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Chapter 1 IT WAS ONE OF THOSE PARTIES THAT WOULD LIVE ON IN THE COLLECTIVE memory, ripening over the years with significance and irony; a party that would launch a hundred favorite anecdotes and change lives. But to actually experience it was hell. It was full of tomorrow’s celebs and high-fliers, yesterday’s love affairs and embarrassments. The laughter was loud and the talk thunderous, the noise almost drowning out the din from the music deck but not making a dent in the clash of egos.Katie sipped at her paper cup of sweet punch again because she’d forgotten how disgusting it was. Ex-boyfriend number three, Hugh, was bellowing at her over the thumping bass. She hadn’t seen him for four years, and was frowning so hard to hear him that she looked as if she was straining. Hugh did not have a naturally loud voice, but what he lacked in ability he made up for in motivation.“…but the annual bonus,” he trumpeted, “you see, is a golden handcuff.”“A golden what?”“Handcuff. Uncouth to go into
Chapter 1
Chapter 2 BY THE NEXT MORNING, THE WARM GLOW WHERE IT MATTERED HAD transformed into a thumping great pain where it hurt. By Monday morning it had developed into a dull ache all over.Katie had a morning shift at the café, and as everyone in the café business knows, morning shifts are the pits. They’re almost as bad as afternoon shifts, which are nearly as horrendous as evening shifts.She woke up edgily, her first conscious thought being that she wanted to be asleep again. Then she remembered that she had a date with Dan and knew all was right with the world. Then she realized she had a dull ache all over her body and the date would probably be a disaster.It was going to be a long day.She ripped herself untimely out of bed and was so traumatized that her entire body went into hibernation mode, huddling against itself for warmth. Her teeth were chattering so loudly she could almost make out what they were saying.Wrapping herself tightly in her ancient towelling robe, she tiptoed down the
Chapter 2
Chapter 3 EVEN THOUGH KATIE NOW KNEW SHE WANTED TO BE AN EDUCATIONAL psychologist, she was glad that today she had a job that didn’t need any concentration. She’d have found it hard to concentrate, what with her mind re-playing every nuance of her conversation with Dan and planning and re-planning what she should wear for her date with him.Every time the café door had opened to the bizarrely welcoming sound of a strangled cat, she’d had a very silly daydream that did no one any good at all. Briefly, the daydream was that she would turn round to find, standing there in the doorway, surrounded by a halo of light and accompanied by a brass fanfare and choral blast, Dan. Their eyes would meet, their hearts would explode, etc etc etc. Well, it kept a girl going.Every time she remembered certain key points about Dan, such as the way his cheek crinkled when he smiled, the way his legs stretched all the way up to his bottom and the undeniable look of keenness in his eyes, she felt invulnerable
Chapter 3
Chapter 4 SO FAR IT HAD TAKEN KATIE FOUR HOURS. WEEKEND TRAFFIC DIDN’T help the fact that she took the wrong turning off the motorway twice which resulted in a loss of confidence so complete that she missed the next two exits and had to double-back twice. By the time she got home she would need a Valium and a shower.As would most of her family.Katie had a condition that was prevalent in her family, which the men dubbed Locational Dyslexia, the women A Crap Sense Of Direction. It didn’t much matter what it was called; the result was the same. She couldn’t direct herself out of a paper bag with an exit sign.And now she was having a nightmare roundabout experience. As she approached, she saw that none of the locations she had memorized were mentioned—even briefly—on this roundabout sign. She glanced in her mirror—cars were slowing down behind her and there was no time to stop. She didn’t have a chance to look and see if any of the names on the signpost were even in the same direction as h
Chapter 4
