Chapter Thirteen
B lair’s last comment stayed with me. I needed to call Lucy back, and I really wanted to speak to Rob.
I headed back to my room to change into my comfy onesie and check my phone.
I found a missed call from Rob. Typical.
He called in the one hour I wasn’t incessantly checking it.
The fact he had made the first move was quietly pleasing.
I FaceTimed him back.
‘Hey,’ he said, his voice lacking energy.
‘Hey, I can barely see you.’ It was very dark where Rob was, I could only just make out his features. ‘Are you in bed already?’
I glanced at the time at the top of my phone, it was only eight p.m.
‘Yeah, I felt tired, so I thought I may as well hit the sack,’ he said half-heartedly.
‘Doesn’t sound like you. Nothing to even watch on TV?’
‘Nothing I fancied.’ This was unlike Rob. Working in television, he was always keen to see anything to keep up with trends, and talk me through the technical details of how they would have been filmed. I don’t think I had ever known him at a loss for something to watch. ‘Anyway, how are you doing?’
I explained the weirdness on the shoot today and this evening, and Rob listened.
I was always interested in his verdict on celebrity goings-on.
He was a voice of reason and had seen plenty of it before, having produced a number of series with stars including the crazy Angel Wear show we did together in New York.
‘Hopefully she’ll come round,’ was all he could muster at the end.
‘You sound pissed off. Is everything okay?’
‘Yeah, I’m fine.’
‘You don’t sound it.’
‘Have you decided to trust me again?’ he asked. I was jolted into remembering why we hadn’t spoken for a few days.
‘Should I?’ I bit back.
‘Amber, there was no reason for you to ever not trust me,’ he said. ‘I’m not in touch with my ex, and I don’t intend to be. Where did you get that thought from?’ He paused. ‘Be honest.’
‘Okay, truth is, I zoomed into a photo on my phone, of you at Christmas.’
‘A photo?’
‘Exactly what I said, Rob. I zoomed into a photo I found on my phone of us on Boxing Day, and it showed your Facebook Messenger open, and an image that looked very much like Emily’s profile picture next to the chat. So, naturally, I assumed that you were in touch with her and—’
‘And you assumed I was having an affair,’ he said, finishing my sentence.
‘Without even being sure that it was her profile picture, or that there were any new messages, or asking me about it. Or being a little more rational about it before accusing me of infidelity? Never mind the fact that you were spying on my phone.’
‘Indirectly. I was actually spying on my own photo, on my own phone.’
‘Amber, I wasn’t texting Emily. I haven’t been in touch with her for a really long time.
Send me the photo and I’ll help you verify what you believe you’ve seen, if you like.
’ He gave an even bigger weary sigh. ‘It really upset me that you’d think I’d do something like that.
’ Now that he put it like that, it did sound as though I had accused him of something big without any hard evidence.
‘Seriously, send me the photo if you want. We can get it forensically analysed.’
I listened for any indication of guilt in his tone, and there seemed to be none.
Rob’s brow was furrowed as he waited for me to respond.
A bit of me did want to examine the photo again – I’ll do that in bed later – but, for now, it seemed pointless belabouring the argument.
I wanted to believe him, and if I wanted to make things good between us, I had to.
‘I’m sorry,’ I murmured. ‘I made an assumption, and I shouldn’t have.’
‘I’m glad that’s sorted then.’ He let out a sigh.
‘Are you okay, Rob?’ I asked again. ‘You don’t seem yourself – you sound really down.
’ Granted the room was pretty dark, but even the whites of his eyes seemed grey and lifeless.
There was none of the usual Rob spark when he looked at me.
‘Look, I really am sorry,’ I continued. ‘I didn’t mean to make you feel this bad.
I shouldn’t have been so accusatory. Am I forgiven? ’
‘You’re forgiven,’ he replied. ‘I’m sorry I haven’t called sooner. It’s been a shit week to be honest.’
‘Oh no, work again?’
‘Yep, same old story, it’s rubbish. There are no new productions.
I’m pretty sure I’m going to be let go. I feel like I’m waiting to be called in for a “chat” with Mike and that will be that.
It’s doing nothing for my confidence. But the worst thing about it?
I don’t even care anymore, Am. I’m over working in TV.
But I have absolutely no clue what I want to do.
Or what I’d be able to do.’ He looked down, unable to make eye contact.
