Page 36 of The Wedding Proposal
She threw open the windows to clear the stink of booze and put on the filter coffee, double strength. While it dripped, she ferried crockery and glassware from the saloon to the galley, loading the dishwasher and standing the rest on a worktop.
When the coffee was ready she poured herself a cup, placed the jug with mugs, cream and sugar onto a tray and took it out to the foredeck. ‘Caffeine!’ she announced, brightly.
Davie looked asleep but Loz managed a smile. ‘Is it very awful in there? I feel mean leaving it all to you, sweetie, but, honestly, Davie did make those cocktails awfully strong. Are you horribly hungover, too? Get another mug and join us.’
Elle deposited the tray on top of the ever-present cool box. ‘I don’t have a hangover and I’d rather get on. That’s what you’re paying me for.’
Loz looked stricken. ‘I was supposed to pay you yesterday and I forgot, didn’t I? I’ll settle up with you when you leave today.’
‘Thanks, that’s fine,’ said Elle, gratefully, and went back to her clearing up, which she didn’t actually mind. Restoring order suited her mood, as she moved quickly around the saloon with hot soapy water to wipe down all the horizontal surfaces — and a few vertical ones that were no longer pristine. She wanted to grit her teeth and scrub at red wine speckling white walls, to vacuum the carpet so energetically that the party debris rattled up the hose.
If only she could clean up her own life with hard work and efficiency. Hard work and efficiency she was good at. But whenever she thought she’d got her life as clean and tidy as the saloon had been pre-party, it was as if a troop of monkeys tumbled in and hurled their shit around.
Her conscience twanged. She shouldn’t include pretty, smiling Kayleigh Dunn in her vision. Kayleigh’s only crime was travelling to Malta to visit her boyfriend. She’d been pleasant towards Elle when a lot of girls in the current situation would definitely have turned into shit-hurling monkeys.
Why was Elle reeling that Kayleigh had turned up, though? Lucas had told Elle Kayleigh would be arriving any time. He’d told her.
Elle kept the doors between the saloon and the foredeck firmly closed and reached new heights of scrubbing and banging, shaking and vacuuming.
At the end of three hours, the interior of Seadancer once again shone like something from a yacht brochure. Elle was in the galley, stowing away the final load from the dishwasher, when Loz crept in, clutching the empty coffee jug.
She eyed Elle as if waiting for her to erupt with Acute Housework Disorder again. ‘Gosh, aren’t you scary, today?’
Elle found a reluctant grin. ‘I’m not scary. I was just in the mood for it.’
Loz hugged Elle with the arm not clutching the coffee jug. ‘Don’t be in a bad mood! I’m sorry I left it all for you and sat outside feeling sick. Sorry I forgot to pay you.’
Elle returned the hug. ‘I’m not in a mood with you,’ she protested. ‘Just with—’ She halted. ‘Haven’t you ever had a good housework session to make you feel better?’
‘No.’ Loz looked astounded. ‘I was thinking more about a nice wine spritzer.’
‘Great. You go sit down and I’ll bring out the wine and fizzy water.’ Elle didn’t want Loz dripping and dropping all over the nice clean galley.
Loz dimpled. ‘I was thinking cheese and biccies, too.’
‘Right.’ Elle opened the cupboard for the cracker box.
‘And we want you to come out and chill with us,’ finished Loz, persuasively. ‘You’ve earned it and it must be wine o’clock by now.’
Elle paused. ‘That does sound good.’ And a reason not to return to the Shady Lady.
Once she was seated in the shade with a much-restored Loz and newly awoken Davie, Elle realised that she’d eaten no lunch and drunk only one mug of coffee all afternoon so was able to bring joy to Loz’s heart by helping herself to a big hunk of cheese and a handful of crackers.
Davie pulled his tatty baseball cap down to shade his eyes. ‘Sorry we didn’t think to rescind the party invitation to your old flame,’ he said, gruffly, making her a spritzer that was almost entirely wine.
Elle accepted the glass with thanks. ‘That would have been tricky. Let’s not worry about it.’
Settling back in her chair and propping her feet on the cool box, Elle gave herself up to admiring the blue Mediterranean twinkling busily, the white yachts jostling at their moorings in front of the honey-coloured stone of Manoel Island.
Again, she reminded herself that this was what she’d come to Malta for, to live her new and exciting life. She was here for her.
Not to stress about the corporate competition, not to do what her parents wanted, not to live her relationship with the feeling that it was always teetering on the brink of some dread discovery. She was here to draw a line under all that.
‘Lucas’s girlfriend has arrived,’ she announced, as if she’d just remembered. ‘That should keep him occupied, shouldn’t it?’
Loz leaned forward to put her soft hand on Elle’s arm, her voice a whisper. ‘Don’t you mind, sweetie?’
Elle drank four big gulps of her drink. ‘Lucas and Elle were over long before Kayleigh turned up.’
