Page 24 of What Would Dolly Do?

‘Terrible reviews, on our own socials, TripAdvisor, Facebook, TikTok, bloody everywhere. Hate-filled utter bollocks. And nasty posts about us too. All anonymous of course. People spewing out disgusting bile about the club, how rank our beer is, the state of the loos. A couple even claim they got food poisoning from our bar snacks. We don’t even serve any bar snacks.

Unless you count packets of crisps and Nobby’s Nuts and I can’t see how you can get food poisoning from Nobby’s Nuts! ’

Stella eventually took a breath and I managed to get a word in to try and reassure her.

‘It’s just jealousy, Stella, vile people with nothing better to do sounding off because we’re suddenly in the news. Ignore it. Don’t reply to any of it whatever you do and it will all blow over. It’s horrible I know but I’m sure it’s just a flash in the pan.’

It took a little while to pacify her but eventually she took my point.

I was touched she was so passionately offended about people talking Sonny’s down.

She was a good egg was Stella. I couldn’t blame her for being sceptical about me when I started.

Her old manager’s ex? I can see why it had taken her a while to trust me.

After she hung up I took a little look at some of the posts myself.

Despite my words of calm reassurance, I had to admit the criticisms stung me too.

This was the last thing we needed just as we were trying to build up our reputation and keep things on the up.

I was tempted to answer some of them, despite my advice to Stella to ignore them all.

I bit my lip metaphorically and literally as I stuffed my phone back in my bag and tried to rise above the nastiness.

Iain caught my eye in the rear-view mirror. ‘Everything all right, miss?’

‘Oh, nothing to worry about … I hope,’ I answered trying to look like I believed what I was saying.

‘Okay, if you’re sure,’ he said. ‘It’s not like you to look so worried, you’ve always got such a lovely smile on your face. A little ray of sunshine you are, no wonder people like having you around.’

I gave him a thankful grin. What a lovely thing to say.

But by ‘people’ did he mean Tom? Who else could he mean?

Had he particularly noticed that Tom liked having me around?

I wondered what Iain knew about Tom’s private life.

A driver would surely get to see and hear a lot of stuff while they were driving a famous person.

I didn’t know how long Iain had worked for Tom: did he work for him in the States or just here in Scotland?

Had he seen Tom with a succession of different women? Did he know Juliana Ripon?

With everything else that had been going on I hadn’t given too much thought to the Hollywood starlet who was reportedly Tom Coltrane’s latest girlfriend.

The press had only given Juliana Ripon a passing reference in the articles and reports that had been circulating since Tom’s performance at Sonny’s had exploded into the media.

A couple had mentioned her, some had her aged 25, others at 27.

One had wrongly claimed she was in the audience for Tom’s impromptu gig but most others reported she was back in the States filming her latest Hollywood blockbuster.

While we’d been hanging out at Forthview, playing daft games with Reggie and Stevie or working on more music with Fergus in the studio, I’d never heard anyone utter Juliana’s name.

When I was alone with Tom, sitting in the garden late at night with a glass of wine after Laura and Ferg had followed the kids to bed, or when we retreated to our charming bedroom with its sun-kissed yellow wallpaper and soft white pillows, I never wanted to ruin the mood with an interrogation about where Juliana fitted into Tom’s life, if she was still part of it at all.

Or what if it had all been blown out of proportion by the press as I’d heard loads of Hollywood relationships were?

I was too keen to feel his hands on my skin and kiss his lips to dwell on my questions.

Sometimes his lips were all I could think about.

Tom’s voice was known all around the world but when it was just the two of us and he spoke softly, urgently, into my neck, close to my ear, the words from those lips could send me delirious.

I adored his speaking voice just as much as his singing voice.

I stuck with my plan of not rocking the boat.

I wasn’t a lovesick teenager who believed every romantic encounter had to be forever.

I was having a good time but I wasn’t expecting it to last for a long time.

Day by day I was discovering more and more about Tom but I truly didn’t feel like I had the right to ask too much more.

He was accepting me at face value so I would do the same for him.

No other man had made me feel as seen as Tom did.

I was starting to see myself through his eyes and I liked what I saw.

I’d never been made to feel like that before.

For whatever reason, Tom had brought me into his life and appeared to trust me.

To a point. Why would he tell me everything there was to know about his personal life?

I completely accepted that would be a foolish thing to do in his circumstances.

I could sell a story to the papers in the blink of an eye.

Moreover, why would he tell me anything about the private life of another world-famous person, one that I had never even met?

I knew he wasn’t married to Juliana. I’d seen photos of them together but there was no way of my knowing if their relationship was serious, ongoing or simply a concoction for the press.

I sensed Tom was a guy who was in a certain amount of turmoil.

Whether that was due to his personal circumstances, his career or a combination of both I couldn’t be sure but it felt like the best way to approach things was to let him tell me in his own time.

When I arrived back at Forthview that time didn’t seem to be right now.

‘REBECCA! Hey Honey!’ Tom was leaning out of an upstairs window at the front of the house as I got out of the car and thanked Iain for the ride. ‘Quick, get yourself up here, fast as you can.’

I didn’t need asking twice and after giving Laura a quick hug hello as she opened the door I ran up the stairs to find Fergus and Tom in the studio looking like two kids on Christmas morning.

‘And what have you two been up to?’ It was impossible not to smile at the looks of sheer delight on both of their faces. ‘Have your numbers come up on the Scottish Lotto?’

‘Better than that,’ Ferg said glancing at Tom with a look of pride.

‘We’ve been working on “Moonlight Home”,’ Tom said. ‘You’ve gotta hear it, I’ve not been this excited about a song since “Whisper Away”.’

He jumped up from the piano then, kissed me softly and then pulled me to sit next to him on the stool while Fergus went into the control booth.

Tom’s arm was snug around my waist but his leg was twitching against mine as we sat side by side waiting for the music to playback.

He was nervous. I could feel it. Was he anxious about the track itself …

or my reaction to it? I was going to be the first person to hear a new song from Tom Coltrane and I suddenly felt a wave of anxiety too.

I’d loved the beginnings of the haunting track I’d heard Tom begin to compose a few days ago.

I hoped I was going to like what they’d done with it now.

I needn’t have worried. Tom’s lyrics were magical, his voice was first croaky with pure emotion and then soaring and strong with hope and desire.

It was beautiful, powerful, but then in the second verse I heard something else.

It was my voice. An answering call to Tom’s questioning, yearning, looking for answers.

It was like my voice was guiding his voice home, out of the darkness to a point of light up ahead.

Helping him to find his way home in the moonlight. That was the song. ‘Moonlight Home’.

I turned to look at Tom, his eyes were burning into mine. Did he really need me to tell him how good this was? ‘D’ya like it?’ he whispered. It was a genuine question. He really wanted to know.

‘I love it.’ I’d never said those words and meant them more. It felt more intimate whispering those three little words into Tom’s ear with his body pressed up alongside mine than anything I had ever said to any man before. I could feel my heart hammering and wondered if he could hear it too.

He kissed me again then and with the pounding in my ears from my own heartbeat I almost missed his next words, ‘It’s gonna be my new single, “Moonlight Home” by Tom Coltrane featuring Rebecca Mooney. What do ya think about that!?’