FRAN rang the doorbell and moments later a blurry-eyed Rosie peered out from behind the safety chain.
‘Wassa time?’ she mumbled.
Fran frowned and stared at her friend in horror and amazement. ‘Five o’clock. Rosie, have you been drinking?’
Rosie swallowed back a hiccup and then beamed. ‘I jus’…jus’ ha’ a small one. I was nervous, see. Knowing that you were meeting Sam.’ Her eyes focussed at last. ‘Did you? Meet him?’
‘I did.’
‘And?’
Fran shivered. It had been a long and boring journey back on the train which had stopped at about a hundred stations between Eversford and London. She was cold and she was tired and frankly, not at all sure that she was doing the right thing in trying to teach Rosie’s ex-lover a lesson. From her brief meeting with him, he had not seemed the ideal candidate to have the wool pulled over his eyes. She was going to have to be very careful….
‘Rosie, do we have to have this conversation on the doorstep?’
‘Oh! Sorry! Come in!’ Rosie unhooked the chain and Fran followed her into the flat which seemed to have had nothing done to it in the way of housework since she had been there the day before yesterday. She wrinkled her nose. How stale it smelt.
Rosie turned to her eagerly. ‘So! Did you get the job?’
Again, Fran felt the oddest shiver of apprehension. ‘Yes, I did.’
‘Oh, joy of joys!’ gurgled Rosie. ‘Well done! Let’s go and have a drink to celebrate!’
‘Haven’t you had enough?’
Rosie looked at her sharply. ‘Maybe I have,’ she shrugged. ‘But that doesn’t stop you, does it?’
‘No, I’m fine. I had tea on the train. I just want to take the weight off my feet.’
Fran waited until they were both settled in the sitting room where dirty cups and glasses littered the coffee table, before she said anything.
‘The place could do with a bit of a clean-up, you know, Rosie.’
Rosie pulled a face. ‘Bet you didn’t say that to Sam! He’s nearly as untidy as me! God, I used to despair of the way he dropped his shirts on the bedroom floor!’
It was a statement which told how intimate they had been, and Fran clenched her teeth as she tried to block out the image of Sam Lockhart peeling the clothes from that impressive body of his. Surely she wasn’t jealous? Not of Rosie? But maybe it was that which made her plump for a home truth rather than sparing Rosie’s feelings any longer. ‘He may be untidy,’ she agreed sternly. ‘But at least his house is clean.’
Rosie, who was in the process of rubbing her finger at a sticky brown ring left by a sherry glass, looked up abruptly. ‘Are you saying my flat is dirty?’
‘I’m saying it could do with an airing,’ said Fran diplomatically. ‘And a bit of a blitz.’
Rosie nodded with the distracted air of someone who wasn’t really listening. ‘Tell me what Sam said first. Tell me what you thought of him.’
Fran chose her next words even more carefully. ‘He’s certainly very good-looking. I can see why you fell for him.’
Rosie squinted. ‘C’mon, Fran. You can do better than that. What did you really think of him?’
Tricky. ‘Well, he wasn’t what I was expecting,’ she said slowly.
‘Mmmm? What were you expecting then?’
Fran wriggled her shoulders as she tried to put it into words. ‘The way you described him, I thought he’d be kind of…obvious. You know. Mr. Smarm. But he wasn’t. He was…’ Now she really couldn’t go on. Being honest was one thing, but not if it had the effect of wounding the very person you were supposed to be helping. And if Fran told Rosie the truth—that she had been more attracted to him than any man since Sholto—then wouldn’t that make her look foolish? And an appalling judge of character?
‘Sexy?’ enquired Rosie.
Fran winced. It would not have been her first word of choice. ‘I suppose so.’
‘That’s because he is. Very. Fran, I didn’t have any real experience of men before I met Sam—but believe me when I tell you that he is just dynamite in bed—’
‘Rosie! I don’t want to know!’
‘Why not?’
‘Because other people’s sex lives should remain private, that’s why!’ Except that she wasn’t being completely truthful. It was more that she couldn’t bear to think of Sam Lockhart being intimate with anyone—and the reasons for that were confusing the hell out of her. ‘Change the subject, Rosie!’ she growled. ‘Or I’ll wash my hands of the whole idea!’
‘Okay, okay—keep your hair on!’ Rosie slanted her a glance from beneath the heavy fringe which flopped into her eyes. ‘So what’s happening about the ball?’
‘He’s ringing me when he gets back from Europe. That’s when we’ll discuss all the details. You know, the budget, the venue—’ she yawned. ‘That kind of thing.’
‘And the guest list?’
‘That’s right. Most of the planning I can organise by phone from Dublin, but I’m going to need a temporary base in London.’
‘Stay here with me!’ said Rosie impulsively.
Fran shook her head. She suspected that a few years down the line, sharing a flat might test their friendship to breaking point. ‘How can I, Rosie?’ she asked gently. ‘You live here. And Sam knows you live here, doesn’t he? I know it’s unlikely, but imagine if he saw me coming out of your flat. It would rather give the game away, wouldn’t it? No, I’ll ring my mother up—she’s got loads of rich friends and relatives. One of them might just be planning a winter holiday in the sun. I could do with a few weeks off—and I’m the world’s best house-sitter!’
She studied the finger that Sam had so softly circled, and swallowed. ‘You know, maybe this is the opportunity I need to make the break and get out of Ireland—’
‘I thought you loved it!’
‘I do. Just that Dublin is such a small city—’
‘And you keep running into Sholto and his new girlfriend, I suppose?’
Fran forced a smile. ‘Something like that.’ She stood up decisively. ‘Got any bleach?’
‘Bleach?’ Rosie blinked. ‘You aren’t planning to go blond, are you?’ she asked in horror.
Fran’s smile widened of its own accord. ‘Not that kind of bleach, stupid! I meant the kind that cleans floors!’
‘Oh, that!’ said Rosie gloomily, and went off to find some.
