suggested Harville. ‘I’ve got some paperwork about the talent show I’d like you to look over.’
‘Yeah, your place. Let’s go.’
Driving from the smart cocktail bar in Nottingham back through Bledburn, Lawrence insisted on taking them through the estate. Deano wondered if he was trying to make some point about their respective birthrights, but he didn’t ask.
‘What are we doing here again?’ he asked, as they slunk past the parade of shops with its permanent residency of boys with beer cans and older guys with dogs.
‘It excites me to think that we could be on the verge of transforming this place,’ said Harville smoothly. ‘Giving hope to the hopeless. That’s what we’re doing here.’
Harville wouldn’t be able to do a damn thing without him, thought Deano, his hackles rising slightly. And if he was doing it out of pure altruism, Deano would donate all his royalties to Battersea Dogs Home for the next ten years. Harville was the sort of person who wouldn’t lift a finger unless there was some personal advantage in it.
But what did it matter? He was helping with the documentary, and he might be able to smooth a path back to Jenna. That was the main thing.
The thought of Jenna made him think again of the photograph, of her face, of what she had obviously been doing, and with whom. He swallowed, trying not to kick a hole in the footwell.
His attention was diverted when Harville began to slow down and crawl along the kerb.
‘Well, well, well,’ said Harville, sounding triumphant. ‘What have we here?’
Deano followed Harville’s gaze to see a young man loping across the patchy grass to the miserable flats behind the shops.
‘Is that …?’
‘Our local artistic genius, if I’m not much mistaken,’ said Harville.
‘Jason Watson.’
‘The very man. Let’s invite him to join the party, shall we? Deano, would you do the honours? He’s taken against me, for some reason.’
Deano, intrigued, was not averse to the suggestion. The chance to get Jenna’s lover and his rival in private seemed too good to pass up.
He got out of the car and hurried, his too-fashionably-tight shoes pinching his toes somewhat, over towards the gloomy dustbin shed.
‘Jason, isn’t it?’ he called, before his quarry could press the doorbell of the flat he meant to visit.
Jason turned around, his face dark with hostility.
‘Who wants to know …? Oh. It’s you.’
‘Yes,’ said Deano, feeling slightly foolish standing in this desolate spot in his expensively distressed denim and leather. ‘Deano. Sorry, we never did get a proper introduction, did we?’
Jason just stared, making Deano’s scalp crawl with embarrassment.
He pressed on regardless, holding out a hand.
‘Er, fancy a drink, mate?’ he hazarded.
‘I’ve come to see my mum,’ said Jason blankly. ‘And I don’t get what you’re doing here. Are you stalking me or what?’
‘No, just happened to catch sight of you … thought a chat might be nice … Y’know, man to man. Friendly, I promise. I’m always friendly.’ He looked around nervously. Some attention was coming their way from the direction of the shops. ‘Look, we’re about to get mobbed. Please?’
He waved a hand at the waiting car.
Jason shrugged.
‘What the hell?’ he said. ‘Might at least get a decent bevvy out of you.’
He followed Deano to the car and climbed into the back seat behind him.
Deano noticed that Harville had his head well down and he spoke in a gruff, unrecognisable voice once the doors were shut.
‘Shall I drive on, boss?’ he said.
‘Oh … yeah,’ said Deano, slightly confused by the chauffeur schtick, but supposing there must be rhyme and reason to it, given the bad blood that was meant to exist between him and Jason.
Jason seemed oblivious to the man in front, obviously assuming him to be a hired driver. He was too interested in Deano himself.
‘So, what’s this about?’ he said abruptly. ‘Going to get me behind the bike sheds and duff me up for taking your girl off you? Is that it?’
‘Not at all,’ said Deano with an uncomfortable chuckle. ‘You know I’m keen to make this documentary. I thought perhaps you’d put in a word for me.’
‘No need,’ said Jason coolly. ‘I reckon she’ll do it.’
Deano caught a breath. ‘Are you serious?’
‘Why wouldn’t I be?’
‘Well … she wasn’t exactly up for it, last time I saw her.’
‘No. It was the shock of you turning up like that. You should’ve given her some warning.’
Deano nodded.
‘OK, it was a mistake, I see that. But you think she’s calmed down now?’
‘I think she’s worked out that the only way to get rid of you is to do this film,’ said Jason, with an edge of cruel satisfaction.
Deano was pierced.
‘Ah,’ he said, pausing to try and regroup. ‘Get rid of me. I see.’ He took a breath and looked long and hard at Jason.
‘The thing is, Jason, she’ll never be rid of me.’
Jason clenched his fists. Deano felt the exhilaration of combat fire up inside him.
‘The thing is, mate,’ said Jason, ‘she’s with me now.’
‘How long has it been? A month? Six weeks?’
‘Long enough.’ Jason’s voice was little more than a growl.
‘Long enough to forget twenty amazing years?’ said Deano. ‘That’s what we had. Well, eighteen. Nearly nineteen. All the same, a long time. Longer than six weeks. And you don’t forget something like what we had in six weeks. I can guarantee it.’
‘She ain’t forgotten the way you treated her,’ said Jason. ‘No way.’
‘I was an idiot,’ Deano conceded. ‘I lost sight of what I had. But I’ve got that sight back now, Jason. You’re a rebound job. She’s flattered – younger man, talented, good-looking, all that. But it doesn’t compare to twenty years of the most incredible rollercoaster you can ever imagine. Nothing could.’
‘Where’s my fucking drink?’ said Jason, suddenly punching the upholstery. ‘You said you’d get me one. Instead I’m getting fucking earache. Drop me off at this corner. I’m done.’
