Love Lies (13 page)

24. Fern

I wake up feeling slightly queasy. I can’t work out if it’s the effects of the champagne I consumed last night or the anticipation of seeing Scott again. I dismiss the idea that it might be guilt or regret that yesterday I finished my relationship with Adam. I shower and dress in virtual silence; I don’t want to wake Jess or Adam – I can’t face either of them. I know I promised Adam that we’d talk in the morning but now the morning is here I don’t think I have anything else to say to him. I just want to get out of the flat and as far away as possible without another draining encounter. As I pick up my mobile I’m delighted to find a text in my inbox to tell me that the car is outside.

I spot the Merc with tinted windows that dropped me at home yesterday and fling myself into the car with the same relief as a robber diving into a getaway car after a heist.

‘Morning, gorgeous.’

His flat northern tones, truly music to my ears, cause me to jump a foot into the sky.

‘Jesus, you scared me. I didn’t expect you –’

He cuts me short by leaning over and kissing me firmly on the lips. It’s a good kiss. Fabulous actually, as you’d expect. He’s practised more than most. The kiss is lingering but still. It is a warm kiss that is full of purpose and implication. His lips are firm and tender. Smooth, warm, clear. We fit. We both keep our eyes wide open to see what effect we have on one another. It’s devastating. Our first kiss.

‘I didn’t expect you,’ I mutter when we finally – achingly – pull apart.

‘You should have seen me coming, baby,’ he says, quietly.

‘Yes, I should have.’

‘I’m right on time.’ He moves some hair from out of my eyes and tucks it behind my ear. It’s a gesture which seems more caring and intimate than some of the sex I’ve had in the past.

‘I think you are,’ I murmur.

I also think we are talking about more than one sort of pick-up. I should have seen him coming; well, if not sex god, music icon Scottie Taylor exactly, then at least I should have seen the fact that someone was going to snatch me from the jaws of the routine romance I was having with Adam. And Scott is in the nick of time. If he hadn’t come along when he did I’d still be relentlessly pursuing a proposal from Adam; a proposal Adam clearly doesn’t want to offer up. How could I have thought that route would lead to anything other than heartache?

But where is this thing with Scott leading?

I didn’t sleep well last night, I wrestled with my conscience, heart and the facts, in an attempt to understand where I’ll be dropped after this whirlwind passes through town. I wasn’t kidding when I told Jess that I think I am falling in love with Scott. Of course I bloody am; I’m only human. But what about him? What does he feel and where does he think this is going? A quick dash around the duck-down duvet? Or more? I have no idea if I can realistically expect this to go anywhere at all but I do know that I am absolutely powerless to resist the momentum. I am not vain, naive or even just plain dumb enough to count on the idea that Scott might feel the same about me as I feel about him and yet… I can’t help but harbour the smallest hope that he might feel something out of the ordinary. All this that I’m feeling can’t be one way. It’s too profound. I need to go where the flow takes me. I only hope it flows into an enormous ocean of possibility and not down some filthy sewer of disappointment.

‘I want to see your flower shop,’ says Scott, interrupting my ever-decreasing circles of reason. I don’t mind, my reason crumbles into longing far too easily anyhow. I’m happy to be distracted.

‘It’s closed on a Sunday. It won’t look as lovely as it usually does,’ I warn him.

‘But it will be private,’ he grins.

The word private has exactly the same effect on me as if he were inching down my knickers with his teeth.

During the week Ben’s B&B is one of the most beautiful flower shops in London. I know there’s a serious possibility I’m biased but I think I can safely claim as much. It’s quite small, situated on the corner of a short string of shops, but you can normally spot it at a distance because of the large, over-hanging, stripy orange and pink canvas. This offers year-round shade and shelter to the buckets of various blooms that spill out of the shop and on to the street. It’s a riot of colour. Today it will look less impressive. The canvas will be tied back and the empty aluminium buckets will be stacked inside the shop. Rather than vibrancy and cheer I’m expecting tumbleweed. But, as Scott pointed out, it’s somewhere private we can go. Obviously I can’t invite him back to my flat, for a chat or a coffee (read – damn good seeing to – all I can think of since his lips touched mine). I understand his place is surrounded by press twenty-four-seven, and so that’s out of the question. We’re never alone at the stadium and if we did just want to chat and drink coffee and we nipped to the local coffee shop we’d be mobbed by every woman and girl in the neighbourhood. My florist, even if likely to be bare and damp on a Sunday, is our best option.

