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Wasn’t the whole point of her article to look at this world of luxury from the perspective of an ordinary High Street girl? Her fresh eyes would enable her to pick up on all the little things that stood out. Like the way people air-kissed both cheeks as a greeting. Jen had never done that in her life.
She was furious with herself. She was an investigative journalist—a professional gathering background for an article. She should be finding this interesting, not intimidating. But try as she might she couldn’t quite squash the needling little voice in her head reminding her that if things had been different, with a shift in circumstances, this could have been her world, too.
Darkness was already filtering in as she left the restaurant, and the cold air burned her cheeks, but she forced herself to do a bit of window-shopping on Brompton Road instead of skulking back to the apartment. In the brightly lit Chanel store, with the interlinked Cs logo huge behind an exquisite suit in the window, she could feel the eyes of the perfectly groomed assistants following her in her cheap jeans as she picked up a black tweed jacket—heavy in her hands, impeccably cut. Beautiful. She checked the label and felt the moisture disappear from her mouth. Maybe if she sold her car. And then some.
She put the jacket back slowly, so as not to look as if she couldn’t afford it, more as if she’d decided it really just wasn’t her. And she checked out a couple of handbags and a scarf on her way to the exit in an attempt to leave with some dignity. None of the staff approached her, clearly knowing perfectly well that she wasn’t worth attending to. She wasn’t the real deal. And all the while she was thinking that what she really wanted was to be back in sleepy Littleford.
She snapped herself out of it. She was just a bit homesick. It wouldn’t last. These last three months in London had gone by in a whirl and she’d loved every pacy second of it. Christmas in Chelsea exuded class. It was all twinkly white lights and mistletoe, co-ordinated colours and not a tasteless bauble in sight. It couldn’t be further from Littleford, which by now would have its threadbare Christmas tree put up on the village green by local volunteers. The same balding tree had been resurrected every year for as long as Jen could remember.
She wanted to stay in London and this was her chance to do that. Her chance to show she could claw her way up in life by herself. She didn’t need a rich father smoothing her path for her.
An hour or so later and things were looking up. It was amazing what people sold online. She scrolled through the auction listings on her laptop, propped up comfortably against the pillows on her bed, mug of hot chocolate next to her. It was gobsmacking how much of a discount you could get for pre-owned clothes. No time to wait for the auction to unfold over a week. She concentrated on the ‘Buy Now’ options.
Within half an hour she’d been possessed by a kind of madness. It was all too easy to click ‘Pay Now’. A pair of jeans, a wear-anywhere shirt, a stunning velvet cocktail dress and a heavily knocked-down pair of nude shoes that she hoped would go with everything—all by designers she’d only ever read about in upmarket women’s magazines. She snapped her eyes away from the screen and calmed her racing pulse with the fact that she could sell the whole lot on when the project was over with.
Before she could stop herself she’d clicked ‘Pay Now’ on a gorgeous leather tote bag. In for a penny, in for … a lot of pounds. Hmm, it was just too easy to get carried away online when the clothes were this delicious. She’d better do a quick recce of the cost. Her wallet was under serious strain. She’d ploughed her meagre savings into her project—after all, you had to speculate to accumulate—but still she needed to watch her spending.
The cost of renting the apartment, although seriously discounted from what it would really be to rent a place like this, was still taking up the lion’s share of her budget. Add in the anticipated cost of tickets, entry fees, food and drink—all the essentials she needed to actually get herself in the same room as her prey—and she had hardly anything left for her own makeover. And, judging by the young women she’d seen today, she was in serious need of one of those if she was to pass herself off as one of them.
She tapped the figures into her pocket calculator and stared in disbelief at the total. Clothes alone would never be enough, she needed to look the part inside and out. That meant hair, make-up, fake tan, nails. How the hell was she going to manage all of that on the ten pounds twenty pence she had left in her budget?
‘Sorry, could you just say that again? I thought you said you were sharing a flat with Alex Hammond, but that can’t be right, can it?’
‘You didn’t hear me wrong.’
Jen held the phone away from her ear with a grimace, but still the piercing squeal of excitement was audible. When it came to overreaction, Elsie was a professional. Then again, to someone who’d spent a lifetime living in Littleford, and for whom the working week consisted of giving perms and blue rinses to the village’s pensioner contingent, the news that your friend was living with a celebrity was probably the highlight of the year. When the squeal subsided she tentatively put the receiver back to her ear.
