No Matter What (28 page)

Terry often visited Reece now.
 
They lived quite close to each other and Terry liked his company.
 
He was a good man, a nice guy, and someone he could talk to quite openly about
India
, something he felt he really needed sometimes because he worried about her so much.
 
“I mean, this moving in together and everything.
 
Doesn’t it seem a bit quick to you?”

Reece leant back in his chair, taking a sip of coffee.
 
“Maybe.
 
I don’t know, it’s a strange one.
 
At first I thought it was just a rebound thing from Kenny, but I think we can write that one off now.
 
It’s quite obviously a lot more than that.
 
She seems happy though, and that’s all that matters, isn’t it?”

Terry shrugged, checking his watch.
 
“Suppose so.”
 
He had to be at soccer coaching in an hour or so but he enjoyed these occasional morning coffees with Reece, because it just didn’t feel like he was sitting in the home of a famous movie star.
 
Reece had a knack of making people feel comfortable.
 
So comfortable that he had Terry drinking coffee before
10 am
and that in itself was an achievement.

Reece took another sip of coffee, staring briefly out of the window as the Californian sun beat down on the pool outside.
 
Despite it being nearly Christmas it was still warm and sunny.
 
Reece loved this climate.
 
There wasn’t a thing that could make him want to move back to
Ireland
on a permanent basis, although he did have a home over in
Waterford
that he used to escape to when he had the time, but he hadn’t been there in a while.
 
Not since all of this had started.

“Have you spoken to
India
?
 
About her and Michael I mean,” Reece asked, turning his attention back to Terry, aware that he was constantly worried about his sister after what had happened with Kenny, but Reece knew he felt he could talk to him.
 
India
was the one main thing they had in common.

“No.
 
Well, I’ve tried to get stuff out of her but she’s walking round like some sixteen year old who’s just got her first boyfriend, and to be honest, it’s hard to get her on her own these days.
 
If she isn’t with Michael she’s hanging around with Kenny – and what’s
that
all about, anyway?
 
I still can’t understand why she wants to stay close to him.”

Reece crossed his legs and pushed a hand through his hair.
 
“He’s her friend, Terry.
 
We’ll never change that.”

Terry started flicking through a magazine lying on the table, one that featured a couple of the less revealing photographs from
India
’s ‘Viper’ shoot.

“Have you seen these?” Terry asked.
 
He knew his sister was one amazing looking woman but he still found it hard to look at photos like that, even if nothing
was
on show in these particular ones.
 
It was still more-than-obvious she was naked.

“Hmm?
 
What?” Reece asked, looking over at Terry, who was holding up the magazine, open at the page of
India
’s photographs.
 
“I flicked through them, yeah.”
 
Reece had found it extremely uncomfortable looking at those pictures.
 
Seeing
India
like that wasn’t something he wanted to make a habit of.
 
“What about you?”

“She’s my sister, Reece.
 
I can’t go there.
 
I’ve had enough stick from my mates back home who’ve bought the bloody magazine.”

Reece smiled.
 
“They don’t really show that much.”

“I don’t care.
 
They show enough, and she’s my baby sister.
 
I don’t want to know.”

The sound of the doorbell made them both look up, and Terry took one last swig of his coffee, picking up his kit bag as he stood up.

“I’ll get that on my way out.
 
Give me a call later ok, and we’ll try and arrange some time to go out and grab that beer.”

Terry had plans for the day ahead.
 
He had the new school soccer team to sort out and he needed to talk to the Principal about the arrangements for the up and coming inter-schools tournament in the New Year.
 
He had a lot to do but he felt as though he’d finally found something he could get his teeth into, and be around his sister at the same time.
 
What could possibly be better than that?
 
Nothing, not in his book.
 
So he’d never become the really famous footballer he’d always dreamed of being back home in
England
, but he’d come to accept that circumstances had changed, and he’d changed with them.
 
Maybe for the better.

He reached Reece’s huge wooden double front door, rummaging round in his bag for his car keys as he opened it, not looking up immediately to see who was there.
 

“Terry ... I ... I didn’t expect to see
you
here.”

He looked up slowly, recognising the voice but not quite believing he was hearing it until he saw her, standing there on Reece’s doorstep - in the middle of
Malibu
.

“What the hell ...”

  
The woman standing there in front of him smiled.
 
“So, aren’t you going to say hello to your mum?”

CHAPTER 18

“You were amazing today,” Michael said, as he stood by the door of
India
’s trailer, arms folded, sunglasses pushed up on top of his head.

She looked at him, smiling slightly.
 
“You’re just saying that so you’ll get sex later.”

“Later?
 
I was banking on a quick one now, between scenes.”

She knew he was only joking; he had that smirk on his face.
 

“You were great out there though, baby.
 
Seriously.”

She went over to him, sliding her arms loosely round his waist, underneath his jacket, kissing him slowly - her favourite way to kiss him.
 
He had the sexiest mouth.
 
She’d suddenly remembered, a couple of nights ago, how she and Charley had once commented on that as they’d sat watching one of his films at home in the flat in
Newcastle
one night, years ago.
 
It had been a throwaway comment, but little had she known then that one day she’d spend so much time kissing that self same mouth.

