Chapter Twenty
C al closed the bedroom door quietly and then turned, letting out a screech as she ran into George.
“Fancy meeting you here,” George said with a wide grin.
“Um… Lucy’s taking a nap before the reception,” said Cal, feeling the blood rushing to her cheeks.
“Mmm, must be quite tiring all that… marrying going on,” said George, raising an eyebrow at her.
Cal didn’t respond, just stood there still, then George laughed.
“I’m teasing you,” he said. “Lucy deserves the best. And she really likes you, you know?”
There wasn’t really a reply to that. Not when Cal knew, even now, that this had to be a short term thing. So she mumbled something about leaving. George stood to one side to let her past.
“Cal?” he called after her.
She turned briefly.
“Welcome to the family,” he grinned.
Cal let herself out, walking down in the late afternoon sunshine to the beach, trying to calm herself. But it wasn’t that easy. The thought of Lucy, of her skin, her taste, everything about her. The second she let her guard down, a smile started to creep out and she just couldn’t stop it.
She was halfway back to the pub when her phone rang .
“Daily check up?” she answered, not as sourly as she had the day before.
“Just making sure you’re keeping on keeping on,” said Syd.
“You really don’t have to do this, I’m fine,” said Cal. Feeling far finer than she could remember feeling for quite some time.
“Actually, you sound… Do you sound happy?” Syd asked. There was a pause. “Cal Roberts, did you get laid?”
“You’ve replaced me with a barman,” Cal said.
“Indeed I have. But we were talking about you.”
Cal looked out over the waves, then shrugged. “I might have… met someone.”
The words didn’t sound right, even to her. They sounded both too serious and not serious enough. Which was kind of the problem.
The sex had been great, Cal put that to one side immediately. There was nothing wrong with their physical connection. If she closed her eyes she could be back in Lucy’s bedroom in a second, back in those few hours of beautiful perfectness. She should be feeling great, she did feel great, except for that underlying suspicion that the other shoe would drop at any second.
“Someone someone?” Syd asked. “Or just someone for now.”
“Someone for now,” said Cal without thinking about it.
“Huh.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Nothing,” said Syd. “Except you sound… different. Lighter maybe. I don’t know. But I suppose if your normal six week rule applies then, well, you know what you’re doing, right?”
“I always know what I’m doing. Be honest, communicate well, leave things better than I found them.”
“Right,” Syd said. “So despite sounding like you’ve just won the lottery, or what I imagine a terrifically grumpy person winning the lottery sounds like, you’re going to be a-okay leaving this woman and going back to your old life?”
“Perfectly fine,” Cal said, going back to looking at the ocean. “You don’t need to worry about me.” Waves were creeping higher up the beach .
“So you say,” said Syd. “Well, you’re still in the land of the living. I’ll phone tomorrow or the next day.”
“No need,” Cal said, but Syd had already hung up.
Cal shoved her phone back in her pocket. There was no point philosophizing about things. Decisions had been made, fun had been had, and Lucy knew the rules just as well as she did. Besides, they were both leaving town.
But, as she walked back to the pub to change her clothes, a little piece of her soul wanted to be lying in Lucy’s sunny, warm bedroom. And a little piece of her heart wanted to hold Lucy in her arms.
“YOU LOOK LIKE the cat that got the cream,” Rosalee said, standing over Cal with her hands on her hips and a curious look on her face.
“Do I?” Cal asked, putting her beer glass down on the table in front of her.
People were dancing, the disco lights were glittering in styled hair, the wedding cake was looming over the buffet table, and Cal’s feet ached from salsa-ing.
With a huff, Rosalee sank down into the chair next to her. “Where is she then?”
“Who?” asked Cal.
“Your lady love.”
Cal turned to her, not sure what to say, and Rosalee laughed, actually laughed.
“You’re not as discreet as you might think. Besides, I’m a barmaid, I’ve seen enough love-lorn customers to know what’s going on with the two of you.”
“I’m not love-lorn,” Cal said.
“Are you not?” asked Rosalee. “Because you’ve not left her side all night, you can’t take your eyes off her, and she looks like you’ve cast some sort of magic spell on her.” She sniffed. “Not that it’s any of my business, I suppose.”
“She went to the toilet,” said Cal. “And no, it’s not any of your business.”
Rosalee sighed. “What are you doing here, Cal?”
“Cleaning out my mum’s house.”
