My heart lurched—the back-stabbing bitch. I stopped myself from lunging at the phone like a lunatic, calmly putting my e-reader down next to Roxy, who had fallen asleep next to me once again. She let out a sigh, not pleased at being disturbed.
The apprehension in my limbs melted away when I saw Fallon was video calling. I swiped to answer, and her face filled the screen. She looked beautiful. Her hair had grown long, just above tit height, sitting in relaxed pink curls. From a glance at the background, she was sitting in the passenger seat of a car.
‘He’s losing his mind,’ she blurted out before I had time to say anything.
I propped myself up against the headboard. ‘You’re gonna have to be more specific, babe.’
‘Oliver!’ She pinched the bridge of her nose. ‘He’s got a list as long as a horse’s penis of requirements for a new house. He won’t settle for anything less. Even if the house is perfectly fine, he’ll spot something wrong and walk out. He’s giving me a migraine.’
Some people shouldn’t have as much money as they do, and Oliver was one of those people. He was brilliant at his job, no doubt. He earned his spot, but I’ve seen him book out entire restaurants for him and Fallon, and he’d been known to buy her obscenely expensive jewellery. When she found out the price of a necklace, she made him send it back,claiming she’d never feel comfortable wearing something that was the price of a kidney.
Hearing him being so particular didn’t surprise me. ‘What are his requirements?’
‘He wants heated floors.’
‘Course he does,’ I scoffed.
‘A hot tub, sauna, two walk-in closets,’ she rattled off. ‘An open planned kitchen with room for a double fridge, a game room, a theatre-’
‘In London?’ I exclaimed.
‘Yep,’ she said in a resigned tone.
‘Wow, he’s lost his mind.’
Her eyes glanced out of the window as her voice lowered a touch. ‘He’s a little antsy now the football season is over. He’s used to training and the schedule. Now, he doesn’t have that. He’s feeling a bit lost, so he’s throwing all his energy into finding us a house.’
‘It’s sweet he wants it to be perfect,’ I offered.
The tension in her shoulders drooped. ‘Yeah, it is. That’s actually why I called. I got the confirmation email, and we’re all booked in. I’ve also got all the balloons and streamers, and the cake is all sorted.’ She started to build steam again, but my brain had fully lost track of the conversation.
My brows dipped. ‘Uh, what are you on about? Booked in for what?’
She stopped abruptly, face flashing with confusion. ‘The trip. With the four of us? We booked it over a month ago.’
Realisation hit me like a concrete slab. Fallon read my expression, brows raised in accusation. ‘You forgot.’
Shit.‘No. I didn’t.’ I shook my head firmly. ‘It was a momentary lapse in memory.’
‘That’s the definition of forgetting.’
‘In my defence, I’ve had a lot going on.’ Oliver’s birthday was next week, and last month Fallon set up a group chatwith me, George and her, wanting to do something special for him to celebrate it and the end of the season. She decided on a weekend away at a treehouse. A fancy treehouse, because,Oliver.It was a surprise. She was going to take him away without telling him where they were going, and we’d planned it so George and I would arrive early to set up birthday decorations.
And like the brilliant friend I was, the entire thing had completely slipped my mind.
We had arranged the trip before this whole bet thing. Before George offered to be my dating tutor, and before I had been making myself come every night to the image of him. And definitely, before I’d lost the last scrap of my sanity to a giant with a scruffy beard who looked like he should be in a vodka commercial.
‘Speaking of, how’s dating going?’
I considered myself an expert on Fallon’s facial expressions; each one I knew like the back of my hand and allowed me a glimpse into where her head was at. When her face creased and voice softened as she asked that question, I drew a complete blank.
‘It’s going,' I hedged. Her eyebrows shot to her hairline as I recounted the date he’d taken me on, leaving out the end in his car. I wanted to keep that part to myself.
‘George hates crowds.’ Fallon said in disbelief. ‘He barely puts up with them to go see Oliver play.’
I shifted up in bed, frowning. ‘What?’ He never mentioned anything about hating crowds. I knew he preferred the quiet since he always chose the quietest pubs to drink in, tucking himself into a corner.
That same expression crossed Fallon’s face again. She shook her head, muttering to herself something that sounded likestupid man.Having enough of guessing, I opened my mouth to ask her what was going on when asound like a door opening echoed from her end, and she turned her head.
