He needs someone to take care of him
, thought Sabrina.
Someone other than that whingeing harridan of a wife.
The combination of the darkness outside and the torrential rain slamming against the windscreen and roof heightened the sense of being in a cocoon: warm, insulated and safe, together. Impulsively, Sabrina reached across and stroked Dorian’s cheek.
It was a small, tender gesture, but the sexual jolt it sent through both of them could have rebooted the national grid. Dorian reached up to remove her hand but found himself gripping it tightly, his fingers entwining themselves with hers. Suddenly it was hard to breathe, let alone drive. He pulled over onto the hard shoulder and turned to face her.
‘Sabrina,’ he began falteringly, barely trusting himself to speak. ‘I … we can’t.’
She leaned forward and kissed him full on the mouth. Not a long kiss, but passionate and hungry, a taste of the wildness inside her. Dorian kissed her back, but it was he who pulled away first.
‘We can’t,’ he said again. ‘Really.’
He said it so gently and with such kindness, Sabrina found herself nodding in agreement. ‘I know. Of course we can’t. You’re right.’
Outwardly, she sounded calm. But inside she was still in shock, horrified by how much she’d wanted him in that moment.
Still
, she told herself,
it was just a moment
. An animalistic connection that flared up for a second between them and was gone.
‘I don’t know what I was thinking.’
‘Nor do I.’ said Dorian. ‘A gorgeous young woman like you oughtn’t to be wasting your time with a stuck-in-the-mud old man like me. You could have anyone you wanted.’
‘You’re not old.’ Sabrina laughed, relieved that the tension had been broken. ‘And besides, I can’t have any man I want. I can’t have Vio.’
After that it all came spilling out: her increasing longing for Viorel, her frustration at his rejection, her anger and despair about his screwing around, knowing she had no option but to sit by and watch.
‘I came to Manchester to make him jealous,’ she admitted, shaking her head with embarrassment. ‘Pathetic, isn’t it?’
Dorian put a reassuring arm around her shoulder. ‘Not pathetic,’ he assured her. ‘Not the smartest move in the world, perhaps – I dread to think what the papers are gonna do to us in the morning – but not pathetic.’
‘Oh God, the papers,’ groaned Sabrina. ‘I’ve fucked it up for all of us. Again.’
‘Yes, well. It’s not an ideal state of affairs,’ admitted Dorian.
Sabrina eyed him suspiciously. ‘How come you’re being so calm about it?’
‘I’m like a swan,’ Dorian grinned. ‘I look serene, but under the waterline my feet are paddling like crazy. Look, the truth is there are some golden rules in movie-making. And one of them is, if the director panics, the ship goes down. Studios want to see confidence. One sign of weakness and you’re finished.’
Sabrina remembered how desperate she’d been to act confident in front of Dorian the first time they’d met, terrified that if he saw how much she needed it he’d take the part away. How embarrassingly cocky she’d been at that lunch in Beverly Hills.
‘Thanks for bailing me out,’ she said meekly.
‘You’re welcome. Shall we get going?’
Sabrina nodded and Dorian turned on the ignition.
Easing back into the sluggish traffic, he said, ‘I do love my wife, you know.’
‘Of course you do,’ said Sabrina. ‘I never doubted it for a second.’
Who’s he trying to convince?
she wondered silently.
Me or himself?
For the next three days, until Chrissie left for Romania, Tish felt as if she were living in some sort of play. Everybody was acting, and nothing was what it seemed.
I suppose I’m as guilty as the rest of them
, she thought, watching Chrissie lavish affection on Dorian, hugging and kissing him at mealtimes and making a big deal about holding his hand on set.
I’m playing the detached, gracious hostess, behaving as if nothing’s wrong. I’m part of the charade.
Dorian had been in a strange mood ever since he’d got back to Loxley with Sabrina, who’d managed to get herself into even more hot water in Manchester. The headlines the next morning had been predictably awful, but Dorian seemed unfazed, pressing on with the shoot thanks to an early break in the weather. In two weeks, most people working on the film would be heading home to join their families. Only a skeleton crew and the five lead actors would be coming out to Romania to shoot the final interior shots at Dorian’s Schloss. As a result, the end-of-term atmosphere was palpable. Once Chrissie left and the sun returned in earnest, the mood on set became even more positive. The work they’d done at Loxley had been worth all the effort. At last, they were on the home straight.
