Lots of Love (48 page)

As she headed back along the narrow corridor between the buildings and the pub, wishing that she had some cash for a stiff drink, she slapped straight into Spurs. He’d been idling in the shadows, smoking a cigarette and waiting for her.

‘Hi.’ She ducked her head and edged past him, but he barred her way with a broad forearm.

‘What exactly do you think you’re up to, Ellen?’

She set her jaw. ‘Having a drink with a friend.’

‘I haven’t seen you drinking much,’ he said softly.

‘I’m working up a thirst.’

They were directly behind the pub kitchens. Wall filters were belching out the smell of cooking fat and sealing meat, along with chemical-filled steam from a busy dishwasher and the banter of kitchen staff swearing at each other.

‘Does Pheely think I have nefarious designs on her daughter?’ He raised an eyebrow.

‘Do you?’

‘She’s very beautiful.’ He smiled slowly. ‘Rory is completely smitten, if not terribly sober, the idiot.’ He pulled a face and glanced towards the garden. ‘He’ll have to get his act together if he wants to keep her keen.’

Ellen watched his throat, taking in the lifted sinews and veins that ran from one ear to his shoulder in the tanned, freckled skin, like ripples in a luxury truffle. He was a lot more tense than he made out. ‘He’s so lucky to have you on hand for advice and guidance,’ she said cattily.

‘Isn’t he?’ He matched her tone. ‘I do like to keep an eye on things. Rather like you.’

‘But I’m sure you’d never dream of stepping in and taking over.’

‘Oh, I don’t know.’ He ran his tongue over his top teeth. ‘Needs must when the devil’s designated driver.’

‘And let me guess, Godspell sucks on your familiars when you want to change gear?’ She knew she was getting bitchier, but she couldn’t stop herself.

‘Leave her out of it,’ he said lightly, swinging round to look at her. He seemed to be focusing on her bindi spot. ‘You need a wash.’

‘At least I’ve got a clean conscience.’

Without warning, he dropped his face to her unwashed neck and breathed deeply. ‘I want to wash you.’

Goosebumps flared in the most unexpected of places – even in her ears. Ellen battled to pretend he hadn’t just said that. Twisting away and feeling his teeth graze her skin, she spluttered, ‘You’ll have to clean up your act first.’

‘I suppose you want me to beg Pheely to forgive me so that my soul is cleansed?’ he sniped angrily, backing off.

‘It might make up for lusting after her daughter.’

‘Does that bother you?’ He marked her eyes with his.

‘It bothers Pheely.’

‘Admit you love me and maybe I’ll do it.’

‘Cut the love crap. You’re the one who told me I wasn’t hot enough for you.’

He bit away an emerging smile and whispered, ‘Surely you know I’m a compulsive liar? Enough people must have told you that by now.’

Ellen snorted sarcastically. ‘So you really
do
desire me with all your soul?’

‘I’ve wanted you from the moment we met.’

She laughed. ‘Which is why you’re out with Dilly and Godspell, I suppose.’

‘I have to do something to keep my mind off you.’

‘Ever thought of trying Morris dancing?’

His smile sprang back. ‘No – nor incest, as it happens.’

‘Hard to tell around here, I should imagine.’

‘I’m told the bells usually give it away.’

They had edged towards each other again, voices lowered to an intimate, teasing whisper.

As they looked at one another, eyes tracing eyes tracing lips tracing eyes again, Ellen felt a blade of longing run its way up her spine, then slide beneath her chin and against her throat. She couldn’t resist her attraction to him, however much she tried. Spurs watched her face, his cheeks quilted with tension. ‘I told you this can’t happen,’ he muttered.

‘Nothing’s happening,’ she said, goosebumps popping out on her goosebumps until she was convinced she must look like a figure in a Seurat painting.

He dragged his eyes from hers. ‘I want you to keep your distance.’

‘And I haven’t come looking for you,’ she said hoarsely.

‘So why are you here?’

‘We’re just watching out for Dilly. Pheely insisted. I didn’t ask to be here.’

‘T’yeah.’ He let out a sharp breath through an uncertain smile. ‘Then go home.’ He walked away.

Ellen rose on tiptoes of frustration as she battled not to chase him down and demand to know what the hell he was playing at. Instead, she threw up her chin and threw the best missile she had to hand: ‘I do love you. Now ask Pheely to forgive you.’

He didn’t even look round.

Pheely clutched Ellen’s arm like a vice when she said she wanted to go home. ‘We can’t leave her here. Besides, he has Pompeii hostage.’

