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‘Ivor sacked me this morning,’ she told him. ‘Not that I’m bothered. You know how you’ve always said that I should set up my own business?’
Josh nodded.
‘Well, that’s what I’m going to do. I’ve got some money–a trust fund–and I’m going to use some of that to find somewhere for us both, Josh.’ She was speaking faster now, desperate to get the words out whilst they were still alone. ‘Somewhere that I can have my showroom on the ground floor and you can have your salon upstairs.’
It was the least she could do after what he’d done for her. She knew how much having his own business meant to him.
‘Now just a minute,’ Josh said grimly, ‘there’s no way I’m going to be beholden to you and have you financing me.’
She’d known that would be his reaction and she was prepared for it.
‘You won’t be anything of the kind. I need you, Josh. You make me brave enough to do things I couldn’t ever have done without you. We’ll be partners, business partners, with everything done properly and legally. You’ll design new hairstyles and I’ll design new salons.’ As she said the words Rose knew that it was what she wanted to do more than anything else, much more than draping curtains in stuffy mansion flats. She wanted to be herself, to follow her own direction, to prove to the world, and most of all to Amber, that she was more than the result–the sum–of the disgrace of her father and the poverty of her mother.
Josh looked at her. ‘Partners? Yo u and me?’
‘Yes,’ said Rose firmly.
The ambulance crew had arrived. Rose stood up to allow them to get to Josh.
As they set to work checking him over Josh winked at her and said, ‘OK, partner.’
His face was bloody and battered, but Rose knew if the ambulance crew hadn’t been there she would have flung her arms around him and hugged him right there out of sheer relief. Josh made her laugh. Josh made her feel that she could do things she’d never have believed she could do by herself. Most of all Josh made her feel safe. He was her friend and her security, and now he was her future as well.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Emerald’s baby was born at three o’clock in the afternoon in an expensive private nursing home just off Harley Street, early in February.
Emerald took one look at the red-faced bawling infant and then waved the nurse away. She was pleased that he was a boy, of course, and naturally she would make sure that her ex-mother-in-law got to know that she had produced what should have been Alessandro’s heir. But for now she wanted peace and quiet in a perfume-scented room, not one that smelled of blood and toil, and certainly not one filled with the roars of the red-faced ‘thing’ the nurse was still there holding.
Irritation brought a frown to Emerald’s face. She started to wave the nurse away again but somehow the baby caught her gaze and held it with his own. Something totally unfamiliar tightened round her heart as though the baby itself had grabbed hold of it with his small fingers. A feeling, something so elemental that not even her strong will could overcome it, took possession of her. To her own astonishment she held out her arms for her son.
Silently the nurse handed him to her.
He was heavier than she had expected: eight pounds eleven ounces, the midwife had told her with approval. Emerald searched his face for some recognisable resemblance to either herself or Alessandro, but could find none. Instead he looked…he looked…
‘Here, take him away,’ she commanded the nurse angrily.
How was it that her son could somehow have reminded her of Dougie? That simply wasn’t possible and yet Emerald could have sworn that the baby and Dougie quite definitely had the same unwavering gaze.
Emerald closed her eyes and let the nursing home staff fuss round her.
It was late evening when Amber arrived at the nursing home. Because Emerald had gone into labour a week early, Amber hadn’t been with her daughter in London as she had planned. The staff welcomed her and asked if she would like to see her grandson since her daughter was still asleep.
‘He’s got a fine head of hair,’ said the nurse who had shown her in to the nursery.
Amber agreed, but her attention was on her grandson. Her breath had caught in her lungs and her heart felt as though it was being squeezed by a giant hand. Looking at Emerald’s baby was just like looking at her own son, Luc, when he had been born. Unable to stop herself, Amber reached down and lifted the baby from the cot. It was funny how certain skills and instincts never left you. A mixture of wonderment and pain f
illed her. She could have been a young mother again, holding her own child for the first time, feeling that first surge of maternal love and that sense of joyful recognition as mother and child see one another for the first time and know the bond they share. The baby opened his eyes and looked at her. Amber’s heart turned over.
Janey opened her eyes apprehensively and looked round the unfamiliar bedroom. She was alone in the bed, thank heavens. Unwanted images of the previous evening crowded inside her head. She couldn’t remember now who out of the group of girls and boys that went out together every Saturday night had suggested going to Eel Pie Island, but she did know that they had all agreed it was a good idea.
The nightclub on Eel Pie Island had a dangerously louche and therefore a very attractive reputation. It was a place where rock and roll and jazz met and sometimes clashed. Saturday night fights were part of what it was famous for, along with the coolest music, the best musicians and the prettiest and wildest girls.
Janey had worn her newest creation, her own take on a darling little frock she had seen in Mary Quant’s Bazaar the previous week–the frock she could now see lying in a heap on the dusty floor of the small cramped bedsit, which belonged to a man whose face she could barely remember, but whose smell lingered on his bedding and on her skin. Rather than think about him and what had happened, she looked instead at her dress, the cotton a dark moody plum scattered with bright pink flowers, which set off the blonde hair she was now wearing longer with the ends flicked up, just like the models in all the magazines. Just like them too she had been wearing black eyeliner and pale pink lipstick.
Janey could remember how excited she’d felt when her friends had pointed out to her that the lead guitarist with one of the groups was looking at her. She’d tried not to be impressed when he had sung from the stage and actually dedicated the song to her: ‘The girl with the blonde hair right here who I’m going to take to bed just as soon as I get the chance.’
But of course she had been, and of course she had danced with him when his group had been replaced by another act. He’d had a dangerous sexy look about him, his dark hair long and sticky with sweat, his body thin and wiry, his grip on her hard and sure when they had danced together. His name, he had told her, was Jerry, and his dream was to emulate his hero, Jerry Lee Lewis, the famous American singer.