“I like you as a director, Mr. Walsh.”

He gave her that smile again. “Oh yeah?”

“Yeah.”
 
She smiled back, squeezing him tight, pushing herself against him.
 
“I like it when you get all dominant and demanding.
 
It kind of turns me on.”

“Really?”
 
He was still smirking.

“Really.”

“I think you’re trying to take advantage of the director here, Ms. Steven.”

“Would
I
do a thing like that?”

He pushed his sunglasses down over his eyes.
 
“I was hoping so, yes.”

She burst out laughing.
 
She loved him when he was like this.
 
He was so funny, so able to make people laugh.
 
She’d thought it had just been the way he played certain characters on-screen but he was so like that in real life too.
 
Handsome and funny and kind.
 
Why hadn’t she seen that before?
 
Why hadn’t she seen what she saw now?
 
Because she’d been blinded by Kenny, that’s why.

She pulled his sunglasses off and put them in his jacket pocket, leaning into him for another kiss.

“You
are
taking advantage, aren’t you, kiddo?”

“Perks of having my boyfriend as the director, Mikey.”

He lowered his mouth down onto hers in a long, deep kiss, giving into the moment, burying his fingers in her long hair, feeling her body warm against him.
 
Forty-four years old and he felt like a student on prom night who’d just scored with the Homecoming Queen.
 

“I only came in to see if you were ready for this afternoon’s filming,” he smiled, stroking the hair from her eyes.
 
Oh, what he wouldn’t give to just stay here and spend hours looking into those eyes.

“Well, that’ll teach you then, won’t it.”

He laughed.
 
She loved that laugh, loved the way he threw his head back, she loved seeing him happy.

“Do we
have
to go out tonight?” she asked, playing with the collar of his jacket and wishing they had time for sex.
 
She was becoming very needy in that department as far as Michael was concerned.
 
Some days she only had to look at him and she wanted him so badly it hurt.
 
There were even times when she’d wake up in the middle of the night and just turn over and watch him sleeping, wishing he’d wake up and make love to her.
 
He was now a permanent fixture in her
Beverly Hills
home, and the rumours that was causing to circulate around
Hollywood
were rife, but she didn’t care.
 
All she cared about was that she and Michael were together.

“We’ve got to show our faces, sweetheart.
 
They’re expecting us.”
 
Although Michael wished, just as much as she did, that they could give it a miss and spend the night alone instead of with hundreds of other people and the inevitable paparazzi that would be hanging around, waiting for yet another picture of them together.

They were going to a big charity event in West Hollywood, a black tie affair, and that meant getting dressed up to the hilt again.
 
India
loved getting dressed up as much as the next girl, something she’d never thought would happen to her because she’d never really been a girlie-girl.
 
But the world she now lived in had changed her to some extent and she was quite happy to roll with it, especially when they could make her look a million dollars every time she walked out the door.
 
It was just that, tonight, she really couldn’t be bothered.
 
She’d felt tired all day, unusually so, and the thought of having to go out after a whole day filming wasn’t one she was looking forward to.
 
Tonight she just wanted to have Michael all to herself.
 
She had to share him so much and she wanted him to concentrate totally on her for a few hours.
 
But, instead of going home later to a quiet house, they’d be going home to a houseful of make-up artists and stylists and she’d just have to deal with that.

She started to kiss him again, her fingers gently stroking the back of his neck.

“You are making me so late back on set, missy,” he groaned, knowing he should be leaving her trailer right now, before this went too far.

“I love you, Michael Walsh,” she whispered, her mouth resting on his as she spoke.

He stroked her face, looking into those beautiful eyes and wishing, just wishing they had the time.
 
“I love you too, baby.”
 
He’d never tire of saying those words, words he’d waited years to say to her.
 
But one more kiss and he had to go.
 
He was a professional if nothing else.
 
“See you back out there, ok?”
 
he smiled, his fingers slowly letting go of hers and she smiled back.

“Yeah.
 
Ok.”

She sat down on the sofa, watching him walk back to the set, hugging her knees to her chest as she pulled out the letter she’d hurriedly stuffed down the side of the sofa when he’d come in.
 
It was a letter from Charley, passed on to her via her agent’s office, and in it Charley had detailed exactly what kind of trouble she was in. How Jimmy was now making her life hell since finding out about that night with Kenny, about how she was being forced to make movies in which she was made to do things she hated, things she couldn’t stomach but things she had to do otherwise Jimmy would see to it that her life would be made even more uncomfortable than it already was.
 
She told India how she couldn’t escape due to the amount of people Jimmy had watching her all the time but how she needed to get out before something really bad happened to her.
 
She was scared and afraid and lonely and that hit
India
hard.
 
Charley was her friend, after all, despite everything that had gone on.
 
It was old news now anyway.
 
If all of that hadn’t happened with her and Kenny then she and Michael may never have got together.
 
But whilst it had all turned out wonderfully for
India
, for Charley her life was now a nightmare, and
India
couldn’t let it stay that way.
 
She had to think though, had to think of what to do, how to sort this out because, right now, she didn’t have a clue.
 
The only thing she did know was that the only person she could turn to over this was Kenny.