The director, certainly, had been devastated to hear Belle had been struck down by a mystery bug and would be unable to continue with the run. Niall had been even more devastated to discover that the mystery bug was Jack Saint and that Belle was leaving for Italy to resume her career as a leading film star.
Granted, her behaviour had been imperious and difficult of late. There was now no trace of the blackly humorous, irreverent car-crash he had met at the audition. Belle had then been at rock bottom, but now success in
Titus
had re-inflated an ego whose titanic proportions Niall had not suspected but which had terrifyingly combined with the voracious sex drive of which he was all too aware. Performing for Belle twice a day, in addition to performing at the theatre, made for an exhausting ride in every sense of the word. In a nutshell—and shells were what they felt like these days—Niall felt used.
While he sat angrily upright, resentment emanating from every stiffened muscle, Belle lounged against the beige leather seat next to him in an exaggeratedly relaxed fashion. Her long white legs, dangling one over the other were exposed—from the top of her cowboy boots, at least—almost to the pubis in tiny denim shorts with frayed edges. From time to time, she swung her legs the other way; Niall, at her side, only narrowly missed—thanks to a well-judged dodge— being hit by the bootheels each time.
He threw several hurt and offended looks in her direction, but it was impossible to see whether they had hit their target. Belle's liquidgreen eyes were hidden behind black sunglasses so huge they made her look like a fly, while her attention was completely focused on the silver mobile mostly hidden in her cascading platinum hair. Her inflated lips, slicked a glossy pink, chewed gum energetically, breaking off from their efforts occasionally to allow a loud and theatrical laugh to escape. "Tom Cruise said that? You're kidding me!"
Niall was sick of hearing how all her celebrity friends were taking Belle's calls once more. Or, rather, he was sick of hearing, in every word Belle said, how completely and utterly she discounted how much she owed to him, Niall, or rather Graham, MacDonald. It had been he, had it not, who helped her with her lines at the audition, which in turn had got her a part in
Titus
, which had led to all this?
"Harvey Weinstein did what? No-ooooo!"
But had she breathed one word of gratitude to him, let alone one word into the ear of the director that might get him a part too? Had she…hell. He had been right all along to loathe the commercial film industry, Niall brooded.
"Well, everyone knows Nicole can't stand her…" Belle cackled delightedly, swinging her legs about again. It was, Niall thought furiously, as if he simply didn't exist anymore. She hadn't even been especially keen that he see her off at the airport.
Niall watched jealously as Belle's jewelled hand dandled fondly on the brown, bony head of the animal that was, of all beasts in the world, his least favourite. Sugar was, as usual, under Belle's armpit, staring evilly at him out of the corner of a big, red, gold-chained handbag. There was, Niall saw, a hint of smugness in the evil, as if Sugar saw the future and it pleased him. It made Niall, despite himself, feel nervous.
Now that they were on the motorway going out to the airport, the car had picked up speed. The increase in velocity increased Niall's insecurity, as if events were moving more quickly than he was. He stared out of the window, swallowing hard. She was ignoring him, and she owed him so much. More than she owed that greedy bastard of an agent of hers, sitting over there in L.A. raking in the money. What was so difficult about that, Niall fulminated silently, his eyes pale slits of resentment as he watched the traffic flash past. Whereas he…he…
You just had to take the last few days. Having saved her career by getting her a part in
Titus
, he had gone on to save her reputation when, having got the nod from Saint, Belle was all for heading straight to the film set and dropping everything. Including the baby and the nanny, whom she was refusing to pay. It had taken him, Niall reminded himself, to point out that flouncing off to Italy while leaving an abandoned African orphan in a London hotel room might not play the press all that well. Especially when she was taking her goddamn dog with her.
"Well, the press didn't care when I adopted him," Belle sulked. "No one took any notice."
"They'll care a lot when you un-adopt him," Niall assured her. "They'll take plenty of notice if you just leave him by himself in London."
