by Carrie Elks
Will didn’t look convinced. ‘What the hell will you do there? Lake Como is notorious for having celebrities, the paps will get you as soon as you leave the gates.’
‘Then I won’t leave the gates,’ Sam told him. ‘Gabi and Sandro will do the shopping, and I can get my head straight in the peace and quiet. I’ll come back here when I’m ready.’ It was all starting to take shape in his mind. A few weeks at the villa and he’d be yesterday’s news.
‘You’ll go out of your mind,’ Will warned him.
‘I’m going out of my mind here. At least there I can do it surrounded by good wine and great food.’
‘Ah, the food,’ Will smiled. ‘And the girls. Man, if I wasn’t contracted for this movie I’d be joining you.’
Sam nodded at his offer, but didn’t comment. He was too busy thinking about booking a flight to Milan. A few weeks in Italy, without the scrutiny of the press. Time to think things through, and work out how the hell things had ended up like this.
Time to put a few thousand miles between him and Serena Sloane.
And if that bitch really did print an article about his family – and he’d be doing everything possible to make sure she couldn’t – he’d be able to lie low for a while. That could only be a good thing.
5
I do desire we may be better strangers
– As You Like It
‘I think that’s it.’ Sandro tried to close the trunk of his Fiat 500, his face dropping as it bounced off the cases stuffed inside it. He prodded them back and then tried again, this time putting his weight into the effort.
‘Are you sure you’re only going for a few weeks?’ Cesca bit away her smile. Shielding her eyes from the bright sun, she peered over at Gabi who was rifling through her bag, desperately trying to find something.
‘Of course.’ Gabi looked up from her search. ‘We promised Signora Carlton, we will be back within a month. Enough time to support Sandro’s poor sister through her birth and the homecoming.’ She paused for a moment, then threw her hands up in exasperation. ‘Sandro, I can’t find my phone. It’s not in my bag.’
Calmly, Sandro leaned forward, reaching for his wife’s hip. He slid the phone out of her pocket, handing it to her without a word. Then he pressed his lips against Gabi’s forehead, whispering a few words in Italian.
In the two weeks since she’d arrived in Varenna, Cesca had become fast friends with the Martinellis. They’d spent their days showing her the house and helping her to explore the village, pointing out where the best coffees were served, which was the best gelaterie, and who Cesca should call in case of an emergency. Their nights were more relaxed, with long, pasta-filled suppers complemented by warm red wine and a lot of laughter. Somehow, within the space of a few days, Cesca felt that she’d found a home from home, and had settled into the rhythm of life at Villa Palladino.
The contrast between her time here and her life in London was almost hard to believe.
‘We’ll keep in touch, I promise,’ Gabi told her, grabbing Cesca’s face as she kissed her on both cheeks. ‘I will email you, it’s the easiest way. Just remember to go to the Internet café a couple of times a week.’
‘And you have all my contact numbers in case of an emergency,’ Sandro added. ‘Call any time of the day or night. And there’s an old car in the garage that you can use if you need to get to a telephone box.’
Cesca made a face. ‘I don’t think I’ll be driving. I can barely drive on the right side of the road in London, I’ll end up in an accident here. I’ll use your old bike instead.’
Gabi looked concerned.
‘I’ll be fine,’ Cesca reassured her. ‘You’ve shown me everything I need, and if there are any problems I promise to call you. The cleaners will be here every other day, and the gardeners three times a week. It’s not as if I’ll be short of people if I need to ask questions.’
Sandro opened the passenger-side door for Gabi. The hot sun reflected off the shiny blue paint, lending it a yellow tinge. ‘We should go, my love, if we want to get there before evening arrives.’
Gabi hesitated, giving Cesca a worried look. ‘If you’re sure . . . ’
Cesca enveloped her in an uncharacteristic hug, wrapping her arms around Gabi’s torso. Gabi held her tightly, though who she was trying to reassure the most Cesca wasn’t sure.
‘Stay in touch, cara mia.’
‘Of course I will. And I’ll see you when you get back from Florence. I expect to see all the baby photos.’