Only Tish found it difficult to share in the celebratory mood. Try as she might, she couldn’t get the awful image of Viorel and Chrissie in bed together out of her mind. Every time she saw either of them, she felt sick. To make matters worse, the day after she’d walked in on them, she received a phone call from Carl at Curcubeu. One of the kids from Tish’s children’s home had been taken seriously ill with suspected liver failure. They’d had to empty the home’s bank account to pay for the little boy’s treatment. As a result, none of the carers had had their wages paid for a week, and two had threatened to quit. Tish had wired emergency funds right away, but Carl had made it clear this wasn’t enough.
‘The staff need to see you here, Tish. Morale’s as low as it’s ever been. People are starting to say that maybe you aren’t coming back.’
‘Of course I’m coming back,’ said Tish, irritated. ‘I was always going to be gone over the summer. Nothing’s changed.’
‘Well it has here,’ said Carl bluntly. ‘We’re broke and exhausted. Child services know you’re in England and they’ve been on our backs harder than ever. You know they want to reopen Vasile’s custody case?’
Tish didn’t know. She felt terrible. She’d been so caught up in all the drama at Loxley, she realized she’d pushed everything else out of her mind, even the children who counted on her. But at the same time, Viorel’s criticism still bothered her. Was taking Abel back to Romania selfish? Or was staying here selfish? Whichever way she turned, she was wrong. Irrationally, she blamed Viorel for this.
‘I’m damned if I do and damned if I don’t,’ she complained to Mrs Drummond one evening, sorting through a vast pile of Abel’s laundry on the kitchen table. ‘I feel like I’m being pulled three ways. There’s Loxley, there’s Curcubeu and there’s Abel. And I can’t let any of them down.’
‘You aren’t letting any of them down,’ said Mrs Drummond matter-of-factly. ‘Thanks to you, Loxley Hall’s future is looking rosy.’
‘I wouldn’t go that far,’ said Tish.
‘I would. We’ve got that nice family moving in in October, haven’t we?’
This was true. To Tish’s delighted relief, Savills had found long-term tenants for the hall who were prepared to take occupancy in the autumn, once the shoot was over.
‘Yes, that’s a start.’
‘And the last third of the film money’s still to come. As for your children’s home, you’ve paid the bills and you’ll be back before they know it. And Abi will be happy wherever you are, my lovely. Don’t let that jumped-up Hudson lad or anybody else tell you different.’
Mrs D’s encouragement meant a lot. But Tish still felt depressed and overwhelmed. Since catching him in flagrante with Chrissie, living under the same roof as Viorel had become virtually unbearable. She couldn’t wait for him to leave, yet at the same time she dreaded Dorian’s departure and how empty Loxley was going to feel once they’d all gone.
One bright Thursday afternoon, Tish found herself with that rarest of luxuries, some time on her hands. Abel had gone out riding with old Bill Connelly, and was going to spend the night sleeping up at Home Farm in a tent, an event of almost indescribable excitement. Bill had found himself somewhat out of favour with Abi since Viorel’s arrival, but with Vio now keeping his distance and focusing all his energies on the final few days of filming, the elderly farmer was once again proving a draw.
‘Lavender and I’ll take good care of him,’ Bill assured Tish, unnecessarily. Conscious that their time in England was running out, she wanted Abel to squeeze every last ounce from his Derbyshire summer.
After two blissful hours hiding in the library window seat, lost in her book, Tish could no longer resist the lure of the late-afternoon light dancing across the woods and parkland, and decided to go for a stroll. Heading down to the bridge where she’d spent so many happy hours as a child, she felt quite overcome with nostalgia. Henry’s presence was everywhere, in the cawing of the rooks overhead, the burbling rush of the stream, the dappled glow of the sunlight filtering through the leaves.
I’ve made my life in Oradea
, thought Tish.
But if home is where the heart is, Loxley will always be home.
She sat there musing and soaking up Loxley’s magic for longer than she’d intended. All of a sudden she felt cold and, looking up, realized it was dark. The night had crept up on her. Hurrying inside, she found most of the downstairs lights were off. It must be even later than she’d thought. A dim glow drew her towards the kitchen. There were bound to be some leftovers in the fridge and she realized suddenly that she was starving.
Not until she’d pulled the remnants of a cold roast chicken out of the fridge and turned on the hob to fry up some onions did she sense she wasn’t alone. She didn’t hear anything exactly, or see another body in the room. But she felt a presence behind her, so strongly that she didn’t think to question it. She also sensed its malevolence.
Mrs D wouldn’t sneak up on me like that
, she reasoned.
