Katy Carter Wants a Hero (34 page)

‘We certainly do.’ Gabriel treats the reporter to his one-hundred-watt smile and she swoons. He looks stunning in faded jeans and the softest cashmere sweater the exact hyacinth shade of his eyes. The long corn-coloured curls frame his smooth tanned forehead and brush the sharp planes of his face, the same face that the nation will soon see as a gallant pirate captain. He takes my hand and kisses it. ‘Katy’s an amazing cook.’

Pass the sick bag.

‘She’s also a very gifted writer,’ gushes Gabriel. ‘She’s just completed her first novel.’

‘Writes novels,’ repeats the journalist. ‘Lovely.’

I glance over at the coffee table where my two notebooks nestle between bowls overflowing with fruit and I feel a little gush of pride. In spite of everything — James ripping up the first draft and me having to spend an enormous chunk of my time talking trivia or selling sex toys with Mads — I have actually managed to finish
Heart of the Highwayman
. Inside those books are thousands of words brimming with so much smouldering passion I’m surprised the manuscript doesn’t burst into flames. Just thinking about the final scene when Jake makes love to Millandra on the clifftop makes me go all tingly.

Sadly, it’s the nearest I’ve got to sex for a long time.

‘I’ll have to edit it and find an agent,’ I say, but Gabriel’s moved on from my novel and on to a far more absorbing subject: himself. With a sigh I check my watch, some hideously expensive thing Gabriel insists I wear for show, and discover it’s not even dinnertime.

Time wears concrete boots when you’re a lady of leisure, that’s for sure. It used to race by at Sir Bob’s. Ollie and I used to go for hours without sitting down or even pausing for a coffee, only stopping when we collapsed into the pub at half four.

I catch a glimpse of myself in the enormous mirror that Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen insisted went over the mantel-piece and experience amazement that the woman looking back is really me. Walking up and down all the sodding hills in this village has knocked pounds off me. I shake my head and the sleek-haired girl in the mirror looks sadly back. I’m so miserable. If only I could turn the clock back to the lunch date in Trawlers…

After Ollie left the restaurant I rang him, howling in frustration when his mobile was switched off. When he finally answered he wasn’t in the mood to talk, and every time I tried to explain as best I could about Gabriel he changed the subject.

‘Listen, Katy,’ he said eventually, ‘you really don’t need to explain. I was there after all. You guys looked really happy together. I’m glad for you. I really am.’

‘But it isn’t what you think!’

‘Of course it is. Gabriel Winters is the perfect romantic hero. He’s exactly what you’ve been searching for.’

‘No he isn’t.’

‘It’s OK,’ Ollie said gently. ‘The minute I saw you and Gabriel together, a lot of things fell into place. He’s perfect for you, he can give you exactly what you need.’

‘He can’t! He really can’t!’

‘He can, Katy. He can give you everything you’ve ever dreamed of and I’m really happy for you. You deserve it. You’re perfect together and I’m glad you’ve found him.’

‘If that’s true, why were you in Tregowan? Was it because—’

But Ollie wasn’t prepared to let me finish. ‘Nina and I are really happy too. It’s great, isn’t it, how everything’s worked out for us both?’

‘But I really need to explain. Gabriel and I are just friends.’

There was a long exhalation of breath. ‘Katy, I’ve got eyes in my head, you don’t need to try and spare my feelings. Look. I’ve got to go. Nina’s just pulled up outside. I’d better not keep her waiting. Talk soon.’

‘Please don’t go!’ I begged. ‘Look, I can’t tell you what’s going on, even though I really want to, but please believe me when I say that there really isn’t anything between me and Gabriel. Honestly!’

‘Katy,’ he said in a tight voice that I hardly recognised, ‘please don’t treat me like an idiot. Just concentrate on Gabriel like I’m going to concentrate on Nina and move on. In fact, don’t call for a bit. I think you and I need some space, don’t you?’

‘No, Ollie, I don’t. What the hell for?’

‘Because it’s for the best, Katy. We need to deal with the choices that have been made, stick with them and move on, which means maybe not seeing each other for a while because it makes things easier.’

‘Easier?’ I echoed incredulously. ‘Not for me it doesn’t. It makes everything worse. Why would you even suggest such a bloody stupid idea?’

‘It’s called tough love,’ he said, and I heard a wry smile in his voice. Then the phone went dead, leaving me shaky with misery. I’d let the best friendship of my life slip though my fingers. What was the matter with him? How the hell had it come to this?