Gabi finally smiled. ‘Of course, and I can promise you will be bored before I am. Thank you again, you’ve saved our lives.’
Shooing her petite Italian friend into the car, Cesca didn’t bother to reply that Gabi and Alessandro may just be saving her own life in return.
The evening was pleasantly balmy as Cesca walked out of the huge glass doors in the living room, making her way to the terrace overlooking the lake. She was carrying a glass of red wine in her right hand, while her left was curled around a notepad and a pen.
Placing everything down on the small glass table beside her chair, Cesca lifted her glass, inhaling the aroma. Since her arrival in Varenna, she’d fallen in love with the full-bodied Sassicaia wine, loving the silky way it slipped down her throat. Now that Gabi and Sandro were gone, she needed to make sure she didn’t drink quite so much. Between the three of them, they’d managed to polish off a bottle most nights.
It was impossible not to be amazed by the view of the sun setting over the lake. The sky was tinged purple and orange by its impending disappearance. Silhouettes of boats bobbed in the middle of the expanse, their masts free of sails as they moored up for the night. Cesca took another sip of her wine, closing her eyes to savour the taste. It lingered on her tongue, the memory still warming her even as the liquid disappeared.
How different everything was. Two short weeks ago she had been in cold, windy London. Views like this were almost impossible to imagine. Not that everything had changed overnight. Nowhere near. But even Cesca had to admit that there was some truth to the old adage that a change was as good as a rest, and this break in the sun was giving her a perspective she’d sorely lacked for so long.
She put her feet up on the footstool, crossing her slender legs in front of her. The strange thing about visiting somewhere new was the way you formed attachments so much faster than you would in everyday life. She’d been living with the Martinellis for two weeks, and she already knew them better than she’d ever known her flatmate Susie, in spite of their five months together. Maybe that’s why holiday romances felt more potent than their back-at-home counterparts. The sun seemed to distil everything until its true meaning rose to the surface.
She’d managed to do some writing, too. Nothing to call home about, and certainly nothing that resembled more than a few jotted sentences, but they were words and they were down on paper, and the sense of accomplishment it had given Cesca was beyond description.
Baby steps. That’s what they were. But she was moving forward all the same, no matter how wobbly her legs felt. It was more than she’d managed in the past, and Cesca was grateful for that.
The sun finally disappeared behind the Grigna mountains, the sky turning a deeper, darker blue. The solar lights strung in the bushes and trees started to blink on, their tiny bulbs resembling fireflies resting within the greenery. Cesca lit a candle, nestling into the sofa as she picked up her notepad, letting the light of the flame illuminate the paper in front of her. That’s where she sat and made notes until her eyes began to droop.
Perhaps she would have fallen asleep there, letting the cooling air caress her skin, if things had turned out to be different. But instead, just as a yawn stole control of her jaw muscles, a loud blast of a horn from the main gate made her sit straight up in her chair.
What in the holy hell was that?
In spite of the evening warmth, goose pimples broke out on her skin. The darkness, so pretty when she was overlooking the lake, became more ominous as she
walked around the back of the villa, her footsteps tentative when she approached the driveway. The moonlight had stolen all colour from the landscape, turning the trees black and the driveway a curious shade of purple grey. The gravel crunched beneath the rubber soles of her flip-flops, tiny pebbles spilling over and getting beneath her toes. She wriggled them wildly until the discomfort disappeared.
A pair of headlamps suddenly blinded Cesca as she froze halfway up the path. For the first time, the seclusion of Villa Palladino seemed more of a curse than a blessing. She was achingly aware of her isolation here. No telephone, no Internet, no connectivity at all. It made her a walking target.
‘Gabi?’ a voice called from beyond the gates. ‘Is that you? I’ve been buzzing for hours, can you let me in?’
‘I’m not Gabi,’ Cesca shouted, shaking her head at the obvious. ‘And I don’t know how to override the gate. It has an automatic lock on it at night. It should be usable by morning.’