Nor would the film crew. They’d announce themselves. It must be an intruder.
Gripping the saucepan more tightly, Tish prepared to swing around, steeling herself for confrontation, when a familiar voice froze her to the spot.
‘Hello, Tishy. Made enough for me?’
Tish turned around slowly.
‘Jago.’
It was almost two years since Tish had last seen her brother in the flesh. He’d grown a beard since then and lost weight but, even in his current lean, angular state, Jago Crewe was preposterously good-looking. With his raven-black curls and sensuously full lips, he was so like their mother, Vivianna, it was disconcerting. Standing in the kitchen doorway now in an open-necked hemp shirt and flowing linen trousers, with various beads and talismans hanging from his neck and wrists, Tish thought he looked like a Hollywood version of Jesus.
‘What are you doing here?’
Jago pouted, instantly ruining the beatific effect. ‘Well, that’s not very welcoming. What about, “How are you, Jago?” or, “Nice to see you, Jago”?’
Tish turned back to her cooking, mindlessly chopping at an onion.
‘So what happened to Tibet? The life of a hermit started to pall, did it?’ She made no effort to keep the sarcasm out of her voice. Tish loved her brother, but sometimes his selfish ness was really too much. As for his faux spirituality, it had always stuck in Tish’s craw. Especially as every time he committed himself to a new cult he abandoned his responsibilities without a backwards glance, leaving others to pick up the pieces. ‘You’re all caved-out, I suppose?’
‘You know, that’s always been your trouble, Tishy,’ said Jago, walking up behind her and rubbing her stiffened shoulders. ‘You’re so quick to judge things you don’t understand.’
‘I understand that you buggered off and left Mrs Drummond at the mercy of your drugged-out bloody friends!’ Tish said furiously, shrugging him off. ‘I had to leave my home and my work to fly back here and get rid of them, but not before they’d trashed the place. They sold Dad’s paintings, you know. Oh, no, sorry, you
don’t
know. You were too busy trying to stick your head up your arse in some Tibetan fucking ashram!’
Jago shook his head pityingly. ‘You see, there you go again. So materialistic. What’s a painting, Tish? Some coloured marks on a bit of canvas, that’s all. Let them go.’
‘That’s all very well,’ snapped Tish, ‘but some of those coloured marks were Staithes Group originals. We lost over a hundred thousand pounds, Jago! It’s not about materialism, I don’t want to rush out and spend the money on a bloody necklace. It’s about preserving Loxley for the next generation. When I got here, we were days away from bankruptcy.
Days.
’
‘I’m assuming that’s why you sold your soul to Mammon,’ said Jago, disapprovingly. ‘I saw the film trailers parked outside. They’re
American
, I assume?’ He said the word as if it were code for ‘vermin’.
‘If it weren’t for those Americans, you wouldn’t have a home to come back to,’ said Tish.
‘Even so, you might have asked me,’ grumbled Jago, helping himself to a Braeburn from the fruit bowl. ‘You know I loathe Hollywood. The crap they churn out’s all propaganda for the fascist, capitalist globalization movement. Loxley shouldn’t be supporting that.’
It was all Tish could do not to hit him. ‘I couldn’t ask you,’ she said through gritted teeth, ‘because you weren’t here. If you remember, you did tell Mrs Drummond and anybody else who’d listen that you wouldn’t be coming back.’
‘Yeah, well, life’s a journey, isn’t it?’ said Jago. ‘Things change. Now be an angel and give me a plate of that chicken, would you? I’ve been travelling for two days straight; all I want to do is eat and crash.’
‘You’re staying, then?’ asked Tish despairingly, thinking of the tenants she’d lined up for October and all the hard work she’d done wrenching the estate’s finances back from the brink.
‘I dunno,’ said Jago. ‘I’ll see how I feel. One step at a time, eh, Tishy? You gotta live for the now.’
The unexpected return of Loxley’s prodigal son created ripples of excitement among the
Wuthering Heights
cast and crew.
All of the make-up and wardrobe girls pronounced Jago Crewe ‘gorgeous’ and took to hanging around the set in hot pants and barely there vests in an attempt to gain his attention. Poor Deborah Raynham could barely utter a syllable in Jago’s presence, much to the irritation of Rhys Evans, who’d been quietly trying to woo the girl for weeks. Rhys wasn’t the only male whose nose was out of joint. Viorel, who’d had the same effect on the girls when
he
first arrived, but who had rapidly lost his appeal once his on-set vow of celibacy became common knowledge, was wildly jealous.