A Sprinkle of Sabotage by Fiona Leitch (bill gates book recommendations TXT) 📗

and everything, but in the back of my mind there’d been that reassuring thought that if all else failed, there was always Tony. And now there wasn’t. Not like that. And it would never have been fair on him, anyway.

He pulled me in for a hug and we stood there for a long time while I cried like a complete idiot (I think he may have cried a little bit too, but he’d mastered the art of doing it discreetly). And I knew that I wasn’t just crying for him, but for Nathan too, because it was only now he was on the verge of leaving that I dared admit to myself that he was the one I wanted to be with.

Chapter Twenty

I finally pulled myself together and headed back into the hotel. Tony had reassured me that my eyes weren’t red or puffy, but I didn’t entirely believe him. Luckily, having been soaked through, I looked so uniformly awful now (especially compared to these glamorous actorly types) that I guessed the rest of my appearance would draw attention away from my freshly wrung-out eyes.

‘I’ll see you later,’ said Tony, as I ran my fingers through my straggly wet hair.

‘Aren’t you coming in?’ I asked, surprised. ‘What about Faith?’

He smiled ruefully. ‘I changed me mind. I don’t want to be just somebody’s booty call after all.’ He laughed. ‘Amazing, innit? I’d have loved being that when I was younger, but nobody was interested then.’

‘You’ve matured nicely,’ I said, smiling, wishing that I fancied him after all. But I didn’t, despite the six-pack, and despite the fact that he was actually far more attractive at forty than he had been at twenty. We looked at each other and both of us sighed, then went our separate ways.

The lady at the reception desk – Karen, according to her name badge – looked at me curiously as I entered.

‘It’s pouring out there and I left my coat in the bar,’ I said, unnecessarily. She smiled.

‘Who are you here to see?’ she asked, but before I could answer Faith came swanning into the foyer from the guest spa, clad in a snow-white fluffy bathrobe. Her hair was pinned up carelessly, with blonde tendrils spilling down her neck in an effortless but casually elegant way that had probably taken ages to achieve. I pin or tie my hair back when I’m cooking but it never looks like that; it has a tendency to escape from the hairband, so I have to pull it back so tightly that I look like I’ve had a facelift. She probably HAS had a facelift, I thought, but then told myself off. I should be celebrating the fact that an older woman was still successful and sexy. Even if it killed me to admit it.

She wafted over in a cloud of Chanel No. 5, the slightly smug smile on her face disappearing as she saw me.

‘Oh, it’s you,’ she said, clearly disappointed. Why was no one ever pleased to see me?

I nearly said, Expecting someone else? But again, I told myself off. She wasn’t a rival, I wasn’t jealous (not really), and there was no need for nastiness. I knew she was expecting someone else, and I also knew he wasn’t coming.

‘Afternoon, Ms Mackenzie,’ I said, smiling pleasantly. ‘How are you? I hope you’re over any sickness?’

She smiled benevolently. ‘I wasn’t terribly ill. Nothing a session in the spa won’t cure.’

Yeah, I know EXACTLY what sort of ‘session’ you were hoping for, I thought, before I could stop myself, but at least I managed not to say it out loud.

Faith looked around, then spoke to the receptionist. ‘Karen, sweetheart, I’m expecting a visitor. Can you let him know I’m in the spa? I wouldn’t want to miss him.’

‘Sorry,’ I said, interrupting them. I hadn’t been planning to say anything; Tony had told me he was going to ring her, but he was a bit of a coward when it came to stuff like that and he obviously hadn’t done it yet. And although part of me was still stupidly jealous, I needed to rise above it. I’d been stood up in the past and it wasn’t nice. Better to let her know than to let her carry on waiting. ‘Sorry, I couldn’t help overhearing. If you’re waiting for Tony, I just spoke to him and he’s had to cancel. He said he was going to call you.’

She stared at me for a moment. Behind her, Karen discreetly looked down at some work (real or imaginary) on the desk in front of her. Faith narrowed her eyes then laughed, sounding just like her cockney matriarch soap character.

‘Okay, message received loud and clear,’ she said. ‘He did say you and him weren’t, you know…’ I could feel my cheeks start to get warm.

‘We’re not, but would it have stopped you if we were?’ I asked, and she laughed again.

‘Not necessarily. But if I were you I’d be getting my hands on that dishy detective from last night.’

‘Ah, now him you really do have to keep your mitts off,’ I said, although I had to admit I’d so far managed to keep my own off him, and it was looking less likely every day that I’d get a chance to change that. She smiled.

‘All’s fair in love and war, or sex and movies,’ she said, ‘but I do try not to step on other women’s toes.’ She sighed. ‘So that’s my plans for the afternoon out the window.’ She looked me up and down. ‘You look like you could do with a facial.’

So that was how I ended up lying next to the woman I’d spent the last few days being jealous of, clad only in a towel. I’d decided I didn’t like her because of the way she’d tried to monopolise Tony, but I had to admit she was a laugh. And I had no right to be jealous, because I had no intention of getting together with