Obsession (47 page)

‘Corrie,’ he gasped. ‘Oh my God, Corrie! You’ve got to help me. Please, make it stop …’

‘Luke! Are you all right?’

He spun round to find Felicity standing at the door.

‘I thought I heard you in here,’ she said, uncertainly.
‘Annalise
is still on the line, she’d like to speak to you again.’

Luke’s eyes had narrowed. He could see her lips moving but barely heard what she was saying. The terror was suddenly with him again, yet he knew with a few last moments of clarity that the rage was closing in. There was nothing he could do to stop it, already it was blinding him to all else beyond Felicity the slag, who’d made him hurt Annalise. Felicity the slag, who had enticed Corrie here to Bennati. Felicity the slag, who must pay for what she’d done.

‘Are you all right?’ she said again, when he continued to stare at her.

He picked up a towel. ‘I’m fine,’ he said, wiping it over his tear-stained face. ‘Just fine. Tell me, Felicity, would you be liking rabbits?’

– 18 –

‘CORRIE! CORRIE!’

Corrie smiled as she saw Annalise leaping up and down to attract her attention through the crowd, and lifting an arm Corrie waved back. There could be no mistaking Annalise’s joy to see her and suddenly feeling the need to hug Annalise she started to run.

‘Oh, Corrie,’ Annalise cried, as Corrie let go of her baggage trolley and swung her into her arms. ‘Corrie, are you all right?’

‘Of course I am,’ Corrie laughed. ‘Are you?’

‘Yes. No. Yes, as long as you are. Felicity called me, she told me what happened – Oh, Corrie, what can I say to make you feel better?’

‘You don’t have to say anything,’ Corrie told her, pulling
her
trolley out of the path of other passengers. ‘I’m fine, honestly. It happened, now it’s over.’

‘But Felicity said you were broken-hearted,’ Annalise protested.

‘Don’t be silly, of course I’m not. How can I be? We only spent one night together. No, no, no,’ she said, as Annalise started to protest again. ‘Not another word on the subject. Felicity’s just exaggerated everything out of all proportion and …’

‘But you’ve lost weight, Corrie. I can tell.’

‘And not a moment too soon,’ Corrie grimaced, wishing more than anything else in the world that she felt even remotely as light-hearted as she sounded. ‘Now come on, let’s get out of here. I take it you’ve still got the hire car.’

As they drove along the 101 freeway into San Francisco Corrie was aware that Annalise, who kept looking at her and smiling brightly, was trying to work up the courage to tell her something. But, when she casually enquired if Annalise had any news Annalise immediately said,

‘No, nothing’s happened. I’ve just been sitting up here thinking, nothing else …’

‘Thinking about what?’ As if Corrie needed to ask.

‘Things. By the way, I’ve booked us into the St. Francis overlooking Union Square. Diane’s place is too small for us both to camp out in, and I wanted to be with you.’

Corrie smiled. ‘That’s good,’ she said, ‘because I wanted to be with you too.’

They talked for a while then about the programme and how the filming had gone, until Corrie suddenly gasped.

‘My God, just look at it!’ she cried, as they brinked a hill and the staggering panorama of San Francisco unexpectedly revealed itself before them. They were at the top of Pacific Heights where the roller coaster of a road they were on swept dramatically down towards the heart of the city. ‘It’s stupendous,’ Corrie murmured, gazing at the maze of majestic towers rising through the rippling heat.

‘You should see it by night,’ Annalise told her, ‘it takes your breath away.’

Corrie’s eyes were circles of wonder as she watched the city unfold. Soon, too soon, they were entering the heart of it, but still she was transfixed. She was experiencing an almost overwhelming sense of relief and familiarity. Relief to discover that not everywhere in the United States was like Los Angeles: and familiarity because nestling in amongst the gleaming, spectacular sky-scrapers, was the unmistakable, though neglected, grandeur of bygone days. This town had a heart, more than that it had a soul. And, she realized with a jolt of pleasure, it had a past. She smiled to herself then, unaware until that moment just how much she had missed England these past two weeks. Its history was something she’d always taken for granted, barely even noticed was there it was so familiar. But in Los Angeles, she realized now, she had been uncomfortable without it.

‘I thought,’ Annalise said, as they approached Union Square, ‘that since you’re only staying two days we’d dump your bags at the hotel then take you off to see something of the city right away. How does that sound?’

