She hummed thoughtfully. ‘And orgasms, don’t forget the most important one.’
I glanced at her quickly and saw the wicked grin spread across her face.
‘Trust me, I’ll never forget that one.’ Moving the conversation on from this dangerous territory, I reached out to the centre console and lifted the charger out to her. ‘Only fair that you chose the music.’
She put her coffee down and let out an excited squeal. ‘And you won’t complain?’
‘Oh no, I’ll probably complain, but you can still choose.’
‘You know good music has been made since the eighties, right?’ she said as she plugged in her phone and started scrolling.
‘Doubtful. Music stopped being good after Queen.’
‘Jesus, okay, grandad.’
I arched my brow at her. ‘I’m only seven years older than you, sweetheart.’
‘And yet, your taste in music is practically geriatric. Have you even heard of Taylor Swift? Lizzo?’
‘I’ve heard of them,’ I wasn’t closely acquainted with their music, but you go into any store and they have their songs playing over the loudspeaker. ‘Just don’t think you can do better thanUnder Pressure.’
‘I’m gonna prove you wrong.’ The conviction in her voice warmed my heart, and I peered at her out of the corner of my eye. Her lower lip was pulled into her mouth as she scrolled through a playlist. I shook my head with a smile.
‘Go ahead, sweetheart.’
22
‘You think really loudly,did you know that?’
My head snapped to the side. George sat in the driver's seat, one elbow resting on the window ledge, the other casually holding the steering wheel. The sleeves of his shirt were pulled up to his elbow, showing off the ripples of his muscles. And holy hell, now I knew what those arms felt like wrapped around my body, pulling me close, tangling in my hair. Sometimes, I could almost convince myself that he would be shit in bed, so all of this attraction I felt towards him was pointless. Last night set that idea on fire. Nearly burning me in the process.
‘The only thing I’m thinking is that your taste in music is awful.’ An hour into the drive, I’d played him the hits from Taylor Swift, Lizzo, JP Saxe and several other pop legends and with each one his fingers would flex, like he was fighting the urge to switch it off. I’d finally conceded and put on the all eighties playlist I had on Spotify. As soon asAfricaby Totocame on, he shot me a smirk and relaxed.
That smile, that fucking smile that felt like it had a directline to my core, had me shifting in my seat. His eyes dipped down to my thighs before he looked back out the window.
‘And yet,’ he said. ‘You’re humming every song.’
‘Stockholm syndrome.’
Roxy was fast asleep in the back, curled up tight. Seeing the travel blanket he’d bought for her brought a fresh knot of anxiety tightening in my stomach. It’s not the fact that he went out and bought it, Fallon would do that, even though she was allergic to Roxy.
It’s the fact that he thought about it, thought about her, aboutme. He had nothing to gain from doing it. There wasn’t a fight he was trying to smooth over. No mistake—that I knew of—he was trying to cover up, and he’d still done it.
For years, the only time my father ever did anythingnicefor my mother, it was after he’d cheated. Usually with a sex worker he’d hired. He’d come sauntering through the door head high, clasping the cheapest flowers he could find and thrust them at Mum without a word. Never said sorry, didn’t acknowledge it at all. Neither did she. She knew what he was doing, the people he would meet, and the things he would do behind her back. The lies, the cheating, she knew it all. But he’d had her so convinced that she couldn’t survive on her own she took every indiscretion on the chin. She’d faded so far into herself that she couldn’t see her own worth.
And he went off, happy as can be, continuing to be a cunt without recourse.
‘No good deed comes for free, Rosie.’My mum would say that like a mantra. A boy walking me home after school, she’d say that the moment I walked through the door. If dad ever took me to the movies—on the rare occasion that occurred—I’d find out the next day he’d gone for the week, away with the girlfriend mum knew all about. And she’d utter that phrase, over and over. Eventually, it embedded itself into my soul.
George doing that for me to anyone else might have beena simple gift, or as he called it, the bare fucking minimum. But all I wanted to know was when the other shoe would drop. When would he break the news that something bad was happening?
No good deed comes for free.
Those words wound round and round in my head as we drove.
When our destination came up ahead, I was itching to get out of the car. Being this close to George was doing things to my head, and none of them were good. Okay, that was a lie. Some of them were good. Some of them were downright filthy, but even those sent my brain into overdrive.
The second he pulled up, I popped open the door and hopped out. I felt George’s steely gaze on me, but I ignored it.
