The Perfect Hero (17 page)

‘
Please
don’t make me!’ Beth said dramatically. ‘It would be like doing homework and I never even bothered with that when I was at school!’

Kay just shook her head uncomprendingly. ‘What made you want to become an actress?’ Kay said at last.

Beth – who had slumped since the
Pride and Prejudice
conversation – seemed to perk up a little. ‘You get to wear nice things,’ she said. ‘Did you ever have a dressing-up box at school?’

‘No,’ Kay said, thinking back to her own time at school. Actually, she’d attended three different schools as her mother had moved house a fair few times in an attempt to make ‘a fresh start’ after Kay’s father had left them. But it had always been a disappointment with Kay’s mother still unable to find the perfect relationship, leaving Kay feeling displaced in her role as the new girl – forever trying to fit in.

‘I would have loved a dressing-up box,’ she said, thinking of how that might have helped her to feel more at home in her new schools. She’d always loved dressing up – losing herself to make-believe by pretending she was a fictional character.

‘Well, we had one,’ Beth said, ‘and there’d always be an almighty scrum for the best clothes. I remember there was this emerald gown with sequins along the top. All the girls would make for that and whoever got it would be instantly transformed into a princess. It was glorious!’ Beth said, smiling as she remembered. ‘I thought acting was like that too. You got to wear glamorous clothes that transformed you into somebody else. But it doesn’t always work out like that. My first job was as a walk-on in one of those dreadful kitchen-sink dramas and my costume was hideous! I looked like a dishcloth.’

‘Well, I suppose that’s fitting for a kitchen-sink drama,’ Kay said but Beth wasn’t amused.

‘It’s important to be beautiful,’ Beth said.

‘But surely the role is more important.’

‘Certainly not,’ Beth said. ‘I don’t take anything now unless it’s going to make me look good.’

Kay was quite shocked by this admission but she supposed she wasn’t really surprised.

‘And, between you and me, I should have been cast as Anne Elliot, although I do still think that Louisa is the most important role in the story, don’t you?’

‘At least you’re not Henrietta,’ Kay said. ‘She gets much less screen time than Louisa.’

‘Yes,’ Beth said. ‘I wouldn’t have even read for Henrietta. I don’t know why Sophie bothered really, although beggars can’t be choosers, I suppose.’

Kay tried to hide her smile at this comment. She was quite sure Sophie was aware of Beth’s sniping comments and knew that Sophie would just laugh them off.

‘I wonder where Oli is,’ Beth said.

‘I was meant to be drawing him this evening,’ Kay said.

Beth didn’t look too happy with this piece of information. ‘Well, he’s stood you up, just like every other woman he’s ever been involved with.’

Kay sighed. She could tell she was pouting and tried to stop.

‘I hate men,’ Beth said but the expression in her eyes seemed to be saying the very opposite. ‘Most of them are wasters and the others just waste your time.’

It was then that the front door opened and a voice called from the hallway. It was Oli.

‘We’re in here, darling!’ Beth called from the sofa, quickly fluffing up her hair and seeming to forget that Oli was a man and that she hated every last one of them.

‘Hello, ladies!’ he said as he entered the room, a huge smile on his face, his cheeks glowing with an evening of alcoholic consumption and fine conversation. ‘You two missed one hell of an evening! Kim’s amazing. You should hear the stories she has to tell.’

‘You were meant to be with Kay this evening,’ Beth said, completely taking Kay by surprise.

‘What?’ Oli said.

‘Kay was going to draw you but you forgot. You’re a pig, Oli!’

Oli looked suitably crestfallen. ‘God! I’m so sorry, Kay,’ he said, stepping forward and grabbing her hands in his. ‘Beth’s right – I’m a pig.’

‘No you’re not,’ Kay said with a little smile.

‘I’m a pig,’ he said, giving a little oink which made Kay giggle. ‘But there’s still time, isn’t there?’

‘What do you mean?’

Oli looked at his watch. ‘It’s only ten thirty,’ he said. ‘Come on!’ Still with her hand in his, he led her through to the dining room where he pulled out a chair and sat down in it, straight-backed and straight-faced.

‘Is that you posing for me?’ Kay asked with a smile.

Oli nodded. ‘Okay?’

She bit her lip. ‘Well—’

‘Not okay? Where do you want me, then?’ Oli asked, turning round.

Kay swallowed hard, desperately biting her tongue lest she answered him honestly.

