Sins of Sarah (10 page)

'So could we. Just ease up on that poor kid for the rest of the afternoon. Do her a favour. She went through hell wondering if you would break her neck for planning this!'

'I'll try,' he promised.

Cress thought suddenly that she had never seen him look so tired. He did make an effort, even managing to wrap on time, for once, and, making a decision as he did so, he walked over to Sarah as she left the set. Wishes never came true unless you did something about them, he thought ruefully.

'Sarah, wait,' he said quietly. 'Thank you for your surprise. I did appreciate it.' She smiled, the slow, wide smile he was beginning to know so well. 'Look, Charles , and I are going out to dinner this evening. Would you like to join us? You might cheer two lonely old men up!'

Sarah considered. 'Well, yes, as long as Charles isn't on one of his long-distance kicks again?' 'No,' he smiled. 'The Priory, it's about half an hour's drive away. Wear your best frock, and I'll pick you up about eight.'

She went down to the wardrobe area in a panic. 'Oh, Ronnie,' she wailed. 'What can I do with my hair?'

'I did warn you.' He brushed out the lacquer. 'Wash it with this when you get back to the hotel, and I'll run over with my tongs. You can't let sir down.' He handed her a treatment shampoo.

He was as good as his word, full of wicked instructions and whirling the curling tongs through her hair like a dervish until he was satisfied with the results. 'There, you'll knock him dead!'

'Them,' Sarah corrected. 'Oh, dear, I think I'd rather go to the disco.'

'Rubbish! Go and butter the old sod up. Might do him good.'

'Old? He's younger than you!'

'Only just! Now move! You look quite yummy!' She hugged him and ran down to the bar, Catherine's jade-green dress swirling around her, and she felt agonizingly shy as she approached the group sitting there.

'Wow!' exclaimed Alex, as Nick rose immediately to greet her, seeming even taller in a beautifully cut dark grey suit. 'I can see you aren't discoing tonight.'

'No, she's playing with the grown-ups tonight,' Nick told him, and took her arm quickly. 'Shall we go?' He led her out before any more of the crew arrived. 'I don't want them to think I'm taking advantage of you,' he laughed. 'Though in that dress it's very tempting to try! That's a Catherine Jayson, isn't it?' Sarah nodded in surprise. 'My wife goes to her,' he said in explanation. He touched her cheek gently as he opened the car door for her, a suddenly intimate gesture that made her shiver. 'I'm glad you came. And I know Charlie will be delighted.' Sarah leant back in her seat, breathing in the luxury of the expensive car. He was driving one of Charles's Jaguars instead of his Porsche, with firm, assured hands on the wheel. In a formal suit and tie he seemed older somehow, the lines around his tired eyes seemed deeper. Cress was right, she thought, he did work too hard.

In the confined space of the car she was painfully aware that his closeness frightened her, and she was suddenly afraid of being alone with him. It was not the same as swimming in the pool, even though they both had far more clothes on, and she was not at all sure of what to say. 'I'm surprised you're not out with your wife tonight,' she ventured at last. 'Charles and I must come a very poor second.'

* * *

'Diana and I don't have that kind of marriage, I'm afraid. And she's very busy at the moment.' He shrugged. 'We're having a dinner party at the weekend, I think. But, please, don't call yourself a poor second. You should have more confidence in yourself. That's half your problem, Sarah. Let's get one thing straight. I'm taking you out to dinner because I want to.'

She was astonished. 'What makes you think I have a problem with confidence?' she demanded quickly.

He laughed. 'Sweetheart, it shows every time you walk into a room or onto the set. You breathe in and set your shoulders as you've obviously been trained to do, but your eyes give you away every time. It's as if you're afraid of people looking at you. You're a beautiful girl, Sarah, yet you seem to be terrified to let anyone see it - the way you persist in covering yourself in those baggy great jumpers and that terrible baseball cap. I must admit, there have been times I've wanted to rip that off just to prove you had hair! You have a body most women would die for, and you always want to hide it! Do you know, I think this is only the second time I've seen you wear a dress, apart from on set, and it's a vast improvement!'

