Chapter 18
18
Paige watched his eyebrow quirk upwards, clearly amused in his cockiness. ‘Oh yeah?’ He stepped back, nestling his butt on the edge of the dining table again as if waiting for some half-ass attempt at convincing him they could never be.
‘Yeah.’ She made sure she caught his gaze as she said the next words. She needed him to know this wasn’t a joke or a ploy. That she was deadly serious. ‘I met Bella in December at O’Hare. We were two of four women who got the last table at a dessert café during a snow storm that had grounded all flights.’
‘Okay.’ He was still smiling, indulging her.
‘There was champagne and cake and we all got talking about our bastard exes.’
‘Ah.’ He wriggled his eyebrows. ‘That’s where I came in?’
‘Yep.’ Paige nodded. ‘All four of us had felt trampled by men who had gone on living their lives quite merrily while we floundered around and after about two hours we’d hatched a plan. Each of us was going to get some revenge on someone else’s ex. Bella got Astrid’s ex. Astrid got Sienna’s ex. Sienna got Harvey. And I got…’
Oliver finally wasn’t smiling any more. ‘Me.’
‘Yes.’ Paige swallowed. ‘I’m not here because I had a last-minute gap in my living arrangements. I’m here for…’
His jaw tightened. ‘Revenge?’
She shook her head. ‘More like payback. Irritation by a thousand paper cuts.’
‘Like what?’ he asked, suddenly very, very still.
‘Like…’ She looked at the dark grey turtleneck she’d worn on the plane with her baggy black harem pants. ‘My clothes. I don’t wear bright, mismatched, charity shop clothes, I wear monochrome. Because it helps me blend into the background. And I’m not this scatty, hot mess who leaves coffee rings on furniture and loses the remote control every day. I mean, I’m not as anal as you,’ she conceded, ‘but I’m not kitchen chaos crumb girl either.’
Except maybe that was the true tragedy of all this. She’d felt more like herself this past couple of months than she had the last four years. A more exaggerated version for sure but truer to the woman she’d been pre-Harvey . That Paige had been fun and spontaneous. She’d been easy-going and quirky. And the last couple of months, she’d allowed herself to be that woman again. To be herself again.
Except now she had to go back.
‘Not ever vegan either I’m assuming?’
‘Nope.’ She shook her head. ‘Pavarotti was part of the charade. Casper too, although that happened organically, not deliberately. Same as the WI talk but I leaped on it because I knew it’d be the last thing you’d want to do. I know how to play violin really well and I don’t think Die Hard is a Christmas movie. Hamster Facts? That was me.’
She could see things clicking into place behind the sudden wintery bleakness of his eyes. ‘The second phone.’
‘Uh huh.’
‘So this is what Bella meant when I told her our relationship was complicated and she said in more ways than you know .’
‘Yeah.’
He shook his head, his eyes locking with hers. ‘Why?’
‘You hurt her, Oliver.’
He gave a harsh laugh. ‘You think I don’t know that?’
‘I think knowing it and truly understanding the depth of it, are two different things.’
He pushed off the table and stalked to the other side of the room before turning accusing eyes on her. ‘So the four of you appointed yourselves judge and jury?’
Paige shut her eyes. She supposed they had, in a way. She could see how it would certainly feel like that being on the other end. Her eyelashes fluttered open. ‘It seemed like a good idea at the time. Some harmless fun. Some… inconvenience for a while.’
He shook his head in disbelief. ‘I don’t know you at all, do I?’
His statement hit her like a cannon blast. Because the truth was, he did know her. She’d been more truthful and open with him than she’d been with anyone – even her three besties – in the last four years. And it was almost unbearable that he would think the opposite. Paige might not have been honest with Oliver about her reasons for being in his house, she may have adopted a different personality but those deeply personal things she’d told him had come from her deepest, darkest depths.
‘All this time we spent together,’ he continued, his voice taut with anger. ‘All the talking and laughing and getting acquainted. Getting naked. And it was all just an act .’
Another blast hit its mark. Yes, her being in his life had been performative. But not all of it. Falling in love with him hadn’t been an act. It didn’t alter the circumstances, though. She swallowed. ‘You weren’t supposed to find out.’
‘Right.’ His lips twisted derisively. ‘But you’re wielding it now like a weapon because you’re hoping it’ll make me want nothing to do with you so you can run away and hide behind that peach emoji again. Unless… all that stuff was a lie too?’
Paige sucked in a breath as this shot almost cut her in two, the jagged edges raw and bleeding. ‘I would never ’ – she faltered as her voice shook in a sudden spurt of outrage – ‘lie about that.’
‘Really?’ he demanded. ‘How would I know? I have no idea who the real Paige is.’
She deserved that but that didn’t make it hurt any less. And she wanted nothing more than to persuade him to see it from her point of view. To beg his forgiveness. But he was right. This was what she’d wanted. To be able to walk away from here and all the potential of public exposure and go back to hiding behind that peach emoji.
So she needed to suck it up.
Lifting her chin, Paige looked him square in the eyes. She refused to trade any more blows with him or let him see just how affected she was by his words and the path she’d chosen to tread.