Chapter 5 KATIE ALWAYS FOUND IT SO MUCH EASIER GETTING BACK TO LONDON, so just three hours later, she was trying to find a parking space within a five-mile radius of her flat. She only had one hour before her date with Dan to get the feeling back in her bottom.She very rarely used her car, for two very sensible London reasons. One, it was cheaper to walk or get public transport, and two, it meant she didn’t have to faff around trying to find a parking space once she got to her destination. Some bastard must have seen her set off on Saturday and nipped into her spot. He probably wouldn’t move for a month. She carefully balanced her weight from one numbed buttock to another.Suddenly, she heard a front door bang shut. Then she saw someone leave a flat further up the road and walk to their car. She was there in an instant, her indicator clicking territorially as he drove away. Within seconds she was in his space, never to leave again. Hah. That would teach him to go out on a Sunday evening
Chapter 5
Chapter 6 IN THE CORNER OF THE SIXTH FORM COLLEGE COMMON ROOM MATT slouched with his mates, pretending to find them as hilarious as they found themselves because some of the blondest, cutest girls had just come in and sat near enough to hear. It was such a rare event that it might never happen again in his lifetime at this college.Matt had been amazed at how much harder it had been to make friends across the sexes at this college than it had been at school. As a bloke here, you could only be one of two things: a top-of-the-tree second-year or a bottom-of-the-shit-heap first-year. The girls’ story was the other way round. They had one year of being toasted and feted as the new hottest things, and then wham! second year came and they were last year’s news. There were younger, lither girls than them now, all the second-year boys had gone and all the boys in their year, who’d been shat on from such a great height the year before, turned their charm offensive (offensive being the operative
Chapter 6
Chapter 7 THAT NIGHT, KATIE SAT AT THE BAR WHERE JON WORKED AND SYSTEMATICALLY got herself drunk. She squinted across to where Jon was serving another customer. Bloody customers. She needed him more than they did. Her bowl of peanuts had got all empty again. She started licking out the bowl.“I like a woman who knows what she wants,” came a voice behind her.She sat up and turned round to find some aftershave wearing a man.“That’s nice,” she blinked at him. “What’s her name?”“You tell me.”She frowned. “Crap name.”“What are you drinking?”“Peanuts.”The man smiled. “That’s unusual.”“That’s nothing,” she beamed. “I can fart Dancing Queen.”The man’s smile wavered and he sidled away. Tsk, thought Katie. Men are so predictable.As soon as Jon returned, handing her a new drink, she started where she’d left off.“It’s hopeless,” she moaned, gulping down her drink. “I’m hopeless.”“Phone him,” repeated Jon.“And say what?”He shrugged. “That you’re hopeless, that you like him and you’d like to give it
Chapter 7
Chapter 8 THERE WERE NOW EIGHT WHOLE SHOPPING DAYS TO GO BEFORE Christmas, which, considering Matt had only one present to get for his mother, was plenty of time. More than a week to build up to Christmas Eve shopping.The only thing Matt liked about Christmas was that life was put off until the new year. It was a procrastinator’s paradise. College had gone mad on this last day of term and, quite frankly, he was glad to see the back of it. If he hadn’t been depressed before, he really was now. Two of his friends, Daz and Si, were dating two of the most fit girls in college. This should have helped his status as, by proxy, he had now leapfrogged most of the boys in college, but it hadn’t. It just made him feel self-conscious every time the girls came and sat with his crowd, humiliated that he was still single when the girls seemed so much more experienced than he, excruciated when his mates showed off in front of them, and downright angry at the looks of utter surprise at the girls’ choi
Chapter 8
Chapter 9 AS SOON AS SHE REACHED HER PARENTS’ VILLAGE, KATIE FOUND herself driving through dense fog. Great white swirls of it danced into the beam of her fog-lights and all she could see was the few feet in front of her. She gripped her steering wheel and drove at a steady two miles an hour, blinking rapidly at the thick mist ahead. When it cleared, she realized she’d quite liked the experience—she had no longer been the only one on the road who hadn’t known where the hell she was. And for the first time in the journey she hadn’t dwelt on the fact that since she’d last seen her family she’d probably lost her job and had cocked up the big date with Dan.To the accompaniment of increasingly hysterical Christmas DJs, she’d spent her journey inventing different possible stories to explain the Great Date Disaster. Over the phone she’d been able to fob her mother off with evasive answers, but she knew that face-to-face she would be unable to manage it. For the past two hours she’d been final
