The Unexpected Consequences of Love (22 page)

Sophie was working on a shoot with a family so annoying you couldn't have made them up. Mind-blowingly wealthy, with homes scattered around the world, they were currently occupying the stunning penthouse apartment of a new hotel up on the cliff top overlooking St. Ives. Here in Cornwall for a week—squished in between visits to their villa in Cannes and friends who owned a palazzo on the banks of Lake Como—they'd decided to mark the occasion with a family photo shoot. As you do, apparently, when you occupy that kind of world.

“If the pictures are good enough, we might use one of them for this year's Christmas card,” Julia generously explained. A rake-thin Californian in her fifties, she'd been surgically altered to resemble a waxwork model of a thirty-year-old. Her husband, a plump British entrepreneur, wasn't remotely interested in being photographed but had been coerced into going along with it in order to keep the peace.

The two teenage daughters had expensive, drawly transatlantic voices with upturned intonations. They also had shiny curtains of waist-length blond hair and teeny tiny bodies that they kept loudly insisting were fat. A hair and makeup artist had been hired for the occasion, as well as their stylist, who'd arrived with armfuls of clothes and accessories from their London home. So far the preparations had taken three hours, and Sophie was still waiting to take her first shots of the day.

“Mom, my lashes still aren't right,” whined the younger daughter, Jemini.

“Okay, honey, calm down.” Julia gave the makeup girl a blank look that would most likely have involved eyebrow raising if Botox hadn't rendered such a feat impossible. “Can you please do them again?”

“Yes. Sorry.” The girl flushed and nodded, visibly mortified.

“Remember the time that one in Monte Carlo did my eyebrows all wrong?” The eldest daughter, Jezebel, spoke without glancing up from her crystal-encrusted cell phone. “It was, like,
so
annoying.”

Sophie exchanged a glance with the makeup girl, who was now battling through a fog of cigarette smoke in order to redo Jemini's lashes. What a life this family led, yet they seemed so utterly bored with it. Having finished texting, Jezebel was now chatting on her phone to a friend. “No, I'm the size of a whale… I weigh, like,
ninety-seven pounds.”

“Shhh, baby,” her mother protested. “Don't tell everyone. We'll get you some lipo; it'll be fine.”

“Not the turquoise ones.” Jemini waved away the skyscraper-heeled shoes the stylist was showing her. “I wore those for last week's shoot. Isn't it your job to keep track of these things?”

The stylist looked as if she'd love nothing more than to stab her with a turquoise stiletto heel. Oh yes, this family was evidently a joy to work for. Sophie's phone vibrated in the back pocket of her jeans and she stepped through the French windows onto the wooden wraparound balcony.

“Sophie? I need you to come over here and settle an argument!”

After enduring the whiny, nasal tones of Julia and her spoiled daughters, it made a nice change to hear Marguerite's forthright voice.

“What kind of an argument?”

“You know the ash tree in my garden? The one with the wicker cocoon seat attached to it?”

“Okay, yes.” Sophie nodded, remembering the shoot they'd done last year for Marguerite's Romanian publisher. Had they not been happy with the shots? “You need some more photos of you on the seat?”

“Not of me. There's a bird nesting in the upper branches and I need to know what it is. Lawrence is insisting it's a blackbird, but I'm sure it's a Cornish chough, even though I know they usually nest on cliffs.
Pyrrhocorax
, that's the Latin name. They practically disappeared from Cornwall in the fifties, but there's been a bit of recolonization in the last fifteen years.”

“Right. Wow,” said Sophie. “I'm impressed. I had no idea you were such an expert.”

“One of my awful exes was a birdwatcher. He made me go on a bird-spotting vacation with him once. And only once.” The shudder in Marguerite's voice was audible. “It was horrendous. Everyone had beards and wore chunky knits. Anyway, I've tried taking photos with my phone, but it's useless. That tree's thirty meters high.”

“You need a long lens,” said Sophie.

“
I
don't. You do. Can you come over and see if you can get some decent shots of it?”

“Well, I can, but not today. Tomorrow's pretty busy too.” Sophie mentally scanned her diary for the next few days. “But I could maybe squeeze in a visit between appointments…”

“I tell you what, just come over whenever you can. I'm going to be out and about a fair bit myself,” said Marguerite, “but it's only the garden, so you don't need me to actually be there. A couple photos good enough to identify the bird, that's all I'm after. And please, God, let me be right and Lawrence wrong; otherwise I'll never hear the last of it.”

