Chapter 1 #4
‘I always like to come.’
Lorcan laughed. ‘Where did you learn to speak English like that?’
‘From Irish men.’
God, she’s amazing, Lorcan thought, longing to pull her out of the water, peel off her swimsuit and make love to her wet, slippery body.
It was a long time since he had felt such stomach-churning excitement about a woman.
Between the cold of the water and the heat of desire, he was fighting for breath.
‘Whose wedding is it?’ Carmen asked. ‘Not yours, I hope.’
‘God, no! My friend, Tom – the one you were talking to earlier. He’s marrying my sister.’
She glanced over to where Tom and Will stood, drying themselves. ‘I thought you were a group of Buddhist monks.’ She nodded at Lorcan’s shaved head.
‘Oh no, we’re not monks – definitely not.’
‘You don’t have anyone else to take?’ she asked.
‘No, I was going alone, as a matter of fact. I split up with my girlfriend last week.’
‘You don’t seem very upset about it.’
‘I’m not.’ Lorcan grinned, ‘She was a pain in the arse.’
Carmen laughed.
‘So, will you come – to the wedding, I mean? There’ll be champagne,’ he said, ‘and cake.’
‘Well, I do love champagne,’ Carmen said. ‘Okay, I’ll go with you.’
Out of the corner of his eye Lorcan saw Will and Tom starting to get dressed.
‘Look, I have to go with my friends. Why don’t you come back with us and have some breakfast?’
‘Sure.’
‘Good. I can run you home after, if you want to change before the wedding.’
‘I live just over there.’ She tossed her head towards the row of houses facing the sea. ‘If you can wait here a few minutes, I’ll pick up my stuff and come with you. Okay?’
‘Okay.’
I must be in a dream, Lorcan thought. Women aren’t this easy. Most of the ones he knew prided themselves on being bloody hard work – his sister Rachel, Will’s girlfriend Tina – and Sarah, the girlfriend he had just split up with.
They pulled themselves out of the water, and Lorcan followed Carmen to where she’d left her clothes.
He couldn’t help staring as she put them on over her swimsuit without drying herself.
She pulled her thick dark hair up behind her head and let it fall again, shaking it vigorously and showering Lorcan with water.
Then she shuffled into her shoes. ‘I’ll see you in a few minutes,’ she said, picking up her bag and turning towards the road.
‘See you soon, Maria del Carmen,’ Lorcan called. Walking back to join the others, he realised he was sporting an enormous erection.
* * *
Back at his house, Will looked around the table with satisfaction as everyone tucked into an enormous fried breakfast that he had cooked.
Even though he no longer drank, he was an expert at managing hangovers, thanks to the hell-raising antics of Walking Wounded, the band he had managed since leaving college.
He could draw on years of experience of coping with the morning-after fallout from its members’ nights of debauchery.
It was one of the reasons he was such a popular choice for best man.
After all, compared to getting those four hooligans on to a stage on time and sober night after night – especially a loose cannon like Owen Cassidy – having a groom at the altar rail on time and in reasonable shape was a piece of piss.
‘Where are you from, Carmen?’ Will asked.
‘Galicia. And you? You’re not Irish, I think?’
‘Well, no, not really. I grew up in England. My mother was Irish, though, and I’ve lived here since I was fifteen.’
‘An adopted son of Ireland, eh?’ Carmen’s eyes twinkled.
‘An adopted son of my mother, actually.’ Lorcan laughed.
‘She seems nice.’ Will said to Lorcan when Carmen left to go to the bathroom. ‘Are you bringing her to the wedding?’
‘Yes, I am,’ Lorcan said, looking ridiculously pleased with himself.
‘Might take a bit of the heat off me and my hair,’ Tom said.
‘What do you mean?’
‘Well, she’s not on the seating plan, is she?’ he pointed out. ‘And I don’t think Rachel’s going to be too impressed that you’re bringing someone you found this morning in the Irish Sea.’
‘Sarah was on the seating plan,’ Lorcan reminded him, ‘so I’m sure there’ll be room for Carmen. If not, she can sit on my knee.’
‘Sit on your nob, you mean.’
‘Is Tina coming to the wedding?’ Lorcan asked Will.
‘Yeah, I’m meeting her there. She’s been staying with friends.’
Tina hadn’t been at all happy to be banished from his house for the duration of the stag party – but, then, she wasn’t happy about much these days, Will thought wearily, unless it involved having her photo in a magazine.
They hadn’t been getting on lately and he had felt guiltily relieved of an excuse not to see her for a few days.
Part of the problem was that Tina, seeing her modelling career coming to an end, wanted to branch out into other things and was on a mission to raise her public profile.
