Page 34 of What Would Dolly Do?

My mouth fell open at the audacity. The absolute cheek of him!

I knew exactly what he was driving at, that Tom Coltrane was using me and the bar to attract attention to himself.

I knew the truth was a little more nuanced than that.

Tom may have thought a big star like him playing a tiny bar like ours had some quirky appeal for a bit of news coverage or social media attention but I now knew Tom’s instincts had a more meaningful motivation.

He had wanted to rediscover his roots, connect with an audience in an intimate space and remember why he had fallen in love with music and performing in the first place.

I hadn’t known any of that the first time he’d walked into the bar, but I knew it now.

The fact we had also connected with each other the way that we had wasn’t part of any publicity stunt, I was sure of that.

Tom Coltrane didn’t need me for that and what had gone on between us didn’t feel fake in any way.

I was only just starting to realise that despite his superstar status Tom Coltrane felt like the most real person I had ever known.

I was struggling to think of a strong enough retort to Robbie’s accusation and that made my blood boil even more.

I looked him straight in the eye and simply said, ‘Well you know what they say, Robbie, all publicity is good publicity … and by the way, the name is Reba.’ He just looked at me with the slightly baffled expression he did so well.

Tom had overheard our exchange and came and stood defensively at my shoulder and added, ‘Shouldn’t you be collecting dirty glasses in …

Peter-burrow, is it? Don’t let us hold you up, Bud,’ dismissing Robbie with that remark and slipping his arm around my waist at the same time.

‘I need you to meet someone real important, Reba,’ he said to me, emphasising my name as we turned away from Robbie and his outraged face.

Was Robbie jealous because he realised Tom and I were sleeping together?

Because I’d just conquered my stage fright fears …

without him by my side? Because Sonny’s Bar was fuller than he ever would have seen it during his time as manager and was fast gaining a reputation as the place to be in Edinburgh?

Or was it a combination of all the above?

I thought I could count on Robbie to be a mate whatever happened, but where was that friendship now?

I had to leave those concerns to one side as I got drawn back into the room.

Laura and Fergus managed to fight through the throng and throw their arms around me before apologising for having to rush off straight away to relieve their babysitter.

I wished they didn’t have to go. I felt like I could really be Reba with them without it feeling weird.

I realised it was a lot easier being Reba on stage than it was off. I hadn’t expected that.

The ‘important person’ Tom wanted me to meet was from the London office of his record company.

A middle-aged man in chinos and a paisley shirt blew my mind when he started talking about a potential recording contract and at that point I thought I might pass out.

He also wanted to know how soon he could get paperwork done for me so they could release ‘Moonlight Home’ as Tom’s new single with me as a featured artist. I was in a spin but he kept saying there were ‘ commitments ’ in Nashville that Tom needed to attend to ‘A-sap !’ He mentioned the name ‘Waz Monsoon’ a few times who I understood was Tom’s manager but it was hard to keep up with everything that was being said.

I wasn’t sure if it was the adrenaline from the show, the amount of whisky I’d drunk earlier or the weird mix of reactions that had come at me from all directions once I’d stepped off the stage but people’s faces began to swim in front of my eyes and I started to feel hot and clammy.

The basement bar had become incredibly claustrophobic.

Tom noticed my discomfort and pressed his hotel key card into my hand.

‘I’ll call Iain, he’ll pick you up and take you to the hotel …

if ya want?’ That sounded amazing. I didn’t want to go back to the flat where Mum and Dad were going to be staying and have them bombard me with more questions than I wanted to answer right now.

I wanted to get out of Sonny’s ‘A-sap’ as the record company guy had put it.

Tom even offered to head back to Forthview House so I could have some ‘space’ as he thought I seemed a bit overwhelmed.

It did sound blissful to have a fancy hotel suite all to myself but he was the one person in the world I didn’t feel the need to get away from.

He agreed he’d have one drink with the record company guy and then meet me at the hotel later.

‘Au revoir,’ Tom said pointedly. I was aware he was advising me to make what’s called a ‘French Exit’. Tom was giving good advice and I took it, slipping away without any further fuss.

Within minutes I was enveloped in the luxurious comfort of Tom’s chauffeur-driven car speeding through the dark city streets.

The clammy, claustrophobic feeling was easing and I thought I was feeling clearer headed, but then I saw her.

Tottering along the pavement in sky-high glittery platform sandals was a woman with a blonde beehive and a distinctive wiggle in her hips and jiggle to her tits.