“I'll do my best.” Sophie smiled. “If all else fails, there's always Photoshop.”

“Ha, that's my girl. Excellent plan. Why be a failure when you can cheat your way to victory?” Marguerite gave a bark of laughter. “Joking, of course.”

“I'll be over sometime this week.” As Sophie said it, a wail rang out from inside the penthouse apartment: “Aw, I don't
believe
it! A freakin' crystal just fell off my phone!”

With characteristic bluntness Marguerite said, “What a ghastly screeching noise. Are you watching
Housewives
of
Orange
County
?”

“Actually, it's one of my clients.”

“Good grief, poor you, she sounds a complete nightmare. I bet you wish everyone was as nice as me.”

Sophie heroically managed to keep a straight face. “Oh, I do.”

The preparations continued. Julia's husband made endless business calls while the rest of his family readied themselves for the shoot. Julia was on the phone to her nail technician in Los Angeles, debating at length the shade of polish she should try next. Jezebel was noisily chewing gum—chomp
chomp—
and surfing the Internet on her iPad.

“Okay, so we're starting to narrow it down now.” Julia yawned, midconversation with the nail technician. “The pale green Dior, the Chanel peridot, or that dark shimmering one by—”

“Aaaaarrrgh!” Jezebel jackknifed upright and began making dramatic retching noises. “Oh my God, that is so
gross
!”

“What? What is it?” Jemini gestured at the hairdresser to move back so she could lean across and see the hideous grossness for herself. “Oh jeez, that just makes me want to barf… It's like something out of a horror movie.”

“Oh. Maybe it is from a movie.” Jezebel, her face still contorted with distaste, looked at Sophie and demanded, “Well? Is it?”

“Sorry?” What were they on about now?

“This!” Jezebel held up the iPad so she could see. “Is it, like, all done with makeup?”

Sophie studied the screen and realized that Jezebel had been exploring her website. Having scrolled through pages of sample photos, she'd stopped at one of the most recently added.

Elizabeth Sharp had been so proud and delighted with the end result of their visit the other week to Mizzen Cove that she'd posted her favorite photo on her personal blog. Word had soon spread, a local journalist had contacted her, and Elizabeth had ended up being featured in several newspapers, with the picture attracting yet more attention and widespread praise. When Sophie had asked if she could include it in the photo gallery on her website, Elizabeth had said, “Darling, of course you can! My pleasure!”

There was no hint of pleasure on Jezebel and Jemini's faces. Jemini was shaking her head in disbelief.

“
Is
it special effects?” Jezebel evidently couldn't contemplate the possibility that the photograph might be real.

“Her name's Elizabeth. She's a history teacher,” said Sophie. “She had breast cancer and she's celebrating still being alive.”

“But…but look at the scars! And her breast is, like, totally
gone
. She's all flat on that side.” Jemini's glossy upper lip curled in disgust. “Why would she let them
do
that to her?”

Sophie said evenly, “To get the cancer out.”

“But why didn't she make them do a reconstruction?”

“As far as Elizabeth's concerned, it's not a priority.”

“Well, I'm sorry, but it's totally gross.
And
she's naked. Some people have no pride,” exclaimed Jezebel. “I mean, look at how
old
she is. And as for her body, what kind of a state is that to get yourself into? She's all fat and round and…urgh, saggy!”

Jemini pointed to the screen. “And she's got cellulite.” She exhaled a stream of smoke and narrowed her eyes at Sophie. “Like, not being funny or anything, but you're the photographer. Shouldn't you have Photoshopped all that stuff out?”

“It's like she's just flaunting all the icky stuff,” Jezebel chimed in. “Why would anyone want to do that?”

Sophie's jaw was aching from keeping her teeth gritted. “Actually, she's a friend of mine.”

“Are you serious?” Jezebel twisted around to gaze at her. “And you put her on your website looking like
that
? If she's your friend, what kind of photos would you take of someone you didn't like?”

“What kind of photos is she gonna take of
us
?” murmured Jemini.

“Don't worry.” Sophie shook her head. “You're not going to get the chance to find out.”

Everyone stared at her. Jemini said, “Huh? What's that supposed to mean?”

It was no good; there was no going back now. After the things they'd said about Elizabeth, Sophie knew she couldn't go through with the shoot.

