Obsession (82 page)

‘It’s all right,’ Corrie whispered. ‘Cristos, please, it’s all right. I want you too. I want you very much.’

‘Are you sure? Oh, God, Corrie, I don’t want to force you …’

‘Sssh,’ she said, putting her fingers over his lips. ‘Do you think I’d have got into bed like this if I wasn’t sure? So why don’t you undress too?’

They made love with such searing tenderness, holding one another so close and never parting for a moment, that by the time it was over both had tears on their cheeks.

‘God, I missed you,’ Cristos murmured, his lips still on hers.

‘I missed you too.’

‘Do you feel OK?’

‘What do you think?’

He chuckled softly. ‘You feel great to me,’ and rolling onto his back he pulled her with him.

When finally she slept, her head on his chest and her legs entwined with his, Cristos lay awake for a long time, wanting to be there if the nightmares came. But they didn’t, and eventually he too fell asleep.

In the morning when he woke Corrie was sitting on the window seat looking out at the garden. He watched her for a while feeling all the pain that she did at what he knew was running through her mind. He wanted more than anything to put it off, to pretend that everything could go
back
to the way it was, but it couldn’t. Last night had shown them both how desperately they still wanted each other, how very deeply their love ran and how much they needed to be together. But seeing Siobhan had shown them – had shown him, because Corrie had already known – why it just wasn’t going to be possible.

Eventually she turned to look at him and smiled with such sadness that he turned away. But there was no point in hiding from it, they had to face it, so getting out of bed, he pulled on his jeans and a shirt and went to stand behind her.

‘You ready to talk?’ he said, as she leaned back against him and he ran his hands over her shoulders.

‘I don’t know that I’ll ever be ready for this,’ she answered, turning her face to kiss his hand. ‘Do you know what I’m going to say?’

‘I guess.’

‘My father told you that he’s handing TW over to me and Annalise?’

Cristos nodded.

‘Of course neither of us is experienced enough actually to run it, particularly me, so Bob, the exec. producer, will manage things until we’re ready to take over.’

‘Sounds reasonable,’ Cristos remarked. Then, ‘Looks like you got a great future ahead of you. Head of your own TV company.’

‘Yes,’ Corrie sighed. ‘Beyond my wildest dreams. Or perhaps it was my wildest dream.’

Cristos turned away and went to sit on the bed. He watched Corrie until finally she turned to face him. ‘You’re going to do something about Siobhan’s life, am I right?’ he said.

Her eyes fell to the floor. ‘Cristos, you saw her,’ she said. ‘You saw what damage has been done to her. I know there’s nothing I can do to change that, but there is something I can do to help the thousands upon thousands of children
who
right now, even as we speak, are undergoing some kind of abuse at the hands of an adult. I have to make people understand, to show them that every child in the world needs their protection, whether we are parents ourselves or not. We can’t just sit by and pretend it’s not happening. It is, and the repercussions go on and on, throughout their lives and into future generations. Phillip and I have been talking this over for weeks, ever since we were in France. We’ve discussed it with Annalise now too, and she’s willing for the whole story to be told. Even her own mother’s part in it. Of course it’ll stop Octavia’s blackmail …’ Corrie gave a dry laugh. ‘Phillip told Octavia the last time he saw her that she had more to fear from me than either him or Annalise. She didn’t know what he was talking about then, but she’ll find out soon enough. Not that revenge on Octavia is either of our motives, but the exposure will ruin her completely. Annalise doesn’t want to be involved in the making of the programme, right now she’s saying that she wants no more involvement with TV ever. Maybe she’ll change her mind one day, but until then it’s up to me. And this is something I have to do, Cristos, you must see that. If I don’t then Luke’s death, the horrible tragedy of his and Siobhan’s lives, will have been in vain.’

Cristos stood up and went to her. She looked up at him as he ran his fingers over her cheek. ‘So what you’re trying to tell me is that there’s no room in your life for us?’

‘Oh no, please, don’t put it like that. It’s just that I can’t come to Los Angeles. I have to be here for Annalise, and to try to make some sense of this Godawful mess.’

‘So this is goodbye?’

Corrie closed her eyes. ‘Please try to understand,’ she begged him.

‘I do,’ he said. Then kissing her gently on the forehead he turned away and started packing up his things.

When he had gone Corrie was inconsolable. Paula tried
to
comfort her, but neither of them could say if Corrie had made the right decision. All Corrie knew was that she would never, not ever, forget the look in his eyes when he’d turned away.

