It was still dark when I woke up, and it took a moment for my eyes to adjust. I was in my room, I was in my bed, but I was very, very naked. Oh no. I rolled over to the edge of the mattress and patted the floor until I could find something underwear-shaped. But when I held them up to face height, they were not my pants. They were man pants. Instinctively I threw them across the room – no one wanted a pair of boxers that close to their face unless they were being worn by Michael Fassbender – and turned over very slowly, very carefully, to see Nick lying beside me. Sliding my legs over the side of the bed, I followed the trail of clothes back out to the living room, wincing at the assorted sex injuries that made themselves known as I moved. If shagging Charlie had been like riding a bike, then Nick was a mechanical bull. Fast asleep, face down in a mound of pillows, he looked so different. All I wanted was to get back into bed and stroke his hair gently until he woke up and shagged me senseless again. I was romantic like that.
Replaying the action in my mind, I pulled on my knickers as well as a T-shirt I picked up en route and surveyed the damage. The apartment was quite a scene. We’d knocked vases off tables, tipped over chairs, and there were cushions everywhere. I placed a hand on the small of my back, gingerly pressing to test bruises and friction burns. How had I managed friction burns in a cottage with hardwood floors? I glanced back towards the bathroom. Ahh, bath mat. Wow, we really had given the entire place the once-over.
‘Hey.’
Nick was awake. In the darkened bedroom, his voice sounded softer than before. Husky. From sleep or sex – I wasn’t sure which. Either way it made me want his hands on me.
‘Hi,’ I replied, still standing in the living room, staring back into the bedroom. I was so pleased about the darkness: he couldn’t see me blushing.
‘So I feel like I should mention it now, before it’s a thing …’ He sat up and stretched. Hot, hot, hot. ‘But you know, this is just what it is. I’m a much better shag than I am a boyfriend.’
I stared. I felt a bit sick. I nodded.
‘I know we’re on the same page, anyway,’ Nick said, patting the empty bed beside him. ‘It’s just usually best to make everything really clear. Just in case.’
‘Just in case?’ I asked.
‘Well, I wouldn’t want you to go falling in love with me,’ he said with a laugh. ‘Come back to bed.’
‘Actually, I’m really tired.’ I picked up his jeans and threw them at him. ‘And I sleep a lot better alone.’
‘Seriously?’ Nick grabbed the jeans and clung to them, showing no sign of actually putting them on. ‘You’re kicking me out?’
‘I wouldn’t want you to get the wrong idea,’ I replied, burning with anything but desire and making a beeline for the bathroom. ‘You can see yourself out.’
I sat myself down on the toilet and angrily scrubbed at my face with a cleansing wipe until I heard the front door slam. How dare he warn me not to fall in love with him? How dare he think I would get ideas? How dare he assume we were ‘on the same page’? Even though we were. Definitely. What an arsehole. I stopped rubbing when my face started burning from something other than shame and leaned back against the cold porcelain of the toilet cistern. Tossing the face wipe into the bin, I went back into the bedroom and straightened up my messy bed. I shook out the sheets and turned over all the pillows. The last thing I wanted to do was turn over in the night and get a whiff of wanker. I’d wanted a one-night stand and now I’d had a one-night stand. Tick box. And now it was time to sleep. But of course I couldn’t sleep. There was only one thing for it. I picked up my phone and asked Siri to call the only person I had left to talk to.
‘Tess?’
‘Amy,’ I said. ‘I’m a knob.’
‘Me too – I shouldn’t worry,’ Amy replied, her voice all tinny and far away. ‘Any particular reason? Above and beyond the obvious?’
‘I shagged a bad man.’ I rolled over and stared at the empty space beside me, pressing my hand into the pillows where Nick’s head had been.
‘I know.’
‘Oh no, another one,’ I clarified. ‘Here in Hawaii.’
‘That’s fast work.’ Amy sounded horribly impressed. ‘Who? Where? How? I want all the gory details. I haven’t had sex in months, and you’ve been shagged twice in a week? I’m horribly jealous.’
‘He’s a journalist for the magazine,’ I replied, eyes locked on the handprint in the pillows, imagining Nick still lying there, still asleep. ‘I have a horrible feeling I may have just shat were I intend to eat.’
‘You are talking figuratively, aren’t you?’ she asked. ‘Just making sure this isn’t the start of a different story.’
