Katy Carter Wants a Hero (28 page)

‘I’m coming!’ I say, clambering over the piled fish boxes and coiled ropes. I trip a bit, OK a lot, in my flip-flops, and no doubt somebody somewhere gets a cellulite shot that will grace the pages of
Heat
, but I don’t care. If Ollie is here to sort it all out, everything will be fine.

‘Careful, darling,’ calls Jewell, watching me struggle up the ladder, dazzled by migraine-inducing flashes. ‘Mind your nails.’

My nails are the least of my concerns; in fact, as I slither and slip on the rungs I begin to fear for my life. The deck of
Dancing Girl
is suddenly a very long way below and not looking like a soft landing. God, I hate heights! Even sitting on the top of the 207 bus makes my legs go all wobbly. I start to feel sick and actually very hard done by. All I want to do is have a quiet break and write my novel in peace. And now I’ll end up as a splat on the manky deck of a boat belonging to a man with all the social graces of a bout of diarrhoea.

Maybe in a parallel universe another Katy Carter has been rescued by a multimillionaire in a yacht rather than sewer-mouthed Guy in his stinky trawler.

My right hand slips on some fresh seagull shit and the crowd gasp as I wobble and slide. I scream and plunge several rungs before managing to scrabble a hold. One lovely flip-flop plops into the harbour and I feel stupidly close to tears.

Just my luck I inhabit the crappy parallel universe.

‘For fuck’s sake,’ Guy says despairingly. Moments later he’s climbed up behind me and placed his strong arms either side of the ladder. ‘Look up and climb, you silly cow. I won’t let you fall.’

Charming! He is so
not
going to be the inspiration for my romantic hero. Jake would never call Millandra a silly cow! Maddy has a serious taste-in-men problem if Richard Lomax and Guy Tregarten are her idea of heroes.

Still, I’m not going to argue with Guy. I look upwards and try to ignore the fact that an enormous lens is pointed at my chest. Several rungs later I sprawl across the quay, hands raw from gripping the ladder and legs jellified from the effort.

I’m alive!

It’s all I can do not to kiss the ground like the Pope.

I am
never
setting foot on Guy’s boat again.

Jewell pokes me with the parasol. ‘Get up, Katy! We can see your underwear.’

Cameras flash. As apparently so do I. I leap up hastily and pull my skirt down.

‘Where’s Ollie?’ I look round hopefully, but there are only strange faces and lenses. That curly mop of bright hair and familiar crinkled grin can’t be far away.

Jewell’s brow wrinkles so deeply that she looks like Yoda dressed in Chanel. ‘Isn’t he the lovely boy with the pants who came to my birthday party?’

Togas and Romans was Jewell’s last theme, and Ol and I had a great time ripping up bed sheets, unlike James, who insisted upon hiring a fancy Caesar outfit and trying to discuss high finance with a very plastered Jewell. Ollie was a major hit, especially when his toga fell off to reveal Batman underpants.

‘Yes, yes!’ I say impatiently. ‘Where is he?’ I crane my neck just in case Ollie is hiding behind a length of orange trawl or is sitting in a net bin.

‘Whatever makes you think he’s here?’ Jewell puts her arm around me and beams for the cameras. ‘The other side’s my better side, angel!’

My poor heart’s had more ups and downs than a ride at Alton Towers today. It’s now plummeting like a crazy bungee jumper. No Ollie? I’m ridiculously devastated.

‘I came with that lovely Frankie,’ Auntie Jewell tells me, adjusting her turban and baring her dentures for the photographers. ‘He called me when he saw the papers. He was adamant that you’d need our support. Bless him! What a sweetheart! He couldn’t drive down quick enough.’

I bet he bloody couldn’t. I make a mental note to murder Frankie horribly when I next see him.

‘Didn’t Ollie want to come?’

‘Ollie?’ Again the powdery old face furrows. ‘I don’t think he was even there, darling. Out with his girlfriend, Frankie thought. Why?’ She fixes me with one of her piercing looks. ‘Did you expect him to come?’

‘Of course not,’ I say quickly. ‘I just wondered.’ Then another thought occurs. ‘Where
is
Frankie?’

Jewell laughs. ‘I have simply no idea. We had a drink, or maybe two, and then he vanished. I expect he’s gone for a walk, the dear boy.’

I groan. This is all I need.

Jewell links her arm through mine. ‘We want to know exactly what’s been going on. Don’t we?’ The reporters nod and shout their agreement. As they press closer, I start to panic, because there’s nowhere to escape to. On one side of the wall is murky harbour water and on the other are crashing waves, neither of which holds much appeal. Backing away as the reporters surge forward, I find that I’m trapped against a net bin. Bits of rotting fish and tangles of gut press against my cheek.