‘Go on, Jason, hit him. Hit him hard.’
The voice came from the front seat, surprising both the back seat passengers.
‘I beg your pardon!’ exclaimed Deano, while Jason shouted, ‘Jesus Christ!’, having presumably worked out the real identity of the ‘chauffeur’.
‘I’m sorry, Deano,’ said Harville, steering the car around a corner and into a driveway. ‘I thought that’s what you were aiming for. And it’s a good idea. Might solve a few of our problems all at once.’
‘Wouldn’t be great for my face, though,’ said Deano, although he could see the value of Harville’s reasoning. Really, wouldn’t it be rather satisfying to see this little upstart … this man who was cuckolding him … put away for assault? And after all, that was the kind of man he was. Council estate dregs. It was mortifying, to be replaced by such a … specimen.
‘What the fuck are you doing with this low-life anyway?’ exploded Jason. ‘Don’t you know about him?’
‘Oh dear, somebody can’t let bygones be bygones,’ sighed Lawrence, parking the car outside some kind of old vicarage that had seen better days. ‘Let’s talk over a few drinks, shall we? I’ve got the most divine single malt inside. I’m sure we can … thrash a few things out. Eh, Deano?’
‘He’s the local mafia,’ said Jason desperately. ‘Are you OK with that? Are you OK with that kind of company? Oh, of course you are, I forgot. Jenna told me you preferred hanging out with drug dealers to being with her. No wonder she’s all over me now.’
Deano punched a fist into his open palm.
‘Now, now, boys,’ said Lawrence with a nervous laugh. ‘Let’s not get into the red and blue corners just yet. Nice and calm, nice and calm.’
He opened the front door and led them into a mildewed vestibule, in need of some tender loving care.
‘It’s not what you’re used to, I expect,’ he said apologetically to Deano. ‘I’ve been having some property issues. Basically, I’m camping out until I can get the Hall back.’
‘Harville Hall?’ said Deano, in some surprise.
‘Well, the clue’s in the name,’ said Lawrence, taking them into a living room. A wood-burner was on the go and Deano looked around for whoever had performed this domestic task.
‘Oh, the boys are around somewhere,’ said Lawrence vaguely. ‘Out chopping wood, I expect.’
‘The boys?’ said Jason.
‘Friends. You know.’ Lawrence smiled in a manner that could only be described as fiendish and took a bottle from a shelf. ‘Do sit down. The furniture might be old but it’s clean and comfortable.’
‘I’m not drinking with you,’ said Jason, remaining on his feet.
‘Oh, don’t worry. I’m not partaking,’ said Lawrence, pouring a hefty measure into a tumbler. ‘I need to keep a clear head. Meetings later, that sort of thing. You artistes live according to different rules than we business types, though, or so I hear.’
‘Business? Dirty business,’ muttered Jason, but he took a tumbler and perched on the arm of a chair, looking guardedly at his company. ‘What do you want with me?’
‘You’ve heard my piece,’ said Deano, knocking back the whiskey.
‘Yeah, and I told you. Jenna’s not interested. She’ll do the film and then you can fuck off back to Hollywood.’
‘Manners,’ said Lawrence mildly. ‘Let’s all be gentlemen, shall we?’
Jason stood up again.
‘What sort of gentleman behaves like you?’ he thundered. ‘You’re no more than a crook, Harville. You tried to attack Jenna. Yeah.’ He turned to Deano. ‘He never told you that, did he? Came back to the Hall after I was put away and thought he could do what he liked with her. If Kayley hadn’t been there …’
‘Kayley,’ said Deano, staring. ‘I like her.’ He put down his tumbler. ‘Is that true, Lawrence? What he just said?’
‘Rubbish,’ said Lawrence, but one of his eyelids twitched as he spoke. ‘Surely Jenna would have pressed charges, don’t you think?’
‘She didn’t want the extra publicity. She had enough on her plate. Besides, she thought the drugs stuff would be enough to send you down without her name being dragged into it even further. Pity the CPS didn’t come through on that one.’
‘Let’s not drag up the past,’ said Lawrence, struggling to maintain a level tone of voice. ‘We aren’t here to talk about me. We’re here for you and Deano to talk things through.’
‘Are we?’ said Deano. ‘You’re the one who wanted to bring him here.’
‘What are you thinking, Harville?’ asked Jason. ‘What’s the plan? Want to put the frighteners on me, do you, with your wood-cutting friends?’
‘Ah, yes, my friends,’ said Harville. ‘Do you know, I think I’ll go and look for them? It’s clear that my presence here isn’t helping at all. I’ll leave you two gents to it.’
He left the room.
For a moment, both Deano and Jason could do no more than look after him in bemusement.
‘I’m not sure I like that guy,’ said Deano contemplatively, once they heard a back door bang shut.
‘Well, I can’t criticise your taste,’ said Jason, calming a little now that Harville was off the scene. ‘He’s a prick.’ He took a draught of the whiskey and allowed himself a roguish half-smile. ‘And your taste in women ain’t bad either.’
‘Thanks. It used to be all right, anyway.’ Deano sighed. ‘To be honest, I don’t know what I’m doing here any more than you do. I only agreed to go out for drinks with Harville to get away from my new agent. She’s driving me mad. And she’s made it pretty clear she wants the kind of relationship Jenna had with me. The A-list star couple. She wants that but she doesn’t really want me.’
‘Diddums,’ said Jason, walking over to the window and staring out. It had started to rain. ‘Still, you won’t be short of skirt, I suppose? Star-struck girls following your every move.’