“I told you she was my friend and you just kept on saying that awful stuff. Trust me, you wouldn't be happy with any photos I took of you.” She was dimly aware of the stylist and the makeup artist surveying her with a mixture of envy, horror, and glee. “Besides, I don't want to take them.”

“You're canceling? You can't do that!” Jemini shrieked. “We've spent all this time getting ourselves ready!”

“You have phones. You can take photos of each other. It'll be fine.”

“Okay, this is crazy. Mom, tell her she has to do it!”

“I don't have to and I'm not going to.” Sophie moved around the sitting room, collecting her equipment. She wouldn't get paid, but sometimes you just had to make a point. Luckily, she was busy enough with other projects to be able to stand the loss.

“Daddy, you have to stop her!”

Sophie said, “He can't.”

“Oh, just you wait,” bellowed Jezebel. “He's
so
gonna sue your ass!”

“Your
fat
ass,” Jemini added; it was evidently the worst epithet she could think of.

“Guess what?” Sophie smiled equably at the sisters as she flicked shut the locks on the metal equipment trunk. “Me and my fat ass can't wait.”

The girls' father caught up with her as she was packing the equipment into her car. Sophie forced herself to stay calm. “If they say anything publicly about me backing out, I'll tell everyone why I did it.”

The poor harassed man shook his head. “I'll make sure they don't. And I won't sue you. Look, I'm sorry. I've worked so hard all these years to make money.” He gestured helplessly up at the hugely expensive penthouse apartment. “To give my family the best life I could. And you know what? I sometimes wonder why I bothered. They've lost touch with reality. They see a flaw and it has to be fixed. The people they mix with, they're all the same.”

He might not have had face-lifts, but his teeth were astonishingly even and white, like mini marble tombstones. Sophie felt for him. “Well, I'm sorry too. I've never walked out on a job before, but you know…”

With the weary sigh of a man only too aware that he was somehow going to have to sort things out and make alternative arrangements, Jemini and Jezebel's father took out his phone and said, “I do know. It's okay, I understand.”

Traffic was heavy on the way back and the journey took two hours. Approaching St. Carys, on a whim Sophie turned left up the lane that led toward Moor Court. If it wasn't to be a completely wasted day, she may as well see if she could spot the mystery bird.

She pulled in halfway up the driveway. Marguerite's sporty red Mercedes was missing, which meant she was probably out. Anyway, as Marguerite had said, there was no need to ring the doorbell. Jumping out of the car with the necessary long lens fixed to the camera around her neck, Sophie took a shortcut through the trees leading around to the back garden.

She came out around forty feet from the back of the house. And here it was, the enormously tall ash tree with the cocoon-shaped wicker seat hanging from one of the lower branches.

Peering up, craning her neck and squinting as the bright sunlight flickered through the swaying leaves, she managed to spot the nest, way up high and half hidden among the blur of greenery. She hoisted the Nikon into position, adjusted the elongated lens, and brought the nest into knife-sharp focus. That was it, perfect, but there was no sign of any birds, either parents or chicks.

Sophie leaned back against the silver-gray trunk of the tree and lowered the camera but kept her attention on the nest. Through either luck or patience, she would catch a few shots of the bird when it decided to put in an appearance.

Fifteen minutes later, she gave her aching neck a rest and massaged her knotted-up left shoulder. Looked like it was going to be down to patience rather than luck. She was hot, and the back of her shirt was sticking to her spine, but…

A tiny movement at the very periphery of her vision made Sophie glance across at the house. For a moment she couldn't work out where it had come from; then it happened again, and she realized there was someone in Marguerite's office.

Not Marguerite, though. The hair was messy and blond, not sleek and dark. It was Riley, wearing a white T-shirt and sitting at the desk scrutinizing the computer screen in front of him.

He didn't know she was out here. Only mildly curious as to what he might be doing, Sophie instinctively raised the camera once more to eye level and refocused the lens until she had him in her sights.

There he was, every last tiny detail of his face as clear as if he were an insect under a microscope. Even after all these years, it never failed to amaze her that a lens had the ability to make something far away appear so close you felt you could reach out and touch it.

Sophie made one final minuscule adjustment and turned her attention to the computer screen.

When she realized what was on it, and slowly worked out what appeared to be going on in the room, she felt all the hairs on the back of her neck prickle in disbelief.

Surely not.

It couldn't be.

Could
it
?