‘Perfect,’ Corrie answered, and an hour later, after abandoning the car at the hotel, they were alighting from a taxi down at Fisherman’s Wharf.

It was teaming with tourists and Corrie balked at the idea of having to spend even a few minutes in such heat with so many people. But, as they strolled from Ghirardelli Square, past the endless queues who were being entertained by buskers as they waited for cable cars, and approached the bay, she stopped being bothered by the masses. This was a wonderful place, so alive and thrumming with excitement, and so entrenched in reality that she was just happy to be there. And how lucky she was, Annalise told her, not to have arrived on a day when the infamous fog was masking it all.

On reaching Hyde Street Pier they rested their arms on
the
wall and stared out across the water to the Golden Gate Bridge – and to Alcatraz.

‘We can take a trip out there if you like,’ Annalise said.

Corrie shook her head. She didn’t want to visit a prison, not when just looking at it, even from this distance, was reminding her of what a prison her own body had become. All her feelings were locked deep inside her now, she would never be able to share them with him, never be able to let them go.

Hooking her arm through Annalise’s they started along the Embarcadero, past the National Floating Park, through a battery of music and streetside dancing, heading towards the site where there had once been a double decker bridge, before it had been destroyed by the earthquake in which so many had perished.

So many gloomy thoughts, Corrie chided herself, and forcing a smile to her lips dragged Annalise over to look at the countless multi-coloured stalls which lined the street with handcrafted jewellery, caricature portraits, hats, T-shirts, sourdough bread and living sea-food. They bought tiny wooden cable cars which when wound up played
I left my Heart in San Francisco
, watched and laughed along with the one man juke-box who, in his Punch and Judy box, was playing a lively tune on his trumpet, and devoured ice-creams the size of a candy floss.

Eventually they reached the world famous Pier 39, and as they strolled arm in arm to where the seals were basking in the afternoon sun, and Corrie inhaled deeply of the tangy salt air, Annalise trespassed into her thoughts with the words, ‘I’ve spoken to Luke, Corrie.’

Having already guessed this, Corrie was only surprised by how long it had taken Annalise to tell her. ‘When?’ was all she said.

‘This morning, just after I talked to Felicity, while you were on your way here.’

‘And?’

Annalise walked on ahead, pushing through the crowd to find them a spot where they could watch the seals. ‘Corrie, please don’t be angry,’ she said, as Corrie joined her, ‘but I’ve decided to go back to him. He wants me to, and it’s what I want too.’

‘Even after what he did, after the way he spoke to you?’

‘Yes. Oh, Corrie, please try to understand. I love him, and part of loving someone is forgiving them, isn’t it?’

Corrie watched as a huge grey seal rolled over and flopped into the water. Would she forgive Cristos if he ever did that to her, she was asking herself. She didn’t think so, but she couldn’t imagine him ever doing it. She squeezed her eyes tightly closed. What was she talking about? He had allowed his picture to be printed in the newspapers with Paige Spencer, knowing she would be sure to see it. She doubted though that it had even entered his head that it would hurt her so badly, if he had thought of her at all, which he most likely hadn’t. And besides, she and Cristos didn’t even have a relationship, they never had, unless one night constituted a relationship, which it didn’t, so how could she compare her feelings with Annalise’s?

‘Did he explain why he did it?’ Corrie asked, knowing already that whatever he had told Annalise wouldn’t have been the truth. But she was wrong, and she could hardly believe her ears when Annalise said,

‘He told me he wanted to make you the producer for this programme. That he thought it was the only way he could do it, and now he’s begging me to forgive him.’

‘Did he say why he wanted to make me the producer?’

‘He thought that was what you wanted.’

‘Not that way.’

‘I know. He understands that now. He told me to tell you that once this programme has been transmitted you’ll revert to being my researcher again.’

Corrie gave a dry laugh and stared sadly out at the chopping waves. ‘So we all go back to where we were before
Los
Angeles and pretend nothing ever happened? I only wish it were that easy.’

‘Do you mean …? Are you saying that you don’t want to work with me again?’

‘No,’ Corrie said, shaking her head. ‘I was thinking of something else.’ She turned to look at Annalise, sweeping her face with her eyes, taking in every line, every pore, every tremor. It was such a pretty face, so young, so trusting and eager. But for how much longer? Already the depth of suffering she had known was beginning to take its toll. ‘I wish you’d give him up, Annalise,’ she said.

