Page 126 of The Blind Date

"Of course, not,” he was quick to deny, gulping when Mum narrowed her eyes at him. "I love missing the game and spending time with my lovely family. I wish I could do it more often."

"That's what I thought,” I grinned and came to a stop in front of my room. Finally letting go of their hands, I turned to shoot them both a warning look before reaching for the key in my pocket.

"Can we please make this quick?" Mum impatiently tapped her foot as she waited for me to open the door. "The cab could get here any moment now. I don't want to keep them waiting. It’ll take a while to bring our suitcases down from our room.”

"The driver will text me when he gets here," I told her as I unlocked the door. I stepped to the side and gestured for them to enter first.

"What's going on here?" Dad asked, staring at me suspiciously and refusing to budge. "What's in your room?"

“It’s a surprise. You won't find out until you go in to check for yourself.” I gestured encouragingly toward the door.

Before Dad could question my motives, Mum’s impatience got the better of her. She pushed past us both to head into the room, but a few feet in, she stopped abruptly and gaped at the last two people she probably wanted to see right now.

"Saffron?" Dad called out to me, warily stopping just behind Mum. "What's going on here? Why are Alfie and Yasmin here?"

"Because you all need to talk and solve your problems!" I exclaimed and slammed the door shut. Before anyone could stop me, I locked the door from the outside and pocketed the key.

"You got them?" Cillian asked as he turned up behind me with his brother, holding up his parents’ phones that he had swiped off their persons, just as we had discussed.

I nodded and held up the ones I had swiped also.

"You think it'll work?" Cedric asked, an unsure expression on his face.

"I'm not sure, but it's our best shot," Cillian said. "Anyway, I call that a job well done. It’s time to move on to part two of the plan now.”

The second part of our plan consisted of us heading down to the bar and ordering some fancy drinks on our parents' tab while they, hopefully, figured things out between themselves.

After all, while locked in a room with no distractions, what else could they do but make up, right?

* * *

"I'm a little worried,”I gnawed on my bottom lip as we finally arrived on the third floor after spending nearly three hours at the bar. "What if our plan backfires? What if we’ve just made things worse?"

"We won't know until we unlock the door, darling.” Cedric gave my hand a reassuring squeeze. "They already hate each other. The worst thing they'll do is come out and hate each other even more. It can’t get any worse than that.”

“Or maybe, we'll turn up to find two out of the four dead,” Cillian grinned morbidly as he walked ahead of us.

"That doesn't help.” Despite not wanting to believe him, the closer we got to my room, the longer I held my breath. "But what if he's right?" I turned to ask Cedric. "What if we turn up and your parents are dead?"

“Hey,” he protested, a small smile on his face. “What makes you think that it’ll be my parents to be the ones that get killed? Have you met my mum? She can be a terrifying little thing when she wants to be.”

"And have you met my mum?” I countered, quirking a daring brow at him.

“You’re right,” he murmured. “If anyone is going to die, it’ll be our dads. Our mums are pretty scary.”

"And they're even scarier together," I laughed, but the sound was quick to die when we spotted Cillian standing with his ear pressed against the door.

“What are you doing?” Cedric asked his brother.

“I don’t hear any wailing,” Cillian frowned, pressing his ear even harder against the door. “Have they become so cold-hearted that they won’t even cry about murdering their former friends?”

“Who are we talking about here? My parents or yours?” I asked.

“Both, either, or whatever is grammatically correct.” He shrugged.

“I guess the only way to find out is if we unlock the door.” I moved to push him away from the door, having already retrieved my key from my pocket.

"I'm going to pinch my nose, just in case the bodies have started to smell," Cillian announced and followed Cedric and me into the room.

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