Love Lies

10. Fern

Scottie’s room is considerably more impressive than the band’s. The look the interior designer has gone after is nightclub verging on brothel. There’s red flock wallpaper and thick red shag pile carpet so the walls and floor seem to meet, leaving me feeling deliciously cosy, irresistibly woozy. There’s a purple suede chaise longue and a number of enormous gold leather beanbags. There are a lot of mirrors with ornate bronze frames reflecting my stunned image right back at me, and whichever way I turn there are masses of enormous vases of gallica roses; a rich, velvety, purple rose which gives off a particularly heady scent.

Scottie flings himself on the chaise longue next to a low purple smoked-glass coffee table and I grab a beanbag and sit down to face him. He starts to deal.

‘What stakes shall we play with?’ he asks.

‘Well, it has to be coppers because even if you play with tenners, it’s coppers to you but not to me which would make the game uneven,’ I say, without thinking whether it’s crass or not to mention that he’s a squillionaire. But then this is the man who signed a multi-multi-million-pound deal with his record company and announced to the world’s press, ‘I’m rich, I’m obscenely rich. Isn’t that fucking great!’ At the time the tabloids and even a couple of the qualities had got sniffy and said that

Scott stares at me; I think he’s contemplating what I’ve just said about coppers versus tenners while I’m wondering what his lips taste like. I use every jot of common sense and common decency to cast the thought aside.

‘Fair enough,’ he agrees, nodding his approval. ‘You know, no one has ever pointed that out to me before.’

Someone should open a window; it’s really stifling in here. I can feel my cheeks flush with colour. ‘Duh, isn’t it obvious? Who do you normally play with?’ I ask.

‘My band, my crew, you know, the gang.’

‘Well, I hope you’re paying them well,’ I say as I reach for my purse. I look inside; not unsurprisingly it’s empty except for a serious stack of loyalty cards and a button which came off my jacket last week. ‘Bugger, I haven’t even got coppers. How about we play for matchsticks?’ I suggest. ‘That’s what my family did when we were kids.’

Scott smiles. ‘Did any of your family end up in prison on charges of arson?’

‘No, but my brother Jake is doing bird for some dodgy deal he was involved in. He was distributing pirate DVDs,’ I admit thoughtlessly.

Scott doesn’t skip a beat but continues to deal the cards.

Oh. My. God. What made me say that? I never rush to reveal Jake’s stock trade. It’s hardly likely to impress anyone; usually this choice piece of family history has

I’m actually really good at cards and know loads of games, thanks to endless caravan holidays in Britain with my family when I was a kid. We used to waste away countless wet hours playing a hand. I suggest we play German whist, a good two-player card game. Scottie knows it and agrees. Scottie plays with an admirable and steady determination too. I wonder where he learnt. I’d guess working men’s clubs when he was knee high to a garden gnome. I know from stuff I’ve read that his mum was a cabaret singer in pubs and he and his brother were

‘You bluffer,’ says Scottie with delight as I successfully beat him with a fairly average hand because he folded.

I scoop up his pile of matchsticks with the same pleasure as I would if we had been playing for tenners – well, almost. As I scoop my booty, he deals the next hand and his fingertips accidentally brush the cuff of my top – causing a sensation similar to riding a white-knuckle ride at a theme park. All my body parts get confused; the bits that I keep in my pants leap into my mouth, my breasts defy gravity as they seem to chase him round the room and my eyes dart to his, even though I know the last thing we should do is make eye contact. Eyes are dangerous. We silently stare at one another for some time. I’m not sure how long. Maybe too long. Maybe not long enough.

‘No one ever beats me,’ he says carefully.

‘I bet everyone throws the game, like you are some sort of five-year-old.’ I try to sound playful; we have to let the sexual tension swill away – or I might drown.

He takes my cue and jokes to lighten the mood. ‘God, I hadn’t considered that. I just thought that I was really good, you know? The superior player. But now you’ve mentioned it maybe that’s exactly what they do.’

‘Oh, Scottie is a poor little rich boy,’ I tease. I get the sense that he likes me gently taking the piss out of him;

‘Rematch. I demand it,’ he laughs. ‘And call me Scott, not Scottie. Only people who don’t know me call me Scottie.’

We play on. OK, deep breath. So I described Scott Taylor as the perfect fantasy man; that didn’t mean I expected to like him if I met him for real. Frankly, distanced from his lyrics and the airbrush I expected him to be a big let-down; an infantile tosser with an ego the size of a planet and a brain the size of a pinprick. But after just two hours in his company I realize that my preconceptions were totally, utterly, completely wrong.

