Chapter 2

CHAPTER 2

L uca

It takes several seconds before I realise the pounding I can hear isn't actually my head—though that is doing a good job of keeping up—but the door.

I groan and roll off the sofa, shuffling across the room. Had I really fallen asleep on the sofa last night? Opening the door a crack, Anna bursts in.

"Thank god, you're alright." She looks genuinely concerned. "I thought you'd done something stupid."

"Stupid?" I look at the empty bottles on the coffee table. Champagne, which I drank to celebrate the opening of my new exhibition, and vodka, to try to forget that my lover—Claude Daucourt—brought someone else to my opening night. And to try to forget the scene that ensued. It wasn't a public scene, thank god, but still, I was pretty pissed off. I'd been with Claude on and off for six years, but he had never flaunted any of his other lovers in front of me, and bringing one of them to my opening night had been a step too far.

"He's an artist too. I thought it might be a good education for him," Claude had said airily, when I'd cornered and confronted him.

"What else are you educating him in?" I found myself asking, which was stupid.

"You, of all people, should know that."

"Claude, did you ever think how I'd feel with you bringing him here, to my night?" I could see by the look on his face that he hadn't. No, Claude never thought of anyone but himself, for all his supposed benevolence. It was all a selfish desire to use what influence he had to get what he wanted—which was adoration from young men. And didn't they seem to get younger? Or was I just getting older?

"Don't forget, I got you to where you are today," he'd hissed at me. It was true. He was an art reviewer and critic for a major Sunday paper. Gratitude had gone a long way in forgiving him every time I saw him with someone else, but it was an old line he'd used once too often.

"Go to hell," I'd replied, before stalking off. I don't remember the rest of the opening night party. I do remember coming back to my apartment and opening the champagne, and the vodka. Unwise, considering the state of my head, but not stupid in the sense that I thought Anna meant.

"I tried to call," Anna was saying.

"My phone's off." Claude and I have been through tiffs before—admittedly, I've never told him to go to hell—and usually he'll get drunk and call me, apologising and begging forgiveness. I always give in, but as I'm still pissed at him, I didn't want to hear his voice right now. So the phone is off.

"Luca, have you seen the papers?" Anna looks genuinely worried.

"No, I just woke up. Why? What?" Then the cold realisation of her words hits me. The other reason Claude was at my opening night, was that he was reviewing it for the paper. Claude was a popular reviewer. His reviews were pithy and funny, unless you were on the wrong end of them.

He would never . . . would he?

"Take a look." Anna heads off to the kitchen where I can hear her filling my coffee machine. I reach for my tablet and switch it on.

"Is Luca Winterton a has been in the art world? His latest exhibition certainly shows a lack of imagination trotted out on hackneyed themes."

I don't get any further before a wave of nausea and panic washes over me. I push the tablet away, my head in my hands. I hear a mug being plonked onto the table and then feel a hand on my back, rubbing, soothing. Anna—my oldest, and probably my only genuine, friend.

"I'm sure it's nothing," she soothes. "It'll all blow over soon enough. The art world knows your connection with Claude, and he has been photographed with that new boy of his recently, so they'll just see it as a jealous outburst."

I really hope so.

I reach for my phone and switch it on.

It beeps as message after message comes in. Are they from Claude saying he's sorry?

"Darling, it's Rueben from Claverdale Gallery. Cynthia says, considering the . . . err . . . you know what . . . we can't display your work, just for a bit. You know how it is. Sorry. Anyway, ciao."

Beep.

"Luca, it's Gavin. Sorry old chum, but you're not trending right now. I'm going to have to take your pictures down. You understand, don't you?"

Beep.

"Mr Winterton, it's Mr Graves, from the Beauchamp Gallery. We're sorry to say that we cannot sell your work anymore."

Beep.

Fuck! Fucking Claude!

I throw my phone across the room.

"I'm finished, Anna." I put my head in my hands.

"No." she rubs my back again. "It'll blow over, you'll see. You're a brilliant artist. The galleries will come round to that soon, hang in there."

Was I though? There was more than a grain of truth in Claude's assertion that he had made me. He was the one who had noticed my art in a small gallery, not long after I was fresh out of college. His glowing review had attracted attention, and other galleries soon requested my work. I was able to rent my own studio and had held several exhibitions in the last six years.

I had often wondered if his review wasn't so much about my artwork, but more about me. He'd taken me to dinner that first day—the first of many—and it had ended with me becoming his lover. I thought boyfriend once, but Claude didn't have boyfriends—but he did have a type, and I knew I fitted that perfectly. Every time the worry that my career was based on my relationship with Claude reared its head, my motivation to create left me, so I'd pushed it to the back of my mind, behind a locked door. Now that door's been bombed open. My art's nothing, and that's worse, way worse, than being dropped by the galleries. Of course they dropped me. I couldn't create a piece of art if my life depended on it. My success wasn't because of my art. It had been dependent on Claude and now he's crushed it.

Anna's phone beeps.

"Shit, shit, sorry Luca, I have to run. I'm already late for my photoshoot. The room alone cost a thousand pounds to rent for today and the photographer, model, and make-up artist, are all there waiting for me."

