“Luo’s a fucking bastard, that’s what happened,” he spat out, sounding more miserable than furious. “He doesn’t even like her. He just enjoys toying with her to wind me up.” A shimmer of unshed tears floated in Splat’s eyes.
Great, more crying.
Noah said, “Who?” even though he knew there was only one likely candidate for Luo’s affections that would have enraged Splat to this level: Meredith. He sighed. “For God’s sake. What happened to those two girls you were chatting up?”
“What? That was ages ago.”
Noah shook his head. Then, Meredith came storming out of the building, chased by Savannah and Aoife. She took one look at Splat’s bloody face, and Luo slouched against the wall, and ran off down the road.
Noah turned to Vitt. “And you wonder why I hate going into the city with this lot?”
“Should we go after them?” asked Frankie, watching the receding figures of the three women.
“Nah. Aoife will drag her back. I don’t know why she’s got her jumpers in a knot, anyway,” said Vitt.
“You mean pyjamas?” replied Noah.
“Same difference.”
“Can you go talk to Luo?”I can’t deal with his bullshit right now,Noah wanted to add. But he couldn’t be seen as taking sides.
Vitt sighed, releasing Splat, who fell onto the wet floor.
“You shouldn’t let him get to you so much,” Noah said, crouching down to meet him at eye level. “You know Meredith would never do anything with him.”
Asking Meredith and Splat to back off from each other four months ago was one of the hardest things he’d done as a leader. The pair had hardly been subtle. At first, it was furtive glances across the breakfast table. But it quickly escalated into softly spoken, private conversations on the edge of the fire pit, heads low. Hands lingering casually on arms. Both of them mysteriously absent at dinner.
At least neither of them attempted to deny it when he spoke to them, together, after it couldn’t be ignored any longer. He’d tentatively offered to ask Captain Murphy to transfer one of them into a different squad, hoping they didn’t take him up on it. They didn’t. Even at that point, with Squad E relatively newly formed, the horrified expression on their faces testified that they would sacrifice their fledgling love for the stability of their new family.
But that did little to comfort Noah whenever he saw them shoot wistful glances at each other.
Vitt came back over from talking with Luo, and summarised that as far as Luo was concerned, he was ‘just dancing’ with Meredith. Splat spat a large gob of bloody saliva onto the ground in disgust.
Noah turned to slip away to ring Brian, praying he wouldn’t mind leaving early, because this night was well and truly over. To the side, Zeke shivered in his drenched shirt. Droplets of water covered his glasses, obscuring his eyes.
“Is your coat inside?”
“I forgot it.”
He slipped off his own black trench coat and threw it at him. Walking away before Zeke could refuse it, he was already imagining how he’d look in it, with the coat dwarfing his slight frame. He shook his head. What was he playing at? He really should have stuck to one drink.
Nobody wanted to sit next to Luo during the journey home.
Meredith had eventually returned, walking straight past them all on the way to the van, sliding into the back. Brian raised his eyebrows but said nothing. The others piled in, leaving Noah and Luo to take the front. Luo opened his mouth to say something—his account of the evening’s events, no doubt—but Noah silenced him with a hand. He’d hear his side of the story tomorrow. He turned the speakers up all the way, blasting music so loud that nobody would even try to talk to him.
His thoughts turned to the following day. He didn’t particularly enjoy rest days, even at the best of times. With every other day so action packed and micromanaged, he often spent the day feeling anxious about wasting it, rather than enjoying it. Tomorrow, it would be his job to ensure the feud between Luo and Splat didn’t fracture the team, poison the atmosphere and cause everyone’s mood to sour.
After parking in the garage, Noah profusely apologised to Brian for the hassle they’d caused in making him cut his night short. As soon as they cleared the checkpoint, Meredith stormed off towards Beech block. Splat stared hard at her receding form, kicking the dirt on the ground.
“Why issheso angry?” Splat said.
Vitt laughed and turned to Savannah. “Oh, men.”
It started to rain harder; the droplets thundered down in heavy, angry splotches. By the time they reached their floor, Splat stormed ahead, with Luo trailing behind the group, looking forlorn. Noah glanced at Zeke. Without Habib to referee, Zeke was about to have an uncomfortable night’s sleep.
“Are you going to be okay with them?” he whispered.
Zeke’s eyes widened. “You think they’ll go for each other again?”
