“How?” Her own frustration was starting to find a voice. “How on earth did you think you were going to sort it out?”
“I don’t know.” He stared down at his lap, defeated.
“And why would you want to do it all alone anyway? I thought we were partners. I thought we trusted each other.”
“We do!” said Henry, but she shook her head angrily.
“Rubbish! You’ve been lying to me since before Christmas. You obviously don’t trust me at all.”
“That’s not true. I never lied to you. I was trying to protect you from all of this.” He reached out and put a hand on her thigh. She didn’t remove it, but still she wouldn’t look at him, biting down on her lip to stop herself from crying as she desperately tried to focus on the traffic in front of her.
“Does Max know?” she asked irrationally. She didn’t know why, but the only thing that could make this worse would be the thought that Henry had confided in somebody else, but not her.
“No. Of course not,” said Henry. “Why would you think that? I’ve hardly spoken to him since Christmas. Besides, he’s totally broke himself, and far too wrapped up in Siena McMahon to listen to my problems. Look, I don’t know what else to say, Muffy,” he pleaded. “I love you, and I’m really, truly sorry that I kept all this from you. But, well, you know now. And we have to make a decision.”
“Oh, it’s we now, is it?” she bit back angrily. She didn’t want to lose her temper with him. She could see he felt dreadful, and she knew that however unjustified his deceitfulness may have been, he had never actually intended to hurt her. But it was all too much to take in. Henry had had weeks, months even, to get used to the idea of losing the farm. And now she was expected to say yea or nay to Ellis’s offer in a matter of minutes.
For the rest of the drive home they sat in stony silence, Henry too guilty and Muffy too upset to initiate any further conversation. Back at Manor Farm, they did their best to be normal and cheerful at supper for the children’s sake. It wasn’t until nine-fifteen that Muffy came downstairs, having finally tucked Charlie into bed, and found Henry staring morosely into a pan of boiling milk on the Aga. She came up behind him and wrapped her arms around his waist, and he turned and hugged her, overwhelmed with relief at this gesture of forgiveness.
“Here, give that to me. It’ll burn.” She lifted the milk pan off the stove and poured it into his waiting mug of chocolate.
“Thanks.” Taking the steaming drink, he sat down at the table, while she automatically squirted some soap into the pan and left it in the sink to soak before coming to join him.
“I’m sorry, Muff,” he said again, burying his head in her neck. She stroked his hair and kissed the top of his head. The kitchen was a mess, full of the detritus of the kids’ earlier painting play, with plates of half-eaten fish sticks and beans littering the table and countertops. Despite this, or perhaps because of it, Muffy looked around the room and felt her heart swelling with a pride bordering on real love. She had redone the kitchen herself over many long years, as the first profits from the farm had begun trickling in. She hadn’t touched the wonderful, time-buckled flagstone floor and the tiny, ill-fitting lead-light windows that had so captivated her when Henry first brought her here, back when his father was still alive. But she had replaced the old man’s ancient death trap of a stove with her beloved Aga, and she and the boys had had great fun helping Henry paint all the cupboards a cheery bright red, now long since faded to the color of unripe cherries. More than any other room, the kitchen made the manor feel like a home. For the last ten years it had been the living, beating heart of the old house. Sitting there now, with Henry, she knew for certain what their decision must be.
“Stop saying sorry,” she whispered. “It sounds so defeatist. This isn’t over yet, you know.”
He pulled back and looked her in the face. “You mean, you think we should turn Ellis down?”
“Of course we’re turning him down,” she said sternly. “That creep will turn this place into a golf course over my dead body. Yours too, I hope.”
Henry put his hand on the back of her neck and pulled her face toward his, kissing her passionately on the mouth. He didn’t think he’d ever loved her more than he did at that moment.
“We’re running out of options though, Muff,” he said gravely when he finally released her. “If we don’t find seven hundred and fifty grand in the next few weeks we’re going to have to sell to someone. And probably for a hell of a lot less than what Gary’s offering.”
