“Not really,” I muttered, breaking eye contact with her to look out of the window.
“You were a real prick to those people tonight,” she said.
I shrugged.
“I presume you’ve fucked that woman Verity?”
“What makes you say that?”
“Uh… other than the fact you could cut the tension between you with a knife? There’s no way you haven’t either fucked her, or you really, really want to fuck her. And let’s be honest – if you really wanted to fuck someone, you would have done.”
“It’s complicated,” I said, looking out into the dark again. “I knew her a long time ago. It’s ancient history.”
“Didn’t seem like ancient history when she tried to burn a hole in my arm with her eyes when your hand was on it.Orwhen you acted like a massive tool the whole night. You can be a prickly pear, but I’ve never known you to be so openly rude. To be honest I wasn’t sure you were capable of that level of expressed emotion.”
I rolled my eyes. “I express emotion, Noo.”
“Not often. You’re a bit of a closed book. A sexy closed book, but a closed one. I think that’s why we’re such good mates – I express enough emotion for the both of us.”
I managed a low chuckle, but I knew it was unconvincing.
“You know it’s good, right?”
“What’s good?”
“Feelingstuff,” her tone had softened, and she was leaning forward into me, her now chip-free hand on my arm. “You can let yourself do it. Try trusting someone. Not everyone’s–”
“Kebab shop on the left, Geoff,” I said after pushing the intercom button. Geoff moved out of the traffic.
Noo sighed. “Don’t think you can distract me with food,” she said. “It won’t work.”
I raised my eyebrows as we pulled over in front of the kebab shop and she smiled. “Okay maybe it’ll work for a bit, but wewillbe discussing your emotional growth in the near future.”
I rolled my eyes as I opened the door. There was no way I was going to allow myemotional growthto be picked over. Especially not when I had a strong suspicion that I was stuck in the headspace of a crushed eighteen-year-old, instead of that of the confident, successful, thirty-nine-year-old man I should be now.
Chapter4
You were always so bloody bossy
Verity
The mistake I made was letting my anger fester. Max told me to let it go, that “we don’t want to work for that stupid sod anyway”, and I knew he was right. I told myself that it was the months of work being flushed down the toilet that had riled me up so much. That and the loss of an important job to our business. But deep down it was actually Harry’s refusal to acknowledge me and our history that had tipped me over the edge into real fury.
The crush I’d had on Harry at school had been extreme. It was the reason that I had refused to cede that safe corner of the library that he arguably did have dibs on all those years ago. Instead, I would head there whenever I had a free period or break, hoping Harry would be ensconced on that sofa and that I could plonk myself next to him.
To me he was fascinating. Most boys at that school fawned over me and would have happily flirted with me in a quiet corner of the library with very little encouragement. Harry would just frown and shift away from me to the edge of the sofa, as I sprawled out deliberately with my feet up on the radiator. I got very little conversation out of him in those first few weeks, and I used to rejoice in any tiny reaction. He’d stiffen in his seat if I lay down with my hair fanning out next to his leg. His jaw would clench if I put on my lip balm. He’d choked on his bottle of water once when I flipped fully upside-down on the sofa with my legs over the back, trying to encourage blood to my brain to help me with my maths. But it was only when I started pretending to sketch him that he broke the stalemate and actually spoke to me. It had taken half an hour of me sitting cross-legged on the sofa facing him, my sketchbook on my lap and my pencil flying over the paper, before he finally said something.
“What are youdoing?” His voice was low with annoyance, and he was looking straight at me. Direct eye contact had been a rarity up till that point, and now I was noticing how very warm his brown eyes were. Even with his eyebrows lowered and his expression set in a default scowl, it didn’t take away from their beauty – not to me.
“Sketching.”
“Are you…” he trailed off and then cleared his throat before continuing. “Are you sketchingme?”
“Yes.”
“For God’s sake, why?”
I shrugged. “Why not?”