Will had found himself sucked into her vortex.
When she was in town she filled his house with a constant parade of hangers-on and wannabes.
She made sure that paparazzi followed them wherever they went, and, to his intense mortification, they were becoming quite a celebrity couple.
She had even tried to persuade him to throw open his doors to MTV Cribs, so they could find her lurking decorously in one of the rooms, no doubt.
‘What’s all this about the two of you getting engaged?’ Tom asked.
‘It’s just a vicious rumour,’ Will said, ‘started by that bloody gossip-columnist friend of Tina’s. I’m sure Tina put her up to it.’
‘Crikey! I’ll get Rachel to fire the bouquet well away from her then.’
‘Thanks.’ Will grinned. ‘Much appreciated.’
The conversation stopped as Carmen drifted back into the kitchen. ‘This house is amazing,’ she said, sitting down at the table. ‘I got lost on my way back from the loo. Do you all live here?’
‘No, just Will,’ Lorcan told her.
‘Is it your parents’ house?’ she asked Will.
‘No, it’s mine.’
‘And you live here alone? But it’s so huge!’
Will shrugged apologetically.
‘And you own it?’ Carmen persisted, as Lorcan and Tom shifted uncomfortably, darting surreptitious glances at Will.
‘Yes.’
‘Wow! You must be really rich!’ Carmen exclaimed.
Will merely smiled.
Suddenly Tom thumped the table, causing everyone to jump. ‘Did Tessa dance topless on the table?’ he thundered.
‘What?’
‘It’s suddenly coming back to me – last night, or the night before, or whenever it was. Did Tessa strip off and dance topless on the table?’
Lorcan laughed. ‘In your dreams!’
‘You mean she didn’t? I could swear I remember—’
‘I’m telling you it was a dream.’
Will knew Tom and Lorcan were deliberately changing the conversation because they knew he found it embarrassing when people made a fuss about his money.
But he hadn’t been offended by Carmen’s completely artless curiosity and, touched though he was by his friends’ solicitude, it was mortifying to witness them dancing around his sensibilities like this.
‘You could have humoured me,’ Tom moaned, ‘left me my illusions.’
‘Come to think of it, someone did dance topless on the table. It wasn’t Tessa, though.’
‘Will, you were sober,’ Tom appealed to him. ‘Did someone dance topless on the table at my stag party?’
Will smiled. ‘Yes – but Lorcan’s right. It wasn’t Tessa.’
‘Who was it, then?’
‘Owen.’
‘Ugh!’
Everyone laughed.
‘We should hit the showers,’ Will said, getting up to clear the plates. ‘The good thing about a house this size is that we can have a bathroom each.’
* * *
Later, Will and Lorcan stood in front of the mirror knotting each other’s bowties.
‘God, we do look weird, don’t we?’ Will said, when they’d finished. ‘Shaved heads and DJs – like bouncers.’
‘You look weird,’ Lorcan assumed a cocky expression. ‘I look cool.’
In fact, the bald look suited Lorcan better than it did Will, accentuating the baby-faced features that made women swoon – the big spaniel eyes framed by ridiculously long sooty lashes, the sensuous mouth.
The O’Neills were a good-looking family, all olive-skinned and dark-haired.
Rachel was acknowledged as the beauty, but everyone knew Lorcan was the real knockout.
‘Be extra nice to Kate today,’ Lorcan said. ‘She’s on her own.’
Easier said than done, Will thought. He had the impression that Lorcan’s little sister didn’t like him very much any more – probably with good reason, he reflected guiltily.
Although he was practically a member of the family, he and Kate hadn’t seen much of each other in the past few years, mainly, Will suspected, because Kate was avoiding him.
On the few occasions they had met, she had spoken in monosyllables if he tried to talk to her.
It was a pity because they’d been good friends.
Still, he had only himself to blame. ‘Has she split up with that boyfriend of hers, then?’ he asked Lorcan.
‘Sadly, no. But he’s not coming. Apparently he finds us “overwhelming”. He’s afraid we’ll swallow him up or something.’
Will laughed. ‘He should be so lucky.’ He had been ‘swallowed up’ by the O’Neills years ago and considered it the best thing that had ever happened to him.
‘Indeed,’ Lorcan said drily, ‘if we swallowed him up we’d spit him out again pretty sharpish.’
‘Still, you must admit, your family can be a bit… Greek.’
‘Greek?’ Lorcan was bewildered.
Will smiled. ‘You know what I mean.’
‘You mean histrionic.’
‘No – though your mother would make a mean Medea.’
‘Incestuous then?’
‘No, I was thinking more in terms of doing good to your friends and harm to your enemies. I can vouch for the doing-good-to-your-friends bit.’