The Socialite's Secret. Carol Marinelli

think that she needs to be somewhere more used to dealing with …’ Scarlet stopped what she had about been to say. Luke loathed the word ‘celebrity’.

      ‘She’s in the best place and in no condition to be moved,’ Luke said. ‘As her daughter, you get to make that call.’

      ‘I don’t think so.’ Scarlet gave a worried shake of her head.

      ‘I know so,’ Luke responded.

      ‘But she has Vince. He deals with all that type of thing.’

      ‘Yes, well, Vince is going to be a bit busy for the foreseeable future. After I’ve spoken with you, believe me, I’m going to be speaking with him and getting a far more accurate history than the one he gave me earlier. I may also be speaking with the police so trust me when I say that I’ll back your call if you want your mother kept here.’

      ‘Luke, please, don’t bring the police into this.’ Scarlet started to cry and not very quietly.

      He sat and watched unmoved. Those tears did not move him and certainly he would not be swayed by hype and celebrity status when he made his decisions.

      He just needed more facts but few were forthcoming.

      His pager trilled and Luke checked it. Seeing that it was Heather, he made a phone call and rolled his eyes as she told him that the press were becoming more insistent. ‘Just say no comment,’ Luke responded tartly. ‘How hard is it to say that?’ He let out a tense breath. ‘Unless there is a change in Anya’s condition, or you need me for another patient, you’re not to disturb me. I’m speaking with a relative now.’

      He looked over and saw that in the couple of minutes it had taken to speak with Heather, Scarlet had stopped crying long enough to take out her phone. Luke watched with mounting irritation. They were speaking about her mother’s near-death and yet Scarlet was checking the news reports and quickly scrolling through social media!

      ‘What are you doing?’ Luke asked.

      ‘It’s everywhere!’ Scarlet said, but then she really started to cry and they weren’t false tears this time. As she put the phone down on the desk, Luke saw an image, and he reached over and picked it up.

      The photo that he saw was of Scarlet. She was dressed in a pair of red pyjamas and her feet were bare as she stood on the street beside the ambulance that her mother was being loaded into. Two bodyguards were restraining her from climbing in. Her black hair was a mop of wild curls, her usually pale skin was red from crying and there was a look of sheer terror on her face.

      Luke looked up from Scarlet’s phone and at the woman who now sat on the other side of his desk—she was the perfectly groomed star in crisis now! Scarlet was wearing tight leather leggings and a tight black top. Over that there was a large silver leather jacket that looked as if it had been thrown on at the last minute. Her black curls were now perfectly tousled. Luke knew, though, from very personal experience, that the photo was a truer portrayal of Scarlet’s morning locks.

      He pulled away from that memory; instead, he looked back at the phone and the image that had been captured by the press.

      It showed a rare moment of reality in a very unrealistic world and this would be the photo that would dominate, Luke was sure.

      Scarlet looking less than perfect.

      It was the Scarlet he far preferred.

      ‘It’s going to be worse than ever now …’ Scarlet could not stop crying. Yes, she was terrified for her mother, but she’d had so much hanging on today, so many plans in place. There wasn’t a hope of escaping from the press now and, Scarlet knew, now more than ever her mother needed her to be near.

      ‘They’re going to make my life hell.’

      ‘Don’t feed them, then,’ Luke said. Her head was in her hands, her fingers were scrunched in her hair, but she lifted her face and gave him a scornful look as he continued to speak. ‘You don’t have to respond to the press, just focus on your mother and yourself.’

      ‘What would you know?’ Scarlet scoffed.

      ‘Oh, I know,’ Luke said. It was pointless to sit and pretend that he could take a comprehensive history from Scarlet and leave the personal aside. ‘David, the anaesthetist, will take a more thorough history once your mother has been transferred to ICU.’ He handed her back her phone, and as he did so he looked at Scarlet’s slender, manicured fingers and remembered hands that were as smooth as a kitten’s paws.

      No, anger at her spoiled, pampered life didn’t now gnaw at him; instead, it saddened him that that funny, adventurous mind had been locked away for so long.

      Yes, the world was supposedly Scarlet’s oyster, but Luke knew that since the day she had been born, her life had been magnified by a lens.

      ‘You’re handing me over.’

      ‘I’m handing your mother’s care over,’ Luke said. ‘That’s normal policy when a patient is moved. I need to get back out there, Scarlet. I have patients to see.’

      ‘What about me?’

      Typical, Luke thought, but, though he tried to generate anger, though he did his best to remind himself of the spoiled princess Scarlet was and the absolute diva she could be, he failed.

      ‘What about us?’ Scarlet said.

      ‘There’s no us,’ Luke lied.

      He was angry now as he recalled all she had done, but instead of standing to leave, he sat there.

      And so did she.

      They sat in the silence of his office and as the world carried on outside, both went back to a time when things had seemed so different.

      When hope had arrived in both their hearts.

      Even if it killed them to do so, both remembered.

       CHAPTER THREE

      ‘I’VE GOT A HEADACHE.’ Anya closed her eyes and massaged her temples. ‘I’m going to have to go back to the hotel and see Vince.’

      Scarlet frowned in concern and said all the right things to her mother but inside all she felt was relief. All she wanted was to get away from the noise of the club and close her eyes and go to sleep. It was after midnight and Scarlet had been up since seven. She had given interviews and done a shoot at London Bridge, and the rest of the day had been spent propping up her mother, telling her that she could get through the show.

      ‘We’ll get you back,’ Scarlet said, and nodded to her mother’s bodyguard.

      ‘What would I do without you?’ Anya asked, and Scarlet felt the knot that had lived in her chest for more than ten years now tighten a notch. And then, because she was Anya, her mother changed her mind about leaving when a young guy came over to their table with a drink and told her how amazing her performance that night had been. ‘I’ll just stay for one more,’ Anya said.

      Scarlet moved over to give the young man room to sit next to her mother but then she stood up.

      She saw the exit door and started to walk towards it.

      Scarlet wanted fresh air.

      More than that she wanted to run.

      ‘Hey, Scarlet …’ A hand was on her arm and she turned to the face of one of her mother’s bodyguards. ‘I’ll send Troy outside with you.’

      She didn’t want Troy.

      Scarlet didn’t want anyone, she just wanted one day, one moment to be allowed out in the world alone.

      She didn’t want to be here in this club.

      And then she looked up and saw a man who looked as if he didn’t want to be there either.