“I know,” she said. “I know. Well we’re just going to have to think of something, then. Aren’t we?”
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
Siena was in a fabulous mood.
She stepped out of the Coffee Bean in Brentwood with an iced chai latte in one hand and a freshly baked chocolate muffin in the other and walked across the road to the newsstand.
It was a baking-hot Saturday, and she had a day of pure feminine indulgence planned.
Ines had broken the rule of a lifetime and flown out to L.A. last night for the long weekend, to a rapturous welcome from Siena, who was so delighted to see her old friend that she had even taken pity on her jet lag this morning and allowed her to sleep in while she did the coffee and paper run.
As soon as she had stocked up on all the latest magazines—Ines was an even bigger gossip fiend than Siena—she would go back to Santa Monica and wake her, then drag her off for a day of massages, facials, a long late lunch at the Ivy, and a lot of shopping.
She smiled to herself as she wandered around the newsstand, stocking up on the latest US Weekly, Star, and National Enquirer as well as the more upmarket Hello! and OK! It definitely wouldn’t do to see only one set of grainy pictures of Tom Cruise’s naked butt on a yacht off St. Tropez—she and Ines wanted the whole lot.
But it wasn’t just the perfect summer weather or the prospect of spending the day with her best friend that had put her in such high spirits. The publicity for Daughter had been going fantastically, and both Muller and Marsha were glowingly pleased with her. But better even than that had been the almost unbelievable changes for the better in Max.
For the last few weeks, he had been an absolute angel to her. It was as if someone had waved a magic wand and all of his jealousy and insecurity had disappeared overnight. All of a sudden he was loving and attentive—but never in the annoying lapdog way that her old model boyfriends used to be. It seemed funny now to remember how panicked she’d been when he’d stormed out after that awful fight on the day of her photo shoot with Hunter. How sure she had been that this was the last straw and he was leaving her for good.
Maybe that scare was just what they both needed?
Whatever the reason for Max’s change of heart, Siena felt deliriously happy and more in love with him than ever as she strolled around Brentwood this morning, oblivious for once to the staring and whispering of her fellow shoppers.
What with things being so great with Max, Ines coming to stay, and Tiffany’s temporary absence meaning Siena got Hunter practically all to herself, life at the beach house was like one long, blissful dream at the moment. She was on a real high.
She paid for the magazines and was heading back to her car when her cell phone rang. She looked at the screen, hoping it might be Max or Ines, but it wasn’t. MARSHA CELL flashed annoyingly up at her.
It was the second time her agent had called this morning, but MARSHA CELL could only mean one thing—work—and Siena refused to even think about work today. Just the thought of Marsha’s insistent, bossy British voice was already causing a small cloud to form on her mental horizon. She switched her phone off. The poison dwarf could damn well wait.
Clambering up into Hunter’s new Navigator—her brand-new Jag was already in the shop, following an encounter with a killer olive tree in Dierk Muller’s driveway last week—she pulled out of the Coffee Bean parking lot and onto San Vicente. She had the radio tuned to KZLA, Hunter’s favorite country station, and Toby Keith was
belting out “Shoulda Been a Cowboy,” one of her all-time favorites, in his sexy southern accent. Siena joined in tunelessly, tapping the steering wheel as she sang along.
She had put down all the windows, letting the warm summer air rush into the car while the music roared out so loudly that the joggers all turned around to stare. She loved the lyrics, although they described a world she knew nothing about: campfires and six-shooters and cattle drives. The song made her think of Duke, and of the old cowboy poster of him she used to have up in her room at Hancock Park. She wondered what Grandpa would have made of The Prodigal Daughter and Dierk Muller. He probably would have thought both the movie and the director were too arty and pretentious. “Art” was always a dirty word to Duke.
But she was sure he would also have been proud of her for what she had achieved. For making her own fame and fortune, for getting back here and into the business and putting one over on her stupid fucking father. Just remembering Pete’s existence caused a knot to form in her chest. She wished she didn’t care about her parents at all, that she could just block them out the way they seemed to have done so effortlessly with her. Why was it always when she was at her happiest that the bad memories forced their way back into her consciousness?
