Kitabı oku: «The Sisters: A gripping psychological suspense», sayfa 3
The room is so at odds with the rest of the house that it’s as if I’ve been teleported into a student bedsit. It smells of unwashed bedding and dirty clothes mixed with something acrid, chemical. I give a little start. Jodie is lying on the single bed that’s been pushed up against the wall to make way for two more ugly sculptures. She has huge earphones clamped on either side of her head, her eyes are closed and she’s quietly mouthing the lyrics of the song that she’s listening to. I can’t quite make it out, but it sounds slow and angsty. I survey the large room with its indigo walls blu-tacked with many posters of gothic bands from the early 1980s, the high ceilings and marble fireplace, and try to imagine it as my bedroom. Two sash windows that are nearly the height of the wall face on to the street below and the identical five-storeyed houses opposite. A silver birch in the front garden bends and stretches in the wind, its leaves casting dappled shadows on the grubby-looking carpet.
Jodie’s eyes snap open and she pulls the headphones from her ears.
‘Sorry, Jodie, I did knock,’ says Beatrice, not looking particularly contrite.
Jodie sits up and swings her legs over the side of the bed, glaring at us sullenly. She’s wearing a huge black T-shirt with a silhouette of Robert Smith on the front which makes her look about twelve. Her legs are pale, her calves adorned with so many moles they remind me of a child’s dot-to-dot drawing.
‘Do you remember Abi?’ says Beatrice. Jodie nods gruffly as I say hello, her bright blue eyes surveying me so intently it’s as though she can read my thoughts, that she knows all about me. My heart skitters and I mentally recall Janice’s words, the mantra she taught me to calm myself when I sense a panic attack coming on.
Jodie turns to Beatrice, her little face pinched into a frown. ‘I only told you I was moving out yesterday and already you’ve found a taker for my room.’ She gets up and steps into a pair of grey skinny jeans that are in a coil by her bed.
‘It wasn’t planned, Jodie. It only occurred to me a few minutes ago when I was chatting with Abi downstairs,’ says Beatrice casually, as she walks over to one of the gargoyle-esque sculptures. I might not know much about art but surely anyone can see her sculptures are hideous.
‘Is she an artist?’ she says, as if I’m not even in the room. When Beatrice shakes her head, Jodie’s frown deepens. ‘I thought you only let artists live here?’ I can sense the animosity emanating out of every pore in Jodie’s body. I stand awkwardly by the door, feeling like an intruder. Beatrice opens her mouth to reply but Jodie cuts her off with a shrug. ‘Whatever. It’s none of my business any more. I’ll leave you to it.’
As she stalks towards me I instinctively breathe in, but instead of walking past me to go out the door, she stops so that her face is inches from mine. ‘For some reason, she desperately wants you here,’ she says in a low voice. I glance to where Beatrice is standing on the other side of the room, examining the sculpture, running her hands over its beaky nose and making appreciative noises, much to my surprise. My eyes flick back to Jodie as she continues, coldly: ‘I’d watch my back if I were you.’ And then she storms off, leaving me staring after her in bewilderment.
Chapter Five
Beatrice perches on her new antique leather sofa, watching as the hands of the reproduction 1950s clock on the mantelpiece move around to five thirty, its every tick pulsating through her fraught body. Any minute now, she thinks, he will be home. Her heart gives a flutter of anticipation when she hears the key in the lock, the slam of the front door, his boots on the stone tiles, his soft Scottish burr calling her name, and she tries to second-guess how angry he will be when he finds out what she’s done.
‘I’m in here,’ she calls back.
He pokes his head around the door and frowns when he notices that Jodie’s three-headed sculpture has been replaced by an unfamiliar leather sofa and a large mahogany desk.
‘Where’s Jodie?’ He comes into the room, dumping his laptop bag by the wall. Beatrice glares at it pointedly, concerned that the ugly black bag will mark her freshly painted lime-green walls. ‘And what have you done to this room?’
Beatrice swallows. ‘I’ve repainted it.’
‘In a day?’
She shrugs. ‘It didn’t take long.’ She decides he doesn’t need to know about the decorator she paid to help her out. Her knees jiggle and she pulls the skirt of her cotton dress over them in a bid to still them. ‘And Jodie’s gone.’
Ben shakes his head as if struggling to process what his sister is telling him. He ignores his bag and Beatrice bites back the stirrings of irritation. ‘Jodie’s gone? Gone where?’