The shop keys are on the same ring as the keys to my flat. I dig them out of my bag and dangle them in front of Scott. He treats me to another wide, sexy grin.

‘Let’s go.’

It takes about a minute to get to the shop, as it’s just around the corner from my home.

‘Bloody hell, look, the canopy is down. That Saturday girl is hopeless. She should have tied that back last night. If it had rained heavily it might have been damaged,’ I grumble. ‘Ben left her to lock up as he was rushing to your gig.’ As the car starts to slow I take another glance. ‘The buckets – the flowers –’

I don’t understand. The shop must be open. The buckets are all over the pavement as usual. Although, not as usual. It’s Sunday. Plus there are more buckets than normal and instead of them being full of various blooms – roses, tulips, chrysanthemums – there are only peonies. Big, fat pink peonies. My very favourite flower, as I told Scott only yesterday. Peonies range from red to white or yellow but I love the pale pink peony that reminds me of a ballerina’s classic tutu. They have compound, deeply lobed leaves, long stems and large, fragrant flowers. They are beautiful.

Not quite understanding what’s going on, I clamber out of the car. I turn to Scott; he’s grinning like a cat that’s just eaten a canary. He dangles another set of keys back at me; I immediately recognize the glittery heart-shaped key-ring as Ben’s.

Scott opens the door and we squeeze into the shop. B&B is a small establishment, and today space is at a particular premium as the store is rammed with bucket, after bucket, after vase, after vase, of stunning peonies. I gasp and am bathed in their particular perfume, heady, excessive, tantalizing. I have been plunged into my very own paradise, my very own Garden of Eden. The dank sweetness seduces me.

‘Did you arrange all of this?’ I turn around and around, bewildered but trying to make sense of the excess and beauty.

‘Ben was a fantastic help,’ says Scott with a modest shrug.

‘But, how? I didn’t know you even knew Ben.’

‘There’s always a way. I had the idea and I arranged it via my driver last night. After he’d dropped off you and your mate at your place he got me on the phone and I talked to Ben. He was really gracious,’ says Scott with a shy and self-effacing smile. ‘I explained to him that I couldn’t send a florist a mere bunch of flowers and yet how could I possibly court a florist if I didn’t acknowledge flowers. He understood my dilemma.’

And fell for his charm, clearly. ‘Court’ – what sort of word is that for any self-respecting rock star to use? A cleverly chosen one, that’s what it is. The perfect word to woo Ben, a lonely pseudo-cynic who is secretly harbouring a deep longing for someone to prove romance is not dead. I stare at Scott with genuine admiration. He’s a bright man, there’s no doubt – a force to be reckoned with. Someone who knows what he wants and how to get it. In my book, there’s nothing sexier.

Enough chat.

I beam at Scott and then hurl myself at him. The relief. I leap into his strong arms and wrap my legs around his waist. He clasps hold of my bum and hoists me high and close. He slams me against the counter near the till, almost upsetting a vase as he urgently and repeatedly kisses me. I kiss back, just as hungrily. My hands discover his body, it’s hard and solid and totally man. There is no shyness or false modesty. We cling to one another, cleave as though we share a life source. He perches me on the counter and inches me out of my light jacket. The cool, damp air of the shop caresses me. The jacket drops to the floor, in a heap, I don’t care that I spent an age ironing it this morning. I only did it to impress him and by the way he’s eating my face, I’d say job done.

I hurriedly flick off my shoes; my toes jiggle their own little dance. I’d had them freshly manicured with a ruby red paint just before my birthday – a rare treat and well worth every penny, since Scott has dropped to his knees and is sucking my toes. His kisses trail up my calves and linger on my knees; every one of them causes me to moan and slither. He gently, but firmly, pushes my thighs apart. His kisses are precise, bottomless, alert, inquisitive. I wonder how far up my legs those kisses are going to trail. He’s still at my knees; I silently urge him, another inch, another inch, higher, higher. But then he changes focus. He stands up and kisses my neck, my collarbone. He inches open my shirt and kisses my throat and shoulders. He kisses my cheeks, my jaw and hair, my eyelids, my eyebrows and my nose. I kiss him too, and lick and taste and devour. I want him. I want him now. Hard and fast. And now. His body is leaning close into mine and it’s scalding me with desire, the like of which I just haven’t come across before. I will him to inch his hand up my skirt. To plunge his fingers into me. More than his fingers. That will do to start with but I want him to sink his cock deep inside me too. It’s all I want. All I need.

