Page 60 of Winter With You

It was enough to have Cheyenne checking her watch. ‘OK.’

‘Good. Thank you,’ Luca said. Then, still with the garment bag in his hand, he opened the door with the other and all but ushered Cheyenne out of it.

The door closed, the publicist was gone and Phoebe burst into tears. Gabriella turned to go to her niece; surely a hug would make her feel better. But, before she could reach her, Luca had beaten her to it.

‘Hey,’ he said softly, dropping the bag onto a chair and putting his hands on Phoebe’s shaking shoulders. ‘We don’t let bullies make us cry.’

‘I know,’ Phoebe said, heaving in shuddering breaths. ‘But it’s also good to let go of your emotions and not hold them in. Holding them in can give you an emotional “pressure cooker” effect. It can also give you indigestion.’

‘This is true,’ Luca agreed, nodding. ‘You are right.’

‘I think it’s also good to envisage Cheyenne in the jungle with Ant and Dec, buried in the dark with snakes crawling up her shorts,’ Gabriella offered.

Phoebe looked at Gabriella, all big watery eyes and flushed cheeks. ‘I don’t have to go on stage and say anything, do I?’

‘Absolutely not,’ Gabriella said.

She nodded, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. ‘OK.’ She took a deep breath, then another. ‘Good.’

‘So, do you think a hot chocolate might make you feel better? Or Reece’s Pieces?’

‘There is a possibility that the sugar will replenish the energy spent on internally debating fight or flight.’ She sniffed. ‘Did you know, this library used to be a chocolate factory?’

Luca took a leather wallet out of the back pocket of his trousers and pulled some dollar bills from it. ‘I did not know that but I saw a vending machine in the corridor.’ He handed Phoebe the cash.

‘Would you like anything?’ She looked to Luca first then Gabriella.

‘I’m good,’ Luca answered.

Gabriella shook her head. ‘No, Pheebs, that’s OK.’

Phoebe gave a small smile and then headed out of the room. And Gabriella now felt so tight inside it was like she was a walking bottle of Coke containing a Mento…

‘OK,’ Luca said, decisively. ‘Let’s get you a water.’

36

‘I’m fine,’ Gabriella said. ‘Just another near Gabriellaism avoided.’

‘A what?’

‘Never mind.’

Luca knew she wasn’t fine. He was getting the measure of her now. She did a good job at her pretence but, every now and then, he saw it. A change of expression that she thought no one caught. Most people didn’t catch it, but he was used to playing that game too. He was aware he did exactly the same thing.

‘I know. It just got a little intense for a minute.’ He passed her a bottle from the batch on the shelf. ‘I’m having one too.’

She took it, opened the lid and drank.

‘Cheyenne is intense too,’ Luca stated. ‘She reminds me of an even more highly charged version of my sister.’

‘She reminds me of everything I dislike about this industry,’ Gabriella answered.

‘So, why do it?’ Luca asked as he hung the garment bag up and unzipped it. There was silence until he turned around and faced her again. She seemed to be contemplating, her eyes on the child-drawn murals on the wall. Until she slumped down onto a seat.

‘I don’t know anymore. I didn’t think it would be like this.’ She sighed. ‘And what if the reason I was doing it wasn’t the right reason?’ She shook her head. ‘I mean, there is more than one reason, but I seem to have to, I don’t know, fight all the time.’

‘In what way?’ he asked. He pulled up a chair next to her and sat down.