Prima Donna (9 page)

She looked away hotly and tried to focus on tonight’s suitor, but her gaze kept getting drawn back. He
had
to have seen her. The eyes of every other man in the room were on her.
Why should he be the only one who was blind? He’d gone out of his way to go after her only three days ago in New York – paying $200,000 for a minute of her time – and yet now he
was flirting with every other woman in the room
but
her.

‘Come on, baby, let’s go back to my hotel,’ mumbled the rock star into her neck. She caught a whiff of his hair. Yes, definitely her type. She closed her eyes and tried to get
into the mood. She just felt sleepy and didn’t fancy him in the least, but she got up anyway. It was better than sleeping alone again.

She put her drink down and grabbed her bag from the table, blowing insincere kisses to Cosima. ‘We’ll catch up in Palm Beach at Easter.’

She turned and found a fresh glass of champagne placed into her hand.

‘Don’t tell me you’re actually going to leave with him,’ Will said, eyes glittering. He seemed amused.

Pia raised her eyebrows haughtily. ‘Of course. Don’t you know who he is?’

‘I couldn’t give a shit,’ Will said flatly. ‘And neither could you.’

‘On the contrary, he’s just my type,’ she purred.

‘You couldn’t be less interested in him. You’re just using him to run away from me again.’

‘Oh. So it’s all about you, is it?’ she said sarcastically. ‘And how exactly could I be running
from
you? I haven’t been near you all night. Your silicone
security team have seen to that,’ she said.

Will smiled, his eyes simmering. ‘You know they’re nothing. Just like he’s nothing,’ he said, looking over at the rocker, who was standing nearby, swaying slightly,
waiting for Pia. ‘You can go,’ Will said, dismissing him like he was a serf. ‘She’s not going with you.’

Pia glared, outraged, but she didn’t contradict him. The rocker shrugged drunkenly – whatever – and swaggered off.

‘Well, I’m surprised you even noticed,’ she sniffed, watching him go.

‘I notice everything about you, Pia Soto,’ he said. ‘I notice the way you sniff when you’re feeling vulnerable, for example. I notice the way your right thumb rubs your
palm when you’re nervous. I notice the way you wince when you land on your left leg because your right leg is fractionally shorter and it’s putting stress on your—’

Pia gasped. ‘How do you know about that?’

‘I’ve already told you I’m a benefactor to the Royal Ballet. I make a point of knowing everything there is to know about what I’m investing in. And what the greatest
assets are.’ He took a sip of his brandy, his eyes never leaving her. ‘I also noticed the way you circled Alonso Rodriguez’s name in your programme that you left on your seat; and
I noticed the way you’ve been looking for him ever since you got here.’

‘I have not,’ she protested.

‘You want to seduce him to spite me, don’t you?’ His eyes were amused.

‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ she said, tossing her head, appalled he’d read her so clearly.

He looked around casually. ‘It’s okay. It takes one to know one,’ he said, looking back at her.

‘You and I are nothing alike. I – I have great talent for one thing. I am world class.’

‘And so’s your ego,’ he laughed. ‘But you get away with it because you’re so damned pretty.’

Never
had a man spoken to her like this before. Who did he think he was? Clenching her fist, she stamped a foot in anger.

That seemed to set him off even harder. He slapped a hand across his stomach and laughed out loud. ‘Did you actually just stamp your foot at me? You really are just a spoilt little girl.
I’ve got a good mind to put you over my knee right now and smack your bottom.’

Pia looked at him, horrified. The man was a maniac.

Slamming her drink on the table, she turned to leave again, knocking Tanner Ludgrove’s single malt all over his shirt in the process.

‘Oh that’s just great!’ Tanner said as Pia streaked past, all indignation and legs. ‘Thank you!’ he boomed after her. ‘I see your legendary charms are having
the usual desired effect,’ he muttered laconically to Will, brushing his shirt.

‘Everything’s going to plan, if that’s what you mean,’ Will replied archly, watching her hair billow out like sails. ‘That delicious creature’s on the cusp of
falling passionately in love with me.’

‘Yeah! It looks like it,’ Tanner drawled sarcastically.

‘What are you doing here anyway?’ Will asked suspiciously. ‘You’re supposed to be setting off in a couple of hours.’