– 32 –

PHILLIP, CORRIE AND
Annalise had been at the Secret Harbour Hotel in Grenada for just over two weeks. It was one of the island’s more exclusive hotels, sprawling across the hillside on one side of the horse shoe bay looking out on yachts of all shapes and sizes which sailed in and out of the moorings each day. The swimming pool, where they were relaxing now, was in front of the huge Italian-style villa which housed the hotel’s restaurant and bar at the top of the hill. Below the pool were the hotel rooms, each like a small villa with their own half-moon terraces jutting out over the sea.

Corrie and Annalise were both in their bikinis, Phillip was sitting beside them under an umbrella reading the paper, Annalise was stretched out in the sun, but Corrie was sitting up, hugging her knees and staring down at yet another luxurious yacht as it inched its way into the harbour.

After a while Phillip put his paper down and looked across at Corrie. Annalise glanced up at him then she too looked at Corrie.

‘Corrie,’ Phillip said, sensing her pain as though it were a nimbus surrounding her, ‘there’s no point in trying to fool yourself any longer, sweetheart. You didn’t …’

‘Please, don’t let’s go over it again,’ Corrie groaned, burying her face in her arms. ‘It’s done now, so let’s leave it.’

‘No, we won’t leave it,’ he said firmly. ‘I’ve been
thinking,
and maybe there is a way you can be with him and still do all you want to do.’

‘How? I want to make that programme, more than anything else, I want to make that programme.’

‘More than you want Cristos?’

Corrie shook her head.

Annalise looked up at her father, and reading her expression he said, ‘I’m going to take a shower, you two talk.’

‘Corrie,’ Annalise said when Phillip had gone, ‘Daddy and I have been talking about this a lot and we think that you feel obligated to make the programme because of us. But you don’t have to, really you don’t.’

Corrie shook her head. ‘I do. I can’t run away from it, Annalise, and pretend it never happened. Luke wanted me to help him …’

‘But Luke’s dead, Corrie. Nothing you do can change that.’

‘Siobhan isn’t dead though, is she? And how many more children are there out there suffering the way she did?’

‘A lot, I know. But you’re suffering too. And so is Cristos …’

‘Oh Annalise, I never told him I loved him. I should have told him. I should have …’

‘Corrie stop doing this to yourself and work out a way to be with him.’

‘I’ve been trying to do that ever since he left, and maybe …’ she looked at Annalise, then turned away.

‘And maybe?’ Annalise prompted.

‘Nothing.’ She didn’t want to tell Annalise that she had worked out a way. That she could go to him and do all that she wanted to do, but it would mean leaving Annalise and Phillip. ‘Phillip said just now that he’d thought of a way,’ she said. ‘Do you know what it is?’

Annalise smiled. ‘I’ll let him tell you.’

Much later in the day they were sitting on Phillip’s
balcony
sipping cocktails. Phillip and Annalise had just returned from a walk, while Corrie had spent the afternoon alone writing a letter to Cristos she knew she would never send. But writing what she felt in her heart helped her to feel close to him, as though she was speaking to him. She knew she was tormenting herself imagining his responses, but she couldn’t stop herself doing it.

‘So,’ Phillip said, watching her as she twirled the paper umbrella in her drink, ‘tell me what’s on your mind, what it is you really want to do.’

‘I can’t,’ Corrie answered. ‘But I thought you had something to tell me.’

‘Yes, I do,’ he said.

Corrie looked at him from the corner of her eye then continued to fiddle with the umbrella.

‘I am thinking,’ Phillip said, ‘that you have worked out a way to make this programme and be with Cristos, but it will mean going to America and you don’t want to say goodbye to Annalise and me when we’ve only just come together. Am I right?’

Corrie glanced over at him and he smiled.

‘Well, Hollywood’s not so far,’ he said. ‘And we’d both much rather you were there and happy, than with us and miserable, isn’t that right, Annalise? And though it might pain you to hear it, TW would survive without you, you know.’

Corrie looked at them, and slowly a smile started to spread across her face. ‘You two really have been talking, haven’t you?’ she said.

Annalise and Phillip exchanged the kind of looks that to Corrie’s astute mind spoke volumes. ‘If only you knew,’ Annalise laughed.

‘So does this make it easier for you?’ Phillip said.

