The Road to Her Read Online Free Page A

just socked, the pair of boots she’d been wearing just before, during our filming, discarded on the floor next to her. Added to all this were numerous cloth bracelets and bangles on her wrist, which looked lovely against her still-bronzed skin. Her fantastic LA tan, which suited her so well would, I thought, soon be a thing of the past.
    “London weather’s not quite what you’ve been used to, huh?” I asked, thinking about the colour of her arms.
    “Not really, no.”
    “How was it? LA, I mean,” I asked. “I’ve never been.”
    “It was okay, yeah,” she said.
    We didn’t speak for a second, and I started racking my brains for something to say to her or ask her. I’d finally gotten round to Googling Elise over the weekend—of course I had! Are you telling me you wouldn’t have done the same thing?!—but it hadn’t told me that much, which was annoying. All I’d managed to find out was that she’d been acting since she was fifteen, had done some youth theatre, a few adverts on TV, and that she’d left the UK for the States a week after her eighteenth birthday. I couldn’t find any websites that would tell me anything of her time in LA other than that she’d tried her hand at the pilot season, so I figured it hadn’t been a successful time there. That would at least explain why she’d come home after only fifteen months.
    “I’ve never been,” I said.
    “You said,” Elise replied, the hint of a smile on her face.
    “And, you, uh, you’re getting on okay with everything here?” I asked, flustered by her nice smile. “It’s kind of straight into it here, hardly any rehearsals, isn’t it?”
    “Yeah.” Elise looked down at her bag as she heard her phone beep, then slowly leant over to retrieve it.
    “I guess it can be a bit strange coming back and starting on a new show, so I understand if you’re feeling a bit overwhelmed by it all.”
    “Yeah, I’m getting on okay,” she said pleasantly, looking briefly at her phone, and then putting it back in her bag. “And I’m not overwhelmed, no.”
    Why was she making me ramble on? My eyes were pulled towards her legs again, so I immediately glanced around her room, looking at some photos pinned to her mirror and the few Good Luck cards still scattered around her table.
    “So you live close to here?” Elise asked, jolting me from my thoughts of her legs.
    “South Bank,” I replied. “Near The Eye.”
    “Nice.” Elise nodded her head approvingly. “I’m renting myself a place further up the Piccadilly line. Guess it’ll be a while before I can afford something on the South Bank, huh?” She grinned lazily at me, crossing her legs at the ankle.
    “I’ve not been there long,” I mumbled, suddenly embarrassed.
    “You live alone?” Elise asked. “Or with someone?”
    “Alone,” I replied simply. “You?”
    “Alone as well.” She paused. “No boyfriend, then?”
    My face coloured, either from the question or from her sexy eyebrow—I wasn’t sure which. “No boyfriend, no,” I said lightly. “You?”
    I saw Elise’s face cloud slightly. “No,” she said firmly. She thought for a moment. “Better that way, I always say,” she said.
    “You think?” I asked.
    “I know,” she said, hauling her legs over the side of the chair and sitting upright. “Weren’t we supposed to be going over our lines for tomorrow?”
    Her sudden change in attitude surprised me, our conversation about boyfriends apparently over.
    “Lines, yes,” I said, slightly flummoxed. “How do you think it went this morning, by the way?”
    “I thought it was great,” Elise said slowly. “You?”
    “Yeah,” I said. “I’m very happy with what we did.”
    “Although…” Elise hesitated.
    “Although?” I asked.
    She looked thoughtful. “Sometimes you seemed a bit, um, stilted, y’know?”
    I put my head to one side and frowned. “Really?” I laughed. “That’s a new one on me, I have to say!”
    “Like, you didn’t get it.” Elise