‘Back to her parents’ house.’ Beatrice makes an effort to keep her voice even; she knows it unnerves Ben when she becomes too animated, and she can’t reveal to him how excited she is. ‘Her dad came to pick her up this morning. Thankfully, she’s taken those sculptures with her. They took up too much room. And now I can have this as my studio instead of using my bedroom.’
Ben glances around the room as if he is expecting Jodie to be hiding behind the long drapes that frame the French windows. He runs a hand over the prickly stubble that’s beginning to show on his chin. ‘I don’t understand. Why has she left so suddenly? She’s said nothing to me.’
Beatrice gives him a long, scrutinizing gaze, then says cuttingly, ‘You know why she left.’ It gives her pleasure to note the way his hand moves to loosen his striped tie, as if it’s choking him, the beads of sweat that bubble around his hairline. He pales, causing his freckles to look more prominent.
‘Because of what she overheard?’
She nods. ‘It was careless of you, Ben. And you’re never normally so careless.’
He paces the room and groans. ‘I know. I’m so fucking angry with myself.’
She winces at his display of frustration. ‘Anyway,’ she says, in an effort to placate him. ‘Luckily, no harm done. Although she says you told her to leave.’
He stops pacing and stares at her, his hazel eyes wide. ‘Of course I didn’t,’ he bursts out. ‘Why would she say that? And why hasn’t she spoken to me about it?’
Beatrice shrugs. She’s enervated by the whole experience. She’s past caring about Jodie.
‘And where has this come from?’ he says, walking across the oiled wooden floorboards to stand next to the sofa. He runs his hand along its curved back. ‘This must have cost a bomb.’
‘That’s what the Trust is for,’ she says. ‘I ordered it last week. I was always going to ask Jodie to move out of this room anyway. It wasn’t fair that she’d taken this over as well as the bedroom upstairs. She wasn’t paying any rent.’
‘You never asked her for any rent,’ he says.
‘It’s not about that,’ she snaps. ‘We don’t need the money.’
Ben takes a seat next to her on the sofa and places a soothing hand on her bare arm. Even though his fingers are warm, the gesture makes her come out in goosebumps. ‘Bea, what you’re doing is great.’
She turns to him, suspecting sarcasm but his hazel eyes are full of admiration and she’s overcome with love for him. Oh, Ben, I’m doing all this for you, she wants to tell him, but knows she can’t. He won’t understand, not yet.
She takes his hand. ‘What we’re doing, Ben. We’re in this together, remember?’
They sit in companionable silence and Beatrice thinks that maybe she won’t tell him about Abi yet, that it will only spoil this precious, rare moment when it’s the two of them, alone. He moves his hand from her arm and snakes it around her shoulder, pulling her to him, and she sighs contentedly as she leans against him. He’s still my Ben, she thinks. My twin.
And then he has to go and ruin it all by asking the inevitable question.
‘What are you going to do with Jodie’s room?’
Beatrice detaches herself from his embrace and moves over to the fireplace. She kneels down in front of it, the draught from the chimney blowing against her bare legs and methodically, and for no reason other than to stall Ben, she places a log from the nearby bucket on to the cold grate, trying to remember the last time they lit a fire in this room.
She hasn’t mentioned to Ben about Abi turning up unannounced two days ago, clutching those pathetic daisies, a sad, haunted expression in her big green eyes. She had stood by the gate, soaking wet and tiny in her oversized parka, looking so frangible that Beatrice’s heart had gone out to her. What she felt for Abi, in that moment, was almost maternal. She wanted to fold her in her arms and tell her that everything was going to be okay, that she, Beatrice, was here to help her.
Ben won’t understand, she thinks as she carefully lays another log in the grate, playing for time before answering her brother’s question. Because she knows that any burgeoning feelings Ben might have for Abi will have to be quashed and she’s not sure how he will react. They have an unwritten rule, no romances between housemates. He plays it down, of course, but she saw the look he gave Abi at the open studio, the way he made a beeline for her at the party afterwards. She understands exactly why he’s attracted to her. Vulnerable, a little shy, slim and fair-haired. Abi’s completely his type.
‘Shall we get someone else to move in?’ he says, cutting into the silence impatiently.
She stands up, rubbing her knees, and faces Ben, wanting, needing, to see his expression, but before she even opens her mouth his face falls as what she’s planned finally dawns on him. Oh, Ben, you know me so well, she thinks.
‘You’ve already asked Abi to move in, haven’t you?’ His eyes are hard, sharp. A hunted animal.
