anything to hide.’
Ed squeezed her hand and tried to make light of it. ‘I know you don’t, but you’re the design director and I’m the lowly runner. They’ll think I’m trying to sleep my way to the top.’ He tried to engage her with a smile.
Charlotte’s frown deepened. ‘I don’t care what they think. We’ve been seeing each other for nearly a year. Your toothbrush can’t remember what your bathroom looks like, I let your best friend sleep on my sofa for three weeks and I’ve played in a Scrabble contest with your mum. For heaven’s sake, Ed, we couldn’t be more together if we tried.’
‘But you know what the top brass are like. They hate relationships on set in case things go wrong.’
‘What’s going to go wrong?’ Charlotte looked alarmed.
‘Nothing! Nothing’s going to go wrong, Charlotte. But I’m building my career, and yours is going so well. We don’t want anything to spoil that, do we?’
Ed felt as though the conversation was running away from him but couldn’t work out where he’d gone wrong. This was the first time Charlotte had ever said anything about wanting their relationship to be more open. They’d both been happy for their work and personal lives to be separate – hadn’t they?
He pulled his cigarettes from his top pocket, took one for himself and offered one to Charlotte. She shook her head, her lips set in a thin line.
‘I’ve given up.’
‘Since when?’
‘This morning.’
‘Oh?’
Ed removed the cigarette from his mouth unlit. Charlotte was looking at him, an unreadable expression on her face. It wasn’t a look he recognised or that he felt particularly comfortable with, if he was honest.
‘What’s wrong, Charlotte?’
Charlotte tugged at her long fringe, something he’d noticed she did when she was nervous or anxious.
‘Something’s happened.’
When he thought about it later, Ed realised what she said next was literally the last thing he’d have thought she was going to say. He’d have been less surprised if she’d told him she’d been born with a penis and had undergone a sex change.
‘I’m pregnant.’
That she uttered these words and not some others was his justification for his response, though he knew as soon as the words left his mouth that it was completely the wrong thing to say in the circumstances.
‘Oh, shit!’
Charlotte immediately stiffened, eyed him with a look that seemed to communicate both disappointment and distress, and snatched her hand away from his.
‘Oh, shit!’ he said again, unable to absorb what those two words could mean for both of them. Registering the look in her eyes, he panicked. ‘I didn’t mean oh, shit, I meant oh, no. I mean, it’s the timing, isn’t it, for both of us.’ Unable to stop himself, he blathered on: ‘Your job, mine…I always thought we’d get together properly one day – you know, married, kids and all that – but just not now…’
This was all coming out wrong. He looked at Charlotte, his secret girlfriend…beautiful, clever Charlotte…the mother of his children…
At this thought, a little spark seemed to ignite somewhere inside him and for a moment he saw them, his future family, and words and feelings that he’d never recognised in himself flickered within him: father, husband, protector…
But Charlotte was getting up off the step, moving towards the door. She reached for the handle, then paused to look back at him. ‘The traditional response when someone announces they’re expecting a baby is “Congratulations!” Look, we’ll talk about it later, Ed. You’re right, my timing is shit.’
‘Wait, Charlotte!’ He leapt up and reached for her, but she brushed his hand away.
‘Look, Ed, it’s fine. We’ll talk later. Right now I need to go home.’
As Ed watched her retreating back and scrabbled to his feet to catch her, he knew he’d screwed it up big time. If this was a test, then he had failed miserably.
He only hoped it wasn’t too late and she’d give him a chance to make things right.
Pendruggan, Cornwall, 2015
Penny Leighton was sitting in the kitchen of the Old Vicarage with her feet up on the kitchen table – it was her table, after all – enjoying a freshly poured cup of tea. For once the house was quiet: her husband had gone over to the church hall, where he was hosting the Pendruggan Mother and Toddlers’ Group as part of his vicarly duties. Across the table, Ed Appleby hunched over a laptop, wrinkling his brow as he perused stately homes on his web browser.
‘That list Cassie sent over of possible locations for Lady Arundell’s family pile – I’ve worked my way through and eliminated the ones that wouldn’t be suitable. Lanhydrock would be ideal, but I also like the sound of Prideaux Place, smaller but gorgeous. It’s not far from here and apparently it has amazing grounds overlooking Padstow. As we’ve got a break in filming, maybe I should arrange a meeting with the owners, do a recce – what do you think, Pen?’
When his question went unanswered, Ed looked over the top of his laptop. The producer of The Mr Tibbs Mysteries seemed oblivious to his presence. She had just dunked a HobNob in her tea before popping it into her mouth and was currently savouring the soft, sugary crunch. A look of sheer bliss on her face, she let out a long ‘mmmm’.
Ed took off his thick-rimmed Michael Caine glasses and rubbed at his tired eyes. ‘Did you hear any of that, Pen?’
‘You know, without your glasses on you look about seventeen.’ Penny dunked another corner of her biscuit into her tea.
‘Don’t change the subject.’
‘Why not? Why do we have to talk about work? We’ve four weeks’ enforced break while our leading lady goes off and does her one-woman thing at the Old Vic. What’s wrong with spending a morning eating HobNobs and taking it easy for once?’ She cast a longing gaze at the copy of Grazia lying unopened by her side.
Mr Tibbs, based on the novels of Mavis Carew and filmed on location in the picturesque Cornish seaside village where Penny had made her home, had proved to be such a runaway success that they were now halfway through filming the fourth series. The invasion of the cast and crew, and the transformation of Pendruggan into something straight out of the 1930s, had become an annual fixture in the village calendar. Some of the locals had been resistant, but most welcomed the film crew, especially now that the series had put Pendruggan on the tourist map. Queenie’s shop had become a must-see destination for the holidaymakers who flooded the village each summer.
Ed sighed and shut his laptop.
‘Besides,’ Penny added, ‘it’s
