she was concerned, this sort of thing happened all the time. Lana had got a lucky break getting hitched to one of the best-looking in the business–she could have done a lot worse.
‘He’s in Boston.’
Katharine plucked a micro-burger from a passing tray. ‘You must wish he was here. Plenty of press opportunity tonight.’ She took a bite out of the burger even though it was small enough to eat in one.
‘We couldn’t make the timings work,’ explained Lana. Briefly she glimpsed Parker Troy out the corner of her eye.
As if reading her mind–though thankfully only a propos the film–Katharine went on, ‘We’ve got fabulous advance reviews coming in; they’re queuing up to talk to you.’ She sipped her cosmopolitan with a neat, cherry-lipsticked mouth.
Lana raised her own drink. ‘That’s good news.’
‘Oh—!’ Katharine spotted a publicist friend and waved keenly, the bangles jangling on her arm. She hugged Lana before being swallowed by a cacophony of exclamations.
Lana weaved through the crowd, nodding to familiar faces as she passed, and made a beeline for a tray of champagne. Throwing back a slug of fizz, she wondered how much it would take to deaden her to Robert St Louis once and for all. Since Vegas she had battled to put him from her mind, back to the dark, lonely place she had kept him all these years. Like having just woken from a bad dream, the outline clung on, refusing to fade.
She tried not to be bitter. How could she be mad at him? She’d wasted no time in getting married herself, and while of course she knew the truth of her pact with Cole, she could only imagine how it must have looked. Her heart ached when she thought of how much pain she’d put Robert through–it wasn’t enough that she’d disappeared without a word, a letter, a call, nothing, but then only a few years later she’d wed the biggest star in Hollywood. Coverage had been splashed across newspapers and gossip rags, on every TV channel and magazine cover. At the time her lack of contact had seemed like a necessary sacrifice. Now it seemed selfish and unkind.
Karma worked in mysterious ways. Robert had moved on and was happily engaged to the woman he loved. It wasn’t her. There would be no more wonderings; no more what-ifs.
‘Lana, darling, thanks for coming.’ Sam Lucas descended on her, his face pink and damp with sweat. He kissed her moistly and she fought the urge to wipe a palm across her cheek.
‘Happy birthday, Sam.’
‘It is,’ he said, picking his teeth. ‘Woulda been nice if Chloe could’ve made it.’
Lana looked around. ‘Where is she?’
‘Not well. I spoke to Brock Wilde this morning.’
‘That’s a pity.’
‘Sure is.’ He grinned. ‘The critics are getting pretty excited about her, I gotta say. She’s gonna make a splash in Vegas.’
The word punched a hole in Lana. She smiled as a tough-guy actor who’d worked with the director in the nineties slapped Sam on the back. ‘Excuse me,’ she said, moving away.
She needed something else to drink–and fast. A tray of champagne swept past and she plucked a flute from its surface, just in time to feel something large and hard bump into her back. She turned. It was Parker Troy.
‘Sorry,’ he mumbled, looking at his shoes. Handsome as ever, he was wearing a brown tux and open shirt, his muddy-blond hair falling over his forehead. If she concentrated very hard he could almost be someone else.
Instinctively she touched his arm. ‘It’s been ages.’
‘Yeah.’
They looked at each other. Parker felt intimidated, as he always did when he had to engage her in anything other than sex.
‘How have you been?’ asked Lana.
‘Good.’
Wow, we really don’t have anything to talk about.
Parker asked a couple of courteous, couldn’t-give-a-crap-about-the-answer-to questions. When he drew a Camel from his top pocket and said he was going outside for a smoke, she knew she would go with him. She needed it. Her body needed release.
They snaked their way through the swarm of guests and outside on to the terrace. A high-walled, secluded space, it was hidden from the street and safe from the paparazzi’s prying eyes. It was empty. They were alone.
Parker took her hand and pulled her round the side of the club, into the neck of a narrow alley that was entirely hidden from sight.
They didn’t say a word. Lana’s head was buzzing with the champagne. All she could think about was how this was a new beginning. Soon, after Cole, she would be free. Whatever she had with Robert, she knew now it was gone. The past was over and it wasn’t coming back.
Parker unzipped his trousers with fumbling urgency, grabbed her ass and hoisted her up. She wrapped her legs around him.
One last time. That’s all this is.
As he drove into her, his breath hot against her ear, somewhere in the distance a weak alarm sounded.
Don’t be stupid, Lana. Tell him to stop.
She felt him move inside her and the rest was history.
Spring
New York
The man scraped the bottom of the saucepan with a knife. Brown shavings of scrambled egg peeled off the metal, curly like woodchips. Shit, he’d burned breakfast.
‘Nelson, honey, can you fix me some more coffee?’
The woman at the table looked older in the cold light of day. She was overweight with loose, pasty skin and a nest of black hair, stiff as wire. With his back to her at the stove, the man tensed, but responded to his alias all the same and refilled her cup. He’d been living under the name Nelson Price for ten years now. Ten long, long years. But the wait would soon be over.
‘Thanks, baby,’ the woman said in a whiny voice. She picked up the remote and started flicking channels on the TV. ‘Where’s breakfast?’
‘I’m doing it, aren’t I?’ the man snapped, thinking she could benefit from missing a meal or two. He couldn’t even remember where he’d picked this dyke up–she’d probably come into Club 44 and taken advantage of him when he was drunk.
At thirty-six, clad in his morning attire of stained beige jockeys, he was an alarmingly unattractive man. Years of drink had left him looking closer to sixty than forty, with ravaged skin stretched over pointed, rat-like features. His eyes were squinty, hard and pitiless. His thin brown hair clung stubbornly to the very back of his head, refusing
