Alain King was thrilled when he saw the first full dress rehearsal of Centre Stage. It was the most powerful play, the most powerful production and the most powerful performance he had ever witnessed.

The stage belonged to Alex. The girl was excellent, definitely destined for a fine career in the theatre, but Alex was compelling. The engaging intimacy with which he wooed his audience was hugely seductive. So seductive that they forgot he was evil. The death of the girl at the end of the play was a chilling shock.

After the rehearsal Alain looked at the cameras set up in strategic positions around the theatre and felt very proud of himself. He’d pulled off one of the most successful television deals in the history of the industry. Centre Stage would go to air live nationally; the UK had already bought the rights, and, after a performance like this, it was an easy bet to assume there’d be a bid for the world rights as well.

He gave Alex time to change and then went backstage to the dressing rooms to congratulate him before the members of the cast were called for notes. Alain was proud of his protege. He’d always considered Alex the only actor worthy of his friendship. We’re alike, he told himself yet again. The man knows what he wants and he goes out and gets it. He’s a winner.

Alex was gratified by Alain’s approval but he was distracted. He’d been distracted a lot lately. Everyone had noticed. They’d put it down to approaching-opening-night nerves and were mostly sympathetic. Alain, who hadn’t been around for rehearsals, was a little taken aback at the aloof reception he received. But because it was Alex, he didn’t dismiss it as ‘actor-wanking’.

‘You want to get a good night’s sleep, Alex,’ he said. ‘You look as if you could do with it.’

Alex wasn’t sleeping well. The familiar characters of his dreams took over as soon as he closed his eyes. He liked them and welcomed them as old friends but they left him drained, and lately they merged so into his daily life that sometimes he had trouble telling his waking and sleeping hours apart.

During the first dress rehearsal he even experienced moments of confusion when he could have sworn he was in his own dream … and that he and Edwin were one. Several weeks earlier, Alex had insisted on no public previews and, though she’d been doubtful at the time, Naomi was now glad that she and Julian had agreed. It would have meant a lot more pressure and Alex was already looking exhausted.

They’d had a hard time convincing Alain, though. ‘He doesn’t want to perform before a live audience until the televised opening night,’ Naomi had explained. ‘It’s not customary, I know,’ Julian added as Alain scowled his disapproval, ‘but I think in this case it’s advisable. Alex is carrying the show and we have to do what’s best for him.’

It was only after Alain had seen the first dress rehearsal that he agreed. Unconditionally. ‘Give him what he wants.’

By the end of the week and a half of technical runs, dress rehearsals and camera run-throughs everybody was in a state of fatigue and Naomi called a clear day prior to opening night. ‘Everyone to sleep during the day, please,’ she announced. ‘Full dress in the evening, then that’s it. Nothing till opening night.’

For Jenny the day off before the opening meant she could go to the airport and meet her mother. She was glad. She’d missed Maddy and she needed someone to talk to, someone close.

She wouldn’t be able to confide everything to Maddy, of course, but her mother invariably found a way to cheer her up when she was down and Jenny needed cheering up.

She saw Maddy in the crowd and waved.

‘Jen! How wonderful! Why aren’t you rehearsing?’

Jenny hugged her mother fiercely. ‘They’ve given us the day off. There’s a dress tonight.’

As they wheeled the luggage trolley to the car park, Maddy picked up on Jenny’s mood. ‘You’re a bit subdued, darling. Is everything all right?’

‘I broke up with Paul,’ Jenny answered, then quickly added, ‘My decision, so I’ve no right to whinge, but I guess it’s made me feel a bit down.’

‘Why did you break up? Do you want to tell me?’

This was the part Jenny couldn’t confide. How could she admit to the shameful way she’d used one man’s body while she mentally made love to another?

Jenny hadn’t realised she’d been doing it until a month before. She’d known that Alex was often in her mind when she and Paul made love but she’d presumed that she loved Paul nevertheless.

