Читать книгу My Best Friend’s Life - Shari Low - Страница 11

Roxy. Day One, Sunday, 11 p.m.

Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock.

Roxy stared at the ceiling as the hands ticked round on Ginny’s alarm clock. Her anxiety levels rose with every sound. It was bloody ridiculous–I mean, who even had ticking bloody clocks these days? Hadn’t Ginny realised that Europe now imported almost the whole of the national export quota of LCD tat from China? Well, at least now Roxy knew what to buy her for Christmas.

Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock.

Urgh! She put her head under the pillow. After a few seconds she realised that this caused a slight problem with the respiratory functions necessary for maintaining life. She stuffed the alarm clock under the pillow instead. Finally, silence! She heard a creaking coming from further down the hall and her eyes widened. She bloody knew it! Her mother was sneaking into Auntie Violet’s room for some naked duvet wrestling. She should have known when her mother joined Weight Watchers that she was up to no good. Why was the thought of middle-aged parents having sex so hard to deal with? Still, she supposed she should be grateful–her mother and Auntie Vi having a tickle she could just about cope with, but the mental image of her mother being rogered over the sofa by some burly, hairy bloke would traumatise her for life.

Her ears strained as she craned to hear the Marks & Spencer’s thermal slippers padding along the Axminster.

Nope, it was too much–there were some times in life that oblivion was the preferred option. She needed a diversion and fast. She pulled the clock back out from under the pillow.

Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock.

This was a living hell. Okay, so maybe it wasn’t on the same scale as, say, civil war, famine or disease, but then, at least there was official aid for those situations. Who did she have to help her? Bloody no one. Her one stalwart, the only person she could depend on, had buggered off on the last train to London.

If it weren’t for the fact that the only things that could make this situation worse were puffy eyes, she’d have cried.

She missed Felix. She’d given him the best two years of her life, and how had he repaid her? With a betrayal that had devastated her to the very soul.

The lying bastard. The cheating, lying, arrogant, cold, condescending, mendacious scumbag. God, how she missed him.

She clenched her teeth to stop the tears. If she succumbed to a full-blown sobbing session she’d have to go to the bathroom for tissues, and the risk of what she’d meet on the way there was enough to quell the waterworks.

She had a sudden feeling of almighty dread. Didn’t her mother tell her that she’d been to an Ann Summers party in the village hall last month? A mental picture of two middle-aged women in PVC bondage gear only six inches away through a plasterboard wall flooded into her head. She pulled the alarm clock closer to her ears to drown out any sound effects. If she heard a buzzing noise coming from the next room the therapist bills would leave her bankrupt.

This wasn’t supposed to happen to her. She’d had her whole life planned out. Go to London. Fall in love with wealthy bloke. Marry in big castle with Mariah Carey singing ‘Ave Maria’ as she swept up the aisle.

Oh, she knew she was being unrealistic. Mariah didn’t do private functions–she’d have to settle for Charlotte Church.

But she’d really thought Felix was the one, because here was the thing: she really had loved him. After a lifetime of dispensing her love and affection towards the opposite sex in direct proportion to their wealth/status/power/generosity (if she ever met Bill Gates, he was in for the time of his life), Felix had totally ambushed her in the emotional department. They’d met in the underwear section of the gents’ floor in Harvey Nicks. He was stocking up on new Prada pants, while she was searching for trendy boxers for her latest fling: a fifty-five-year-old with a saggy arse and a penchant for thongs that was putting her off her food. Although the fact that he owned half of Buckinghamshire was a huge consolation (and, in all honesty, her very favourite thing about him).

But despite her devotion to her current man’s portfolio, she couldn’t help but admire Felix’s merchandise. He was over six foot (she checked out his shoes–nope, no lifts) and his shoulders were as broad as his hips were narrow. He was wearing cream chinos, moccasins, and the kind of preppy shirt that made him look like he belonged in one of those old black and white films of the Kennedy family playing touch football on the beach in Martha’s Vineyard.

The moment they made eye contact and he smiled at her across a Y-Fronts for the Older Man display, she realised to her utter astonishment that all that Mills & Boon ‘love at first sight’ mush that Ginny used to read really did have a basis in fact. If she’d been wearing a corset, she’d have whipped it off and made a dive for his throbbing loins right there and then.

Instead, she smiled back, said hi, and ten minutes later they were having coffee, two hours later they were having sex, and within the month they were talking long-term relationship with the prospect of a city flat and a house in the country, four kids (all at boarding school) and a month every summer in Barbados. She’d absolutely adored him. Her knees went to jelly when he walked into a room. Her stomach flipped when he grinned at her. Okay, so he was sometimes a bit on the arrogant side. And yes, he could be abrasive, self-centred and ruthless. But then, weren’t those common attributes in most successful men? She loved his confidence, his strength, his certainty, and from that first orgasm in the fifth-floor toilet of Harvey Nichols, she’d known without a single doubt that he was her soul mate and that she wanted to spend the rest of her life with him–in sickness and in health, till death (or his unfaithful cock) do them part.

