No Matter What (145 page)

She moved away from him slightly, hugging her knees back up to her chest. “The timing just wasn’t right, Ray.
 
I was going through the divorce and that was messing with my head so much.
 
I guess you could say that’s what I was when we ... when we had that night together - messed up.
 
My head was all over the place.
 
All I’d wanted was one night to exorcise all those demons inside me ... an outlet to get rid of all the pain and frustration Michael had put me through.
 
There wasn’t supposed to be a baby.
 
Something so innocent just got in the way and I don’t like what I did but ... but it was the right thing to do.
 
Wasn’t it?”

Ray nodded, although he hadn’t thought so at the time.
 
He’d wanted to go to
L.A.
, he’d wanted to tell her they could make a go of it, he’d wanted her to know that, but in hindsight he knew she was right.
 
They’d made the only decision they could have made at the time.
 
She’d been going through a high profile divorce and he’d been married.
 
There was nothing else they could have done.

“I still wish you’d have let me come over to
L.A.
 
I could have been with you. You shouldn’t have gone through that alone.”

“I was ok.
 
It was fine.
 
I have an extremely caring and discreet doctor, he took care of everything.
 
He took care of
me
.
 
If you’d have come over it would only have attracted attention that we didn’t need.”

Ray was aware he was wringing his hands and he stopped, noticing she was looking at him doing it.
 
But he had to say it.
 
He had to get it out there.
 
He had to let her know.

“I would have come for you,
India
.
 
I would have left my wife and I would have come for you because ... because I shouldn’t have let you get into my head but I did.
 
I did, and if you’d just said the word I would have been there.”

India
looked at him.
 
“Ray ... I had no idea.
 
I didn’t know you felt anything ... I didn’t know ...”

“Why would you?
 
I was married, I didn’t tell you how I really felt.”
 
He looked at her.
 
“Would it have made any difference?”

She stared at him for a second.
 
He was so different to JJ.
 
He was older, obviously, but that wasn’t the only thing that made him different.
 
His whole demeanour, the way he acted, everything he did was almost the complete opposite of his younger brother.
 
Ray was the perfect English gentleman with his Home Counties accent and mannerisms whereas JJ was the archetypal
California
boy.
 
Something drew her to both of them but it was JJ she’d fallen in love with.
 
She’d never had those feelings for Ray.

She shook her head and reached out, taking his hand.
 
“It was the wrong time.
 
I wasn’t ready to let anyone in, not while I was going through that divorce.”

“But if things had been different?”

She stroked his fingers with her thumb, looking down as she did so.
 
“Maybe. I don’t know.”
 
She looked back up.
 
“Maybe.”

“Did it ... the abortion … how … how did you get through that?”

 
“It was very quick, Ray.
 
I was only a few weeks gone.
 
I suppose some people would say you couldn’t even call it a baby at that time but ...”
 
She squeezed his hand as she remembered the empty feeling in her stomach afterwards as she’d lain there crying.
 
A strange and lonely empty feeling.
 
“It was over in minutes.”

She let go of his hand and stood up, walking around the room, suddenly feeling the need to stretch her legs.

“
India
.
 
About JJ ...”

She stood still and looked at Ray.
 
“What about him?”

“What if Michael tells him?”

She leaned back against the wall beside the fire and folded her arms.
 
“He won’t.”

“Can you be sure of that?”

She looked down at the floor.
 
“No.
 
I can’t be sure.
 
Not where Michael’s concerned.
 
I can’t be sure of anything anymore.”

He came over to her, reaching out and gently tucking a strand of hair behind her ear as she looked up at him.

“I don’t want to complicate things any more than they already are,
India
, but, I just want you to know that I ... I cared.
 
I wanted to love you, I wanted you in my life and I know that wasn’t the plan, but, the plan messed up anyway, didn’t it?”

He put a hand to the side of her face, his thumb gently stroking her cheek and she put her hand over his as they looked at each other.

“What we did together, some of those things ... you were and always will be my favourite fantasy.
 
I’ll never forget that night.”

“Ray ...”

“We could re-live it, all over again, couldn’t we?
 
Right now, right here, one more time, to put an end to it all ...”

She let go of his hand and walked away from him, pushing a hand through her hair.
 
“I think you need to go now, Ray.”

“Come on,
India
; don’t tell me you never once thought about it?
 
You never once thought about doing all of that just one more time?
 
To get it out of your system?”

“It’s not
in
my system, Ray, not anymore.
 
I love your brother, ok?
 
And right now I want to be with
him
, so this conversation’s over.
 
We’re done here.”

“I’m sorry.
 
I don’t know why I did that, I’m sorry.”

She turned round to look at him.
 
“It’s been an emotional night.
 
People say things they don’t mean, things they don’t mean to say out loud.”

“Maybe.”
 
He picked up his jacket, turning to leave.
 
