Текст книги "An On Dublin Street Valentine"

Автор книги: Samantha Young

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Текущая страница: 3 (всего у книги 6 страниц)

“No.” I shook my head, curling my lip in disdain. “Of course you wouldn’t because every time I try to have a conversation with you, you blow me off to take a phone call from either the office or a client. Any tiny miniscule of free time you have you spend with Belle and that’s fine because she’s more important… but it’s like you don’t even care that we haven’t had a real conversation in months or that you haven’t touched me in six weeks. Nothing but a perfunctory kiss on the lips before you leave for work in the morning. Almost like a habit rather than a desire.”

“You think I haven’t noticed?” he said, exasperated. “Of course I’ve noticed we haven’t seen much of each other, but we knew this transition would be hard at first.”

“There’s difficult and then there’s this!” I cried. “Maybe other women accept this but I won’t put up with it. I didn’t marry you so the other side of my bed would be warm at night. I married you because you’re supposed to be my best friend.”

“I am your best friend. We’re having a rough time, that’s all.”

“And Ally?”

“Is nothing.” He glared at me. “And the fact that you would think otherwise has me really fucking worried.”

I nodded slowly. “You should be, Cam. You should be worried.”

He paled. “What are you saying?”

I narrowed my eyes on him. “I’m saying I’ve been lonely for months and you haven’t reached for me, you haven’t noticed.” The tears were running too fast down my cheeks for me to keep up with wiping them so I just left them. “I’ve tried to pretend that it’s okay. It’s just a rough patch. But it’s not okay. I’m not the girl who thought she wasn’t worthy of real love anymore. I’m not her. She would have let you take her for granted. I won’t.” I shook my head. “The way I feel right now… it’s not okay. I’m not a bloody doll you can put aside while you’re too busy to play with me. I’m your wife and marriage doesn’t just magically work out. You have to work at it. And if you don’t want to do that anymore because you’re too busy with other pursuits then fine… but I’m not sticking around for it. Belle and I will find somewhere else to live. Do you understand me?”

The words had barely left my mouth and Cam was across the room, gripping my arms tight, pulling me into his body. I let out a little gasp of surprise as I tilted my head back to look up into his strained face.

“Never,” his lips trembled with emotion, “Never say that to me again. I can’t live without you.” he rested his forehead against mine, and I felt him trembling. “I’m sorry,” he whispered hoarsely. “I’m so fucking sorry I made you feel that way.”

We stood together for a moment as I let the sincerity and fear in his voice calm me somewhat.

Our breathing found pace, our inhales and exhales slowing down.

“I don’t mean to be needy,” I whispered, my cheeks burning over what I’d said to him, what I’d threatened. “It’s just not like you to not… want me.”

“I’ll always want you,” he said, his voice gruff. “I’ve just been so fucking exhausted trying to keep up with everything.”

I pulled back to look at him. “I know. I know… I just...” I shrugged, feeling guilty for even suggesting leaving him.

He nodded, his soulful eyes searing into mine. “But you’re right. I was taking you for granted. I just expected you to put up with my absence while things were tough.”

“I want to support you,” I said. “I do. But I’ve felt invisible lately.”

He sucked in a breath at those words and cupped my face. “What do I do, Jo? How do I make this better?”

I shook my head and stepped out of his embrace. I felt cold of a sudden. Wrapping my arms around my waist, I shrugged. “We work at it. Relationships take work. I guess… I guess we both took how easy it has been for granted. Things are different now. We have Belle and our jobs… we have to work a little harder at the you and me part.”

He nodded, as subdued as me. “What now?”

“I’m tired,” I said softly. “I’m going to bed.”

Fifteen minutes later we lay on our bed in the dark of our room.

We didn’t touch.

“I love you, you know that right?” Cam’s voice was thick, gruff with emotion.

I took a moment, fighting fresh tears.

“Jo?”

I nodded even though he couldn’t see me. “I love you too,” I choked out.

