Page 37 of Famous Last

“You are not going to be-lievemy day,” she muttered as she stomped out each syllable on the steps. When he looked up, he realised Marshall stood framed in the upstairs doorway, holding the door open. Bev must have been looking down because when she finally lifted her gaze, she clunked to a stop.

“Fudge me. Marshall Highlander. What the heck are you doing…oooh?”

“It’s not what you’re thinking,” said Spencer, coming up the stairs behind her.

“You don’t know what I’m thinking.”

“Maybe not, but I can hazard a pretty good guess.”

“He’s wearing your clothes. What am I supposed to think?”

“That he’s keeping a low profile in my flat.”

“With your clothes on.”

“In comfort.”

“And he’s the reason you pulled your first ever sickie?”

“He—he needed somewhere to stay for the night—”

“For thenight? He slept here? In your bed?”

“Yes, but we didn’t—it wasn’t—”

By now, Marshall, standing with Tiger between his legs, had begun to chuckle at the back-and-forth between them.

“You two are like an old married couple,” he said eventually.

“He wishes,” said Bev, a quip he had heard many times before, as she stopped at the entrance and held out her free hand. “Beverley Salvatore. We met at Muriel Moresby’s charity event, but you probably don’t remember me. An honour to meet you again, Mr Highlander.”

“Marshall, please. And I do remember you, Beverley. Although Spencer has told me a lot more about you since.”

“Don’t believe a word. He’s got a very creative mind. I’m guessing you’re not going to say no to a glass of bubbly? Bearing in mind the media shitstorm you’ve been dodging?”

Spencer followed Bev into the flat, and a bemused Marshall shut the door behind them. She had already thrown down her bag and coat onto the table, and went over to Spencer’s cupboards, opening one after the other, obviously looking for glasses. He only had tumblers, but she already knew that.

“Top shelf, above the sink. What are we celebrating?”

Once she had the glasses lined up on a countertop, she took a moment to compose herself before turning her full attention to Spencer.

“Hell in a handbag, Spence. Everything went to the dogs today. No coffee for the Monday morning meeting, and lots of frayed tempers. I wasn’t there at the beginning, but I heard that Muriel blamed you, blamed the fact that you didn’t have a contingency plan in place for when you might be sick. Apparently she said something like ‘we have a plan in place for Covid, why don’t we have one for morning coffee?’ I didn’t get there until almost nine-thirty and by then they’d sent Kimberleyout to get the drinks. Also, Prince wasn’t there at the beginning of the meeting—he said he sent you a text message at eight, but you didn’t respond—so they had to figure out the laptop setup themselves. And Muriel announced during the meeting that Evelyn, the events manager, is on long-term sick leave and won’t be returning to the office this side of Christmas, so the client party is hanging by a thread. She wants me to take over, as if I haven’t got enough to do already. Surely she realises that getting something decent arranged with such a short deadline is virtually impossible—”

“Or virtually possible,” said Marshall cryptically, which tripped Bev up for a second before she ignored him and carried on.

“On the plus side, Killian finally sent through his December article—hot off the press—which is apparently awesome. But he adamantly refuses to let anyone but you touch it, because, according to him and much to Muriel’s annoyance, ‘Spencer is the only one who understands the subtleties of my prose and my blend of humour—’”

“You get to proofread Killian’s work?” asked Marshall. “That’s pretty impressive.”

“Do you know him?” asked Spencer.

“We’ve met at a couple of benefits. He’s very particular.”

“Excuse me, I’m holding the talking stick!” said Bev, asserting herself, apparently wholly over the fact thattheMarshall Highlander stood next to her. “You two have had all day to talk and I am pretty much bursting at the seams. So, final thing, Spence, just so you know, Clarissa missed three important deadlines today, something she attributed to you. Told Muriel she’d asked you to finish them up on Friday before you left for your parents’—”

“That’s a barefaced lie!”

“Yes, and Clarissa knows that. I tried to back you up, told Muriel you wouldn’t sit on something that important, but I’ve no idea if she believed me or not. If only you’d been there to defend yourself.”

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