‘Are you sure?’ Elsie asked breathlessly. ‘The Alex Hammond? The one on the front of today’s newspaper with no shirt on? I’ve never seen abs like it.’
Jen made a mental note to check out today’s paper, then mentally crossed it out. She didn’t have time to think about Alex Hammond’s abs. She felt mildly offended by Elsie’s disbelief. Was it really that far-fetched that she could move in these social circles?
‘Yes, definitely that Alex Hammond,’ she said.
Elsie sighed.
‘So any chance of you coming home before Christmas Day is even more non-existent, then? I’m dying of boredom here without you. What’s he like?’
‘Nowhere near as hot in the flesh,’ she lied.
She hadn’t counted on Elsie being quite so starstruck. It was a good few minutes before she could get her off the subject of Alex’s physique and onto the subject of the favour she needed to beg. For Pete’s sake, her future career was at stake here.
‘I need your help,’ she said when she could get a word in. ‘The success of my article depends on it.’
She’d bored Elsie rigid with her writing career plans since they’d both been at school.
‘What kind of help?’
‘I need to look like a goddess—on a budget and in minimum time,’ she said. It sounded an extremely tall order spoken out loud.
‘How long?’ Elsie asked.
‘One day would be nice. For a start, is there some over-the-counter product I can use to make my hair look sun-kissed?’
Elsie made a dismissive chuffing sound.
‘Pah! You don’t need to bother with any of that over-the-counter rubbish. Not when you’ve got a professional on your team. I’ll see you right. Don’t you worry.’
‘But you’re in Littleford. And I can’t afford to pay for you to come here even if I was able to let you stay.’ She didn’t bother to enlighten Elsie about the fight she’d had to keep herself under this roof.
There was a disappointed sigh at the end of the phone.
‘I suppose it was too much to hope for a meeting with Alex,’ she grumbled. ‘And it’s been ages since I’ve seen you. The place has been dead quiet since you took that magazine job.’
Jen squashed the sudden pang of homesickness. No matter how much she had missed her, Elsie would eat Alex alive if she got within touching distance of him.
‘Sorry,’ she said apologetically. ‘He’s rarely home, anyway. We barely see each other. And even if you were here, what I’m after is that modern, subtle, glossy-but-undone look the It-girls have. I need to look like myself, but better. I’m not sure there’s much of a call for that kind of look in Littleford.’
She was trying hard to be tactful but clearly failed, because Elsie gave a derisory sniff.
‘A couple of months in London and you think we’re all hillbillies,’ she complained. ‘Just because I spend my days doing shampoo and sets for grannies doesn’t mean I don’t have all the skills for modern stuff, you know. A tint is a tint, whether it’s blue, pink or just-back-from-Cannes-gold. I’ll pop some colorant in the post tonight, shall I?’
Jen brightened immediately.
‘Is it something I can do myself, then? Can you write me a list of instructions?’
‘I can do better than that, honey. I’ll instruct you personally via Skype.’ She spoke in bossy and professional tones, as though she were a stylist to the stars, then ruined it by adding with a touch of stalker, ‘Now, give me Alex Hammond’s address.’
After a day of catch-up phone calls and e-mails, in which the subject of his swift departure from the States was skated over, Alex wandered into the kitchen on a fact-finding mission. Mark’s follow-up phone call had come that afternoon.
‘There is no Jennifer Brown that my press contacts have ever heard of, but it’s hardly an unusual name, and the world is stuffed with freelancers trying to get a foot in the door. If anything that makes her more dangerous. She’s getting exclusive first-hand experience of your day-to-day life, and at some point—if it hasn’t already—it will occur to her that she’s sitting on a fantastic scoop.’
The morning papers had brought another spate of articles about him and Viveca, and Alex’s never hugely impressive patience was close to breaking point. There were three films in varying stages of production that he should be immersed in, and instead he was stuck here, keeping out of sight, all because the studios backing them financially were unsettled by the sudden tabloid interest in his sex life. At this time of year more than ever he wanted to be busy. Needed to be busy. Working hard and partying harder. Anything but sitting here twiddling his thumbs in the flat with time to think about what might have been. He just wanted this whole ridiculous thing wrapped up so he could get back to doing what he did best.
‘Then get something on her!’ he snapped at Mark. ‘Get some leverage that we can use if she tries anything.’
