Chapter Five
Dan lay down on the hotel bed, took out his phone and scrolled to Pete’s name. His finger hovered over the number before he sighed and set the phone down on the bedside table.
It didn’t matter how innocent the occasion was, if he told Pete that Anna was cooking him dinner, the guy would read something into it.
Okay, not entirely true. Pete would ask seemingly harmless, yet actually deviously sneaky, questions that would inevitably get Dan to admit he liked her.
And then the whole going round for dinner with her and her daughter for a quick bite to eat would morph, in Pete’s imagination, into a candlelight dinner for two. And end with him tumbling her into bed.
The visual caused Dan to shift restlessly on the bed.
No, this couldn’t be happening. He couldn’t be attracted to Anna Dalton — mother, widow, head teacher.
A woman like that needed steady, serious and committed.
He’d tried that, failed catastrophically at it and was now an expert in casual, light, easy. Ducking out before it became too heavy.
It invariably meant he was lonely, but over the last few years it had at least kept him sane.
His phone started to vibrate on the table and when he glanced at the caller ID, he groaned. Bloody Pete. It was like he had a sixth sense.
‘Checking up on me?’
Pete started to laugh. ‘Do I need to?’
Dan screwed up his face. That was exactly the type of conniving question he needed to avoid like the plague. ‘I’m sitting in my hotel room, alone. What do you want?’
‘You’re sounding a bit tetchy there, Danny boy. Anything I need to worry about?’
‘I’m tetchy because you keep phoning to check up on me.’
‘Reassure me everything is going well with the school, and that you’re keeping away from booze and women, and I’ll get off your case.’
He felt the edge of his temper. ‘For Christ’s sake, I’m not some fly-by-night playboy alcoholic.’
‘You might know that, I might know that. Recent photographs suggest otherwise.’
‘Twice,’ he muttered. ‘That’s the number of times I’ve been snapped coming out of nightclub the worse for wear.’
‘Five times,’ Pete corrected.
Shit, had it really been five? Were there three nights he couldn’t even remember? Shame coiled through him, leaving him twitchy, nauseous and disgusted with himself. He was of an age when he should be able to handle a set back without wallowing in self-pity and resorting to the bottle.
Apparently not, though. It was no wonder Pete was treating him like a child. He’d spent the last two months acting like one. Heaving out a sigh, he stared up at the ceiling. ‘I’ve agreed to write the school play.’
Silence echoed down the phone, followed by the sound of a throat being cleared. ‘Did you really just say you were going to write it?’
‘Yes. We can’t agree on anything off the shelf, and, well, I have an idea that I think will work.’
Another pause. ‘But write it, Dan? Seriously? Your focus right now should be reading scripts other people have written.’
Dan felt another spike of irritation. ‘Well, right now I’m not reading anything.
’ Because he knew Pete was only trying to help, he took a breath and softened his tone.
‘Look, I’ve got time on my hands and I fancy doing something with that time rather than watching my phone and hoping it will ring.
Besides, I enjoy writing. You know that. ’
‘As a hobby, yes. Your focus now should be your job. Writing this play will take up a lot of time. Time you should be spending rehearsing for the auditions I plan on sending you to.’
Auditions that, so far, seem to have dried to a trickle. ‘No need to get your pants in a twist just yet, Anna has to agree to it.’
‘And how is the lovely Anna Dalton?’
‘How do you know she’s lovely?’ The moment he said the words, Dan wished he could grab them and shove them back into his big gob. Especially as the silence at the other end told him Pete hadn’t missed his slip up.
‘Well, I know now.’ More silence, of the variety that made Dan squirm. ‘Please tell me you’re not going to do anything stupid.’
‘And stupid would be what, exactly, in your opinion?’
He heard Pete curse. ‘You know damn well. Playboy actor Dan Ramsey breaks heart of head teacher he was supposed to be helping. That isn’t a headline I want to see.’
By God, that stung. ‘I have no intention of breaking anyone’s heart, ever.’ Natalie had stuck her five-inch stilettos into his, and while she hadn’t broken it, he wouldn’t wish the feeling on anyone.
A heavy sigh echoed down the phone line. ‘I didn’t mean to suggest you’d do it on purpose, but you’re up there temporarily. Starting anything would be crazy.’