***

Josh was driving back to the hotel after a meeting in Padstow. He'd reached St. Carys, and slowed to let a girl push a twin buggy across the road, when he happened to glance across at the mini supermarket on his right.

Clearly visible through the glass frontage was Sophie, surveying the shelves of wine.

Sometimes fate intervenes and offers a helping hand, and it would seem rude to refuse it. Josh waited until the twin buggy had reached the pavement, then promptly parked up on the double yellows. Within twenty seconds he was entering the shop, executing a surprised double take as he recognized a familiar face.

“Hello!” Did that sound okay? Suitably casual? God, sounding casual was hard
.

Sophie swung around and said, “Oh, hi!”

“Can't decide?” She'd been holding a bottle in each hand, studying the labels.
Look
at
her, so beautiful…

“They're both the same price.” She pulled a face, holding up each bottle in turn. “This one sounds nicer. But
this
one's on special offer and has a prettier label.”

“Go for the first one. It's what they're like on the inside that counts.” He liked Sophie inside
and
out. “Off somewhere nice?”

She shook her head. “No.”

“Celebrating, then?”

“Kind of the opposite. Commiserating with myself. I walked out of a job today and there's still a chance I could get into trouble over it. Long story,” she added drily. “Anyway, what are you doing here?”

“Just dropped in to pick up some…cookies.” It was the first thing that came into his head; he could hardly say
I
only
came
in
here
because
I
saw
you
.

“You live in a hotel. Surely you must have cookies?”

“Not the kind I wanted. I had a sudden craving for Garibaldis.” He saw the look on her face. “It's okay, I'm not pregnant.”

Sophie laughed. “I haven't had a Garibaldi for years.”

Was this fate? Seizing the moment, Josh said, “I'll share mine if you share yours. Fancy a walk along the beach?”

He saw her hesitate, then make up her mind. “Yes, I do. Although…”

“Although what?”

“Will we take turns swigging out of the bottle? Because it might not be the classiest look I've ever gone for.”

Josh made his way down the left-hand aisle and picked up a packet of Garibaldis, then moved on to the tiny kitchenware section, there to provide emergency supplies for vacationers staying in tents and caravans in the area.

“They don't have glasses.” He rejoined Sophie in line for the checkout. “Will these do?”

She surveyed the two cheap china mugs, one blue and stripy, the other pink and decorated with teddies and hearts. “Perfect. Yours is the pink one.”

“Funnily enough, I thought it might be,” said Josh.

***

Sophie sat and wiggled her bare toes in the sand, hyperaware of Josh's forearm millimeters away from her own. They'd walked to the furthest edge of the beach. Now Josh was opening the bottle—hooray for screw caps—and pouring red wine into their mugs. They both knew they could have gone to the Mermaid, where there were comfortable seats and proper wineglasses to drink from, but they'd taken the beach route instead.

“Cheers.” Josh clinked their mugs together, the side of his hand brushing against hers.
Zinggg
.

“Cheers.” She took a sip and said, “It's nice. You were right.” Had he felt the zing too?

“I'm always right.” His eyes crinkled with amusement. “So, what happened to make you walk out on your job today?”

Sophie told him. The outrage bubbled up; recalling Jemini and Jezebel's reactions made her furious all over again on Elizabeth's behalf. When she'd finished ranting, she said heatedly, “It just makes me so mad. Elizabeth's worth fifty of them!”

“I agree.” Josh was nodding.

“Life's so unfair. Why does bad stuff have to happen to people who don't deserve it?” It would be poor form to suggest that people who
did
deserve it should be the ones to get cancer, but the thought was there in her brain. She took a bigger glug of wine and said, “Some people swan through life without realizing how lucky they are.”

“Also true.”

“Why are you looking at me like that?” He definitely had a particular expression on his face.

“I like how you get indignant on other people's behalf.” He smiled. “You're so…principled.”

“So principled that I lost out on the best-paid job I've had in months.” She grimaced. “Ah, well, never mind. It's only money.”

He paused, gazing steadily into her eyes. “There's something I'd really like to know. What happened to put you off men?”

Her stomach clenched; they weren't here to discuss
her
.

“You've asked me that question before.”

“I know I have. Still waiting for the answer.”

“You'll have a long wait, then. I told you, it's private.”

“I'm a good listener. And pretty unshockable.”

“That's irrelevant.”

