by Maggie Brown
The arrival of Austen Farleigh four days ago was the big news amongst the staff, but so far, Sophie hadn’t sighted her. She wondered if the singer’s visit was the reason Eleanor had remained exclusively in the villa. She certainly closed up when Sophie tried to discuss the singer.
But apart from Eleanor’s dislike of Austen, there seemed to be something else bothering her. After the kiss, Eleanor had retreated into the persona she had played before Carol arrived—warm but distant. Surprisingly, Carol had been ultra-friendly on her return from the ill-fated boat trip, which made the last of her stay pleasant for everybody. But Sophie knew, even though it was obvious the two had reached an understanding, that Carol had somehow influenced how Eleanor interacted with Sophie.
As they sat close together in the buggy in the glow of the security light, Sophie turned to look at Eleanor. She was gazing through the windscreen with a faraway look, seemingly oblivious of Sophie’s presence. A knot of rebellion formed in Sophie. How could Eleanor be so indifferent to her after that kiss in her room after the shipwreck? Frankly, she was tired of this hot and cold shit. It was about time they had a candid discussion about their feelings. If Eleanor didn’t want her, then she should stop damn well kissing her. With deliberation, she pressed against her and she reached over to tuck the folds of the dress back from the edge. When Eleanor stiffened at the contact, Sophie stroked her thigh and let her hand rest there. “Are you comfortable?” she said disarmingly.
“I’m fine.”
“Good. I won’t disturb you then.” Sophie idly began again to rub the leg, pleased when she felt the muscles quiver.
Halfway down the hill, Eleanor said abruptly, “Put both hands on the wheel, Sophie.”
“Why? It’s quite safe. It’s only a golf buggy and we’re creeping along.”
“You have to drive safely.”
As soon as Sophie removed her hand from the thigh, she regretted the loss of contact. “I’m sorry. Did I upset you?”
“You didn’t.”
Sophie stole another quick glance at her profile. Eleanor seemed frozen in the seat. “It won’t happen again.”
“Good. Now I can’t have any distractions…I do have to prepare myself. I would appreciate if you are quiet until we get there.”
Suitably chastised, Sophie didn’t utter a peep until they arrived outside the entertainment centre. After she parked, she waited to see if Eleanor wanted her to walk in with her. With an absentminded nod, Eleanor swept up the stairs, which left Sophie to follow in her wake. Inside, the dining tables had been replaced by rows of comfortable chairs around the stage. The room already buzzed with anticipation and curiosity. Sophie estimated there were at least two hundred patrons casting eager eyes towards Eleanor as she entered.
The star was immediately claimed by a large woman with pink fluffy hair, dressed in a pink kaftan that blossomed out like a tent. By the warmth of the greeting, Sophie could see they were old friends.
Nobody even looked her way, and as Eleanor didn’t seem to notice she was there, Sophie walked down to the resort staff congregated on the wooden benches at the back.
Lisa gave her a wave. “Sit here beside me.”
“Thanks.” Sophie sat down then felt a hand grasp her shoulder. Doug, spruced up to the nines for the occasion and smelling of spicy aftershave, sat behind her with a big grin on his face.
Curious, she looked around the room. She recognized quite a few, mostly a who’s who of the Financial Times, a sprinkling of celebrities and a flock of arty types. She didn’t spy any politicians, which would have been awkward. She would have had to feign illness and disappear. She relaxed back in her seat, confident that if anyone here read the Globe, the newspaper wouldn’t be associated with her.
Over the tops of heads, she could see Eleanor in the front row, seated between the pink lady and a man with silver hair who looked like Richard Gere with a moustache. A podium was set up on the stage, in the place of the grand piano now relegated to the back wall. A hush fell over the gathering when Deirdre walked to the microphone. She didn’t speak for long, merely gave a brief welcome and outlined the agenda.
Then when the room dimmed, a cone of light shone down on the polished wooden stage. As eight poets came and went, reciting one poem each, Sophie sat enthralled. She had only ever read poetry, but hearing it was so much better.