‘Is she really serious about you?’ Deano sounded incredulous. ‘Jenna, I mean.’
‘Yeah, she is.’ Jason turned to face him. ‘I know. Doesn’t seem likely, does it? I’m just some loser from Bledburn and she’s … she’s what she is. But she’s the only person who’s ever … ah, forget it. You wouldn’t understand, and it’s none of your business anyway.’
‘She’s discovered you,’ said Deano. ‘And that’s Jenna’s thing – discovering people. So I can understand what she sees in you. That look in her eye that she gets when she’s really excited about a new talent – that’s what she has with you. She had it with me once.’
‘There’s more to it than that, though,’ said Jason after a pause. ‘After all, she spots a lot of talent. She doesn’t sleep with it all.’
‘She loved my talent and she loved the life it gave us,’ said Deano. ‘But once she saw that there was stardom of her own to be had, she lost interest in me. She stopped coming on tour with me – too many of her own commitments. She was chasing that LA dream every bit as hard as I was. Don’t let her tell you otherwise. And you’re a part of all that. The amazing new undiscovered talent. You’re fucking textbook, mate. Just don’t expect it to last forever.’
‘What the fuck are you talking about?’ Jason slammed down his tumbler and bent towards the seated figure of Deano, his stance radiating menace.
Deano held up his hands.
‘Hey, don’t shoot the messenger,’ he said. ‘But I’ve been there, remember. In the end, you last as long as your effect on her ego. When your success reaches a level where you can do without her – that’s when she loses interest. Watch and see.’
‘Fuck off.’
Jason couldn’t look at him. He went back to the window, brooding; the insecurity that lay always just beneath his surface fully reawakened.
‘That’s not the way she sees it,’ he said eventually. ‘She told me you started shagging around because you couldn’t stand her making a go of her own career. You did it to get her attention. Sad.’
‘To get her attention, maybe,’ said Deano, but his voice was ragged with anger, despite his attempts to maintain a civilised veneer. ‘To get a bit of heat out of that cold, cold fish.’
Jason swung around, his fists clenched.
‘Don’t,’ he warned. ‘Just don’t, OK?’
‘She’s got her hooks right into you, hasn’t she?’
‘If she was so wrong for you, why do you want her back then? Eh?’
‘Because there’s nobody else for me,’ hissed Deano, standing up himself.
The pair of them squared up, eye to eye, nose to nose, Jason having a slight height advantage, Deano wiry and quick.
For a few loaded seconds, violence fizzed in the air.
Then Jason stepped back and reached into his back pocket for his phone. Damn. He’d left it at the Hall.
‘Fuck it,’ he muttered. ‘I’m getting out of here. How far out of Bledburn is this place? I’m going to have to walk it.’
‘I’ve no idea where we are,’ Deano admitted, wandering over to the shelf in search of a top-up for his glass.
‘Jenna’ll be wondering where I’ve got to.’ He paused, chewing his lip. ‘I lost my temper and walked out,’ he admitted. ‘You probably don’t know about it yet, but you soon will. There was a bit of a problem with a photo going up on Facebook …’
‘I know,’ said Deano heavily. ‘Did you put it up?’
‘No. It was an accident. We were messing about with the phone and … anyway, I’d better get back.’
But Jason opened the door to find a pair of heavy-set men in the corridor outside, accompanied by Harville.
‘’Scuse me,’ he said, but the men didn’t stand aside.
Come to think of it, he recognised them. He’d seen them around the estate. They did stuff for Harville – security and whatnot. His goons.
‘You can’t be leaving without saying goodbye, surely,’ said Harville, swanning into the room. ‘I don’t know. Coming to my home, drinking my whiskey … It’s true what they say about that estate, boys.’ He paused, looking Jason in the eye. ‘Scum, the lot of them.’
‘Yeah, well, it runs in the family,’ said Jason, wishing immediately that he hadn’t. Harville looked puzzled, but he didn’t pursue the reference.
Instead he ushered his goons into the room and shut the door behind them all.
‘Look, Lawrence, I ought to be getting back,’ said Deano, his expression uneasy. ‘Parker and the guys will be going crazy. She hates it if I even go to the bathroom without my bodyguards, let alone …’
‘Oh, just another ten minutes, please,’ said Lawrence. ‘And help yourself to whiskey. I got that in just for you. I read it was your favourite.’
‘Thanks, but …’
‘Ten minutes.’
Deano flicked his gaze from Lawrence to the goons to the whiskey bottle.
He plumped for the bottle and poured from it, shaking his head.
‘You see, Deano, I had a thought – a thought that might work very well for you,’ continued Lawrence. ‘Do you remember when we were in the car and I surprised you by encouraging our friend here to, ah, express his emotions?’
‘You told him to hit me!’ recalled Deano, affronted.
‘Yes, but there was method to the madness, and the more I think about it, the more convinced I am. If Scumbag there does attack you, then he goes straight inside and you have a wonderful opportunity to gain the sympathy and perhaps eventual affections of your estranged wife. After all, she’ll soon realise that she’s been wasting her time when she sees what a thug she’s been involved with. And what better to bring back the old feelings than seeing you with a few cuts and bruises, victimised? They love a victim, after all, don’t they? The ladies?’
‘What are you on?’ moaned Jason, trying to tough his way past the goons, but they took hold of his arms, preventing him from moving.
Deano drained his drink, looking as wary as a man who had just downed four-and-a-half measures of a strong single malt possibly could.
