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She’d accentuated the body lotion used after her shower with a drift of the same fragrance on her throat and wrists, and fixed modest silver studs in her ears.
Neat, she thought, scrutinising herself in the mirror, but not gaudy.
She walked over to the window seat to repack Carrie’s sewing basket, and stood for a moment staring out of the window at the grassy headland, the blue ripple of the sea beyond.
It was the last time she would see it like this, because first thing tomorrow they were coming to put up the marquee. So she would take a long, final look now at this view, so familiar and yet at the same time so alien.
So many memories too, she thought wryly, and so few of them to be treasured. In fact, she could almost count them on the fingers of one hand. The feel of the short turf, cool beneath her bare feet as she ran. The hot gritty slide of the sand under her burrowing toes down in the cove, and the eventual, blessed shock of the sea against her heated skin. Misty mornings. Blistering afternoons, lying languid in the shade. All pure nostalgia.
But also tears scalding her eyes, like salt in her throat. And a man’s voice saying almost gently, ‘What’s wrong? There must be something…’
She stirred restlessly. That particular recollection had to go. It had no place in her memory. Not any more.
Perhaps this was really why she was here? she thought. To clear her mind of the past and prepare for a future that in so many ways was looking good. The kind of career many actresses her age could only dream of.
Except her dreams were different, and that was something she had to deal with once and for all.
To accept that she’d been crying for the moon all these years, and that the man she wanted had his own obligations, his own priorities, creating a void between them that could never be crossed.
She turned abruptly away from the window. Took several deep, steadying breaths from her diaphragm, as she did before she began an important scene. She opened her door, stepping into the passage—and ran straight into Simon.
‘So there you are.’ Abruptly he took her arm, propelling her back into her room and following. ‘What’s going on, Rhianna? I thought you weren’t going to be here. That’s what you let me believe, anyway.’
‘I told you I hadn’t made a decision,’ she defended, rubbing the arm he’d grabbed, aware that she was quivering inside, and a lot of it was temper. ‘What’s the matter, Simon? Conscience troubling you at last?’
‘Oh, for God’s sake.’ His voice was harsh, goaded. ‘I made a mistake, that’s all. I’m not the first man and I won’t be the last to get spooked by the thought of marriage and have a fling before the gates finally shut.’
‘A fling?’ she echoed bitterly. ‘Is that what you call it? It’s rather more than that when you tell someone you love her. Make her believe in happy ever after, then dump her, leaving her pregnant with a child she thought you wanted too.’
‘Is that why you’re here?’ he said hoarsely. ‘To tell me the termination’s been cancelled after all? Or to make some other kind of trouble?’
‘No,’ she said. ‘And—no. Does that put your mind at rest? But understand this, Simon. I’m keeping quiet about this whole hideous mess for Carrie’s sake, not yours. You don’t deserve her, you appalling creep, and you never have. But you’re what she wants.’
‘Well,’ he said softly, ‘she isn’t the only one—is she, sweetpea?’ He lifted his hand and stroked it insolently down her cheek.
Rhianna flinched away as if she’d been burned. ‘Just get out of here,’ she said harshly. ‘And you’d better make Carrie happy, that’s all. Don’t ruin her life as well, you complete and utter swine.’
‘No,’ he said, suddenly sober. ‘I won’t. Because I really do love her. Maybe it took a stupid, meaningless involvement to teach me how much. To make me realise I couldn’t bear to lose her. Can you understand that?’
‘I’ll never understand you, Simon.’ Her glance was cold and level. ‘Or anything that’s happened in the last months. Not if I live to be a thousand.’ She paused. ‘And my own loss, of course, doesn’t matter,’ she added bitterly.
‘Come off it, Rhianna.’ The mockery was back, coupled with a note of triumph. ‘How can you lose what you never had? Get real.’ He paused. ‘And now, sadly, I must tear myself away. But I’ll be back tomorrow, so remember that I’m about to marry your best friend and be nice, hmm?’ He gave her a valedictory grin, and departed.
Left alone, Rhianna sank down on the edge of the bed, feeling the inner trembling spread through her body, permeating every nerve, every sinew.
