Chapter 21
Lizzie said, ‘We don’t have to do this today, not if you aren’t feeling up to it.’
But Cami was already shaking her head. ‘We have a schedule to keep to,’ she insisted. ‘Can’t afford to fall behind.’
‘Did you get much sleep last night?’
‘Some. I’m fine.’ There were violet shadows beneath her eyes and she clearly wasn’t fine, but there hadn’t been any tears and she was visibly determined to battle through. She tapped her laptop for attention. ‘Now, we were up to . . . let’s see, twenty years ago. You’d just finished filming Never Available and you were having a summer romance with André Villeneuve . . . Tell me all about him.’
‘He was gorgeous. And knew it too.’ Lizzie adjusted the Ray-Bans on top of her head to keep her tangled blond hair out of her face. They were sitting outside on the terrace, facing each other across the table as if they were still conversing over Zoom. The sun was out, they could hear the next group of guests settling in at Hay Hall fifty yards away, and there was also the sound of a tractor doing its tractory thing in the distance. ‘Mum wasn’t happy about his reputation, but of course I refused to listen to her. André and I used to go out together in disguise so we wouldn’t be recognised, and speak with foreign accents. I thought he was wonderful.’ She sighed, remembering the feel of his gold-tipped lashes against her neck and how lucky she’d felt to have found her perfect man at last. ‘I loved him. And he kept telling me how much he loved me. Then I had to fly over here from LA to do a TV show and André said he’d come with me, but he didn’t turn up at the airport. I was panicking, thinking something terrible had happened to stop him. And he wasn’t answering his phone so I was picturing a car crash. But of course it turned out he’d been too tired to catch the flight because he’d spent all night shagging Rosa Toledo in one of the bungalows at the Chateau Marmont.’
‘Some men are the pits,’ said Cami.
‘You know it. I know it. You’d think we’d learn our lesson, but somehow that never happens. We keep on going, hoping for the best and being let down over and over again.’
‘Did you get your own back on André?’
‘You mean apart from telling everyone he had a chipolata and was hopeless in bed? Not really.’ Lizzie sighed. ‘I think I just moped around and wondered what was wrong with me that I couldn’t manage to find someone who really did want to be with me. I basically felt as if it was my own fault, which— Oh, for God’s sake, what is going on over there?’
Over the course of the last minute, music had started playing on the other side of the fence that separated Pine Lodge from Hay Hall. The volume had been steadily ramped up to ear-splitting levels, and now Lizzie could hardly hear herself speak. She wasn’t a diva – well, maybe a little bit of a diva – but this was ridiculous. And it wasn’t stopping. She and Cami sat there for another full minute, looking at each other. Finally, shaking her head in disbelief, she jumped to her feet and marched over to the ten-foot-high fence between the two properties.
‘Excuse me. I said, EXCUSE ME.’
But her lungs were no match for Guns N’ Roses belting out ‘Paradise City’ at fifty million decibels. For crying out loud, whoever was making that racket had only moved in a couple of hours ago and this was how much they cared about disturbing their neighbours? It was bloody selfish of them and needed sorting out.
Unless it actually was Axl Rose and Slash. Then she might let them off.
Lizzie took out her phone and called Nella, who apologetically explained that she was on her way to Oxford and wouldn’t be back for an hour and a half. She then tried Nick’s number – ding went her heart; she couldn’t help it, it just happened each time she was about to see or speak to him – but no reply.
Fine. She’d just have to do it herself. Turning to Cami, she shouted, ‘Back in a minute,’ and mimed going round there.
The houses were set well apart but their outdoor areas adjoined each other. Leaving her own, Lizzie made her way across the gravel and let herself through the latch gate into next door’s garden. Growing up in LA, she was used to unexpected sights, but the scene that greeted her wasn’t one she’d encountered before.
Music continued to blare from a sound system set up on the lawn. A smallish, scruffy man with a frizz of pale blond hair and a beard was wielding a bulky, professional-looking video camera, recording the actions of another man, who was barefoot, wearing a black tuxedo over a white dress shirt open to the waist, with an unfastened black bow tie dangling around his neck. He was waving a long paintbrush in one hand, holding an artist’s palette in the other, and dancing like Mick Jagger in front of a large half-finished painting fixed to an easel.
Like, really dancing, completely into it, and singing along to the ear-splitting music as he leapt forward, added a splash of vivid crimson to the canvas, then turned to flash a dazzling smile at the camera before dancing back again. The next moment, alerted by a gust of wind shimmying the zigzag hem of her emerald silk kaftan, he turned and spotted Lizzie standing at the edge of the terrace. She saw recognition dawn and his smile broaden, then he put the brush sideways between his teeth like a long-stemmed rose and began to dance towards her, reaching out with his free hand to grasp one of hers.
