Reputation in Tatters Page 5

  ‘I’ve been thinking,’ he said now, his deeply blue eyes focusing intently on Freya’s face. ‘It might be a good idea if we got you away from here for a few days. Interest is already hot after your statement today, and it’s going to get even hotter. I’ve already received a couple of text messages from my secretary saying the phone hasn’t stopped ringing since the interview. It might help to get a little relaxation and some sun in before we proceed with part two of our campaign. How does the South of France sound to you?’

  ‘I’ve been telling her that she needs a holiday for the past two years!’ Oliver exclaimed, animation lighting up his eyes—eyes the same silky brown as his beautiful niece’s. ‘But will she listen? I think it’s a wonderful idea, Nash! Do you know of a place that’s private, where she won’t be disturbed?’

  ‘I have a place of my own in the Dordogne,’ the other man replied, his glance somewhat guarded as he moved it to the woman sitting beside Oliver…as though he were still carefully weighing up the suggestion in his mind. ‘It’s right in the heart of the countryside, and about twenty miles from the nearest town. We can go there.’

  ‘We?’ Freya stared at Nash in astonishment. Did he really mean them to go to the South of France together, and stay in a place that was miles from anywhere? She barely knew this man and he barely knew her! Did he really expect her to run pell-mell into the unknown with him without so much as a by-your-leave? Coiling her hair behind her ear, she let her dark eyes duel bravely with his now disturbingly dancing azure glance. It didn’t help that he seemed to be mocking her a little. Did he think she’d back down and refuse to go because she was too scared of taking such a risk?

  ‘It will be the perfect opportunity for me to get to know you better, Freya. It’s important that I learn as much about you as I can, since we’re going to work together. And besides that it will get you out of the eye of the storm for a while. As well as being able to relax a bit more, without constant press intrusion, there’ll be plenty of opportunity for being physically active too. There’s some stunning countryside to walk in, as well as a pool at the house.’

  The South of France sounded highly tempting, Freya had to admit. It conjured up lazy sun-drenched days, tempting culinary aromas, and the kind of relaxation that her body and mind craved deeply. Her uncle was right—she did need a holiday. Yet there was still the knotty little problem of going with Nash. Could she trust him as much as he seemed to be taking it for granted that she should? It was a tall order after what she’d endured at the hands of her ex-husband and a bloodthirsty press.

  Silently acknowledging that she was too mentally fatigued to argue the case any more, Freya came to a decision. She would go. At the end of the day, Nash was a friend of her uncle’s, and Oliver Beaumarche was no mean judge of character. The people he befriended usually became friends for life. And he wouldn’t have even considered asking Nash to help if he thought the man was untrustworthy in any way.

  She picked up her glass of mineral water and sipped it before replying. ‘The thought of getting away from this circus is definitely appealing. When would we go? Don’t you have to arrange things at work and at home?’

  ‘I’ve got no one to answer to at home, as I live alone, and as things turn out I’m due some free time. Plus…this is work for me, remember?’

  He smiled, and the smile highlighted the two fascinating thumbprints in his cheeks…dimples! Freya wished she didn’t keep noticing things about him that distracted her from the matter in hand, but it wasn’t easy when the man exuded an aura that would stun a room full of people into silence merely because he had entered it.

  Yet what did it signify that Nash was a highly attractive man? She’d been around enough of them to know that the outside packaging meant very little, and it certainly didn’t follow that she had to succumb to that attraction in any way. She didn’t want to sign up for any more pain or shock, and she didn’t want the rest of her life to be like the car crash she’d suffered a year ago. From now on Freya wanted to make good choices…wise choices that served her and didn’t sabotage her efforts to improve her life. Nash had been hired to help her achieve some positive publicity and to rebuild her damaged reputation so that she wouldn’t have to resume her career under a cloud. Other than that, their relationship would remain purely professional and platonic…she was absolutely certain about that.

  ‘We’ll leave the day after tomorrow, if that suits?’ he suggested.