‘I don’t like this,’ he said. ‘It’s dodgy. I see your reasoning though. Thanks for thinking of me, but …’
‘Think about it,’ entreated Lawrence.
‘You want me to let Jason rough me up? I don’t want to get roughed up.’
‘And I don’t want to do it either,’ contributed Jason, though he sensed he would have little choice in the matter if the balance of Deano’s decision was tipped the wrong way.
‘Of course it’ll involve a little bit of discomfort,’ said Lawrence. ‘But think of the advantage. Think of the amazing press you’ll get too. It’ll be great for album sales. Jenna will run back to you with open arms. Everything in the garden rosy again.’
‘And what’s in it for you?’ asked Deano, frowning.
‘She rides off into the sunset with you and I get my home back,’ he replied promptly. ‘Not to mention the collateral pleasure of revenge on this little turd.’
Jason was dismayed to see that Deano appeared to be giving the proposition his serious consideration.
‘He’s mental,’ he blurted. ‘Don’t do it. He doesn’t care about you, or Jenna, or any of us.’
This seemed to kick-start Deano’s moral compass.
‘No, he’s right,’ he said. ‘It’s too risky. Too much could go wrong. And no guarantee Jenna would fall for it either. Sorry, mate, but I’m out.’
The goons closed ranks.
‘Are you sure about that?’ asked Lawrence, his voice silk laced with poison. ‘You see, I’ve been talking to your friend Parker. In fact, more than talking. I sold her some of her favourite nice white powder, for you and her to share tonight. And I happened to carelessly leave my phonecam running while I did it.’
There was a stunned silence.
‘You did what?’ said Deano weakly.
‘There’s footage of Parker taking the stuff off me – and the conversation makes it very clear what it is and who it’s for. In fact, she tells a delightful anecdote about you snorting it off her breasts one night. It would make any tabloid journalist worth their salt scream for joy. And I know a few journalists …’
‘Why would you even …?’
‘It’s the Harville code,’ said Lawrence, grinning. ‘Always make sure you have something on everyone. Even if you can’t see how you’ll use it to begin with. Insurance. It’s my business.’ He tapped the side of his nose.
Deano, summoning some bravado from somewhere, laughed.
‘And do you know what my business is, Harville? I’m a rock star. I booze, I shag around, I snort a few lines. It’s expected of me. Who exactly are you expecting to shock with this?’
‘Your friend Parker, presumably,’ said Harville without missing a beat. ‘But you don’t mind sending a lamb to the slaughter, I suppose?’
There was a silence. Harville’s point had hit home.
Deano sighed.
‘Maybe you’re right,’ he said. ‘Maybe it’ll help my cause with Jenna.’
‘That’s the way to see it,’ approved Harville. ‘A moment of pain for a lifetime of gain.’
‘But if I do this,’ said Deano hotly, ‘that’s it. You’re out of my life. No coming back for more favours. You delete the stuff with Parker off your phone and we start again, as if we’d never met.’
‘Ground zero,’ said Lawrence, nodding earnestly. ‘For all of us.’
‘Are you having a fucking laugh?’ said Jason desperately, struggling with his captors. ‘This is insane.’
Deano walked over to Jason and stood with his chin raised towards his love rival.
‘Go on then,’ he said. ‘One clean punch. Do your worst.’
‘I’m not doing anything,’ insisted Jason, but one of the goons aimed such a vicious kick to the back of his knee that he staggered and lost his footing, crying out in anguish.
‘You’ll do as you’re told,’ said Lawrence softly. ‘And then all this will be over, and you’ll get out of here alive.’
‘Steady on!’ exclaimed Deano. ‘I’m not getting mixed up in any murders.’
‘Figure of speech,’ murmured Lawrence.
‘Do it,’ growled a goon, releasing Jason’s arm but keeping a tight hold on the back of his neck. ‘Take a swing at him.’
‘Jenna’s a tramp,’ said Deano suddenly, putting his face close to Jason’s. ‘She must be, to shack up with a piece of scum like you. I bet she was all over you. Nice bit of rough. If only I’d known that was what she liked, I needn’t have bothered trying to work out what was wrong between us. I could have just bussed in some bums from Skid Row to keep her happy … Oof.’
But his exclamation was nothing to do with Jason hitting him.
Jason had lashed out, yes, but Deano had ducked and sprang away from him, to aim as fierce a blow as he could to one of the goons.
The goon had seen it coming, quick as it was, and knocked Deano to the floor.
‘Shit!’ shouted Lawrence, running over to the motionless figure of Deano. ‘What have you done?’
‘He was going to have a go at me!’ whined the goon. ‘He was trying to get one over on us.’
‘Christ, have you killed him?’
Lawrence leant over Deano, feeling for a pulse.
The goons joined him, too anxious and guilty to notice Jason slipping away into the hallway behind.
When Deano woke up, he had no idea where he was.
Everything was a blur – as much in his head as in front of his eyes, and besides, it was dark. There was a smell of damp in the air, though – he was sure of that, and a sense that he wasn’t alone. He heard the shifting of fabric beside him, a person in motion, then a voice.
‘What happened to you?’
‘Who’s that? Where am I? Fuck, my head!’
He clutched it, gasping, and gave up his attempt to sit.
‘I’m Kayley – remember me?’
A sense of grateful pleasure appeared amidst all the bad feelings. Kayley. Yes. This was good.
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Yes, I do.’
More bad memories amongst the good.
‘I suppose you hate me for what I did? Going up to the Hall?’
‘Yeah, well, you lost me my job, but never mind that. You’re in a hell of a state. What happened?’