The bed creaked and I felt his warmth hit me as he rolled into me. He slid his arm around my waist and pulled me against him. My hands fluttered for a moment and then settled on his chest.

“I can’t believe I even made you doubt it,” he whispered, sounding agonized. “That I hurt you so much you thought about leaving me.”

“Maybe my expectations are too high.”

“No.” He stroked my hip. “Baby, no. I fucked up.”

“We’ll get back on track.” And I meant it. I was already feeling relief pour through me just being in his arms.

“But you fucked up too.”

I stiffened.

“I know I should have noticed,” he said. “But I’m also not a mind reader. It should never have gotten to this point, Jo. You should have told me that you were worried I didn’t want to be with you.” He tugged gently on my hair, tipping my head back.

I could just make out his features but I didn’t need to see them clearly to know there was anger in his eyes.

“We’re stronger than this. What happened?”

Just like that the panic was back. “It… it was a combination of things I think. I’ve been feeling a bit … a bit off about getting older,” I admitted. “With Belle turning four this year and Cole getting married soon … and us not having sex in a while … it’s all just built up. Joss was right. I kept it to myself too long. Explosion was inevitable.” I sighed, miserable with myself.

“Jo,” he said, and I could hear the incredulity in that one word, “You are still the most beautiful woman I have ever known. I will never want anyone the way I want you.”

“You have to promise,” I curled my fist in his T-shirt, “Not to disappear on me again, and I will promise to let you know what’s going on in my head.”

“I promise,” he said immediately.

I tucked my head against his chest and closed my eyes. Things weren’t magically mended between us, but we’d get there. When we were younger and just starting out we’d had the argument to end all arguments and still we made it through it.

“I’m sorry about Ally,” he said. “You’re right. I should be taking whatever chance I get to be with you and Belle. If it had been you in that office, chatting away to some guy, and I walked in on that scene with the kinds of thoughts in my head that were in yours tonight, I would have killed the guy.”

“I know Ally was just a catalyst for our bigger problems… but I didn’t like the look in her eyes when she’s looking at you, Cam, and that’s not paranoia.”

“I will make it clear I am one hundred percent not interested. I promise you that.”

I gave him the words I knew he needed to hear. “I trust you.”

“Thank you, baby.” He hugged me harder. “I love you. I will never take you for granted again.”

He held me close until eventually the tension melted out of my body and sleep reached out to take me.

***

“Baby.”

I buried deeper against my pillow, shutting out the voice that was trying to wake me. Hadn’t I just fallen asleep?

“Baby, wake up.”

I slowly opened my eyes, blinking against the glow of light in our bedroom. My bedside lamp was on and the clock radio said it was eleven thirty.

We’d gone to bed at nine o’ clock. Less than three hours ago.

What the hell?

I glanced at Cam who was sitting beside me, fully clothed. “What are you doing?” I mumbled, rubbing at my eyes. They felt swollen from crying earlier.

He took my hand. “We only have thirty more minutes left of Valentine’s Day.”

Sleepy but intrigued, I let him tug me out of bed and I followed him through the cool, dark flat in my pajamas.

When we stepped into our living room I gasped.

Candles covered the mantle over the fireplace, our coffee table and any surface that would hold one. On the floor in front of the fire Cam had set up a picnic of snacks and wine. In the middle of it all was a huge heart-shaped box of chocolates.

I stared at him in questioning awe.

“I nipped out to the twenty four hour supermarket.” He smiled coaxingly at me.

Tears pricked my eyes and I grabbed his hand. “Thank you.”

He reached for me, tugging me toward him and pressing my body against his so there wasn’t even a speck of air between our torso. “I will never fuck up like this again. I promise you that.”

I nodded. “Me neither.”

He brushed his lips over mine, a seductive whisper of promises still to come. I shivered in anticipation. I’d missed him in more ways than one.

“Come on.” He led me down onto the rug and I laughed at the mini sausage rolls and quiches he’d heated up.

