A camera flashed and she gasped and quickly closed the shutters.

No!

Unlike Cliff, she’d never sought fame or celebrity, but she’d been caught in his spotlight anyway. It was one of the reasons she’d moved to a different neighborhood after the divorce. She’d hoped to be able to slide away from the dazzling beam of attention that always landed on him. She’d chosen to live in a small discreet community, rather than up among the flashy mansions in Bel Air, where Cliff entertained lavishly on his verdant terrace overlooking the Pacific Ocean. They’d found her, of course, because the media could find anyone. But she’d hoped that by living a quiet, low-key, non-newsworthy, Cliff-free life she’d become less interesting to them.

She’d been wrong. It seemed she’d never be free of Cliff. She was anchored by the past, unable to sail away, her secrets played out in public for all to enjoy. They knew about her father’s death. They knew she was estranged from her stepmother. They’d managed to track her down in the little house up the coast where she now lived. Predictably, she’d been only too happy to voice her opinion. “She’s no daughter of mine. Always was a difficult child.”

Her phone rang, dragging her back from a downward spiral into the past. This time it was her assistant, Nessa.

Joanna answered it. “Hi.”

“Let me in! I’m outside the garden room. I came via the back entrance.”

“I don’t have a back entrance.”

“I took a secret route. Could you just let me in, boss? We’ll talk tactics later.”

Joanna walked to the back of the house, mystified and a little alarmed.

She’d chosen the house precisely because it was so secure. When she’d first viewed it, instead of admiring the kitchen appliances and ceiling height, she’d been checking areas of vulnerability. The fact that the house backed onto dense woodland had been a plus. And this was an unfashionable area. There was no road, and no running trails. Her property was protected by a high wall and tall, mature trees that concealed the house from view.

It had been a carefully considered purchase, but when she walked through the door she never once thought I love this house, or even I’m home. She didn’t think of it as home. Home was a place where you felt safe and able to relax. Neither of those things could happen when you were an object of public interest.

She walked through the garden room and saw Nessa standing on the deck, glancing furtively over her shoulder. Normally impeccably groomed, she had twigs stuck in her hair and her shoes were muddy and scuffed.

Shaken by the fact her home wasn’t as secure as she’d thought, Joanna opened the door and Nessa virtually fell inside.

“What is wrong with people? I tried coming in the conventional way—actually through the front door, you know, like a normal person? But there are a million people with cameras and two TV vans—which, frankly, I don’t get. Because why are you news? You’re not the one who was trying to have sex in a moving vehicle. I mean, I’m all for multitasking, but it depends on the task, doesn’t it? Sex and driving—call me boring, but those two things do not go together.”