‘Well, congratulations.’ He clapped slow and hard for several beats. ‘You got what you wanted. Now you can leave. I hope you’re happy having a good laugh with your little karma club.’
Paige pressed her lips together to stop them from trembling as his disdain reached across the room. But he’d given her an out and she was taking it before she changed her mind. Legs shaking, she picked up Pavarotti’s cage and, leaving everything else, she once again walked out of his house.
This time for good.
* * *
Two weeks. It took Oliver two weeks to simmer down. Two weeks of stewing and not walking and not writing. Hell, he barely ate or showered. He just lay on the couch in the media room, watching TV in the dark. Working his way through his alphabetised CD collection that Paige – purposefully and probably with great relish he realised now – had constantly messed with.
He didn’t answer calls and didn’t bother responding to messages, notifications or emails. He was far too pissed off to be pleasant to anybody. The only exception had been Doris who knocked on the beach-side door every day and refused to stop knocking until he answered that he was okay.
And then a text arrived from Paige.
Oliver glared at it for long moments, wanting to hurl his phone across the room but wanting to read it desperately. He suspected it would be her saying she was sorry because she sure as shit hadn’t said it the day she’d told him the truth and despite telling himself he didn’t care, a perverse part of him revelled in the idea of a grovelling apology.
His throat as dry as the three-day-old toast sitting on the crumb-covered coffee table, Oliver tapped on the text.
Hi. Just emailed your document. I wasn’t sure if you wanted anything to do with it straight away so I’ve left it til now.
She was right, the book had been the furthest thing from his mind as he’d wallowed in self-pity.
It’s good, Olly, you should keep going.
That was it. Three lousy sentences. Nothing remotely grovelling about it but it did have a weirdly soothing effect on the boiling acid that had been gurgling in his stomach for the past fortnight.
It’s good, Olly, you should keep going.
It was the fourth time she’d called him Olly and he hated how much he liked it.
Rolling up into a sitting position, Oliver grabbed his laptop that hadn’t been opened since Paige left. He winced at the bright light from the screen as he navigated to his inbox and located Paige’s email. He opened the attachment straight away, a tiny hum of joy resonating deep inside at all the neatly ordered tabs Paige had set up.
He hadn’t wanted to write in two weeks but looking at it now all laid out, ready to go, his mid buzzed with it again.
Minimising the document, he read the email.
Dear Oliver,
I’m writing this because I realise I never said sorry that day. About pretending to lose the document or about lying to you. That was remiss of me so I must now apologise twice. One the actual apology, the second time for not apologising in the first place.
So… sorry. And sorry.
I’m also sorry that I minimised your experiences over the years at the hands of tabloids and the paparazzi. That was particularly egregious and deserves special condemnation.
I’ve been thinking a lot these past couple of weeks about my passivity. And you’re right. I have been punishing myself. So… if those images ever do come into the greater public domain I’ve decided I will make that stand. To turn them around in my favour and use them as a way to speak out against the crime of revenge porn. To become an advocate for people who have experienced it and lobby for meaningful change in the legal system. I don’t expect it will be easy but things worth doing seldom are, right? And I might as well put that three quarters of a law degree to good use.
I don’t know if I’d be brave enough to do it without my hand being forced – maybe one day. But the point is, I’m no longer terrified of what happens if it is. And I couldn’t have got to this place without you giving me a push. So thank you for that.
I’ve also been thinking about what you said about our time together all being an act. I just want you to know that while a lot of what happened between us was manufactured, my feelings for you never were. I don’t expect you to believe me, but it’s the truth.
Lastly, I want to thank you for my time in Cornwall. I know I was there for all the wrong reasons but it was the first time in four years I actually got to be someone more closely resembling me again and for that I will forever be in your debt.
Love always,
Paige (the real one)
Oliver read the email over several times, feeling lighter and lighter each time. She was sorry. Her feelings hadn’t been manufactured. And she’d signed it – love always.
Love always .
She’d told him she’d loved him the day she’d left but it had got lost in the avalanche of hurt that had followed her terrible revelations shortly after.
But she had said it. And so had he.
Something unlocked in his chest at the memory. And the love he’d been denying, that he’d pushed away behind a wall of rage, rushed back in. He might have been angry at her and pissed off at what she’d done but love was hard to cancel out.
Apparently. He was just new to this thing.
Picking up his phone, he dialled a number that answered on the second ring. He didn’t give the recipient a chance to get in a hello. ‘I need Paige’s address.’
‘ Olly, I’ve been calling you for days!’
‘The address, Bella?’
She huffed into the phone. ‘Why?’
‘Because I love her and I know she loves me and I’m going to go and get her.’
‘Good answer.’
* * *
Paige stared absently out of the window that looked out on the Royal Mile, a tiny sliver of the castle visible if she leaned right over in her chair and cocked her head to the side. As far as house-sitting gigs went, she’d had worse. Not that she’d been particularly appreciative of the view, preoccupied as she was with thoughts of Oliver and how badly it had all ended.
She’d finally given in to the urge to make contact with him two days ago but there’d been no reply. She knew he was okay because Doris had kept her UTD with her daily check-ins but part of her had hoped he might respond.