Chapter 9
Chapter 10 THREE MONTHS LATER, THE NOVELTY OF THE NEW YEAR HAD MORE than worn off. in fact, it had worn off in the first week of January when the entire idiot nation had been depressed to discover that, yet again, the new year had failed to deliver them a new life. Now all they were left with was gray weather and repeats of The Good Life. Not even the changing of the clocks had helped. All that had produced was more daylight to be disappointed in.Life at The Café had gone on this year much as before. There were two new photos of Katie on the fridge door. One was taken by Sukie at a drunken works do where Katie chatted to a lovely bloke all evening about what a failure they both were at relationships. Funnily enough, neither of them had wanted to take it any further. The other photo was of her enjoying a great night with a bloke at Jon’s bar. Jon had taken the photo before the bloke had showed her his tattoo of the ship he was on at the moment.Sukie was finally getting somewhere with TV
Chapter 10
Chapter 11 THE NIGHTCLUB’S LOW CEILINGS, UNEVEN WALLS AND INTERMINABLE bass made Katie feel like she was pot-holing in hell rather than out having fun with friends. She was scrunched up between Sukie and Matt, which would have been fun were Sukie not chatting up the new chef Nik, and Matt chatting up the new waitress Patsy. Dan and Paul hadn’t come. She hadn’t wanted to come either, she’d wanted to go home and write up her menu ideas or failing that, jump off a high building, but when she’d suggested getting an early night, Sukie had thrown her a look that said “manager” all over it.She decided to go back to the upstairs bar, where she could chat to Jon, eat bar nuts and feel her own heartbeat again. She shouted to Sukie that she was going up, making enough sign language for her to understand. She squeezed out and felt Sukie and Matt lean back into her space as she tried to step over legs and feet. She pushed her way through a mass of junkie-garbed teenagers with piercings and tattoos.
Chapter 11
Chapter 12 THE NEXT MORNING KATIE’S HANGOVER WAS BIGGER THAN HER BODY. As she shuffled down Asherman’s Hill, she was convinced it must be throbbing or pulsing or glowing. Possibly all three. How could this much pain be invisible? Her joints were competing for Most Pain Award. She had taken painkillers but they’d probably got lost working out where to go first.Maybe this wasn’t a hangover, maybe it was flu. Maybe, she thought slowly, just maybe, the hangover was masking some type of malarian killer flu that she’d caught at the nightclub from someone and they’d already died. When they did the docu-drama about it, after her tragic death, Sukie would play her and a Hollywood scout would spot her and she’d marry Tom Cruise. Maybe then Sukie would like her again.She really was in a kind of hell. There she was minding her own business despising her job and then wham! She loved it and didn’t want to lose it. Two minutes later, wham-bam! Boss from hell. If only she could explain to Dan what had
Chapter 12
Chapter 13 RICHARD MILLER, HOTSHOT LITERARY AGENT, SAT BACK AND LOOKED across his shiny new desk in his shiny new office, at the shiny new potential publishing sensation: a client who could confirm his reputation in the literary world, who was so near his grasp he could feel his fingertips tingling. Jon stared back across the vast desk at him, taking deep breaths from his diaphragm and concentrating on not dribbling. He swallowed as if he had meant to.“Gosh, sorry,” said Richard Miller politely. “I never asked, would you like some water?”“Thanks.”“No problem.”While Richard Miller popped out of his office, Jon wiped his brow, loosened his tie and continued his deep breathing.It was going well, he thought. Surely it was a good thing that Richard Miller was the same age, same height and same coloring as him and pretty much came from the same background. Surely it had been a good thing that Richard Miller had identified so strongly with his antihero Henry Logan (“we both love Häagen Dazs!’