Sarah considered, in astonishment, the fact that he should even notice. 'The dresses were Cressida's idea,' she admitted. 'I don't really think about clothes much, as long as I'm comfortable.' 'That's obvious! You should listen to Cress more. She's very good at her job. Remember, Sarah, you are no longer hiding in children's TV. What you look like matters - not just to me, but to the rest of the business as well. You're frightened of your own shadow most of the time! It's good for me, in that I can see my bullying paying off, but if you look good you'll have far more confidence to deal with everything else, I assure you.'

'You mean you bully me on purpose?'

'Of course I do! I get results quicker that way, I'm afraid.' He smiled disarmingly. How much younger he looked when he did that, she thought. 'It's been easy so far, though. After this week we have much more difficult stuff to do. I've led you in gently, but those two-handers for you and James will be hard going emotionally - especially for you.' She knew he meant some of the scenes she dreaded. James's character was meant to be shell-shocked from the War, and she had long, impassioned speeches to an unresponsive figure in a wheelchair. They were planned for most of the next week, with their first love scene on the Friday. Nick had carefully watched her bruises fade, and scheduled accordingly.

'Nick, I'm more afraid of doing that love scene than any of the two-handers,' she admitted, biting her lip in case he was annoyed with her.

Nick was pulling into the restaurant car park. He switched off the engine before he turned to look at her. 'I did ask you about doing those scenes,' he reminded her.

'Yes, and I said I would do them.' She was firm on that point. 'It doesn't mean I'll find it easy, or pleasant. Oscar insisted I was to do it. He made me agree.'

'Wise old Oscar,' he commented. 'Look, stop fretting. I know it won't be easy. It's not something I would like to do myself, I admit, but I promised I would try and help and I will. It'll be a minimum crew, and you can pick who you want of your own personnel.' Even with a slimmed-down crew it would mean at least eight people, and for a moment he wished he had cut the scene - but as it put the couple's feelings into perspective it had to stay. At least, he thought ruefully, he could be quite sure she was not sleeping regularly with James. If she were, there would be no reticence on her part about the love scenes. She was certainly keeping Charles at arm's length, that he was sure about - much to Charles's annoyance and Nick's private amusement.

'Look, forget about it for now,' he advised her then, and went round the car to help her out. 'Let's see if Charles is on time for once. He isn't usually.' He wasn't. Nick was delighted to have her to himself for another twenty minutes before Charles finally arrived.

Sarah sipped at the Veuve Cliquot he'd ordered and listened carefully as he discussed the complex character she was playing. Now she had worked on Abigail for three weeks or so, she understood a great deal more of what was expected of her. It certainly surprised her that Nick had such a firm grasp of a woman's feelings - he could probe deep into her soul, it seemed.

'The book Home Leave is based on is in Charlie's library,' he said, when she voiced her surprise. 'I'll dig it out for you. We're changed a lot of it, but the basics are the same.'

Charles joined them with an exclamation of pleasure. 'This certainly beats dining a deux with Nicholas, birthday or not!' he beamed, settling into a chair. 'I thought the waiters' eyes were twinkling a bit tonight!'

They were both courteous and attentive, with the inborn good manners that came naturally to men of their background, but it was Nick to whom she was drawn more and more as the evening progressed. They found shared preferences for rare steak, and she found they shared the same sharp sense of humour as Nick relaxed and the stress disappeared from his tired eyes. Charles, she merrily flattered and flirted with, as the champagne eased her nerves, but it was Nick who held her attention. Why wasn't he always like this? she wondered sadly.

She listened, with growing awareness of the depth of his intelligence, as he and Charles discussed some of the books Nick had obviously been reading from the Hastings Court library. Sarah, who never read anything more taxing than the latest Jilly Cooper or John Grisham, was enthralled by the way he dissected and critically analyzed books she would have dismissed as boring, bringing out areas of them that she would never have noticed. But she admitted to him that she didn't read much - she had decided long ago never to tell Nick anything less than the truth.