“Not what I meant. You know what people think about you, and yet you’re here messing around with a girl that we’ve all come to know and like. It can’t last.”
“I wasn’t planning on it lasting?”
“So you’re just going to run away. Like last time?” asked Rosalee.
“Jesus, I can’t win, can I?” Cal said, blowing out a breath. “Everyone hates me and I should go back where I come from, but also I should stay and marry a Tetherington girl because otherwise I’ll break her heart.”
“Life’s full of tough choices,” Rosalee said. Cal noticed the empty champagne flute dangling from her hand, which might explain why Rosalee was talking to her at all. She sighed. “It can’t have been easy coming back here.”
“It wasn’t.”
Rosalee sucked her teeth and nodded. “And yet, here you are. And the longer you’re here, the more you become a part of the furniture.”
Cal could see Lucy on the other side of the room, Mrs. Gupta had caught her and was talking to her about something. Just for an instant she could feel like Lucy was hers, like she was hers to rescue, hers to have, hers to hold. “What’s that supposed to mean?” she said to Rosalee.
“It means…” Rosalee gave the biggest of sighs. “It means that we’re not bad people, Cal. Whatever you might think. You did something wrong, and you know you did. And people are going to talk about it, people are going to dislike you for it. But… but if you’d stayed, then it would all have blown over by now, wouldn’t it?”
Cal looked at her.
“I suppose I’m saying that you’ve done the worst part. You’ve come back. You’ve faced people. It’ll only get easier from now on. You can make up for the past, show people who you are now. I mean, if that’s what you want.”
Lucy was gliding across the room now and Cal couldn’t look at Rosalee anymore. She could feel her heart beating harder. Maybe Rosalee was right. Maybe she had already done the hardest part. Maybe she could stay, not sell the house at all.
“Dance?” Lucy said, holding out her hand.
Cal let herself take it, let her fingers intertwine with Lucy’s, feeling her skin. The possibility of staying lingered in her mind. “Yeah, let’s dance,” she said.
One three-minute song. That’s how long it lasted. One three-minute song and then Cal was pulling away, remembering that this wasn’t her. Remembering that she was broken and didn’t do relationships. Remembering that she had a rule about these things.
“Who invited her?”
She turned around to see Mikey Hadley sneering at her, tie loose and hair askew, half-cut already.
“I did,” Lucy said, pushing her way in front of Cal. “You got a problem with that, Mikey?”
Mikey glared at Cal, then looked back at Lucy, shaking his head. “Nah, no problem.”
“That’s what I thought,” Lucy said, pulling Cal back off the dance floor.
She couldn’t have Lucy defending her honor all the time, could she? Besides, Lucy had her own life to live. She was going to London. So anything else was purely a pipe dream. No, short term, that was the deal and Cal was going to stick to it.
Anything longer and she’d screw it up anyway.
She followed Lucy through the crowd of people, watching the way her body moved under her dress, the way her dark hair sparkled in the lights, feeling her hand so comforting and warm.
Obviously, she could stop this whenever she wanted. Stop it and walk away. Just like with everyone else, every other woman she’d ever met. Lucy was no different.
For a second she had a memory of Lucy pushing her to the bed, pushing her legs apart, and a deep warmth bloomed inside her. Not that she was necessarily used to women taking control like that. That was new. Different. Enjoyable, if she was being honest.
The fact remained that they were on a deadline.
They finally reached the edge of the dancefloor and Lucy pulled her in, close enough that Cal could feel the curves of her body. “Pen and Ash will be cutting the cake soon,” she said, her words breathed into Cal’s ear.
Cal put her hands on Lucy’s waist, let her thumbs graze her hipbones. “I like cake,” she said, leaning into Lucy’s smell.
“I thought maybe we could go after that?”
Cal pulled back a little to see Lucy’s anxious face, her eyes wide. “Go? Go where?”
“Home?” Lucy said, pushing her hips into Cal’s hand.
The implications were very clear. As was the word home. A word that Cal’s libido was not going to allow her to argue with just at the moment.
“Ah,” she said. “I see. Well… I can only dance so much.”
Lucy grinned at her and Cal’s heart skipped a beat.
Short term.
Right.
She could do this. She could walk away any time she wanted.
Just not right now. Not when Lucy’s smile was lighting up the room like a beacon. Not when she could barely breathe. Not when she could think of their bodies sliding against each other in the heat of the night.
Not right now.