Obsession (46 page)

By now Cristos’s face had turned very dark, but feigning surprise Luke pressed on, ‘Hey, she hasn’t got to you, has she? Shit, I didn’t think you’d fall for that, mate. I mean, didn’t she tell you? Didn’t she say one word about me? Well, I don’t suppose she goes round advertising the fact that I’ve been screwing her ever since she joined TW, she wouldn’t want everyone to know that’s how she got her job. Mind you, I’d have screwed her anyway with a body like that. You know, come to think of it she wasn’t too backward in telling us about you today. She rates you pretty high, you know? I’ve been wondering what she was thinking she might get out of you.’ He shrugged. ‘Who can say? Generally she’s known as my property, but feel free to enjoy it. She’s a star-fucker, and a bloody good one at that. You’ll be quite a feather in her cap.’

Cristos was on his feet, a murderous rage blazing in his eyes, ‘One of these days, Fitzpatrick,’ he hissed, snatching up his keys.

But Luke kept going. And he kept on going until he heard the front door slam behind Cristos.

Corrie was out of the pool by now and had gone into the changing room to pick up a towel. When she came out she presumed that Cristos had gone inside for something and went to the bar to freshen her drink. When he still didn’t materialize after five minutes she looked across at Luke and said, ‘Where’s Cristos?’

‘He left.’

Corrie frowned. ‘What do you mean, left?’

‘He’s gone. Said he had another appointment and went.’

Corrie’s face was so strained she could barely move her lips. ‘Without saying goodbye,’ she whispered.

Luke shrugged, then seeing the way Corrie’s eyes began to narrow he held up his hands, ‘Now hang on a minute …’

‘What did you say to him!’ she yelled. ‘What did you say, you bastard!’

‘I didn’t say anything. You were there, in the pool, you’d have known if I was talking to him.’ But she hadn’t been looking, and Luke knew that. ‘He just sat here, watching you swim,’ he went on, ‘then when you got out he said something about having made a mistake and that he was leaving. And he left.’

‘What do you mean, a mistake?’

‘How do I know? That’s all he said, that he’d made a mistake.’

‘What’s going on?’ Felicity said, coming into the solarium in the briefest of swimsuits. ‘Where’s Cristos?’

‘Gone,’ Corrie stated.

‘What? Gone where?’

‘I don’t know,’ Corrie answered, verging on tears, and picking up her wrap she ran up to her room.

Felicity found her half an hour later, sitting on the edge of her bed, staring sightlessly out of the window. Apart from the red rings round her eyes, her whole face was drained of colour. Hearing the door open she looked round and seeing it was Felicity turned back to the window.

‘How are you feeling now?’ Felicity asked, going to sit beside her.

Lowering her eyes to her hands Corrie simply shook her head.

‘Have you tried to call him?’

Corrie nodded. ‘The answerphone’s on.’ She turned to look at Felicity then and Felicity felt her own heart turn over at the very real pain in her eyes. ‘I don’t understand, Fliss,’ she whispered. ‘I just don’t understand. If he didn’t want to see me, then why did he come? And what did he mean about making a mistake?’

Sighing heavily Felicity took her in her arms. ‘I didn’t want to tell you this, Corrie,’ she said, ‘but I think I’ll have to. I mean, I don’t know if it’s got anything to do with the way he just left like that, or with what he said, but … Well, before you got here, to LA, there were rumours going
around
about him and Paige Spencer – the lead actress in his movie. I don’t know if they’re true, but there are those who think that it’s pretty serious between him and Paige. I’m only telling you this so that you’ll understand just what you’re up against here.’

Corrie’s heart was a red hot furnace of pain, and every word Felicity was saying was a torch making it burn all the hotter. Just the thought of him with another woman was so pure in its torment that Corrie didn’t think she could stand it. It hurt too much even to cry.

‘I have to go now,’ Felicity said, a few minutes later. ‘I just popped in to say goodbye. There are some sleeping pills next to my bed if you want them. Don’t take any more than one though, will you? He’s not worth it, babe, honestly. None of them are.’

When Felicity returned from her night shoot the following morning Corrie was already up and had breakfast waiting for her. Felicity was so tired she wanted nothing more than to collapse into bed, but not wanting to seem ungrateful she slumped into the chair Corrie pulled out, and dropped her bag on the floor.

