The Hollow Heart (The Heartfelt Series) (31 page)

“Let’s go home,” she said. The three turned into the wind
and walked briskly back to Weathervane.

The next day dawned bright
and blustery. The sea had whipped itself into a swirl of sparkling grey. Cloud
streaked across a pale blue sky as the soft sun tried in vain to warm the land.
Marianne stumbled down to the kitchen to find Ryan and Monty both missing. By
the time she had made coffee, they reappeared sandy, damp and smiling.

“We saw the baby. They’re fine, she’s beautiful. They had a
good night. Padar says the doctor will be here this morning just to check them
over, but they’re okay. It’s looking good.”

Marianne sank into a chair.

“Thank God.” The word God turned into a sob. Ryan was
holding her in an instant. She tried to pull away.

“Hey, hey, you’ve been awake half the night. You’re worn
out. Let me take care of you, just for a little while.”

She wiped her nose on his shoulder.

“Is that all I have you for, a little while?”

“This time. Can that be enough for now?”

“I suppose it will have to be.” She searched his face, it
was full of love and disappointment. She thought of George and felt his loss.
She took Ryan’s face in her hands and kissed him. Love is love, take it when
you find it, she told herself.

“This is awful, Ryan. I can hardly bear it.”

“I know, but it’s not forever. I will sort it, please
believe me. I truly do love you and I want to be with you.”

“Well, you’ve some explaining to do, that’s for sure.”

“I know I have.” He handed her a tissue. “Please don’t cry,
my love, all is not as it appears, but what I’m about to tell you is so
screwed, you couldn’t make it up.” And so Ryan told the woman he loved, why he
had just married a woman he did not. Right from the beginning of his and
Angelique’s wild and wonderful romance, through their turbulent break up,
Angelique’s addiction, pregnancy and the forthcoming birth of their child.

 He told her how Larry turned up on set to tell him he had
thought it all through, and that the only way he would have the right to custody
of his baby, was to marry Angelique, and despite this being the last thing he
wanted to do, he saw it was the only thing he could do.

Monty had a long wait for breakfast and, after more tears,
recriminations and reconciliation. Ryan wrapped Marianne in a blanket, lit the
fire, and held her till she fell asleep, never taking his eyes off her for a
minute.

Stateside, Larry Leeson
was about to have a coronary, albeit self-induced. Suspecting her estranged
husband of infidelity, Angelique de Marcos had booked herself into the Beverley
Hills Maternity Clinic for a pre-arranged Caesarean section. The hospital had
just telephoned, she had been successfully delivered of a baby boy. Mother and
baby were doing well. Father was away without leave, as Larry put it.

“What’s the point of having a cell phone if it’s never
switched on!” the exasperated agent told Ryan’s voicemail. Lena was on the
other line.

“You know where he is Larry, you always do,” she said, “now
find him and get him to contact his wife urgently, then at least I can put out
some sort of press statement. The uncaring, self-obsessed bastard!”

“Hey, he didn’t know she was doing this. The baby is barely
due.”

“He knows Angelique well enough to figure she is not going
to sit around and wait for a natural birth, especially with him disappearing
again. C’mon Larry, get real.”

“He’s due back the day after tomorrow.”

“Not good enough, he should be here now.”

“I’m doing my best.”

“I repeat. Not good enough.” The line went dead.

Larry trawled his contacts book to find the selection of
numbers he had collected during his visit to Ireland. He was aware the ‘Bridge
Too Far’ Festival had taken place that weekend. He knew of Ryan’s donation to
the campaign. He had made a not-ungenerous donation himself, but when he pleaded
with his client not to attend the event, being so close to the birth of his own
child, even if he was estranged from his new wife, Ryan’s refusal to even
acknowledge the plea gave Larry his answer. He knew where Ryan was, alright, he
also knew if Lena had an inkling of how much he did know, she would eat him
alive.

He dialled the postmistress. Miss MacReady recognised his
voice immediately. She had developed a huge crush on the immaculately groomed
New Yorker when he had visited the island.

“Is he supposed to be here?” she asked cautiously, after an
ebullient greeting.

“Reckon so.”

“And where do you think he might be?”