Chapter 13
Chapter 14 TWO HOURS AND TWO BOTTLES OF WINE LATER, SUKIE AND KATIE HAD put the world to rights. The reason their twenties felt hard, they decided, was because they had never had to fight political oppression, famine, drought, earthquake or flood, genocide or even very severe weather conditions. They would not live their lives in service, in poverty or pain; their lives would not be full of—nor foreshortened by—relentless pregnancies. Television would entertain them when they did not have the energy, time or money to entertain themselves. Medication would help them should they find themselves not in a constant state of happiness. Their twenties were hard because, they concluded, they were so damned lucky.Sukie tutted and shook her head. “Typical,” she said. “Too many choices. Too many expectations. Too much…” she searched for the right word.“Mm,” said Katie.“You know what I really want?” asked Sukie suddenly. “To make me really happy?”“A pink duffle coat?”“I want life to be easy.”“Mm,”
Chapter 14
Chapter 15 AT THE END OF A FORTNIGHT, THE BUILDERS, POLYTHENE DOORS AND Capital Gold were all as a dream and The Café was no more. Long live Crichton Brown’s.The day the builders left, Katie was given the afternoon off, so Messrs Crichton and Brown could finish the final transformation on their own. The next day, the day before its official opening, they decided to keep the Café/Bar/Restaurant—for such it was now—closed, so as to give their staff a chance to acquaint themselves with the new equipment and teach Patsy the ropes. Only the coffee queue would stay open as usual. Tomorrow was to be the first day when everything was up and running. Initially, Katie had disagreed with their decision to keep the food section closed for another day. She thought it should open as soon as possible, before the customers forgot that once, a long time ago, they used to be able to buy food here. It was, after all, now into the third week of closing. However, after ten minutes with Patsy she saw the wi
Chapter 15
Chapter 16 THE NEXT FORTNIGHT SAW EVERYONE ADAPT, IN THEIR OWN TIME AND in their own way, to the new status quo. Patsy was still being shown the ropes and, after much thought-provoking discussion, Katie and Sukie had finally agreed on a nickname for her. She was, they decided, the teletubby that everyone forgot because she’d got lost in the shopping mall on the way to the television studio. She was called Ditzy and on her head she had a fluffy question mark with sparkly bows on. This kept them happy for a day or two. Nik, however, now called Patsy “Beautiful” all the time. Katie and Sukie, in response to this, agreed that should the two ever have children together, there might actually be a reversal of evolution and they would be the first humans to ever give birth to a live ape. This kept them happy for a week or so. They were friends again, although Katie felt constantly mindful of how quickly Sukie could turn.They soon realized that Paul was not going to be anything more than a fina
Chapter 16
Chapter 17 THAT DAY, BETWEEN THE TWO OF THEM, DAN AND KATIE PREPARED and cooked everything available on Crichton Brown’s restricted menu. When they finished making the food, they helped out front and when they finished helping out front, they cleared everything up and cleaned the entire restaurant until it gleamed. It was impressive, but not as impressive as the fact that they did all of this without saying a word to each other. This may have been usual for Dan, but for Katie it was a new experience. She paid scant heed to her customers or Sukie that day, for she was indulging in a competition with Dan and she was going to be victorious.When Nik called, she answered before the phone had rung twice. He told her that he was definitely coming in tomorrow, if he got any sleep that night. They chatted for a while until he thought he was going to be sick again. She was willing to wait, but he hung up. She was doubly grateful for the call, first because she’d had someone to talk to and second
Chapter 17