I wave her away. I know how much this means to her. She's a costumier, specialising in recreating historical garments. She's been working on this collection for months and the shoot is today. Out of it, she's hoping to get work with production companies, on a period drama.

"Thanks." She leans in and kisses my cheek. "I'll be back as soon as I can. Don't do anything stupid." She takes my spare key and leaves in the same style of whirlwind as she entered.

Don't do anything stupid. I'm not going to do anything at all—except sit here and mourn my lack of talent and lack of career. Well, not do anything except reach for my coffee. No, that wasn't doing it for me. Maybe if I add some whisky? Perhaps just the whisky for now.

Anna did come back and stay with me, only going out to work when she needed to. She made me coffee and brought food, but I didn't taste any of it. When the alcohol ran out on the third day, she refused to get me anymore.

"If you want any, you're going to have to fetch it yourself." I think it was her way of getting me to leave the apartment. It was a good effort but I couldn't do that. Oh, I tried, but every time I got to the door, I felt dizzy and couldn't breathe.

I managed to go to the studio once. Anna had insisted, and she was a hard woman to defy. She said it was like falling off a horse and I needed to get out and create something. But the muse isn't like that. If it's gone, it's gone. I had stood looking at the blank canvas for a long time, going through a range of emotions—mostly that I was a fraud and no good. Then the fear set in that I would never create again, and then disgust at myself for not realising sooner that I was no good as an artist. I don't remember throwing the canvas across the room. But I must have done so, because that's where it was when Anna found me hours later, curled up and shivering on the sofa I kept in there for days when I worked late and didn't make it home. She led me home and didn't suggest it again.

I keep my phone off and can't bring myself to go online. My world shrinks to the four walls of my apartment, and I want it that way. There's a part of my brain which knows I'm being ridiculous, but the rest of it is very good at denying any say in what I do. One day—I lost count of which one—Anna comes back from work with a smart gentleman in tow.

"I found him hovering outside," she announces.

"I'm from Claythorne and Parma," the gentleman opens with. He's thin and very fair, blond eyelashes framing watery, blue eyes, which are quite startling to look at. But the name doesn't ring a bell with me.

"The solicitors," he continues, obviously and correctly seeing I need a prompt. "Executors of Ms Winterton's will." Ah Great Aunt Frances—that is something I remember. Her funeral was a month ago. She had been my legal guardian in my teens, and I'd loved staying with her at her beautiful house in the countryside. Now she's gone and I have no family left at all. I don't need a reminder of how sad my life is.

"We've been trying to call you Mr Winterton," he says looking around, and I see the apartment through his eyes. I can see it's a mess—that I'm a mess—and it isn't like me. I sit up a little straighter.

"Sorry," I mumble "Mr . . . "

"Gaberley."

"Mr Gaberley. I'm sorry, where are my manners? Would you like some coffee?"

He softens a little. "Yes, please." He glances around for somewhere to put his briefcase and to sit down. I shoot a pleading look at Anna. She's smiling, probably at me being more animated than I have been for days.

"I'll get them." She whisks herself off to the kitchen.

Once we have coffee, and I've moved things off the armchair so Mr Gaberley can sit down, he speaks again.

"I've brought you a copy of Ms. Winterton's will." He takes some papers out of his briefcase. Aunt Frances' will. What can that have to do with me? I hadn't seen her for a few years. A shot of guilt, that I hadn't visited her when she went into a home for her last few months, runs through me.

Mr Gaberley hands me the papers. "She made you the sole beneficiary of her will. She has left you Larchdown House. There's an amount of money as well, though some of it went into her care."

I don't know if he says anything else—I certainly don't hear it. I just sit, looking at the words on the page in front of me. Larchdown House and gardens. She's left me her house. I look at Anna, and her eyes are shining—I know she'd love to see it. Mr Gaberley hands me some papers and a pen. "If I could just get your signature here . . . here . . . and here." He points with his long, pale finger.

"Good, then I can give you this." He hands me an envelope, stands up, and I follow him. He offers me his hand, which after a second's hesitation, I shake.

"Enjoy your new house, Mr Winterton."

I sink down onto the sofa, sighing. What the hell am I going to do with a house?

"Bloody hell, Lu!" Anna exclaims, "It's not everyday someone leaves you a house, what's it like?"

I reach for the envelope. Inside are a set of keys and a cheque for a not inconsiderable amount of money.

"It's quite big, with large gardens. What do I want with that? I can hardly look after myself and this tiny apartment right now?"

"Well, you could always sell it." Anna is ever practical. "But you should go and see it. It'd be perfect. Get away for a while."

She's right. It would be good to get out of London for a while, if I could get out the door, but this feels different. I could go away, where no one would judge me or whisper scandal behind my back.

"Yeah, I might." It certainly feels better than sitting here any longer. "Do you want to come with me?"

"Of course I do, but I can't leave just yet. I have to get my show finished. You go and I'll join you in a few weeks."

I can feel a bit of my old enthusiasm creeping back.