‘How are you feeling this morning?’ she asked, stifling a yawn.

‘Oh, I’m fine, thank you,’ Corrie answered, brightly. ‘How did last night go?’

Felicity sighed, ‘Well, we got there in the end. I’m just about all in though. I’ll eat this then get off to bed.’

Corrie went off to the kitchen to fetch the coffee, but from the breakfast room where she was sitting, Felicity saw how badly she tensed up when the telephone rang. She made no move to answer it though, so Felicity picked it up herself. It was her director, ringing to ask if she’d like to go see dailies that evening.

‘Thanks,’ she said to Corrie as she sat down again and
picked
up the coffee Corrie had just poured. ‘Aren’t you having anything yourself?’

‘No, I don’t feel very hungry,’ Corrie said.

‘No man is worth starving yourself for,’ Felicity remarked.

‘I’m not starving myself, I’m just not hungry,’ Corrie answered tersely.

Felicity watched her as she sat down with her own coffee and started to flick through the pages on her clipboard. Corrie’s suffering was so near the surface it was plain for anyone to see, and Felicity knew precisely what was happening inside her. Last night the pain, today the anger, tomorrow the hurt, confusion and disillusion. It was the way it always went in situations like this. But during the endless hours of waiting for the moon to appear last night, Felicity had thought a lot about Corrie and Cristos and though it went right against the grain with her to give a man a second chance, since to her mind not one of the bastards was worth it, she was of the opinion that in this instance Corrie should. She couldn’t say exactly why she felt that way, except that she just couldn’t get it out of her head that in some way Luke Fitzpatrick was behind Cristos going off like that. Exactly what Fitzpatrick stood to gain from breaking them up, Felicity didn’t know, but what she did know was that she’d rather rot in hell than sit back and watch some man screwing up the life of a friend of hers.

Putting her knife down and picking up her coffee, she looked across the table at Corrie. This wasn’t going to be easy, she could sense that already, but to hell with it, she was going to give it a go anyway. ‘Corrie,’ she said, ‘I think you should try calling him again.’

Not even the anger could disguise the hurt in Corrie’s eyes as she looked up. ‘Felicity, he walked out of here without even saying goodbye. Don’t you think that means he should be the one to call me?’

‘Yes, I do. But if he’s worth it, Corrie, and I think as far as you’re concerned he is, then you’ll swallow that pride and ask him why the hell he did.’

‘He made a mistake,’ Corrie reminded her. ‘He said that, he said he’d got it all wrong. So I don’t need to ask, do I?’

‘You’re going to take Luke’s word for that?’

‘I don’t have much choice, since he chose to say nothing to me. And even if Luke is lying, there’s always Paige Spencer, isn’t there? You told me about her yourself. I take it
you
weren’t lying.’

Felicity sighed. ‘No, I wasn’t lying, but it’s only gossip, Corrie. There might be nothing to it. Look, you’re going home in a few days, why not give it one last shot before you leave?’

‘Frankly, I don’t see the point. Now can we change the subject, please?’

‘No!’ Realizing that her tiredness was in danger of making her sound fiercer than she intended, Felicity made an effort to soften her voice. ‘Look,’ she said, ‘I can’t explain this, and God knows, cynic that I am, I’m the last person on earth to romanticize a situation, but I saw the way he was watching you the other night at dinner, and we both know that he was only there because of you. Not only that, I saw the way you looked yesterday when he called. This is special between you two – at least I reckon it could be … Oh, I don’t know what I’m trying to say really, except that I think he cares for you more than …’

‘No!’ Corrie shouted, leaping to her feet. ‘I don’t want to hear it, Felicity. I was taken in by it once, and it won’t happen again. If he cared he’d have called me by now, but he hasn’t, has he? Now, if you’ll excuse me I have to get ready to meet the crew.’

Felicity watched her walk out, deciding not to go after her, as probably the last thing Corrie could handle right now was pity. She’d been there so many times herself in the past, so she knew that Corrie’s hurt was still too raw
to
be comforted. Maybe, once the anger had gone, she could try again. Or was it really worth it, Felicity asked herself, stifling another yawn. If the rumours about Paige Spencer were true, then it probably wasn’t.