I’m sorry, Ben.
‘You didn’t even bother to ask me. It’s my house too.’
She can’t help but feel a flicker of remorse as he gets up wordlessly from the sofa and leaves the room, the door banging closed behind him.
Chapter Six
Monty’s house, or rather, his mansion with its gabled roof and turrets, sits grandly at the top of a steep hill overlooking Bath. A crescent moon floats above the chimney and I think how eerie the house looks in the fading light, how gothic. I’m almost expecting to see bats swarming around one of the towers. It gives me an unwelcome flashback to Halloween, to that night over eighteen months ago, to that fateful party we attended, the argument that resulted in us all leaving earlier than planned.
Beatrice sidles out of the taxi, elegant in her black shorts and opaque tights that show off her long, shapely legs. I follow her as we pick our way over the gravelled driveway. The cacophony of voices, clinking of glasses and the beat of some dance tune floats through the open windows, alerting us that the party is already in full swing.
‘Are you okay, Abi?’ asks Beatrice as she stops to extricate her stiletto heel from the gravel, leaning on me for support. ‘I imagine these things are hard for you.’
Beatrice hasn’t asked me any more about Lucy, which I’m relieved about. That way I don’t have to lie to her. Would she still want to hang around with me if she knew about Alicia and how I ended up in a psychiatric hospital after Lucy’s death? I pull the sleeves of my blouse further over my wrists to hide the evidence of my downward spiral.
‘I’m fine,’ I lie. I’d been so flattered when Beatrice rang me up and asked me to Monty’s party. Not only does she want me to be a housemate, but she’s invited me to be part of her group of friends too, to be part of her life. All the same, my anxiety levels are high this evening, despite the antidepressants.
‘Isn’t this place amazing?’ she says, in an effort to lighten the mood, linking her arm through mine. ‘Monty is minted. Ha, Minted Monty, that’s what we should call him.’ She laughs at her own, rather feeble joke while my heart pounds uncomfortably in my chest.
Beatrice told me she’d met Paul Montgomery, or Monty for short, after he’d given a talk while she was studying for her MA at the university, and they had become ‘great friends’ apparently. ‘He’s gay and very flamboyant,’ she says. ‘And quite a successful artist. His parties are legendary.’
I take a deep breath before we push our way through the heavy front door and the heat hits me like an invisible wall. I find it hard to swallow, my tongue sticking to the dry roof of my mouth. There are people everywhere, clusters of them on the landing, milling about the hallway, languishing against door frames with easy smiles, glasses of bubbly in their hands. Waiters dressed in black and white manoeuvre expertly through the crowds, refilling glasses surreptitiously and handing out hors d’oeuvres from silver trays. The music pulsates in my ears, making my heart beat even faster, my pulse pounding painfully in my throat. I always knew this was going to be difficult, the first party without Lucy.
I suddenly glimpse her amongst the knots of people gathered on the sweeping staircase, a floaty scarf around her long neck, her familiar encouraging smile playing on her too-large mouth, but when I blink again she’s gone. Beatrice glances at me, mouthing if I’m okay and when I nod she squeezes my hand reassuringly, telling me I’m doing fine and to stay close to her. I follow her swishy bob, my hand gripping hers as we snake our way through the hordes of jostling bodies, in the same way I used to follow my sister whenever we went to parties or clubs.
It was always Lucy and Abi Cavendish and never the other way around. She was two minutes older than me, my better half, the brighter, shinier, more intelligent twin. I was the runt of the litter. As my mum was always so fond of telling us, as a baby I was the sickly one who suffered from acid reflux, whereas Lucy thrived, consuming all the milk and solids that she could get her chubby little mitts on. In the faded photographs taken with Dad’s instant Polaroid camera from the mid-1980s, square-shaped and yellowing, the corners curled with age, Lucy and I sit together on a sheepskin rug in front of a stone fireplace or on a picnic blanket on the lawn of our garden, two almost identical toddlers dressed in matching clothes, her pudgy-thighed and cute and me, her stunted skinny twin, Lucy’s distorted mirror image.
Even at school she made friends easier than I did; she had a natural, breezy way about her, whereas I was too intense. When she suggested we join in with the other girls in the playground I would stick out my lower lip and shake my head, which infuriated her. She was a social butterfly and I was clipping her wings. I wanted her all to myself, as if I somehow knew, even then, that the time we had together would be short, finite. When Lucy did play Hide and Seek or Tag with the other kids, I would drift around the playground by myself, inventing stories in my head of the great adventures we would have, just the two of us.