‘I know.’ He just needed to keep reminding himself. ‘Was there any other wisdom you wanted to impart or can I get back to my evening?’ And the meal he definitely wasn’t going to tell Pete about now. Even though it was entirely innocent.
‘That’s about the height of it. Are you going to the Get Real annual bash on Friday?’
Get Real was the name of the TV production company who made Love Surgery. ‘What, so I can thank them for kicking me into touch?’
‘So you can remind them that for the last six years you’ve played one of the lead roles in their show and helped make it a hit.’
The moment he’d been told he was being axed was still etched in Dan’s brain.
Nothing personal, the slimy git of a producer had told him.
The character has gone as far as we can take him.
In other words, the ratings were going down and they needed to shake things up by killing off someone big.
Then bringing in a younger actor who’d appeal to the teen audience.
Dan had tried to argue that he had ideas for storylines that would show the viewers a whole new side to Tyler Moore but his pleas — only one step back from begging — had fallen on deaf ears.
Three weeks later, he’d filmed Tyler’s death.
Poor bastard hadn’t even been allowed a heroic death.
Facing down a gunman, giving CPR while a burning building collapsed on him?
Oh no. Tyler had been killed by a drunk driver while walking to his car.
It kind of summed up Dan’s acting career.
Disappointing. Anti-climactic. A wasted opportunity.
At least that’s what his parents thought.
They were too polite to say it to his face, but he’d seen the looks they’d given each other when he first got the part in Love Surgery.
He’d overheard the phone calls to their acting friends; he’s accepted a role in that ghastly soap.
‘Dan?’
Shaking himself out of his funk, Dan sat up. ‘Still here. And still the same answer. I’d rather spend the evening writing a school play for a bunch of five- to eight-year-olds.’
‘Attending the party would do your career more good,’ Pete pointed out.
‘I’m helping with the play because you thought it would help my career,’ Dan countered. ‘So let me do it the best way I know how.’
And if that happened to include having dinner with the attractive head teacher . . . he pictured her wide smile, the soft lips and pretty eyes. Yeah, if he got to have dinner with her, then lucky him. He was quite capable of enjoying her company without it leading to anything.
* * *
Anna sneaked into her bedroom and eyed herself in the long mirror behind the door. Black trousers — she’d really got into a rut with them — and a green-and-black spotted blouse. Clothes she’d worn all day. Did she change, or would that look like she was trying too hard?
If she didn’t change and he did though, would that look like she didn’t care?
Immediately, she began to undo her blouse.
It was only when she started to slip it off she realised she shouldn’t care.
This wasn’t a date. This was her being kind to a man who was helping the school out.
A man whose sad, tortured expression when he’d spoken of his son had tugged at something deep inside her.
One parent to another, that’s all. Obviously he was stunning to look at, but she wasn’t shallow enough to be drawn to looks alone. Was she?
‘Are you taking that off, or putting it on?’
Anna jumped at the sound of the voice. ‘Good God, Val. I didn’t realise you were here.’
‘Maisie let me in.’ Val and Bob, Chris’s parents, lived next door but one.
When Anna had first moved in to live with Chris, she’d found it unnerving having her in-laws-to-be so close.
Since his death though, Anna wasn’t sure how she’d have coped without them.
Her parents were great, but they lived in Devon and were busy with her sister and their kids, who lived nearby.
Val and Bob had been there for her every day.
Taking care of Maisie. Taking care of her, even though their loss had been just as hard to bear.
‘Maisie tells me you’ve got a man coming to dinner.’ Val held up her hand, eyes twinkling. ‘She actually said, a sick actor who told me he bunked off school to buy Sherbet Fountains when he was my age.’
Anna laughed, slipping the blouse back on. ‘God knows what he’s been telling her. I think he thought, as she was waiting for me, she’d been naughty, so he was trying not to make her feel so bad.’
Val watched her carefully. ‘He sounds nice.’
Damn, there was that word again. And on any other man it wouldn’t matter, because Val wouldn’t read anything into her inviting a nice man to dinner. But if she asked who—
‘An actor, Maisie said.’ Val’s moss-green eyes, so like Chris’s, so like Maisie’s, remained on her. ‘Have I heard of him?’
Anna felt an uncomfortable flush spread across her face. ‘It’s Daniel Ramsey.’
There was a small pause, Val clearly clicking through actors’ names and putting them to faces. Then, bingo. ‘Dr Tyler Moore?’