Not that she was pernickety or anything – OK, maybe she was – but there were great splatters of paint on his clothes, on his tanned forearms and across his left cheekbone. Plus, the palette was covered in the stuff. Lizzie stepped smartly backwards, pointed to the sound system and signalled with an index finger across her throat for him to kill the noise.
He gave her a rueful spoilsport look for not joining in, then nodded at the other guy to turn off the music.
‘Whoa-oh,’ screamed Axl Rose before being abruptly cut off mid bellow.
‘Hello.’ The dancing artist removed the brush from between his teeth. ‘Well, well, fancy meeting you here. Did you know I was arriving today? Did someone tell you?’
‘Excuse me?’ Lizzie was taken aback.
‘Are people talking about me on the socials? I mean, no change there, of course they’re talking about me. I just wondered how you managed to track me down.’
Someone had a sky-high opinion of himself. He was handsome, he was chiselled and he was clearly convinced he was irresistible. Lizzie raised an eyebrow in disbelief; how she hated cocky men.
‘I’m sorry, I have no idea who you are.’ When she disliked someone, her voice always became more clipped and British, like Dame Maggie Smith in Downton . ‘But I managed to track you down due to not being able to hear myself think.’
‘Wow, burn . Of course you don’t know who I am.’ He winked at her. It was one of those winks.
Icily, she reiterated, ‘I don’t .’
‘I have no idea who you are either.’
He did know. She could tell just from the way he was looking at her. What a tosspot. As Dame Maggie probably wouldn’t say.
‘I came over to let you know we’re trying to work next door. But your music is so loud we’re unable to.’ She glanced down at his tanned bare feet on the grass. ‘If you could turn it down, that’d be perfect. Thank you.’
‘The thing is, I’m trying to work too. This is my work.’ He gestured at his palette and the canvas fixed to the easel. ‘So, sorry about that, but we’ll be done soon.’
‘You could wear headphones.’ It was happening again; she was on the verge of getting into an argument with a belligerent stranger. What was it about the men in this country?
‘Hello?’ He looked at her as if she was the one being unreasonable. ‘This is my brand. It’s what I do.’
‘It would be nice if you could do it more quietly.’ Lizzie gritted her teeth; she was being polite, wasn’t she? She wasn’t verbally abusing him, just letting him know what a nightmare he was being.
He shook his head at her. ‘It needs to be loud to create the atmosphere.’
‘See those things over there?’ She gestured behind her. ‘They’re called fields. You could use one of them.’
‘But we rented this place for a reason.’ He considered her for a long moment. ‘Look, we’ll be done in an hour and a half.’
‘It’s a beautiful sunny spring day, but you’re telling me I have to shut myself away indoors. How considerate of you.’ Turning on her heel, Lizzie saw that the beardy guy, who’d put down his video camera earlier, was now filming her. She shot him a killer glare. ‘And you can turn that thing off for a start.’
As she was leaving, she heard tuxedo guy behind her drawl, ‘So nice to chat to you too. Always a pleasure to meet a fan.’
True to his word, the music blared out for another ninety minutes. Inside Pine Lodge with all the windows closed, Lizzie and Cami sat across from each other in the enormous living room and went into greater detail about Lizzie’s teenage years in Hollywood. It was weird how the more you concentrated your mind on a certain period from the past, the more vivid the memories became as they rose up from the forgotten depths of your brain. People and incidents you hadn’t thought about in decades emerged like ghosts from the mists of time. It was like exercising muscles that had been lazing around doing nothing for years.
They finished at four o’clock and Cami took her laptop, tape recorder and notebook up to her room to collate the information she’d gathered. Lizzie went for a swim in the pool, then carried a mug of coffee upstairs and sat out on the roof terrace with its spectacular view over the village, the hills and the surrounding countryside.
Just after five, she heard the click of a gate latch. From her elevated position up here, it wasn’t possible to peer into next door’s garden, but as soon as the occupiers left it, they were visible. And yes, there he was, the idiotic painter minus his bearded sidekick and minus the pretentious, paint-splattered tuxedo. He was now wearing a blue Lycra running vest and shorts teamed with an expensive-looking pair of trainers. He didn’t glance up at her as he set out on his run, presumably not even aware that her house had a roof terrace where people might be spying on their neighbours.