‘You don’t need to remind me,’ Tanner replied drily, looking around at all the underdressed women. ‘But Alonso’s shacked up with his latest woman in my bunk.
Perhaps you’d like to see if you can shift him. He’s your pet.’

Will frowned. ‘Damn right I will. Those are
my
ponies you’re driving back. I didn’t tell him to crash at yours. I’ll give him a ring and tell him the
coast’s clear.’ He got his mobile out of his jacket pocket.

Tanner looked at him. ‘You didn’t what?’ He shook his head. ‘What are you? His pimp?’

Will looked casually around the room as the phone rang, one hand in his pocket. It was like the lights had gone out now Pia had left. ‘I just asked Alonso to make himself scarce with a
girl at the bar, that was all,’ he said casually. ‘You know what he’s like. It’s no big deal.’

Tanner shook his head. At bang on six foot, he was well built, with rich hazel eyes and a flushed complexion that came from spending his life outdoors. Although twenty-eight, he looked younger
thanks to the thick brown hair that was kept in a schoolboy ‘short, back and sides’ and his boyish smile. Until he’d met Violet, he’d had no problem pulling girls either,
but things were on the rocks between them and his eye was beginning to wander again.

Tanner drained his drink and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. ‘Who was that girl anyway?’

‘My new project,’ Will smiled and looked over at the grand staircase down which Pia had fled. ‘She’s the girl who’s going to change my life.’

Pia stomped down the stairs haughtily, half-wondering whether Will would chase her. She looked around, but he wasn’t there. No. Of course not. He didn’t have the
nerve to come after her.

A porter got her coat for her while she scanned the lobby for Sophie. She couldn’t imagine where she had gone. Back to the hotel? It was unlike her to leave without checking Pia was all
right first. They would be having words about this in the morning.

A few stray autograph hunters mobbed Pia as she stepped outside the hotel, but she shooed them away crossly. She was off duty. In the distance she could hear the jingle of a horse-drawn sleigh
bobbing down the street. Beyond the hotel steps, out on the frozen lake, she could see an army of workers sweeping and brushing the decimated polo pitch in preparation for tomorrow’s final.
No doubt the Black Harbour team would win. As Bryan Spence had said, Will Silk wasn’t known for his losing streak.

Well, she wouldn’t be here to watch him lift the trophy. She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of standing victorious before her. She’d go back to the hotel and pack
immediately. Forget the final. She wanted to catch the first flight out of here in the morning.

Her jet-lagged body sagged at the thought of another flight, but she wasn’t leaving just to escape Silk again. Even after this morning’s workout, she was missing her time in the
studio and on the stage. Every day’s absence made a difference and she could feel her form slacking off. She needed to get back to Chicago and back to class.

Her break-up with Andy and the suspension had confused her momentarily, thrown her into a vortex away from all her anchors. But she should have known to keep focused on her dancing. It was the
only thing that had ever mattered to her, the only thing that had ever loved her back.

In the distance, she heard the familiar jingle of bells again. Such a pretty sound. So much nicer than the Chicago cabs that gurgled outside her apartment day and night.

She stepped into the road. Ahead of her, a door in one of the horseboxes opened and a laughing couple tumbled out. She stopped dead at the sight of them. It couldn’t be!

But it was. She watched, frozen, as the man leant down and kissed the woman so lustily that she fell back against the stairs, pulling him down with her – on her.

‘
Hai!
’ a voice called.

Was that . . . ? It couldn’t be! She squinted trying to make out the woman . . .

The jingles were closer. So close.

Too close!

Something, an instinct, broke the reverie and she whirled around. The dappled grey mare instantly tried to step back, pulling into a frightened rear as the blue wooden sleigh continued its slide
forward.

Pia gasped with terror – there was no time to scream – as the horse’s front legs bucked in front of her. She threw her arms up, but too late – the horse delivered a
glancing blow to her cheek that knocked her off her feet and sent her flying against the cars parked by the kerb.

Dazed, she tried to get up, to get away, but her foot slipped on some black ice, kicking the horse’s leg sharply with her stiletto, and it reared up again. Pia heard the driver shout,
trying to calm the horse, but it was too late – it had had enough. With a defiant dip of its head, the horse cantered up the hill and the crystal calm of the Engadine night was shattered by a
scream as the rails of the heavy antique sleigh were drawn over Pia’s precious, precocious right foot.

