Page 28 of Short Stack 3

He throws his arm over my shoulder. “I love you,” he says loudly and very affectionately.

“I love you too,” I say.

We walk down the narrow streets towards our cottage. The wind is fierce now, and it’s raining hard again, making it difficult to see ahead. My hair is soaked and plastered to my head, and my jeans are clammy and cold, but I’m with Asa, so I don’t think I’ve ever been happier.

Henry and Ivo

Risk Taker

Gone Camping

A new short story. This is set after the events ofRisk Takerand was inspired by my husband buying a camper van.

Chapter One

Henry

The horn toots outside the house, and I look down at Bertie. “Is it too late to hide?”

He’s balanced on the top of a teetering pile of clothes like a canine circus performer. As usual, he has nothing useful to add. Instead, he leaps down and goes to the front door, his tail wagging enthusiastically.

The horn sounds again, and I hear my other half bellow, “Henry?”

Shaking my head, I open the door. “There is no need to shout that loudly. I’m in the house, not in another country.”

Ivo grins at me. “Iknowwhere you are. It’s in a land called A Severe Case of Denial. Get in.”

On any other day, I would have admired how his blond hair—which has grown a little longer—falls around his sharp face and highlights his cheekbones and full, pouty lips. I might even have catalogued how his old denim shirt makes his golden eyes look lighter than usual. However, I can’t do any of that because myhorrified attention is all on the camper van where he sits behind the wheel.

“Is this it?”

He must mistake my horror for admiration because he leaps out and lopes around to me. “Yeah. Isn’t it great?”

“That’s not the word I’d have used.”

I examine the Volkswagen camper van. It’s painted a rather jaunty-looking blue-and-white colour, like something from the seaside.

Ivo slides open the side door with a theatrical flourish, and I peek inside. “Oh, it’s like a little ice cream parlour,” I say, charmed. The floor is covered with black-and-white chequered linoleum, and the cupboards are all painted sky blue.

“And look at all these little cupboards.” Ivo climbs in and, in the manner of a game show host, starts to open them. I’ve seen a cupboard before, so I’m not quite as entertained as him and find my attention straying to his behind, displayed like a work of art in those old jeans.

“And the bed is up here.”

“Pardon?” My attention is drawn back with a screech. “Where?”

He chuckles, his eyes full of an unholy amusement. “Up here, Henry. We put the roof up and then sleep here on a board.”

“On a… on aboard?” I splutter.

He bites his lip to stop his laughter from erupting, but it sparkles all over his face. “With a duvet and proper pillows, though. Not in sleeping bags, darling. I know how you feel about them.”

“Like a caterpillar being suffocated?—”

“—by its own skin. Yes, I do seem to remember those words.”

He pulls out his phone from his jeans and points it at me.

“What are you doing?”

---