‘It’s fine,’ she said. ‘You’re fine there. Let me get my things.’

‘Kay!’ Beth called from the living room. ‘You just left me.’

‘I’m going to draw Oli,’ Kay said, poking her head round the door.

Beth pulled a sour face. ‘And what am I meant to do?’

‘Go to bed?’

Beth did not look amused. ‘You’d better pass me that bloody book.’

Kay passed her the copy of
Pride and Prejudice
. ‘It’ll make you feel better, I promise.’

‘I doubt that very much,’ Beth said but opened the book and cast her weary eyes to the printed page.

Chapter Twenty-One

Kay rushed up to her room to get her pad and pencils but she had to stop by the mirror first, grabbing a hairbrush and attacking her tresses.

‘Blast!’ she said, as the fine hair floated out in a static halo. She skipped through to her en suite and ran her brush under the tap, doing her best to control the errant strands. Then she fished in her make-up bag for a lip gloss and mascara. For a moment, she worried about the dress she was wearing but she didn’t have time to get changed.

Oli was still sitting in the chair when she re-entered the room and she had to take a moment to believe the scene in front of her.

‘Okay?’ Oli said, turning round to face her.

Kay nodded, holding up the tools of her profession. She was ready to begin.

She’d never sketched such a handsome profile before. The heroes she’d drawn for her books had always been from her imagination or inspired by the heroes from the films she watched. Never had she been presented with a real-life hero. She had to concentrate on the task in hand in order to do a good job but she knew how easy it would be to just sit and stare at Oli and end up with a blank sheet of paper. But she was working now and had to take things seriously.

Of course, she’d had experience sketching from life at the art classes she’d attended at her local college, but they’d never had the budget for this calibre of model. They were far more likely to be shrivelled-up old men who really should know when to keep their clothes on.

But Kay couldn’t afford to start thinking of men with their clothes off when she was drawing Oli Wade Owen – that would be far too much of a distraction.

‘What are you thinking of ?’ Oli suddenly asked.

Kay blanched. It was as if he’d read her mind. ‘What do you mean?’ she asked, stalling for time.

‘I mean, what does an artist think of when they’re sketching?’

Kay breathed a sigh of relief. It was just a regular question and he didn’t have the powers of telepathy.

‘I usually don’t think at all,’ Kay said. ‘I mean, I’m concentrating on what I’m doing.’

Oli nodded. ‘Like acting then.’

‘Is it?’

‘A lot of my mates ask me what I’m thinking of when I’m kissing some beautiful actress in a love scene and they don’t usually like the answer.’

‘And what’s the answer?’

‘That I’m thinking of getting the job done.’

Kay smiled.

‘You don’t mind talking whilst you’re working?’ he asked her.

‘No,’ she said. ‘What do you want to talk about?’

‘Oh, I don’t know – anything really. Like what’s a pretty girl like you doing running a dreary old bed and breakfast?’

‘Do you think it’s dreary?’

Oli cast his eyes around at the tatty wallpaper and the swirling carpet.

‘I know it’s not perfect yet but it will be,’ Kay said.

‘But what are you doing stuck out in the middle of nowhere?’

‘Lyme Regis isn’t nowhere!’

‘It’s a long way from London,’ Oli said.

‘And why’s that such a bad thing?’

He raised his eyebrows in surprise at her question. ‘You don’t like London?’

‘It’s okay,’ she said, ‘in small doses. I actually once thought about moving there.’

‘Why didn’t you?’

‘Oh, it was just an idea. I thought my father might be there. He’d always talked about going to London.’ She looked up and caught Oli’s eye. ‘He left when I was young,’ she explained, ‘and I had this crazy idea that I could find him and make things right again – but it was just a silly dream.’

‘I’m sorry,’ Oli said.

‘It’s okay,’ she said. ‘It was all such a long time ago but I still wonder where he is and what he’s doing and if he ever thinks of me. Especially now Mum’s gone. He probably doesn’t even know that.’

‘Families can be crazy, can’t they?’

‘Yes,’ Kay said, ‘I’m afraid they can.’ She sighed. ‘But you’re happy in London, aren’t you?’

‘I couldn’t live anywhere else,’ Oli said.

Kay’s pencil hovered over the paper for a moment. That was a shame, she thought, although she could learn to compromise. After all, it would be fun to have a home in London and one by the sea too.

‘Where shall we go this weekend, darling?’ Oli might ask. ‘Down to Lyme or stay in town for that party?’

