No Matter What (142 page)

“Michael?
 
Did you hear what I said?”

He nodded, moving a few steps closer, pleased to see that she didn’t step back.

“I don’t know what we’re going to tell Ethan,” she went on, pushing a hand through her now shorter blonde hair, looking back out of the window for a second.

“He’ll be fine.
 
He’s a smart kid, he’ll be ok.”

She looked at him again.
 
He looked tired.
 
The beard really did suit him though, surprisingly, because he was still so handsome, he still had that look about him.

“
India
... I’m sorry.
 
You need to know that because, I never got the chance to tell you and, I’m sorry.
 
I’m so, so sorry.”

“Why this movie, Michael?
 
Why didn’t you tell me you were directing?”

“Would you have backed out if you’d known?”

“Yes.”

“And that’s why I had to make sure it was kept secret.
 
It was the only way I could think of to get your attention.
 
You wouldn’t see me, you wouldn’t speak to me.
 
I had to do something.”

She stared at him.
 
“Hang on ... you did this
deliberately
?
 
You made sure it all happened this way?
 
You set this up?”

Michael came closer again but this time she did back away, slightly.

“
India
, I had to.
 
I had to make sure I got this movie, I had to make sure I did this.”

She laughed, a cynical laugh, turning round, turning away from him.
 
She couldn’t believe this.
 
How the hell had he managed to pull this off?
 
How the hell had she not known anything about this?
 
She’d always known he was a powerful man in
Hollywood
, but until now she hadn’t realised just how powerful.
 
To be able to pull strings like this, it was crazy!

“You’re unbelievable.
 
Do you know that?
 
Fucking unbelievable!”

“I had to do it,
India
, I had to.”

“No!
 
You didn’t
have
to do anything, Michael, and you know that.
 
You could have left things exactly as they were because everything was fine.”

“It couldn’t go on and you know that, face up to it,
India
.
 
Things couldn’t go on the way they were but you wouldn’t even talk to me on the ‘phone, how else was I supposed to get to you?”

“Not like this!
 
Jesus, Michael ...”

He tried to reach out to her but she pulled her hand away.
 
“Don’t touch me!
 
I don’t want you touching me.”

Another kick to the stomach.
 
He felt like he’d been winded and getting his breath back was hard.

“Everything I ever did was only because I loved you,
India
.”

“You raped me because you loved me?”

Jesus, she was making this hard.
 
But was it any less than he actually deserved?
 
He looked down at the ground again, not really wanting to look her in the eye.
 
The memory of what he’d done still haunted him too, but whatever it took to make it up to her he would do it.
 
Anything.
 
He’d do anything.
 
Because being sorry just wasn’t enough.

“I never stopped loving you,
India
.”

“You hurt me, Michael.
 
Like you’ll never believe, you hurt me.
 
Because of you I did things ... because of you I wasn’t myself for years, you changed me and I hated that.
 
I hated
you
.”

He looked at her, his heart breaking at the words she spoke.
 
“Don’t say that,
India
, please.
 
I can’t bear it.”

“But it’s true, Michael.
 
After what you did, I hated you, and what happened in
London
... I couldn’t handle it at first, seeing you like that after so long.
 
I let you get to me and I should have been stronger … I should have pushed you away.
 
I should have …”

“But you didn’t.”

She looked up at him.
 
“I wanted to pull out of this movie anyway, do you know that?
 
Once I knew.
 
I wanted to get away from you because my life was good again.
 
I’d put you to the back of my mind, I’d filed you away, I’d let you go.
 
I’d stopped you from getting inside my head and preventing me from moving on.
 
I’d done all of that and then I see you.
 
I see you and I let you back in and that was wrong.”

“What made you change your mind?” he asked, noticing the way she kept looking at her wedding ring.
 
The wedding ring she’d been given by another man.
 
“About the movie?”

“I’m a professional, Michael.
 
I don’t let people down.
 
But I want to let you know that I might have let those feelings overtake me for a while - it was the shock of seeing you again, it hit me hard - but I’m over it now.
 
You’re back there where you belong.
 
In the back of my mind.”

This was hurting him far more than he’d thought possible.
 
What had he done to her?
 
How had he made her so cold?

“I still love you,
India
.”
“Don’t say that.
 
Don’t
ever
say that ... don’t.
 
I don’t want to hear it.”

She turned away from him again, looking out of the window.
 
JJ was talking to Ray.
 
Another problem she had yet to deal with.
 
How had her life got so complicated again?

“But I do.
 
I do still love you, and I think you still love me too, deep down inside …”

She swung back around and stared at him, shaking her head, but she couldn’t say the words.
 
She couldn’t say that she didn’t love him.
 
She couldn’t do that.

