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  “When Bridget slips on the skin of a character, it’s seamless. When this show opens, she’ll be Mary.”

  Bridget was an exceptional actress. She had to be. Offstage, she was a total bloody nightmare.

  “We should have cast Margo,” Amelia said, for the five-thousandth time.

  “And I would have,” he agreed. For the five-thousandth time. “If Margo wasn’t on her honeymoon and otherwise engaged.” In shagging an Italian tenor. For three straight months, which seemed almost unbelievably out of character for his ex-girlfriend, who usually couldn’t be prised away from the stage or a film set for more than a few hours at a time.

  The gossip columnists still had whiplash over that elopement. People were naturally having a field day speculating over whether he’d been cheated on, which he hadn’t, and whether he was heartbroken, which he wasn’t. He was happy she was happy with her new husband. He even liked Alberto Ferreti, although he could have done without the other man’s tendency to hug anyone who came within arm’s reach, be it friend, stranger or his wife’s ex.

  He’d just be a lot happier if she’d capped the honeymoon at a perfectly reasonable two weeks and not skipped the country at this particular moment. Because he fully agreed with Amelia. Margo would have been the better choice as lead, as he’d informed her more than once, running up against the brick wall of her husband’s fucking cuddles every time. She was turning down what could be the defining role of her stage career to drift about the Italian coast having sex in a houseboat. Clearly true love, but bad timing.

  “So long as you’re prepared to reel Bridget in when the claws and fangs come out,” David put in bluntly. “I told you I wouldn’t work with her again. I still come out in an anxiety rash every time someone mentions Amadeus.”

  “If she acts like that anywhere near my stage again, she’s out. And she’s aware that doors will immediately close in every other theatre worth mentioning. She’ll behave.”

  Amelia suddenly snorted, regaining a scrap of humour. “I’m amazed she had the spine or the stupidity to go full-on diva around you in the first place. If you’d pop round mine every night and use your death stare on my kids, I’d be a well-rested, even-tempered angel of a woman. Do it for the team.”

  Luc laughed for the first time all day. “How are the boys?”

  “Fine,” said their mother gloomily. “Jay says they’re either going to end up in parliament or prison.” She jabbed the iPad at him again. “Hudson Warner’s pushing for Lily in a big way, and you know what he’s like when he gets a fixed idea.” Luc did know. It was remarkably similar to when Amelia got a fixed idea, and bringing up his chief shareholder wasn’t going to help her case. He was one budget meeting away from pinning Warner’s photo to a dartboard. “I’m telling you, it’s not the most out-there suggestion. There is an actress under all that second-rate burlesque bullshit. Obviously she’s not as vacant as she plays in Knightsbridge.”

  “If she was as vacant as she looks on screen, she wouldn’t be able to tie her own shoes.” Luc gathered up the rest of the paperwork. “We’ll meet back here tomorrow at eight-thirty to make a final decision.”

  He had three other prospects in mind. None of whom sounded like a bloody helium addict. Lily Lamprey was the type of actor who could be found in triplicate in every casting agency in the city, and they didn’t have time for this.

  Given his week so far, it seemed par for the course when he almost fell over the tea trolley on his way out the door. The catering kid flushed a blotchy red under the freckles and determinedly avoided Luc’s gaze.

  Luc had no intention of going home at four o’clock in the afternoon, but took part of Amelia’s advice and hunted out a few painkillers in his office. The benefits were destroyed by yet another call from his contractor, with yet another construction issue.

  There was a time when the Queen Anne had been the most iconic theatre in the West End. Seven generations of Savages had run it successfully until his grandfather had inherited, and it had become synonymous with third-rate melodrama and sordid cabaret. For the past twenty-five years, it had been so run-down it had been taped off as a hazard zone.

  Luc had spent twenty of those years producing hits for other people’s theatres. He’d moonlighted in Hollywood, directing bullshit blockbusters that paid considerably better than films with decent actors and scripts that made sense, and taken a lot of prospective investors out for lunch. He’d put up with the interference of Hudson Warner for months. He hadn’t slept properly for weeks. But the restoration was finally taking shape.