Chapter 18 THE NEXT MORNING WAS DECEPTIVE IN ITS LAZILY BEAUTIFUL START. Katie woke up to sun streaming in through her curtains and the reassuring sound of the kettle softly boiling. She found Jon pacing the kitchen, yawned a hello and joined him at the kettle.“I have got to get on with my work,” he muttered to the wall.“I have got to stop drinking,” she muttered next to him.They stared at the wall together.“I’ll help you if you help me,” said Jon suddenly.“OK.”“So far,” he said, “there’s a very clever twist with a parrot and a dwarf, but I need another twist.”She ran through yesterday’s customers and remembered the woman with unfeasibly large hands.“Why not put in a transvestite?”He gave her a sideways look. “Why?”She shrugged. “Because you can have someone thinking the murderer’s a woman until you realize one of the characters likes dressing up in women’s clothing.”Jon started nodding slowly. “Hmm,” he said, pouring boiling water into their mugs.“OK,” said Katie. “Your turn to help m
Chapter 18
Chapter 19 DAN HAD NOT NOTICED HIS WIFE-TO-BE DISAPPEAR TO THE LADIES because he was in a bit of a daze, but after his parents had finished their main course, and hers still lay untouched, he began to suspect. This had happened once before at a May ball. She hadn’t been able to resist eating the oysters and then her body hadn’t been able to resist bringing them up again. Her ball dress, which had impressed 250 drunk Oxford students, had then made an impressive £7.50 for Cancer Research. He excused himself and found the Ladies. He waited outside for a while until he was fairly sure no one else was in there and crept surreptitiously inside.He could hear very feeble sobbing.“Gerry?” he whispered.One of the cubicle doors moaned.“Dodgy moule?” he asked it.Another moan.“Do you think you’ll be able to get to the car?”Silence. Then a large sniff.“I can’t bear it.”“Hey hey,” he coaxed gently. “We’ll get you home in no time.”“No!” she cried. “I mean why me? This was not how I pictured celebratin
Chapter 19
Chapter 20 DAN SAT AS NEAR TO THE BACK AS HE COULD. HE DIDN’T WANT TO block anyone’s view and felt somewhat soothed by the thought that he was near the exit. He kept having flashbacks to Sandy in her room and felt like shit in a suit—a nice suit, but that seemed irrelevant right now. He looked down at it and gave it an almost nostalgic smile. This would probably be the last time he wore it. Geraldine hated it.Gerry! He’d forgotten to call her and find out how she was. He looked round the room and gauged that he’d still have time to rush back upstairs and phone her—he hadn’t brought his mobile down with him. He stood up and apologized to the guests shifting in their seats to let him out.As he slowly closed the door behind him, the sound of the string quartet dimmed. He sped across the thick-pile carpet, to the sweeping stairs and then stopped. At the top, coming toward him were Hugh and Katie sharing a joke. Katie wore a golden corset with ball-gown skirt, her hair covered in glitter, s
Chapter 20
Chapter 21 “WHAT ARE YOU DOING?”“Nothing!”“Then stop moving your hand.”“I’m not moving my hand. Look!”“The other one.”“Just relax.”“Hugh, this is not Porky’s, and I am not fourteen. Let me go.”“Shhh.”“Let me go or I will knee you so hard your doodads will give you an overbite.”“I love you.”“I don’t care.”“Oh.” That was unexpected.“It is irrelevant,” she continued. “You are drunk, you are still grieving Maxine—”“No!” Hugh sat up. “I love you. I’ve always loved you.”“Don’t be ridiculous.”“I’m not being ridiculous! I love you.”“I don’t care.”“You must believe me.”“No, Hugh, you’re not listening to me. I don’t want to get into a debate about this because that will validate it.”“What?”“And anyway, I will win. Get some rest and—”“Promise me one thing!”“No.”“You owe me.”Katie gasped. “I owe you nothing, Hugh Penrose,” she whispered hoarsely. “Just because I ended a relationship that was no longer right for me. You have absolutely no moral—”“Oh shut up, I meant because I drove you up here and
Chapter 21
Chapter 22 IT WASN’T UNTIL KATIE HAD SPENT A FRUSTRATING FIVE MINUTES trying to open the suite door with her Monsoon card that she realized she’d left the key inside earlier when putting Hugh to bed. She stood looking at the closed door for a while, hoping for inspiration and thankfully inspiration came. There was only one thing for it. She would have to hitch-hike home.Then she heard the sound of a television from inside and banged on the door. Eventually it opened and there stood Hugh, doing an impressive Stan Laurel impersonation. Deeply sexy if you liked the dumb-shmuck look. Which, now that Katie was a working woman with her own Monsoon card, she felt she had grown out of.“Ah, Katie,” smiled Hugh. “Who is it?”Oh dear.“It’s me,” she said, walking past him into the room.“Excellent, excellent. Excellent.”The television was on, but the rest of the room looked very much as she had left it. Even Hugh looked very much as she had left him, the only difference being that he was now vertica