‘I can’t do that when I don’t know who she is,’ Mark protested. ‘I need more background. Though it fills me with dread to say it …’ he took a breath ‘… you’re going to have to go and chat her up.’
CHAPTER THREE
FINDING the kitchen deserted, Alex followed the sounds of the TV and found Jen in the small den off the kitchen. It was a small, informal sitting room, cosier than the vast main lounge, with a small sofa, a couple of chairs and a very inferior forty-inch TV set. Where television was concerned, in Alex’s opinion, size definitely mattered.
Jen was curled up in the corner of the sofa under a well-worn patchwork quilt that he didn’t recognise. In fact, glancing around, he saw quite a few items that couldn’t possibly have been put there by the interior designer he’d employed. There were framed snapshots and Christmas cards on the sideboard, tinsel on the mantelpiece and a small potted Christmas tree near the window. A fire crackled in the grate.
From nowhere came an unexpected flash of envy. She’d settled in. Surrounded herself with things that meant something to her, reminded her of her home, her family. When had he last done that anywhere? When had he last bothered with Christmas decorations? These days it didn’t seem worth the effort just for him, although Jen clearly didn’t see it that way. Home for him was whichever house he happened to be in, and family didn’t fit in his life any more. Susan had seen to that.
Jen was wearing glasses and eating cheese on toast from a plate that was balanced precariously on the arm of the sofa. She looked tiny and somehow fragile.
She glanced up at him.
‘Hi,’ she said.
He nodded towards one of the empty chairs. ‘You mind?’
She shrugged noncommittally, but turned the sound down on the TV and took her glasses off, so he figured she couldn’t be dead against him joining her.
‘I thought the whole appeal of the executive house-sitting thing was that people get to experience luxury they can’t afford themselves,’ he said, settling back in the chair. ‘You know—get a fabulous pad at a fraction of the rent.’
She was watching him, blue eyes wide. He liked the way she didn’t fuss with her appearance. Her hair was piled up in a messy bun and he could see a tiny spray of freckles over her nose. No evidence of hours spent in front of the mirror with a make-up brush. He was used to ultra-groomed women, for whom venturing out was all about the way they looked. She was a breath of fresh air.
‘What’s your point?’
‘So how come you’re eating cheese on toast off your lap in the den? The sitting room doesn’t look lived-in, and you didn’t even bag the master bedroom. This is the only room apart from the kitchen that looks like you’ve set foot in it. You are free to use the whole apartment, you know.’
‘Where would you suggest I eat, then?’ she asked. ‘That enormous glass table in your dining room? The one that seats twelve?’ She shrugged. Smiled faintly. ‘I’m not that kind of girl.’ She glanced around. ‘I feel more at home in here. It’s cosy. You can keep your huge lounge with that monster TV.’
He felt another uncomfortable twist of nostalgia as for no reason his childhood home slipped into his mind. Not a glass table in sight back then, and they’d been lucky to have one temperamental old television. But Jen had sparked his interest with her indifference to the luxury trappings of the apartment. If anything it seemed more of an aversion. Yet hadn’t she said her article was something to do with the opulent side of living in South-West London? Time to charm it out of her.
‘Do you want a coffee?’ he asked.
When he came back with two mugs she’d finished her toast. The empty plate was on the table.
‘How was today, then?’ he asked, sitting down. ‘What did you think of La Brasserie?’
She held her cup in both hands, like a child, and smiled up at him.
‘It was amazing,’ she said.
‘Did you get the background you were talking about?’
She shrugged. ‘I got some,’ she said. ‘You should have seen the food! There were things on that menu I’ve never even heard of, let alone tried. And the people were something else. I wanted to get an idea of image, you know? What the young women in the Chelsea set are wearing, how they act.’
Her face became animated as she talked about her project. He felt absurdly touched by her excitement over a restaurant he’d visited more times than he could remember. Over things he no longer noticed.
‘And what did you think?’
‘I think I’ve only seen the tip of the iceberg. I mean, there were quite a few touristy types there, too, but it was still an eye-opener. They’re all so glamorous. Fantastic clothes! One girl had a dog living in her handbag!’
He burst out laughing and she tentatively smiled back. As the blue eyes lit up he realised she was quite stunning. Good thing he had Mark to keep him on task. She could be a serious threat to his newly sworn singledom if he let her.