‘I guess it does,’ Corrie answered. ‘But we have to talk about it some more. I mean …’

‘There’s nothing to talk about, darling. At least not with us. It’s Cristos you must talk to.’

Corrie looked at him for a long moment, then suddenly she was on her feet, throwing her arms around him. ‘Oh Dad!’ she cried. ‘I do love him, really I do.’

‘I know you do, darling.’

There were tears on his cheeks when she pulled away. ‘It’s worth giving you up to him just to hear you call me Dad,’ he said.

‘Dad! Dad, Dad, Dad!’ she cried. ‘You’re the most wonderful dad in the world. Now, are you sure you don’t mind me going?’

‘Quite sure.’

‘Then if it’s all right with you I’m going to call him now.’

‘It’s all right with me, but if I were you …’ Phillip began, but Corrie had already run around the side of the villa heading off to her own next door.

Jeannie and Richard were in the bedroom of their Sherman Oaks home, packing – and fighting. As fast as Jeannie put things into the suitcase Richard was throwing them out, telling her she didn’t need them.

‘I know you don’t like flying,’ Jeannie was saying, ‘but you got yourself across to France all right, so now you’re gonna just have to … Hey! I want that hat,’ she cried, catching it as Richard flung it across the room, ‘it’s my lucky hat.’

‘Like your lucky dress, lucky shoes and lucky panties. Why do you need lucky panties? Who are you planning … Take it out, Jeannie. You’re not leaving any room for my stuff, and get the phone.’

‘I’m still watching you,’ Jeannie warned as she leaned across the bed to the telephone. ‘And put that hat back. Hello,’ she barked into the receiver.

‘Jeannie! It’s Corrie! I’ve tried all Cristos’s numbers and I couldn’t get him. Do you know where he is?’

Jeannie spun round to look at Richard. ‘Um, uh, hang on a minute,’ she said, and putting her hand over the mouthpiece she hissed, ‘It’s Corrie. She’s looking for Cristos. What do I tell her?’

‘What he told you to tell her if she called,’ Richard answered simply. Then seeing his wife’s distraught face, and realizing he was being far too casual about something so important, he got up from the floor and took the phone from her. ‘I’ll handle it,’ he said. ‘And don’t go near that suitcase. Corrie? Hi, it’s Richard. You’re looking for Cristos Jeannie told me.’

‘Yes, that’s right. Do you know where I can find him?’

‘Well, yeah, I do, but I can’t tell you I’m afraid.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Well, he’s like gone away. I mean, he’s still here in LA, but he’s not at his home. And he’s kind of left instructions to say that he didn’t want to talk to anyone …’ He paused and winced, ‘Most of all you.’

‘Oh no!’ Corrie cried. ‘Oh God, what am I going to do? Are you in contact with him?’

‘Kind of.’

‘Then give him a message from me, please. Tell him that I’ve changed my mind. That I want to be with him. That I’ll leave England … Tell him I love him. Please Richard, would you do that for me?’

‘Sure, OK, I’ll tell him, but I don’t …’ He looked at the receiver. ‘She’s rung off,’ he said.

Corrie was marching about her room. She wanted to cry but wouldn’t let herself. She had to think, but all that was going through her mind was how much she must have hurt him for him to have shut himself away the way he had. She so desperately wanted to make it up to him now, but what could she do? Perhaps she should just get on a plane
to
LA. But no, if he didn’t want to see her then there would be no way of finding him. Maybe, once Richard had given him the message he’d call.

The next morning Corrie was in the shower when the telephone rang. She bumped her shoulder on the bed post, stubbed her toe on her suitcase and tripped over the towel in her haste to get to the phone.

‘Am I speaking to Corrie Browne?’ said the voice at the other end.

‘Cristos!’ she cried. ‘Oh Cristos! Did you speak to Richard?’

‘Yeah, I spoke to Richard.’

‘Then you know. You know that …’

‘Yeah, I know.’

‘Do you want to see me?’

‘Sure I do.’

‘Then I’m coming right there. I’ll get the next flight out, I’ll be there as quick as I can. And Cristos, Cristos, I … No, I’ll tell you when I get there.’ She rang off and started flying about the room stuffing things into her suitcase. She took her sarong and wrapped it around her, there was no time to dress. Then she remembered she had to book a flight. She got on the phone to reception, asked them to handle it, then heaved her case from the bed and dragged it out onto the balcony.