Chapter 22
Chapter 23 TWENTY MINUTES LATER AT 7.30, MATT STOOD OUTSIDE THE GNAT and Parrot. He glanced furtively in the windows to see if Jennifer was here yet. He was early. Should he go in or walk round the block once more? Or should he use this golden opportunity to give himself some Dutch courage? He pushed open the pub door, the smell of smoke and alcohol a muggy comfort, and walked to the bar. He ordered a pint—no, half—no, a pint. Didn’t want her turning up and thinking he was a lightweight, did he? On the other hand, he didn’t want to get pissed. Still, there was no law to say he had to drink the whole pint was there? He wondered what she’d have. As his pint was being poured, he checked yet again that he had enough cash for the date, and had brought Time Out with him, just in case she fancied going a bit further afield. And he’d brought some fags. Only ten. He didn’t smoke as a rule, but you know, he did it socially. And tonight was social, wasn’t it?Pint in hand, he turned round and chec
Chapter 23
Chapter 24 DAN STARED AT HIS REFLECTION IN THE JEWELER’S WINDOW, IMAGINING what Katie would be doing at the café now. It had been a whole week since Sandy’s wedding and once they’d both got back to work it had been far easier to pretend that it just hadn’t happened. In fact, they’d hardly spoken to each other. He’d decided that the kiss really had been a drunken mistake on her part and she was now probably scared that he might come after her. The last thing he wanted to do was turn into another Hugh, so he had made a concerted effort all week to appear as indifferent to her as possible. In fact, he’d come close to telling her about his engagement just so that they could be normal with each other again, but he’d never been alone with her long enough. No, he’d wait until it was somehow relevant—maybe tell everyone at work together. Meanwhile, his wedding plans were hotting up, which was really helping to take his mind off the kiss. That and his mother’s mantra.Standing outside the jewell
Chapter 24
Chapter 25 KATIE HAD ABSOLUTELY NO QUALMS ABOUT PHONING IN SICK ON Sunday morning. In fact, she felt she had no choice. Yes, she had had close to no sleep last night, but, more importantly, she was unable to face Sukie or Dan. She didn’t care what they thought about her taking time off, or rather, she cared less about it than she did about having to face them. Next Friday they were having their first summer party, and all the people who had helped make the café what it was were invited, including all their regulars, partners and friends, and of course, local journalists. She had to be able to face them all by then.She just didn’t want to get up, she realized, as she lay in bed after calling in sick at the café, and then calling Dan on his mobile. She really did feel sickened, truly sickened to the stomach, by everything. By herself, by her actions and by her life.She hadn’t had to face Jon last night because he had been ensconced in his room. So she had taken a bottle of wine and drunk
Chapter 25
Chapter 26 TUESDAY WAS MID-JUNE PERFECTION AND KATIE WAS WOKEN BY THE sound of about three-hundred exhilarated birds announcing this happy fact. She was out of bed in the blink of an eye, showered, dressed and out of the house before anyone else awoke, catching a precious dawn hour that gave her a sense of ownership over the rest of the day. She drove through narrow, blossom-hemmed lanes and felt confident that she would see many more such mornings. For she, Katie Simmonds, Cowardess Extraordinaire, was about to change her life and take a risk. She was putting all her eggs in one big, fat, frilly basket. And to her amazement it felt good—like taking the stabilizers off a bike. After all these years, the very thing she’d been scared of had been the very thing she’d needed to do to unlock her spirit. She felt liberated.Great-Aunt Edna met her at the door, her eyes bright and warm.“What say you to a morning cup of tea in the garden?” she asked with a smile. They shared the bijou garden wi