‘Where do you live usually, then?’ he asked. ‘When you’re not staking out the Chelsea set? I thought it must be somewhere in London—you know, at the journalistic hub?’
Jen paused for a moment to collect her thoughts. It was one thing to share an apartment with the guy, another to start telling him personal stuff. Then again, she could do with some leverage here. This morning’s recce had given her some good ideas about working on her own image—and now she’d got Elsie on board to help with hair and make-up, and hit the online second-hand shops so hard that the thought of it still gave her palpitations.
What she was lacking was information on the type of man she was aiming this image towards. She had no personal experience in that area. Her mother had always avoided talking about her father at all costs, never referring to him without using a variety of colourful expletives. La Brasserie hadn’t really been much help there, either. Wealthy businessmen were apparently too busy making themselves richer to be chilling out in the daytime midweek—no matter how posh the restaurant, and no matter how delicious the food.
Speculate to accumulate. Maybe if she made small talk with Alex she could get some tips out of him and distract herself from the still lingering sense of isolation her afternoon’s research had left her with.
‘I’ve been in London for the last few months, but really I’m from Littleford,’ she said. ‘It’s a small village in the West Country. You won’t have heard of it.’
No one ever had.
‘Not far from Bath?’
‘You’ve been there?’ she said, wondering when the hell he’d have had the need to drop in to a village where the star social attraction of the year was the Farm Festival in July, when everyone got together to admire cows and stuff themselves with local produce.
He shook his head. ‘No, but I know the general area quite well.’
When she looked at him expectantly he added, ‘I grew up in Bristol.’
‘You’re from Bristol?’
‘You make it sound like the moon.’ The green eyes looked mocking. ‘I haven’t always lived like this, you know. My parents are working class. My dad was a lorry driver and my mum was a dinner lady at my school. I could always count on her for extra custard.’
‘Really?’
‘Your surprise could be construed as insulting, you know,’ he said.
‘I guess I just assumed you’d had a … well, a privileged upbringing.’
‘Why? Because someone from my background couldn’t possibly make something of themselves?’ His tone was light, but the eyes had a razor-sharp edge to them.
She backtracked. Hard.
‘I didn’t mean that. It’s just … well, it’s such a glamorous career, what you do. Hollywood, London, Cannes.’
He shook his head.
‘I didn’t have any of that in mind when I started out.’
He took a sip of his coffee. She waited for him to elaborate, but it seemed his own glam world wasn’t as interesting to him as it was to her.
‘What’s Littleford like, then?’ he asked.
‘Quiet. One pub, couple of village shops, church, duck pond,’ she said, trying to fob him off quickly so she could get the subject back on him. ‘So, how did you start out?’
Her plan to pump him for background information on what suits he wore was trampled underfoot by her stampeding curiosity about his childhood. She’d assumed he’d been born to wealthy parents and had had an upbringing involving public school, nannies and a network of contacts that had given him a leg-up until he’d reached the top. Just how wrong had she been?
‘I started out small,’ he said. He looked down at his coffee mug, a smile touching his lips, creasing the corner of his eyes lightly. ‘I guess I just always had big ideas.’
She smiled at that but he shook his head.
‘It wasn’t particularly a good thing. Where I lived you got through school, then you got out and started earning. Big ideas were seen as a waste of time. I had to fight to get my parents onside about going to college. I worked part-time to fund the course, but there was a real sense that I was wasting that money. I was lucky. I had an inspirational tutor and I was determined to succeed. I made a short film. Just a twenty-minute thing I wrote, produced and directed on a minuscule budget. I knew it was good. I believed in it totally.’ He laughed a little. ‘Feature films came much later. Ideas above my station never really went away.’
‘Nothing wrong with that,’ she said. She could definitely relate to it. ‘You don’t get anywhere by sitting around.’
She realised suddenly that she was feeling hugely impressed by him, and quickly reminded herself that he might have made his own wealth but he didn’t seem to be in touch with his roots now. Typical. Get there and never look back. He obviously wasn’t above using his money to ride roughshod over other people now he’d got it.
‘So you live alone?’
He asked the question casually, without meeting her eyes. The kind of question that might be asked on a date. A spark tingled its way up her spine at the thought and she felt mildly ridiculous. The idea that Alex Hammond might be interested in someone like her when he could call up a model at the drop of a hat was ludicrous.
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