Then, when Alex’s manner towards her changed so drastically, when the sexual chemistry between them disappeared, she gradually realised that she hadn’t been making love to Paul at all. And one night she was shocked to discover that Paul actually repulsed her. He repulsed her because he wasn’t Alex. Jenny felt ashamed.

She couldn’t tell that to Maddy. She couldn’t tell that to anyone. ‘It’s nothing really, Mum. We just broke up, that’s all.’ Then she added with self-loathing, ‘Personally I think I’m a bit of a shit and that he’s too good for me.’

It was obvious Jenny didn’t want to talk about it and that she was feeling guilty so Maddy didn’t say anything for a few minutes. Then they arrived at the car which put a further stop to the conversation until they’d loaded the luggage and driven out of the carpark.

‘Well, do you know what I think?’ Maddy asked finally. She didn’t wait for an answer. ‘I think you’re a very lucky girl who has no right to feel sorry for herself.’

Jenny looked at her, a little surprised.

‘At the risk of sounding tough,’ Maddy continued, ‘you don’t have time to be sorry for Paul. He’s a twenty-six year old man—he’ll get over you. And you have the biggest night of your life ahead of you, a night that every young actor dreams of! You don’t have time to be indulgent.’

It was the right advice and Jenny knew it. And she knew her mother meant exactly what she said. Maddy hadn’t achieved her success without developing the ability to do battle and she expected the same of her daughter.

‘You’re wrong, Mum, he’s a twenty-seven year old man. And you’re right, I am being indulgent and I don’t have time to worry about him. And I’m so glad you’re back in time for the opening.’ Jenny felt better already. Roll on tomorrow night, she thought, with growing excitement.

The final dress rehearsal that evening was a bit of a shambles. Mainly because of Alex. He kept fluffing his words and forgetting his lines and he was irritable when the stage manager tried to prompt him. ‘I know, I know, don’t tell me,’ he snapped.

Towards the end of the play Alex became completely lost. ‘No, no, it doesn’t go like that!’ he yelled when the stage manager once more gave him a line.

‘That’ll do, we’ll leave it for now,’ Naomi called. There was only Alex’s final speech to go. She couldn’t get any more out of him and she knew it. ‘Fifteen minutes to change then meet in the stalls for notes please.’

Naomi refused to let herself worry. Alex had never forgotten his summation speech before. He was just suffering typical pre-opening nerves. It would have been far more of a worry, she thought, if the end of the play had technical problems. The effect of the symbolic imagery was crucial to the final impact.

As Edwin addressed the audience, lights came up on a silk screen upstage and Katerina’s silhouette appeared behind it, larger than life. She slowly disrobed during the speech and, when he joined her at the end, she was prepared for her death. Then Edwin stepped behind the screen and everything went to black except for the one spotlight behind the two giant silhouettes. Katerina, naked, with her head flung back and her arms outstretched, accepted him into her embrace, and as she did a scream of agony-ecstasy rang out. Blackout!

The staging, the lighting, the sound effects—all were crucial. But they had worked like clockwork in each of the previous dress rehearsals so Naomi was prepared to leave them for tonight. Anything to keep Alex happy; there was no point in pushing him further.

She gave only fifteen minutes of notes, mainly relating to technical aspects of the production, after which she said encouragingly, ‘You know what they say: “bad dress rehearsal, good show”. After tonight’s effort, I’d say that means we have a smash hit.’

She smiled as she said it and everyone laughed, grateful for the banter. But they were all aware that Alex hadn’t laughed. He hadn’t even appeared to hear the comment. He was away in another world somewhere. Hell, I hope he comes back in time for the opening night, Julian thought. He’d never seen Alex so preoccupied.

He said as much when he cornered him at the stage door. ‘Are you all right?’ Julian asked. ‘There’s nothing wrong, is there?’

He was relieved to be met with one of Alex’s most charming smiles. ‘I’m sorry about tonight, Julian, I really am. My mind wasn’t on the job.’ He put his arm around Julian’s shoulder and gave him a comradely squeeze. ‘Don’t you worry, though. Naomi’s quite right: bad dress, good show. I’ll be in top form tomorrow, I promise.’