"Who says I was going to leave him by himself in London?" Belle swung her mass of brittle, perfumed, white hair back over her shoulder.
"Well, who else were you going to leave him w…?" Niall did not, however, finish the sentence. There was a purposeful glint in those liquid-green eyes. His heart hammered. She could not mean, surely…
"You, of course," Belle said breezily.
"Me? Me?"
He'd managed to persuade her not to sack the nanny only by adopting the lowest of tactics. "If you fire her, Emma will go to the papers," he had warned. "Remember how, um, hugely famous you are now, Belle."
"Famous again, you mean," corrected Belle. The tactic had worked, however. Belle had, with the utmost reluctance, agreed to pay Emma a minimal salary, and she and the baby gone ahead to Italy earlier that morning. Much earlier: their bargain flight had been scheduled to leave before six.
The Mercedes, Niall saw from the signs above the motorway, was now nearing Gatwick. The parting was imminent.
Seeing the crowd of photographers outside the glass doors at the terminal entrance, Belle gave a theatrical sigh. "Oh. My. God. Just look at those goddamn paps," she drawled, as if, Niall thought, these were not the very same men whose attentions, a mere few days ago, she would have tap-danced round a toilet seat to attract.
"I'll come with you," he offered eagerly. "See you on the plane. I'm strong. I can shove my way through…"
He stopped. Belle had held up a hand. "No."
Niall stared. "But why not? I mean, I've come with you all this way…"
"I didn't ask you to," Belle said with a curl of her pink glossy lip.
As, beside her, he caught the glint of Sugar's teeth, a sickening feeling now spread through Niall. The despicable animal was grinning. Ignoring it as best he could, Niall fought for a passage through his swirling emotions. "I came," he assured the dog's mistress with all the passion he could muster, "because I love you, Belle. We haven't been long together, but you've come to mean so much…"
Belle was texting. She wasn't, Niall saw despairingly, even looking at him.
"It's over," she said, frowning over the keys. "I was gonna text you when I got to Florence, but I guess I may as well tell you now. Eyeball to eyeball," she added, from the other side of her enormous sunglasses.
"Over?" Niall croaked. His mind whirled. Oh, God. Where was he going to sleep tonight?
"Over," Belle confirmed, pressing the send button on her text. She looked up and flashed him a megawatt smile. "I've gotta move on," she explained.
"Move on?" Niall exclaimed in a tragic croak. He was determined to give this one the works. The YMCA was beckoning otherwise. "Move on from me? But why? I thought you loved me." His voice broke on a sob.
"Loved you?" Belle's tone was astounded. "Baby, this is Hollywood."
The chauffeur opened the door, and she slid out. He watched her stalk past the paparazzi, sunglasses flashing disdainfully, and disappear inside the terminal. She didn't even look back.
What now? He could hardly go back to Darcy's Knightsbridge flat, not now that he had left her for someone else. Any hope that Darcy, from the distance of America, was unaware of the liason had been shattered by the widespread publicity it had received. Plus the venomous texts he had received from her on the subject. That their relationship was over was in no doubt.
He'd left his bicycle at her flat, Niall recalled gloomily. It would have been useful, now that the days of limos and chauffeurs had come to an emergency stop.
Chapter Thirty-one
Orlando Fitzmaurice sat in the airport, his legs in their cut-off jeans stuck out in front of him, his large, trainered feet subtly drumming the ground along to the iPod whose earphones were entirely hidden under his tangled, dark-gold hair.
The place seemed full of leggy teenage girls with long blonde hair. Well-heeled Jasmines and Elizas, he could tell, heading for Daddy's villa in Tuscany. As he was himself, even though Daddy, in his case, had rented it, shuddering at the price, and his mother twitteringly referred to it as the aubergo. And they were, of course, sharing it with the Faughs.
Although it had been some weeks since the invitation was issued, and he should probably be used to it by now, Orlando still found it hard to believe that his mother really had invited the world champions of freeloading on their summer holidays with them. Moreover, that the Faughs would be present when his A levels came through. The results were going to be terrible, and so was being with his parents when the dreaded fax arrived. The prospect of being with the twins as well was almost beyond bearing.