‘I don’t know his name, but whoever he is, he’s got a right hook straight out of Raging Bull.’
‘Out of what?’
‘You don’t know that movie? About a boxing champion?’
‘Oh, right, I get it. But I still don’t get what you’re doing in here.’
‘No, neither do I. And I don’t know what you’re doing here either. Are you mixed up with Harville? Do you work for him? Where is this place?’
He managed to sit up this time, and make out Kayley’s eyes in the gloom.
‘Your guess is as good as mine, duck. And me, work for Harville – do I fuck? No chance. Never in a million years.’
‘So, what …?’
‘He’s been out to get me ever since I grassed him up, to get Jason out of bother. And now he’s got me.’
‘So, are you saying he’s, like, keeping you prisoner?’
‘Certainly looks like it. Unless he wants me as a pet.’
‘So then I’m …?’
‘I don’t know but it’s not exactly the kind of accommodation you’re used to, is it, love? Where’s the en suite? I’d complain to the management if I were you.’
He laughed weakly, enjoying Kayley’s down to earth black humour despite their dire straits, but sobered rapidly once the pain came clanging back into the side of his head.
‘But he can’t do this,’ he whimpered. ‘What on earth is he playing at? He can’t do this to me. I’m Deano Diamond!’
‘Yeah, well, you might be surprised to know that I’m human too, but apparently it’s OK to chuck me in a cellar,’ said Kayley.
‘I didn’t mean that … It’s outrageous behaviour, no matter who …’
‘Yeah, sorry. Just feeling a bit sensitive. It is hard to see how he could get away with doing this to you. I mean, people care what happens to you, don’t they? Lots of people. I wouldn’t worry. The feds’ll be all over this place like a dose of the clap before you know it.’
‘I hope you’re right. What does he think he’s doing?’
‘Why did he lamp you one? If you don’t mind me asking.’ Kayley sat herself on the edge of the uncomfortable camp bed.
He could smell the faint remains of her cheap perfume and hear the clanking of a big chunky bracelet. There was something in those twin stimulants that transported him back to his teenage years and made him feel as if anything was possible. Strange for a man lying injured on a camp bed in a locked room.
‘I don’t know. It was all a bit chaotic. Harville had some hare-brained scheme to get his revenge on your friend Jason, and I somehow ended up at the sharp end of it.’
‘Jason’s here?’ Kayley’s voice was urgent. ‘In this building? Now?’
‘Well, he was. I …’ Deano tailed off, the effort of memory putting too much strain on his aching brain cells.
‘That’s really weird. What’s he doing here? Is he looking for me?’
‘No. Harville kind of tricked him into getting into the car with us. Jason didn’t realise who I was with at the time.’
‘So he’s being kept prisoner here too?’
‘Well, perhaps. I didn’t realise the place had a suite of dungeons … You never can tell, can you?’
‘Jenna’s going to be beside herself. Her boyfriend, her ex and her PA all missing at the same time. Surely the boys in blue must be on their way.’
Deano heard the hope in her voice, a hope that came from fear.
‘How long have you been down here?’ he asked, putting his own problems aside for the first time in his concern for his co-prisoner.
‘Not sure. Hours.’
‘Not days?’
‘No. I don’t think so. Time passes pretty slowly down here, though, so I couldn’t really say. They’ve fed me once, so I guess half a day?’
‘Jesus. What the hell is Harville playing at? Does he really think he can do this?’
‘He’s a bastard. I’ve tried to warn you. He’ll stop at nothing to get what he wants.’
‘But what does he want? How is holding us prisoner going to achieve anything?’
‘Maybe a ransom? From Jen. She’s loaded and he wants to buy back the Hall. Could be a bargaining position.’
‘For God’s sake, he’d do all this for a house?’
‘He’s obsessed with the place. I’ve seen the lengths he’ll go to, first hand.’
‘He’s a lunatic.’ Deano paused for thought before adding, ‘Well, Bledburn’s Got Talent is definitely off.’
Kayley’s laugh pealed through the stale air, and warmth crept slowly into Deano’s chest. Making her laugh seemed like a significant achievement, especially in these conditions.
But she sobered quickly and said, ‘I wonder what he’s done to Jason. Do you think he might …? I mean, he really hates Jason …’
Deano swallowed.
‘You think he’s capable of …?’
Nobody wanted to put the thought into the open, where it had to be addressed. But Deano couldn’t shake the thought that a man who could attack and imprison a very famous person wouldn’t think twice about killing a lesser mortal.
A sound he didn’t at first recognise as a sob came from Kayley.
‘Hey,’ he said, once he’d worked out that she was crying.
He put out a hand to touch the dim outline of her arm. It shook under his fingertips. He sat up properly and put an arm around her, drawing her close. Her ponytail tickled his wrist as he slid her into his embrace. The perfume flooded his senses and he almost swooned at the feel of her in his arms, shuddering and warm and so comfortable against him. How long had it been since he had just held someone, or been held? He couldn’t remember.
All his experiences of intimacy in the last few years had taken place in a coked-up haze, in tour buses or dressing rooms or hotel elevators. They were generally fast, furious and over in a couple of minutes. He didn’t like waking up with somebody else in his bed – for some reason, he thought of that as infidelity, while the quick post-gig shags didn’t strike him in the same way. He could scratch his itch with any number of groupies, but he had never wanted to share a bed with anyone but Jenna.
All the same, it was nice, this feeling of closeness and protectiveness. Kayley was certainly cute. Did she have a boyfriend? He almost asked her, but it didn’t really seem the right time.