Roxy bit her lip and swallowed back a sob as she had a sudden astonishing thought: She would have loved Felix even if he were poor.

She let that magnanimous sentiment float in her mind for a second, before taking an imaginary baseball bat and battering it to death. Who was she kidding? She was in love, she wasn’t Mother Teresa.

And while Felix wasn’t exactly Donald Trump, he did work in the City (something to do with liquid assets) and earned a six-figure salary–enough to provide them with a comfortable future. Sadly, it was also enough to provide some tart from the florist with a second-hand Micra and reduced rental in one of the flats in Felix’s property portfolio. Daisy, that was her name. Bloody Daisy, working in a florist–you couldn’t make it up. Sometimes, in painful moments (eyebrow plucking, bikini waxing), she took her mind off her agony by torturing herself about how long it had been going on. Days? Weeks? Surely it couldn’t have been more than a couple of months without her spotting the signs? After all, it would surely have affected his behaviour. Unless…Her heart tightened. Could it be that this wasn’t the first time? Was his wandering dick the reason that he’d always blocked her suggestions that they move in together? Had he been shagging everything in sight since the moment they met?

How could he have been? She had never even contemplated being unfaithful to him. Well, apart from the time she’d snogged his brother in the coats cupboard at the family Christmas dinner. Oh, and the time she’d let his mate grope her to orgasm in the back of a taxi. But alcohol was to blame on both those occasions, and anyway, neither of those incidents counted because there was no exchange of body fluids. After all, a girl had to have her standards.

His mate had been rather cute, though…What was his name again? Nope, it was gone.

But the point was, she had never breached his trust, even when she had really wanted to. Hadn’t she had a raging crush on Sam since the minute she had started working in the Seismic? But had she once acted on it? Absolutely not. And that was only partly because a) she realised that he wasn’t interested in her in the least, and b) as previously ascertained, the man ran a brothel for God’s sake–not exactly the type of career that you’d be happy to disclose on passport applications.

A buzz cut through her thoughts.

Dear God, no. Please no. She clenched her eyes shut and wondered if she could remember the phone number for the Samaritans.

Bzzzzzzzzzz.

Nooooooooo. Mental instability beckoned and she saw her future–rocking back and forth in the foetal position and recoiling at the notion of sexual relations.

Bzzzzzzzzz.

She suddenly realised that the buzzing noise was a bit closer to home. Or, rather, to her single bed and Mark, Kian, Shane, Nicky and Bryan.

Her hand grappled across the bedside table and snatched her vibrating phone.

It would be Felix–well, he could bloody well rot for all she cared. She would never forgive him. Never.

Actually, since her feet were sticking out the bottom of the duvet and hypothermia was slowly setting in, she was beginning to realise that a fortnight at the Sandy Lane Hotel in Barbados would probably heal her shattered heart.

But she’d never tell him that. Let him come begging, the bastard–preferably with Expedia vouchers in hand.

She opened the new text message.

Arvd safe. On way 2 flat. Hope u r ok. Lol, G.

She tossed the phone onto the floor. Typical bloody Ginny, rubbing salt in the wounds. In approximately an hour’s time, Ginny would be snuggled down in HER king-size bed, between HER 800-thread-count Egyptian cotton sheets and HER cashmere throw, drinking a decaf mocha choca from HER state-of-the-art coffee machine. Actually, the coffee machine belonged to her flatmate, but that’s why it was called communal living.

She pulled the duvet up around her ears. She missed her life. She might only have left it about thirteen hours earlier, but she missed it.

But in the words of the Dalai Lama, as one chapter closes, so another opens. Or was that Oprah?

Maybe this break would be good for her. No city living, no crushing crowds, no five-pound vanilla skinny lattes from the faux American coffee bar at the corner of the street and no cocaine crumbs on her handbag after she’d propped it on top of a toilet cistern while peeing in a nightclub. Ew, she hated it when that happened–why couldn’t people clean up after themselves? She really didn’t get the whole cocaine thing–why snort up all that cash when it could be used to finance a high-grade Marc Jacobs habit instead?

Maybe she should just view this whole episode as a city detox. She would de-clutter her life and her mind, and get herself back on track to the glorious existence she deserved. She would take bracing walks that would leave her with the complexion of Heidi Klum after a week in a Swiss spa. She would heal her tortured heart and soul by reconnecting with those less fortunate than herself (and, let’s face it, in this backward land that time forgot that was just about everyone). She’d embrace the slower pace of life and use it to recharge her batteries and catch up on all those things she didn’t have time for in the city: reading, exercising, eating healthily, plotting Felix’s death.

She wiped her eyes with Shane’s hair. Yep, this was going to be fine. Great. Perhaps not in the same league as a night in Pangaea knocking back champagne with minor (and occasionally major) royals, but she’d cope.

She let her eyes droop and her breathing settle into a steady rhythm.

Roxy Galloway was a survivor and she was going to be okay. It was her last thought as she fell asleep…just missing the strange buzzing noise that started in the next room.