Nothing New for Sophie Drew: a heart-warming romantic comedy - Katey Lovell (best english novels for beginners .txt) 📗

bid to remain impartial. That annoyed me too, because I knew she’d been as pissed off by Tawna’s behaviour as I had. Surely she could back me up, rather than sitting so firmly on the fence that she might as well be nailed on?

“I’m going to bed,” I said, nodding in the direction of the lobby. Shooting stars flashed before my eyes at the sudden movement. “Come on, Eve.”

I strode out of the bar, head held high even though I was fully aware of the punters cautiously watching me, the reason for the commotion. I tried to sashay like a catwalk queen, but my heel skidded on the slippery surface of the floor, and I went over on my ankle. It hurt.

Only when I limped to the lifts, pressing the “call elevator” button so hard that I almost snapped my finger in two, did I realise I was still alone. So much for Eve not taking sides.

Five minutes later as I climbed into bed, the Times Square billboards shining brightly through the crack in the curtains, my chest tightened with dread. What would happen next? Tawna and Eve were the only people I knew in the whole of America, and they hated me. As I sobbed into my super-plump pillow all I could think was that there really was nowhere to run.

Chapter 24

Eve and Tawna came to bed not long after I’d stormed out of the bar, and although I wasn’t asleep I screwed my eyes shut and pretended to be dead to the world. I lay still as the pair of them pottered around me talking nonsense as Eve took out her contact lenses and Tawna followed her nightly skin care rituals.

They carried on chatting long after they switched out the light, reminding me of summer sleepovers where the three of us would share our deepest secrets in the safety of the darkness. This time though, I remained silent, holding my breath as I waited for them to discuss the night’s events. They didn’t, instead making up daft lyrics to an Ed Sheeran song and debating whether orange Smarties tasted different to the other colours since they replaced the delicious E numbers with natural flavourings.

When the telltale snoring from either side of me confirmed Tawna and Eve were asleep, I swung my legs out of the bed, slung my cardigan on over the top of my pyjamas (plain black, more loungewear than nightwear) and pulled on my trainers. I needed fresh air, but most of all I needed space to think.

Turning left out of the hotel, I headed towards downtown Manhattan. It was quieter than it had been during the day, but sunshine yellow taxis were still ferrying people about and revellers were spilling out of the bars. New York might be the city that never sleeps but, even along the main drag, it wasn’t a place where I wanted to be alone at night. I felt sadness for the homeless men huddled in doorways wrapped in grubby coverless duvets; and the skyscrapers that had seemed so ambitious during the day – reaching symbolically upwards to the heavens – were now oppressive, looming over me like monsters.

I didn’t stray from Broadway, well lit and well populated, and I thought and walked, thought and walked. Although I was both mentally and physically exhausted, the sensation of my feet pounding against the concrete was grounding, but as the cushioned soles of my trainers pushed me further south, I made a decision. It wasn’t the one I’d set out to make, how to mend the fractured relationship with my two best friends, but as I sat on the bench on the outer edge of a large landscaped square (the open space making me feel far less oppressed), I took my phone from my pocket, logged into my PayPal account and, seeing I’d received more payments for clothes I’d sold online, transferred the balance into Darius’s account.

I felt marginally better. I fired him a text to let him know I’d made the payment. It was a day late, with it being seven in the morning in Britain, and it wasn’t the full amount he’d asked for, but it was all I had to give. Hopefully it would be enough to keep Nadia sweet in the short-term, so Darius and Summer could stay within easy travelling distance of each other. My phone beeped a response almost immediately, but where I’d expected a message of thanks from Darius, there were five words.

We need to talk.

Max.

There were no kisses, no “I miss you”s. Nothing to suggest anything he had to say was positive. Unsure of how to respond, I ignored the message and switched my phone off.

I sat for a while, squinting past the street lights towards the foreign, starless sky. People milled around, but I didn’t feel threatened, and although my head was sore I no longer felt drunk. The rage that had consumed me had dissipated too and I wanted, more than anything, to be back in the hotel room with Tawna and Eve. But would Tawna hate me after my bitchy comments? And would Eve mind that I’d told Tawna about her own private business? I only hoped they’d be able to find it in their hearts to forgive me.

I started walking, heading north.

“Where have you been?” Tawna fired. “We’ve been worried sick.”

She looked haggard, which was rare. Her eyes were slits, the whites a bloodshot red.

“Walking,” I mumbled, sitting down on the edge of my bed to pull off my trainers.

“At this time of night? In New York City? Are you crazy?” Eve’s eyes were the polar opposite of Tawna’s, wide cartoon-like circles. “I woke up and you were gone. I was frantic.”

“You should have phoned.”

“We tried eight times,” Tawna replied bluntly. “It went to answerphone every time.”

“I thought you’d been mugged or worse…” Eve’s voice tailed off and she lay back on her bed. “You’ve no idea how worried we were. I’ll tell you something, that’s one way