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She was used to crowds, for heaven’s sake. She’d lived and worked in Bristol. But here the noise and numbers suddenly threatened to overwhelm her.
She’d never seen a market like it. As well as all the fruit and vegetables on offer, there were innumerable stalls offering bric-à-brac, second-hand clothing—including a display of old fur coats and military uniforms from another century—books, jewellery and musical instruments.
The temptation to linger and explore was fierce, but buying food had to be her main priority.
She turned and fought her way back, diving into a supermarket with something like relief. She filled a basket with staples, then pushed her way up the road to a specialist bakery she’d noticed earlier, where tempting displays of every kind of bread and pastry were presented outside for customers to pick and mix.
Olivia chose some focaccia bread, with a mini-baguette filled with smoked ham and salad, which, with fruit, would serve as lunch. She selected apples, plums, tomatoes and peppers from a street stall, and then stopped at the old-fashioned butcher’s further up the road and bought a chicken and enough minced pork and beef to make a pasta sauce.
On her way back, she passed the end of a cobbled mews and paused for a moment, looking wistfully at the narrow smart houses, painted in pastel colours. One of them she saw, even had a ‘For Sale’ board hanging from its first-floor balcony.
As she hesitated a couple came out of the house opposite, walking fast, hand in hand, the girl looking up into her companion’s face and laughing. Olivia stepped back to let them pass, an intense pang of envy twisting inside her as she wondered what it would be like to live there with someone you loved.
She allowed herself to indulge a brief fantasy of being there with Jeremy. Wandering out to buy fresh croissants and oranges to squeeze for breakfast, while he stayed in bed with the newspapers. Then, later, going for a stroll together round the second-hand bookshops and junk stalls, choosing something for the house—a piece of pottery, maybe, or some glassware. Something to provide memories in the years ahead.
She stopped herself right there. At the moment there was no guarantee that she was going to share any time with Jeremy, she thought wretchedly. Not after her appalling gaffe at Lancey Gardens.
She shuddered as she walked slowly back up the hill, weighed down by her shopping and the remembrance of the morning’s confrontation.
Because she could just imagine the row there would be when Jeremy got back, she thought despondently.
Declan Malone had caught her off guard—flicked her on the raw—but that was no excuse. She’d behaved like an idiot, pushing herself forward like that before she’d sussed out the situation.
If only Jeremy had told her that he was holed up temporarily with his wife’s cousin. Instead, she’d gained the opposite impression—that he had his own independent flat, that he was making a life which she would be able to share.
I couldn’t have been listening properly, she admitted, with a sigh. Or else I simply heard what I wanted to hear.
Nothing, but nothing was working out as she’d expected. And she could well end up on her own in one of the world’s great uncaring capitals.
Or she could go back to Bristol, she reminded herself. No one apart from Beth knew why she’d come to London, and her flatmate was too kind and loyal to have spread the word. She could probably even get her old job back.
My God, she thought in swift horror, as she crossed the road to Lancey Terrace. That was real defeatist talk. Return to square one and occupy her familiar rut. When in fact it had been more than time for a change. For her to take hold of her life by the scruff of its neck and shake it.
She had a career—valuable job skills to offer. She could earn her living—pay her way. She’d come to London to share Jeremy’s life, not to become some pathetic dependent.
And whatever happened, she intended to survive.
Lifting her chin, she strode the last hundred yards.
Her shopping unpacked and put away, Olivia sat down to eat her lunch and take a long look round her. The flat was starting to look occupied, and she had her small portable radio to fill the silence. She’d noticed, too, there was a TV aerial in the room. And from the information that Sasha had thrown at her earlier about Notting Hill Gate she reckoned she’d be able to rent a set quite easily.
That will be my project for the afternoon, she thought. Keep busy—keep interested—and, above all, don’t brood.
She’d found a vase in one of the cupboards. She’d get some flowers to go in it. And some wine. If it turned out there was nothing to celebrate, then she’d drown her sorrows instead, she decided, squaring her shoulders.
She got out her A to Z of London, working out the shortest route to the Gate.
Sasha had told her she could find anything there, and that seemed to be true, she thought as she battled with the other Saturday afternoon shoppers. Like Portobello, it seemed to be fizzing with life. She gave herself time to look properly, lingering in front of boutiques and reading the menus of the various bistros, walking, inevitably, much further than she’d planned.
But if Notting Hill was to be her home, at least for the time being, she needed to get to know it. She wanted to look as confident and purposeful as the people who streamed past her, and feel it too.
She thought suddenly, I want to belong.
At a wine shop she bought some red Italian wine to go with the pasta, a decent Chardonnay for the chicken, and an optimistic Bollinger for her reunion with Jeremy, investing in a strong canvas bag in which to lug her purchases home, as most of her shopping was likely to be done on the hoof from now on.