“Working on that goddamn script with Marianne, I suppose.”
He laughed at the euphemism. Miss MacReady ignored the inference.

“Is she supposed to be here?”

“No suppose about it. She’s like a damn magnet, that woman.
No offence ma’am, but this relationship is driving a coach and horses through a
number of very important people’s schedules.”

“Is it now?” Miss MacReady was unimpressed.

“Well is he there, or not?”

“Sure, there’s been over three thousand people here this
weekend.”

Larry sighed. Why were the Irish so damned obtuse?

“Ma’am, could you please just get a message to him? His wife
had a baby boy yesterday. Both fine. Can he please get his ass back here PDQ.
Have you got that?”

“Oh, how lovely, two babies in the one weekend. A great omen
for the future, I’m sure of it.”

“If you see my client ma’am, please give him the message, or
he’ll have no future!”

“Ah, Mr Leeson, you’re very dramatic. I thought Ryan was the
actor.”

Larry hung up and, not for the first time, tried to fathom
out what was going on in the seemingly deranged brain of his long-time-buddy
and errant client. Ryan had everything they had been working for all these
years, a fantastic career and all that went with it. Okay, his relationship
with Angelique was tricky and needed to be handled delicately, but that could
be managed, and Ryan could once again be free to enjoy the fame and fortune he
had always craved.

Yet in those quiet moments during a break on set, or in the
back of a limo en route to a press conference, Larry knew Ryan was somewhere
else, with someone else, probably being the most important thing of all -
himself. He shrugged at the New York skyline through the office window. Well,
if that is what love does to you, you can keep it. And forgoing his diet, he
decided to treat himself to a very large lunch.

Despite Larry’s cynicism,
Ryan and Marianne were, indeed, working on the script. Ryan had persuaded an
editor friend in Hollywood to look over the first draft and put it on a memory
stick. He was having problems with some of the dialogue.

“It’s the love scenes. It sounds false. He comes over as a
right gobshite.”

“The less dialogue in a love scene, the better, I reckon.”
She turned a few pages, distracted. Ryan cartoon-tip-toed away, then turning
back, did a silent movie double-take and threw himself at her, fumbling at her
clothes, pulling down her collar to slobber over her throat. She beat him back
with a cushion. Monty, now yapping wildly, decided to join in, tugging at the
hems of their jeans as Marianne fought back. Ryan started to tie Marianne up in
a throw and, as she tried to escape, they all fell writhing to the floor. Miss
MacReady nearly collapsed on the swirling mass as she came in through the back
door. She was dressed from head to toe in grey flannel. No time for frivolity
today.

“What are ye at?” she snapped, “you crowd are always rolling
around on the floor together. You’re like a gaggle of gypsies.”

They broke free, breathless and laughing. Monty greeted her
enthusiastically. Miss MacReady always smelled wonderfully exotic.

“Mr Leeson’s been on. I have news.” She gave them a minute
to gather themselves. “Your wife had a little boy yesterday. You’re needed
elsewhere.”

Ryan gasped. Marianne stood up slowly, brushing herself
down.

“They’re both fine. But you’d better call him, he’s very
agitated as you can imagine.”

Ryan took Marianne’s hand. She was staring at her feet.

“I didn’t say I’d seen you, either of you. Goodbye now,”
Miss MacReady called back as she left.

“Goodbye now,” Ryan echoed. Marianne let his hand drop. She
folded the throw, put the cushions back on the sofa. She gave Ryan a
half-smile.

“I’m glad your baby is okay. It’s lovely news that you have
a little boy. I know you have to be with them,” she said.

“I want to be with
him
, not them, and I don’t want to
leave you, but I do have go back now. Can you understand that?”

“I’ll have a look at the script, see what I can do, but no
promises.
Gone with the Wind
, it ain’t.” She straightened some papers on
the kitchen table, fiddled with the tap at the sink.

“I’ll get going then,” he said very quietly, picking up the
overnight bag. Pulling his jacket from the back of the chair, he took a small
box from the pocket and, opening it, held something glistening on a chain
towards her. “For you, a love token.” It was a platinum pendant, a tiny replica
of a Weathervane with each moving part set with diamonds. He held it aloft and
spun the arrow. “Wherever you are, part of me, the best part of me, is with
you, and wherever you are, that’s where I want to be. It’s where I’m meant to
be.”