‘Figuratively,’ I confirmed. ‘And it was stupid. He’s a complete twat.’
‘Hot twat?’
‘The hottest.’
‘Oh my God, your life is turning into a Taylor Swift song. This is amazing.’ She didn’t sound too concerned. ‘Really, Tess, what’s the problem? You shagged a hot man. It’s good – it’s sorbet sex. Palate cleanser. Get the taste of tit-face Charlie out of your vag.’
‘That’s so poetic.’ She was disgusting sometimes. ‘Have you heard from him?’
‘No,’ she answered. ‘And don’t change the subject. Tell me about this foxy wanker who charmed your iron knickers off.’
‘I have no idea what happened, really. I think pretending to be Vanessa is getting to me,’ I said with half a yawn. Hearing Amy’s voice was like having a warm bath and a hot chocolate. ‘I saw him, I hated him, and then I wanted to have sex with him. And then I did. I didn’t even really have to try. It was mental.’
‘Women don’t really have to try – how many times have I told you?’ she said. ‘You just need to be, like, oi, big boy, let’s have it. And if they don’t respond, they’re not worth having. Or gay. Or both.’
‘I’m not sure I agree with that, but OK,’ I muttered, trying to remember whether or not I’d called Nick ‘big boy’ at any point in the past two days. It wouldn’t have been inaccurate, but it would have been indelicate at best. ‘I’m just mad at myself because he’s such a knob. I don’t even like him.’
‘So hate-fuck him until you go blind, come home and never think about him again,’ Amy suggested as though it were completely rational. ‘And you’re always mad at yourself. Or feeling guilty. Or feeling guilty about being mad. You are allowed to just enjoy yourself, you know.’
‘I am?’ That was a scandalous new concept.
‘Really, Tess, you’ve got to stop calling me from fucking Hawaii and complaining. Ooh, I’m in paradise. Ooh, I’ve shagged a gorgeous man. Ooh, I just found a magical pony that shits diamonds. Just get on with it.’
‘I haven’t found a …’ It took me a second to understand what she was getting at. ‘Fine. Sorry. I just feel a bit gross, that’s all.’
‘Because you had sex with a hot man?’
‘Because I had sex with a hot man who I don’t know and don’t like.’
‘Honestly, Tess Sigourney Brookes.’ Amy was starting to get annoyed. ‘It’s like feminism never happened with you sometimes.’
‘How is this feminism?’ I was starting to wish I’d never called. ‘How am I progressing women’s rights by letting a bad man put his penis in me?’
‘Have you never seen Sex and the City? And I’m fine. Thanks for asking.’
Oh, bloody hell – of course. Amy had lost her job. I’d completely forgotten.
‘I’m sorry, I’m just so tired. It’s like five in the morning or something, isn’t it? I wasn’t thinking. Are you OK? Have you found a new job yet?’
‘I don’t really want to talk about it right now,’ she snapped, and then sighed, softening at once. We weren’t very good at being mad with each other. ‘Don’t worry about it. Don’t worry about any of it. Come Sunday, you’re never going to see any of these people again, are you? So just have fun before you have to come home and live in the real world again.’
She’d made a good – and worrying – point.
‘Thank you for being amazing,’ I said, fighting full-on yawns by now. And rightly so. I was jet-lagged, mentally exhausted from All Of The Lying, and physically exhausted from All Of The Sex. ‘I don’t know what I’d do without you.’
‘You’re welcome,’ she replied. ‘And you’d die. You’d actually just die.’
‘I’m going to sleep.’ I was smiling again. ‘Talk to you later.’
‘Not if it’s to tell me you found Aladdin’s lamp,’ Amy said. ‘Love you.’
‘Love you too,’ I said, waiting for the double beep to tell me she’d hung up before I set my phone back on the nightstand and fell fast asleep.
The thing I’d learned first about Paige was that she was not shy about personal boundaries. Having already demonstrated how very comfortable she was with letting herself into my cottage, she had clearly decided it was perfectly reasonable for her to come into my bedroom while I was still fast asleep.
‘Morning, sleepyhead,’ she said, tapping me briskly on the top of the head until I opened my eyes, a steaming mug of coffee in her hand. Not for me. ‘How are you still asleep? It’s almost ten.’
‘Oh shit’ I rubbed my eyes and tried not to upset any of my injuries. I was sore everywhere and I didn’t really want to have to explain why to Paige. ‘What time are we meeting Bennett?’
