Page 24 of The Player

“Why?”

“Well, dear, if I knew that, I could sort it out myself. But, as I don’t, the job falls on you.”

“Do I have to?” I say nervously. I haven’t seen him all morning, which is highly unusual. Usually, Con will pop in and have a coffee in my office before he starts work. It’s time I treasure because it’s just him and me sorting out our days and gossiping idly. Today, however, he didn’t come to see me, and I’ve got the distinct impression that he’s ignoring me. It’s suited me, though, because I’m rather nervous about seeing him, and obviously, I’m right to be if he’s in such a mood. I wonder if he’s still cross with me, and then I remember his argument with Tim at my birthday party.

I rub my bottom lip. “Maybe someone else could do it,” I say in a cowardly rush.

Joan shakes her head. “No, it’s just you. And you should pop through pretty sharpish before all the staff leave.”

“He can’t be that bad. It’s Con, for goodness’ sake.”

“Oh, so it must have been someone else who told Mandy that gossiping hadn’t become an Olympic sport.”

“He’s not wrong,” I mutter. “She spends that long on the phone talking to her mates I think she’s wearing the plastic off the receiver.”

“I’ll leave you with it,” she says in a voice of doom and exits the room.

I swivel in my chair and look down at the quiet car park. Was it only a few days ago that I’d been looking forward to seeing Con because he was my best friend and nothing else? Instead, it seems like years ago that he became something more to me—someone who makes my pulse race and my palms sweat.

I stand up. The more I think about it, the more my mind comes back to that argument at the party. Con’s strange behaviour last night was probably because he’d carried on the argument with Tim when they got home.

I lean my head against the cold glass of the window. “I don’t want to do this,” I whisper. “I don’t want to go in there and smooth his mood so he can make up with that wanker. I want them to split up so I can have my chance.”

I still. But there’s the rub. Or not, as the case may be. The painful realisation had come to me as I lay sleepless last night. Con will never be mine. He’s never made a move on me, and he’s had the years since David’s death to do it, which rather points to his disinterest.

His type seems to be trendy musicians or pretty boys. I fit in neither category. However, the category I do sit in is as his best friend. That title means so much to me, as does Con, and I know I have to do the right thing, as painful as it may be. I have to walk in there and cheer him up and counsel him back towards Tim. He must feel something for him. He doesn’t usually invite men to stay at his house.

It was his family home, and Con has guarded it like it’s treasure since they died. It’s very special to him. The fact that Tim is there speaks volumes to me, and it tells me to stop daydreaming before I end up ruining our friendship.

I straighten from the window. “Time to be his friend,” I say grimly. “He’s done so much for me. I can surely do this one thing for him.” I sigh. “And then I can go home and eat chocolate and wonder why my timing with men is always so catastrophically bad.” I leave my office in much the same way Charles I did on the morning of his execution. Although my dress sense is better than his.

As soon as I reach the corridor, I can hear Con’s raised voice, and I pick up the pace. Even so, I stick my head around the door cautiously.

He’s standing in the middle of the room, gesturing at a guitar. “It’s a piece ofshit,” he proclaims. “I might as well go and work in a brothel for all the good I’m doing here. Andwhile I’m at it, I’m going to live in one too. It’s got to be more fucking peaceful than around here. Phones ringing all the time, constant demands.” He stops abruptly when he sees me. He’s frowning heavily, an expression that’s completely alien to his usual easygoing self. When he sees me, his expression lightens for a second, but then the thunderclouds gather again.

“Goodness,” I say lightly. “That would be fine unless you ended up with someone like Lucy Scrimshaw as the madame. Then it would be all about lining up for inspection to see whose penis was the neatest.”

“What are you doing here, Frankie?” he says, turning back to his workbench. He looks at the guitar and kicks the bench in a disgusted fashion. He then immediately winces.

I eye George, who shakes his head with a smirk on his face.

I try a jaunty wink at Con. “Well, my day has really been missing a grumpy twat, so I thought I’d rush in to get my fix before you break your foot, Con.”

George chuckles, and Con sighs, scrubbing his hands through his hair. The brown-blond strands glint in the sunlight that’s pouring through the huge windows.

“Can I help you?” he says in a beleaguered fashion that shouldn’t make me want to smile as much as I do. Con in a rare strop is an adorable sight.

I eye him and then make up my mind. “Yes, come on. I need you.”

“I hope it isn’t talking to Jimmy Fitch’s people.”

“Not likely. I do want them to put in an order rather than run and hide in an air raid shelter.”

He heaves a sigh that suggests I’m the most irritating person alive, so I make my smile extra wide.

“Come on. Chop chop.”

“Where are we going?” he asks, wandering towards me, reluctance written all over his body.

---