Page 65 of Star Struck

My eyes went back to Gethryn. He was still sprawled as though lying on this sunny rooftop was the only thing he had to do all day, relaxed and at ease. But now I could see underneath to the bones of unhappiness. ‘Geth,’ I whispered.

‘Y’see?’ Jack’s voice sounded as though it came from years away. ‘It shouldn’t have come as a surprise that we found each other, the TV world isn’t that huge. But I’d changed my name and I’d never known he existed, so . . . and we worked together. It all worked.’

‘But he found out who you were.’

Jack bunched the hem of his T-shirt and scrubbed it over his face. The scar over his ribcage flickered in and out of vision for a moment, like a flip-book animation, as though two alternate lives rode one over the other. ‘It was Lissa. She got pregnant. My baby, Skye. My child. And I thought . . . I honestly thought that it would save me. That I’d finally be able to care for something, that I’d be able to leave the past behind and start to love someone.’

‘Jack.’

I couldn’t stop myself from looking away from him, tearing my eyes from his hunched shoulders and glancing over at Gethryn. The expression of triumph on his face made me feel sick.

‘But by then I’d crapped it all up with Liss — and I don’t blame her for it. Having a baby by a guy with my background, a drunken bastard who didn’t love her, couldn’t love her — who said I’d even be able to love the child? And she ran.’

Gethryn was nodding now, smirking at me and raising his eyebrows.

‘She ran to him?’

Jack’s eyes were closed and new lines of strain creased around them. ‘Yeah. She said she loved me. He was all body and brawn, she said. Until . . . well, he understood. That’s his real gift, Skye. He took all of them after that, all the girls I . . . everyone I couldn’t love, they all ran to Geth in the end. I damaged them and he understood.’ Jack rested his forehead against my shoulder and just stood silently. I knew he was still crying because of the spreading dampness of the velvet across my skin, but he made no sound and no movement at all, until I put my arms around him, when he let out the single word, ‘Sorry.’

The Iceman had shattered.

‘She told him all about me and he’s used it against me every day since.’ He spoke into my skin. ‘Every day. Whispering Ryan’s name, telling me what a lousy, fucked-up father I would have made . . .’

‘The baby . . . ?’ I felt his tears against my neck, felt his shoulders give one last, huge heave.

‘She lost it. Stress, they said, when Geth cheated on her. Geth cheated on all of them, in the end.’ The words sounded as though they came from between clenched teeth. ‘No baby. No Lissa. No love.’ A violent shudder. ‘No salvation.’

Gethryn had lost all pretence of gazing at the view or concentrating on the bottle. Those golden eyes were watching us and I noticed, for the first time, how predatory they looked. ‘You still think it was coincidence, don’t you, Ice? You finding me, me getting that part on North, you bringing me onto Skies? No, I knew who to talk to, who to put pressure on, to get in. You stupid, fucked-up bastard, I knew who you were all along. People talk, you know that? Everyone back home in Leeds, in the old neighbourhood, they all knew when you came out of prison, all knew you’d changed your name and ponced off to live in York like nothing had ever happened — people don’t like that sort of thing, see. They like men who stand up and take responsibility, not men who run off and try to pretend to be someone else. Must have had thirty letters that week, my family. Leeds might be a big city, but you get a name for things like you did, a name that carries with you, whatever you call yourself. No, I knew who you were; I was just biding my time.’

‘So you let me blame Lissa?’ Jack’s words were muffled against my skin.

Gethryn’s laughter made my skin creep.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

The pain was indescribable. Jack felt it take the strength from his legs and the will from his mind as it swept through, riding the train of memory. But Skye stood steadily, letting him embrace the agony and wash it out in tears on her skin. She was even holding him, murmuring words he couldn’t hear into his hair, putting her cheek to his as if to share some of the pain.

‘You see what kind of man I am? Now, do you see? When I got out . . . I locked it all up tight, all the feelings and the guilt, all in a little box marked “alcohol”. I drank so that I could feel drunk. To reassure myself that I could at least feel something; even altered states of consciousness are better than nothing.’

He didn’t tell her that nineteen years hadn’t dulled any of the memories. That he could still hear Ryan’s scream as the car hit, still hear the tearing, grinding sound of the car being peeled apart like an orange. Could still hear himself laughing, that stupid, piercing laugh of the recklessly high, blindly incomprehensive of just what he’d done.

Remorse stabbed at his gut and twisted. For the first time in nineteen years, he let it. ‘I leaned on alcohol and then I leaned on Lissa. Never really stood alone and faced what I’d done, just buried it all, the emotion, the guilt. So, you see, I’m not much use,’ he said. Skye smelled of hot velvet and he wondered if he’d ever be able to pass an uncut moquette sofa on a warm day without thinking of her, and then frowned. That was the second time he’d compared this lovely, willowy, tragically sexy girl to a three-piece suite. ‘Really, not much use at all,’ he repeated to himself.

‘But you’ve got potential.’ Skye gave him a half-smile, which was more than he deserved, he reckoned. His heart gave a peculiar double beat which at first he mistook for lust, but then realised was hope.

A few muscles uncoiled from their rigid stance and he passed a hand over the back of his neck, almost surprised to feel the heat of his own skin. Still alive. Bleeding inside, but still alive. And with her . . . with Skye, I might even recover.

He raised his head, knowing that his cheeks were smeared with desert dust, knowing that his eyes probably looked like hell pits. ‘I can get you help, Geth . . . Tyler, you know I can. Shit, I can even help you myself, if that’s what you want.’ Using Gethryn’s real name for the first time, here like this, gave him back some of his certainty. He felt stronger now, as though some of her strength had transferred to him in that smile. ‘Get off the booze, clean up your act. Maybe do a stint in a clinic or something, yeah? Get yourself straight and maybe I can write you another part. I’ll go and see your family . . . I’ll do anything. I just want to make amends.’

Gethryn clambered to his feet. With his heart sinking Jack saw the giveaway signs: the lack of co-ordination, the shrunken pupils. Geth was beyond listening to whatever he had to say. He wanted revenge, pure and simple.

‘Fuck off. Leave me here. I’m gonna throw myself off, end it all. You’ve told them all about me, that I’m . . . what was it you said? “Unreliable, unprofessional and unencumbered by morals”, wasn’t it? Fine piece of word-play that, I’d almost admire you for it, if it didn’t mean that I’d be lucky to get a bit part in Days of our Lives. You’ve ruined my life, Jack.’

‘That’s not true.’ Jack knew it probably was, but that wouldn’t help here. ‘Come back to Britain. We’ll come up with something together, Ty.’

‘You just don’t want me to tell them, do you? Kept it quiet, never breathed a word about Ryan, let Liss think it was all news to me — I didn’t tell no-one, see. Get me Lucas James back and I might just manage to keep it all down a bit longer, might be able to see my way to “forgetting” what you did to my brother. What do you say, Jack?’ Geth held his arms wide. ‘You overlook my little habits and I’ll overlook you being a murdering son of a bitch. Okay?’

Jack felt the hope well up inside him. He could get out of this clean, get away; no-one need ever know what he’d done. All he had to do was bend a little. Make excuses. Tell everyone that Geth was re-hired and . . .

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