It was only at university that I stepped out of Lucy’s shadow. I had no choice. With her brains she was always going to be accepted at a red-brick, Russell Group university; my parents wanted her to be a doctor, and she didn’t disappoint them. I, on the other hand, only ever aspired to the local poly, although I think I surprised everyone, myself included, when I got into Cardiff to study journalism.
Lucy would have walked into this party with her head held high, as if she belonged in this world of wealth and art and I would have followed, her confidence rubbing off on me like body glitter.
‘Beatrice, my pretty darling,’ booms a loud voice and a big bear of a man with a frizzy beard, who looks to be at least fifty years old, parts the crowd. ‘I’m so glad you could make it.’ He’s wearing a dazzling print shirt that’s open at the neck and strains over his ample stomach. They busily air-kiss each other and then turn to me. ‘So, this is Abi,’ he says, his chocolate brown eyes meeting mine. ‘I’ve heard a lot about you. I’m Monty.’ He gives my hand a hearty shake. ‘Come and get a drink.’
They walk off together, leaving me trailing behind them. I can see the strap of a blood-red bra poking out of Beatrice’s black vest top and cutting into the flesh of her shoulder. I can’t quite catch what they are saying above the boom of the music.
We reach a huge, high-ceilinged drawing room with white walls, the coving and Georgian shutters painted a lead grey. Monty thrusts a glass of something orange into my hand and then resumes his conversation with Beatrice and I’m hit with a twinge of jealousy that he’s taking up so much of her time. I take a gulp of my cocktail; it’s so strong the alcohol burns the back of my throat, coating my anxiety, and before I know it I’ve finished the glass and taken another one from the tray of a passing waiter. I feel light-headed as my eyes sweep the room, noticing the many gilt-framed oil paintings of scantily clad, angelic-faced men and women, almost like modern versions of Botticelli, that adorn the walls. I recognize the paintings as being Monty’s own work. Beatrice had shoved a leaflet from his most recent exhibition under my nose while we were in the taxi on the way here. His paintings aren’t to my taste.
I catch snippets of conversations about artists I’ve never heard of or books I’ve never read, and I’m reminded of the parties in London that I attended with Nia and Lucy. They were similar to this; glossy, monied people, effortlessly cool and confident. But I didn’t mind that I never quite fitted in, because I had Nia and Lucy, and we usually only went along for a laugh and a free goody bag.
A cluster of thirty-somethings are dancing rather self-consciously in the corner to Happy Mondays. I turn my attention back to Beatrice, relieved when I see Monty drifting away from her to talk to an elegant woman in her mid-sixties. Beatrice raises her eyebrows at me and wrinkles her nose. ‘Is that woman wearing a real fur stole?’ she giggles. ‘Look, it’s even got a head.’ She seems to find this hilarious and I stare at her, perplexed; how many cocktails has she been plied with? ‘Come on, let’s go and explore,’ she says. ‘I’ve always wanted to have a nose around Monty’s place.’ She takes my hand and we make our way through the different rooms, all as huge and elaborate as the drawing room and filled with people drinking cocktails or champagne. It’s like being in a Stephen Poliakoff film. My heart pounds in my chest. Not with the usual anxiety but with a growing sense of exhilaration at being so near to Beatrice. Her confidence, her joy, is infectious. When I’m with her I experience that heady rush of adrenalin at being around someone who I admire so much. She makes me believe that I can do anything, be anyone.
Giggling and clutching each other, we stumble across a small music room and dump our now-empty cocktail glasses on top of a glossy cream piano. ‘At last,’ sighs Beatrice as she leaps on to a Chesterfield leather sofa, dangling her long legs over the arm. ‘A room with nobody in it. There’s too many people at this party. And my feet are killing me.’
To emphasize this point she kicks off her high heels and stretches her toes, webbed like a duck’s in her opaque tights. I plonk myself next to her, grateful for a break from the relentless music and chatter and noise that accompanied us around every room as if we were being chased by a swarm of bees. The lighting is dim and I’m flattered that Beatrice is comfortable enough with me to lean back against me. I breathe in her smell; her perfume, the apple shampoo from her hair. We sit this way for a while in companionable silence. Me, upright against the stiff back of the Chesterfield, with Beatrice using my lap for a pillow, her legs stretched out so that she takes up most of the sofa.