‘We’re gonna be OK,’ he said, as convincingly as he could, although he was by no means sure of this. ‘You’ll be out of here in no time, back to work at the Hall.’
‘I doubt it. She sacked me,’ said Kayley through her tears. ‘Remember?’
‘Oh. Yeah. Sorry about that. But she might take you back. If I beg her on my knees.’
‘Would you do that?’ Kayley looked up at him. He could see the teary gleam of her eyes.
Yes, God, yes, for you.
‘Of course,’ he said. ‘It was my fault, after all.’
‘That’s true,’ she said. ‘You muppet.’ But she said it affectionately, with a little cracked laugh.
She shivered suddenly, seeming to contract in his arms.
‘Did you hear about the body?’ she said.
‘What body?’
‘The skeleton they found under the Hall.’
‘Oh … yeah, I did. It was all over the news.’
‘Perhaps that’s how we’ll end up. Bones in a basement. Perhaps nobody’ll come for us and we’ll die down here, of starvation. Perhaps that’s what happened to her. Perhaps Lawrence knew all about it.’
‘Don’t be daft, Kayley,’ said Deano, his local intonation coming back in sympathy with hers. ‘They said the skeleton was more than a century old.’
‘Yeah, but they’re all the same, those Harvilles. Aren’t they?’
Deano sighed. ‘So we always used to say.’
‘I should never have touched him with a bargepole.’
‘Who, Lawrence?’ Deano drew back a little, wondering if she could see his quizzical expression in the dark.
She sighed. ‘Yeah. I was gullible and he dazzled me.’
‘Seduced you, then threw you into a cellar? Seems like a Harville way to go about things.’
‘It was a long time ago. That’s not what this is about. This is just revenge for grassing him up.’ She drew a quick breath. ‘But I wish I knew what he had planned.’
‘He’ll let us out soon. He’ll have to. He’s in a whole world of trouble already – no point making it worse.’
‘Or – in for a penny, in for a pound,’ said Kayley gloomily.
Deano pulled her closer, wanting to shut out the dark for her, wanting to bring in some light and some hope. Just for her.
‘Well, do you have any idea where he might be?’
Jenna waved away Linda’s offer of a dented can of Coke and looked around the tiny coop of a living room as if Jason might be hiding beneath the coffee table.
‘Not me, duck. He could be anywhere. I’m surprised he ain’t told you where he’s gone. You two had a row, have you?’
‘Just some silliness,’ said Jenna, trying to convince herself. It was, wasn’t it? Just silliness. He was being touchy and she had more than a genuine right to be agitated over the Facebook photo.
The vultures had been gathering when she left the Hall to come and look for Jason, who had left the phone that had caused all the trouble on the floor in the bedroom.
‘The thing is, Linda,’ she said uneasily. ‘Shit. You’re going to hear about this from someone, so it might as well be me. The thing is, a … compromising … photograph of me has turned up on the web.’
‘Nudie shots? Jealous, is he, of your past?’ Linda’s glee rather overrode her clumsy attempts at sympathy.
‘No, it was him that took the photograph,’ said Jenna. ‘Just thought I ought to warn you.’
‘Eh? What the bloody hell did he put it online for? Daft beggar. I’m not surprised you had a row. I’ll give him a row when he turns up here.’
‘No, no, it was an accident. The wrong buttons were pressed. I panicked, and he thinks I overreacted.’
‘Overreacted? I don’t think so, love. You’re a big star. This could hurt you.’
‘Exactly, exactly, that’s what I said, but he just didn’t seem to get it.’
Jenna began to pace, then noticed somebody staring up at the window from the back of the shops and pulled the curtains tightly shut.
‘So he marched off in a strop,’ continued Jenna. ‘And I thought he might have come here. That’s all.’
‘Well, I wish he had, but he didn’t,’ said Linda. ‘Look, let me put the kettle on, at least. You look like you could do with a sugary tea.’
‘Oh, all right. While I’m here, there was something I wanted to talk to you about anyway.’
‘Ooh,’ said Linda absently, wandering over to the little galley kitchen off the living room and getting mugs sorted. ‘That sounds official.’
‘I haven’t been able to mention it to Jason. I just think he’d … not take it very well.’
‘Ooh,’ she said again, more interested this time. ‘Tell me more.’
Jenna waited until Linda had put the tea mugs down in front of them. One of them said ‘World’s Best Mum’ and Jenna wondered for a moment if Linda had bought it for herself. The idea of Jason giving it to her was so poignant she almost felt tears well up. But perhaps that was just the stress.
‘Well, you know how he’s just dismissed the stuff about being Lawrence Harville’s half-brother out of hand,’ began Jenna.
‘Yeah, but I’ve told him, it’s the truth. Swear down.’
‘I believe you, Linda, really. And, deep down, I think he does too. But he just doesn’t want to.’
‘No,’ sighed Linda. ‘He doesn’t.’
‘Anyway, I found something else out the other day, when I was at the county archive, and I wanted to ask you a few questions.’
Linda looked surprised at this new tack, raising her eyebrows at her tea.
‘Fire away,’ she said.
‘Watson is your birth name, isn’t it? You didn’t change it by deed poll or have a previous marriage before Jason that I don’t know about?’
‘No, I were born Linda Watson and I daresay that’s how I’ll die as well.’
‘And are either of your parents still alive?’
‘Eh? Oh no. Both long gone. Dad had that lung thing miners get. Mum didn’t last a lot longer once he went.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that. How old were you?’
‘Me? I were about twenty-four, twenty-five. Jason were a nipper. Doubt he’d remember much about them. Why?’