‘Darlings, move back! Let us through!’ Jewell demands.

‘Not until we have a comment.’ A thin-faced girl in a silver bomber jacket shoves a microphone under my nose. ‘Angela Andrews,
Daily Dagger
. Did you steal Gabriel from Stacey Dean?’

‘Is he good in bed?’ demands another.

‘Is he?’ asks Jewell, agog.

‘I don’t know!’ I snap. ‘I hardly know the man!’

‘Is it true that he’s bought a house here?’

‘Are you an actress? What are you in?’

‘A mess, that’s what I’m in,’ I groan.

Jewell and I are pushed back again as more reporters press forward. Any further back and we’ll be in the net bin. Jewell brandishes her parasol at them but the reporters are made of sterner stuff.

‘Hit me with that and I’ll do you for assault,’ jeers Angela Andrews.

‘Who says I’m going to
hit
you with it?’ Jewell retorts, poking the reporter’s bony rear. Angela backs off nervously. I can’t say I blame her. Jewell looks like she means business.

‘Out of the way, Grandma!’ A burly photographer shoves through towards us. ‘All we need’s a quote from Katy.’

‘That’s enough!’ A spray of water rises from the boat below, showering the journalists, who scatter shrieking and trying to shield their cameras. ‘She said no fucking comment!’

Guy is wielding the boat’s deck wash like Arnie wields an Uzi. All he needs to do is shout ‘Hasta la vista, baby!’ and the image will be complete. Icy-cold sea water drenches the reporters as he swings the hosepipe from left to right.

‘How jolly!’ trills Jewell, watching the reporters scurrying for shelter like disturbed ants. ‘Will we be on the news?’

‘Get back on to the boat,’ yells Guy. ‘Down the ladder!’

I’m just about to point out that I’m with an octogenarian who can’t possibly be expected to shimmy down ladders when Jewell pushes past and starts the descent, calling, ‘Hurry up, Katy! Don’t be afraid!’

‘Thank you, darling,’ she coos when Guy lifts her on to the deck. ‘Bless you for helping a frail old lady.’

Frail old lady? I’ve met frailer Sherman tanks.

Jewell, swooning in Guy’s arms, winks up at me. ‘This lovely young man will help you. He’s ever so strong.’

‘I’d rather die than let him help me,’ I say as I inch my way back down towards the deck.

‘Get your arse down here now!’ Guy roars. ‘Or we’re going without you.’

I don’t need asking twice, because Angela Andrews, sopping wet now, and shrieking blue bloody murder about her Prada bomber jacket being ruined, is back on the quay. I’m down that ladder and on to the boat quicker than I’m out of school when the bell sounds.

And that’s pretty bloody quick.

The boat engine roars into life, plumes of blue smoke cough out of the exhaust pipe and Guy tears about pulling in ropes and old tyres.

‘Cast off!’ he yells to Mads and me. ‘As I go astern, push away from the wall.’

We do as he says, even though the wall is rough and slimy and we haven’t the foggiest what astern means. Mind you, I’ll do pretty much anything, to be honest, if it means getting away from Prada Bomber Jacket. She’s almost on the boat now, one narrow foot stretching out towards
Dancing Girl
and the other anchored on the ladder. She’s looking seriously pissed off, and I can’t say that I fancy my chances if she gets her hands on me. Being a teacher, I’m more likely to go to the moon than I am to go to Prada, but I can imagine how much that jacket cost.

Luckily for me, while she’s straddling the air between boat and ladder, Guy engages the engine and
Dancing Girl
shoots backwards with a jolt. Several alarmed seagulls caw in annoyance and rise into the air, crapping cheerfully on the reconvening journalists.

Jewell claps her hands. ‘Marvellous!’

And what’s even more marvellous is the loud splash Angela Andrews makes as she falls into the harbour.

‘Whoops!’ says Guy from the wheelhouse. ‘Did someone fall in?’

Angela Andrews floats in the harbour, her face a picture of rage. The silver coat puffs around her like a trendy brand of life jacket and a gloopy mass of seaweed sits jauntily on the top of her head. High on the quay her colleagues cackle delightedly and take pictures.

‘I hope Richard doesn’t hear about this,’ worries Mads. ‘He’ll go mental.’

