Public Secrets
Chapter 19 : "No, no one will hurt it." With a sigh, Bev slipped an arm around Emma's

"No, no one will hurt it." With a sigh, Bev slipped an arm around Emma's

shoulders and looked out toward the hedgerow. This time Emma didn't

inch away, but sat still, fascinated, one hand over Bev's stomach.

"I'm a little afraid of being a mum, Emma. Maybe you can let me

practice on you."

After a deep breath, Bev stood up, bringing Emma with her. "We're going

to start right now. Let's go up and put on your pretty pink dress.

We're going out to tea." The h.e.l.l with reporters, the h.e.l.l with starers

and gawkers. "We're going to make ourselves into the two prettiest

ladies in London and have our tea at the Ritz."

FoR EMMA iT was the beginning of her first relations.h.i.+p with another

female that wasn't based on fear or intimidation. Over the following

days, they shopped at Harrods, walked in Green Park, and lunched at the

Savoy. Bev ignored the photographers who snapped them. When she

discovered Emma's love of beautiful materials and bright colors, she

indulged them shamelessly. Within two weeks, the little girl who had

come to her with only the s.h.i.+rt on her back had a closet bulging with

clothes.

But at night the loneliness crept back, when each lay in bed pining for

the same man.

Emma's longings were more direct. She wanted Brian to come back because

he made her feel good. Love wasn't something she'd learned to define or

agonize over.

But Bev agonized. She worried that he would grow tired of her, that he

would find someone more in step with the world he lived in. She missed

the good, strong s.e.x they shared. It was so easy to believe he would

always love her, always be with her during that calm drugging time after

love and before sleep. But now, alone in the big bra.s.s bed,

she would wonder if he filled up his loneliness with women as well as

music.

The sky was just beginning to lighten when the phone rang. Bev groped

for it on the third ring. "Yes." She cleared her throat. "h.e.l.lo."

"Bev." Brian's voice was urgent.

Instantly awake, she shot up in bed. "Bri. What is it? What's

happened?"

"Nothing. Everything. We're a smash, Bev." There was a dazed and

das.h.i.+ng edge to his laughter. "Every night the crowds get bigger.

They've had to double security to keep the girls from flinging

themselves on stage. It's wild, Bev. Insane. Tonight one of them

grabbed Stevie's sleeve as we were making the dash for the limo. Ripped

his coat clean off. The press is calling us vanguards of the second

wave of the British invasion. Vanguards."

Sinking back onto the pillows, Bev struggled to drum up enthusiasm.

"That's wonderful, Brian. There've been some snippets on the telly

here, but not much to go by."

"It's like being a gladiator, standing there on stage and listening to

the roars." He didn't think he could explain, even to her, the thrill

and the terror. "I think even Pete was impressed."

Bev smiled thinking of his pragmatic, business-first-and-last manager.

"Then you must be something."