“It’s all they had. It’s not quite La Cour.”

I grinned, shaking my head. “It’s perfect.”

We started eating and I just then realized how hungry I was.

“So tell me about Dee,” Cam said, sipping on his glass of wine. “Is she okay?”

I frowned, remembering how scared she’d been as we waited for the results of her screening. She’d found a lump four weeks ago but thankfully it had turned out to be a cist. “She’s fine. We got a fright but she’s fine.”

“Next time shit like that is going down you grab me by the hair, the balls, whatever the fuck you can grab, I don’t care, and you yell at me you need to talk. Okay?”

I stared into his eyes. “I will. I’m sorry I didn’t.”

He lowered his gaze and his wine, and I waited, recognizing the troubled look on his face. “Would you really try to leave me?”

I closed my eyes, wishing I’d never said that. It was the heat of the moment, it was my own pain talking.

But I’d hurt him.

“It would have to take a hell of a lot to make me leave you, Cameron MacCabe.”

He looked up at me now and I shivered at the heat, the longing… the determination in his eyes. “I would follow you, you know. I would follow you to the ends of the earth to convince you to come back to me. I will never stop fighting for you.”

And that right there…. That was one of the many reasons I loved him. “I just needed the reminder. Not everyone has a love like ours, Cam. I was terrified we were becoming just… ordinary.”

His answer to that was to push the food out of the way and crawl toward me.

My breath hitched as he nudged my legs apart and pressed his body against mine until I had no recourse but to lie back on the floor beneath him. He braced himself over me, one hand caressing my thigh.

“It’s been too long. I need to be inside you, baby.”

I nodded, speechless as arousal flushed hot and tingling between my legs and in the swell of my breasts. “I need you too.”

Cam slowly stripped me of my pajamas and his own clothes until I was lying naked in the glow of the candlelight and he was braced on his knees over me. I drank in the sight of him, of the warm light highlighting the hard, muscular body that was maintained by the gym and his martial arts training. I had to admit part of me had resented his immoveable commitment to his fitness these last few months—more time given to something else other than me.

But lying there, desire prickling my every nerve ending as I took in his masculine beauty, I had to admit I loved the outcome of his commitment. My gaze moved up to his face and my breath caught in my throat at the expression in his eyes.

“I was right you know… all those years ago.”

My brows drew together at his cryptic comment.

“When I said no man could possibly deserve you.”

Tears stung my eyes at the memory. “You’re stunning. No man could possibly deserve you.” Cam had said that to me the first night we were together. It wasn’t something a woman easily forgot.

But it was an insanely beautiful realization that Cam hadn’t forgotten one thing about that night either. A tear slid down my cheek and he came slowly down over me, one hand on my hip, the other cupping my face so he could wipe my tear with his thumb. “I will make this up to you,” he repeated hoarsely, his own eyes bright with emotion.

And I knew him well enough to know that he’d be kicking his own arse for weeks to come about this.

I sought to soothe him, as he had soothed me. “You already are.”

On that he kissed me softly, sweetly as he slid his hand between my legs and caught his thumb on my clit. I sighed in pleasure, arching into his touch as he circled my clit, need swirling low in my belly.

Just as the tension was about to break in me he broke our kiss and removed his thumb.

My eyes flashed in unfilled desire.

A small, playful smirk curled the corners of his delicious mouth and I cried out his name as he slipped two thick fingers inside of me.

“Look at me, Jo,” he demanded and I did as he asked.

Our eyes held and locked as he wound me up with his fingers, his own eyes darkening with a deepening arousal as he watched my eyes dilate, as he listened to me pant his name over and over.

I came on a cry of relief and he grasped my wrists, held my hands above my head and began to thrust into me.

Light flared in his eyes as he looked down at me. Not once, as he pumped his hips against mine, as the sweat began to bead across his skin, as the muscles in his jaw clenched with his effort to hold his release in check, did my husband once break eye contact with me.