It’s on the tip of my tongue to ask her how she’ll tell, but I stop myself just in time. Given the ugly expression on Angela’s face, the thwarted crowd of reporters and the Ollie-shaped gap in my life, I’m going to need all the friends I can get. It’s a sad sign of the times that I’m adding Richard to my rapidly dwindling list.

Guy emerges from the wheelhouse. ‘Change of plan. We’re going to Fowey. I know a good pub. You can wait there until it gets dark and then come the back way into Tregowan.’

‘Good idea,’ agrees Mads. ‘If we walk down the cliff path we can avoid the press easily.’

‘We can black our faces!’ cries Jewell. ‘And use leaves for camouflage!’

I sit on an empty fish box and bury my face in my hands.

‘I need a drink,’ I say.

Actually, make that several drinks.

And they can be doubles.

I’m starting to wish I’d stayed in London.

It’s getting dark by the time the cab drops us all off at the top of Tregowan Hill. The light bleeds away from the sky, just like Jewell’s scarlet lipstick has from her lips, and the lights of the village twinkle below. We’ve been deposited next to a rather overgrown footpath that doesn’t look like it’s been used since the days of smuggling, and left to pick our way down through the tangled brambles.

Not that anyone’s perturbed by this. They’re all far too pissed to care. Guy’s wearing Jewell’s turban and smoking a joint, Mads keeps lying down to gaze at the sky and Jewell is singing ‘Show Me the Way to Go Home’ at the top of her voice. Every now and then somebody hisses, ‘Ssh!’ before erupting into cackles of laughter.

Oops! Think that’s me!

‘Katy!’ Maddy grabs my arm and sways. ‘Look!’

‘What?’

‘There aren’t any lights on in the rectory. Where’s Richard?’

We sway together and the twinkling village dips and rolls nauseatingly.

‘He’s out,’ she declares. ‘He’s with some other woman.’

I think this highly unlikely. It’s a cause of major amazement to me that Rich has found one woman who wants to shag him. The possibility of two seems to be pushing it rather.

‘I’m going to find him,’ Mads says, lurching off into the darkness. ‘And then I’m going to chop his balls off.’

‘Ouch,’ Guy winces.

‘I’ll help you,’ Jewell offers, stumbling in her wake.

‘Where do you think you’re off to?’ Guy catches my sleeve when I try to follow. ‘You’re supposed to be meeting Gabriel Winters. Dinner at Mr Lover Lover’s, remember? He lives over there.’ And he stabs his finger wildly in the direction of some very distant lights.

I know I’m slightly pissed, but surely that house is about a mile away and at the end of some very thick woods? I glance down at my feet, now encased in a spare pair of Guy’s wellies and slopping about madly. I look like I’ve got flippers for feet.

‘I’ll never make it,’ I say. The path looks very dark and shadowy. I’m sure I can see a vampire lurking. ‘Can’t you come with me?’

‘Bollocks to that! It’s miles!’ Guy gives me a shove. ‘You don’t need me. Whatever happened to girl power?’

I don’t think I ever had any, to be honest, but I’m not telling him that.

It’s only a woodland path. I’ll show him.

Not that he’ll leave me anyway.

‘Fine.’ I square my shoulders. ‘I’ll go on my own. Bye then.’

‘Bye,’ says Guy cheerfully and vanishes into the dusk.

What! That wasn’t supposed to happen!

I’m all alone in the middle of the woods in the dark. And I’ve never seen dark like it. Where’s the orange glow?

I wish I’d never watched
The Blair Witch Project
.

Or
Scream
.

Or any horror film at all basically.

Deep breaths, Katy. You can do this. I shuffle forward and stretch out my hands. It’s only a walk in the woods, after all. Even if the woods are very dark and the path is getting steeper. I could cheerfully murder the sadistic bastard who thought building a house halfway through the woods was a good idea. Honestly! And I’m sure the air is getting thinner the higher I climb. If Gabriel wants guests to come to dinner then he really ought to provide an oxygen tank or something; at the very least a cable car.

Bloody inconsiderate I call it.

I pause for a moment to get my breath. It doesn’t help that the fine weather has vanished, to be replaced by a depressing mizzling rain that is drifting in from the sea. My hair is starting to frizz and my nose is dripping, not a sexy look. Not that I want to look sexy for Gabriel, but a girl has her pride. And it’s not every day that I get to have dinner with an A-list celebrity.

Pausing for breath, I lean against a tree and look at the village falling away below. The mist is thicker now, wrapping itself around the ancient buildings. The beach vanishes. The houses that perch dizzyingly high above the sea are obscured, smothered and blanketed and the lights in their windows blinded. I have the horrible sensation that the world is slowly but surely being erased.