I went back to Maddy’s and spent the rest of the afternoon bawling my eyes out and working my way through a family pack of digestives and a bottle of Richard’s whisky. Nothing made any sense and the more I drank the more muddled I felt. I couldn’t believe Ollie would call time on our friendship just because I was seeing Gabriel Winters. He’d never made this kind of fuss about James.

Why had he overreacted in such spectacular fashion? And why was I so upset? If I cried any harder I’d flood the rectory. I blew my nose hard on a bit of kitchen roll and attacked my ninth biscuit. God! I hadn’t been this devastated on the day James threw me out, and we’d been engaged and living together.

Ollie was only a pal, whereas I’d loved James.

Hadn’t I?

And then it hit me, with all the force of a sledgehammer falling out of the sky and landing on my head.

I was in love with Ollie.

What?

How did that happen?

Ollie wasn’t my type.

Ollie was
not
a romantic hero.

But amazingly it seemed this didn’t matter. Abandoning the sodden kitchen roll, I wiped my eyes on my sleeve and contemplated the awful truth. I’d made the stupid mistake of falling in love with my best friend and my timing was crap because he was now engaged to Vile Nina and as far as Ollie and the rest of the world was concerned I was with Gabriel Winters.

I tried to call Ollie back but his phone was switched off, and the following day my romantic tryst with Gabriel was plastered all over the papers. The next time I called, his mobile number was unavailable, and after that it was always Nina who answered the landline and I was pretty sure she never passed on my messages. I even wrote to him, telling him exactly how I felt and how there really wasn’t anything going on with Gabriel.

‘If you don’t believe me then ask Frankie,’ I pleaded in my letter. ‘He won’t like it but he’ll explain everything. But I miss you, Ol, and I need you to know that my feelings for you have changed beyond friendship. If you feel the same then please call me.’

But he never replied and all my emails and texts went unanswered too. Ollie, as he’d promised, had decided to concentrate all his energy on his fiancée and leave me to my romantic hero. I contemplated driving up to London and confronting him, but what would be the point? He’d made his choice and he’d chosen Nina. It was hardly dignified behaviour to start stalking him, was it? Besides, I’d moved to Cornwall to make a new start and to say goodbye to the sappy, passive Katy who only saw herself in terms of the man she was dating. Well, I was through with that version of me.

I would just have to accept Ollie’s decision and move on with my own life.

So, with this thought firmly in mind, I threw myself into the charade with Gabriel, which paid well, enabling me to finish my novel and send Ollie a cheque to pay back what he’d spent on my medical bills. By the end of the summer I had money in the bank, a manuscript to sell and the most coveted wardrobe in south-east Cornwall. But did these things make me happy?

Did they heck.

I sigh. At least my hair looks good. It’s amazing what expensive products can do to a girl. Several appointments at Nicky Clarke and a pair of ghds later and it’s goodbye ginger curls and hello new sleek hair, the same colour and silky texture as Sasha’s coat.

My eyes still well up when I think about Sasha. Why does everything always come back to Ollie? Frankie says he hardly sees his cousin now, which is hardly surprising because since the Screaming Queens were signed, Frankie’s feet have hardly touched the floor. It’s been one promotion after another, and there’s great excitement this week because his first single has just been released. I still think the Queens sound like they’re having their entrails ripped out with cocktail sticks, but hey, what do I know? Everyone else seems to love them.

‘Everything OK, Katy?’ Gabriel’s manager, Seb, materialises at my side.

‘Fine,’ I say. ‘How much longer will this take?’

Seb raises an eyebrow. ‘Not enjoying it?’

This is possibly the understatement of the year. I feel cocooned in misery but at least I’ve had the time and space to finish my book and reassess my life. And I’ve made a few decisions too.

But before I mention any of this to anyone, I need to sort out Mads, who’s convinced Richard is betraying her with some harlot called Isabelle, and who is still selling vibrators the length and breadth of Cornwall. I can’t leave her to self-destruct.

‘I’m going out soon with Maddy,’ I tell Seb. ‘I need to get going.’

‘Celebrating finishing your book?’ He jerks his head towards the notebooks.

‘Something like that,’ I hedge. Actually Mads is taking Throbbing Theo et al. to a hen night over in Bodmin and I’m going to lend moral support. That and boost sales when one of the guests invariably recognises me and wants to buy the same knickers as Gabriel Winters’ girlfriend. Mads’s profits are really up since I became his official consort and she’ll soon be Caribbean-bound.

