The Place We Met Page 24
‘It’s OK,’ I assure him. ‘I just want to forget it.’
‘I should have told you sooner about Taggie,’ he says slowly, and I tense up at the mention of her name. It’s impossible not to picture her stumbling away from me, her face ashen. ‘Bumping into her after so long has knocked me off kilter, but that’s no excuse, I know. I didn’t talk about her before because I wanted to leave it in the past. It was all so …’ He pauses, squeezing me harder. ‘Messy and upsetting and horrible. I know it was my decision to end things, but that doesn’t mean it was easy.’
I think about Taggie’s face when I asked her if she was still in love with him. How she’d had to fight to stop herself from crying.
‘I understand,’ I tell him, and he kisses the top of my head.
‘I just want to focus on you now,’ he says. ‘On us. I want to leave the past in the past and move on.’
‘Look,’ he adds, letting go of me to pick up his phone from the bedside cabinet. ‘I’ll delete her number now, and all the messages. I’ll never mention her again.’
‘Stop.’ I place a hand over his. ‘You don’t have to do that. I trust you.’
‘I will do it,’ he says. ‘For you.’
I shake my head. ‘Don’t.’
He sighs and replaces the phone, pulling me down until I’m lying next to him. He’s still under the duvet, while I’m on top of it, and I reach across to stroke the red hair on his chest.
‘You can talk about her, if you need to,’ I tell him. ‘You can talk about her with me.’
‘I don’t want to talk about her,’ he states, slowly beginning to unbutton my coat. ‘I want to talk about you.’
‘You do?’ I murmur, playing along.
‘I want to talk about your face,’ he whispers, running a finger along my cheek. ‘And your neck,’ he says, again stroking. I prop myself up and he helps me wriggle out of my coat. I’m wearing a black polo-neck tucked into jeans, and he tugs at the waistband, his eyes never leaving mine. He still hasn’t kissed me, but I can feel the warmth of his breath on my lips, and I shiver with pleasure as he slips a hand under my jumper and walks his fingers up towards my bra.
‘I definitely want to talk about these,’ he whispers, extracting one breast from the satin cup and circling my nipple with his thumb. It’s the first time he’s touched me in such an intense way since we bumped into Taggie, and my body responds instantly with a hunger I didn’t know I was feeling. I want him to tear my clothes off me, but he’s intent on taking his time, first removing my top and bra, then moving across the bed to inch down my jeans. Once I’m laid bare save for my knickers, he works his way up my body with his tongue, tasting and tickling and nibbling until I’m practically begging him to let me join in.
When he’s satisfied that he’s teased me enough, Pete takes my hand and guides it into my underwear, his low voice husky with arousal as he tells me gently what to do, where to touch, when to stop. Usually I would blush and squirm and roll to one side, but today I feel fearless, and I find I can meet his gaze with equal intensity. This is what we needed, to reconnect with each other and, more than that, venture into new and more intimate territory. Despite everything that’s happened, I feel closer to Pete in this moment than I ever have before, and when he finally, blissfully, kneels between my legs before pulling me forwards on to him, I look right at him and utter the three words I’ve been wanting to say for so long – the statement I wasn’t sure until this moment that I truly meant.
‘I love you.’
41
Taggie
I knew I’d seen Lucy somewhere before. I knew it, but I still can’t believe it. I’m not even sure how I’ve made it through the past few hours in one, sane piece, and if it wasn’t for this evening’s party, which I’ve spent so long planning, I think I would have fallen apart. As it is, there’s so much on my to-do list that I haven’t had any choice but to put this morning’s encounter by the lake firmly under lock and key in my mind, and pretend it never happened.
‘Agatha!’
‘Piss off,’ I curse under my breath, before turning around. ‘Yes, Gladys?’ I say sweetly, my fake smile making my jaw ache.
‘Can you tell Will-yum that he must wear a proper suit tonight? He’s trying to get away with jeans.’
‘Bill, you should wear a suit,’ I parrot obediently, even though he’s welcome to turn up dressed in a rainbow-patterned thong and nothing else for all I care.
Gladys’s husband looks miffed.
