He ended up overseeing the whole campaign. His eye for detail kept it simple and stylish, from the commercials to the posters, CD cover and music video. He turned from being a flavour-of-the-month photographer, to a style icon. He and Franco began to hang out with each other; they got invited to the same glitzy parties and launches, Tara often noticed the two of them arm in arm on the paparazzi gossip pages. She was a little jealous to see they had become good friends.
Franco had difficulty with the increased hero worship. He was not a natural celebrity; he enjoyed his privacy. The press interest in him intensified, his life became unbearably claustrophobic. Ned had told him the attention would blow over soon, not to worry, keep his head down, and try to enjoy it while it lasted; it wasn’t hurting his sponsorship value.
His team manager, Terry Woodman, Woody, was not too happy with the added publicity; being an ex-player he understood the pressures that came with the game. He didn’t need any distractions taking his boys’ focus off their game. He brought in more security at the training ground to control the crazed paparazzi and fan interest... as if bloody Frankie’s girl would turn up here… what a bunch of prats!
Woody was proud of Franco. His player had taken the extra dressing room banter with a pinch of salt; he had the grace to smile and rise above it by working harder. The boys would sing, “Have you seen it?” every time he missed a ball and fall into fits of laughter. To shut them up, he didn’t miss too many. Woody was also proud that Franco’s fee had gone to charity; it was a good thing; the lad was setting an example in their financially crazed industry.
The club Board were very happy. Tickets were sold out. Online and megastore merchandising sales figures were rocketing. Franco memorabilia was flying off the shelves, his shirts, posters, books, mugs, kid’s wallpaper, pens. Anything with Franco on it was now cooler than ever, especially for the teenage girls. Stadium tours were fully booked with fans eager to see the players’ dressing room, showers, tunnel, dugout, press-room, anything to get closer to Franco, with fantasies of bumping into him at the ground. Franco was now a severe babe magnet, a brand of his own.
Franco didn’t mind the banter in the club, or the singing on the terraces during the games, it spurred him on. People on the whole were good with him, mainly because it was a worthwhile charity. What he did mind was that his private life was curtailed even more. He stayed at home most nights, a prisoner; it was too difficult to go out without being mobbed.
The few times he did leave the flat were when Seb coaxed him out, saying life was too short, everyone had to have some fun… don’t worry baby boy, I’ll protect ya, which he did. Along with Michael’s help of speedy getaways, Seb was the master at controlling difficult situations. His dulcet Irish tones would calm, melt, and manoeuvre the trickiest of moments. He felt safe and had fun with Seb.
Sadly, Michael had to have the windows of the Mercedes tinted, so that they could drive the streets with privacy. Franco hated it, tinted windows were naff; he felt more like a drug dealer than a footballer.
He stayed with Maria after their return from Italy. Those around him didn’t understand why, but mentally he was in a bad way and needed someone. He felt it better to be with the devil you know, rather than be alone. He used her; she became a willing companion in his misery.
He didn’t taste the meals she cooked, or hear her inane chatter. They shared a bed without intimacy, when they had sex it was without feeling, a cold bodily function for him to release stress. He would fuck and roll off her, ready to sleep. When he wanted to come, he thought of Tara; it worked every time.
They had little in common; she shopped, he trained. He didn’t notice that more and more of her belongings were being moved into his flat; he didn’t care, didn’t have the energy to care. She was there to stop him feeling lonely, although, if he were honest, he felt lonelier.
Like Tara, he hated the painful dig of seeing the two of them plastered everywhere, as the campaign continued to blaze throughout the UK. While travelling he kept his eyes down and took to hooking himself up to his iPod for fear of seeing a poster or hearing the ‘Gotta See Her’ track. Even classical music reminded him of her, he started listening to jazz.
He would often repeat Ned’s words to himself… this will all blow over, son, the public are fickle, sit tight.
He dreamed about her every night. The dreams would start out with the two of them blissfully happy, with a feeling of safety and love, and end up as nightmares, with grotesque, exaggerated pictures of her and Ed haunting his sleep. Sometimes she would be with other men, laughing at him, taunting him. He would wake up in a cold sweat, shouting her name.
