‘Oh, Aiden. We are so sorry. There was an accident and the bridge was closed.’
‘You could have phoned, sent a message, anything.’
‘I left my phone at home and Pippa’s battery died. It’s just been one of those nights.’
‘Barely anyone turned up except a few from book club and the locals. Noah kept asking where you were and I had no idea.’
‘I’m so sorry, but the situation was out of our control. We saw Noah leave. Do you know who he was with?’
Aiden shook his head. ‘He just said his lift was on his way.’
The door swung open again and Irene walked through it. ‘Oh my gosh. I’m so sorry I’m late. It’s manic out there. There was a huge crash and the bridge was closed. Arthur and I were sat in the queue for over ninety minutes. We couldn’t go anywhere. I’ve been ringing you, Elle, but you didn’t pick up.’
‘I left my phone at home.’
‘Where is everyone?’ asked Irene, looking around the library.
‘Obviously not here due to the traffic – or left because they’d been here for two hours and no one else turned up. I feel dreadful. How disappointing for Noah. Not the book signing he was expecting.’
Elle’s mood had slumped to an all-time low. She was hoping that Noah wouldn’t think she’d swerved the event on purpose, as that couldn’t be further from the truth.
ChapterThirty-Eight
The next morning found Elle in low spirits. She’d barely slept a wink thinking about the previous night. Soon after they’d arrived at the library, Elle and Pippa caught another taxi home. The first thing they did was open a bottle of wine.
Elle couldn’t get the image of Noah leaving the library out of her head.
She picked up her phone from the bedside cabinet and brought up his social media. On his Twitter feed there were a couple of retweets from the previous night but Elle could tell by the photo that the library wasn’t crowded with people and she felt dreadful. The latest tweet was of Noah and the same girl he’d climbed into the car with. It was captioned:About to paint the town red.
They had huge smiles on their faces and Elle couldn’t help but notice how gorgeous the woman was.
Snuggling down under her duvet she tried to block all thoughts of Noah from her mind.
Pippa tapped on her bedroom door. ‘Hey, are you up?’
‘Just about awake,’ Elle replied.
‘Here, I thought you might be needing these.’ Pippa padded across the floor and placed a couple of headache tablets in Elle’s hand along with a glass of water. ‘We must have drunk a couple of bottles last night. I’ve also put some bacon under the grill. We need a little sustenance to soak up the alcohol.’
A loud beep was heard. ‘The damn smoke alarm.’
Pippa hurried back downstairs to begin wafting at it frantically with a tea-towel until it stopped. Elle sat up in bed, swigged the water and swallowed the tablets. She willed her headache to go as later today she was meeting Irene, Arthur and Jessica at The Lakehouse restaurant, which was only accessible by boat. Hoping she’d feel a little more human in the next few hours, she pulled back her duvet and slipped on her dressing gown.
‘Bacon butties are ready when you are,’ Pippa shouted from the bottom of the stairs.
Elle had to admit it smelled good as she followed the aroma down the stairs into the kitchen.
Pippa was dancing around to a song on the radio when Elle walked in. ‘Where have you got all your energy from?’ she murmured, her head still pounding.
‘I have no idea. Brown or red sauce?’ she asked, sliding the plate of bacon butties towards her.
‘Brown please.’
‘It’s this afternoon you’re meeting Irene’s new man, isn’t it?’ she said, tucking into her breakfast and catching the oozing sauce on the plate as she took a bite of the sandwich.
‘Yes, Irene can’t wait to introduce us.’
‘Where are you going to?’