She was less than twenty yards from the gate. Beyond the shining headlamps she could make out the vague form of a car, and was that a man standing beside it? The voice was certainly masculine.
‘Well I can’t wait out here until morning. For a start I’m starving. And I’ve been travelling for God knows how many hours, I just want to go to bed. Come on, just open it, OK?’
He wanted to stay here? Cesca’s eyebrows nearly shot off her head. She had half a mind to turn around and walk back down to the villa.
‘Well you can’t just come in here without the owners’ permission,’ she shouted. ‘And they haven’t let me know anybody is coming.’
‘Where the hell are Gabi and Sandro? They can let me in.’
Cesca hesitated, unwilling to reveal she was here on her own. Why wouldn’t he take no for an answer? This man had no right to turn up in the middle of the night and demand to be let into a private home. She could feel the anger rising, replacing the anxiety he’d first caused. She wasn’t about to take any shit off this guy, whoever he was.
‘They’re not here right now, so they can’t let you in.’ There was the merest hint of a gloat in her voice. Not that she was proud of it.
His sigh was audible. ‘Then you’ll need to let me in, sweetheart. There’s an override switch behind the post. You just have to key in the code, whatever the hell it is right now, and it should let you open the gate.’
Cesca stepped back, surprised. ‘How do you know that?’
‘Because I live here.’
The wind was well and truly knocked out of her sails. She could feel the embarrassment suffuse her. ‘Mr Carlton?’ No wonder he sounded like a mixture of English and American. The New York born producer had spent enough time in London to talk like a native.
‘Bingo. Now can you please let me in before I die of thirst out here?’ His voice softened, as if he was smiling.
‘Of course!’ Cesca began to run towards the gate, mortification fuelling her speed. What on earth must he think of her? She couldn’t believe she’d left him standing outside for so long, waiting for her to let him into his own house. Though she’d never met Foster Carlton, she was well aware of his reputation in theatre circles. His short temper was legendary: he must think Cesca was a complete idiot.
She walked around the gatepost to the control box. Sandro had explained that it was there in case of emergency. Her fingers shook as she tried to tap in the code. ‘I’m just opening it now. I’m so sorry about the mix-up, Mr Carlton.’
In her distress, she managed to key the wrong code in, a shrill beep from the control box informing her of her error. Taking a deep breath to calm down her nerves, she pressed the numbers again, feeling the rubber giving way beneath her pressure. Within moments the mechanism was whirring, making the metal gates creak as they slowly opened up. Cesca looked over, seeing the form of the man just behind the iron, and as a gap slowly emerged he stepped forward, his feet sinking into the gravelled drive.
‘Mr Carlton . . . ’ Her words trailed off as he stepped into the halo of light, spilling from the headlamps. The man she’d expected – the portly, middle-aged man that had graced the pages of Variety and other entertainment magazines – was nowhere to be seen. Instead there was a man in his mid-twenties, his sculpted jaw and dark brown hair as familiar to her as a family member. A regular in her dreams, or rather her nightmares, for the past six years. And the bastard looked even better than she remembered.
‘Sam?’ Cesca felt the words leap from her tongue. She felt like spitting to get rid of their taste. ‘What are you doing here?’
He smiled at her, his face a mask of confused interest. ‘What am I doing here? This is my house. The more important question is who are you?’
6
Come what come may, time and the hour runs through the roughest day
– Macbeth
Sam felt a wave of exhaustion wash over him. He’d been travelling since yesterday, catching a flight first to Heathrow and then connecting to Milan. On the first leg he’d been hounded by reporters, stalking him through the airport, taking pictures and shouting questions. By the time security had ushered him onto his final flight, he’d felt all the energy seep out of him. He wasn’t sure he’d be able to face going through the circus again when he arrived in Italy, but a combination of good luck and the late hour allowed him to leave the airport without being spotted.
His PA had arranged for a car to be delivered to the airport. A zippy little Ferrari that cleared the distance between Milan and Varenna in the blink of an eye. Sam had put his foot down, enjoying the open roads, so different to the gridlock that always seemed to surround LA. He’d been in a great mood all the way up to the gate, when he’d keyed in his code but the damn thing had refused to open. In spite of buzzing the house, he’d had no response, having to resort to using the air horn to get some attention.