  ‘Good,’ Freya answered with unguarded frankness. ‘The day after tomorrow is fine with me.’

  Oliver beamed at them both.

  ‘Hello?’

  In her bedroom that same evening, Freya answered the ringing telephone, expecting her mother to be on the other end of the line. They’d talked earlier, after Freya had returned from lunch, but she often rang more than once in a day, to ascertain that her daughter was taking proper care of herself.

  ‘You silly little bitch!’

  It very definitely wasn’t her mother. Instead, a harsh-sounding male voice ripped into her, sending icy chills charging violently down her spine. James. She dropped down onto the bed with its neatly spread satin eiderdown, her heart racing.

  ‘I’ve changed my number…how did you get it?’

  ‘I have my contacts, as I’m sure you know. Anyway…what the hell do you think you’re doing, rubbishing me in public like you did today? I warned you about making trouble for me, didn’t I?’

  Freya heard the resounding thud of her own heartbeat in her ears, despising the fact that her whole body was trembling as though she’d just emerged from a freezing plunge-pool. Yet, thinking of her new resolve to turn her life around, she knew that she couldn’t keep on letting this cruel, manipulative man belittle or frighten her. She really did have to start fighting back.

  ‘Leave me alone, James! We’re over! Remember? You’re nothing to do with me any more! And I didn’t rubbish you to the press earlier today…I merely spoke the truth—something I should have done a long time ago. And if you try to get in touch with me again, or threaten me, then I won’t hesitate to call the police and tell them what you’re doing!’

  ‘Do you really think they’re going to believe you? Everyone knows you’re a crazy, spoiled little bitch!’

  ‘It’s not me that’s crazy, James.’ It was hard to keep her voice steady, but deliberately drawing upon her acting skills Freya managed it. ‘And if you make any more defamatory remarks like that, my lawyers will be contacting you too.’

  ‘Who’s helping you? Is it that meddling rich uncle of yours? Tell him from me to mind his own bloody business and keep his nose out of where it isn’t wanted!’

  ‘Why don’t you tell him yourself? Or can’t you do that because the truth is you’re not so sure about coming out on top in that fight? You’re only capable of threatening women! Why don’t you just get on with your life and let me get on with mine? You’ve got your girlfriend and your baby and most of my money…surely that’s enough to keep you from feeling so dissatisfied?’

  ‘I won’t be satisfied until your name is dirt—until people say “Freya Carpenter? You mean that crazy, no-talent actress? What ever happened to her?”’

  He slammed down the phone in a temper, and Freya shakily returned the receiver to its rest and covered her face with her hands. ‘Please, no… Not again.’

  Minutes later, she almost catapulted up to the ceiling when the phone rang again. Feeling sick with nerves, she snatched up the receiver and said loudly, ‘Right! As soon as I put down this phone I swear I’m going to ring the police!’

  ‘Freya? What’s happening? It’s me…Nash.’

  ‘Nash?’ She almost crumpled with relief. Sliding her fingers through her long waving hair, she couldn’t stop shaking. ‘I’m sorry about that…I thought it was James.’

  ‘Have you talked to him? Has he been round there?’

  ‘No, he hasn’t been round, thank God! He rang me just now. I thought today might spark off something with him. I knew he’d
be mad at me for speaking out.’

  ‘Are you okay?’

  ‘I am now.’

  ‘According to my information, he’s supposed to be flying out to Antigua today. Did the call sound like it was long-distance?’

  ‘It might have been. I don’t know…I couldn’t really say.’

  ‘Obviously he threatened you? What did he say?’

  There was such command in Nash’s voice that Freya didn’t think to play down the truth. Besides, it was a relief to be able to tell someone what was really happening for a change, instead of pretending things weren’t so bad and bearing the situation on her own.

  ‘He said he won’t be satisfied until my name is dirt, and that he’s warned me about making trouble for him… Do I have to go on?’ she replied, her skin feeling clammy now that the shock was slowly ebbing away. Dragging the silky blue eiderdown onto her lap, she spread it over her knees.