A brief interval was announced before the main act, so that waiters could serve drinks. She took two beers from the tray, and as she passed one over to Doug, she noticed a woman in dark glasses slip onto the chair beside him. At first, Sophie gave her only a cursory glance but refocused in disbelief. Why she bothered with the sunglasses was a mystery, for nobody could mistake that famous body covered with tattoos. Austen Farleigh flipped back the shades, winked and murmured, “Well hello there, pretty lady.”
Sophie had no hope of stopping the heat of embarrassment that flushed across her cheeks. Busted! She gave a weak smile and a small, “Hi.”
Then Austen was forgotten when Eleanor walked onto the stage. She stepped behind the podium, looked into the crowd and waited for the applause to fade. Again, she swept her eyes over the crowd, but this time with such intensity that all sound died. Quietly, she walked away from the dais to the very front of the stage and began to speak, “And why I pray you? Who might be…”
From those first words of Rosalind’s monologue from Shakespeare’s, As You Like It, Eleanor had the audience spellbound and held them captive for nearly an hour and a half. No one moved, riveted by the performance as she went from Rosalind, to Constance from King John, to Kate from The Taming of the Shrew, to Beatrice from Much Ado About Nothing, to Juliet from Romeo and Juliet, and finally to Lady Macbeth.
Sophie sat mesmerized, aware she hadn’t fully understood Eleanor’s extraordinary talent. The woman held the audience in the palm of her hand—she didn’t just play the characters, she was them. The choice to finish with Lady Macbeth surprised Sophie. She thought she would end her recital on a lighter note like Juliet, but then again, greatness never took the common path. When the last lines were uttered, “Have done to this,” the room erupted into clapping. When as one they rose to their feet to applaud, Eleanor smiled and bowed.
To Sophie, she looked like a painting: impressionistic, perfectly composed, unattainable, and untouchable.
She gulped back self-reproach. How arrogant she had been earlier this evening, to touch this woman without permission. Eleanor had more class in her little finger than Sophie had in her entire pathetic body. Hell, she wasn’t even Sophie Ryan, faithful housekeeper and companion. She was Sophie Marsh, hack reporter, and spy. In this exalted company, she was a complete outsider. A nobody. All she had was a small flat in the burbs of Brisbane, an abundance of working class relations (some without a brass razoo), total savings of ten thousand dollars and a heap of a car she was still paying off. What a loser!
As for those kisses she still dreamed about—they had been pity kisses, that Sophie had conjured up into something more than they were. Eleanor had tried to tell her that, to keep a respectable distance, but she hadn’t listened.
Her lip dropped as she fought to bite back the threatening tears. The only thing left for her now was to get over it, to banish the feelings that ached in her chest.
She had to forget how Eleanor’s lips had tasted. How she had fitted perfectly in her arms. How her body had responded to her touch, her smallest sound, her slightest movement.
She was going to have to grow up.
A sharp series of whistles from behind made her turn around. Austen had two fingers in her mouth, enthusiastically blowing. Sophie laughed as her black mood faded. She joined with whistles of her own, a talent she’d perfected growing up with brothers. Deirdre appeared at the podium with an enormous bouquet of flowers, thanked Eleanor profusely and reminded everyone to stay for the party. When they stepped down from stage, the lights brightened.
Sophie craned her head to find Eleanor, but now people were on their feet she was
lost in the crowd. It would probably be advisable to catch up with her later anyway, she figured. Her company would be in demand, and Sophie would only be in the way. She had very little in common with these people, except for her love of Shakespeare.
Then she felt someone take her arm. “What about we adjourn to the bar? I could do with a stiff drink,” said Austen.
Sophie smiled. “Why not. I could do with one too.” She turned to Lisa and Doug. “Want to come?”
Doug shook his head. “Count me out. I have a big charter at dawn. I’ll take a rain check.”
“I’ll come,” said Lisa eagerly.
Austen twitched her eyebrows. “Come on then. I like threesomes.”
“Huh! You wish,” Sophie shot back as she led the way to the bar.