Without consciously thinking about it, I reach out and gingerly brush her fair hair back from her face. It’s so fine, the skin of her forehead as soft as velvet. Her eyes are closed and at my touch she exhales contentedly. And as I stare down at her beautiful face, so similar to Lucy’s yet so different, my feelings for her merge like the paints on a palette until they become murky, unclear. On one hand she’s becoming a friend, a sister … and yet, just out of reach, a shadow in my peripheral vision, I’m experiencing another, unfamiliar feeling. I lean over her, studying her delicate features. Her eyes are still closed, her long lashes casting shadows on her smooth cheeks and I suddenly long to kiss the freckles that fan across her nose, to touch the clavicle in her throat. I imagine kissing a girl would be softer, sweeter somehow. I lean over her, my mouth hovering above hers and time seems to slow down.
As if reading my thoughts, Beatrice opens her eyes and lifts her head from my lap in one swift movement and I shrink back against the sofa, my face burning at what I was almost compelled to do. What was I thinking? Those two cocktails have obviously gone to my head. I don’t fancy Beatrice. The feelings I have for her are confused in my mind, that’s all. I admire you, Beatrice, I want to yell. You remind me of Lucy. You’re the sort of person I wish I could be and you’re so beautiful. Reminiscent of a sculpture, a piece of art. But the words won’t come, it’s as if my brain has been stuffed with cotton wool, and I can only stare at her as she swings her legs from the arm of the sofa, bending forward to pull on her heels.
If Beatrice suspects the internal struggle I’m having with my emotions, if she knows I was moments away from kissing her, from making the biggest fool of myself, she doesn’t let on. Instead she jumps up and offers her hand to me. ‘Come on,’ she says, her usual bright bubbly self. ‘Let’s go and dance.’
I take her hand and follow her humbly from the room.
The mood has changed when we re-enter the drawing room. Someone has dimmed the lighting and a monotonous house tune that is devoid of a chorus or verse is thumping away. Monty is swaying in the middle of the floor with a drink in his hand and his eyes closed.
I open my mouth to comment when I see a girl I recognize weaving her way through the sweating, heaving crowd towards us. She’s wearing a cute babydoll dress that suits her petite figure and her bleach-blonde pixie crop has been gelled off her face. Her large dark eyes are entirely focused on Beatrice. ‘I’ve been looking for you everywhere,’ she says querulously when she reaches us. Her voice is thin and reedy. And then it hits me who she is: Cass, the photographer who lives with Beatrice.
‘Cass, you remember Abi?’ Beatrice says. ‘She’s going to be our new housemate.’
Cass drags her eyes reluctantly from Beatrice to murmur a hello before turning her gaze back to her. ‘I need to talk to you,’ she says.
‘Okay,’ says Beatrice, taking her hand, as she did with me half an hour earlier. ‘I’ll be back soon,’ she says, flashing me an apologetic smile and I have no choice but to watch as they walk hand in hand further into the room and I can’t help the white-hot flame of hurt that flickers in the pit of my stomach.
I consider calling a taxi and leaving. I’m humiliated by what happened with Beatrice in the music room, and now I’ve been jettisoned for Cass. There is no reason for me to stay. I hover in the doorway self-consciously and I’m about to make a run for it when I spot a familiar face in the crowd by the large bay window. He’s dancing with two guys and a girl I’ve never met and he doesn’t notice me at first. I watch as he moves his body with the confidence of someone who knows they can dance. A waiter breezes past and I take another cocktail from his silver tray and sip it while staring at Ben; at his long legs encased in dark indigo jeans, at the crisp white shirt that’s open exactly the right amount to show off his tanned neck and contrasts with his expensive fitted charcoal blazer. I’d forgotten how attractive, how sexy, Beatrice’s twin brother is.
Then, as if he’s sensed me assessing him, he lifts his hazel eyes in my direction and he grins at me and I draw breath. He is extremely good looking. He stops dancing and we drift towards each other like two magnets and I’m unable to stop the smile spreading across my face. He’s so tall, taller than I remember, his sandy hair longer and more tousled, and before I know it we’re face to face. I suddenly have the urge to throw myself into his arms, to nuzzle against his chest, inhaling his lemony scent. He’s so different to Callum, the eternal student with his scruffy trainers and mussed-up hair. Ben seems more sophisticated, more grown-up somehow, even though at thirty-two they are the same age.