And I’ll be Prozac-bound if the strain of lying to Richard, the press and the world in general carries on much longer.

‘Katy!’ coos the reporter. ‘Could you join Gabriel on the terrace? We need to have a sunset shot of the two of you gazing into each other’s eyes. To go with you telling the readers how you found your very own romantic hero.’

Do you know, I’m totally off romantic heroes. They all have something wrong with them anyway. Take Gabriel, for instance: he’s so self-absorbed that if you wrung him out he’d just re-form, like that policeman in
The Terminator
. Then there’s gorgeous Guy with his sewer mouth, and even Jake has a propensity for barmaids with heaving bosoms. They’re all a total let-down if you ask me.

I think I’ll write my next novel in a different genre altogether; perhaps a farce, which is what my life resembles lately.

‘You’re late!’ accuses Mads, when I eventually make it to the rectory. ‘I was about to give up on you.’

‘Sorry,’ I call, bounding up the stairs and heading into the minuscule bathroom. ‘
Hiya
! was doing a photoshoot. Let me get this crap off and I’ll give you a hand with the boxes.’

I squirt a generous dollop of cleanser into my palm and then smear it over my face. After several minutes of scrubbing furiously, Clinique’s finest surrenders and I look like me again, albeit a little pinker. I’m just fluffing up my hair when I hear raised voices from downstairs. Sounds like Richard and Mads are rowing again.

‘Don’t deny it’s yours!’ Mads is screeching.

‘OK.’ Richard sounds calmer, but experience tells me that it’s the calm before the storm. ‘It’s mine. Do you have a problem with that?’

‘What do you think?’ Mads cries. ‘I know what this means! You’re seeing that slag, aren’t you?’

I’m halfway down the stairs at this point and I freeze. There’s no way I’m going to interrupt this mother of all rows.

‘Not this again,’ says Richard wearily. ‘I’ve told you, there’s no one else.’

‘So what do you need this for then?’

I’m holding my breath. What on earth has she found?

‘What do you think?’ There’s the sound of movement. ‘I haven’t got the time or the inclination to go through this again, Madeleine. I’ve got to out.’

‘Out! Out! Always out!’ she yells. ‘Where to now?’

‘A prayer meeting,’ Richard says. ‘Where are you going?’

‘A friend’s house, you got a problem with that?’

‘Of course not, it’s just that you seem to be spending an awful lot of time lately at
friends
’ houses.’ He pauses. ‘Are you sure it’s not you having the affair?’

This is horrible. I feel like a child perched on the stairs listening to her parents rowing. Not that I’ve ever heard my parents rowing — they’re normally far too stoned and anti-conflict — but I’ve seen enough clichéd TV dramas to get the picture.

‘That’s right. Turn it round on me! I know you’re seeing some slag, so don’t even try to pretend you’re not. It’s always one
prayer
meeting after another, isn’t it?’

‘I’m a vicar. Of course I go to prayer meetings.’

I shuffle down a few more stairs until I can peek into the kitchen. Mads is standing by the sink with her hands on her hips, cheeks flushed and snaky curls bouncing in outrage. Richard, tall and considerably more muscular lately, has his back to me. I’m almost asphyxiated by the overwhelming waft of Aramis.

‘So why do you need that?’ Mads jabs her finger at the ghetto blaster in Richard’s arms. It’s made from a hideous yellow plastic and looks like the remainder of the Beatles’ submarine after decommissioning. Until I came to the rectory I’d never seen anything like it. It’d probably fetch a fortune on some 1980s’
Antiques Roadshow
special.

‘The Bishop and I thought we’d play some hymns while we pray.’ Rich grabs his jacket from the chair and shrugs himself into it. ‘If that’s OK with you?’

Mads says nothing, but her mouth is pursed tighter than a crab’s bottom.

‘I’ll take that as a yes. Don’t wait up. I’ll be late. Enjoy whatever you’re up to.’ Spinning on his heel, Richard almost knocks me flying. I flatten myself against the wall as he charges past like a human tornado.

All is not well in the house of love.

‘Bastard!’ shrieks Maddy when Richard slams the door. ‘Cheating bastard!’

‘Calm down!’ I beg, not liking the way her knuckles glow chalky white through the flesh or the way her eyes are fever bright. ‘You can’t carry on like this.’