Anxious to recapture her good mood, she reached across to the passenger seat and picked up one of the magazines, glancing at it idly while she drove along. It was The National Enquirer, the most sensational gossip rag of them all, and Siena’s closet favorite. A brand-new edition, too, out today, so she and Ines got to catch up on all the Hollywood scandal before anyone else.
At first she thought she must have misread the headline. It was above a blurred, slightly grainy photograph that she didn’t recognize as herself. Slowing for a red light, she put the car into park and stared at the front page for a closer look.
Oh my God. No.
She felt her heart pounding and the bile rising in her stomach. The front cover was indeed a picture of her, and not just any picture.
She was hanging topless from the tree at the beach house, with an openmouthed camera crew at her feet. It had evidently been taken with a long-range paparazzi lens. In the background, the blurred figure of Max, his features barely discernible from the distance, had been circled in red. The headline read:
SIENA MCMAHON: CHEATING LOVER SEES RED OVER TOPLESS PICS.
Numb with shock, Siena flipped through the magazine looking for the story. It didn’t take her long.
There, on pages four and five, was a full-length photo of an identikit blond swimsuit model, apparently named Camille Andrews, superimposed next to a picture of Max in black tie, taken at the Emmys two years ago with Hunter.
Siena started to read, but she could barely take it in:
“‘He told me he was a producer,’ said stunning Camille from Texas, who works part-time at Hollywood’s trendy Sky Bar. ‘It wasn’t until after we’d made love twice that I learned he had a girlfriend. I felt so used.’”
Siena wanted to stop reading, but the words kept drawing her in, like some kind of evil force field, and she couldn’t tear her eyes away.
“‘Max was only an average lover,’ the girl went on. ‘But what he lacked in skill, he sure made up for in enthusiasm.’”
Bitch, thought Siena irrationally. Max could fuck in the Olympics when he was with her. It wasn’t any wonder he wasn’t inspired by that cheap, hard-faced little whore. She stared at the picture of Max, all messy hair, broken nose, and huge, honest smile, his eyes crinkled up into nothing with merriment, as if willing him to jump off the page and tell her it wasn’t true.
It couldn’t be true.
Not Max. Not decent, solid, honest, true Max, her rock, her soul mate. He would never do that to her.
He couldn’t.
She dimly became aware of horns honking at her from all sides, of angry drivers yelling and overtaking her, flashing their lights and shaking their fists. The light must have turned green. On autopilot, she put the Navigator into drive and lurched forward, the article still clenched tightly in her right hand.
The truck had hit her before she’d had time to blink.
Her first awful thought as she reemerged groggily into consciousness was that she was back at school in England. The stark white walls, the gloomy semi-darkness from the partially drawn curtains, and the faint smell of disinfectant all stirred unpleasant memories of St. Xavier’s.
“Sister Mark?” she mumbled as a female figure in white uniform loomed into view.
“Well, hello again,” said the figure, smiling broadly.
As the woman got closer, Siena noticed that she was Asian with a lovely, gentle face. Definitely not her old headmistress, then. She was young, probably about Siena’s own age, and wore a badge that announced her name was Joyce Chan.
“Do you know where you are, Siena?”
She tried to nod but found her head and neck hurt when she started to move. “Yeah,” she said. Her voice sounded unusually hoarse and dry. “Hospital. I guess.”
“That’s right,” said Joyce, filling a glass of water and holding it to Siena’s lips. “You had a nasty accident, but you were very lucky. You’re going to be just fine.”
“Ah, Miss McMahon. Welcome back to the land of the living.”
A strikingly handsome man in his early forties had entered the room and was walking purposefully toward her. He wore a white coat and a stethoscope around his shoulders and looked more like a heartthrob soap actor playing a doctor than the real thing, all white teeth and tan.