‘We’re not,’ Paige said with a frown. ‘He’s cancelled. Again. We’re meeting his son in half an hour, though. It would seem Daddy dearest is being a bit of a diva and his son is going to explain what’s going on.’
‘He has a son?’ I was a bit surprised. But then, as Amy often liked to remind me, even Elton John was married.
‘Yeah, he’s taking over the business. Has taken over the business. I don’t know, actually, I’m only the art director. They tell me naahthing.’
‘So Nick’s going to interview the son?’ I was confused. And still so very tired. It was all I could do not to swipe that coffee cup out of her perfectly manicured hand.
‘I don’t know.’ Paige shook her head. ‘If it’s all we get, it’s all we get. But will anyone care? I mean, who wants to know about the business brain? How often do you read about Robert Duffy compared with Marc Jacobs?’
‘Who?’ I asked.
‘You are funny,’ she said. ‘I keep forgetting you’re not actually Vanessa. Or in fashion. Or a photographer.’
Exactly what I needed to be reminded of first thing in the morning.
‘Not that I’ve got time to worry about that.’ She slapped my duvet-covered arse and stood up. ‘Come on, out of bed. Up and at ’em.’
‘You’re looking very fresh considering the state of you last night,’ I commented on my way into the bathroom. Paige followed. Surely she didn’t think we were going to chat while I had a shower? She sat down on the toilet, lid down, and looked up at me, wide eyes bright and sparkling. Oh. She did.
‘Berocca, eye drops and four of these,’ she said, holding up the coffee. ‘And I work in fashion, darling. If you can’t get your shit together the morning after, you may as well fuck off to the teen mags where no one cares what state you’re in.’
‘Nice.’ I turned on the shower, waited for it to steam up the glass screen and pulled my clothes off as quickly as possible, disappearing under the stream of red-hot water and rinsing off all the residual sleep and sex.
‘Anyway, what state did you come home in?’ Paige shouted over the shower. ‘Why are your clothes all over the living room? Did you get lucky or are you just a scruffy cow?’
‘Scruffy cow,’ I yelled as fast as I could. ‘I was just so tired I couldn’t wait to get into bed. And drunk. I was drunk.’
I hadn’t forgotten Paige throwing herself at Nick the night before. Conveniently, I had completely forgotten it while I was having all of the sex with him, but now it was a very clear memory, shining brightly in the front of my mind. And it did not fill me with joy.
‘Is Nick coming to the meeting?’ I asked as casually as humanly possible.
‘In theory.’ Paige’s reply was full of equally feigned nonchalance. ‘I sent him a text. He wasn’t answering when I knocked on his door. I hope he isn’t dead.’
‘Ha, me too,’ I agreed, not entirely sure I meant it. ‘So, tell me how you know him?’
‘Oh, we’ve worked together a few times over the years – different mags and stuff, you know? He’s always been a bit of a flirt, I’ve always been a bit of a flirt. Nothing serious, though – he’s just not that kind of bloke.’
‘What kind of bloke?’ I scrubbed myself red-raw with coconut-scented shower gel to get every last trace of him off me in case I didn’t like her answer.
‘The decent kind,’ she laughed. ‘The kind that takes you out for dinner and says nice things and texts in between shags.’
‘So you’ve slept with him?’ I poked my head out of the shower and grabbed a towel, suddenly feeling very sick. This must have been exactly how Vanessa didn’t feel when she realized we’d both had sex with Charlie.
‘Oh no.’ She flapped her empty hand around her face. ‘Not for the want of trying. I don’t know – I really like him, but he doesn’t do girlfriends. Everyone knows that and I’m not one of those girls who shags the guy she likes, even though he’s a tosspot, and hopes he’ll eventually realize how great she is. That’s just asking for trouble.’
‘What if it’s a guy you don’t like?’
‘Entirely different matter.’ Paige stood up and ventured back into the bedroom. ‘Get dressed, we’re going to be late. We can discuss my plan to make an honest man out of Nick Miller later.’
‘Can’t wait,’ I said weakly.
Bleurgh.
I could hardly believe how fresh-faced Kekipi looked when we got to the main house. Even though I hadn’t been that drunk and had managed to grab at least six hours of decent sleep, I was fully aware that I looked like shit, whereas he and Paige looked like they were fresh out of the spa. And I never looked like shit because I always got a full eight hours’ and I never spent Tuesday nights drinking cocktails with fifteen gay strangers and banging a bad man. Either someone was going to have to teach me how to use concealer or I was going to have to go back to my old life sooner than anticipated.
