‘I’m not stupid, Mum. I can do the maths. You got pregnant almost as soon as you met Dad. That’s why you went to live in Parador and got married. No wonder it didn’t all work out with him; you shouldn’t have got married in the first place.’
‘How dare you!’ whispered Grace. ‘I loved your father . . .’
‘Love?’ said Olivia cruelly. ‘Don’t make me laugh.’
With a flick of her hair, she stalked out of the room. Grace could only stand there staring at the spot where her daughter had been. Slowly she turned and walked to the window, where she could see Olivia running up to her boyfriend like an eager puppy. How had this happened? In the blink of an eye, her sweet little girl had become a woman, a woman she barely recognised.
Olivia was right, of course: she did still think of her daughter as a child – a baby, even – and she knew she couldn’t hold on for ever. She curled her hand into a fist. She should never have confronted Olivia in that way; she shouldn’t have trotted out the old clichés about waiting and responsibility. No wonder Olivia didn’t want to confide in her. She had certainly played this particular episode badly. But was Olivia also right when she said she had played it all badly? For fourteen years, Grace had tried to do the right thing for her children, putting them first, pushing her own needs to one side to make sure they had the best start they could have. Had she been a bad mother? She could certainly have done things differently, that was true. But should she have done?
‘Grace?’ called Catrina from the doorway. ‘Do you want to look at the outfits for the next shot?’
Grace quickly brushed a tear away.‘Sure, I’ll be there in a minute,’ she said.
Out in the garden, Olivia was sitting next to Lord Freddie, her head resting affectionately on his shoulder.
Just don’t make the mistakes I did, darling, thought Grace, picking up her camera and turning away. It was the best she could hope for.
53
November 2007
Alex Doyle felt without a care in the world. Fregate Island, a private Seychelles atoll thirty miles east of Mahe, was beautiful, remote and the last word in barefoot luxury. A riot of coconut palms, cashew and almond trees perfumed the whole island like a bottle of Melissa’s bespoke scent. For five days that week the lush secluded oasis was especially exclusive as Alex and Melissa had hired out the entire island for a holiday of paparazzi- and people-free luxury. Melissa was just about to go on a twelve-country promo tour for the Christopher Hayes film Next Door But One and Alex had finished a twenty-one-date tour of South American football stadiums; they felt they deserved it.
‘I’m nervous about the movie,’ said Melissa, turning towards her husband. They were lying on wooden sunloungers positioned right at the water’s edge of Anse Parc Beach, a small table between them holding cocktails, their ice slowly melting. Fregate wasn’t entirely deserted, of course. This was a luxury resort for the super-rich and there was an army of waiters, chefs and gofers to make sure their two guests never went without.
‘What are you nervous about, honey?’ said Alex, putting down the book he was reading – a biography of hair metal band Motley Crue – and peering at her over his sunglasses. ‘The early buzz on the film is great. Hayes said he’d work with you a
gain in a heartbeat and you got a six-million-dollar pay packet. Sounds OK to me.’
She frowned, shielding her eyes from the sun. ‘None of that matters, Alex. All that matters is box office and the Academy.’
‘I’m not an expert,’ said Alex, ‘but the two things don’t necessarily go hand in hand. I mean, look at Die Hard. Brilliant movie, big box office, but where was Bruce Willis’ Oscar? You can’t necessarily have both.’
‘Next Door is not an action movie, Alex,’ she said sourly. ‘All I’m saying is that I want people to enjoy the movie, of course, but I also want recognition from my peers about my craft.’
Alex rolled his eyes at the mention of the craft. Melissa was taking herself very seriously these days. Having acting lessons with a teacher at Lee Strasberg and searching for scripts that involved a physical transformation – her logic being that Nicole Kidman, Charlize Theron and Halle Berry had all won Oscars in roles where they’d had to put on weight, don a prosthetic nose or wear little make-up.
‘Christopher thinks I should stay a brunette.’
‘I’ve been telling you for months you should stay as a brunette.’ In fact, Alex wasn’t entirely sure what Melissa’s natural hair colour was: she had her roots done every two weeks and her pubic hair had been waxed, dyed and buffed with the same regularity as the hair on her head. ‘Brunette definitely suits you, baby,’ he said, but Melissa had already closed her eyes, concentrating on her tan. He started reading his book again, but quickly put it down – all those stories of shooting up and orgies with groupies made him feel uncomfortable. He rolled over and grabbed the stack of tabloid magazines that Melissa had picked up at the airport. She professed to loathe the things and had taken out lawsuits against a number of them, but they were a guilty pleasure for her as much as the next person.
He flicked through the first one casually, enjoying the tittle-tattle, the dress disasters, the celebrity meltdowns. He closed his eyes, relishing the cool breeze coming off the Indian Ocean, like a lake of shimmering jade in front of him. He had to admit, it had taken some persuading to get him to a private island. For many years he had been uncomfortable being by the sea at all. The year before, he and Melissa had had huge rows when she wanted to move to Malibu, because Alex was not sure if he wanted to wake up every morning to the sound of lapping waves. He hadn’t told Melissa the real reason about his preference to stay in their Hollywood Hills home.
Reaching across, he got his cocktail and sipped it slowly as he leafed through the magazine. He couldn’t pinpoint the precise moment he’d started drinking again, but it was usually only a couple of Budweisers every day and Melissa had been either on set or too self-absorbed to notice. Suddenly he stopped on the centre-spread story in US Weekly, his eyes wide. Too Hot To Handle! screamed the headline. There were two blown-up pictures on facing pages – one of Melissa and Justin in bed together, the curve of her breast and his bronzed, rippled torso totally visible. The other was a grainy long-lens shot of the two of them in deep discussion. That one made him feel like puking. In it, they were completely clothed, but Justin’s hand was held up to Melissa’s face, stroking the underside of her jaw. It was such an intimate gesture, it was like a punch to the stomach for Alex. Maybe Melissa could explain the bed shot away – although he had no idea how – but this one, this was unmistakably a photograph of two people who were in love.
He wanted to throw the magazine away, but he couldn’t take his eyes from the page, vainly hoping it would change. The chatter about an on-set affair between Melissa and Justin had been fairly continuous throughout the filming of Next Door But One, but Melissa had kept reminding him about Justin’s sexual preference. He only had her word for it, and even she couldn’t dispute the intimacy in these pictures.
‘Melissa,’ he said.
She opened one eye lazily. ‘What?’
He held up the magazine.
Melissa groaned.‘Not this again?’ she said, snatching it from him. ‘When are you going to get over being so damn insecure?’
‘A picture of you and Justin naked together isn’t really helping things, Melissa,’ he snapped.
‘Oh get real, Alex,’ she said wearily. ‘This shot is from the movie – the movie! It was leaked by Brett – it’s all part of the publicity.’