‘Sorry, but do you have any brothers or sisters?’
‘No, only child, me. It’s been me and Jase for as long as I can remember. Nobody else to depend on. Mum was good, though, when he were a baby. Used to help out a bit where she could.’
Jenna nodded and supped at the tea, although the sweetness of it made her teeth protest.
‘So your dad was a Watson, and your mum …?’
‘A Craven. Rita Craven. Look, what’s all this about? Are you making an episode of that Who Do You Think You Are? thing about our Jase? ’Cos it’d make a pretty boring one. Nobody’d watch it.’
‘Not as boring as you think,’ said Jenna, leaning forward, her eyes alight with what she knew. ‘Rita’s mother’s surname was …’
‘Ooh, now you’re asking.’ Linda’s forehead crumpled with the effort of memory. ‘Her family were Nottingham people. Began with an M …’
‘Manning!’ said Jenna triumphantly.
‘Ah, that’s it,’ said Linda, regarding Jenna with some suspicion. ‘How do you know that then?’
‘It’s the same name as the woman in the diary,’ said Jenna. ‘The one who married Harville, then accidentally killed the maid and disappeared.’
‘What, you think we’re …?’
‘Related? Yes. Yes, I do.’
Linda stared. ‘Go on, then. Why?’
‘When I went to the archive,’ said Jenna, all her anxieties forgotten in the pleasure of revelation, ‘I wanted to see if I could trace Frances. Find out what happened to her and her baby. The first thing I found was her death certificate – she died just a couple of years after the whole affair. The cause of death was given as diphtheria.’
‘Poor thing.’
‘Yes, awful. Ten years later, they found a cure for it. Tragic, isn’t it? She was so young.’
‘Very tragic, yeah. And the baby?’
‘Well, there’s the thing. I looked through all the birth certificates, but there weren’t any with Frances named as the mother. Then I looked again and there was a baby born in December of that year to her parents! Richard and Sarah Manning had a baby boy called David.’
‘But it wasn’t theirs really?’
‘No, that was just what they told the registrars. And Frances, when she died, wasn’t living at home. She was living at an address in a very shady part of town. I wish, wish, wish I could have been a fly on the wall at the meeting when it was decided to raise the child as her little brother. Can you imagine how heart-breaking it must have been?’
‘Don’t you think Harville ever went looking for her? Perhaps that’s why they registered the baby like that?’
‘Perhaps. If Harville couldn’t prove the baby was his, then he couldn’t claim him. No DNA tests in those days. Besides – I looked up Harville. He married again within a year of Frances running off, and had another son a year after that, who went on to inherit Harville Hall. Except the real heir …’
‘Was alive and well and in Nottingham …’ Linda’s jaw dropped. ‘Are you saying …?’
‘David had two daughters,’ said Jenna eagerly. ‘Edith and Jane. Then he went and got himself killed in the First World War, God bless him.’
‘Edith’s my grandma,’ said Linda. ‘Edie Manning, as was – then Edie Craven. Came to Bledburn to do nursing and met Granddad Craven when she was looking after him after he broke a wrist down the mine. I remember her telling me her dad was killed at Mons. Bloody hell. Bloody hell, Jen. What does it all mean?’
‘It means a lot of things,’ said Jenna. ‘But one of them … an important one … is that you are actually the legitimate heir of the Harvilles.’
‘Bullshit! How can I be?’
‘Linda, you’re in the direct line of succession. David was Harville’s first born son. Your grandmother was that son’s older daughter. And so on down the line. You are Lady bloody Harville.’
The pair of them burst into wild laughter.
‘That’s fucking funny,’ said Linda, once she was able to speak through her tears of mirth. ‘Me a Lady. C’mon, Jenna, you’re pulling my leg.’
‘I’m not,’ insisted Jenna. ‘I’ve seen all the certificates. I mean, I don’t suppose you’d ever be able to claim your inheritance because of David being registered as the Manning parents’ child, but all the same …’
Linda clapped a hand over her mouth, her eye suddenly big with horror.
‘But that means that me and Harville …’
‘You’re cousins, albeit fairly distant ones now.’
‘All the same … ugh. It’s incest, isn’t it? What we did?’
‘No, I don’t think so. That’s first cousins. Children of your aunts and uncles.’
‘Oh, well, that’s all right then. I think. Still seems wrong though.’
‘It makes Jason a Harville on both sides, though. I haven’t dared mention it to him.’
‘I can’t take this in. It’s mad.’
‘I know. I nearly screamed when I put all the documentation together and realised what it meant.’
‘So bloody Lord High and Mighty Harville isn’t even the right bloke for the job,’ said Linda indignantly.
‘Ah, well, who knows? Perhaps there’s legal documentation to insist the Hall is always entailed away to a male member of the family. So you might never have got to live there and use the title anyway. But all the same …’
‘It’s quite a nice feeling,’ said Linda, lifting her chin and looking, despite herself, surprisingly regal. ‘Lady Linda. I like it.’
Jenna smiled at Linda’s burst of pomp and circumstance, then put her cup down.
‘But it’s the whereabouts of Lord Jason I need to know about,’ she said. ‘Can’t you think of anywhere he might be?’
‘Well, let me think …’
But Linda’s thinking was disturbed by a hammering at the door.
‘Is that him?’
Jenna rushed to answer it, but quickly slammed it shut again on seeing the flash of bulbs from the landing.
‘Jenna, Jenna! What have you got to say about the picture in circulation all over the internet? Jenna!’
‘Oh God,’ she said, running back to Linda. ‘We’re under siege. Somebody’s tipped the press off that I’m here.’