Annalise shook her head. ‘I know you do, but I can’t,’ she whispered.

‘But if you could only see what he’s doing to you. You look awful, Annalise. No, ravaged is the word, and it’s him who’s doing it.’

‘I know. But it’s because I haven’t been with him. I’ve missed him so badly while I’ve been here. But I made myself stay. I knew I had to think, to decide what to do for the best … Corrie, I can’t live without him. I don’t want to live without him. OK, I know he has his faults, but there are other things about him …’

‘What things?’

Annalise shrugged. ‘I don’t know. I can’t put it into words, but he means more to me than anyone else in the world.’

Corrie heaved a deep sigh and turned back to the seals. Should she tell Annalise what Luke had said to her before she’d left? How he’d asked her to marry him, that he needed her? She really didn’t think it would do any good, that Annalise, in her desperation, would very likely find it in her heart to forgive even that, and Annalise’s next words confirmed it.

‘I told you,’ she was saying, ‘I’ve done a lot of thinking, and I realize now that Luke is never going to be faithful.
It’s
just something in him I’m going to have to condition myself to live with.’

‘Oh Annalise,’ Corrie groaned. ‘Why should you do that when there are so many men out there who would be faithful? Who would love you every bit as much as you deserve to be loved, and who would treat you the way you should be treated.’

‘But they’re not Luke, are they?’

Corrie turned to face her, and lifting a hand to stroke her hair, said, ‘Annalise, I know this is going to hurt you, that it’ll hurt a great deal, but I have to tell you so that perhaps you’ll start to understand what he’s really like. Before I left Los Angeles this morning, Luke asked me to marry him.’

To her amazement Annalise simply nodded. ‘I know,’ she said. ‘He told me. He asked you to try to make me jealous. He thought it would bring me back to him.’

Corrie turned away quickly before Annalise saw the fury in her eyes. The bastard! she was thinking to herself. He tells her everything, he never lies and because of it Corrie could see that she was never going to get through to Annalise. Well damn it, she wasn’t going to give up yet.

‘I think there’s something wrong with Luke,’ she said bluntly. ‘I mean seriously wrong. I think his mind is disturbed.’

‘Isn’t everyone’s, one way or another?’

‘Annalise!’ Corrie cried, barely able to resist the urge to shake her. ‘Ask yourself, just ask yourself rationally, who in their right mind would do the things he does?’

‘I don’t see that he does anything so out of the ordinary,’ Annalise answered. ‘All right, sometimes he might, and I know he gets some very odd moods every now and again, but don’t we all?’

Corrie turned away in exasperation.

‘Come on,’ Annalise said, taking her by the arm, ‘you’re getting angry now, and I don’t want anything to spoil these
two
days, so let’s walk on around the pier and talk about something else, shall we?’

Realizing that for now she was beaten Corrie allowed herself to be dragged away for more shopping and sightseeing. It wasn’t until much later in the evening, when they were sitting in McCormick & Kuleto’s sipping white wine and tucking into the most succulent mussels, that Corrie broached the subject again.

‘What do your parents think of your relationship with Luke?’ she asked, as Annalise dipped her fingers in the lemon water.

There was just the briefest of hesitations before Annalise answered, but it was long enough for Corrie to know that she was going to lie. ‘They never really say too much,’ she shrugged. ‘At least Mummy doesn’t. Daddy thinks that I’m too young for him, but then Daddy would.’

‘Meaning?’

‘Daddy wouldn’t approve of anyone, no matter who they were. He’s always been over-protective of me, but he’s beginning to understand now that I have to make my own decisions in life.’

‘So your father doesn’t really approve of Luke, is what you’re saying?’

‘Corrie, if you’re thinking of ganging up with him against me then please don’t. The last thing in the world I want is for us to fall out, but we will if you do anything to interfere in my relationship with Luke.’

‘All right,’ Corrie said crossly, ‘then I’m going to tell you quite frankly that Luke Fitzpatrick frightens me. That I really think he’s up to something that involves both you
and
your father. No, don’t ask me to explain, because I can’t. But it’s a feeling I have, and I know I’m right. So, I want your solemn promise, Annalise, that if he ever does anything, anything at all, either to harm you or frighten you or anything that is in any way out of the ordinary, you will come straight to me.’