I scramble for his fly.

‘No.’

No? Did he just say no? Scott jumps away from me. His breathing is heavy. I’m actually panting – it’s embarrassing – especially as he is shaking his head and he’s just said no. No what. No nookie? Please God, anything but that.

‘Wait.’

Wait is better. Better than no.

Scott closes and locks the door of the store. Just as he pulls down the blinds I see Bob take up guard outside.

‘Someone might have followed us,’ explains Scott. ‘I don’t think so. We were really careful but the rat pack can scurry into the most surprising places. You don’t need your bare arse plastered across the tabloids tomorrow.’

No I don’t. I rather liked the reference to the ‘elegant, mystery girl’ in the Mirror yesterday but I’m significantly less keen on the idea of encountering a headline like ‘Floozy found frolicking in flora’ or anything similarly dripping in attention-grabbing alliteration. My mum definitely wouldn’t like it. The mention of the door-stepping tabloid journalists has the same effect as an icy shower. Even with the blinds pulled we don’t re-launch ourselves at one another. A gentle silence falls between us but happily it’s not an embarrassed silence, it’s quite calm and comfortable.

Scott wrinkles his forehead and then runs his fingers through his hair. His simple gesture grabs me between the legs. He’s a moving icon. I still can’t quite believe it. I’m sat spreadeagled on the counter of Ben’s B&B, panting from the exertions of a pre-lim, pash-sess, with one of the undisputed sex gods of the twenty-first century. How can something this amazing be happening to me? And hallelujah that it is.

‘Have you had breakfast?’ he asks tentatively.

‘No, haven’t been able to –’

‘Eat. Me neither.’ He grins at his confession that I’ve somehow disturbed him too. I’m delighted. I want to kiss him again. Kiss him and never stop.

‘But now I’m ravenous,’ I admit.

‘Got just the thing for that.’

Scott nips into the back room where we do all our paperwork and make cups of tea. The room is not much larger than the average woman’s wardrobe, and in terms of sustenance the best he can hope to rustle up is a couple of mouldy custard creams. The Saturday girl will have polished off the chocolate Hobnobs yesterday, as she does every week.

Scott returns carrying a tray laden with breakfast goodies: a flask of coffee, enormous croissants, orange juice with bits floating (suggesting freshly squeezed – rather than past its sell-by date, which is what floaty bits would suggest in our flat). There’s a bowl of Greek yogurt, a small jug of honey and an enormous bowl of plump, ripe strawberries.

I think of Adam’s tray of toast and coco pops – limp by comparison.

‘Just a little something I prepared earlier,’ he grins, self-consciously. ‘Fern, tell me, am I trying too hard?’ He glances around the shop, stuffed full of my favourite flowers. My eyes meet his searing green ones as he gives a cheeky wink.

‘Yeah, you are,’ I giggle.

‘Coming on a bit too strong?’

‘Yeah,’ I laugh now. ‘It’s really off-putting,’ I joke.

‘Not the moment to pull out a wedding ring then? Or reveal the vicar I’ve hidden behind the foliage, come to that?’ he asks.

I know he’s just messing around. But my heart literally leaps into my mouth and I find it impossible to swallow. Oh God, the horrible irony of that. Imagine if I were to choke to death on my own happiness in this, my perfect moment.

I get a chance to pull myself together as he sets the tray on the floor. He produces (seemingly from nowhere, but actually from the trunk of the Merc) a beige cashmere picnic rug and matching scatter cushions. We flop on to them. I lie on my back and he feeds me strawberries and I know with every single fibre of my body that life will never be sweeter.

25. Fern

By the time the croissants and strawberries have been eaten and the coffee has gone cold, neither of us is wearing much. Quelle surprise. He’s in jeans, but once again he’s revealing his tip-top chest, and I’m in just bra and knickers (revealing my best-if-I-breathe-in-and-lie-at-a-funny-angle bod). Our clothes didn’t come off in a mad passionate frenzy but – a little like when we were playing poker – we indulged in a slow, tantalizing striptease.

