Читать книгу It’s Not Me, It’s You - Mhairi McFarlane, Mhairi McFarlane - Страница 16

It was one thing to search for someone who used the phrase ‘womble’s toboggan’ – Delia had to consult the Viz Profanisaurus on that one – in comments on newspaper message boards.

It was entirely another thing to suddenly find yourself in the crosshairs of some sort of omniscient online troublemaker. The back of Delia’s neck grew cold and she shivered.

She couldn’t think of any possible way this man (was it a man?) had found her. Yes, she’d been in the café, but how had he known she was looking for him? She’d not committed a single keystroke to discussing him online, so even if he’d hacked her email (and how would he do that?) there was no smoking gun. And how would s/he recognise her anyway?

The principle of Occam’s Razor, Delia told herself; the simplest answer was usually the right one.

So the Naan could be one of her colleagues, who’d overheard the briefing with Roger?

Only thing was, there was surely no one in this office of long-servers and clocker-offers who had anything approaching that level of disrespect for their salary.

I mean, was it polite Gavin, forty-three, who liked Dire Straits, wakeboarding, his kids, and hated his wife? Nope. Or maybe Jules, fifty-one – married, no kids, saving for a Greek Island hopping month off to celebrate her thirtieth wedding anniversary soon? Hardly.

The idea they were firing up private email in office hours to endanger their income stream was downright crazy. And they certainly weren’t Viz readers.

And yet. Peshwari Naan’s words glowed stark black and white in front of her. Delia could go straight to Roger with this email address evidence, and say ‘Voila, here’s a way to talk to him.’ But something stopped her, and she wasn’t sure what. Possibly pride. A little longer, and she might solve this mystery and produce a stellar result.

After fifteen minutes internal debate, Delia opened a reply.

Yes I am. How did you know I was looking for you?

No reply, though she nervily hit refresh on her inbox every two minutes until it was time to go home. Home to Hexham.

Her phone rang mere minutes after she left the office, and she realised Paul was watching the clock, anticipating her being free. She answered. They had to speak some time.

‘Delia, at last.’

‘What do you want?’

‘To see if we can meet up.’

‘I don’t want to. We haven’t got anything to discuss.’

‘I understand how angry you are but I don’t agree that we don’t have anything to talk about.’

‘Like Paris, you mean?’

There was a rewarding moment of stunned silence, then Paul muttered:

‘Jesus, Aled, you absolute twat.’ Louder: ‘Yes, Paris, we can talk about that. How I’m not going. I’ve finished with Celine.’

‘Sorry to hear. Hope you’re both OK. Hugs.’

Paul sounded shocked, and Delia wondered how small a mouse she must’ve been in this relationship for him to not expect this depth of fury and hurt at him sleeping with another woman. Did he think she’d sling the Le Creuset set about a bit, sob, and then eventually allow him to put his strong arms around her? She felt more like committing a blunt trauma head injury with the cast-iron casserole dish.

‘I know you need time. I’m here if you want to talk,’ Paul said.

‘You seem to assume I’m coming back, one time or another.’

‘I’m not assuming anything! I’m letting you know what’s happened and where I stand. Glad I did, given Aled’s obviously not a reliable go-between.’

So winning, so plausible, so very Paul. The Paul who’d lied through his teeth. What had Aled said? ‘I told him Paris was a stupid idea.’ It sounded as if Paul had initially told Aled he’d considered going, even if he’d rejected it later.

‘Aled said he’d had to talk you out of it.’

‘That’s … ! What? I’m so angry at Aled for this. I can only think he blurted and then thought he had to say that to you, to compensate. You know what he’s like, tact’s like a foreign language to him sometimes.’

‘Who knows? Not me. Bye, Paul.’

Delia couldn’t act as if she and Paul still had that shared ground, and were confidantes.

She had considered Paul’s explanation already: that Aled, conscious he’d put his not-inconsiderably-large feet in it earlier in the phone call, was trying to win brownie points by making Delia think he’d disapproved enough to intervene.

Delia knew what she was doing. She was trying to knit the wound back together almost instantly: to find a way out, so Paul’s behaviour wasn’t as bad as she feared. Delia wanted to believe him, rather than Aled. She stopped herself, but not before she’d shown that her instincts to side with Paul remained in place.

Delia was going to have to subdue impulses like this. She’d trusted him absolutely, without question, and look where it had got her. Now, she had questions – and absolutely no trust.