Had the morphine not knocked her into delirium, Pia would have been delighted to learn that Will Silk was indeed now chasing her – by helicopter.

The rumours inside the hotel had started quickly – before he’d even finished his drink – and by the time news of her accident reached him, most of the partygoers had emptied
onto the street.

It had taken him – the person with the greatest interest in seeing that she was okay– several minutes just to push past all the other people present, and the sight of Pia, so pale
and her foot twisted at an obscene angle, had almost poleaxed him.

‘Oh my God, oh my God, this can’t be happening,’ Sophie had been repeating, her hands tearing her hair as Pia was lifted into the air ambulance. ‘Wait, please.
Don’t go yet,’ she implored the medics. ‘I just need to talk to—’ She pressed the speed dial on her mobile again; but, as much as the shock had sobered up her brain,
she couldn’t get her fingers to work properly and they kept misdialling.

The medics ignored her, slamming shut the door.

‘No, please. I’ll only be a moment.’

Will pushed forward, his jaw clenched. ‘You heard the girl. Just wait!’ The medics stared at him. It was clear he wasn’t in the mood for diplomacy. ‘That woman is a
world-class ballerina.
No one
touches her foot,’ he ordered.

A stunned silence fell around them.

‘Monsieur Baudrand?’ Sophie yelled into her phone.

‘
Oui?
’ whipped a thin voice.

‘Oh thank God I’ve got hold of you. It’s Sophie,
monsieur
. . . It’s about Pia.’ She paused as she suddenly tried to find the words to tell him.

‘What now?’ Baudrand exhaled, exasperated at the thought of his – suspended – star still causing trouble.

‘She’s been in an accident,
monsieur
. I’m sorry. There’s no easy way to tell you this. Her foot has been broken.’

Four thousand miles away, she could hear him catch his breath.

‘How bad?’ he managed.

Sophie shook her head. ‘It’s completely crushed,
monsieur
. I—’

Will grabbed the phone.

‘That’s enough. Let’s leave the hyperbole to the papers, shall we?’ he said in a low voice. ‘Mr Baudrand? This is William Silk, a friend of Miss Soto’s.
She’s in an air ambulance and I’ve got a helicopter on standby. Where does she need to go in the world? Who’s the best?’

There was a long pause. ‘Jeremy Rosen at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital, outside London,’ he said finally. ‘He did Talanov’s ankle three years ago. I’ll
call him now.’

‘We’re on our way.’

Will handed back her phone and looked at the medic.

‘She’s going to the Royal National Orthopaedic outside London. A surgical team will meet you there.’

‘
Aber nein
,’ said the medic, holding up his hands in refusal. ‘We are not authorized. We must take her to the
Klinik
here.’

‘No. She needs a specialist.’

The medic shrugged. ‘Sorry,
Herr
—’

‘Fine. If you won’t take her, I’ll fly her over myself. Get her out of there.’

‘But you are not equipped! There’s no way you can possibly . . .’

‘I’m not negotiating with you. I’m telling you. She is the very best in the world at what she does, and the only person who’s putting her foot back together is the person
who’s the very best in the world at what he does.’

Sophie stared at him – impressed by his great authority and relieved that someone else was directing the show.

The medic knew there was no point arguing with this man – he was too rich, too powerful and too determined. And they couldn’t afford to waste time. They only had enough morphine for
three hours.

‘Okay, okay,’ he said reluctantly. He knew he could lose his job over this, but he recognized his beautiful patient now, and it didn’t take a genius to work out that there
would be a media storm if her recovery was compromised by mistakes at this end.

Will grabbed his mobile out of his pocket. ‘Get the chopper going,’ he said into it. ‘We’re going to London immediately.’

Sophie went to climb into the helicopter with Pia but the medic stopped her.

‘Family only.’

‘But I’m her PA,’ Sophie wailed. The man shrugged and shut the doors. Didn’t he realize it was as good as the same thing?

‘Come on,’ Will said to Sophie, who had started wringing her hands frenziedly. ‘You’re coming with me.’

They raced over the frozen lake, past the pitch hoardings, past the trailers and horseboxes. Beyond all this, a pilot was sitting in the cockpit of a black helicopter, going through the drill
and starting up the blades. Crouching low, they clambered in and fastened themselves into their seats.