My eyes searched his face. ‘Well, maybe you won’t be let go.
Is it worth having a chat with Mike to tell him how you’re feeling?
Maybe there are other roles that you could go for?
’ I felt helpless that I was here and he was all alone worrying about this.
‘And if it’s not TV, of course there are plenty of things you could do.
You’re so talented! Why do you think I’m dating you? ’
Silence. He didn’t even crack a smile at my attempt at a joke. This is really bad.
‘I can’t tell my boss the truth,’ he snapped. ‘If I did, I’d be let go for sure. And how will that help us, with rent to pay and a mortgage to try for? I need to keep my job, Amber. I just hate it.’
‘Look, I’m doing this job with Mandy to help us save,’ I said, trying a change of tack. ‘You’re such a brilliant director. You’ve nailed every project you’ve worked on. What is it about TV you hate?’
‘Babe, they’ve all been low-budget celebrity crap.
I’m hardly winning Emmys. I just find that world so one-dimensional now – besides, it’s old, none of that stuff is winning ratings wars anymore.
The main channels want eyeballs, hard-hitting documentaries, true crime, or slick Oscar-worthy dramas created in virtual worlds.
’ He sighed heavily. ‘Maybe I should become a pilot.’
‘I don’t think your eyesight is good enough.’ It was a bad attempt to be funny.
He didn’t react. ‘So, what else has been happening?’ he asked.
‘I’ve had all kinds of shenanigans from Mandy since I’ve been here,’ I muttered, hoping to show him that work is rarely a ball all the time for anyone.
‘But this will make you laugh … I bruised my lip in the gym the other morning and Mandy took me to a cryotherapy chamber to try to stop the swelling.’
‘Cryotherapy?’ He winced.
‘It’s basically a giant freezer.’
He feigned interest. ‘Sounds painful.’
‘What are you doing at the weekend?’ I asked.
He shrugged. ‘No plans yet. Will you be working all of it?’
‘Mandy’s having drinks at the house tomorrow evening. I wish you could come. I could ask, she might be willing to make an exception?’
‘It was fairly explicit in your contract that guests aren’t allowed,’ he replied. ‘Anyway, I’m not really up for it,’ he said resignedly. ‘I feel like a total party pooper at the moment.’
‘I’ll call you instead, it’ll be nice to commiserate with you when they cut short my contract.’
‘Oh baby, you never know – be positive, okay?’
‘I’ll try.’
After we said goodbye, I stared into space for a few moments, thinking about the call.
Something didn’t feel right. I’d rarely heard Rob so lacklustre.
He felt so far away. I couldn’t think about it for too long because I needed to get back downstairs in the annexe to start packing up the clothes from the shoot.
As I began carefully folding up items and putting them back into the bags in which they arrived, I remembered with alarm that Mandy had been wearing the diamond earrings earlier in the kitchen.
They were on a strict twenty-four-hour loan and would be collected by a security guard later this evening.
With a price tag of over ten thousand pounds, I could not afford for them to go AWOL.
I WhatsApped Blair to see what they thought I should do but got no reply.
So that was how I found myself on all fours outside Mandy’s bedroom door half an hour later, trying to look through the keyhole.
The house was really quiet. Everyone involved with the photoshoot had long gone, and I hadn’t seen Jimi for the rest of the day, after he disappeared from the kitchen when Mandy did.
Coco and Philippa were pottering around in the kitchen.
There was no response from Mandy’s room when I knocked softly, although there was every possibility she couldn’t hear me.
Either that, or she was sleeping soundly.
There was no option other than to creep into Mandy’s room to retrieve the earrings; hopefully she had left them somewhere obvious – on the dressing table, a bedside table, or perhaps in the bathroom.
If I couldn’t find them, I’d just have to come clean and find a way to delay the collection.
I pushed the door open slowly and poked my head around it.
The room was in complete darkness. Shadows hid the corners, making the space feel larger than I knew it was.
I edged forwards, my eyes slowly acclimatising to the darkness.
I could make out a light around the closed door to the en suite, and then the edges of pieces of furniture.
At the far side, the end of the bed was becoming visible, and to my left, Mandy’s dressing table. It was there I decided to look first.
I crouched down, figuring it was better to crawl to keep out of sight, just in case Mandy woke up. The contour of a body in the middle of the bed told me she was in it. I was about halfway across the floor when I heard a floorboard creak on the other side of the room.