Public Secrets Part 74

"I'll make you happy, Angie. Look, I know it can't be easy being

married to someone who's part of what I'm part of. The tours and the

fans and the press. But we can make something for ourselves, just the

two of us, that's ours, only ours."

"I love what you are," she told him with complete honesty.

"Then will you? Will you marry me, and start a family?"

"I'll marry you." She threw her arms around him. A family was a

different matter altogether, she thought as he lowered her to the floor

again. But as the wife of P. M. Ferguson, her career had no place to

go but up.

BRim DIDN'T KNow how much more he could take, kicking around the big

house day after day, sleeping night after night beside a woman who

cringed away from his slightest touch.

He was on the phone nearly every day, hoping Kesseiring could give him

something, anything. He needed a name, a face that he could vent his

helpless fury on.

He had nothing but an empty nursery, and a wife who drifted through the

house like the ghost of the woman he loved.

And Emma. Thank G.o.d for Emma.

Rubbing his hands over his face, he pushed back from the table where

he'd been trying to compose. He knew if it hadn't been for Emma over

the past weeks, he'd have gone insane.

She was grieving too, silently, sadly. Often he sat up with her long

past her bedtime, telling her stories, singing, or just listening. They

could make each other smile, and when they did the pain eased.

He was terrified every moment she was out of the house. Even the

bodyguards he'd hired to see her to school and back again didn't take

away the gut-knotting fear he felt when she walked out the door.

And how would he feel when it was time for him to walk out the door? No

matter how much he missed his son, the day would come when he needed to

go back to the stag&, back to the studio, back to the music. He could

hardly tie a six-year-old girl around his waist and haul her with him.

And there was no leaving her with Bev. Not now, and not, as Brian saw

it, in the near future.

"Mr. McAvoy, excuse me."

"Yes, Alice." They had kept her on, though there was no child to nurse.

She nursed Bev now, Brian thought and dug a cigarette from the pack he'd

tossed on the table.

"Mr. Page is here to see you."

Brian glanced back at the table, the scatter of paper, the jumble of

lyrics and half-phrases. "Bring him on in here."

"'Lo, Bri." With one look Pete took in the evidence of a man struggling

to work without much success. b.a.l.l.s of paper, a cigarette smoldering in

an overflowing ashtray, the faint scent of liquor, though it was barely

noon. "Hope you don't mind me popping 'round. I have some business and

I didn't think you'd care to come in to the office."

"No." He reached for the bottle that was never far from his hand. "Have

a drink?"

"I'll hold off a bit, thanks." He sat, trying for an easy smile. The

mood between them was stiff and uncharacteristically formal. No one