Once they were seated with drinks, over the top of her glass, Sophie studied Austen as Lisa held her attention with her chatter. She definitely was one sexy woman, with her purple-tinged dark hair tousled casually in a bob over a very handsome face, startling grey-green eyes and a lithe well-formed highly desirable body. Colourful tattoos covered both arms, with an enticing hint of another just visible at the top of her very low-slung jeans. She was dressed all in black: a short tank top that left her lower abdomen showing, tight-arsed jeans and knee-high polished boots. She was so hot she looked ready to combust.
Though she was outrageously dressed for the present company, she somehow pulled it off, for there was no denying charisma oozed from every pore. Sophie wasn’t overly impressed though. Political reporting had made her sceptical. She’d interviewed too many conceited clowns to be taken in by looks alone. People had to prove themselves in her book. Perhaps Ms. Sexy Boots needed to be taken down a peg—she looked like she always got her own way.
She slowly lifted her eyes up the body to find Austen looking at her with a lop-sided grin. “Like what you see?”
“Maybe.”
“Only maybe? You wound me, babe.”
“Yep, only maybe,” answered Sophie solemnly, then she signalled the bartender for another round. “I like the cool reserved type best.”
“Oh?” murmured Austen. “And who might that be? Now let me guess. It wouldn’t be the Ice Queen from the stage?”
Sophie grinned. “That’s for me to know and you to guess. But you have to admit the woman is flipping gorgeous.”
“Look all you like, babe, but you won’t get very far there.” She sounded a little peevish.
“Aha. That sounds like you tried and she told you to bugger off.”
“I know Eleanor and she’s very charming,” piped in Lisa.
Austen didn’t acknowledge Lisa, but continued to eye Sophie with a frown. “Perhaps I blew her off.”
Sophie swooped on that statement. “Really? Why would anyone blow off Eleanor? You’d have to be blind Freddy.” She gave a snicker. “Perhaps you should take the shades off.”
Austen’s fingers tensed on the glass for a moment and then to Sophie’s surprise, she chuckled. “Come on, drink up. You’re starting to interest me. And I warn you, I play to win.” She flexed an arm. “What do you think of my tattoos?”
Sophie lightly traced an intricate one with a fingertip. “Impressive.”
“Would you ever get one?”
Sophie tilted her head and looked at her. “I’ve got a small flower on my hip, a lasting reminder of an all-night party when I was eighteen. You know, there’s a saying—‘For all the young women thinking of getting a tattoo, remember. When you get older, a butterfly on the back becomes a buzzard in the crack.’”
Austen began to laugh, big gusts rolled out of her. She threw an arm over Sophie’s shoulder. “I know I’m going to like you.”
Sophie opened her mouth to reply when she caught Lisa’s nod to someone behind her.
She turned around, still attached to Austen’s arm. She winced. This didn’t look good. Accompanied by the woman who up close looked like a mass of candy pink fairy floss, Eleanor approached the bar.
And she looked furious.
Chapter Twenty-One
Eleanor finished the last word of her recital and waited for the audience’s response. Early in her career she had wanted to go into theatre, for to her, true acting was onstage. There were no endless reshoots—the first performance was it. During her stint with American TV, she’d auditioned for a play on Broadway, didn’t make the cut and had to deal pragmatically with the misery of disappointment. These days, she only looked back at the stage as what might have been.
Tonight had been a trip down memory lane, something she had enjoyed immensely. She was familiar with most of Shakespeare’s plays, so it had only been a matter of brushing up on the lines. When the resounding accolades came, she felt a rush of pure pleasure. No matter how big a star she was now, it was only ever about how the audience enjoyed the performance.
She had been delighted to find her mother’s old friend, Ginny Babcock, had come over for the weekend. A popular author of self-help books, life for Ginny, a widow of five years, consisted of self-help classes and after-dinner speaker gigs. She was making a mint. With her outrageous pink theme, there was no mistaking she was as eccentric as Frances Godwin. Eleanor never quite understood what self-help Ginny had to offer, for she appeared to be in perpetual chaos like her mother. But whatever it was, it was a licence to print money.