Chapter 26
Chapter 27 DAN SAT ON HIS APARTMENT FLOOR, CLICKED HIS PHONE OFF AND FLUNG it on the sofa. Then he turned to the pad at his feet and crossed off another name so vehemently it tore the paper. He gave his stubble a slow scratch. He was glad Katie was back at the café. He hoped she was feeling better. Perhaps now Sukie would stop behaving so oddly. He gave a long sad sigh. Only two days to go before the café’s summer party. Should he tell her before or after it? He knew he should tell her before the others, although chances were they’d guessed something was wrong by his absence today. The only problem was, the longer he left it, the less energy he had and the less energy he had, the less he felt able to do it. He wasn’t even sure if he had it in him to go to the party. And if Katie took the news half as badly as Geraldine had, it would mean another hysterical banshee on his hands.Ah dear, Geraldine. Just one more thing to worry about. It had been hard facing up to the fact that he had to
Chapter 27
Chapter 28 BY THE TIME SHE GOT TO WORK ON THURSDAY MORNING, KATIE WAS beginning to feel a tad tetchy. Partly with Dan for not returning any of her calls, but mostly with herself for making such an enormous wazzock of herself. How many times had she called him in the end? For goodness sake, she was supposed to be his manager! How could he possibly respect her when she couldn’t even leave a basic answerphone message? Truth was she knew she could hardly blame him for not calling her back—he’d probably pulled a ligament laughing so hard at her messages—but blame him she did. She’d stayed in all evening, tense with anticipation at the thought of sharing a phone call with him. She hadn’t been able to go to bed until midnight, assuring herself that he might have been at some important late-night meeting and might yet phone. Then she hadn’t been able to sleep till three. Needless to say she was exhausted this morning. And with tomorrow being the big party she really didn’t need this. Then when
Chapter 28
Chapter 29 THE BIGGEST DAY OF CRICHTON BROWN’S CALENDAR HAD FINALLY arrived. Friday was a textbook summer day: the endless sky, weightless air and warm breeze made people’s limbs lighter, hearts happier and smiles wider.Katie arrived extra early, sure that Dan would have to make it in today and would probably do so at the crack of dawn. She was wrong, so she had a long morning ahead of her in which to get riled. She had intended to tell him before anyone else got in that she was leaving. She didn’t want the rest of them to know until after the party, or possibly after she’d signed the paperwork with Dennis Blatchett, but Dan she’d wanted to tell immediately. As she turned the coffee machine on, her plans changed. If he didn’t come in today she wouldn’t tell him at all. She’d just leave, no explanation, and the sooner the better. She’d given him more than enough chances to contact her—made an absolute fool of herself trying to, in fact. So sod him. Time to leave.By the time today’s comm
Chapter 29
Chapter 30 THE CAFÉ WAS CLOSING AT SIX SO THAT THE PARTY COULD START AT eight, so Katie had two hours to make contact with Great-Aunt Edna before Dan got back from seeing Geraldine. Plenty of time, she told herself, but after forty minutes of no reply, she was beginning to get concerned. She’d give her another ten minutes and then phone home to ask them to pop round and check that she was all right. Meanwhile, it was officially party preparation time. The others got excited and when Matt turned up after one of his exams to join in the fun, he was greeted like a long-lost friend. They all sat at one of the tables with their preferred choice of caffeine for a quick break.“Is Dan coming back?” asked Sukie.“Of course,” replied Katie. “He’s just got some business to attend to.” It suddenly dawned on her just how horrible the next two hours could be for Geraldine—and Dan. She stared at her coffee. Was she making a big mistake? Was she getting carried away with the moment? Was she playing peo
Chapter 30
Epilogue
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