‘Oh dear. What are we going to do?’
‘I’ll call the police, see if I can get them thrown out of the building at least. They shouldn’t be in your communal hall.’
‘Shame that,’ said Linda. ‘I were going to run out to the offy. If I’m Lady Harville, I ought to be on the champagne.’
It had been a stupid idea to storm off without his mobile or his wallet.
Jason could see that now.
In fact, he could see that storming in general was a bit pathetic and childish really.
He wished to God he hadn’t done it.
If he’d kept his temper and stayed with Jenna, he wouldn’t now be crossing a wet wheat field with no idea at all whether he was heading in the right direction for Bledburn.
He hadn’t taken the road back for fear of being pursued and picked up again by Harville and his goons. Luckily they had been so preoccupied with Deano, they had given him a head start. He’d been out of there like a bat out of hell.
But he needed to get back to Bledburn as fast as possible. He couldn’t say he was Deano Diamond’s biggest fan, but he felt he ought to get him some help.
Jumping a stile into a field of nervous sheep, he thought over Harville’s plan. Could it have worked for him? Would Jenna have believed that he, Jason, had decked Deano? And would she then have dumped him?
He thought the answer to the first question was yes. It would be perfectly easy for Jenna to believe he was capable of using his fists on his rival.
He had shown her time and time again what a mardy bugger he was.
‘You need to chill, son,’ he muttered to himself, start-ling a nearby sheep into bleating.
But would she dump him over it?
He found this question more difficult to answer, because it raised a few more, some of which he didn’t really want to think about.
He didn’t doubt that she loved him now, wholeheartedly and passionately. But now was still only a few months distant from their first meeting. And he knew, from bitter experience, that a relationship can start as promisingly as it likes – it still doesn’t mean it will last.
As he tramped through the fields, his mind went back, almost against his will, to those heady early days with Mia, back at school. They had been the Romeo and Juliet of the year, without all the suicides and suchlike. Always getting into trouble with the teachers for their public displays of affection and being told to ‘get a room’ by their eye-rolling peers.
‘Pretty hard to get a room when you’re fifteen and skint,’ he had said once. ‘But if you can get one for us, we’ll take you up on it, no probs.’
In the end, a room had not been necessary.
He and Mia had grown up together, their development into adults entwined with, and perhaps inhibited by, each other. Towards the end, she had accused him of suffocating her, and he had been hurt. She had never said she didn’t want him! He had assumed she wanted to spend all her free time with him, as he did with her.
Perhaps there was a lesson in that. Perhaps he shouldn’t be living with Jenna at this early stage. Perhaps she would tire of him, as Mia had done.
And then what would he do?
It wasn’t as if his life had been great before he met her. It hadn’t. It had been shit, in fact. In many ways, she had saved him – so many ways.
But he didn’t like the thought that he had been saved. Seeing himself as some kind of lame duck who needed Jenna to come and sprinkle her magic dust over him to make him something worthwhile was difficult and humbling. But … well … it was a way of looking at it. It was how lots of people saw it, especially Lawrence Harville, and probably Deano Diamond too.
Without Jenna, he was nothing.
But, hang on, no he wasn’t. He was really and honestly a good artist, and now he had clients and a portfolio and all that. He believed in himself more than he had ever done before.
He was something.
He just wanted to be that something with Jenna.
But what if Mia was right and he was boring and suffocating?
The thoughts rolled round and round in his mind as his feet blistered and his legs grew stiff with exhaustion.
If Jenna would have dumped him for punching Deano Diamond, then that would mean that she still had a place in her heart for Deano.
This, the idea that had been threatening him ever since Deano’s return, made him stop in his tracks and let it sink in.
She and Deano had a history he had no part of, and he was jealous of that. He hated to think of it, especially hated to think of their young love when they were bursting with exhilaration and full of hopes for the future. He often thought of painting pictures of scenes from their early life together, just so he could have the satisfaction of painting over them. He wanted to paint over Deano, black him out, turn him into a lamp post or some other piece of scenery.
‘But that’s impossible,’ he said out loud.
This time his audience was a trio of cows, which took no notice and continued to chew the cud.
He needed to accept that Jenna had a past, as she had accepted his. She had never shown any signs of being jealous of Mia, or even interested in her.
‘It’s different for her, though,’ he said to the cows. ‘She can have anyone she likes.’
One cow looked up at him with mournful brown eyes, as if to say, ‘But she likes you.’
‘God knows why,’ he muttered in reply to the imagined remark.
The cow stared on. This time she seemed to say, ‘Take a look at yourself.’
He grinned at that.
‘I’m not bad looking, if I do say so myself. Cheers, Daisy. Incidentally, can you tell me how far it is to Bledburn?’
She couldn’t.
He laughed and walked on, mildly invigorated by the exchange.
He couldn’t answer the question about whether Jenna would dump him for hurting Deano. But he could ask her. And that’s what he’d do.
Everything out in the open, cards on the table. Then, a fresh start. Maybe they should leave Bledburn, go to London, leave all this Harville shite behind for good.
He reached the top of a ridge and exhaled with relief.
Below him was the complex of lakes, made from the old pits, and landscaped to provide a leisure and water-sports park for the people of Bledburn, who mostly couldn’t afford it.
‘My kingdom,’ he said, spreading his arms wide.
He squinted down at the huddled town, trying to find the spire of All Saints Church, from which he would be able to place Harville Hall. Yes, there it was.
‘Hold on, Jenna,’ he shouted to the birds wheeling overhead. ‘I’m coming home.’