She discovered a TV store without difficulty, and ended up buying a reconditioned portable with a reasonable warranty for far less than the cost of an annual rental, treating herself to a cab to get it back to Lancey Terrace. After all, she reminded herself, she couldn’t waste good job-hunting time waiting at the flat for a delivery to be made.
In spite of her personal reservations, there was a curious satisfaction in making her basement look like home.
But, when it came to it, the idea of spending her first evening in London concocting a pasta sauce for one held little appeal.
Up to now there’d always been people around her—family first, then friends, and flatmates. Always someone to laugh with, or moan to, or simply exchange the news of the day.
This was her first experience of being single in the city, and she needed to tackle it positively.
So she wouldn’t skulk in the flat, feeling hard done to. She would go out. Go to the cinema in the Gate, and have a meal afterwards. Make her first night in London an occasion.
She changed, putting on black leggings, a cream shirt, and a long black linen jacket, and set off. She had a choice of films, including a well-reviewed romantic comedy, but it seemed safer in her present state of mind to opt for a thriller, with a plot convoluted enough to keep her mind engaged, and, consequently, off her personal problems.
She emerged feeling more relaxed then she’d done all day. Now all that remained was to find somewhere to eat. Probably not easy, she realised, surveying the still crowded pavements. Maybe she’d have to settle for a take-away.
She’d intended to head for one of the bistros she’d checked out earlier, but instead found herself wandering up Kensington Park Road.
The lit window of a restaurant drew her across the street, but one look was enough to convince her that it was not only full to bursting point with beautiful people, but, more significantly, out of her price range.
She was just moving on when she saw a diner seated at a table for two in the window itself turn, hand raised, to summon a waiter.
She recognised him with stomach-churning immediacy. Declan Malone, she thought, stiffening, her hackles on full alert. But not with the morning’s exotic redhead, she noticed at once. His evening’s companion was a willowy blonde decorously clad in a dark trouser suit. For the moment anyway. Presumably the peach towel outfit came later.
‘Poor girl,’ she muttered under her breath. ‘Does she realise she’s simply feeding the ego of a serial womaniser?’
Clearly she didn’t, because she was devouring Declan Malone with her eyes, to the complete detriment of the food on her plate. And he was looking at her and smiling in a way that had been totally lacking in his dealings with Olivia.
In fact, Olivia acknowledged without pleasure, she would hardly have recognised him.
A taxi drew up, and three girls got out, all stick-thin, and talking and giggling at the tops of their voices.
As the new arrivals pranced past her into the restaurant, shrieking their hellos and air-kissing everyone within reach, Olivia started, as if she’d been woken abruptly from some spell.
What the hell am I doing? she demanded silently. Hanging round here with my nose pressed against the glass like the Little Match Girl? Do I want him to look up and see me?
Hastily, she turned away, retracing her steps towards the Gate.
She realised with sudden bleakness that her appetite had totally deserted her. And, more disturbingly, that she had never felt quite so cold, or so lonely in her life before.
Claudia Lang was not a particularly conceited girl, but she was sufficiently keyed in to know when her dinner partner’s attention was wandering, and human enough to be piqued by it.
She reached across the table and put a scarlet-tipped hand on Declan’s sleeve.
‘Is something wrong?’
Startled, Declan wrenched his frowning gaze back from the window.
‘No—I’m sorry. I—thought I saw someone outside. Someone I knew.’
Claudia directed a sceptical glance over her shoulder at the darkness beyond the window. ‘Then you must have X-ray vision,’ she commented lightly. ‘Do you want to go and check?’
‘Of course not.’ The frown faded, and the smile he sent her was charming and repentant. ‘I’m probably wrong, and anyway, it’s really—not important.’ He paused, then added with cold emphasis, ‘Not important at all.’
And wondered why he’d needed to say that.
CHAPTER THREE (#ud9b1ee46-220c-527d-926f-cc690cc8ab82)
A GOOD night’s sleep was all she needed to cheer her up and put her right. That was what Olivia had told herself. But sleep was proving elusive.
The sofa-bed was comfortable enough, but quite apart from the non-stop traffic noise—did no one else ever go to bed?—there was no air in her room. Although she’d opened the window at the top, the atmosphere still felt heavier than the quilt she’d kicked off. The curtains hung unmoving.
The dial on her alarm clock told her it was nearly three in the morning, and so far she hadn’t closed her eyes.
I’m just on edge about seeing Jeremy again, she thought. And it’s a strange bed, strange room, strange city. What else can I expect but insomnia?
She got up and padded down the narrow passage into the kitchen. She poured milk into a saucepan, and set it on the hob, then opened the tin of drinking chocolate she’d included in her groceries.
Of course, if everything had gone according to plan she wouldn’t have been doing much sleeping anyway, she acknowledged, her face warming slightly.