‘It’s too tight,’ he whimpers, looking at his wife beseechingly. ‘I’ve put on weight since we’ve been here.’
‘Nonsense!’ she booms, playfully pinching his cheek. ‘Oh, you do say the silliest things.’ She turns back to me. ‘And Agatha,’ she adds.
Now what?
‘Yes?’
‘Is your friend Marco going to join us at the party tonight? I should so like to pinch him for a dance.’
‘No,’ I say, in my best apologetic voice. ‘He has to work.’
‘Oh, what a shame,’ she cries, stepping closer so she can whisper in my ear. ‘I was rather hoping to pinch him for a New Year’s kiss, too.’
I laugh, only realising a fraction too late that she wasn’t joking. She can’t seriously think that Marco would be willing to slip her the tongue under the mistletoe – can she?
‘We shared a moment,’ she confides now. Bill has wandered off to talk to another member of the group, no doubt still sulking because he didn’t get his own way with the suit, and Gladys is now telling me in a hushed tone all about how her and Marco’s eyes had met and she’d felt it ‘in her bones’.
‘Felt what?’ I reply.
‘Lust!’ she declares, before bursting into noisy snorts of laughter.
Shelley finds me banging my head slowly against the wall in the office.
‘Hungover?’ she asks, and I nod wearily.
‘Me too. Bloody tequila has a lot to answer for.’
The two of us were so drunk last night that Marco had to walk us to the taxi rank and sweet-talk the unimpressed driver into taking us home. He was worried that we’d throw up all over his seats, but what he should have been worried about was our singing. Unfortunately for him, ‘Never Forget’ by Take That contains some extremely high notes.
‘Do you know what you’re wearing yet?’ Shelley adds, slipping into Sal’s chair so she can check Facebook on his computer. I haven’t even looked at my account since I left London – there are too many people on there that I want to avoid.
I shrug, my mind still soup.
‘A dress.’
‘Well, obviously,’ she retorts. ‘But which one?’
‘A black one.’
‘Why, are you in mourning?’
‘Ha ha,’ I retort, feeling wounded. I leave her to it, letting the office door bang shut behind me, only to collide with Sal, who is coming the other way with a large wreath of holly in his hands.
‘Ouch!’ I cry, as the sharp edges of the leaves come into contact with my bare arms.
‘Attento!’ snaps Sal, clearly irritated. I’ve been giving him tasks all day, as diplomatically as I can, but it’s become increasingly plain with each passing hour that he is not a man who likes being told what to do. He’s now ranting away about napkins, and I hold up my hand to silence him, quickly suggesting that he leave the finer details to me, and help set out the canapés on their silver trays instead. However, from the expression on his face, you’d think I’d just asked him to walk barefoot across hot coals.
Bloody men.
By the time the sky outside the windows has turned black and the lights on the opposite shore begin twinkling like fireflies, everything is in its place. The waiting staff stand poised in the grand dining room, ready to offer flutes of Prosecco to the guests as they arrive, and a wonderful aroma of slow-cooked beef and garlic is wafting up the stairs from the kitchen. Sal has allowed me to totally outdo myself with the decorations, and strings of fairy lights in various colours are
arranged around pictures and door frames. Each table has been set with the hotel’s finest silver, and on my suggestion, Shelley has designed song request cards to be handed over to the DJ while everyone’s eating. She seems completely oblivious to my strung-out mood, and pulled me to one side as soon as I came back downstairs in my dress to tell me how much she fancies the local guy I hired to lay the temporary dance floor. This wouldn’t usually surprise me, except that the man in question isn’t all that much taller than me – basically a good six inches below Shelley’s normal height threshold. Then again, he has spent most of the afternoon down on all fours working, so perhaps she hasn’t realised.
The disco part of the evening is taking place in the ballroom, and from there the guests will be able to slip out through the old-fashioned French windows and across the manicured lawn in time to watch the fireworks at midnight. There’s a vast Christmas tree dominating one corner, and mistletoe hangs in the doorways leading through to the dining room and reception. It all feels festive and fun, exactly as I painstakingly planned it to, but I disloyally can’t wait for the whole night to be over. Ever since I realised earlier exactly where I knew Lucy from, a horrible thought has been creeping its way through my insides, closing like a fist whenever I allow myself to dwell on it. I don’t want to believe that it can be true, but, if the past few months have illustrated anything at all, it’s that extremely horrible things can and do happen.
