See You at the Show (45 page)

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

“What the hell did you think you were doing?” Mark shouted, crashing into the thankfully private hospital room that Stevie found herself in.
 

She’d had her stomach pumped, been lectured at, she felt like she’d just gone five rounds with a heavyweight champion and it was slowly starting to sink in just what had happened – just what it was that she’d done.
 
Or what she’d attempted to do.
 
A spur-of-the-moment, not-thought-through action that she regretted so much.
 
But at that point in time it had been the only way she could think of to make things better.
 
A huge black cloud had been almost embracing her, sucking her deeper into that vortex of negativity, the confusion had been overwhelming.
 
She hadn’t been herself.
 
But she’d been very much shaken back to reality now.

“Mark…I don’t know…”

“Jesus, Stevie, you fucking scared the crap out of me!
 
Why didn’t you just call me?
 
Why didn’t you just tell me to come straight back over, we could have talked about things, you didn’t have to do
this
!”

She sat up, hugging her knees.
 
“Yeah, I kind of get that now, Mark.”

He pushed a hand through his hair, unable to stop pacing the floor.
 
“Have you any idea what kind of day you’ve given the fucking press?
 
They’re out there thinking all their Christmases have fucking come at once…and if I hadn’t got there when I had…”

She looked at him.
 
“You found me?”

He stared back.
 
“Yeah, I fucking found you.
 
And I’ll ask you again, what the hell did you think you were doing?
 
Have you any idea how fucking selfish that was?
 
I have spent months missing you like you wouldn’t fucking believe, I had my heart ripped out when you walked away from me and the second you come back, the second you give me some kind of hope that you’ve come back to me you do this!
 
Jesus, Stevie…”

She didn’t want to cry again, but he was giving her no choice.
 
What she’d done
had
been selfish.
 
Just like fifteen years ago she’d put herself first and fuck what anyone else was feeling.
 
History had almost repeated itself because she couldn’t face up to something, and she’d vowed she’d never be that weak again, yet look at what she’d done, what she’d tried to do.
 
The weakest act of all.

“Mark…”

He looked at her, at her pale and tear-stained face, and his anger slowly began to subside, although the shock of the day’s events was still going to take some getting over.
 
He couldn’t think straight, and keeping it together was getting harder as the day went on.

“Shit, Stevie.
 
At least your timing was good.
 
We’ve got no show tonight.”

She couldn’t help but smile as he sat down beside her on the bed.

“You fucking crazy bitch.
 
I know you do rock ‘n’ roll like nobody else, honey, but this isn’t the way to go, no matter how bad it seems.
 
I fucking freaked when I found you.
 
I thought you were…just don’t ever fucking do that again, do you hear me?”

She closed her eyes, trying not to think about anything for just a few seconds.
 
But this was a wake up call.
 
The time had come to stop being weak and face up to everything that had happened.
 
No more running, no more hiding.
 
Stefanie Fredriksen may have gone for good but Stevie Stone had to face up to what had happened, to what both Stefanie
and
Stevie had done.
  
It was time to grow up and deal with things, no matter how hard or complicated they were.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered, feeling him take her hand, and that just made the tears start again.
 
Mark Cassidy wasn’t supposed to be the nice, caring person that he was fast turning into but she liked it.
 
It was good.
 
It felt a bit strange but it also felt right.
 
It probably always had, and if she’d just let things take their natural course with him would everything have turned out different?
 
Maybe none of this would have happened.
 
But her past would always have been there, always nagging away at the back of her mind so maybe believing in fate was the best way to go.
 
She had to believe that this had happened for a reason, to give her a chance to put everything right that she’d messed up in the past.
 
She was just sorry that other people who should never have been involved had got caught in the cross-fire.

“Me and Daniel…it’s over,” she went on, gripping Mark’s hand tighter and he moved closer, pulling her in against him, kissing the top of her head.
 
“He wouldn’t even speak to me, Mark.
 
He got somebody else to do the dirty work…he wouldn’t even speak to me.”

“It wasn’t your world, baby.
 
You never belonged there.”

She snuggled in against him, closing her eyes as he held her tight.
 
She was too tired to go over everything again, too tired to think, but he was right.
 
It hadn’t been her world, but she felt as if loose ends had been left untied as far as Daniel was concerned, and she hated that feeling.
 
But it was out of her control now.
 
He wasn’t just some ordinary guy, he was the Prime Minister, and that changed everything.
 
She’d been told it was over and she had to take that and move on.
 
None of it was up for discussion.

She’d been stupid, she’d been selfish but things were going to be different now.
 
They had to be.
 
It wasn’t going to be easy, and for once in her life she was going to have to take some responsibility because everything was going to change all over again.
 
It had to.
 
And one big change in particular.
 
One big change that needed to happen, she needed to do it, she knew that now.
 
If he’d let her.
 

Because Stevie Stone wanted to be a mum – fifteen years late, but she’d do everything in her power to become that mum that she should have been all those years ago, and hopefully Luke could start to forgive her.
 
For everything.

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

Daniel watched as more boxes and bags were carried inside and taken through to the living quarters in Downing Street, looking on as Samantha issued orders, sorting out which room each box was to go in, obviously in her element, but he just felt empty.
 