'He's totally boring about literary subjects,' Charles told her sympathetically. 'Comes of having an English degree, I suppose. I prefer Horse and Hounds and Sporting Life personally!' Even if he that were true, he understood Nick, she thought wistfully, her eyes clouding.

'Best racing tipster we had at Oxford,' Nick quipped. 'Even in the nursery he read form books.' 'To Nanny's disgust!' Charles laughed.

'Nanny was disgusted by most things,' Nick rejoined. 'When I first came to Hastings, Sarah, I was three, and I spoke better Malay than English because I had been looked after by an ayah. Nanny was absolutely horrified! The times she slapped me for not speaking in English! I can still feel her wet hands on my bare legs!'

Charles shuddered. 'She's eighty-seven now, and she still tells me off when I go to see her.'

'She still tells me my hair needs cutting,' sighed Nick.

'Which it does!' Charles grinned.

'We had au-pairs,' Sarah said. 'George used to chase them like mad. They were always leaving in floods of tears. Daddy used to really yell at him!'

'I can't imagine George Campbell doing that,' Charles commented, 'from what I know of him. I've met him a few times recently,' he explained to Nick.

'No, well, Maggie is far too strict with him - but then he's old now. Oh, sh . . .!' She put her hand to her mouth in horror. George was a year younger than either of them, and Charles knew it.

'Well that puts us in our place!' He laughed at her discomfort. 'Would you two like a liqueur?' Since Charles was driving back. Nick ordered his favourite malt. Sarah declined, so Charles ordered more champagne for her. She smiled to herself. So much champagne in a few weeks. Life was changing. Even she was changing, and beginning to feel very differently about Nicholas Grey.

'Penny for them?' Nick broke in on her thoughts and she blushed hotly.

Charles had gone to speak to some friends and they were alone. Sarah recovered her composure and gave him a wicked grin. 'Maybe one day I'll tell you, but not now!'

'From that one grin, I think I can guess,' he told her.

Sarah fervently hoped he couldn't! She wondered if he was flirting with her, but, shrugging, she put it down to the wine. She wondered again, however, when he elected to sit in the back seat of the car with her. She'd got in the back automatically, assuming he would sit at the front with Charles. But a few minutes later she was laughing.

'You'll never believe this,' she said to Charles in amusement. 'Nick is fast asleep!'

'I would,' Charles told her. 'He did a night shoot in town last night, because someone was ill. I don't think he went to bed at all.' Nick's head was thrown back awkwardly. Instinctively Sarah reached over to ease him into a more comfortable position, and to her surprise he moved, settling himself against her, his arm going across her waist, though he was obviously fast asleep.

'So much for my sex appeal,' she commented drily. 'I seem to be better as a pillow!

Charles had watched the almost maternal gesture through the driving mirror, feeling helpless to intervene. Even asleep. Nick managed to hold her full attention. 'I think your sex appeal is working perfectly,' he assured her. 'But even you couldn't compete against total exhaustion!' Sarah leant back against the seat with Nick nestled into her shoulder, his dark hair soft against her cheek and lemony scented from the shampoo he used, his thick lashes dark smudges on his face.

He had shed both jacket and tie as they had left the restaurant, so she was suddenly all too aware of the taut muscle pattern of his body as he relaxed against her, his breathing slow and even. And as she held him steady she realized just how good it made her feel. She shivered to herself as she remembered how his gentle kiss after the cast dinner had affected her for hours afterwards, and the same warmth flooded through her now.

Oh, God! she thought with panic - Was this what falling in love felt like? But surely not with Nick, of all people!

Too old - too married - even if he did have a strange married life! And yet she was relishing the sweetness of holding him, the spice of danger that his waking would bring, and she found herself longing for the drive to go on for ever.

But after twenty minutes or so Charles was pulling up at her hotel, and she was forced to disengage herself from Nick. He only stirred briefly, before settling back again. 'He'll kick himself for missing out!' Charles said cheerfully, covering his chagrin, as he escorted her to the door.