‘Can I get you anything else to eat?’ Kekipi asked, the very model of professionalism, while gesturing towards the spread already laid out on the table. ‘Mr Bennett will be with you momentarily.’
‘I’d take your arm off for a fried-egg butty,’ Paige muttered, turning her head away from all the sushi on the table. However fresh she looked, she clearly didn’t feel it. ‘Fish? For breakfast?’
‘Mr Bennett’s request,’ Kekipi explained. ‘One fried-egg butty. And Miss Vanessa?’
‘Oh, that’s me,’ I said, just slightly too loudly. Paige quirked an eyebrow and shook her head. ‘I’m fine, actually. Thank you.’
As soon as he was gone, I grabbed a plate and piled it high with tiny sugary-looking pastries. I needed carbs and I needed them now.
‘Before we start, are you actually going to be able to pull this off?’ Paige asked, looking me dead in the eye. ‘This whole Vanessa thing?’
‘Yes?’ I didn’t even sound like I believed myself. ‘It’s fine.’
‘Good,’ she replied. ‘Because if you fuck up now I know, we’ll both be in for it.’
‘Really, though …’ I choked down a mini Danish and shrugged. ‘What would happen if someone found out? How bad could it be?’
‘Bennett would probably pull the interview altogether. I’d get fired. The magazine would probably sue Vanessa’s agent. They’d definitely sue you.’ she started to tick off the options on her fingers. ‘Bennett could sue us. The possibilities are endless. They mostly involve people getting sued.’
I lowered the pastry back down to the plate.
‘I really hadn’t thought past Vanessa kicking the shit out of me,’ I whispered. ‘Bloody hell.’
‘And that’s assuming the photos are good enough to use in the first place,’ Paige smiled sweetly. ‘If they aren’t, assume all of that and more.’
‘Good photos.’ I stared at my feet. ‘Gotcha.’
‘Amazing photos,’ Paige corrected. ‘The best photos anyone has ever seen.’
‘But Vanessa isn’t actually a very good photographer,’ I pointed out. ‘Surely adequate photos would be enough.’
‘The best photos anyone has ever seen,’ Paige repeated, slowly this time. ‘Or you won’t need to worry about Vanessa kicking your arse because I’ll have already handed it to you on a plate, yeah?’
‘On a plate.’ I nodded to show I understood. ‘Best photos ever.’
‘Glad we’re clear,’ she replied. ‘Ah, Mr Miller, at last.’
I hadn’t expected to have a physical reaction to seeing Nick, but as he strode up the path, all grumpy face and Wayfarers, I wanted to get up from the table and dive into the sea. His pale blue shirt was creased to hell and his khaki shorts looked like they weren’t buttoned up properly at the fly. He did not look like a man who had enjoyed a good night’s sleep in a luxury villa in Hawaii. He looked like a man who had spent the night shagging someone rotten and then spent a couple of hours tossing and turning until the sun came up.
Interesting.
He leaned across the table, right in front of me, just to make me jump. Without a word he grabbed the coffee pot, poured a full mug then threw in several sugar lumps in complete silence. Paige glanced at me, trying not to smile, as he took the seat at the far end of the table as far away from the two of us as possible.
‘Where’s Bennett?’ he asked after two long sips of coffee. ‘He’s late.’
‘So are you, sunshine,’ Paige replied. ‘Bad night?’
Even though he didn’t take off his sunglasses, I knew he was staring straight at me.
‘I’ve had better,’ he said with an entirely straight face, while I coloured up from head to toe. ‘I’ve had worse.’
‘Looks like you went through the wringer.’ I was determined not to let him win. ‘Sometimes it’s best just to let sleep come naturally. When you try too hard, you just end up frustrated.’
‘Oh, don’t worry, I’m not frustrated,’ he replied swiftly. ‘But you don’t look so clever yourself. Maybe you could do with trying a bit harder.’
‘Now, now, children,’ Paige intervened, entirely oblivious to the extreme level of bitchy subtext flying across the table. ‘Let’s not have fisticuffs. We need to sort out this Bennett sitch, and I don’t really want to have to do that on my own. Can we kiss and make up?’