‘Of course you will.’ Julian smiled back gratefully. ‘You’ll be dynamic.’ And he left the theatre feeling positive and excited. The next night was going to be very important to a lot of people.

Alex arrived at the theatre over two hours before the half-hour call. He sat in his dressing room and looked at himself in the mirror for a long time. He heard Jenny arrive an hour later and he waited thirty minutes before going to her dressing room and tapping lightly on the door.

‘Oh, Alex, I didn’t know you were here already. Come in.’ She was in a satin robe and her face was scrubbed clean ready to be made up. She looked very young.

‘I thought I’d wish you good luck.’ He smiled and closed the door behind him.

‘Thanks,’ Jenny said gratefully. ‘You too. Chookas, as Mum would say.’

He stepped up to her, very close, and put his hands on her shoulders. The satin was cool to touch and he could feel the heat of her body beneath the fabric.

‘You’re very good in this role,’ he murmured.

His eyes were locked into hers and Jenny’s heart was pounding wildly.

‘We’ve drifted apart a little during rehearsals,’ he said. ‘My fault. I needed to distance myself for the part, you understand?’

Jenny nodded. She scarcely dared to breathe.

‘But I want you to know,’ he continued tenderly, ‘that I care about you.’ His eyes travelled to her mouth as he drew her close to him. ‘I care about you very, very much, Imogen.’ And he kissed her fully, sensually, his hands exploring the satin of her back.

As he walked back to his dressing room, Alex wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. He could still taste the fresh warmth of her lips and tongue. It wasn’t right, he knew that. She was his daughter. He hadn’t wanted to kiss her, but it had been necessary. He’d been fully aware that he’d distanced her sexually. But he’d also been aware that he could get her back at any time and in a matter of seconds. He needed the full sensuality of her performance tonight.

In his dressing room Alex sat down and slowly started applying his make-up. Jenny ceased to exist as he watched Edwin gradually materialise in the mirror before him.

Naomi had forbidden Julian and Alain to go backstage before or during the performance. She’d kept well away herself apart from a brief visit beforehand to wish the performers all the best and an even briefer visit at interval to say ‘going great’.

Julian had readily agreed that it was poor form to hound the actors at such a crucial time but the two of them practically had to tie Alain down. Particularly at interval.

‘I want to see Alex. It’s going brilliantly. He’s fucking fantastic! What’s wrong with telling him that?’ He wouldn’t take no for an answer.

Finally the only way Julian could stop him was to warn him that the difficult part was yet to come and that Alex had stuffed up badly in the final dress rehearsal.

‘Oh.’ Alain’s excitement was momentarily arrested. ‘Well, he’d better not fuck up now. There’s a lot of people watching this out in television land.’

The audience was as spellbound during Act Two as they had been during Act One. Alex had them eating out of his hand.

There was several seconds’ blackout before the final scene. Alex and Jenny stood in the wings while the stagehands wheeled the giant silk screen on stage.

Jenny was still doing up the buttons of her blouse after her dash to the dressing room to don her body stocking and change of costume. She was flushed with excitement. She knew she’d been good. And Alex had been brilliant. They’d worked together as one. She was very aware of his presence beside her. She thought of their encounter in her dressing room. She remembered his mouth on hers and she longed for him to touch her again.

‘There’s something I want you to know, Jenny,’ Alex whispered.

She turned to him eagerly, expectantly, her shadowed face so young in the mild glow of the backstage working light.

‘I’m your father,’ Alex said.

There was a moment’s confusion in Jenny’s mind. Alex was getting his role mixed up with reality, she thought.

Then he continued. ‘That production of Cymbeline your mother was in at drama school, remember? The production in which she played Imogen?’

Jenny looked back at him, unable to move.

His face was bland, expressionless. ‘I played Cymbeline,’ he said.

