Name & Address Withheld (4 page)

As Lizzie directed the driver to her door Matt knew that, while he was still sailing on the crest of a lager wave, he really wanted to kiss her goodnight, and even with his rusty dating dial he knew that she wouldn’t resist him. As the taxi slowed to a pant Matt gave the cabbie the postcode for his onward journey before sliding the interconnecting window closed and turning to face Lizzie who, to his amusement, was taking ages to gather her non-existent belongings together before opening the door.

Taking her hand, he leant forward to give her a goodbye peck on the cheek and, to his delight, Lizzie moved her mouth to meet his. Like a couple of love-struck teenagers they kissed. His synapses buzzed with the excitement that passed between them as he felt her lips touch his, just lingering enough to be meaningful. In a moment she was gone, and for a second he’d never wanted anything more than to still be with her.

Matt’s mind was a mess as the driver pulled away from the kerb.

‘Where next, mate? Well done. She was lovely.’

Lizzie had come down off her cloud by the time she’d unlocked the front door. She shouldn’t have kissed him. True, she’d had a much better evening than she could have imagined, but he was a work colleague…sort of…and she’d had a lot to drink. Alcohol had diluted her inhibitions and now, sobering up at home, the self-justification process was starting in earnest. But no one was going to be having meetings with the
advertising people until well into the New Year, by which time Matt might have forgotten all about it.

About what, exactly? They’d had a couple of beers, chatted, danced, chatted, and then, for about ten seconds, they’d kissed each other goodnight. If she’d been eighteen years old she would’ve just put it down as a good night out, so why, fourteen years later, was she torturing herself? Lizzie hated her carefully camouflaged romantic core. It caused nothing but trouble. That was why she’d made the decision to bow out of the relationship arena and focus on her career instead. Professionally she berated herself. What if he’d been hoping for a kiss and tell with a B-list—make that E-list—agony aunt? But then there wasn’t exactly anything to kiss and tell about, was there? She was single, pissed, and at an office party. Nothing scandalous about that.

She wished that the gland responsible for providing her with this level of adrenaline would take a break. All these hypotheticals were in danger of giving her a headache. Life was all about taking opportunities and seizing the moment, and tonight that moment had been hers. In fact, if she was totally honest with herself, part of her wished she’d taken a bit more.

Lizzie performed her ablutions noisily, and even gargled a couple of times with some vintage Listerine that she found on a shelf, hoping that Clare would wake up for a debrief. Wide awake, Lizzie climbed into bed. How could she possibly sleep now?

Across London Matt looked out of his kitchen window as he poured himself another pint of water from the filter jug which she insisted was better for them. He was disconcertingly sober. For the first time in his life he had been unfaithful: to his wife, to himself and to Lizzie.

He should’ve said something. It might only have been a kiss, but in his mind it was already a whole lot more. His marriage might be dead, but why should she believe him? It was the oldest line in the book. Now it was rapidly approaching 3:00 a.m. on Saturday morning and he was about to creep into bed claim
ing to have lost all track of time at the party. Hopefully she wouldn’t wake up. She was certainly unlikely to have missed him. If she had, it would be the first time in months. He picked up his glass and left the kitchen, confused.

chapter 2

R
achel rubbed her eyes and was appalled to feel that her incredibly expensive all-weather mascara was now crusty. As she swallowed and winced at the furry stale oral aftermath of her Shiraz Cabernet and Marlboro Lights session, fragments of her evening started to return to her memory. She must have drunk a lot to have been smoking. Enough to forget that she had given up last month. A token attempt to try and keep at least one of her vices under some sort of control. She cupped her hand and exhaled into it. Her breath smelt as bad as it tasted.

‘Bollocks.’

Now she was talking to herself. Not a good sign. She fell back onto the cushions. It had only been a few drinks with the team after work, but, coupled with a long boozy client lunch earlier in the day, it had obviously got a little out of hand. Now that she had a sofa in her office this was becoming an all too frequent occurrence.