  Detecting the weariness in her tone, Nash clenched his granite jaw tight. After the guts it must have taken for her to speak out to the press earlier on today, it must have been like a kick in the teeth to receive a threatening late-night phone call from that bastard Frazier, he thought. Examining the cut-crystal glass that he’d half filled with brandy, he swirled the darkly golden liquid round a little before placing it down on the windowsill untouched.

  ‘No, sweetheart,’ he conceded a little huskily. ‘You don’t have to go on. What you’ve just told me illustrates the picture perfectly. You should have rung the police straight away…did you?’

  ‘No. It hasn’t helped me in the past, so why should it now? Every time I reported anything James always got to them straight after and told them I was making it all up because I was lonely or drunk or high, and I craved attention.’

  ‘How the hell has he still got your number? Didn’t you have it changed when all this kicked off?’

  ‘Of course I did! More than once. But he said he has contacts—whatever that means. How he gets my number, I don’t know.’

  ‘Well, I have some contacts myself, at Scotland Yard, and rest assured I’ll be talking to them as soon as I get off the line to you! How are you feeling now? Do you want me to come over?’

  ‘I don’t think he’ll try ringing again… Anyway, I won’t answer the phone any more tonight. I’ll be fine. I’ve been dealing with this sort of thing for a long time now…I should be used to it. You don’t have to come over, but thanks all the same for offering.’

  Nash had real trouble accepting her assertion. He knew first-hand what it was to witness a man’s intimidation of a woman, and nothing could unleash his fury more than that. She probably wouldn’t sleep, he told himself, thinking of her walking round that chilly house all alone. And after a night with no sleep she was going to have the added challenge of dealing with a barrage of reporters and photographers waiting for her on her front doorstep in the morning. As he’d told her earlier at lunch—interest would be hot after today’s statement.

  Staring out of the sixth-storey window of his Westminster apartment, he contemplated the London skyline in all its twinkling late-night glory. It was a privilege he enjoyed most nights, and he never took it for granted. For a boy who had been raised in a tiny flat in the backstreets of Stockholm, it was the difference between a palace and a hovel. Rubbing his hand round the back of his neck, Nash quickly revised his plan of going to Freya’s in the early hours of the morning to give her some support with the press and came up with a far better idea.

  ‘Pack a bag,’ he ordered bluntly.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Get your passport, throw some things into a suitcase and get ready to leave. I’m coming over there to pick you up and bring you back to my place. You can stay here until we travel to France on Friday morning.’

  ‘That’s a little extreme, isn’t it?’

  ‘Extreme? After what you’ve just experienced? Listen to me, Freya… I won’t take the chance of Frazier bothering you again tonight, and this is the best way to ensure that he can’t get to you. You already know that tomorrow morning there’s going to be even more media interest, and probably a crowd of photographers and reporters waiting to catch you leaving the house… That’s if they aren’t there already?’

  ‘I’ve got about a half a dozen of them camped out on my doorstep.’

  ‘That clinches it, then. I should have thought of it earlier, but you’ll definitely be better off at my place.’

  There was silence at the other end of the line. Feeling his skin prickle with an acute sense of foreboding, Nash made his voice sharp. He knew she must be feeling at a pretty low ebb after that phone call, and he didn’t want to risk her getting any lower and doing herself some harm. If she’d been addicted to drugs it crossed his mind that they might have been prescription drugs. What if she had a drawer full of powerful sleeping pills, for instance? Perhaps she’d never consider such a thing in a million years, but Nash didn’t know her well enough yet to easily dismiss the possibility.

  ‘Freya? Did you hear what I just said?’

  ‘I heard you,’ she answered, that mesmerising brushed-velvet voice of hers making a whisper-soft imprint on the part of him that wasn’t entirely impervious to more tender feelings. ‘This isn’t normal, living like this…is it? I wonder if my life will ever be normal again? If I’ll ever be able to have any peace?’