Enjoying the warmth of the late-afternoon sunshine on her face, Lizzie watched him go and thought how nice it would be if he could just lose his balance on the uneven ground and fall face-down in a handily positioned cowpat. Or maybe get his foot caught in a rabbit hole and sprain his ankle.
Was it bad to think that? Oh, but it would put a stop to that stupid show-offy dancing around in front of his easel.
Moments later, her gaze fell on something on her side of the fence and an idea began to form . . .
It had taken longer than she’d expected, but the reward would be worth it. No longer up on the roof terrace, Lizzie waited on one of the garden benches close to the high fence, her finger on the trigger like a cowboy in the Wild West. Usually the gardener rolled the hose back up and stored it in one of the outhouses, so the fact that he’d left it out today felt like a sign.
Having sat here patiently for the last thirty-five minutes, she was eventually rewarded by the sound of rhythmic panting and running footsteps. Here he was, back at last. Joy flooded through her as she listened intently then leapt to her feet, squeezed the trigger and aimed the fountain of water high into the air and over the fence.
Childish? Yes.
Satisfying? Oh, definitely.
Whoosh went the ice-cold water, sparkling like diamonds in the sunlight against a backdrop of clear blue sky.
And whoosh went the adrenalin in her body as she shook the powerful hose to make sure it didn’t miss an inch of him.
‘What the hell ?’ yelled a male voice that didn’t sound anything like the voice of the show-off next door.
Oh God.
‘Sorry, I’m so sorry,’ Lizzie shouted back, mortified. ‘It was an accident . . .’ The temptation was to run away and hide, but she couldn’t do that; sometimes you just had to take the flak like an adult and own up.
Besides, everyone around here knew by now who the current occupant of Pine Lodge was. Even Lizzie couldn’t bring herself to shift the blame onto poor pregnant Cami. Hurrying over to the gate and pulling it open, she stepped out and came face to face with a sodden jogger in a red T-shirt, black jogging bottoms and a face she wished she didn’t recognise.
To say he wasn’t amused would be an understatement.
‘Great. It had to be you, didn’t it?’ Her victim shook his head at her, droplets of water dripping off the ends of his hair and lashes.
On the upside, at least she hadn’t added to her tally of men she’d fallen out with. Instead she’d just given one of them a second reason to curl his lip at her in disgust.
‘For the record,’ he said slowly, ‘it isn’t funny.’
That was the moment Lizzie realised the expression on her face was one of dismay verging on laughter. It happened sometimes of its own accord when something unexpected occurred and her brain struggled to decide how best to react. Because he did look funny, and if it had been a prank played on a friend at a party, they’d both be cracked up laughing by now.
Except he wasn’t a friend, he was Bluebell Man. And they weren’t at a party.
‘I know. I’m sorry. Of all the people this could have happened to, you’re the worst.’ She made sure her mouth was no longer smiling. ‘I thought you were someone else.’
He raised a sceptical eyebrow. ‘But you didn’t think to check first.’
‘I didn’t have a periscope, so I couldn’t see over the fence. If I’d known it was you, I definitely wouldn’t have done it. Look, I’m sorry, OK? But it wouldn’t kill you to lighten up. All I did was accidentally spray you with a bit of water.’
‘My watch isn’t waterproof. Let’s hope you haven’t damaged it.’ He held up his left wrist and studied the watch’s face, and it was the grim expression on his own that prompted Lizzie to blurt out, ‘Oh my God, what is the matter with you? Why do you have such a stick up your ass? I tell you what, any watch that can’t cope with a splash of water isn’t fit for purpose anyway, but if you’re determined to be this petty and ridiculous, why don’t I just give you the money to buy yourself a decent replacement? In fact, wait there, don’t move, I’ll be back in one minute with my wallet, and guess what? Whatever you buy will be a damn sight better than that cheap thing, and then maybe you can stop being such a miserable sod.’
She meant it too, and had deliberately brought a load of cash down here for tipping purposes. But by the time she’d fetched her purse and returned to the spot where Bluebell Man had been standing, he had disappeared.
Honestly, though, how could it be that every woman she’d encountered so far was so nice whilst every man was such a prize prat?
OK, not quite every man. She still had her sights set on Nick Callaghan, but he’d been up in London for the last few days, meaning she hadn’t had a chance to make her move yet.
No matter. Patience was a virtue. Plenty of time to show him how irresistible she was. Taking out her phone, she quickly WhatsApped Nella:
Who’s the new guy in Hay Hall?
Nella responded straight away.