Joyce stepped back respectfully as he approached the bed.
“How’s our patient doing, Nurse Chan?” he asked, picking up the clipboard of notes fastened to the end of Siena’s bed.
“She opened her eyes a few moments ago,” said the nurse, and added with a smile, “she looks great, though.” Siena smiled back.
“I’m Dr. Delaney,” said the soap star, perching on the edge of the bed and taking Siena’s hand in his. It was the first time she noticed there was a drip feeding something into her veins. “Are you up to it if I ask you a few questions, my dear?”
“Sure,” she said. “My head hurts a little, but I feel fine. What’s this?” She gestured to the needle protruding from the back of her hand.
“Don’t worry about that,” said the doctor briskly. “It’s just a little bit of painkiller, for the bruising. I’m more concerned about your head right now. How much do you remember of what happened to you this morning, Siena?”
This morning? So she’d only been out for a few hours. Well, that was good at least. Hopefully it meant her injuries couldn’t be too serious. Thoughts and questions swirled around in her head as she tried to piece together a coherent chain of events from the blurred fragments of memory. It was difficult.
“Take your time,” said Dr. Delaney.
“Well, I was in the car,” she began. He nodded encouragingly. “I was going home, I think. Yes, that’s right, I was going to see Ines, she’s here for the weekend.”
The doctor watched his patient smile, pleased and relieved that things were falling back into place. Her right eye, cheek, and temple were severely bruised, and she had cracked two ribs, but she still somehow managed to look incredibly desirable, propped up on the hospital pillows with one smooth white shoulder slipping tantalizingly out of her regulation white nightgown.
Adorable.
If he weren’t here in a professional capacity, he probably would have made a play for her.
Sadly, though, she was his patient, and a very lucky patient at that. He would run a brain scan on her later, but apart from a mild concussion and the rib injuries, she appeared to be fine. Given that her SUV had been crushed like a Coke can, that was a minor miracle.
“Oh!” Siena’s hand flew to her mouth in shock, and she started trembling.
Here we go, thought the doctor. He squeezed her hand as tightly as professional ethics would allow.
“I remember. I remember what happened now. It was because . . .” H
er voice trailed off, and he could see she was fighting back tears and in deep distress.
“I read something,” she said at last. “It gave me a shock, and, and, the lights changed.” She was crying openly now, tears streaming down her bruised and swollen cheeks. “I guess I must have pulled out suddenly or something, I don’t know. And that was it.”
“It’s all right, my dear,” he said gently, “you’ve done very well. It’s wonderful that you can remember. It means you’re on the mend.”
He already knew what it was that had given Siena the shock. The paramedics had found her with the paper still clenched in her hands. This being Hollywood, juicy stories had a habit of leaking out, and a growing swarm of press was already gathering outside the hospital gates, hoping for a statement or, better still, a picture of their heartbroken heroine after her brush with death.
Suddenly he felt a wave of compassion for Siena. Fame and fortune weren’t always as great as they were cracked up to be. Poor girl. She was obviously terribly upset about her boyfriend. Fella must have been crazy to cheat on someone so beautiful and vulnerable, and so obviously madly in love with him. With difficulty, he resisted the desire to take Siena in his arms and comfort her.
“Was anyone else hurt?” Siena asked, dragging her thoughts away for a moment from Max’s betrayal and shattering Dr. Delaney’s lustful reverie. “Oh God, I didn’t kill anyone, did I?” She sounded quite panicked.
“No, no, nothing like that,” he assured her. “You were lucky you weren’t killed yourself, though.” Siena looked dazed. “Really. Reading and driving at the same time isn’t the smartest of ideas,” he chided her gently. “Your car was totaled.”
“My car, you mean.”
Hunter, weighed down with a huge bunch of red and white roses, appeared in the doorway. His beautiful features clouded over when he saw Siena’s battered and tear-stained face. Dropping the flowers, he showed none of Dr. Delaney’s compunction and ran over to take her in his arms.