There was a rustle from the seats opposite. His mother had lowered her
Vogue
and was looking at him. Her mouth was moving up and down, but he heard nothing through the thunder from his earphones. She was making turn-it-down gestures. Orlando turned it down.
"Darling?" Georgie shrilled.
"I've turned it down, Mum," Orlando mumbled, shooting a self-conscious look at the people passing about them.
"Honestly, darling," Georgie said in a more normal voice. "You're supposed to be looking out for Laura and Hugh, and you're just staring at the floor from what I can see." Her thin face creased with exasperation.
"Sorry, Mum," Orlando grunted in the resonant baritone he had recently acquired. His voice had become deep and gruff in a way that seemed to catch even more female attention. Unwillingly, he raised his chin and cautiously, beneath his cliffs of brow, began to scan the airport for the Faughs.
"Look! Look! Over there!" Georgie yelped, her face ablaze with excitement.
Beside her, Richard lowered his newspaper in panic. Had the dreaded hour come?
"Look!" Georgie exclaimed again, pointing.
On the wide carpeted gangway that led through this departure hall into the next, a blonde woman was walking quickly through, gesturing angrily, surrounded by photographers. They were all yelling and letting off their flashes.
"Isn't that Belle Murphy?" Georgie gasped.
"Who?" asked Orlando. He had no interest in celebrities, apart from the distraction from himself that they afforded his mother.
There was a sharp, irritated, intake of breath from Georgie. "Honestly, darling. Don't you know who anyone is?"
"I'll go and see if I can find the Faughs," Orlando mumbled, untangling his legs to stand up to the whole of his six-foot-plus height. He had every intention of avoiding their guests if he saw them, but it got him out of the maternal firing line.
"Ow!" yelled Emma, as a colossal training shoe crushed down on her foot.
It had not been a good day. She had arrived at the airport and checked in what seemed like weeks ago, only to discover that the bargain flight she and Morning had been booked on had been delayed by up to four hours. She had walked around the heaving terminal more or less constantly since and now knew every single item in every single shop.
And now some clumsy oaf had walked slap-bang into her and crushed her foot. As well as, Emma saw, annoyed, made a dirty smudge with his sole over her white Converse.
"Sorry," Orlando blurted. He had not seen this woman until it was too late, and he had practically knocked her over. He saw in horror that she had a baby strapped to her front. "I'm really sorry," he grunted, in the new deep voice he still didn't feel entirely comfortable with.
Her assailant was very tall, Emma saw. About her age; maybe younger. He wore a pair of cut-off denim jeans and a sagging white T-shirt. His face was hidden beneath lots of blond hair, and there were iPod earphones curling around his neck. So far, so bog-standard, Emma thought.
He pushed his hair back to expose his face, and, instead of the spotty and misshapen bunch of bog-standard teenage features she had been expecting, Emma now found herself looking at a face of celestial beauty. He had the most extraordinary eyes, a brackish green ringed with yellow. She was immediately conscious of her predawn lack of make-up and the way her hair scraped back in an early-morning ponytail from which it was constantly escaping. Her exposed ears seemed to double tenfold in size, turn purple, and pulsate.
Of course, she thought he was an idiot, Orlando realised. You could tell by the way she was looking at him. She had a very direct gaze. Most girls he knew sort of squinted, giggled, and whooshed their hair about. This girl's cool and interested appraisal was something entirely different.
For a moment, the world around Emma had simply melted away. But now, against her front, Morning stirred. She hoped desperately that he wasn't about to scream.
But the only sound from directly south of her was a happy gurgle; looking down, Emma saw that the baby was smiling at the boy.
"Nice baby," said Orlando appreciatively. "What's his name?" He had not failed to notice, of course, that the baby was black. Very black, in fact, more so than one might expect if this girl was, as seemed likely, his mother.