Do I detect interest?? I’m sure he won’t mind me telling you. His name’s Dane Cruse.
Back in her original spot on the roof terrace, this time with a glass of Sancerre and a bowl of cashews for company, Lizzie put the name into Google and came up with millions of hits. As she’d guessed, he was massive on Instagram and TikTok, with a worldwide fanbase composed chiefly of women who drooled over his videos whilst raving about his looks, his charisma and his extraordinary talent. There were many, many videos, expertly designed to catch a scroller’s attention. Dane had evidently made his name by being the rock-star version of an artist, flamboyant and animalistic, his undeniable good looks set off by an array of striking outfits as he created art on outsized canvases in various locations: on a beach, up a mountain, on a frozen lake or in the grounds of a glamorous country house . . .
The distant thud-thud-thud of footsteps on hard ground caught her attention, and Lizzie looked up in time to see him returning from his run. She tilted her head back and closed her eyes as he jogged past, only opening them again once the gate next door had clicked open and then shut behind him. A pretty boy with an ego the size of a planet might once have been her kryptonite, but she was over that type now. What she needed was a real man, one who wasn’t convinced he was irresistible.
She took a slurp of the icy wine and whizzed through the list of contacts on her phone. There it was. Nick Callaghan’s number. Picturing him caused a pleasurable shiver to zip down her spine. What was she so scared of? Wouldn’t any man be thrilled to be invited out to dinner by her? She tapped out a message.
Hi, I’m dying to try out that restaurant someone mentioned the other night. The Dove? Fancy coming along with me to dinner sometime soon? Let me know when you’re free and I’ll book a table! X
One kiss, that was fine. A message that was straight to the point, with a side order of flirtation.
She pressed send.
Moments later, the message had been read. Lizzie waited. And waited.
After several minutes, Nick replied.
Lizzie, that’s really kind, thanks for the offer, but I’m afraid I don’t have any free evenings for the next fortnight. So sorry, but I’m sure Cami would go with you. I know you’ll both love it.
No kiss either. Not even a small one. Lizzie exhaled with disappointment. What was the matter with the men around here? And why wasn’t it putting her off Nick?
Annoyingly, his rejection only made her want him more.
*
Jed had tried his best to persuade himself that Karina was who he wanted to be with, but it was time to admit defeat. He’d been wrong, and this relationship wasn’t working at all. Being seen out together might have been good for his ego, but personality-wise it was never going to be a match. Beneath the stunning exterior, he’d belatedly discovered, she was entirely obsessed with money and being admired by strangers. It wasn’t her fault; it was just the way she was.
‘I know where we’re go-ing!’ she said now, in the sing-song voice that had also begun to grate. ‘I know where you’re taking me!’
It was her birthday next weekend and he was looking forward to it, but only in the sense that as soon as it was over he would be able to break up with her. Where women like Karina and her friends were concerned, it definitely wasn’t a good look to do so just before the big day.
‘How do you know?’ He was mildly curious, because he hadn’t booked anywhere yet.
Karina rolled over on the bed and gave his chest a playful scratch with her nails. ‘You left the tab open on your phone, silly billy. I saw it on there last night.’
‘How?’
She grinned, reached for his hand and pressed his right thumb against an imaginary screen.
‘You shouldn’t do that,’ Jed told her. ‘It’s wrong.’
‘It’s only wrong if you’ve got something to hide. And I needed to make sure you were taking me somewhere I’d want to go. You might have arranged a weekend at the same spa where Gaynor Masters is having her hen party, and that would have been a disaster.’
Gaynor, previously a close friend of Karina’s, had left her off the guest list after a major falling-out in Harvey Nicks over the last pair of lilac Louboutins. With a pang, Jed thought back to Juliet’s modest collection of low-heeled footwear. Shoes that cost more than some people’s cars had simply never been of interest to her. If they were comfortable and came from Clarks, that was all she needed.
‘Anyway, I definitely approve of the place you’ve picked. It looks so cool.’ Karina cuddled up to him, happily nuzzling his neck. ‘Which of the houses have you booked us into?’
She’d seen his searches of the Starbourne Prestige website. Jed opened his mouth to explain that he’d been looking at it for an entirely different reason. Then closed it again, because why not? Spas weren’t his thing and he knew she was expecting to be taken away somewhere fabulous. It was expensive, but he could afford it. And from the photos, it did look impressive.
If – big if – any of the properties were even available at such short notice. They might not be. He plucked a stray strand of her long blond hair from his mouth and said, ‘If I told you that, it wouldn’t be a surprise, would it?’