  Another call, this one from his solicitor, was interrupted when Lana Cho banged open his office door. The casting assistant didn’t bother to wait until he’d ended one conversation before she launched into her own rant. Apparently Bridget Barclay was refusing to join the meet-and-greet the following weekend because she had a sore throat and obviously fancied a preemptive case of can’t-be-arsed-itis.

  It was half past seven by the time Luc got off the phone with Bridget, having informed her that unless she could present a medical certificate confirming she’d contracted leprosy, the plague or dragon pox, her presence was contractually required. He also suggested that it was a little early to piss off everyone involved in the production, and that her throat might heal more quickly if she just contemplated her grievances silently instead of shrieking them at the top of her lungs.

  He tossed the phone aside and swore.

  Margo probably wouldn’t appreciate it if he flew to Italy and forcibly towed her love boat back to the Thames.

  He looked at the tablet on his desk. He had a dinner reservation at eight-thirty. It was likely to be his last date in some time if Amelia removed a body part of her choice tomorrow, so he sat down with a sigh and located Lily Lamprey’s audition reel.

  At the first line, he winced.

  Oh Christ, that was her actual voice.

  He’d given her the benefit of the doubt and assumed she’d adopted the phonesex panting for the Knightsbridge role. She obviously did play it up; her natural voice registered a few degrees lower in tone. It was still off-pitch and it was weak. She’d be hoarse by intermission and lip-synching by the curtain call. She was far better suited for television work, and had probably already landed the only role she’d have the range to play.

  He almost killed the screen there and then, but Amelia’s accusation of prejudice echoed in his ears and he kept watching. He remained expressionless throughout the taped performance, but at the midway point, he leaned in.

  When the clip ended, he sat back and narrowed his eyes.

  Well.

  It was there. The glimmer of possibility Amelia had picked up on. Even with the gangster’s moll doll-face, and the godawful “Happy Birthday, Mr. President” candyfloss voice, it was—amazingly—there, that ability to take the essence of a character into herself, to let it crawl over her skin, and show in her eyes, and direct the movements of her body.

  Under the soap-opera shit, an actor.

  It took her too long to hook her audience. She ought to be able to transform at a finger-snap. The voice was problematic. Potentially disastrous. She would need outside training, additional effort and expense.

  But there was something about her. Something that gelled, that reached out and tugged suggestively at his conception of this version of Elizabeth.

  She could—possibly—do it.

  So could the other three actors on his personal shortlist.

  And if she failed to live up to that spark of possibility, she would undermine the entire production. The critics would shred both of them.

  She wasn’t worth the gamble.

  He was in the car park, reaching for his keys, when his phone rang. Amelia’s name flashed onto the screen. He answered, and heard the sounds of outraged hollering as one of the demon children resisted being hauled off to bed.

  “Did you watch the reel?” she asked over the racket, getting straight to it, and Luc returned the serve.

  “Wat
ched it, point taken, still no.”

  “Damn.” The angry roaring in the background dulled. He assumed she’d either escaped to a different room or slipped the little bugger a quick sedative. “I was hoping we could take the easy route for once. For someone who claims to be cool-tempered, you have a real habit of steering us into Drama Town.”

  He opened the car door and tossed various files and electronics onto the passenger seat. “Very long day, Amelia. If you could translate that into English in the next ten seconds—”

  “I’ve had Warner on the phone, ruining the buzz of an expensive bottle of red. Does nobody around here understand the basic concept of a Friday night?”

  “What does the old bastard want now?”

  “He’s pulling rank. He wants Lily Lamprey in this show and he’s not backing down.”

  Luc snorted. “Warner doesn’t have rank to pull. This is my production. My theatre. The board has no say over casting.”

  “Technically, no. But he can pull his backing, in which case your mortgage increases by millions of pounds, and I’m thinking that’s not a financial hit you can afford until the theatre is up and running.”

