Page 11 of Never Too Late
‘Hasn’t he been playing? Is he out of practice?’
Lottie shook her head. ‘Very much the opposite. He spends hours every day playing his guitar.’ She gave Steph a wry smile. ‘He calls his favourite guitar Clarabelle, and I sometimes feel quite jealous. He spends more time with her than with me.’
‘So why do you think he doesn’t want to join in?’
The smile slipped from Lottie’s face. ‘He’s been that way ever since Vince died. He’s never been able to explain it completely, but I think he feels he was at least partly responsible for Vince’s death – you know, because of the drugs they were taking together – and he can’t handle the idea of the group without Vince in it.’ She glanced around again. ‘The thing is that there was a lot of trouble in the band back then. Keith was throwing his weight around and Ben was close to walking away when Vince killed himself. I sometimes wonder if Ben hadn’t been thinking along the same lines too.’
‘When you say, “throwing his weight around”, what do you mean? Keith seems a pacific sort of guy.’
‘He’s a lot better now, but back then he was a tyrant. He’s ten years older than the others and he thought of himself as the main man, the leader of the group, and he felt he should be making all the decisions and giving the others orders. I’m not saying he was responsible for what Vince did, but his constant shouting at him probably didn’t help.’
‘That’s so awful. So Ben’s worried Keith might start screaming and shouting all over again and that’s why he’s holding back? What a shame. I’m sure he’d enjoy it if he could find the courage to try again.’
‘I know you’re right, but it’s been ten years now and he still hasn’t changed his mind. Mind you, just getting him to agree to come over here now was a major victory and it shows he’s making progress. He and Keith have even been chatting together a bit, so it looks as though they might be getting back to being friends again. Here’s hoping. I know it would do Ben a world of good.’
A few moments later Denver and Willow arrived back from their trip to Florence. He appeared far happier than the previous night, although his girlfriend was still looking daggers at Steph. He came over and bent down to kiss Faye on the cheeks. From the expression of surprise on her face, this wasn’t a common occurrence.
‘Ciao, how’re you doing?’ He was sounding very relaxed, suspiciously relaxed, and the thought crept into Steph’s head that this bonhomie might be chemically induced. She hadn’t seen a single trace of drugs among the group members so far, but her suspicions grew as he came over and hugged Lottie and then did the same to Steph herself. She shied back from his touch and the first thing she saw was Willow, looking as though she was about to launch herself across the table at her. To defuse the situation Steph jumped to her feet and glanced at her watch.
‘Seven o’clock. I told my mum I’d call her. Do excuse me.’ And she hurried out into the sunset and down the steps to the path leading to the beach. When she got there, she perched on the big flat boulder and took a few deep breaths. Two thoughts were going through her head, neither of them welcome.
Uppermost in her mind was the unwanted attention she was receiving from the son of the man who was paying for her to be here. If she were to follow her instincts and tell him to take a hike, this might lead to a major scene, and there might even be a chance that she might find herself on a flight back to London. And the logical corollary to this would be that it might also see her lose the job she loved. Ethan could hardly keep working with Royalty if the ‘right-hand woman’ he was employing was considered persona non grata by them. She groaned to herself as the shadows lengthened and was on the point of phoning her mum to ask for her advice when the sound of splashing attracted her attention. Coming through the water towards her in the twilight were two heads; one canine and one human. As she looked on, two figures emerged from the water, and she gulped.
It wasn’t quite the same as the moment Daniel Craig emerged from the water in whichever Bond film it was, but it was pretty special all the same. As the man walked out of the sea with water streaming down his body, she felt a totally unexpected shiver of attraction. There was something about the sight of this tall, athletic man that reached deep inside her, and it wasn’t a feeling she had ever experienced as forcibly before.
She didn’t have time to let her mind dwell on the implications of this as the Labrador came bounding across the beach towards her, tail wagging furiously. Realising that the dog was as soaking wet as the man, she hastily scrambled up until she was standing on the rock so Waldorf could only prod her feet with his nose, rather than fling himself at her and soak yet another outfit, albeit just shorts and a T-shirt this time.
‘Waldorf, vieni qui!’
The command did the trick and the dog turned away and hurried back to his master who was standing stock still, looking puzzled, midway between the sea and Steph’s boulder, now gripping the excited dog’s collar in one hand and studying her intently. Realising who this man was, even though his face was in the shadows, she scrambled down from her perch on the rock and walked across to greet him.
‘Hi, you must be Robert. My name’s Steph. I’m the recording engineer. We’re here to get your father’s studio working.’ She, too, carefully avoided any mention of a possible new Royalty album. She now knew that this was a taboo subject.
‘Hi.’ Not the longest of utterances but coupled by the touch of his wet fingers as they shook hands, it still succeeded in reproducing that same seismic tremor throughout her body. She found she had to clear her throat before saying anything else.
‘Been for a swim?’ As openers went, this was without doubt one of the more inane, and the moment it popped out she was glad of the shadows to hide her blushes. What on earth was going on inside her? She sounded like a teenager.
‘Yes.’ There was a brief pause before he gave a little wave of the hand. ‘Bye.’
And he and his dog headed off up the path leaving her feeling more confused than she had felt for ages. She was still in a relationship with Ethan and yet she hadn’t been able to suppress a feeling of attraction for this other man. She was going to have to be very careful.
She was still feeling confused an hour later when she returned to the villa for dinner. The others were all already seated around the table and she slipped into the last spare seat, fortunately at the other end, as far away from Denver as possible, although this meant she was alongside Ethan. Johnny and his wife Tara were opposite her and they gave her a smiley welcome. Ethan was clutching a glass in his hand, but she was relieved to see that it contained water this time. He turned his head towards her as she sat down.
‘Did you talk to your mum?’
‘Yes.’ She didn’t tell him what they had talked about. Her doubts about Ethan himself would not make suitable dinner table conversation. ‘She sends her love.’ She hadn’t.
‘Yeah, right…’ Ethan had no illusions. ‘Anyway, listen: Johnny’s been telling me that he and Keith are coming down to the studio tomorrow at ten to lay down a track or two. You’d better be wide awake and bring your A game.’
Biting her tongue to stifle a retort, she smiled sweetly. ‘Yes, boss. Of course.’
Johnny chimed in from across the table. ‘Hey, Steph, Keith tells me you’re a classically trained pianist. That’s great. You’ll have to play us something one of these days.’
She smiled back at him. ‘Not really classically trained, I’m afraid. I did all the piano grades at school and a degree in music, but I’m nothing like concert pianist level. I just don’t have the dedication. I love playing, but I couldn’t imagine a life where I have to sit at a keyboard on my own every day and practise for hours on end, repeating the same stuff over and over again.’
‘Like Rob does.’ Tara looked as if she had caught the sun today. Her face was peppered with freckles and her cheeks were flushed. ‘Faye tells me he practises for hours and hours. In fact, she says if you go down to the beach you can sometimes hear his beautiful violin music coming from his house on the cliff top.’
‘Keith said he was good. Does he play with an orchestra?’