“Is it?” Josh shook his head fractionally. “You're a beautiful girl. I like everything about you, apart from the fact that I asked you out and you turned me down. I didn't like that bit at all.”

“Poor you. Heartbreaking.” In order to keep her own emotions in check, Sophie resorted to flippancy. “You could always ask Tula out. I'm sure she'd say yes. She likes you.”

“And you don't?”

It was her turn to give him a long look. “You shouldn't ask questions like that. The answer may offend.”

“Did he hit you?”

“Who?”

“The one who caused all of this.”

He was watching her intently. Sophie said, “No, never. And that's as much as you get. I'm not saying any more.”

“But—”

“Wait.” She held up her hand to stop him in his tracks. “It's private, okay? I'm not going to talk about it. Ever. Apart from anything else, it isn't my story to tell.”

Josh was still watching her, looking as if there was something else he wanted to say. In return, Sophie silently signaled that it would be a pointless exercise. Okay, time to change the subject, to the reason she'd agreed to come down to the beach with him in the first place…

***

What a situation to find yourself in. Josh glanced at the bottle stuck at an angle in the sand and saw that it was almost empty. They'd been sitting out here for an hour now. And all he'd wanted to do the whole time was pull Sophie into his arms and kiss her senseless.

Meanwhile, what had she been doing? The answer to that was: her level best to find out as much information as possible about Riley.

Which was pretty frustrating, to say the least. Every time he'd attempted to steer the conversation to other subjects, Sophie had deftly steered it right back again. She wanted to know whether they had been good friends all those years ago when Riley had first come to live in St. Carys and Josh himself had been returning here during breaks between university terms. Had Riley always been as lazy and hedonistic as he was now? What had he taken his degree in? Did he genuinely have no ambition at all, or did Josh think there could possibly be more to him than met the eye?

It was a virtual interrogation.

“Why are you so interested?” He didn't want to sound like a bad loser, but if she was asking all these questions because she was attracted to Riley Bryant… Well, he wasn't at all sure he could keep his feelings about it to himself.

Sophie shrugged easily. “Just curious.”

“He wouldn't be your type.”

She glanced sideways at him, amused by his tone. “You don't know that. He might be.”

“I do know. Riley's just…Riley. He's good fun, great to spend time with, but what you see is what you get. It doesn't go further than that.”

Sophie still wasn't looking convinced. “You don't think he might have hidden depths?”

Josh poured the last of the wine into their mugs. “No,” he said flatly, “I don't. And relationships aren't his thing. Nothing ever lasts longer than a week. More often it's a matter of hours.”

Her choppy blond hair was being blown across her face. Sophie tipped her head back, shaking the strands out of her eyes. “Maybe that suits some girls.”

Okay, did she mean
her
? Was she hinting that she wouldn't be averse to a night with Riley? Experiencing a tightening inside his chest, Josh said, “When I asked you a while back, you told me you weren't interested in him.”

“Did I?” Sophie smiled, checked her watch, and finished her wine. “Wow, it's later than I thought. I need to get home.”

Josh rose to his feet, brushed the sand off his jeans, and reached out a hand to haul her upright. For a moment they were facing each other, their bodies almost but not quite touching; he could see his own face reflected in her clear, gray eyes. The urge to draw her closer was stronger than ever. He longed to trace the dimple in her left cheek, to breathe in the scent of her, to push his fingers through that tousled blond hair and feel the warmth of her skin at the base of her throat.

And more than anything else, he wanted to kiss her,
hold
her
and
kiss
her…

Okay, more than
almost
anything else, but let's not get carried away. One step at a time.

“Well, I'd better get back. Lots of work to do.” Breaking contact and shaking dry sand from her own clothes, Sophie handed him her empty mug and said cheerfully, “Here, you take it; it's yours. Thanks for the chat. It's been nice.”

She stepped back, moving away, the empty wine bottle swinging between her fingers as she carried it over to the trash can. Once it had been disposed of, she turned, waved, and called out, “Bye!”

And now, with the setting sun behind her, she was heading for the steps, making her way home, presumably to assimilate all the newly gathered information she'd inveigled from him about Riley Bryant.

Josh exhaled, marveling at his own misguided plans. So much for not getting carried away and taking things one step at a time.

If Riley took advantage of Sophie and then ditched her, he would want to kill him.

Then again, if Riley took advantage of Sophie and
didn't
ditch her… Well, that would just make him want to kill him
more
.