I had a moment of envisioning the Onslow Boys in aprons carrying out trays of devilled eggs and bite-sized sausage rolls to a trestle table and quickly had to wipe the vision from my mind out of fear of cracking up.
“Do you need any help?”
Adam paused at the staircase; he was thinking of how to respond, like he was warring with what to say. Now he really was worrying me.
I made my way up to him, standing to his side, taking in the grim lines of his troubled face.
“I promise not to indecently expose myself in public this time.”
And there it was: a ghost of a smile formed in the corner of his mouth, one that went as quickly as it appeared. Something was definitely up, something he was keeping from me. I started to feel my insides twist at the thought of what it might be. Was it about Megsy? Someone else? The thoughts in my head were racing as fast as my heart.
Come on, look at me, Adam; look at me with those eyes that I know, the kind, sparkling eyes I could recognise.
But all I got was a glance and a sad smile. “We’ll be right. See you tonight?” He playfully tapped me on the chin with his knuckles as he headed down the stairs.
“Um, yeah, sure, okay,” I said, mainly to myself, watching on as Adam made his way down the stairs and disappeared from view. We had gone from laughing, joking to cold and distant.
I didn’t know what was going on, but I sure as hell was going to find out.
I sat in the beer garden under a canopy of shadowy evergreen trees sheltering me from the afternoon sun. Rubbing my hands anxiously along my thighs, my attention shifting between the main glass sliding door into the garden and the side entrance, trying to anticipate which one Tammy would appear through. What had begun as a simple luncheon to vent out my high school-esque crush became wanting to get Tammy aside for a whole other reason, to delve into what the hell was happening with Adam and Chris.
What was he keeping from me?
My mind was a million miles away, thinking about the heated death stares between the brothers. What had made them so angry with one another? Lost in my troubled thoughts, something caught my attention, my focus lifting to a hand waving in front of my face.
OH FUCK!
My eyes were wide with horror. I sat, stunned into speechlessness, as there, right before me, stood Toby Morrison, one of two people I was meant to be hiding from this weekend.
Sprung!
“What are you doing here?” He breathed out a laugh, genuinely surprised to see me. My cover was well and truly blown; I wanted the ground to open up and for me to sink deep into the earth. I could just hear the Onslow Boys now:
You had one job to do, Ellie. One. Job. Hide!
As I sat there like a stunned mullet, in that very moment Adam, Ringer, and Sean were probably slaving away at the lake house to get tonight’s ultimate surprise of the century ready, all for me to cock it up in one fell swoop.
Toby must have read it all over my face, the sheer terror of seeing him, of all people. All humour slipped away as his dark brows knitted together in concern.
“Is everything okay?” he asked, intently studying my face, waiting for my reaction.
I swallowed, summoned all my courage, praying to the universe to give me an answer of some kind that would simply explain everything in a way that would prevent him spilling the news to Tess that I was back in town before tonight.
Think, Ellie, think!
And just as I summoned enough functioning to have my mouth gape a little, stammering through a reply, I was saved by the opening of the side glass door of the hotel, where Tammy appeared like a shining beacon of light that would prevent me from plunging into the rock face of certain doom.
“Hey, Toby!” She beamed, making her way over to him with a playful hip and shoulder, her perky ponytail swinging, like it always did. If Tammy was worried about my blown cover she certainly wasn’t showing it.
“What are you doing here?” she asked, all light-hearted; it seemed like an innocent enough question.
“Just grabbing some lunch. Where is everyone?”
My panicked eyes flicked to Tammy, who still remained calm and unwavering. Toby must have thought I was an utter freak, going by my inability to even construct a coherent sentence.
“At Sean’s,” Tammy responded without even blinking.
Was she insane? If I had blown everything by Toby seeing me then she had as good as laid breadcrumbs for a starving bird.