Maria pretended to be asleep, but she heard every word. She also heard him whisper Tara’s name while they fucked. They fucked, they didn’t make love. He was a robot to her; she knew that he felt nothing, that he just went through the motions of living alongside her.
She also knew it was Tara in the Sporjakk campaign; the humiliation of seeing the two of them together, intimate and loving, cut deep. She kept silent; if she ignored it long enough, it would all go away; he would forget the bitch. He was with her now; that was all that mattered.
She relied on one set of pills to get her through the day and another for the nights. Eventually Franco would come back to her, he had to, he was all she had.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
It was 3 a.m. the flat was in darkness; he’d let himself in through the front door. He could hear her soft snores from the bedroom. He stripped naked in the hallway, leaving his clothes in an orderly pile on top of his shoes. He clicked his phone off and perched it neatly on top.
His bare feet tip-toed into the bedroom; he stood over her bed and took in the scene. The room was hot; her body shone with perspiration. In her sleep she’d thrown off the blanket; it lay in a heap on the floor at the end of the bed, a sheet covered the lower half of her body, one leg kicked out to find cooler air. He loved his night visits.
Her snores abruptly stopped as if she felt a presence. He stood very still, watching, barely breathing; had she woken? Her restless darting eyes remained closed; she tossed her head from left to right on the sweat-damp pillow, trying to shake something or someone off her. He waited quietly until she calmed, her snores resumed; she was asleep. With the amount of medication he’d spiked her wine bottle with; she should be out of it for at least six hours.
He leaned over her face and kissed her gently on the mouth, his tongue traced the outline of her lips, backwards and forwards, covering her with saliva; her mouth eased open to his touch. He trailed his fingers down the side of her face, to her chest, circling her bare breasts as they heaved in and out. He cupped them, her nipples hardened.
He walked around to the foot of the bed and slowly pulled off the sheet, exposing her body; holding her gently around the ankle, he eased each leg straight and open, forming a V shape. His hard, condom clad cock swayed between them, the anticipation killing him.
He crawled onto the bed and knelt between her legs. The light from the street lamp crept through the break in the curtains, giving him enough light to enjoy the sight of her naked body. His hands trailed the soft skin of her inner thigh; feeling goose-bumps tingle into life, he gently stroked the delicate skin of her lips through soft pubic hair. He parted the folds and dipped a finger inside; a low groan came from the back of her throat.
She was all he ever wanted, a beautiful soft angel, why had she abandoned him? When she was drugged like this they could be the way he’d always wanted, a loving, passionate couple. He knelt forward and ducked his head between her legs, not touching, just breathing in her smell. When he could bear it no longer; he pushed his face into her flesh and breathed in again, hard against her pubic bone, taking her in. His tongue searched out her clit, running backwards and forwards over its delicate skin, teasing the knot of nerve endings out of hiding, when he found it, he gently worked it.
Her breathing began to falter; she let out another moan and lifted her hips, pushing towar
d the stimulus. His large hands gripped her inner thighs, forced them further open, and held her in place. He worked his tongue in circles, over and over until juices started to flow. Her head rolled from side to side, her mouth opened wide, her hands gripped the sheet. He felt her building, felt the swelling of her clit as her moans became panicky intakes of breath.
He wouldn’t let up, no matter how many times her hips bucked; he held her down; his tongue rubbed and delved into her until she finally came in deep long waves, crying out in her sleep.
He released her thighs, crawled up over her body, and sank long and hard into her wetness, riding the final waves with her. He wrapped his arms around her shoulders and put his juice covered mouth over hers, taking her breaths as she groaned with pleasure, stealing the air from her lungs. He loved tasting his angel.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Back in his flat he dropped the condom in the bin, took a hot shower and made coffee, he had work to do. Over the past days he’d patiently watched the saga unfold. He took his hat off to Tara and her team; they had done a great job, the campaign was a success. Franco had become a saint, a sex god with golden bollocks. Everyone, young, old, gay, straight, grannies to toddlers, adored him. The whole country were searching for Tara, chasing reward monies. Sport, Music and Fashion were lucrative industries, they’d managed to combine all three… the higher they climb, the harder they fall… assholes, this is gonna be SO much fun.