 
“Reece said you were a mess, after we split.
 
He said for weeks afterwards all you did was cry, and you couldn’t sleep at night and … he said you told him you still loved me.”

“I wasn’t myself.
 
I was confused and hurt and scared, and I was feeling things I couldn’t explain, things I couldn’t get my head around.
 
But that was years ago, Michael, and things change, people change, and I fell in love again.
 
With JJ.
 
He’s
the one I love, not you.
 
I loved you once, Christ knows I loved you so fucking much and I told the watching world that only the other night and that was true, but that was then.
 
Don’t think for one minute that those feelings are still there because they’re not.
 
And they never will be.
 
They’re gone.”

Every word was killing her because she wasn’t being honest, she was doing what she had to do in order to move forward again, that was all.
 
He’d come back into her life and she’d suddenly come to a screeching halt and she couldn’t afford for that to happen, not again.
 
But the feelings she still had for this man were both frightening and dangerous and it was taking every ounce of strength she had to fight them.
 

He reached out to her again but she moved away from him, snatching her hand away before he’d had a chance to take it.

“
India
, please ... for Ethan’s sake.”

“No!
 
Don’t
use our son as an excuse.
 
Don’t do that.
 
For Ethan’s sake we’re civil to each other.
 
For his sake we do this and we think of him because if he wasn’t here, I wouldn’t even look at you.
 
I’ve got nothing more to say.
 
I’ll see you on set.”

She turned to leave, walking towards the door, but his voice stopped her dead in her tracks.

“I know about you and Ray.”

She turned back around and looked at him, suddenly sick to her stomach as that now all-too-familiar feeling of unease washed over her yet again.

“I know about you and your husband’s brother.
 
I know,
India
.”

She felt as though she was in some kind of nightmare.
 
She couldn’t believe she was hearing this.
 
“What … what exactly do you know?”

He looked at her.
 
He hadn’t wanted to do this, he really hadn’t wanted to do this but she’d left him with no choice.
 
It was his last throw of the dice, it was all he had left.

“I know about that night,
India
.
 
I know you and him spent a night together that I’m absolutely positive your new husband doesn’t know about.
 
And I’m sure you don’t want him to either.
 
But I know what went on.”

“Do you ever stop?” she said quietly, staring at the man she’d once worshipped.
 
The man she didn’t recognise anymore.
 
“How can you do this?”

“Ray Foster and India Walsh ... if that got out ...”

“You bastard!”

“
I
wanted you both together in this movie, do you know that?
 
It was
my
idea.
 
It was me who pushed for him to star alongside you because I wanted to see how you coped, knowing the history you two have.
 
I wanted to see how that worked.”

“You know nothing.
 
You may think you do, but you know nothing.
 
What happened with me and Ray, it’s in the past.
 
It was one night, it meant nothing.”

“Didn’t it?”
 
He looked at her, right at her, right into her eyes.
 
She was scared, and part of him felt guilty for doing this to her.
 
He’d done enough, he’d hurt her too much already but he’d gone too far now.
 
She had to know this.
 
She had to know what he knew.
 
It was his only insurance.

“It meant nothing,” she repeated.

“But it did, didn’t it,
India
?”

“It meant nothing.
 
It was before Joe and I had even met ...”

“So why didn’t you tell him when you got together?
 
Why didn’t you tell him about that one night you spent with his brother?
 
That one night that, apparently, meant nothing.”

“Why are you doing this, Michael?”

“Why didn’t you tell him,
India
?”

“I’m not listening to this, I’ve had enough.
 
You’re sick, Michael; you have to be to get some kind of kick out of this.
 
What is wrong with you?”

“Why didn’t you tell him?”

She stared at him, unable to comprehend how this man was the father of her beautiful boy.
 
Unable to believe she’d let him touch her again.
 
Unable to believe she’d once loved him so much, and that he’d ever loved her too.
 

“You didn’t tell him because it wasn’t just that one night, was it?
 
That wasn’t the end of it.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
 
But her voice was shaking, her head spinning.
 
This couldn’t be happening.
 
If he knew…

“I think you do,
India
.
 
I think you know exactly what I’m talking about. Because that night ... something happened, didn’t it?
 
Something happened that meant it went beyond that one night.”

She shook her head, backing away from him, trying to get to the door, to get out of there because she didn’t want to be here anymore.

“I love Joe,” she whispered.
 
“I love him.”

“Oh, that’s not in question, honey, I know you do.
 
But you obviously don’t love him enough to tell him your secret.
 
The secret you and Ray have carried with you for nearly five years.”

“I was confused, Michael.
 
My head wasn’t in the right place, what me and Ray did ... what we did ... it shouldn’t have happened.”

“But it did.
 
Didn’t it?
 
It
did
happen.”