‘Ask for it back – you can freewheel it home. It’s all downhill from here.’

‘That’s what I’m afraid of.’ Pheely sighed in despair, looking at Dilly who was shrieking with laughter and stealing one of Rory’s cigarettes, irresistible body spilling out of Ellen’s dress in all the right places.

Ellen sat in a cloud of Pheely’s cigarette smoke, watching the equally unwelcome rainclouds gather overhead. She refused to look at Spurs and tried to blot his soft, drawling voice from her consciousness. She reminded herself again and again that he wanted her gone. Whatever his reasons, it wasn’t going to happen, chemistry or no chemistry.

He doesn’t want me here, she told herself, wondering why the back of her neck was burning up, as though the sun were shining brightly through the overcast sky.

‘Don’t look now,’ Pheely lit another cigarette, ‘but Spurs can’t keep his eyes off you.’

Loitering under the trees in a beer garden without a drink was one thing, but when the heavens opened and they were forced to cram inside the small, heavily beamed pub, it was obvious that something was missing. Spare tables, chairs and any cash to buy a drink being key among them.

Spurs’ posse had gathered at a bowed table in a window recess by the time Ellen and Pheely reluctantly squelched and dripped inside. Dilly was talking non-stop – already very tight on Archer’s.

‘. . . 
totally
cool.’ She was giggling, determinedly ignoring her mother and Ellen as they passed.

‘Still here?’ Spurs looked up at Ellen, rubbing the shoulder he had hurt earlier. His face seemed guilty somehow, anxious to convey a message that she couldn’t read.

‘Erin! Hi!’ Rory raised his glass, spilling most of the contents, his sleepy grey eyes crossed as he grinned up at her. ‘Joinush!’

Ellen looked at Spurs again and suddenly saw a green light. She opened her mouth to accept, but Pheely pinched her arm hard. ‘We’ll be fine at the bar!’ she insisted, dragging Ellen along. ‘You’ll just have to bat your eyelashes to get us free drinks.’

‘What?’

‘Hi.’ Pheely smiled at the landlord as she plonked herself down on a bar stool.

‘What can I get you, ladies?’ he offered affably, as he filled a pint glass for another customer.

‘Ellen?’ Pheely turned to her mischievously.

Thrown, Ellen looked at the friendly, bearded face behind the bar and smiled awkwardly. ‘What do you have?’

‘We’re a public house, madam. We have the usual selection.’

‘Could you just talk me through it?’ Ellen asked, trying not to hear Pheely’s groan beside her.

Suddenly she felt a warm, hard body pressing against her back. ‘I’ll get these, Keith.’

Ellen’s skin performed a Mexican wave as Spurs leaned across her. She half expected her popping goosebumps to spring him back against the far wall like lead shot.

Beside her, Pheely was glaring at the towels lined up on the bar. ‘Really, there’s no need.’

‘I’d like to buy you a drink, Pheely,’ Spurs said softly, trying to catch her eye, his chest still pressing hard against Ellen’s back.

Acutely aware that he’d said she needed a wash and that she probably smelt foul after a day’s painting and an impromptu run, Ellen tried to lean away but, short of clambering right over the bar, she was trapped. She could feel his heart beating against her shoulder-blade and was surprised by its speed – it was racing as fast as her own.

‘In that case,’ Pheely was saying, in an arch, childish taunt, ‘I’d like a glass of champagne.’

‘We don’t sell it by the glass,’ Keith said apologetically.

‘Then we’ll have a bottle,’ Spurs said easily, although his heart still hammered Ellen’s back. ‘Ellen?’

‘I’ll just have a mineral water.’

‘Oh, c’mon – help Pheely out.’

She glanced over her shoulder, met his eyes and immediately felt as though she had drunk Dom Perignon dry. Champagne fizzed and popped in her veins as she read the message in his face. I’m sorry, his eyes pleaded. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry. And I’m scared of Pheely. ‘Have a glass of champagne, Ellen,’ he persisted.

‘Sure.’ She smiled: she had a small victory to celebrate. She had read his mind. Only the opening line, admittedly, but it was a start.

‘Come and join us.’ Spurs turned to Pheely as Keith fetched a bottle of dubious-looking champagne from a fridge in a back room.

‘We’d just cramp Dilly’s style,’ she said sharply, glaring at her clay-embedded nails.

‘I’d really appreciate some adult conversation,’ he joked uneasily.