I barely noticed him undo the buttons on my shirt and I hardly registered the soft slither of fabric as my skirt fell down my legs. It was almost as if when his fingers fluttered across my shoulders and neck the buttons sprang open of their own accord. And, as he gently stroked my back, my shirt pretty much spontaneously combusted. As he touched my waist and dwelt on my thighs my skirt ran for the hills. It’s odd; while I know he’s practised in the art of disrobing women, the experience still feels completely individual and mine.

While it’s very lovely that he doesn’t rush the disrobing, truthfully my knickers are doing a full all-singing-and-dancing routine of their own and I am more than willing to fling caution to the wind if he’d fling me to the wall (or the floor or behind a big bunch of peonies – I’m happy to be flung anywhere really). I’m keen to seal the deal, he’s the one who wants to loiter and withhold gratification. Don’t get me wrong, I’m enjoying every lingering, luxurious second, but I’ve never been a patient girl and I’m fighting a growing anxiety that this will all vanish at the drop of a hat. Disaster. Particularly if I haven’t dropped my knickers. There’s a serious possibility that I’m dreaming and I might wake up without getting to the really good bit. Because doesn’t that usually happen? Nothing has ever been safe since Bobby Ewing emerged from the shower in May 1986 and revealed that Pam had dreamt the previous Dallas series. I was knee-high to a grasshopper when all of this occurred (or more accurately didn’t occur) but I remember the effect it had on my mum (still in shock, she burnt the toast at breakfast the next morning). You can’t just invalidate an entire season of the country’s most popular show and not expect some long-term scarring. Imagine, if we found out Carrie never really met Mr Big, Aidan Shaw just dreamt him up.

Even if this is for real, there’s still the very serious possibility that it might end hideously abruptly. Saadi might storm the building. The press might track us down with sniffer dogs. He might get bored. Asleep or awake, I have no control.

Besides, despite the cashmere rug and cushions I’m beginning to find the shop floor an uncomfortable place to lie. The cement floor is cold and unrelenting and I only endure it by concentrating on his soft warm flesh instead. I trace my fingers over his tattoos. The decorated skin slightly less yielding than the rest of his body. I gently trail the tip of my tongue over his nipples; the gentleness becomes hard. At this point he still hasn’t gone anywhere near my tits but I feel my own nipples spring to a responsive point through the silky black fabric of my bra. I snake my fingers across the arch of his eyebrows, over his cheekbones, marvelling at the fine almost translucent skin around the sockets of his eyes. The fabulousness of him creates a pounding deep in my stomach and below.

He’s so attentive. He seems to be just as mesmerized by me. He dances around my breasts and the parts where my legs join. He kisses my stomach, waist, ribs, neck, shoulders and arms. He kisses inside the crook of my elbow and tells me the skin there reminds him of holding a baby bird. His endless strokes, his confident caress and gentle, sweet touch create an almost unbearable and aggressive longing inside me. I have to bite my tongue to stop myself yelling that I need him to get a move on. I need him to take me. I am soaked with my excitement. I long to feel his cool fingers inside me on my red hot flesh. I’m sure I’d come immediately, spurting out on to his hands. The exquisite release would send shocks somersaulting through my spine. I’d grab hold of his cock, move it up and down, swiftly and expertly, until he came on my stomach. That wouldn’t be breaking my promise to Saadi, would it? Not by the letter of the law.

I’ve never longed for anyone quite so much. For God’s sake this is Scott Taylor and he’s lying semi-clad on top of me, next to me, sometimes underneath me. He manoeuvres me like I’m featherweight. It’s inhuman to expect me to resist. Actually cruel. There are probably international laws against such torture.

But I did promise Saadi. What if we do go for it and he’s knackered at the gig tonight? Ninety thousand people are expecting to be entertained. My needs suddenly shrink and are submerged by this enormous statistic. With reluctance I wiggle out from underneath him.

‘We can’t,’ I moan. ‘I promised Saadi.’

‘You what?’ Scott looks stunned.