“Are we …
 
are we ok,
India
?”

She looked at him, folding her arms against herself, giving him a small but tired smile.
 
“Yeah.
 
We’re ok.”

She watched him leave.
 
Another complication on her already growing list.
 
The mess was only getting more widespread and she really didn’t know what to do next.
 
All she could hope for was that people didn’t act on what they knew.
 
She had to hope that was the case, because, if it wasn’t, who could predict how it was all going to end.

CHAPTER 68

March 2010

It was a bright, cold and typically Northern late winter day, and location filming on a beach at this time of year in the North East of England wasn’t something anyone would choose to do, but that’s what was happening today.
 
The saving grace was that at least the sun was out.

Shooting on
India
, Kenny and Ray’s movie was about to wrap.
 
Today was the last day of filming and, for the most part, it had been ok.
 
At times it had almost been fun, but there’d always been that nagging doubt at the back of
India
’s mind, that fear that Michael would say something to JJ.
 
So far he’d kept his mouth shut but
India
wasn’t comfortable.
 
She didn’t like the way he looked at her sometimes, the way he’d watch JJ when he thought she couldn’t see him.
 
It put her on edge.
 
He was playing games, she knew that.
 
Whenever she and Ray had had a scene together he’d made them do it far more times than had been necessary and she couldn’t say anything to him, she couldn’t face up to him on set because if she did she was scared he’d do his worst and she couldn’t risk that.
 
He was sometimes childish and unfair but he was always subtle, and that made her more nervous than anything else.

But, despite all of that, she’d loved being back in her native North East.
 
She’d loved showing her kids the places she’d used to come to when she’d been young, and the days her and JJ, Ethan and Ellie had spent just wandering around the small Northumberland market towns like a normal everyday family had been some of the best days of her life.
 
It had felt right, it had felt real, so different from the days out back home in
L.A.
when there was never a member of the paparazzi that far away.

She wanted more days like that.
 
She wanted her life with JJ to be the life she’d always wanted, and that meant making sure that Michael never told her husband what he knew.
 

She stood outside on the cold sand, her jacket wrapped tight around her, her hands warmed by the tea she was holding as she looked out at the vast expanse of the
North Sea
.
 
At that second she felt an almost magnetic pull back towards the country in which she’d been born.
 
It was a million miles away from the life she knew now but when she was here she was somebody else.
 
She wasn’t India Walsh the movie star.
 
She was just
India
.
 
And she liked that.

“You should be in make-up, angel,” Bobby said, walking up next to her.

“I’m thinking, Bobby.”

“Yes, well, don’t do that for too long will you; you need energy for the rest of the day.”

She looked at him and smiled, nudging him playfully.
 
“Shut up.”

He nudged her back.
 
“What’re you thinking about, anyway?”

She sighed, taking a sip of tea.
 
“I’m thinking about buying a place over here, Bobby.
 
A nice little hideaway where me, Joe and the kids can come and just get away from it all.
 
Nobody’s really bothered us here and that’s been great.
 
The villages and towns around here have welcomed us all and I’ve loved that.
 
It’s made me feel normal again.”

“Oh, you’ve never been normal, princess.
 
I’m almost sure of that.”

She laughed, kicking him gently.
 
“Bugger off to make-up and tell Scott I’ll be there in a minute.
 
I’ve got something to do first.”

“Like what?”

“Like never you mind.
 
Go on.
 
I won’t be long.”

He kissed her cheek and smiled, squeezing her hand before heading off to hair and make-up.

She waited until he’d gone, finishing her tea and discarding the empty carton in a nearby bin before making her way over to Michael’s trailer.
 
She needed to know what his next move was going to be, or if he was even going to make any move at all.
 
He was
that
unpredictable.
 
So she needed to know, she needed to have some idea.

He opened the door and she looked at him.
 
He looked tired and she hoped it was the sleepless nights caused by guilt that was doing it.

“It’s not a good time,
India
,” he sighed, looking back over his shoulder into the trailer.

“This whole movie hasn’t exactly been a good time for me, Michael, so guess what?
 
Life’s a bastard sometimes.”

She pushed past him, going inside, giving a cynical laugh as she came face to face with Layla Boyd.
 
She folded her arms and looked at her.

“Well well.
 
If it isn’t the future fifth Mrs Walsh.”

Layla stood up, a defiant look on her face.
 

India
just smiled at her.
 
“Oh, don’t worry, Barbie.
 
I haven’t come to fight you for him, you’re welcome to him.
 
Just, not right now.
 
I need to talk to him.”

“You can’t just walk in here
demanding
to see him, who the hell do you think you are?”

India
moved a step closer to Layla, looking her right in the eye.
 
“I’m the mother of his child, sweetheart.
 
You’re
only sleeping with him.”
 
She turned to look at Michael.
 
“Get her out of here.”