  “Is that what he’s threatening?”

  “That was the underlying suggestion, yes.”

  “It wouldn’t be as financially catastrophic as a bad opening run.” He slid behind the wheel. “And it’s a bluff. Even Warner isn’t so thick that he’d jeopardise his investment over what I assume is an elderly infatuation. Or is she a blood relative?”

  “Luc Savage, die-hard romantic.” Grudgingly, Amelia admitted, “He’s her godfather. Lily Lamprey’s mother is Vanessa Cray, the Irish singer. You know—schmaltzy, jazz stuff. Not really my thing. Warner was allegedly one of her boyfriends back in the day, a revelation that forced me to imagine him in a sexual context. My brain attempted to self-destruct and I had to Google pictures of kittens to recover.” There was a burst of static. “Are you still there?”

  “Unfortunately, yes.”

  “Lily’s father is a peer. Don’t bother making a snarky comment. You live in fucking Kensington, rich boy. The Savages’ Cockney roots are so well buried by now you’d need a map and a deep-sea drill to find them.”

  Luc switched the phone to the wireless system and pulled out into the Southbank traffic. “A peer. Not Jack Lamprey? The penny-dreadful sex kitten is Jacko Clubs’s daughter?”

  “Jacko Clubs?” she repeated disbelievingly. “Chummy with his Lordship, are we?”

  “I’ve met him once or twice. He was a friend of my father’s a long time ago, until they fell out over my mother. Or he heckled Dad at Drury Lane. I can’t remember which was the proverbial last straw.”

  “By the look of his London house, he must be one of the few genuinely wealthy peers. Or mortgaged to the hilt and reduced to letting the public fondle his antiques for twenty quid a pop.”

  “Lamprey’s a mainstay of the rich list. And the family black sheep. Took centuries of old money—made the respectable way through war-mongering, tenant-exploitation and tax evasion—and tripled it by founding and investing in a good percentage of London’s nightclubs. Mostly the dodgy ones. I suspect he’d pick your pocket for fun, without blinking an eye.”

  Not that his family could talk. His grandfather’s approach to business would have made Lamprey seem more like a gambolling lamb than a black sheep.

  “Maybe don’t share that opinion with Lily when you contract her.”

  Raindrops began to patter against the windscreen and Luc flicked on the wipers. “Jesus, Amelia. Did Warner catch you burying a body, or are you on the Lampreys’ payroll?”

  Amelia made the sound that usually preceded her loss of temper. “Look. I have to deal with enough pissy little boy tantrums at home. Warner’s being a real dick about this and I don’t think it’s worth the aggravation. You can bring her up to scratch.”

  Luc groaned.

  “Take Warner out of the equation and consider on the basis that she came to you through the usual channels.”

  Apparently he was going to hit every red light in the city. “She wouldn’t have got beyond a conversation between her agent and a junior receptionist. Most of the talent on our books have performed in at least one production,” he added sarcastically.

  “She’s done stage work.”

  “What, am-dram and student Shakespeare at the Institute?”

  “Luc.” Frustrated vibes were rolling through the phone. “You’ve always acted on your instincts and it almost always pays off. What happened to the born gambler?”

  “He took a header out the window when I signed a multimillion-pound mortgage.”

  “I’ve got a feeling about this.”

  It would be easy to mock that statement, but he was paying Amelia her “lovely lot of money” for her own instincts, which were usually sound and occasionally genius.

  “Hell,” he said after a moment, with feeling.

  “See, I knew the real Luc was lurking somewhere beneath that boring-as-eff exterior. When the theatre is up and running, and the press gets off your back, you might even dig up your sense of humour.” Amelia hummed with satisfaction. “I’ll call her agent and get her in for a meeting ASAP.”

  “No promises.”

  “Look on the bright side. Bridget Barclay hates your guts and is going to be an absolute shit to direct, even if her performance is worth it. This’ll be a nice contrast for you. If you cast Lily Lamprey, she’ll be so grateful for the break that she’ll think you’re an absolute god.”