  How often had Nash reflected on those very same thoughts when he’d been going through hell all those harsh years ago, when he’d lived in his hometown? Well, he had turned dark beginnings into a far brighter future, and so would Freya. Nash would show her how or die in the attempt! It was fast becoming clear to him that this woman could really benefit from some time away from the scene of all her unhappiness. Oliver had confided in him that his niece hadn’t left the UK in almost two and a half years—apparently he’d tried to persuade her to take a break abroad many times, and the restaurateur had homes in Spain and New York she could stay at—but the mental cruelty that Frazier had visited on her had made her almost agoraphobic.

  ‘You just need a change of scene, sweetheart. Going to France for a while will be good for you. Staying at home you’ve just got all the same things and associations that you face every day, and they’re like permanent reminders of everything that seems wrong in your life. Leaving them behind for a while will help you see things in a new perspective.’

  ‘You must think I’ve completely lost the plot—but I wasn’t always like this.’

  ‘I know, Freya. I’ve seen you up there on the silver screen, remember?’

  ‘That was a long time ago. I was a very different girl then.’

  ‘Not so very different.’ Catching his reflection outlined in the huge plate-glass window that encompassed a stunning view of the Thames, Nash saw a brief flash of pain register on his face. He couldn’t pretend her words had glanced off him without making a dent somewhere. ‘Life’s just knocked you about a bit… It will get better, I promise.’

  ‘What makes you so sure?’

  ‘Good instincts.’ He grinned at his own sense of certainty. If only he could transfer some of it to the traumatised woman at the other end of the phone…

  ‘Well, if you’re so sure that staying at your place tonight and going to France is the right thing, then I’ll go and pack my suitcase.’

  He heard her sigh, but this time there was definite resolve in her much more steady voice and Nash was relieved. ‘I’ll be there in half an hour,’ he promised, then rang off and straight away depressed the numbers on his cordless phone for Scotland Yard, thinking as he did so that an ordinary member of the public was probably accorded more protection from the law and from friends and family than this lovely, talented woman whose face had graced movie screens…

  A faint misty light was coming through the slatted silk blinds, dappling the damson-coloured duvet on the bed, and, blinking her eyes open in surprise, Freya sat up in a flash, barely knowing where she was for a moment. Peering at the illuminated digits on the alarm clock on the cabinet
beside her, she registered the time in amazement. Five past seven!

  ‘I don’t believe it!’ she muttered, checking again. She’d slept right through the night without waking up once…something almost unheard of! She was shocked to her marrow, especially as she had been sleeping in a strange bed as well.

  She glanced round the spacious, frighteningly neat room, with its definitely masculine décor—there was no hint of anything remotely feminine amongst the muted colours and expensive modern furniture that she could easily detect—and, drawing her knees up to her chest, wrapped her arms around them as she contemplated her situation. Last night she’d been too tired and mentally fatigued after the phone incident to enter into a protracted conversation with Nash about what had happened. As it was, her nerves had been even more frazzled by the clamour of photographers almost swamping her and Nash as he’d spirited her away from them to his waiting car.

  On reaching his apartment, she’d declined the nightcap and alternative cup of tea he’d offered and asked if he would mind if she just turned in. Immediately he’d shown her into this bedroom, which was easily reminiscent of a suite at a top-class hotel, and told her to try and get a good night’s rest. When he’d said the words Freya had hardly believed that such a thing was possible, but here she was, seven hours later, feeling more rested and more refreshed than she’d done in absolutely ages.

  Was it the distinct feeling of security she’d received from knowing that she was in Nash’s domain and effectively under his protection? Was that why she had slept so well? That late night call from James had shaken her up badly, and to be honest when Nash had mentioned her spending the night at his flat part of Freya had been utterly relieved that he’d suggested it. Should she now berate herself because her defences had been low and she’d accepted an offer of help? If she’d accepted more help during the past two years when she’d needed it, then maybe she wouldn’t have ended up as mentally bruised and battered as she was.