It was like looking at a previous incarnation of myself all dressed up as Dolly Parton.

The car sped by too quickly for me to get a proper look at her face but the walk, the stature, the hair, were all spot on.

It wasn’t very likely that the real Dolly Parton was wandering around Edinburgh late at night and all alone.

I’d dreamt of Dolly for years and the only explanation I could think of for what I’d just seen was that I must be hallucinating.

Great. That was all I needed. Now I was seeing things.

When I woke the next morning Tom was fast asleep by my side. I must have crashed out before he came in. I lay perfectly still so as not to wake him but my mind was whirring so fast I was worried the noise of all the different cogs turning might do it anyway.

The thought most prevalent in my manic mind was that I’d done it.

I’d stood on stage without Dolly as my disguise and held a room and won them over.

I’d faced my fears and the relief and excitement I felt about that was real.

But as Dolly herself would say, ‘If you want the rainbow you have to put up with the rain’, and despite last night being the most fun I had ever had on stage there were a few people who clearly wanted to rain on my parade.

The question now was whether I was going to let them.

When Tom rolled over and pulled me into his arms it became a lot easier to forget about everything other than his lips, his fingers and every other part of his insanely sexy body.

He growled my name into my hair and I drove him wild when I told him how much I loved what he was doing to me.

Everything and everyone else faded from my mind until I was only aware of me and Tom, just the two of us, as we rocked and rolled together on that king-sized bed.

Afterwards we lay together until Tom felt compelled to break the post-coital spell.

‘There’s something ya need to see,’ he said, his voice coming from above my head where it was resting on his bare chest. I giggled until I realised he was being serious. He reached out an arm and grabbed his phone off the bedside table.

Social media was alive again – and not just with the latest secret Tom Coltrane gig.

This time the websites were buzzing with rumours about me and Tom.

Some snatches of my performance last night at Sonny’s had gone viral but the speculation about whether Tom and I were an item was the subject getting most attention across various platforms.

‘Tom Coltrane’s Sexy Scottish Songstress.

’ I read the strap line from one post aloud and froze.

I’d seen the movies – was this the bit where the big star is told by his bosses to go home on the next plane?

The part where he explains he and the girl are from different worlds that can’t ever meet?

I took a breath and looked up at Tom who simply raised an eyebrow.

‘That’s showbiz, honey,’ he said.

He didn’t seem bothered by the gossip. Instead he was actually concerned about me. ‘This isn’t my first rodeo,’ he smiled. ‘But I know it’s a lot to face. Are you okay?’

‘Sexy Scottish Songstress? I’ve been called worse,’ I responded.

Robbie’s words about being used as a publicity stunt lurched from the back to the very front of my mind.

As did my response to him which still held true.

If I wanted to break through as an artist in my own right, these stories wouldn’t do me any harm.

They weren’t significantly untrue, so we would hardly be in a position to sue anyone over the content.

Reading further down they were actually accompanied by some great compliments and positive reviews of my songs and performance.

One even described me as the best thing to come out of Scotland since Walkers Shortbread. I’d take that.

‘All publicity is good publicity?’ I framed it as a question but by repeating the line I’d given to Robbie last night I was letting Tom know that I wasn’t going to be getting hysterical about a bit of gossip on the internet.

‘That’s ma girl!’ Tom grinned.

But his reply prompted another, probably far more important question in my mind.

Was I ‘his girl’? Or was that position already filled by a Hollywood actress who went by the globally known name of Juliana Ripon?

It was time to bite the bullet. Reba was proving to be a whole lot braver and more direct than Becky and I decided that was a good thing.

‘What will Juliana Ripon think about these stories if she sees them?’ I sat up and looked directly at Tom’s face to gauge his reaction after raising the spectre of Juliana.

The bedsheet tumbled around my waist but I sat defiantly naked as Tom rubbed his hand over his eyes before they swept over my breasts and then met my gaze.

He pulled a slight grimace at the mention of Juliana’s name but I couldn’t be sure if he was irritated by the thought of her or by the fact I’d been bold enough ask.

‘You’ve got nothin’ to worry about on that score.’

That didn’t really answer all the questions that were circulating in the air around us.

Here we were lying together in sex-rumpled sheets while somewhere on the other side of the Atlantic a gamine and gorgeous young actress may soon be learning all about me.

Tom and I were definitely no longer in our bubble.

The protective shield around us had burst and the really big question was … would we be able to survive without it?