Nick turned up one corner of his mouth and nodded. ‘I’m game if you are, Vanessa.’
‘I think she means figuratively,’ I said, adding cream to my coffee. ‘I’m a professional.’
‘Really?’ He rested his elbows on the table and pushed his glasses up over his eyebrows. ‘I probably owe you some money then.’
Before Paige had time to question Nick’s jibe or my look of outrage, the glass door to the house slid open to reveal a tall, slender man wearing a Hawaiian shirt and cargo shorts. Despite his ensemble, I knew it was Mr Bennett Junior right away. He was the spit of his father. The clothes were casual but tailored to his body perfectly, his grey hair was stylishly cut, and even though he had to be somewhere in his mid-forties, he was a striking man. And not just because he had the most amazing handlebar moustache I had ever seen. On cue, he twirled one of the ends and waited until he had our full attention.
‘Aloha.’ Mr Bennett the younger held his arms out as he approached the table and made his way round to shake everyone’s hand. ‘Apologies for my lateness. I hope you haven’t been waiting too long.’
His accent seemed to be American, but he was attempting to affect something of a little British lilt and it wasn’t quite working. Nonetheless, he was an imposing figure. Just ever so slightly funny at the same time. It could have been the moustache.
‘Not at all.’ Paige answered for all of us. ‘We were just saying what a wonderful way this is to start the day.’
No we weren’t, I said silently. We were just trading badly concealed barbs across the table and one of us was basically calling the other a whore. But it didn’t seem like saying that out loud would really propel the conversation forward, so I just smiled.
‘I’m Artie Bennett.’ Our host sat down at the head of the table and let Kekipi pour his coffee before piling a ton of sushi onto a plate. For breakfast. Gross. ‘Shall we do introductions?’
‘Paige Sullivan.’ Paige flashed her loveliest smile. ‘I’m the art director with Gloss. I’ll be overseeing the shoot. And this is Vanessa, our photographer.’
‘Hi.’ I raised a hand in an awkward half-wave. Clearly she didn’t trust me to introduce myself. Fair enough, really.
‘Nick Miller. I’ll be writing the piece on your father,’ Nick interrupted, not giving me any more time to add to my hello. ‘When do you think I might be able to meet with him, Artie? These constant cancellations are getting really quite frustrating.’
Wow. Bolshy. I held my breath, waiting for Artie’s response. Looking over at Paige, I saw she was doing the same.
‘Well, Mr Miller.’ Artie failed to return Nick’s informality but matched his attitude entirely. ‘We do have a bit of a problem there. I was hoping we could eat breakfast and get to know one another a little before getting down to the work chatter, but if you’d rather get it out of the way—’
‘I would,’ Nick confirmed. ‘Is he going to do the interview or not?’
Artie put his plateful of sushi down on the table and shifted in his chair to face Nick square on. Taking a deep breath, he placed his elbows on the table and tented his fingers under his chin, taking his time and considering his response. The tension was killing me.
Clearing his throat and sitting straight back in his chair in such a way that clashed horribly with his casual clothes, Artie gave Nick a brittle smile. ‘As of this moment, Mr Miller, he says he is not.’
Paige let out a horrified gasp, as if the moment wasn’t already dramatic enough, while Nick simply looked to the skies and then rubbed a hand over his face. I stayed silent. There was no way for me to make this situation any better.
‘So what do you propose?’ Nick asked as Artie picked up his chopsticks and started on an admittedly delicious-looking piece of salmon sashimi. ‘Are we all just supposed to sit around here until he stops sulking? We all flew halfway round the world just to talk to your dad and now he doesn’t want to play?’
I had always been a big believer in the idea that you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar, but it seemed Nick did not agree. I was half expecting him to vault over the table, slap Artie Bennett with a glove and challenge him to a duel. He looked pissed off. Paige looked terrified. I looked ambivalent. I couldn’t deny it – the first thing that had crossed my mind when he said Bertie didn’t want to do the interview was that if there was no interview, there would be no pictures. It was starting to look like I could potentially get away with this whole charade scot-free.
‘I’m going to talk to my father later today,’ Artie said once he had chewed and swallowed his food. ‘I have impressed upon him how important this interview is for the company, how important it is to me, and I have explained to him that you have travelled a very long way to meet with him.’