He’d given them enough time to enjoy the fruits of their labour; now it was time for a short sharp smack of reality. He worked quietly through the rest of the night, standing naked in his darkroom over trays of solution, waiting for images to emerge on paper. It was a turn-on to watch the naked bodies come alive before his eyes. He shunted the trays backwards and forwards; causing ripples in the liquid, making the bodies writhe, giving them life. He loved working with film; digital just didn’t do it for him.
The moments he’d caught were meant to be private, secret, tucked away for their memories only, not to be captured and displayed for others to dissect and giggle over. He would humiliate and betray her, just as she had him. He chuckled to himself... they look like animals, dogs on heat. He selected the cruder looking shots and went about his Devil work, cheerfully whistling the ‘Gotta See Her’ tune… gotta see her now everyone, your all gonna see her now.
His excitement was tinged with sadness, he was nearing the end. Following her, being intimate with her, had become a part of his life, and he was good at it, she never suspected, not even his night visits. Once the photographs were exposed to the media, they would be moving to the final step of their dance, the music would stop, she would complete her penance, and he would go home.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Her car was in for its paint job; she’d driven around with ‘BITCH’ etched on the hood for long enough. She assumed Maria was the culprit, and was considering sending the re-spray bill to Franco; it was his bloody nutter of a girlfriend, after all.
Sometimes she was pleased she to be a woman and not a man, she could never date women, all those dramas and ‘time of the month’ emotions. Some women were an utter nightmare, even she was scared of them.
She dragged herself into work, buses were on strike so she battled her way through the sardine sweaty, overcrowded underground. She hated the underground, never feeling quite safe; a sitting duck for fire, terrorists, pick pockets and creepy undesirables with smelly armpits.
Surfacing safely onto Piccadilly Circus, gratefully breathing in fresh London polluted air, she picked up her regular coffee and biscuit breakfast combo, and she rushed, head down, through the reception of Harvinger Larvsen, straight to the lift. There seemed to be a lot of people hanging around, but she was too tired to bother to find out why.
“Morning, girls,” she sang, in the direction of the two receptionists, as cheerfully as she could muster, not in the mood to chat, she was exhausted. She’d had a heavy night of unsettling dreams and images again, it was becoming a habit.
She must have tossed and turned all night, her bed was a mess and she was covered in sweat when rudely roused by her ‘effing annoying’ alarm clock. Her body ached, her throat was parched and she had a searing headache. She hated mornings, she stood under the shower for twenty minutes to rejuvenate her body; she was not a morning person.
It was only as the lift doors closed that she noticed Mrs B and Tracey hadn’t replied to her cheery hello. They were glaring at her open mouthed, as if she’d just murdered a new-born baby in front of them… what’s eating them today? She’d probably used their soya milk by mistake. Woe betides anyone who came between Mrs B and her section of the communal fridge door in the staff canteen.
She swapped flatties for heels just as the lift door opened, and headed straight for her desk, mumbling a cheery “good morning” to the rest of the office as she slumped in her chair.
Her head hurt, she retrieved her biscuit and gratefully found a dog eared pack of headache tablets at the bottom of her bag. She stuffed the oversized bag into the bottom draw of her filing cabinet and, with some effort, squeezed it shut. Knocking back a few of the tablets with a swig of coffee, she brought the cup to her mouth and noticed new bruising on her wrist… where had that come from?
She shook her head, she was so clumsy recently, always covered in bruises, most of which she couldn’t explain. In the shower that morning, she’d noticed two small round thumb shaped bruises on her inner thighs… where the hell had they come from? Maybe she had thin skin?
The office seemed deathly quiet; she looked around to see all eyes on her, the mood distinctly hostile.