  *

  Luc Savage was a pompous prick, with a head the size of the O2, and—if there was any justice left in the world—most likely a penis the size of a grape.

  Lily’s thighs squeezed tight. The man between them stopped midway through a fake orgasmic moan and grunted. She grimaced down at him in apology; he pulled a horrific face in return.

  The active camera angle was fortunately aimed at her back.

  From the corner of her eye, she could see the studio clock. Still plenty of time, but she couldn’t afford too many more takes. Closing her eyes, Lily deepened her breathing and cried out.

  That was uncannily like the sound her first car had made when the engine died on the M3. She was slaying it vocally today.

  “Cut.” Of the three directors working on Knightsbridge, Steve Warren was the one who least enjoyed filming the many, many sex scenes. He had a yen for the dodgy political storylines and occasional backstreet violence. There were only so many ways people could writhe around in the buff, squeaking and panting.

  Lily shared the general air of over-it. Even the newest assistant was yawning and secretly texting. A month ago, he’d been permanently red-cheeked and unable to look directly at the fake action.

  Her own phone was back in her dressing room, cuddled up against an almost empty packet of Jammie Dodgers. She’d stress-eaten seven biscuits, way too early in the morning, pushing the limits of even her tolerance for sugar. She still felt sick and perversely blamed Savage for that, too.

  “…wailing like a spooked bat,” Steve said crossly. She tuned back in to the criticism. “This should be old hat by now. You seem to spend most of the week getting your kit off.”

  Yes. Once again, she had spent most of the season tossing her suspender belt and sequins across the room and leaping astride one cast member or other. How kind of someone to notice. Pity that Steve didn’t think to drop a word in the writers’ ears, to change the repetitive movements of their fingers.

  When Lily had originally read the pilot script and locked herself into a four-year contract, it hadn’t been immediately clear that the characterisation of Gloria was sexist as hell and about as deep as a puddle. The writers had started off softly. Gloria hadn’t become truly vile until halfway through the first series.

  As a newbie with a point to prove, it had seemed important to secure any acting role to get her foot in the door. And at that sweetly naive age, she had told herself that Gloria would evolve for the better over tim
e, become more complex and subtle. There had finally been a few tantalising glimpses of hope this year, a hint at meatier material than batting her lashes and shimmying onto another lap.

  Instead, Gloria had settled for systematically nicking the duke’s prized paintings and fitting a third married lover into her busy scheme-and-shag schedule.

  Lily was fed up to the back teeth with faking orgasms, not a skill she’d ever felt the need to perfect in her personal life, and it was obviously starting to show in her performance.

  She did take her work seriously, even when it was complete bullshit.

  “I know.” She was still perched on Ash’s stomach, concealing his discreetly bound-up groin, and he was politely looking to the side, to avoid eye-to-nipple-shield contact. And people said working in television wasn’t really that glamorous. “I’ll pitch it lower.”

  “Let’s just go for soundless bliss, shall we?”

  “Does that go for me as well?” Ash tried to insert a fingertip between Lily’s big and second toes. He’d discovered she was insanely ticklish there after the series two writers had gone off on a toe-sucking tangent. Not a high point for any of them. She brought her heel back and whacked it against his thigh.

  “As you don’t sound like a hyperventilating mouse—” Steve reached to hand a clipboard to one of his hovering assistants “—no. It does not.”

  For a supposedly closed set, they seemed to be approaching Tesco-on-Christmas Eve numbers of people. Both she and Ash had requested core crew only. As usual, totally ignored.

  “I think I preferred last week’s ‘constipated camel,’ thanks.” She tried to get back into position without kneeing Ash in the kidney or accidentally shuffling into willy territory. It was a close call when he decided to do a full-body stretch. “It had more of a ring to it.”

  She took another paranoid look at the clock, and Steve caught the anxious time-check.

  “Do you have somewhere else to be?” he asked with heavy and totally false concern.