‘Well, that’s very big of you.’ Nick stood up, his chair scraping along the terracotta tiles of the veranda. ‘If you could maybe call me when he thinks he might be ready, that would be great.’ He turned to Paige and tossed down his napkin. ‘This is what happens when you make arrangements with the monkey instead of the organ grinder.’
Without waiting for a response, Nick stormed off back towards the cottages. He was definitely not in the best mood ever. You’d have thought he’d be a bit more chipper, given the night he’d had.
‘Mr Bennett, I am so sorry,’ Paige said, standing up but going nowhere. ‘I can’t apologize enough. I don’t know what could have come over him. He’s a very passionate man and I think he’s not feeling well and—’
But before she could finish, Artie cut her off with a full, throaty laugh.
‘Oh, Ms Sullivan, please sit down.’ He waved his hand at her, still chuckling to himself. ‘There’s nothing like a little drama at breakfast. Mr Miller is obviously frustrated. I don’t blame him. I had a very similar reaction when my father declared his intentions to me last night. I do, however, somewhat object to being called a monkey.’
‘I’m so sorry, seriously.’ Paige couldn’t have looked more embarrassed. ‘I really apologize, I do. Nick is just, he’s just …’
‘He’s just a bit of a knob,’ I interrupted. ‘Really. Can’t be helped.’
‘He is a bit of a knob.’ Artie began laughing again, this time squeezing a couple of tears out of the corners of his eyes. ‘Oh, that was funny, Ms – oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t catch your name?’
‘Vanessa,’ I offered with a relieved glance at Paige. ‘Vanessa Kittler.’
‘Vanessa, yes,’ he repeated as though to commit my name to memory. ‘He is a bit of a knob. Very eloquently put. I had very much hoped I wouldn’t have to come with this news today, but at the moment my father is being quite difficult.’
‘If you don’t mind me asking,’ I started with caution, ‘how come your dad arranged all this if he didn’t want to do the interview? Seems a bit silly.’
‘In short, he didn’t arrange it,’ Artie replied, getting right back into the sushi. ‘I did. My father was against it from the beginning, but after a while he seemed to be persuaded. It was only after Mr Miller arrived on Monday morning and I went to check in that he decided he wasn’t interested any more. And it’s very difficult to talk my father into something that he doesn’t want to do.’
‘I suppose that’s why he’s been so successful?’ I suggested. Nothing like a bit of flattery to grease the wheels. ‘Because he knows his own mind?’
‘This is true,’ he agreed. ‘But this is a very opportune time for an interview. Not to get into family politics, but this is something we have been discussing for a while – his retiring, my taking over the store, the brand. This piece is really quite important to me. If Mr Miller had stayed to discuss things a little longer, I would have made assurances that the interview will be salvaged somehow.’
‘That’s wonderful news,’ Paige replied. ‘Thank you so much, Mr Bennett.’
‘Artie, please,’ he offered eventually. ‘Failing all else, I can pull clothes for the fashion shoot and we’ll work around the interview somehow.’
Paige’s face lit up while my smile sank. I was so not getting out of taking those bloody photos.
‘Well, the idea of the original shoot was that we would have your dad as sort of the king of fashion,’ she explained with enthusiasm. ‘We were going to shoot at the palace, have him in the middle of the set on a throne with all the gorgeous nature and historical culture clashing against the more modern fashions. Perhaps we do the shoot with you as the heir apparent? The prince regent?’
‘That could definitely be arranged.’ Artie stood up gracefully while Paige and I scrambled out of our chairs. I half expected her to start bowing. ‘If you would excuse me, do enjoy your day. I believe we should have everything back on track tomorrow. I apologize in advance if things end up being a little rushed, but I’m sure we’ll make things work.’
‘We will,’ Paige said. ‘If nothing else, the models arrive this evening. Perhaps we could take a look at the clothes this afternoon or this evening and pull for the shoot?’
‘I’ll see what I can do,’ Artie replied with a gracious nod and disappeared back into the house, his plate still full of almost untouched sushi.
‘Models?’ I looked at Paige.
‘For the clothes?’ She looked right back. ‘How did you think you were shooting clothes without models?’
‘Coat hangers?’ I squeaked.
‘You’re a moron,’ she sighed, sinking back into her seat and banging her head gently on the table in front of her. ‘I’m fucked, aren’t I?’
All I could think was that she wasn’t fucked. We all were.
For the want of a more positive answer, I ate another pastry and kept my mouth shut.