Kay could live with that, she supposed, blushing as Oli looked up at her.

‘London’s the place to be,’ he said with a sigh.

She wouldn’t mind – not if it made him happy. ‘Just sit still a moment.’

‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘I’m a bit of a fidget, aren’t I?’

‘You’re doing fine.’

‘I’m not very good at being still. I can’t even sit to read a book for more than ten minutes – I usually read my scripts on the treadmill.’

Kay looked up from her paper. ‘Really?’ She tried to imagine it: a copy of the script for
Persuasion
in one hand whilst his strong, lean legs ran those miles. It was a heart-stopping image. ‘And what did you think of
Persuasion
?’ she asked, trying to banish the image of Oli in lycra from her mind.

‘The script was okay,’ he said.

‘I love
Persuasion
,’ Kay said. ‘It’s one of my favourite Austen novels.’

‘Well, I wouldn’t know about that.’

Kay looked up again. ‘You haven’t read the others?’

‘I haven’t read
Persuasion
,’ Oli said.

‘You haven’t read it?’ Kay said in alarm.

‘You’ve got to be kidding!’ Oli said. ‘I tried once but it bored me to tears. It’s so slow! I think you have to be a woman to get that sort of thing. Or gay.’

Kay looked shocked for a moment. Oli wasn’t joking, was he? He really hadn’t read the novel. Here he was playing one of Austen’s greatest heroes and yet he hadn’t even read the book!

‘For God’s sake, don’t tell Teresa. She’d skin me alive.’

‘I’m not surprised!’ Kay couldn’t help saying. ‘How can you be in the film adaptation of a novel you haven’t read?’

‘You don’t need to read it,’ he said. ‘What’s the point of a script if you have to read a huge book as well?’

‘But it’s only a small book. It wouldn’t take you long. I could lend you a copy if you want.’ Kay was about to go and get one but Oli stopped her.

‘Please! I really don’t need to read it.’

Kay put her pencil down for a moment. She couldn’t concentrate now.

‘Great,’ he said. ‘I’ve upset you, haven’t I?’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘You have.’

He shook his head. ‘You women just don’t get that Austen is a girl thing. It’s not for men.’

‘But Adam loves it,’ she said.

‘That doesn’t surprise me.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I mean Adam’s probably gay.’

Kay gasped. ‘He is not!’ she said, thinking what a disaster it would be for her plans for him if he turned out to be gay. What would poor Gemma do then? She’d hate to have to break the news to her. She could just see the scene now.

‘Gemma, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know how to tell you. But you’re strong. You’ll get over this – you’ll see!’

‘I won’t! I won’t ever get over this. I may as well throw myself from the Cobb right now!’

‘No! Gemma – don’t!’

God, it would be awful,
Kay thought.

‘Perhaps you could try an audio book of it,’ Kay said, not willing to give up on Oli just yet.

‘Tried that,’ he said.

‘And what happened?’

‘I fell asleep in the bath. Nearly drowned.’

‘Oh, dear,’ she said. ‘Maybe I could read it to you?’

Oli looked round at her, his blue eyes wide. ‘You’d really do that?’

Kay nodded, thinking of the hours they could spend together.

‘That’s the sweetest thing anyone’s ever offered to do for me.’

Kay smiled. Oli had redeemed himself just a little.

‘Can I look now?’ Oli asked.

Kay looked up from her sketch. ‘I’ve not finished yet. You keep distracting me!’

‘Oh, come on. I’m dying to see.’

‘Sit still!’ Kay said with a giggle.

But Oli was on his feet and crossed the room in a moment. ‘Wow!’ he said. ‘That’s really good.’

‘You think so?’ Kay said, looking at what she’d managed to get down in their brief time as artist and model.

‘Of course I think so! You should do this for a living.’

Kay beamed him a smile. ‘I’d love to! I really would.’

‘Then you should. You absolutely should.’ He held her gaze for a moment, his blue eyes mesmeric and Kay could have sworn something wonderful was about to happen. Just one moment longer and—

Beth’s head popped round the door. ‘What are you two doing?’

The spell was broken.

‘I’ve been sitting in that front room all by myself !’ she said, accusation flooding her voice. ‘You’ve been ages.’

‘Kay’s just capturing me,’ Oli said. ‘Take a look.’

Beth hopped into the room and looked at Kay’s work. ‘Hmmm. Not bad. But then you have got a good subject.’