I wanted to touch him but every time I tried to move my hands he pressed them down harder to the floor.

“Do you see?” he groaned, his thrusts coming faster and harder. “Do you see what you do to me? Only you. Only you…”

On those words I cried out his name again, my inner muscles rippling around him as I came.

“Johanna,” he called out as his hips stilled and then jerked against mine as his own hard climax rocked him.

He rested his forehead against my chest as he tried to catch his breath.

“I think we both needed that,” I whispered, amused and sated.

Cam looked at me and released my wrists to rest his hands on my waist. I circled his shoulders with my arms and wrapped my legs around him, holding him inside me, tight to me.

“You and Belle,” he whispered, his words somber. “You mean everything to me.”

Tonight had left us both raw, but whereas I was much calmer now, much more at ease, made so by his reassurances, Cam was unsure. I could see the panic buried deep in the back of his eyes. He didn’t know if I believed him. And I had a feeling he was going to spend the next few months trying to prove his love to me. As much as that would be lovely, I didn’t want Cam feeling the way I had felt for the last few months.

“I believe you,” I whispered. “I promise that I believe you.”

He coasted his hands up and down the sides of my waist in a soothing, comforting caress. “It’s Saturday tomorrow.”

“It is.”

“You, me and Belle. This whole weekend. Just us.”

“No work?” I said, hopeful.

“I’m switching my phone off.”

I grinned. “That sounds fun.”

“Mmm.” He brushed his mouth over mine. “I think it’ll start with a sleep-in.”

“Oh?”

“You’re going to be very, very tired, Mrs. MacCabe.” He grinned cockily. “But very, very satisfied.”

I laughed and he grinned harder at the sound. “Do your worst, Mr. MacCabe. We’ve got all night.”

“Correction,” He said gruffly. “We’ve got forever.”

I bit my lip on a smile. “You’re the quite the romantic this evening.”

“Well.” He shrugged nonchalantly. “It is Valentine’s Day. I don’t mind putting in the effort.”

I playfully pushed at him and he shook with laughter, peppering me with teasing kisses and tickling fingers that I tried to avoid. My failure at both caused my squealing laughter to fill the flat, Cam’s deeper amusement joining it and making my home feel familiar and beautiful again.

Olivia and Nate

“Liv, have you seen my fisheye lens?” Nate yelled from his office at the back of the house.

I gently brushed January’s soft hair into pigtails. “Why do you need your fisheye lens?”

“Mummy, can I have some gummy bears?” Lily asked from the kitchen.

“Because I’m doing that magazine shoot this morning! We’ll be experimenting with shots and the fisheye lens might come in handy!” Nate shouted, sounding exasperated.

He was late.

He hated being late.

“Well the lens should be with your equipment.” I kissed the top of January’s head and she hopped off the arm of the sofa and hurried off into the kitchen to be with her big sister.

“Mummy? Gummy bears?”

“No, Lily.” I followed Jan into the kitchen to find Lily clutching a mini bag of chewy fruity bears. “Sweetheart, those are for recess. Eat your banana and yoghurt.”

“It’s called playtime not recess and I’ve already eaten my banana and yoghurt.” Lily pouted.

“Liv!”

I gritted my teeth at Nate’s yelling as I plucked a banana from the fruit bowl and handed it to Lily. “Have another and watch your sister while I help your dad.”

Hurrying toward his office I thrust open the door to find him rummaging manically through a drawer. “Why isn’t it with the rest of your stuff?”

“How the fuck should I know?” He snapped. “Every time you put something down in this house it takes a walk.”

“Okay, calm down and think. When was the last time you used the fisheye?”

He ran a hand through his dark hair, hair that was starting to show sprinklings of grey in the edges. That and the wrinkles around his eyes that had appeared from his (usually) excessive smiling did nothing to detract from his masculine beauty.