For the next forty-eight hours Corrie threw herself single-mindedly into her work. At least it got her through the day, but the nights were a different matter altogether. Sleep continually eluded her, and as she lay there tossing and turning in the darkness, all she knew was the confusion and utter hopelessness she felt inside. She had believed, truly believed that she had meant something to him, and even now, after what had happened, a part of her was still refusing to accept that she hadn’t. She couldn’t forget his eyes when he’d looked at her, nor his tenderness when he touched her, but as Felicity had pointed out, he was a man well practised in the art of seducing women and how naive she was to have fallen for it so completely.

She spoke to no one about it, she didn’t want to talk about him at all. She just wanted to try and forget, to get on with her life and put this stultifying pain and disappointment behind her.

But two nights before she was due to fly back to England she found herself picking up the phone and dialling his number. She hadn’t really thought about what she was going to say, all she knew was that Felicity was right. If he was worth it then she would swallow her pride and give him another chance. And he was worth it, even though he had walked out on her and not even bothered to call to explain.

As the phone started to ring at the other end her nerves clawed at her stomach so cruelly she started to feel sick. If the answerphone picked up the call she knew she wouldn’t leave a message, but the answerphone didn’t. At first Corrie didn’t know who it was, since all she could hear was music, then she heard a woman laugh and Cristos saying ‘give me
that
phone!’ Then the woman’s voice said, ‘Hi there, Cristos Bennati’s residence.’

Corrie replaced the receiver, knowing that she would never feel so bad in her life as she did at that moment. But there was still worse to come, for the following morning when she opened the newspaper there, staring back at her, was a picture of Cristos with Paige Spencer. They were leaving Spagos together, Paige was gazing up into his face and Cristos looking straight into the lens, was laughing.

Luke was sitting at the mirror in his bathroom, staring at himself. His face was ravaged, but he didn’t recognize the pain and sadness in his eyes, he saw only the diminishing light of rage that moments ago had reared up at him, mocking him, perverting him, sucking him into the hell he could never escape …

Thank God no one had seen him, were anyone ever to witness the rabid demon tormenting his soul it would be the end. Even now he could feel the great monster fidgeting within him. It was a like a separate being, a life force obliterating his own with an unslakeable thirst for vengeance. It governed him, mind, body and soul until he no longer knew who he was.

Then this morning he’d asked her to marry him. He’d got down on his knees and asked her to become his wife. She’d laughed. She hadn’t said anything, not a single word had passed her lips, she had simply laughed. He knew of course that shock had provoked the response, so he had waited for her laughter to subside and asked again.

Of course he wasn’t surprised when she turned him down, after all she still carried a torch for Bennati. Neither was he surprised that she had done it so spitefully. She’d guessed that he was behind Bennati walking out on her, but he, Luke, had wanted her to understand that he needed her far more than Bennati ever would. He couldn’t do that while Bennati was around, and what a fool he had been
ever
to let her come here. He’d only done it so that she would see for herself that a man like Bennati would never be interested in someone like her. He’d wanted to be there to pick up the pieces, to take her battered ego and soothe it so that she would come to recognize his tenderness, but it hadn’t worked out that way. At least not at first, but he had seen to matters, and now, with Bennati no longer an obstacle, he must make her understand that to marry him was the only thing she could do – for all their sakes.

He pressed his fingers to his eyes as though to push back the tears that had started. She was on her way to Annalise now, he knew that even though she hadn’t admitted it. Annalise had called him herself, just after Corrie had left. Annalise, his darling, precious, Annalise. How he’d wanted to go to her, to hold her as she told him she forgave him. But he had stopped himself, and that was why the rage had come. It had nothing to do with Corrie, he felt only a desperation for Corrie that she should try to understand. But how could she when he couldn’t find it in himself to tell her what he had done, or why it was that he did it?

He knew that she would try to talk Annalise out of ever seeing him again, and please God she would succeed. He had to let Annalise go; he had to end everything between them before he started doing to her what the bastard had done to Siobhan. But it was going to kill him to lose her, it would sap the very life from him to be without her now. He slumped forward, his body convulsing with sobs. But Corrie wouldn’t succeed, would she? The sly, vindictive beast inside him had seen to that. It had spoken to Annalise and now Corrie wouldn’t stand a chance.