Chapter 16 #3
“Give me five minutes,” I said to him and went back upstairs. I threw on last night’s jeans and found a T-shirt from my floor and put it on. It smelled, but it wasn’t as bad as the shirt I’d worn out to the club.
When I got downstairs, after another deep breath, I opened the door. Simon was standing in my garden. He was in a bright red running shirt that someone must’ve bought him for a joke and a pair of tiny, tiny shorts.
“Okay, my phone is on this time, so what’s your excuse for turning up unannounced?”
He shrugged. “Trying to see you in your pants again.”
I glared.
Kennedy came up to him and demanded his crotch to sniff, and while Simon was distracted, I opened the door wide and let him decide if he wanted to come in. I went back to my hunt for ways to pacify the men in my head.
I was downing paracetamol like it was going out of fashion when dog and man came inside. Simon stood awkwardly in the doorway, looking me up and down. His eyes seemed to be taking me in and assessing me. You saw me a week ago, I don’t age that fast, I was tempted to say, but didn’t.
“You went home,” I said instead.
He nodded. Once again like the act was painful. “I hadn’t been in some time. It was nice to be there. See people from the past. It … grounds you.”
I pretended I could empathise with that, but I’d never been back, so I had to imagine it.
“You left without saying goodbye.” I cringed as I said it. I turned to face the other way and drank a pint of water.
“Were you annoyed with me?” he asked. His voice was closer to me, but I hadn’t heard him move.
“Concerned.” I tried to keep my voice even. I turned back and there he was, six inches from me. I could feel the heat pulsating off his body. His face red from being in the sun, the sweat running down his neck onto the hem of his shirt. Those blue eyes.
He ran his fingers ever so lightly over my arm. “I could take you with me next time I go home. My parents loved you; Mum would be happy to have someone to fatten up with her cooking.”
“I’ve never been to Aberdeen.”
He turned his hand around, brushing the back of his knuckles over the curve in my arm at the inside of the elbow. The hairs there were standing up, and every time his hand swept across them, I felt a zing in my body jolt from my chest to my toes.
“It’s a nice place, but the countryside around it is much more beautiful, you’d like it.
” His eyes were on me, maybe searching for something.
Whatever it was, I wanted to shout the answer was yes.
Yes, Simon, I want you. Yes, let’s go to my bedroom and lock the door and not come out for days.
Yes, move in and let’s get married and adopt some dyslexic Azerbaijani orphans.
You can be Daddy, and I’ll be Papa; you can teach them how to fish, and I’ll teach them Polish folksongs while we make pierogi.
At night, we’ll make love until we pass out in each other’s arms.
“Arden,” he whispered so quietly I could barely hear him, even as close as he was.
My phone started to buzz.
Simon jerked back like he’d been given a shock. He was on the other side of the room in a blink. “You should get that. I’ll feed Kennedy for you.” He grabbed a tin of dog food and avoided my eye.
He moved around my kitchen like he really lived here. I watched him and tried to steady myself. “Ah, yeah, thanks.”
I grabbed my phone from the counter and took it outside.
“Hi,” I said when I eventually calmed myself down enough to answer.
“Are you okay?” Ollie asked.
I took a deep, shaky breath to try and stay calm and held the phone as far from me as I could. “Peachy keen,” I answered. “Just hungover. I went to a club last night. Terrible mistake, those places are not for people in their thirties.”
Ollie laughed. “Who did you go with?” he asked. A man?
“Sonia, my friend.” I didn’t want any complications.
“I haven’t heard from you in a few days,” he said.
I looked in my kitchen window and saw Simon on the floor with Kenny all over him. The pair of them were as thick as thieves.
“Busy. And also, not much to report.”
“Have – have you thought any more about me? About that night?”
I held the phone away from my face and breathed deeply.
“Arden, please, I hoped … it meant something.”
“It did.”
“But not enough?”
I let it hang in the air.
“I spoke to Constance,” I said. “She’s great. So, thank you for finding her for me.”
“Not a problem. Glad I could help.”
I could hear the regret in his voice. The catch in his throat with every word. This conversation was costing him. Picking up the phone to ring me was emotional turmoil. For me to give these answers was a dagger to his chest.
We lapsed into silence. “Ollie,” I said softly.
“I miss you,” he said.
“I miss you too,” I blurted without thinking. I looked up. Simon stood in the doorway. His face impassive.
“I, uh, I’ve got to go. Kennedy’s set fire to the kitchen.”
“What if I came down to visit you? Next weekend? I could stay in your spare room,” he said in a hurry. “We could talk things through properly, no distractions.”
“Let me think about it,” I said and hung up.
Shit shit shit.
I went back inside and found Simon at the breakfast bar, with Kennedy beside him, like he was his dog and not mine. Like I was the interloper in this charming domestic scene.
We both stood in silence. I decided to change the subject. “How well do you know Suzy Rabbit? She and Riz were friends, yeah?”
“Yes. She’s … Riz was not exactly friends with her. He had—” Simon struggled for words. “There seemed to be something going on there that I didn’t understand.”
“Last night Errol threatened me.”
Simon’s head shot up.
“He was at the Lucky Feather. I went with Sonia.”
He stood.
“I was thinking about it properly when you were gone. If anyone knew who Riz’s killer was, then who really benefitted? Suzy.”
“Do you want to help me?” he asked.
“I …” Instead of answering, I pulled up Suzy’s website on my phone. It had a link to her Twitter. “She’s judging the Bogford Sheldon village fete at lunchtime according to this tweet from last night.” I looked at Simon. “Go home and get changed, and I’ll pick you up in an hour.”
Simon left without a word.
I showered, ate, and dressed quickly. I put Kennedy on his lead and at ten thirty made my way to the car and drove down to Simon’s house.
Bogford Sheldon was about ten miles to the west of here.
It was a smaller village than Lilbury but had a new housing development being built, so was key for younger voters who might be wooed away from the Tory replacement candidate.
Simon’s street was busy with the old dears going about their mornings. I pulled up outside his flat. I texted him instead of honking my horn, in case the shock killed half of the oldies. He emerged twenty seconds later in jeans and a white T-shirt.
“Ready?” I asked.
“Let’s go get some answers.”