The Austen Playbook (London Celebrities #4)(52)
“And I’m still taking my four days in Paris,” Freddy said emphatically. “But I just did back-to-back performances in emotionally draining roles, and I wanted a few laughs and a bit of romance.”
She’d meant scripted romance, but it was an unfortunate choice of words. Rupert’s brows and teeth snapped together. “Yes. I just ran into that vile Sadie Foster, who informed me that you’re zoning out in rehearsals over James Ford-Griffin.” The derision was dripping.
A pleasure as always, Sadie. What a winning delight of a human being.
That unprecedented urge rose in Freddy again, to defend and protect a man who’d probably never needed—or more to the point, accepted—help from anyone in his life. She wasn’t going to dismiss him even verbally, even to avoid the looming argument. “I am seeing Griff.” Well, she supposed she was. They hadn’t really gone into that point. They’d been too busy having sex and reading other people’s letters. And when she told him about the suspicions bubbling in her mind—and if she couldn’t find something to disprove the picture that was coming together, she’d have to tell him—she didn’t know what would happen. “But—”
“How charming,” Rupert said, with a strong edge of sarcasm. “Over dinner he can read you excerpts of the ridiculous reviews he’s written.”
“Oh, come on, Dad. That’s his job. One of his jobs. And for the most part, those reviews were dead-on. Maybe not tactful—” the understatement of the year “—but that’s partly effect for the paper. Nobody wants to read a boring review any more than they want to see a boring show.” It was also just Griff’s personality, but she didn’t feel it necessary to add that.
Rupert didn’t even seem to be listening to her. Big surprise. “A Carlton and a Ford. It’s like history bloody repeating itself.” Her father’s walking stick scraped along the floor. “You’ve read All Her World. You know how hard it is to get to the top. You need to stay focused, keep in your mind in the game and your eye on the goal.”
Most of the lecture drifted into the dust around them. Freddy’s brain had zeroed in on just three words of it. The biography. Oh, fuck. Fuck. She hadn’t even thought as far as that. Please let me be wrong about this. Please let it be that I really am just too influenced by the play right now. Please. “Is it true you’re planning to adapt the book into a screen version? You’ve never mentioned it.”
“There are plans in the pipeline. I didn’t want to say anything until they were concrete.” Her father scowled so hard that creases developed creases, and he ended up looking a bit like the Grinch. “And then that obnoxious bastard you’re fawning over announced this mockery of a film he’s making and threw a spanner in the works.”
Freddy found that she was compulsively smoothing her hair back behind her ears. She stopped and pressed her hands against her thighs. “He’s uncovering a lot of new research on Henrietta—”
“He doesn’t know anything about your grandmother!” Rupert seemed to realise how sharp his voice had become, and made a visible effort to ease the atmosphere down. “Anyway, that’s no longer an issue of concern. Let’s concentrate on you in the meantime.” He looked about them. “Christ. It’s been a long time since I’ve been in this room.”
“This is where she wrote The Velvet Room, isn’t it? That summer?”
“Yes.” Rupert’s gaze ran over the huge oak desk, which was now battered around the legs and had picked up the scratches of dozens of different pens over the years; then past it, to the bookshelves, and the tiled feature wall. “This is where it was written.”
He went silent, his eyes unfocused, his mind obviously back in the days of another summer, over fifty years ago.
Then suddenly, with a renewed surge of determination, he turned to Freddy. “It’s obviously too late to pull out of this play now. It would be far worse for your future prospects if you gain a reputation for being unreliable. Fortunately, it’s a short rehearsal period and just the one performance. We’ll just have to hope this live broadcast goes without a hitch, and then we can put our full focus on the new production of The Velvet Room. I hope you’ve arranged for time off next week to come back to London for the first audition.”
There was no “hope” in his voice, just pure expectation.
Freddy pulled her own gaze from the infamous writing desk. “I’m not sure I want to do it.” Still hedging, but it was the first time she’d ever just come out and said that to Rupert’s face.
In the seconds that followed, she could hear the tick of the clock.
“Of course you want to do it.” After the initial surprise, Rupert waved her words aside, as easily dismissive as if she were still a teenager with no idea what she was doing, just going where she was told and reading the lines she was given, and enjoying herself wholeheartedly.
Freddy would still like to enjoy herself wholeheartedly—what the hell was the point, otherwise—but she’d grown out of the rest of that mindset a long time ago.
Even now, a little voice in her head was whispering that it would be easier to just do the audition, do the play, make her father proud, avoid the confrontation. And bury what she thought might be the truth, before it could bring a lot of things toppling down.