Page 60 of Lie For Me

‘Ahhh, a good morning to you too, Little Miss Cheerful,’ Jack said with a grin.

‘It’s early,’ Lucy muttered, ‘and I need coffee. It’s on its way,’ she added, before Jack could say anything else.

She leaned back in the chair and took a deep breath, her neck falling back and her dress pulling tighter across her chest. Jack sipped his coffee and trained his eyes on the breakfast menu.

‘Have you seen Dave?’ she asked, as the waitress arrived with a fresh pot of coffee. She snickered. ‘He’s in a baaad way…Greg said some of them were still up drinking at 04.00.’

‘How is he even up at this time, then? Surely better to sleep it off?’

‘Too hot to sleep,’ Lucy said, wagging a finger towards the sun. ‘And Greg thought Dave needed to eat ASAP.’

They fell quiet, but Jack could feel Lucy looking at him. He turned to look at her and she was peering at him out of the corner of her eyes.

‘Yes?’ he said.

‘Just checking that, um.’ She poured her coffee. ‘That we’re still okay after…’

Jack waited, wanting to make her say it.

Lucy looked around furtively.

‘After last night.’

‘Why? What happened last night?’

He opened his eyes wide and questioning, as he sipped his coffee.

‘What?! You know what...’ Lucy burst out laughing. ‘You know exactly what I’m talking about.’

‘Ah, yes.’ Jack returned his cup to the saucer. In a whisper loud enough for the returning waitress to hear, he said, ‘When you tried to have your way with me.’

The waitress started clearing away Jack’s empty coffee pot and milk jug.

Lucy said to her, ‘I didn’t try to have my way with him.’

The waitress shook her head in horror at being in any way drawn into the conversation and hurried away, cups clattering on the tray.

‘But if I had wanted to,’ she added, a smile playing about her lips, ‘you’d have been more than eager.’

Jack could feel warmth creep into his face as he recognised the truth in her words and was glad they were sitting in the shade. He had wondered more than once just how far things would have gone if the waiter hadn’t shown up to fetch cleaning supplies.

‘Okay, okay.’ He held his hands up. ‘I think everyone had plenty to drink, and we all got carried away, and now it can be The Thing We Never Speak of Again.’

‘Yes,’ Lucy agreed, banging her cup down a little too noisily. ‘What happens at the wedding, stays at the wedding.’

‘Exactly. The first rule of accidentally snogging your friend outside a cleaning supply cupboard is—’

‘Don’t talk about snogging your friend…’

They both snorted with laughter. It was going to be okay.

Lucy laughed, but he saw her smile fade, and her face suddenly seemed very still.

‘Luce? You sure it’s all okay?’

He reached out and touched her arm.

She abruptly moved her arm away.

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