Gladys must have heard about the complimentary bubbly, because she’s the first one from the group to come down from the guest bedrooms upstairs. Bill follows in her wake, red in the face and wearing a plum-coloured suit jacket that’s straining dangerously at the button. For once, they haven’t dressed in co-ordinating colours, and I have to admit that Gladys has never looked better. She’s opted for black, just like me, but unlike me she’s clad in a jumpsuit rather than a dress, and has gone to the trouble of setting her hair in curls and applying surprisingly tasteful make-up. I felt too dazed to bother with all that in the end, settling instead for a super-high ponytail, a slick of dark-red lipstick and a simple gold chain around my neck, which was a Christmas gift from Elsie.
Not in the mood to hang out in the bar area with a newly enamoured Shelley, but reluctant to get trapped with a lurking and even more red-faced than usual Tim, I go instead to the kitchen, on the pretext of helping Luka the chef with the final preparations.
‘Taggie,’ he declares, his red cheeks shining. ‘You know I love you, but get the blooming heck out of my kitchen, yes? I have twenty-eight covers tonight.’
‘But I can help,’ I begin.
Luka shakes his lovely head and points over my shoulder towards the door.
‘Out, tesoro.’
‘I am not your darling,’ I grumble to myself as I jog back up the stairs. I know he’s only shooing me out because he knows full well that my job is to greet the guests, not carve the meat, but I still feel as if I’ve been told off. And I hate being scolded – I always have. It’s up there with people trying to look after me all the time, which is my behavioural kryptonite.
I’ve just re-emerged in the entrance hallway when Sal comes out of his office, frowning as soon as he sees me.
‘Agatha, stop running away and bloody hiding.’
He never calls me Agatha.
‘I’m not,’ I lie.
He narrows his eyes and thrusts a clipboard at me.
‘Silenzio. It is your party, so you must tick off the guests as they arrive – and Taggie.’
‘Che cosa?’
‘Smile, for God’s sake – it is a party.’
He’s right, of course he is – I need to stop feeling sorry for myself and suck up all this impotent anger, if only for a few hours. There’s a lot riding on this party, and if anything goes catastrophically wrong, I can bid my hopes of a promotion farewell. However, I decide grumpily, taking the list and standing in place just inside the big front doors, the only thing that would make me smile right now is the ground cracking open below Sal’s feet and swallowing him whole.
42
Lucy
I’m the one who sees her first.
Pete is busy counting out euros for the taxi driver, while trying and failing to thank him in Italian, so his back is still turned when I look up and spot her gawping at us in horror from the open doorway of the hotel.
‘Taggie’s here,’ I say, without preamble.
‘What? Where?’ Pete sounds as alarmed as his ex-girlfriend looks, and I glance at the two of them in turn, trying to decide what to do.
‘Oh, shit,’ he groans, rubbing his forehead in agitation.
Taggie has disappeared, but Pete is still staring at the spot where she was just standing, a muscle twitching in his jaw.
‘Do you want to leave?’ I ask gently, taking his rigid hand.
‘I don’t know,’ he says, sounding harassed. ‘What do you want to do?’
‘I think we should stay,’ I say honestly, and when he looks at me I smile encouragingly. ‘It’s New Year’s Eve, Pete. Some might say it’s the perfect time to make amends. You don’t really want to go back to London and have that horrible shouting match on the boat be the last time you spoke to her, do you?’
He screws up his face.
‘I suppose not.’
‘It’s a big place,’ I add, looking up at the vast yellow building in awe. ‘It’s not as if we’ll be sitting next to her at dinner.’
‘At this point, nothing would surprise me,’ Pete mutters, but at least he’s squeezing my hand now.
‘Let’s go in and see what happens,’ I suggest. ‘If it’s awful, or if you find it too weird, then we’ll just leave, OK?’
He smiles grimly.
‘OK.’