His smile was lopsided. He put the pendant around her
throat, kissing the downy skin of her neck as he fastened the clasp.

“It’s beautiful,” she said, silent tears sliding down her
cheeks. “You’d better go.” She touched the gift and sat down at the table. He
patted Monty, kissed the top of Marianne’s head, and left.

The photograph of a barely
identifiable couple embracing on a wintry beach with a small white dog at their
ankles first appeared in an Irish Sunday newspaper. Within a week it had gone
global in celebrity gossip magazines; TV showbiz news and online, the story was
everywhere. Headlines screamed, ‘Super spy love-rat abandons pregnant wife’
‘Wife in labour as Ryan labours under another love’ ‘Star misses birth to be
with Irish lover.’

Miss MacReady was straight down to Weathervane when the
story broke, bringing copies of newspapers and magazines. Shocked, Marianne
immediately prepared a statement to refute the claims but, as the story took
hold, she, the experienced media manipulator, felt powerless against the
onslaught of gossip and conjecture.

The same question kept ringing round in her head. Who had
taken the photographs, who had betrayed them, here, where they felt safe, where
they could be themselves? Marianne switched off her mobile and unplugged the
laptop. Miss MacReady promised to keep her abreast of any significant
developments via the landline.

The warning of the small huddle of paparazzi hiding in the
lane behind the cottage, came too late. Marianne and Monty walked straight into
them on their way to see Oonagh and the baby.

“How long have you been seeing Ryan O’Gorman, Miss
Coltrane?” called one.

“Did you know he abandoned his pregnant wife to be with
you?” shouted another.

“It’s been said you’re an ambitious home-wrecker. What do
you say to that?”

Marianne scooped Monty up and side-stepped into Maguire’s.
Padar slammed and bolted the door behind her. She pushed the hood of her jacket
back.

“Miss MacReady phoned here when she couldn’t get you up at
the cottage.”

Marianne sighed heavily. Padar put a hand on her shoulder.

“Can we go up?”

He nodded.

She flew up the stairs to greet a glowing Oonagh and a tiny,
bluish baby Bridget. She clasped her sweet smelling friend to her. Oonagh was
propped on pillows and cushions, a collection of pink and white gifts already
amassing in a corner of the room. Marianne spied the clutter of magazines and
newspapers on the floor. Oonagh’s laptop was snoozing on her dressing table;
her addiction to celebrity gossip barely on hold.

“I believe there’s swathes of paparazzi on the island,”
Oonagh stated eventually, sipping tea Padar had delivered, as Marianne sat in
the armchair, nursing Bridget.

“Hardly swathes. They’ll soon get bored and bugger off.”

“You’re very stoical about the whole affair.”

“And that’s what it is, an affair, or what it
was
.”

Oonagh spotted the trinket, glistening at Marianne’s usually
unadorned throat.

“It’s over?”

Marianne did not answer. She turned her attention to
Bridget, telling her how beautiful she was and how lucky her parents were to
have her. Monty endorsed this from a polite distance, slowly shifting his tail
from side to side.

“Did you see the double-page spread in
The Biz
?”

“The new show business magazine, under the editorial
direction of one, Paul Osborne?” Marianne raised an eyebrow at her friend.

“A series of pictures going way back, starting with the
‘Power 2 The People’ Awards. You’re holding hands.”

“He was leading me out of a bomb site, as I recall.”

“Then there are pictures here on the island and, together,
having a quiet dinner at a Tudor lodge in Berkshire, more than just an affair,
anyway.”

“Oonagh, drop it.”

“One of the newspaper supplements ran a really unflattering
photo of you next to one of Angelique at a red carpet event, with the headline:
‘Who would you want to wake up with?’ But then another celebrity mag dug out a
lovely one of you at the anniversary celebrations, saying you were a highly
talented, award-winning journalist and stunning looking as well, in fairness to
them.” Oonagh always liked to highlight the good points of the publications she
was so addicted to.

Marianne asked Bridget when she hoped her official
christening would be. Oonagh finally took the hint.