“Wonderful,” Ginny gushed as she gave Eleanor a smacking kiss when she came down from the stage. When she pulled her into a hug, Eleanor felt as if she was sinking into a marshmallow. “Now come,” she continued in a voice that broached no argument, “and I’ll introduce you to a few people.”
Eleanor would have preferred to go home. The performance had left her drained and a stress headache had begun to throb behind her eyes. It would have been so nice to soak in a hot tub with a glass of red, but she knew that wasn’t an option. She was expected to mix. After thirty minutes of socializing, she pointedly looked at her watch, hoping Ginny would take the hint. She didn’t, instead dragged her on to yet another group.
Eleanor glanced around the room again, though the crush of people still limited visibility. Where was Sophie? Her absence was beginning to make her anxious. She should have been the first to congratulate her, not these people she didn’t know and would never see again. And though she was loath to admit it, she wanted Sophie’s approval. With a guilty start, she focused back on the conversation. As she listened to a tall, stooped bank executive waffle on about Shakespearean women, she held back a biting comment. Not only was he arrogant, his chauvinistic views were tedious and misogynistic.
Suddenly, loud laughter came from the direction of the bar and they all turned to look. Eleanor drew in a sharp breath. There was no mistaking that sound.
Austen was here.
Ginny must have sensed something from her stiffening stance, because she whispered, “What’s wrong?”
“There’s someone I know over at the bar.” Eleanor drew back with an apologetic smile to the group. So far, she had avoided their meeting, but she knew she had been postponing the inevitable. Better to do it now, for it would be on her terms here. “Excuse me. I have to go.”
As she moved off, she had no hope of losing Ginny, who clearly sensed a drama and was sticking like glue. Suddenly, a thought occurred to Eleanor. Maybe her mother had sent her friend to check up on her. It was something she would cook up without a qualm, and knowing Ginny, she would delight in the subterfuge. Talk about the witches from Macbeth—Double, double, toil and trouble—the two of them would stir any pot.
The sight that greeted her at the bar immediately sent her blood pressure skyrocketing. Austen, like an oversexed black-clad vampire, was hanging all over Sophie. Eleanor fought hard for control. A public altercation between two superstars wouldn’t survive even Eurydice’s strict privacy laws. So she said in a clipped voice, “Hello, Austen.”
“Eleanor. Good to see you again. I loved your performance. It was so you, especially Lady Macbeth.”
“Thank you. Comi
ng from you, that’s a great compliment.”
“Come and have a drink with us.” A slow smile spread across Austen’s face, though her eyes remained flinty. “That is, if you don’t mind slumming.”
“I’d be delighted. A glass of the McArthur Park Merlot would be nice. And one for my friend,” Eleanor said. Conscious that Ginny waited expectantly beside her, she introduced her reluctantly. Ginny simpered and held out her hand to be kissed, which Austen did with a flourish.
“And these two sexy girls are Lisa and Sophie,” announced Austen.
Eleanor smiled at Lisa, then for the first time directly faced Sophie. “I can see now why you haven’t come over, Sophie,” she said.
Sophie looked more annoyed than remorseful. She slipped out from under the tattooed arm, and raised her eyebrows. “Oh? Were you expecting me to?”
“I thought you would at least have come to tell me what you thought.”
“You didn’t give me that impression when we came in. I thought you didn’t want me hanging around, so I kept out of your way.”
“I’m sorry you felt like that. I was preoccupied.”
“I accept your apology then.”
“I wasn’t apologising, Sophie,” said Eleanor sharply.
“I thought you said sorry. That sounds like an apology to me.”
Eleanor gave an involuntary chuckle. “I should know better than to bandy words with you.”
She looked over to find Austen staring at her. “You know Sophie?” she asked.
“She’s her housekeeper,” offered Lisa. “You were fantastic tonight, Eleanor.”
“Thank you, Lisa. That means a lot to me. Was Doug here?”