Almost dizzy with the effort, Rachel rummaged in her capacious bag for some breath-freshening gum, paracetamol and her mobile. She held the display close to her face while her eyes refocused to inspect the small screen. No missed calls and
no messages. Relieved or disappointed? She wasn’t sure. She could call and tell him that she was on her way, but phoning at this point would be tantamount to admitting she was in the wrong, not just at the office. Hopefully she’d manage to slip into bed undetected and be vague about the time of her return if he asked in the morning.

As she located her shoes, she shivered in the unfamiliar cold of the office. In two days she’d be here raising hell like she always did on a Monday morning when deadlines looked as if they weren’t going to be met, and tomorrow she’d be back to tie up a few loose ends and do the real work that was near impossible to achieve while she was playing hard at projecting the image of being in control.

Next week she would finally know whether she had won the account they’d all been working so hard for. She could already picture the banner headline in
Campaign
: ‘Anti-drugs offensive taken on by Clifton Dexter Harrison’, and her publicity shot alongside. It was high-profile, and a huge social concern, and once you’d made a name for yourself the industry didn’t forget. The account director on the last AIDS awareness campaign was running his own agency now. This could be her big break. The culmination of all the late nights and early mornings of the last few years. She’d sacrificed everything for this moment.

Rachel felt a pang of remorse. She’d always had a selfish streak—single-minded, she preferred to call it. But she couldn’t sit back and relax until she’d made a name for herself. Rachel was a here-and-now girl. Moments were for seizing and unwinding was for watches—all part of her ‘take now and pay later’ attitude to life. But this could be it—her very own meal ticket. Then she’d set about fixing her relationship. She was sure that with a bit of effort and a couple of surprise weekends away it could all be back to normal again. Rachel didn’t do failure. Fingers crossed, she would make her New Year strategy the anti-drugs offensive followed by a quick-fire campaign to save her marriage.

The issue addressed, her mind returned to rest and now focused on getting her some beauty sleep as soon as possible.
By waving her arms as she locked her office Rachel managed to trigger enough motion sensors to illuminate her exit route from the building, and successfully startled the security guard who she suspected must have managed to nod off against the cold marble wall of their smart reception area. She wondered how much they were paying him to sleep in the upright position.

The house was pitch-black and, jaw clenched to prevent her teeth chattering, she tiptoed up the stairs. As she stared into the dark of the bedroom she could see that the curtains were still open and the bed was still made. He wasn’t back yet. Her concern was only momentary as her tired memory saw fit to remind her of a message she’d picked up when they’d left the bar. He had another Christmas party.

Relieved that she wasn’t going to have to explain her late return, have sex or yet another conversation about nothing in particular, Rachel flicked the lights on. She cleansed and toned in record time and was dead to the world when her slightly smoked and pickled husband collapsed into bed beside her. The room was quiet as their breathing patterns united and they lay beside each other, together but apart.

chapter 3

G
eorge Michael and Andrew Ridgely were crooning away on the radio for the umpteenth December in a row. It never seemed to be their Last Christmas.

Lizzie was lying in bed, staring at the ceiling, waiting for the cacophony of mushy sentiment and sleigh bells to come to an end. It was Saturday morning. Five days before Christmas. No wonder so many people found the festive period depressing. The contrast with the high of the night before was almost too much. But the evening had surpassed all her expectations and now the weekend was just the same as it would have been whether or not she had kissed Matt. It just felt worse. And it certainly wasn’t being helped by the hangover that was starting to roll in from somewhere behind her ears.

Clare must have been watching her from a hidden camera, as she chose this moment to wander in breezily with a cup of tea. As if she had just happened to be passing with a spare mug. Lizzie wondered how many times she had walked past her door in the last couple of hours, desperate for some sign of life.

‘Morning. How was last night, then?’

‘Great…’

It was a unique delivery. Lizzie’s voice rumbled and squeaked into action and her first syllable came out grudgingly. Her tones were definitely less dulcet than normal, and she could only just hear what she was saying. She must have done more shouting in smoky atmospheres than she had realised. She coughed a couple of times in an attempt to restore her more familiar range before continuing.

‘…a lot of fun, actually…’ Her voice was a unique tribute to Eartha Kitt.