We both take a deep breath and head up the wide stone steps, me wobbling a bit in my high heels and Pete looking as sheepish as a dog that’s been caught with its nose in the fridge. A smart plaque on the wall next to the entrance is engraved with the words ‘Casa Alta Hotel’ and warm light spills out to greet us from a large, square-shaped reception hall. The polished wooden floor gleams, and there’s more wood panelling on sage walls. A reception desk is set back to the left, complete with a vase full of winter blooms and a brass call bell, and a faint murmur of voices is filtering out from an open door opposite the bottom of the stairs.
‘I guess we just go in,’ I say quietly, when nobody appears.
Pete grasps my hand a little tighter.
‘Come on then.’
We walk through the doorway into a long, rectangular dining room festooned with fairy lights. The walls are painted in a soft cream colour, while claret curtains tied back with a twisted length of gold rope hang by ornate windows even taller than Pete. Two vast chandeliers are casting a pleasant glow over the tables, all of which are topped with gold and white striped cloths. Silver cutlery glints, and the polite chatter from the twenty or so other guests competes with the soft sound of classical music. Taggie is nowhere to be seen.
‘Well, this is a bit fancy,’ Pete says into my ear, trying to lighten the mood, but it isn’t enough to dampen the flame of foreboding that is burning away ferociously in my gut. My instinct out on the steps was to face the music, but now that we’ve crossed the threshold, I feel nervous. The Taggie that I saw on the boat and the version I met feeding the birds were very different, and I have no idea which version of her will come out tonight. She told me she worked in a hotel, but hadn’t given me the name, and it feels wrong that Pete and I have come here to the Casa Alta. It’s her turf, and we’re invading it.
A waiter wearing a bow tie to match the curtains hurries forwards and offers us a glass of Prosecco. Pete, I notice with unease, knocks his back almost in one. We’re just heading to the makeshift bar to get him another, when our path is blocked by a middle-aged woman looking extremely glamorous in a black jumpsuit. Behind her, looking slightly less self-satisfied, is a man that I assume must be her husband, who is wearing a suit jacket at least two sizes too small.
‘I’m sorry,’ I say politely. ‘Do I know you?’
‘Will-yum and I,’ she gestures to the uncomfortable man at her side, ‘were on the boat with you a few days ago. You had a row with your boyfriend.’ As she says this last part, she stares pointedly at Pete, who glares right back at her.
I recognise her then, remember the red fleece jacket and the bossiness, and brace myself for what I know is going to be an excruciating exchange.
‘I’m glad to see the two of you have made up,’ she titters, seemingly oblivious to Pete’s intense hostility. ‘I told her to go after you, didn’t I, Will-yum?’
‘You did, Gladys,’ her husband agrees.
Pete is glowering so hard that I fear his look of fury will burn a hole right through the fabric of this woman’s outfit.
‘Right, well,’ I begin, turning to walk away, but the woman puts a cold hand on my arm.
‘You mustn’t let it worry you,’ she says, looking at me with gentle reproach. ‘Will-yum and I used to bicker all the time, but it’s only because he cares about me so much.’
Shouldn’t that be we care about each other? I think, but instead I just smile.
‘I’ll be at the bar,’ mutters Pete, and hurries away before I can protest.
‘I’m Gladys, by the way,’ the woman adds, ignoring my proffered hand and going in for a kiss on each cheek instead.
‘Lucy,’ I reply, looking over her shoulder to locate Pete.
‘The food here is very good,’ she’s telling me now. ‘Will-yum has been enjoying it a bit too much, haven’t you Will-yum?’
‘A bit too much, yes.’
‘Sorry, excuse me,’ I say, turning my back and leaving them mid-sentence. Taggie has just appeared through a second door at the far end of the dining room, and is scanning everyone’s faces. She’s pulled her hair back into a very high ponytail tonight, which makes her look far more severe than usual, and I can see the deep berry red of her lipstick from here. She looks devastating, but dangerous, too, and I shudder involuntarily. The two of us locate Pete at the same time – he’s leaning against the wall staring into space, and he looks utterly miserable – so I hurry over to reach him before Taggie does.