‘She says it puts you off your stride,’ I admit with voluble sadness. ‘Believe me, there’s nothing I’d like to be doing more than –’ I search around for the best word. It wouldn’t be a shag. Not considering the immense sexual attraction that clearly zings between us. But it wouldn’t be a fuck, not after the hours of conversation; it would be more passionate than that.

Scott helps me out. ‘There’s nothing you’d like to do more than me.’

‘Exactly.’

‘Me too, so what’s stopping us?’ He kisses my shoulder again and my resistance shivers like a leaf hanging by a thread from a tree. He kisses the back of my neck and a great big breeze threatens to blow that leaf right off. God, I want him.

‘I’m scared of Saadi,’ I confess with a whine.

Scott laughs but pulls back and tosses my top back at me. ‘We’ve got more chance of behaving ourselves if you put those fantastic tits away. I’ll get the cards.’

He looks momentarily reluctant but stands up and starts to hunt for the cards. I’m grateful he’s moved away from me. The smell of him sends me weak with want. He smells of pheromone, not of a chemical aftershave. It’s delicious. While he roots around for his clothes and the cards I hunt around for the will to pull my top on.

He deals. ‘Well, it’s not so bad. We only have to wait until after the gig tonight, right? That’s what you promised her? You haven’t promised her you’d take Holy Orders or anything, right?’

‘Right.’ I smile.

‘OK, great. We get more time to get to know each other and that’s a good thing,’ says Scott.

‘What shall we talk about?’ I ask. ‘We covered all the basics yesterday. I know that you used to shoplift for dares, you know that I padded my bra with tissue –’

‘Until you were sixteen!’ howls Scott.

‘Yeah.’ I’m beginning to regret telling him that bit. ‘You prefer milk chocolate to dark.’ I pull on my skirt.

‘You like that hideous white stuff designed for kids.’ He picks up his T-shirt and turns it the right way out but doesn’t put it on immediately.

‘Correct. You’ve never eaten an oyster.’

‘Snot in a shell.’

‘Agreed. You like football and I like flowers.’ I run my fingers through my hair and try to appear less rumpled than I am.

‘Why are peonies your favourite?’

Good question. A bit left of centre. I’ve never been asked that before, yet I do have an answer.

‘I think they’re a great mix of sturdy and exotic, which has to be something every girl aspires to. They smell so clean. The flower was named after Pæon, a physician to the gods, who got the plant on Mount Olympus, from the mother of Apollo. Once planted the peony likes to be left alone and punishes those who try to move it by not flowering again for several years. I like the idea that a plant has a sense of revenge,’ I giggle.

‘No uprooting. I’ll remember that,’ says Scott.

‘Ah, but remember, once established, it produces splendid blooms each year for decades,’ I mutter, just in case we’re talking about more than the plant. I continue with my search for fresh topics. ‘I know all about your family. You know about mine. Where do we go from here?’

‘You could tell me a little more about your boyfriend.’

The word boyfriend hits me like a train. Hell, does he still exist? The thought that Adam is somewhere – anywhere – doing something – anything – floors me. I’d completely forgotten that he existed. It’s easy to do when I’m cocooned up with Scott, away from anything remotely normal or expected; protected from any inconvenient truths and intrusions.

‘Adam.’ Even his name sounds alien. Yet he’s been in this shop a hundred times. He’s popped by to while away slow hours and help me lug round potted trees. He’s dropped off sandwich lunches, he came to my rescue when we had a power cut and I struggled with the burglar alarm and the electric till. These things happened a millennium ago.

‘Yes. This Adam, is it serious?’ asks Scott.

‘We broke up.’

‘When?’

‘Yesterday.’

‘I see.’ And he probably does. It’s clear-cut, isn’t it?

‘What about you? Seeing anyone special at the moment?’ I turn the spotlight.

‘Dangerous question, Miss,’ says Scott, deftly sidestepping; another skill I realize he must be practised at. How many times has he been asked that by a nosy journalist? What was I hoping for, that he’d say something like, At this exact second, yes. Generally, no? In my dreams.

‘Dangerous questions are part of getting to know someone,’ I tell him. ‘I don’t imagine you usually go in for this, do you?’

I’m nervous, partly because I don’t want him to affirm that he’s a heartless, relentless slapper and I’m heading for disaster and, partly, I’m shy because if he does confirm that normally he’s a heartless, relentless slapper but I’ve made him different, then I’ve definitely dug for that compliment, which puts me right back in the position I used to be in with Adam when I asked if he liked my new top.