‘Really?’ Clare’s voice was laced with expectation. Eager for details, she perched on the edge of Lizzie’s bed just as her flatmate leapt to her feet, impressively grabbing her towel from the chair in one single movement.

‘I’ll fill you in after my shower.’

Lizzie surprised herself with the buoyancy of her tone, especially as her whole body was wobbling with the effort of reaching a vertical position. Heart beating faster than normal, she half-walked, half-skipped to the bathroom just as Macy Gray’s ‘Winter Wonderland’ replaced Wham. She didn’t know why she hadn’t just confessed there and then. For some totally irrational reason she was suddenly embarrassed at her behaviour.

She was standing on the bath mat drying herself when Clare knocked.

‘For goodness’ sake. You never get up after ten on a Saturday. I’ve been pacing up and down in the kitchen, cleaning surfaces, just waiting for you to wake up—and then you decide to have a shower first. Since when have you been so obsessive about your cleanliness? Unless, of course, you’re washing a man right out of your hair…’

Lizzie refused to be goaded into a confession. All in good time. She swapped her now damp towel for her bathrobe, and as she opened the door Clare practically fell into the room. She must have been leaning right up against it.

‘Well, I spoke to all the bosses without saying anything incriminating, boogied the night away with Ben and the team, drank lots of alcohol and then got stuck in the corner with Danny Vincent—possibly the most self-centred, boring, slimy
drive-time DJ in the history of broadcasting. It was terrible. To make matters worse my head feels too heavy for my body, and right now I’m not sure whether I’m going to make it through the next few hours without being sick…’ Lizzie didn’t remember being exceptionally drunk at any stage of the evening, but her body was telling a different story. ‘Maybe I’m coming down with something…’

‘Poor you…’ Clare empathised fervently.

This was why, Lizzie mused, she was her best friend.

‘…but I think you’ll find it’s just a good old-fashioned hangover. So, did he make a move?’

Lizzie shuddered at the thought of those whiter than white teeth and tighter than tight trousers.

‘No. Thankfully, just when I thought there was no way out, I was rescued by a different bloke who had spotted my predicament from the bar.’

‘I see.’

Lizzie was being so pseudo-offhand that Clare now knew there was a whole lot more to this than she was being told at the moment. This was typical Ford behaviour. Whenever Lizzie had anything interesting to divulge she just tossed it in ever so casually at the point in the conversation where you had as good as stopped listening. Clare decided to play it cool for now. She knew from experience that this coy moment couldn’t last long. Lizzie meanwhile, freshly energised by her shower, was just burbling on.

‘Anyway, just the usual, really. Lots of drinking, chatting and dancing, and then I got a taxi home. It must have been nearly 2:00 a.m. when we finally found one.’

‘We!’ Clare picked up on the discrepancy at once. Ha! Lizzie had let her guard down. Such a careless mistake. Amateurish, in fact.

Lizzie could have kicked herself. It had all been going so well. But Clare was her best friend. She was entitled to the full story—and besides, it wouldn’t feel real if Clare didn’t know. Yet now she felt sheepish. Since her divorce Clare had been so generally anti-men that Lizzie felt somehow she had let the side down.

‘OK. So I shared a cab with him.’ Lizzie looked at her feet awkwardly.

‘With…’

The intensity of Clare’s stare was currently boring a hole in the side of her head. Lizzie felt sure that Clare would be able to bend spoons if she put her mind to it.

‘With Matt.’ Lizzie looked up. She was going to take this on the chin. She had nothing to be ashamed of. It wasn’t as if she met people every weekend. In fact she couldn’t remember the last time…

‘The guy who rescued you from the clutches of the delightful Danny?’ Clare grinned at her use of alliteration, just in case Lizzie had missed it.

‘Yeah.’

‘You shared a cab all the way to Putney? Does he live round here, then?’

Lizzie hesitated as she realised that she had no idea where he lived. She vaguely remembered Matt telling the driver where to go next, and she even remembered listening, but she had no recollection of what he’d said. Her mind had quite clearly been on other things.