He’d bowed to the pressure, asked Samantha to come back to him and in the beginning he’d actually believed it had been the only way to go, because his relationship with Stevie could not have continued, not if he wanted this illustrious political career of his.
 

He’d believed that it would get easier as time went on but, even now, more than three months after it had all happened, he was still struggling with a multitude of emotions.
 
Not being able to say goodbye to her, then hearing that she’d tried to take an overdose, that had hit him hard.
 
For someone like Stevie to get that low, she must have been really confused, and he hadn’t wanted to turn his back on her, but that’s exactly what he
had
done.
 
For the most selfish of reasons.

He turned and walked away, back into his office, closing the door behind him.
 
Sometimes he felt as though his whole time with Stevie had been nothing but one long dream that had never really happened and this was his only reality, but the ache deep in the pit of his stomach, the pain he felt across his chest if he thought about her too much, that was very real.
 
That hurt.
 
Because he’d been in love with her, with that beautiful, wild woman with the tattoos and the attitude.
 
He’d been in love with her.
 
Maybe he still was because it was very hard to just switch those feelings off, and he’d tried.
 
God knows he’d tried.

Samantha hadn’t taken much persuading when he’d asked her to come back.
 
He’d thought she’d want explanations, reasons as to why he’d done what he had but she’d just wanted to leave all that behind, pick up where they’d left off, almost.
 
Bury it all and forget it had ever happened.
 
She’d decided that drawing a line under it all and never mentioning it again had been the best way to move forward, and that’s what everybody was advising him to do so he was trying his best to go with it, he really was.
 
But it wasn’t that easy.
 

Stevie was everywhere.
 
She’d told her side of the story; put the exaggerated version of events to rest in both a national newspaper and a TV interview, and he’d watched that interview intently, watched as she’d re-lived it all.
 
He’d seen the pain in her eyes, the regret that was all too obvious, and just seeing her there on the screen, as beautiful and wild as he remembered her – he’d felt as though someone had reached inside his chest and grabbed at his heart, so intense was the pain.
 

Oh, she hadn’t talked much about
their
relationship, but that was probably because she’d been warned not too, Daniel suspected.
 
It had become a somewhat sensitive subject, but when he’d watched her face as his name had been briefly mentioned he’d seen a flicker of something in her eyes that told him
she
hadn’t wanted it to end the way it had either.
 
He’d sensed that maybe she’d have liked to have said goodbye too, although he still wished they hadn’t had to say goodbye at all.
 
But then, maybe Angus was right.
 
Maybe it never would have worked.
 
The differences between them had already started to surface and that would only have got worse as time had gone on, but it didn’t stop him from missing her.
 
Missing her smile, the way she talked to him in that upfront, no nonsense manner of hers.
 
Missing the way they made love.

But it would seem that she was very much back with Mark Cassidy now.
 
Back with her rock star boyfriend.
 
She was getting her life back on track while he felt as though his was standing still.
 
He knew she was over in
America
with the band, working with them on the
U.S.
leg of their tour and the papers were full of photographs of her with the tall and handsome Black Rock Diamond front man.
 
Photographs Daniel found very hard to look at yet he couldn’t ignore them.
 
He couldn’t let her go, and if that was the only way he could get to see her then he’d accept that, no matter how much it hurt.

A knock at his office door shook him back to reality and he looked up.
 
“Come in.”

Samantha walked into the room, her blonde hair pulled back in a perfect ponytail, her dress and heels the epitome of the well-bred, upper-middle-class politician’s wife.
 
Angus was right.
 
She was everything he needed.
 
But nothing he wanted.

“Daniel, darling, I really think I should re-arrange the furniture in the drawing room, don’t you?
 
Put our own stamp on it.”

Daniel was staring blankly at a pile of paperwork on his desk, trying to work out what had to be done and what could wait and he wasn’t completely concentrating on everything she was saying.

“Daniel?
 
Are you listening to me?”

He looked up again, trying to give her what he hoped was a convincing smile.

“I’m sorry.
 
I was miles away.
 
If you feel it needs re-arranging then I’ll leave that in your capable hands.
 
I’ve got some work to be getting on with in here.
 
I’ll leave it entirely up to you.”

She smiled back.
 
“I’ll have this place looking like home in no time.
 
Would you like a cup of coffee before you get started?”

He shook his head, sitting down behind his desk and switching on the laptop, looking up as Samantha closed the door behind her.
 
She was back in his life.
 
And he felt more alone than ever.

***

Samantha knew when she was being dismissed.
 
But she also knew she had to be patient.
 
It would all eventually get back to normal, it was just going to take some time, that’s all.
 
And Samantha had plenty of that.

She smiled as she surveyed the surroundings of a house she’d always wanted to be inside, ever since Daniel had made his desire to become Prime Minister known and, bar the somewhat false start, she was finally here and well on the way to making Number Ten, Downing Street their home.
 
As far as she was concerned this was the start of their brand new future because Daniel needed her, why else would he have asked her to come back?
 
He needed her by his side and she was going to do everything she could to make sure he stayed the popular and successful man that he’d become because, as Angus had predicted, he’d managed to weather the storm created by Stevie Stone remarkably well with minimum damage to both his career and reputation.