Edwin’s spotlight came up and Alex walked out onstage leaving Jenny staring after him. She knew it was the truth.

She could hear Alex starting on the final speech but her mind was numb. Jenny was on automatic pilot as she walked into her position behind the screen.

Jenny remained oblivious of her actions and everything around her as she slowly, mechanically, undid the buttons of her blouse. Vaguely she heard the words of Edwin’s final speech. ‘Death is the ultimate gift a human being has to give,’ Alex was saying. But all Jenny could think was, ‘He’s my father! Alex Rainford is my father!’

Then she was jolted back to reality as she heard the words ‘There’s been a change of plan’. What was Alex saying? That wasn’t in the script. He must have dried and he was buying time.

Jenny automatically slowed down her disrobing as she waited for him to get back on track. She’d think about Alex later, she told herself, she must concentrate on the performance for now.

‘You see, I wasn’t really honest,’ Alex was saying to the audience. ‘There was a death I saw when I was just a boy, but it wasn’t a man in the street.’

In the audience, Naomi and Julian sat bolt upright. ‘What the hell’s he doing?’ Naomi whispered. But Julian didn’t answer.

‘It was my brother Tim,’ Alex continued, ‘and he died for me. The ultimate human gift.’

He really has gone insane, thought Julian, horrified, as he rose from his seat. ‘I’m going backstage,’ he hissed to Naomi. ‘I’ll tell them to bring the curtain down.’

Alex started to walk slowly towards the screen. In the prompt corner the stage director was hissing through his headphones to the lighting operator: ‘Keep the spotlight on him. Christ only knows what he’s up to, but keep the fucking spotlight on him.’

Jenny had finished disrobing and her naked silhouette was frozen: head back, arms outstretched. She didn’t know what else to do.

‘It was the most intimate experience I’ve ever shared with another human being,’ Alex said.

‘He’s gone back to the beginning of the play,’ the ASM whispered to the stage director as he stood by ready to bring down the curtain.

‘I know and they’re loving it. Don’t do a thing,’ the stage director hissed back.

Alex stopped upstage, beside the screen. He turned to face the audience, savouring the moment. He’d been pleased with his rewrite. He’d spent a lot of time constructing it as he’d stared into his dressing room mirror.

But what came after that? ‘It was the most intimate experience I’ve ever shared …’ Yes, he’d said that. What next?

Well, of course, he had to tell them, didn’t he? Yes, that was it.

‘Tonight I’m going to share that experience with another,’ he said and he stepped behind the silk screen.

For a second, Alex’s giant silhouette appeared on the screen as he grasped Jenny’s wrist. Then they both stepped out onto the stage.

‘I’d like you to meet her. This is my daughter, Katie.’

Exposed, and in her flesh-coloured body stocking, Jenny appeared to the audience as a naked, fragile sacrifice. She was terrified. Behind the screen she’d felt trapped and confused but her main worry had been how they were going to finish the play without the audience knowing that the leading actor had gone off his trolley. Now, as she looked into Alex’s eyes, she knew she was looking into the demented eyes of a madman.

‘Don’t worry, Katie.’ Alex gestured to the audience. ‘They’re our friends. They’re going to share our ultimate gift. Come along, let’s sit and talk.’ His grasp on her wrist was vicelike and Jenny was forced to follow him to the bed downstage near the prompt corner.

In the audience, Maddy had been watching, a little bewildered. She’d read the play only the once but surely this wasn’t the original end? Very effective nevertheless, she thought. They must have changed it during rehearsal.

But when Alex pulled Jenny out from behind the screen, Maddy knew in an instant that the girl was terrified. Something was definitely wrong. She left the auditorium as quickly as she could, hurrying through the foyer and out into the street towards the stage door in the back lane.