Often, when taking time to admire how gorgeous my husband was, I got tingles between my legs and a sudden switch to an amorous attitude. Not today, however. Today was Valentine’s Day and as much as Nate and I enjoyed mocking the commercialism and general hokeyness of the day, he always acknowledged it by giving me flowers in the morning.

Not today.

Nada today.

Except he was uncharacteristically grumpy.

“I don’t know.” He shrugged. “It’s been a while.”

“Was it for that article you did for the paper… I remember it being distorted… you know the picture of Portobello Beach. The history piec—”

“You’re a genius!” He pointed at me. “I gave the bloody lens to Mikael that day and he didn’t give me the fucker back.”

“Nate the girls are just down the hall,” I reminded him.

“Sorry,” he mumbled. “I’ve got to go. I’ll call Mikael and get him to bring the lens.”

I had no idea who Mikael was but I nodded since it was getting my husband out of the house. The girls were due at school and I was due at work and I just needed him and his bad mood gone.

He grabbed his equipment and gave me a peck on the lips as he passed. “See you later.”

Following him out into the hall I watched as he dumped his equipment and hurried into the kitchen. Standing in the doorway I looked on as he lifted January up into the air making her giggle and squeal before he peppered her face with kisses that made her laugh harder. Once she was safely on her feet he turned to Lily and enfolded her in his arms, chasing her cheeks with kisses as she squirmed and laughed at him to get off of her.

The sight made my chest ache with its beauty.

“Bye girls. See you later.” He flashed me a quick smile as he passed me and I tried to ignore the way the ache in my chest suddenly turned into a painful knot.

The door slammed shut behind him and I clapped my hands and grinned at the girls, covering my dour mood. “Time for school. First one to the door with their shoes, coat and schoolbag gets an extra bag of gummy bears.”

The girls giggled and started hurrying to get ready.

***

I stormed through the security gate at the main campus library of the University of Edinburgh where I worked as head librarian for the User Services department. I was promoted to Librarian three years ago when my boss Angus took early retirement and high-tailed it to Greece with his civil partner.

“Olivia, there you are,” Ronan, my longest serving colleague hurried toward me as I dashed behind the help desks toward the staff room. “The reserve section self-service check in check out system crashed this morning but we just got it up and running five minutes ago. I’ve left a few frantic messages for you.”

“Sorry.” I shrugged out of my coat and threw it over my chair. “Bad start to the day. It’s running you say?”

“Yeah, it’s fixed.”

“Good. So why are you still looking at me like the roof of the building is on fire?”

He frowned at me. “Because I didn’t know what to expect. Irritations such as system failures tend to make you very depressed lately.”

“I’m not depressed.” I grabbed a hold of the weekly schedule to remind myself what I was doing this morning. I was on reshelving. Great. Alone time. “I’m fine.” Ronan snorted at my back but I ignored him and made my way to the carts that were loaded with the books for reshelving. “If I’m needed, page me.”

As I rode the elevator up to the second floor, I mused over Ronan’s comment. I hadn’t been myself lately. I hadn’t been myself lately because Nate hadn’t been himself lately.

It wasn’t the sex, I thought as I started working. Sex with us was always easy and great so it wasn’t the sex. It was just… lately I felt like we were drifting a little. We both had work and the girls so the only time we really had alone was at night in bed and well… we had sex instead of talking.

And Nate and I did great banter.

I missed the banter.

Don’t get me wrong I loved our girls and I loved the four of us hanging out because we had great fun. I was probably being a spoiled child even thinking of complaining about what we had.

But this morning… well that was new and I didn’t like it. Nate didn’t wake me up with a kiss and a cuddle like he usually did. And there were no flowers and there were always flowers on Valentine’s Day. In fact he hadn’t even mentioned the day, even not to make a crack at it.

This morning he just rolled out of bed and hurried into the shower. He barely said two words to me as I walked into the bathroom as he was coming out. He just said something about needing to be fast because he had an early start and that he would make his own coffee.

The most he’d said to me was when he was yelling about that fisheye lens.