Scott is not a manufactured, brainless bore. He’s the real deal. I’ve heard it said that if a girl met some super-star in a supermarket she probably wouldn’t even notice him. And, honestly, I think I would leave Justin Timber-lake stacking shelves and it’s possible that even Mark Owen would not cause me to get all flustered while squeezing my fruit and veg. But I’d notice Scott. He could take me even in the dairy aisle – and it’s really cold there. There are no screaming fans buoying him up as we play cards, no sign of an enormous entourage, no photographers, and he’s not wearing clothes embroidered with gold leaf or any outward sign of his colossal wealth, and yet he oozes that ephemeral star quality that only one person in ten million is lucky enough to be born with. He is breathtakingly compelling.

I realize that Scott has asked me to play cards on a whim. This is not the start of a lifelong friendship. This dream will end when he gets hungry and needs to call for food or when something else catches or demands his attention, so I squirrel away every last detail of this experience. I know that I’ll want to savour each moment over and over again, on my own and with friends. Hell, I might throw a party to tell people about this. Although I guess I’d have to edit slightly for Adam’s sake. Not that I’ve actually done anything wrong but I imagine he’d be less than happy to hear that I’m zapped with lust every time Scott so much as glances at me. I watch the way Scott stands, moves, talks, stays silent, sips from his water bottle and it is absolutely fascinating to me. I’m entranced.

We are joined by a mountain of a man who appears not to be accustomed to smiling. I assume he is a personal security guard. He doesn’t have a uniform but he checks behind doors and in cupboards and he examines the phones before he finally sits in a chair, in the corner of the room. Even then his eyes don’t settle but dart constantly from left to right. He asks if he can look in my bag. Scott says it isn’t necessary but I hand it over anyway.

‘What was he looking for, my hairbrush?’ I joke.

Scott grins as he glances across to the bald-as-a-coot security guard. ‘Tape recorder, drugs, a gun,’ he replies with a shrug.

‘You’re kidding?’

‘No. I’m clean at the moment and these guys are paid to help me keep it that way. The last thing I need is some sexy siren coming in with a stash of crack, then getting

I’m crazily flustered because he’s just indirectly referred to me as a sexy siren. I wonder what sort of weird things does he imagine I might get him to do? I try to stay on track. ‘A gun?’

‘Never happened yet. Least not to me. But two words, John Lennon. Lots of fans are really mixed up and get into that “if I can’t have you, no one can” mindset. It’s fucking scary.’

‘God, it must be,’ I shift in my beanbag. I had been quite resentful of the security guard interrupting our tête-à-tête but now I’m glad to have him here. I quickly return to the deck and deal again. Scott picks up his hand and stares at me over his cards. I swallow hard. I’ve worked out that if I don’t look at him or think about who I’m actually playing with, I manage quite well. The moment I catch his eye I find I’m floored.

He is absolutely bloody gorgeous.

Besides his strength, and height, and dirty grin and soul-searing eyes, he has broad shoulders that reduce to a neat stomach, slim hips and the cutest bum. Anyone who has ever read a copy of Heat magazine knows that his weight and level of fitness tend to fluctuate depending on how much boozing he’s doing at the time, but right now I’d put money on him having stomach muscles taut enough to climb up. He is wearing a pale grey T-shirt and some battered, low-slung jeans that threaten to slip – that is part of the allure – no socks or shoes. I’m not normally a feet sort of girl. I couldn’t tell you what Adam’s feet

‘It’s hot in here,’ I comment pathetically.

Scott stares at me and holds my gaze. ‘Isn’t it,’ he murmurs. I know, know, know that he’s a practised seducer. He is sort of Don Juan, Casanova and James Bond all at once. Of course, he will have looked at hundreds, perhaps thousands, of women in exactly the same way as he’s looking at me now. And I know, know, know that should make him less desirable –

But it doesn’t.

‘Have you ever played strip poker?’ he asks, flashing me his famous flirty-flirty grin.

‘No. And I don’t think I’ve ever been asked to, least not since I was about thirteen,’ I laugh, nervously.

What a daft, obvious thing to suggest. How ridiculous. Like I’m going to fall for that. I have a boyfriend; it’s inappropriate to even imagine that I might consider it. A live-in boyfriend. We are practically married.

Practically.

We’re not married, are we? We’re not even engaged. And this flirtation with Scott is just a bit of fun, it doesn’t mean anything. It isn’t going anywhere. Anyone would do the same. Kill for the chance to. No one is going to get hurt by this bit of fun. Playing strip poker would just be more fun; a lot more, maybe. It’s not serious. Besides, he’s bare-footed, wearing jeans and a T-shirt, add in boxers (assuming he’s not commando); that’s just three items of clothes. I’m wearing pumps, a vest top, a skirt, a zip-up top, knickers, bra, belt, earrings and about a dozen bangles – plus I’m pretty damn good at cards.

‘It’s a laugh,’ he says with another filthy, bold, irresistible smile. He speaks with great certainty and a hint of challenge, and his words slosh my common sense clean away. I’m high on his presence and the crazy red room; even though I haven’t been drinking I feel as drunk as a sailor.

‘OK, deal.’