It was futile she knew after everything she’d done but hope sprang eternal, right?
Her phone vibrated at her elbow and Paige picked it up, absently opening the text from an unknown number. It was probably just a new client enquiry.
Thank you for subscribing to LOVE FACTS! We’ll be sending you regular updates about falling in love. To STOP, reply with STOP. To see more reply MORE. Standard messaging rates may apply.
Paige frowned at the screen, taking a second or two to compute the text. Love facts? A small, confused smile pulled at her lips. Was this… Oliver? She sat forward in her chair. Her finger hovered for a beat before she typed MORE and sent it off.
Ten seconds later, three little dots danced on the screen and she waited.
Thank you for continuing LOVE FACTS! Did you know that love is addictive? When you fall in love your brain releases dopamine which is similar to a sugar rush, turning you into a love-junkie. To OPT OUT of these messages reply OPT OUT! To continue reply MORE. Standard messaging rates may apply.
Paige’s smile grew bigger. If the fact was correct, she was in serious withdrawal mode right now. She tapped in MORE and sent it off.
Thank you for continuing LOVE FACTS! Did you know that some people believe that Die Hard is a romance? And the other people are wrong? To agree press 1. Standard messaging rates may apply.
Paige laughed out loud and pressed 1. And waited again as the dots did their dance.
Thank you for your response and continuing to engage with LOVE FACTS! Did you know a heart can actually break? Research shows that break-ups can cause real physical pains in the area of one’s heart. This is known as Broken Heart Syndrome. Press 1 if you’re experiencing something similar right now. Standard messaging rates may apply.
Did she know that? Paige sobered, she sure as hell did. She pressed 1 and sent it into the ether.
Thank you for continuing to engage with LOVE FACTS! Did you know that some men will walk 500 miles to fall down at your door? To OPT OUT of these messages reply OPT OUT! To find out how many miles it is from Cornwall to Edinburgh reply MORE. Standard messaging rates may apply.
Paige blinked. Was he…? Her heart gave a funny little flutter in her chest as she dialled Oliver’s number. He picked up on the first ring. ‘Hi.’
There was a roughness to his tone like maybe he had just walked 500 miles and Paige’s tummy also got the flutters. ‘Where are you?’
‘I told you,’ he said, a smile in his voice. ‘I’m at your door.’
For a second, Paige just stared in disbelief at the window then she leaped from her seat and ran. Across the room, down two flights of stairs, straight to the door, her breathing now as erratic as her heartbeat. Yanking it open, she found him standing there in jeans and a plaid jumper, smiling in the weak sunshine, looking ridiculously sexy.
‘Hey.’ He held up a zip lock bag containing her fridge magnets. ‘I thought you might be missing these.’
Paige laughed. Definitely not . But she had missed him. She launched herself at him then and he laughed as he caught her, his hands under her ass, his mouth hot on hers as they kissed like no one was watching, instead of a significant number of people on the Royal Mile.
‘I can’t believe you’re here,’ Paige muttered, dragging her mouth off his, her hands cupping his face. He was real. He really was real.
‘Believe it.’
She kissed him again until somebody passing by said in a thick Scottish brogue, ‘Get a room, you two.’
They broke off, grinning at each other as Paige dragged him inside. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said as the door shut behind him and she stood on the first step to equalise their heights, sliding her arms around his neck. ‘I’m so sorry.’ She stared into his eyes. ‘About the payback plan and lying to you and the whole bloody debacle.’
‘I know.’ He smiled. ‘It’s okay.’
‘It’s not.’ Paige shook her head. ‘But thank you. Mostly I just need you to know that I meant what I said in my email. I might have been faking a lot of things in Cornwall but my feelings, falling in love with you, were 100 per cent genuine.’
‘I believe you.’ He slid his arms around her waist. ‘I’ve been thinking about it a lot the last couple of days and I can kinda understand the genesis of the whole payback thing. Who can blame you for wanting to get revenge on Harvey and how that might make a normally measured individual do something a little… out of the box.’
She laughed. ‘That’s one way of putting it.’ She’d never underestimate the power of prosecco again, that was for sure.
‘And, honestly, if you hadn’t? We’d have never met. So I can hardly be mad about that.’
Looking into those blue Prendergast eyes, Paige couldn’t fault his logic.
‘All I care about right now,’ he continued, ‘is how much I’ve missed you and love you and don’t ever want to be apart from you ever again. These last two weeks have been hell.’
Paige’s system flooded with cool relief. She’d spent the fortnight convinced she’d blown it for good. ‘I love you too,’ she said, her chest filling up.
His arms tightened around her waist. ‘Please say you’ll come back to Cornwall with me when you finish here in a couple of weeks. Or if you don’t want to live there, pick a place. As long as I’m with you, I don’t care where we live. Wherever we are, I just want to love you to distraction.’
Paige wanted nothing more than to love him to distraction, too. Pressing her forehead lightly against his, she murmured, ‘Cornwall is perfect.’ She’d been reborn there in so many ways that it felt like her spiritual home.
‘Cornwall it is,’ he said with a smile.
They kissed then, long and deep. The distraction beginning in earnest.