I process Ben’s full sensual mouth, his freckles scattered across the bridge of his straight nose. They belong to him but they are part of Beatrice’s beautiful face too and it suddenly occurs to me, in that moment, that some of Ben’s attraction is that he’s her brother, her twin. He’s the male version of her.
‘Abi,’ he says, his lips twisted in a smirk. ‘Fancy seeing you here.’
‘Hi, Ben,’ I say shyly. ‘I came with Beatrice.’
‘Of course you did.’ He’s smiling but I notice a coldness to his tone and his eyes flicker to where Beatrice is standing with Cass. She turns in our direction, a scowl decorating her pretty face and it has the same effect on me as a child’s scribble would have on a famous painting.
‘Have you two had a row?’ I ask, shocked at the animosity I detect in Beatrice’s eyes. Or was that aimed at me?
‘You could say that,’ murmurs Ben, much to my relief. Ben doesn’t take his eyes off Beatrice. It’s almost as if they’re having a staring-out contest, maybe a game from their childhood and I’m frozen out, invisible, it’s the two of them, always the two of them. How can there be room for a third? I realize I’m holding my breath, waiting.
Then his gaze snaps back to meet mine and I exhale, grateful that I’ve got his attention again. ‘I’m desperate for a cigarette,’ he says. ‘Do you want to join me in the garden?’
I follow him back through the chequered-tiled hallway, edging past a group of lads hanging out in the kitchen and dump my half-empty glass on the worktop before stepping into a large garden. It’s a fresh spring night and I wrap my arms around my thin blouse, wishing I had brought a coat but relieved that at least I’m wearing jeans and not the one skirt that I possess.
‘Here, have this, you look freezing,’ he says, inching off his blazer and placing it over my shoulders. The light from the kitchen casts a glow over us and I can see the outline of his slim body through the cotton fabric of his shirt. He huddles nearer to me, cupping his hands around his lighter as he sparks up his cigarette, the tip crackling and glowing as he takes a puff and then offers the packet to me. I haven’t smoked in a long time, but I take one gratefully, thankful that I have a use for my hands. He lights it for me and I inhale deeply, instantly calmer as the nicotine travels to my lungs. Oh, I’ve missed this.
‘So,’ he says, exhaling puffs of smoke that disappear into the dark night. ‘I hear we’re going to be housemates.’
I stamp my feet against the cold and nod. ‘Not until mid-June. I’ve got to give my landlord a month’s notice on my flat.’ I take another drag on my cigarette.
‘It’s a shame you’re moving in,’ he says, a shy smile on his lips. I stare at him mutely, disappointment coursing through me that Ben doesn’t want me to move in. Have I offended him in some way? We seemed to get on well at the party on the night of the open studio.
‘We have a house rule, you see,’ he says gravely. ‘No romances between housemates. Beatrice is very particular about it.’
My face flames and I try and hide it by blowing on my hands theatrically even though it’s not that cold.
‘And I was hoping that maybe you would come out for a drink with me sometime? But I’m not sure that would go down too well, now that you’re going to be moving in.’ He regards me intently over the tip of his cigarette.
I’m speechless. He’s attracted to me, I can hardly believe it. He flicks his cigarette butt into the flower bed where it glows orange against the brown soil before slowly burning out.
‘Well, I’m not a housemate yet,’ I say shyly.
‘That is true.’
We stare at each other and I wonder if he’s going to kiss me; my heart bangs against my chest at this unexpected turn of events.
‘So you will come out for a drink with me?’ His voice is hopeful, his pupils dark as he inches closer.
‘I will,’ I almost whisper, without breaking eye contact. We stand together for a few moments, neither of us speaking. Come on, kiss me, I think.
A far-off peal of laughter breaks the moment and he moves away from me slightly to retrieve his mobile from the back pocket of his jeans. When he asks me for my mobile number, I reel it off to him and he taps it into his phone. Then he rings my mobile so his number is stored on my phone as well.
‘No excuses, no saying you’ve lost my number,’ he jokes. ‘The joys of modern technology.’
I laugh, knowing I’d never have the nerve to ring him unless he called me first. I’m about to open my mouth to say something when I notice Ben stiffen. His eyes shift away from me to look at someone or something over my shoulder. I turn and see Beatrice standing in the doorway, her long fingers toying with the stem of a champagne glass, staring at us thoughtfully. Cass is nowhere to be seen. She smiles but it doesn’t quite reach her eyes and I can tell she’s annoyed about something. ‘There you are,’ she says. ‘I was wondering where you’d got to.’ I’m unsure if she’s talking to me or Ben.
