her bedroom door. On the floor in front of her was a folded note with a set of car keys on top. Sabrina picked up the note and read it.
‘Sorry Angel. Terrible migraine. Gone to bed. I left you the keys, in case you still fancy getting out of Dodge tonight. Will make it up to you soon, promise, V xx.’
The disappointment hit her like a punch to the stomach. She was angry with herself for caring so much. After all, it was only one dinner. And it was only Viorel Hudson who, if Dorian had let her keep Enrique, she probably wouldn’t be bothering to try to seduce in the first place. Even so, standing there in her sexy pants and heels, it was hard not to feel a bit like Cinderella at midnight. She also wondered whether Vio really had a migraine, or whether this was some sort of petty power game he was playing to get her attention. He’d been fit as a fiddle all day on set. It had certainly come on very suddenly.
Pocketing the car keys, she was about to change back into flip-flops and wander down to the kitchen – most of the actors skipped Mrs Drummond’s buffets and ate supper in the catering trailer with the crew, but Sabrina had no interest in making small talk with cameramen – when she suddenly changed her mind. Sabrina had never been to a British pub, and although the thought of dinner alone was not exactly appealing, it was better than spending the night here making conversation with Tish Crewe and her housekeeper, or, worse, getting cornered again by Rasmirez. She was pretty sure she remembered the way down into the village.
Fuck it, she thought. I’ll go.
The Carpenter’s Arms in Loxley was a low-beamed, medieval building, built in the same warm stone as the rest of the village, but covered almost completely at the front by blossoming violet wisteria. It had an old-fashioned swinging sign, a pretty beer garden overlooking the village green and, on a warm, late spring evening like this one, it was packed.
Sabrina didn’t even have to step out of the car for people to turn and stare. Just the sight of Vio’s rented Mercedes SL 500 pulling into the car park was enough to set tongues wagging, and see pint glasses being set down warily on wooden picnic tables. When Sabrina actually walked in, you could have cut the silence with a knife.
‘Table for one?’ she asked the barman, nervously. What had felt like a casual outfit back in her room now seemed ludicrously over the top. Everyone else here seemed to have at least one item of clothing held up with string. Perhaps this had been a mistake.
‘We’re a bit busy at the moment, love,’ the barman began, but he was interrupted by his wife, a stocky woman with wobbly, butcher’s arms and a distinctly lesbian haircut, who grabbed Sabrina’s hand and pumped it vigorously, as if she were a fruit machine in a Vegas casino.
‘Busy? Course we’re not busy, Dennis,’ she said, smiling ingratiatingly at Sabrina and revealing a row of half-rotten teeth. ‘Table for one, was it? Follow me. I’d expect you’d like somewhere nice and private, would you?’
‘Thank you. That’d be great.’
The landlady led Sabrina to a recessed corner of the room, where an old man was nursing the dregs of a pint of bitter. ‘Let me clear that away for you, Samuel,’ she said briskly.
‘But I’m not finished,’ the old man protested, as she physically prised the glass out of his gnarled hands.
‘You are now. We need the table. Lady’s having dinner.’
‘Oh, please, you mustn’t disturb your customers on my account,’ said Sabrina, embarrassed. Insisting on special treatment at Hollywood clubs was one thing, but she wasn’t in the habit of turfing harmless seniors out on the street, especially not in a little village joint like this one. ‘I can wait.’
‘Nonsense,’ the landlady laughed nervously. ‘Sam doesn’t mind.’
‘Yes, I do,’ muttered the old man with an air of hopelessness as he was dragged from his cosy corner and propelled towards the snug bar.
‘There now,’ said the landlady, ignoring him and turning back to Sabrina. ‘You make yourself comfortable. Dennis’ll be over with a menu in two shakes of a lamb’s tail.’
Feeling more awkward than she had since high school, Sabrina sat alone at her stolen table, cursing Vio Hudson. What the hell was she doing here? Grateful for the low lighting, she slunk back as far as possible into the corner and, a few moments later, hid herself behind the large, leather-bound menu. Deciding that as she was here, in a British pub, she ought at least to do the thing properly, she ordered steak and kidney pudding and chips. She was contractually forbidden to drink, but no one was here except for the locals, and they could barely see her in the gloom, never mind the contents of her glass, so she ordered a double vodka and tonic, following it swiftly with a second. By the time she’d finished that, and eaten the chips (she took one bite of the pudding and almost gagged), she found she was feeling less awkward and, for the first time since arriving in England, relaxed.
‘You’re that actress, aren’t you?’ A young girl having supper with her parents approached Sabrina’s table. She looked to be about eleven, with braces on her teeth, and wearing a low-cut pink top that revealed nothing at all but which she clearly thought of as teenage and cool. ‘Can I have your autograph?’
‘Of course,’ Sabrina beamed. She used to resent autograph hunters. In the States they were like locusts, they’d swarm you anywhere – at the doctor’s office; while you were on the phone. But she realized with a twinge of panic that this kid was the first person to ask for her autograph since before she went to Revivals, over four months ago now.
‘What’s your name?’
‘Michaela,’ said the girl shyly.
Running her pen across the back of the cardboard coaster, Sabrina felt a rush of pleasure like a heroin shot in the arm.
‘There you go, Michaela. It was a pleasure to meet you.’
The child skipped away happily, clutching her treasure. Sabrina was gazing after her, basking in her own magnanimity, when she felt a tap on her shoulder.
‘I sincerely hope that was a mineral water.’
Dorian Rasmirez was towering over her, holding her empty glass in his enormous, fat-fingered hand. He was wearing corduroy trousers and a chunky knit fisherman’s sweater, which only added to his already substantial bulk, and he was smiling, the first time Sabrina had ever seen him do so. He’s happy because he’s caught me out, she thought dully, but she was too tired to care. She felt like an exhausted salmon about to be eaten by a bear.
‘Of course,’ she lied, wearily. ‘Ask at the bar if you don’t believe me.’
‘I don’t believe you,’ said Dorian, pulling up a chair and sitting down opposite her. ‘Luckily for you, however, I don’t care. You’re entitled to a drink after today.’
Sabrina’s eyes narrowed. Was this a trick?
‘Why are you being nice to me?’
‘Would you rather I wasn’t?’
‘What are you doing here anyway?’ She eyed him suspiciously. ‘Did you follow me?’
Dorian laughed, a deep, throaty laugh that shook his whole chest and made people turn around to look at him. ‘I have better things to do with my evening. Like trying to undo the shit-storm you caused with your little impromptu press conference at Heathrow