“What’s up, someone die?” she asked the girl sat nearest to her, Kelly.
“No, but someone is about to,” said Kelly.
“Who?” Tara began to feel cold, oh no, it was happening, they had found out about her. “Who, Kelly?”
“You… you silly mare… have you not seen the papers this morning? Facebook? …. You’re trending on Twitter.”
Kelly chucked the day’s press cuttings on her desk and opened up a news homepage on her computer monitor.
“It’s gone viral, you’ve got some explaining to do girl,” she whispered. “Pete Wells is spitting exocets, wants to see you. You may need some brandy in that coffee. Go to the loo and have a read, I’ll cover for you… NOW… get outta here quick.”
She ushered a bemused Tara into the ‘Ladies’, along with a pile of office newspapers, then fended off calls to Tara’s desk, most of which were from an incensed Pete. Her heart went out to Tara; even though she came across as a little snooty at times, you wouldn’t wish this on your worst enemy. She was well and truly up for the slaughter. She’d fooled the bosses, the client and the public.
Kelly turned back to the images on her screen, titled her head sideways and checked out Franco’s six pack… but she is one lucky girl to have bedded ‘The Bossellini’, yum, he’s edible… poor Tara looks a bit rough though, ridden hard and put away wet… a quaint little term she’d picked up from an ex Texan lover… not everything is only big in Texas, Italy seems to have it’s moments too… she grinned.
Tara laid the papers across the line of sinks in the dim light of the ladies toilet.
“Ohmigod,” she put her hand to her mouth in shock.
Crude close-ups of Franco and his mystery girl were splashed across the front pages of every paper. Black and white shots of their naked bodies rutting like animals. She felt sick.
As she turned the pages more and more of the horror spread out before her, there must have been ten or fifteen pictures – where the hell had they come from. Her heart racing, she read some of the headlines, the press were having a field day;
YOUR HARVIN’A’LARF’SON
FRANKIE’S RED CARD
ST FRANK’S AWAY GAMES
GONNA SEE HER
INSIDE JOB
SPOR-JAKKING OFF
CHARITY TO DUMP ROSSELLINI
AGENCY CON
She cringed with
embarrassment; the pictures resembled stills of a cheap porno movie. Each newspaper had its own comical way of blanking out any offending genitalia. Pictures of footballs, red cards, boots and World Cup trophies were stuck over her private parts.
Unscrupulous behaviour, definitely ‘not cricket’: Saint Franco and Miss Tara Warr, Assistant Executive of Harvinger Larvsen, the advertising agency responsible for the successful ‘Gotta See Her’ Sporjakk Campaign, have been exposed.
The campaign launched a reward driven, media-frenzied search to find the Sporjakk mystery girl. The nation had been led to believe that she was a member of the general public. The mystery girl has been revealed as Miss Warr, a member of the Harvinger Larvsen production team, their New York HQ is ‘unavailable for comment’.
The pictures had been taken in her apartment, they were grainy and out of focus at times, but her face was as clear as a bell… oh shit, what will mother say?
Chapter Forty
Seb had not seen the press that morning; he’d been too busy preparing to meet David. His phone and morning paper forgotten, he’d scrubbed and showered his body to within an inch of its life, knocked back a double coffee-cognac and taken a taxi to David’s flat just before 9 a.m. He’d called him the night before, asking if he could pop over for coffee in the morning. More coffee was the last thing he needed; he was climbing the walls with the caffeine-induced amphetamine rush.
David had expected his call and was cool as a cucumber; his smile seeped down the phone line.
“Yes, of course you can, see you around 9 a.m. when I get back from the gym.”
Seb knew he was passing the point of no return but he didn’t have a choice; he needed to find out who he was. How fitting that his virginity should be taken by the very boy who’d started it all, the boy who’d unleashed the cravings all those years ago, the boy who’d controlled a small dark place in his mind ever since, the boy he wanked over. They both knew he was there for sex, to exorcise the ghost, one way or the other.
The Penance List Page 23