‘I’m sure if you practise enough you’ll start to get the hang of it,’ she muttered.

He carried on smiling, eyes boring into hers. ‘Give me a chance, Pheely.’

That smile was still as devastating as it had been twelve years earlier, the silver gaze as hypnotising, and try as she might, Pheely’s resolve started to melt.

‘I suppose if we joined your table, I could study Godspell’s funny little face in animation.’ She thought about it. ‘She’s so deep that her personality rarely surfaces, don’t you find?’

‘Quite.’ Spurs cleared his throat, and they all looked back at Godspell, who was looking as deep and animated as a puddle in a hard frost while she studied her dark fingernails in minutiae.

Pheely shot Spurs another look of mistrust, then cocked her head as Keith popped the cork with tell-tale lack of practice, firing it into the tankards above the bar. ‘Well, maybe for a moment,’ she conceded, hopping off her bar stool just in time to avoid several pieces of pewter falling on her. ‘I guess it can’t be any more dangerous than it is here.’

Ellen found herself sitting as far away from Spurs as possible, tucked tightly at the far end of the window-seat between Godspell and Rory, whom she soon discovered were not great conversationalists. Rory managed ‘Hello, again,’ and Godspell stared blankly when Ellen asked after her insects. Any subsequent attempts at striking up banter fell flat.

Evidently livid that her double date had been hijacked by the motorcycling double act, Dilly ignored her mother and played up to the men. She hadn’t been wrong when she’d told Ellen she was a hopeless flirt. Now reeling from an alcopop sugar high, she was about as tactful as a red-top photo-strip and didn’t so much flirt as spurt.

‘Where’s Sharrie tonight?’ she asked Rory.

‘Out, I think,’ he told her sleepily.

‘I bet she has loads of boyfriends. She doesn’t strike me as too fussy.’ She sniggered. ‘And she’d be quite pretty if she lost some weight. Then again, she probably has fantastic breasts. Big girls always do.’

Rory looked instinctively at Dilly’s huge gravity-defying tits jutting from her slender chest as she launched into giggly tales of how awful it was having a bra so much larger-cupped than the other girls at boarding-school. ‘I just don’t understand why they all tease me, then stuff their baggy Wonderbras with socks and loo roll, do you? I mean, it’s not as though I’m
fat.
God forbid. I just got given these darlings as a part of the great handout, and I
do
find them a bit of a handful. I used to want to be flat, like you, Spelly,’ she sighed with mock-envy at Godspell’s plumb-line chest, ‘but now I’ve grown rather used to my puppies.’ She cupped her cleavage and batted her eyelids as she aimed it innocently at Rory.

Watching it all impassively, Godspell didn’t say a word. Neither did Rory, whose eyes were crossing even further as he stared at Dilly’s assets.

He was, Ellen realised, very drunk indeed, the beautiful pewter Constantine eyes glazed, the dreamy smile soporific and the long, lounging body close to sliding off its chair.

Spurs, by contrast, was sharp-witted and sober, totally focused on gaining Pheely’s trust, his knuckles white as they clutched a pint of Coke.

Ellen had never seen him nervous, and it made him look more like a beautiful fallen angel than ever. The sinews in his neck leaped, muscles slammed in both his cheeks and he pulled back his hair from his forehead again and again to reveal wide, anxious eyes as he spoke in a near-whisper, oblivious of Dilly’s big-breast debate. ‘I know I’ve done the shittiest things alive, but I can’t bear the thought of you hating me . . .’

He’s going for it, she thought in disbelief, looking away as guiltily as a tourist stumbling into a cathedral confessional, her throat choked with emotion.

Swiping angry tears from her eyes before they spilled, Pheely wasn’t making it easy for him, and neither was Dilly who, irritated by the amount of time Spurs was spending talking to her mother, brought up her favourite topic of the day. ‘I think people are really
far
too uptight about sex,’ she told Rory loudly, stilling the entire pub with her joyful, sing-song ‘Who’s queen?’ voice.

‘Too right.’ He raised his glass.

‘I mean, I can’t
wait
to have a go.’ She looked coquettishly towards Spurs, but he carried on talking to Pheely in a low, earnest tone.

Straining to hear what he was saying, Ellen almost jumped off her seat when Dilly slapped the table with her palm and demanded,
‘Why
am I still a virgin at seventeen? Ellen was much younger when she lost it, and she’s only ever slept with one man. I’m not going to bonk the county or anything. I just want to know what it’s like.’