And then the peck on the lips.

The peck!

We did not peck.

Unsettled I shoved a book onto a shelf and lost myself in thought. Had we hit that point? That inevitable point in marriage? That inevitable point that I never actually believed was inevitable for us?

That point where we just… start taking one another for granted.

I blinked back the burn of tears at the thought, finding myself overwhelmingly upset by the idea.

After almost eight years of marriage and with no sign of falling into that trap I thought we were sure to escape it. Of course like all couples we’d reached a comfortable familiarity and sometimes we bickered, but we’d never lost that need for one another, emotionally or physically.

Oh God.

Was the peck the beginning of the end?

***

“So when did he start with the lip pecking?” Ellie asked as we shared a coffee over lunch at a café just around the corner from the university.

Ellie was a professor and tutor in the art history department and whenever we could we met up for lunch.

I frowned. “Just this morning. But he completely forgot Valentine’s Day.”

“I thought Nate believes Valentine’s Day is just one giant commercial puppet trick.”

Those were his exact words actually. “True, but—”

“Liv, it’s one day. You’re really getting this upset over one peck and one missed Valentine’s Day?”

I grimaced. “You’d be pissed if Adam forgot Valentine’s Day.”

“Of course I would. I’m a romantic. You are a semi-romantic. And Valentine’s Day has never been a big deal to you.”

“We’re just… we don’t get to hang out alone anymore and I understand that that is a part of being parents,” I sighed heavily. “I would probably be more okay with it if I knew he missed our alone time as much as I do.” I groaned. “I sound like an awful mother. I’m not. I love my kids and I don’t know what I’d do without the girls but Nate and I haven’t had a real conversation in—”

Ellie held her hand up cutting me off. “Liv, no one thinks you’re a bad mother okay. Calm down. It’s hard. We all know it is. You have to work at it. Make time. Why does the ball have to be in Nate’s court?”

I sat back and processed that. Ellie was right. As a modern woman it was kind of shocking of me to place all of the romantic responsibility on Nate. “You’re right. It’s unfair to put the expectation on him. Perhaps I can get Nathan and Sylvie to look after the girls next weekend.” They were Nate’s parents and they’d helped us out before in the past.

“Doesn’t hurt to ask.”

“Olivia?”

At the deep, somewhat familiar, male voice I looked up from my lunch to see a tall, good-looking guy standing over our table. I stared at him until his gorgeous light green eyes caused recognition to hit me.

“Ben?” I pushed back my chair and stood up. “Benjamin Livingston?”

“She remembers me.” He grinned at me before pulling me in for a hug that I returned happily.

This guy, this handsome tall Scotsman was the reason Nate and I were together. I’d had a crush on Ben when he was a post-grad student at the university and I’d ask Nate to help me become more confident and seductive to win Ben over. Of course in doing so I ended up falling for Nate and vice versa, but during the ‘down’ moments of our ‘courtship’ I’d spent time with Ben and he was a great guy.

He pulled back, still smiling. “You must still work at the library?”

“I do. I’m head librarian now.”

“Hot.” He grinned and Ellie laughed drawing his attention. “Hi, nice to meet you.”

“Oh we met once before.”

He studied her and then nodded. “Ellie, right?”

“Right. Good memory!”

Still stunned to see him after all this time I found myself asking, “Do you have time to sit with us?”

Ben nodded. “If you’re sure?”

“Of course.”

“Let me just grab something to eat.”

Once he was out of earshot Ellie leaned across the table and said in a low voice, “How funny. And he hasn’t changed a bit.”

It was funny to see him of all people on a day when I was feeling so nostalgic for the early days in my relationship with Nate. To clarify I was nostalgic for the post-Benjamin days. Nothing in the world could make me want to relive the angst of being with Nate but not really being with Nate, breaking up with Nate and thinking I’d lost him forever.

“So, how are things?” Ben said without preamble as he sat at the table with us.

