“Liam? I need to get my head round it.”
I was used to people just going with what I thought, to accepting without challenging because I was the guy who stood up on stage and sang the songs.
“When did it change for you?”
“When you came round that Sunday to Max and Vic’s and we slept together for the first time without rowing.”
“Before then. I knew before then. Else I never would’ve come round that Sunday. But I don’t know when it was – maybe it was when I thought about you at some point the week before or a text you sent or something, I don’t know. Something just shifted.”
She nodded. “I get that.”
I’d expected more of an argument.
“I know you might hurt me, Soph. I know that one day you might break my heart, or I might break it myself by breaking yours – and I don’t know how I’d live with that. But I want to try this.”
Her eyes had filled with tears and for the first time in my life I didn’t have the urge to shift away quickly from a woman crying. Instead I’d have given both my testicles to make her stop.
“I’m scared of hurting you and being hurt.”
“I know. So am I. But I trust you enough to get fake married to me and not chuck it all over the media, so I kind of trust you with me.” I didn’t know that she’d get it, wasn’t sure if anyone would get it.
She clung to the side of the tub, the water skimming the tops of her tits. I wanted her to be clinging to me, but not yet.
“Is this more to you than that building?”
I laughed. She shot me a look of death. Normality was resuming.
“Sophie, you can have all the building if that will make you happy. And all of this one. I’ll buy them both for you and sign the deeds over to you.”
“What about your recording studio?”
I shrugged. “There will be other opportunities. I’d rather marry you and keep you than have a building that you’re not in.”
“Oh.”
“Really? That’s your response? That was a pretty good line.”
She laughed. “Aren’t you mad at me for leaving?”
“Yes. You have a lot of making up to do.”
“But you’re going to let me do that making up?”
I knew the expression on my face was one of pure shit-eating smugness.
I felt a kick from across the hot tub, only a tap because it was as far as her leg could reach.
“You’ve kicked someone who’s just got out of hospital…”
“It wasn’t a kick, it was a tap!”
“Seriously?” I took the stride towards her through the water and for the first time in what felt like forever, my hands were on her. She felt small, slight and when I looked at her in the light of day I saw the worry on her face.
“It’s okay. You can smile. If you want to.”
She did, a tentative, watery smile that stole any breath I had left.
“When I heard about the crash…”