‘No, this is fresh stuff. In the past I’ve been a bit of a careless fucker. Literally. You know, I’m a rock star, I’m young, gorgeous. What can I do?’ He stares at me and as our eyes collide, I forgive him. He’s right, he’d have to be insane not to be sticking it up every girl available. What’s the point of being who he is otherwise?

Scott lights a fag. He smokes way too much and Ben wouldn’t like it in the shop but I can’t bring myself to reprimand him. He takes a long drag and then eyes me nervously.

‘Fern, anything you’ve ever read about me is probably true. In fact, however bad it was, double it. The really bad stuff doesn’t even get into the press. When I am doing a lot of drugs and drinking far, far too much – I’m an animal.’

For the first time since we met he seems to be having difficulty in holding eye contact.

‘I shag indiscriminately. I’m careless. Heartless. Yes to whisky, yes to cocaine, yes to that hole. I’m an aggressive, rude slag. I don’t have a sense of humour. Or even a sense of where the bog is. I once pissed in my wardrobe. Ruined thousands of pounds’ worth of suits. Big shame. I don’t like the person I am when I’m drunk or high and I don’t suppose you would. Christ, my own mum doesn’t.’ He pauses and looks really pained. ‘But I don’t know who else I can be.’ He draws breath. The impact of his raw and gravelly honest words hits.

‘Well, there’s bound to be someone,’ I say carefully.

‘You think?’ He turns to me quickly, hopefully.

‘Yeah.’ I want to cheer him up. He hasn’t told me anything I haven’t already read about him (except maybe the peeing in the wardrobe bit), but just because this stuff is often splashed all over the newspapers doesn’t mean it’s not deeply personal and difficult to talk about.

‘Have you ever been around an addict?’ he asks.

‘No, not really. My auntie Linda is a bit too fond of a tipple but she hasn’t started to sell the family heirlooms to pay for her habit yet. Well, she can’t, we don’t have any family heirlooms, but you catch my drift. I don’t know anyone who does drugs. I’ve had the recreational swig of Calpol when I’ve been babysitting for my nieces and nephews, but that’s it.’

‘You’re shitting me?’

‘I’m not. My mates did that Just Say No thing that John Craven and the Grange Hill Kids peddled for years.’

‘Why?’

‘Well, I thought it was because we were all fine upstanding members of the community but the truth is probably that we were only offered anything once and it’s easy to say no once. I guess you’ve been tempted more than most.’

‘Very understanding of you.’

‘I’m only this nice until you sleep with me then I turn into a bitch,’ I joke.

Scott pulls me close to him. My goose bumps bang into his.

‘Addicts are fucking terrible people to care about. They break your heart without even meaning to. And they don’t even notice, let alone worry. Addicts don’t give you a moment’s peace, any respect and their apologies might as well be written on bog roll,’ says Scott.

‘Why are you telling me this? Are you trying to scare me off?’

‘Yeah, I think I am.’

It won’t work. Surely Scott has encountered enough women by now to know that every woman loves a cause. Every woman wants to save and fix. It doesn’t matter if it’s a broken toy that needs glue or broken skin that needs a kiss and a band-aid; we like to be needed. Pathetic or noble, I’m undecided, but it’s where we are after eight million years of evolution. I think that’s why some grannies and great-grannies look back on the Second World War with a certain amount of fondness. The bright side to the carnage and terrible bloodshed, they were at least allowed to fulfil their true vocations; make do and mend is a woman’s battle cry. And there’s nothing we like to mend more than a battered, vulnerable heart. Especially if it comes as a box set with a pair of emerald green eyes.

I trail a finger over his stomach. I think I might have to ask him to put his T-shirt back on in a minute; visual arousal isn’t solely a male thing. ‘Why would you want to scare me off?’ I ask.

‘Because it might be easier if you go.’

‘In what way?’

‘Because I’m beginning to realize that if you stay, everything will be different for ever more.’

Yeeeeesssssssssssssssss.

Is there anything a woman prefers to hear? I’m different. I’ll make things different for ever more. I want to punch the air and hang out bunting but I tread carefully.

‘Different isn’t bad, necessarily,’ I say gently.