She supposed Jeremy would have taken her to a hotel. Because they certainly wouldn’t have been allowed to be together at Lancey Gardens, as Declan Malone had made more than clear.
King of the double standard, she thought stormily, slamming the inoffensive tin of chocolate back in the cupboard. No prizes for guessing how he was spending the night.
Glumly, she poured the hot milk into a beaker, and stirred in the chocolate powder.
One of the things she’d been trying to figure as she stared into the darkness was possible damage limitation, but so far she hadn’t come up with a thing.
From Sasha’s remarks, it was clear that Declan Malone sincerely cared about Maria, and had little idea that her marriage was in such serious trouble.
Not until I showed up anyway, she thought, pulling a face. Although, if they are so close, it seems odd that she hasn’t confided in him.
She sat at the small, round living room table, her hands cupped round the beaker, her mind going wearily over the same ground, and finding naught for her comfort.
She could only hope that Jeremy would see she’d acted in their best interests, and not mind that she’d jumped the gun.
And if Declan threw him out it would give him an incentive to find a place where they could be together, she encouraged herself. Maybe her intervention would be the catalyst that changed things at last.
If only he could be persuaded to look at it that way.
She’d half expected to be awake all night, but almost immediately after she got back into bed she found her thoughts swirling drowsily into emptiness.
Only to discover that she was standing in front of a giant pane of glass, and she could see Jeremy on the other side. She tapped on the glass, and called to him, but he didn’t seem to see or hear her, and she knew she had to get to him—to make him listen. She started banging on the glass with both fists until it suddenly disintegrated, parting in front of her, then flowing round her like thick mist.
She began searching through the mist for Jeremy, hands outstretched, crying out his name, and at last felt her wrists taken. Gripped tightly.
But when she looked up, peering through the stifling grey miasma, she saw that the man who held her was not Jeremy, but Declan Malone, his eyes glittering like ice.
‘Oh, God.’ Olivia sat bolt-upright, her heart hammering. For a moment she was totally disorientated, then she saw the sun pouring through a gap in the green curtains and realised she’d been dreaming.
A glance at her alarm clock confirmed that she’d slept late too.
Her head felt heavy and her eyes were full of sand, so that it would have been very easy to lie back and sleep again. Fatally easy.
‘Just asking for more nightmares,’ she muttered, pushing back the quilt and swinging her feet to the floor. ‘And who needs them?’
She set coffee to brew, and poured orange juice into a glass, then went to shower and dress.
By the time she’d drunk her coffee, and eaten two slices of toast and marmalade, she was beginning to feel marginally human again.
She washed her few dishes, then tidied the bed into a sofa again, tucking the bedding away inside as Sasha had shown her.
And now, she thought, I have the rest of the day in front of me. What shall I do with it?
Not that she could do very much, she reminded herself. She needed to stay round the flat so that Jeremy could contact her there. But she could at least walk to the Gate and get the Sunday papers. Fill the time that way, because, a small, sober voice in her head suggested, she could be in for a long wait.
If she’d thought the streets would be quieter on Sunday, she soon discovered her mistake. But there was a different, more relaxed atmosphere.
Olivia found a seat at a pavement table outside a café, and ordered herself a cappuccino while she settled down for a leisurely bout of people-watching.
It was something she normally enjoyed, but somehow, today, it only seemed to deepen her sense of isolation. There were too many couples, strolling hand in hand in the sunshine, smiling into each other’s eyes.
Eventually, she left her coffee unfinished, and walked quietly back to her basement.
I won’t always feel like this, she promised herself. I won’t always feel an outsider. One day—soon—I’ll be walking with Jeremy, and someone will be watching me—envying me. One day …
She tried to visualise it. Fix the image in her mind like a lodestar. But instead, incomprehensibly, she found herself remembering the restaurant last night, and Declan Malone smiling at his companion. And herself outside. Looking in.
For a moment she felt totally frozen, all the muscles in her throat tightening suddenly, as if she was going to cry.
Then her hands clenched fiercely into fists at her side.
Oh, for heaven’s sake, she thought in self-derision. Pull yourself together.
She made herself an omelette for lunch, and afterwards, when she’d cleared away, she put some music on, and stretched out on the sofa with the crossword.
She’d barely started when there was a knock at the door, and Sasha called, ‘Olivia, may I come in, darling?’
Today, the caftan was emerald-green, and she was carrying Humph tucked under her arm.
‘It all looks very nice.’ She cast an appraising glance around her. ‘Does it feel like home? Not yet, I dare say.’
She seated herself in a swirl on one of the dining chairs. Humph wriggled to get down, then trotted over to the sofa and jumped up beside Olivia, circling twice on his chosen cushion, then settling down with a sigh.