And now, finally, he had managed to step inside, only to find this girl staring at him accusingly, as if he’d committed a monstrous crime.
‘You . . . ’ The girl hesitated, still frowning. ‘You don’t know me?’ She sounded insulted.
He looked her up and down, trying to gauge her by the light of the moon and the headlamps. She was small, maybe five foot or so, with warm blonde hair she’d twisted into a knot at the top of her head. Wearing a short, floaty skirt and skimpy vest top, her skin was glistening and smooth. Her body might be gorgeous but currently her face was anything but. Her expression was twisted with anger.
What the hell was up with her?
‘Why would I know you? I’ve never seen you before. I’m just here at my family’s villa to spend a few days away from it all. I wasn’t expecting a fan club.’ He flashed her a smile again, hoping it would calm her down. ‘Though fans are always welcome, of course.’
‘Oh, you’re still full of yourself as ever.’ The girl gave a short laugh. ‘They promised me you wouldn’t be here, they expressly told me you were in Hollywood. I wouldn’t have come if I’d known you’d be arriving.’
Sam narrowed his eyes. That wasn’t exactly the response he’d been expecting, and it definitely wasn’t what he was used to. He rarely met attractive women who weren’t either interested or at least friendly to him. ‘I’ve no idea what you’re talking about. I’m not full of myself, I’m just trying to get into my house and get some sleep. If you want to shout at me for even existing, then fine, but could you at least save it for morning?’
From the corner of his eye he could see the girl curl her hands into fists. For the first time since he’d arrived on Italian soil, he began to feel anxious. What if she was some kind of deluded psycho fan that he’d somehow managed to piss off?
What was it with women this week? If they weren’t betraying him, they were stalking him. Jesus.
‘So you’re not the guy who runs out and leaves everybody behind to clear up his messes, while he flounces off into the distance?’
Sam’s back stiffened. Did she know what had happened between him and Serena Sloane? Christ, he couldn’t escape
it no matter where he went.
‘Who are you anyway?’ He repeated his question of a few minutes earlier. ‘What’s your name?’
‘Why should I tell you?’ She folded her arms across her chest. ‘You clearly couldn’t care less about who I am. I’m just a bit player in the Sam Carlton show, aren’t I?’
He put his hands on his hips, scrutinising her. She was English, her London accent was enough to give that away. Maybe in her early twenties, though the light was bad and he couldn’t quite pinpoint her age. Closer up, he could see her bronzed skin was pebbled with freckles, making a cute line across her nose and cheeks. She looked wholesome, pretty. Even attractive – if it weren’t for the fact that she was clearly completely crazy.
‘Have I done something to upset you?’ he asked her, giving that smile a final go. Third time lucky, right?
Wrong.
She threw her hands up in the air. ‘What do you think? I’m not some kind of crazy woman who shouts at every stranger that walks through the gate, you know.’
Sam bit his lip to swallow down a sharp retort. ‘That’s exactly what you sound like.’
‘You really don’t remember me?’
He stared at her again, trying to place her face. If he was honest, there was a tiny bit of familiarity that tugged at him, but for the life of him he couldn’t place her. Had she been at his school, or was she an extra in a movie he’d made? Damned if he knew.
‘I meet a lot of people and I’m useless with faces. I’m sorry, I don’t know you at all.’
‘Typical.’ She rolled her eyes. ‘Somebody ruins your life and they can’t even be bothered to remember who you are.’
Wow, that was sharp. Sam’s head snapped back at the force of her words. He couldn’t remember the last time a girl had looked at him with such hatred.
‘I ruined your life?’ He was incredulous. ‘Funnily enough I don’t remember doing that. You’d think if I’d been a real asshole I’d be unable to forget it.’ Was he being set up? He craned his head around, looking for signs of other people, of cameras. Maybe she was planning to sell her story, too.