Alain wasn’t at all confused. He had never fully read the script, he hadn’t felt it necessary. And, even though he’d seen an early dress rehearsal, he wasn’t really aware of the change of text. Bloody magnificent, he was thinking. He was a little surprised, though, when Alex sat the girl on the bed and pulled a gun out from beneath his jacket. Alain certainly hadn’t remembered a gun in the dress rehearsal. It was a good touch, though.

Alex was furious that he’d been forced to take out the gun earlier than he’d intended. The whole sequence, including the revelation of the gun, was supposed to be performed as a ritual, not a stick-em-up farce. He was angry, very very angry and his head was starting to hurt. He knew he had to make himself calm down. He must do things properly.

It was Julian who had forced the gun. Alex had seen him arrive in the wings as he led Jenny to the bed. His immediate concern was that Julian might be a little offended by his rewriting of the play. No, he told himself, as soon as Julian sees what happens at the end he’ll know that I’m right.

But Julian didn’t stand and watch. He crossed behind the set to reappear beside the stage manager in the prompt corner and Alex was horrified to see him issue an order for the curtain to be brought down.

That was when he pulled out the gun. ‘Bring that curtain down and you’re dead,’ he hissed at the stage manager. His head started to ache as soon as he said it. It was wrong. It wasn’t meant to go like that.

Julian was standing in the wings only a metre or so away and Alex appealed to him. ‘Don’t spoil it, Julian,’ he whispered. ‘The play hasn’t finished yet. Wait for the end.’

Julian was frozen, staring in horror at the gun. Suddenly he looked across the stage to the opposite side of the wings. Alex followed his eyeline and saw that Maddy had arrived and was standing there, also staring at the gun.

Alex started to relax. Good. They were all here. All the special people. His gift would be for them too.

For the first time, the audience started to get a little restless and Alain began to curse the actors up on stage. Don’t fuck up now, you wankers, he silently urged. Get on with it!

Naomi had left to find out why the hell Julian hadn’t brought the curtain down.

Alex was the only one who knew what was going on. The ache in his head had gone as swiftly as it had arrived.

He could see them all. The audience. The television cameras which signalled all those people in their cosy homes. And of course, watching silently in the wings, the stage management crew, the director, and, on either side of him, Julian and Maddy.

Julian, who loved him and knew him so well. Julian, who had written his life for him.

And Maddy. How had he ever forgotten Maddy? She was so beautiful. And she’d given him the most precious possession in the world. She’d given him his daughter. His Katie. His own flesh and blood. Just as Tim had been. Only closer, closer than Tim. Katie was part of him.

He looked down at her beside him. She was staring back, trembling, not daring to move.

‘Yes, we must treasure this moment, Katie,’ he said, and he was concerned when her eyes flickered with fear. ‘Oh no, no, you mustn’t be frightened.’

He stroked her hair with the hand that held the gun. The cold metal of the muzzle caressed her temple. Jenny whimpered with terror.

‘Yes, soon, my darling, soon,’ Alex promised soothingly.

The image of Tim flashed through his mind. Tim’s body. A river of red seeping towards the door. Then Jonathan Thomas. Jonathan lying in a crimson bath. Yes. Blood. There would be lots of blood. They’d like that. Alex slowly rose from the bed and crossed to centre stage.

Although she was released from his grip, Jenny couldn’t move. She watched Alex, mesmerised, like a rabbit in a spotlight.

Julian had also remained as still as possible, aware that any movement of his could push Alex over the edge. Now that Jenny was freed, though, should he risk trying to reason with him, or even try to wrestle the gun from him? Julian didn’t know what to do.

‘I share with you all the ultimate gift,’ Alex said to the audience. And he smiled, first at Maddy, then Julian, then at Jenny.

‘Watch, Katie. Watch closely,’ he commanded as he turned to Jenny and raised the gun. She stared down the barrel, unable to move. ‘This gift is for you, Katie, my darling daughter.’

Then Alex shot himself. Through the temple. Just as he’d planned.

After several seconds of horrified silence, the entire audience rose to its feet. The theatre resounded with cries of ‘Bravo!’ ‘Author! author!’