“Really good.” I lifted my diamond-adorned left hand. “Married. With two girls.”

“To whom?”

I blushed, remembering how he stepped back from pursuing a relationship with me because of Nate. “Nate Sawyer.”

“Like I didn’t already know that.” He said and then held up his left hand where a platinum wide band encircled his ring finger. “Three years. Her name is Jules and she’s pregnant with our first kid.”

“I’m happy for you,” I said with genuine feeling.

“I’m happy for you too.” He smiled and then turned politely to Ellie.

She answered before he even asked. “Married to my brother’s best friend even though it was like pulling teeth to get him to even attempt a relationship with me. We have two little boys, Will and Braden, and they are quite possibly the cutest kids known to man.”

Ben laughed at her oversharing. “That’s great. And any plans for Valentine’s Day, ladies?”

“Dinner and a party a colleague is hosting. You?” Ellie said.

“Well I actually live in Aberdeen now but we came back home for my mum and dad’s fortieth wedding anniversary. The celebrations are lasting a whole week.” He shook his head, laughing I assumed at his family. “Jules is being dragged around while my mother picks out baby clothes, and I tried to tag along but my mother is adamant when she wants something and she wants alone time with Jules, so I decided to grab some lunch and do some work.” He patted the laptop bag at his feet.

I eyed the bag. “What do you do now that you’re no longer a student?”

“I’m an academic.” He shrugged. “There’s nothing much else out there for a guy with a PhD in history but to continue on. I’m a professor at the University of Aberdeen.”

“That’s wonderful.”

“Thanks. You still happy at the library?”

“Very. It keeps me busy. So do the girls.”

“No plans for Valentine’s Day tonight then? Are you like me and Jules… at the mercy of our family?”

I shook my head, feeling that annoying little knot I knew shouldn’t feel. It was just Valentine’s Day for goodness sake! “Nope. No plans.”

***

“Liv, your phone is ringing in your bag.” Angie, one of my library assistants rushed out to the help desk. “It keeps ringing. Someone clearly wants to get a hold of you.”

Worried, I let her take over with the student I was helping and hurried into the staff room to rummage through my bag for my phone. I shot apologetic looks at the staff that were trying to work as I looked at the screen.

It was Nate.

I called him back, locking myself in one of the staffroom toilets.

“Hey, babe. I tried you a few times,” he said.

“I know, is it urgent? Why didn’t you call the office?”

“Because it’s not urgent.”

“Then why try me three times?”

“Because I want to talk to you.”

Hearing the rumble of affection in his voice I slumped down on the closed toilet seat and smiled, that little knot in my chest loosening a little. “Yeah? About?”

“Your day. I had to rush out of the house this morning so fast I didn’t even kiss you properly. I felt bad.”

Relief whooshed over me. “Yeah, I noticed.”

“Aye, I know you would have noticed that, that’s why I’m calling to make sure you know I noticed it too.”

“Well I appreciate that.” I laughed softly. “Is that all you were calling about?”

“I’m on a break so I just thought I’d call. If you have to get back to work though it’s fine.”

“Nope.” I shook my head, enjoying hearing his voice too much to let him go just yet. “How did the shoot go?”

“Great. Mikael turned up with the bloody lens, which was good because we needed it after all. How’s your day been so far?”

I thought about the strange meeting. “You’ll never guess who Ellie and I bumped into and ended up having lunch with.”

“Who?”

“Do you remember Ben?”

There was silence on the end of the line.

“The postgrad guy?” I offered.

“Yeah I know who it is, Liv,” he said, sounding a little impatient. “Why did you have lunch with him?”

Hearing the edge of jealousy in his voice I rolled my eyes. “He’s married. Her name is Jules and she’s pregnant.”

“And if I hadn’t been in the picture her name would probably have been Olivia.”

“Oh come on.” I sighed. “It was just two old friends having lunch with another friend. I thought you’d find it funny. It was weird to see him after all this time. And on today of all days.”