‘Do you miss me?’ she asked, presumably of Glen, in a voice spilling with saccharine tenderness. ‘Oh, you do. I can see it in your eyes that you miss me. I miss you too and I’m thinking about you all the time.’
Fuck’s sake.
Niall couldn’t catch the other side of the conversation. Carli must have her ear buds in. Glen was no doubt telling her how much he missed her too and how he was thinking about her and imagining her naked and asking if they could do online sexy time later.
Fuck you, Glen. You could never love her like I loved her.
Niall scraped his hand through his hair. He shouldn’t be here, listening in on this conversation, even if it was only one side. But when it came to Carli, his masochistic tendencies pulled themselves into sixth gear. If she was with another guy, he wanted to know exactly who and why, and what he had that Niall couldn’t give her. Damn this Glen!
‘Anyway, I have to go, honey.’ Carli’s voice dripped like caramel syrup.
Niall paced to the end of the hall and looked out the window towards the distillery. He didn’t want to hear the rest of the conversation, all the smoochy goodbyes and miss you forevers. When he was certain it would be over, he inhaled, walked back to the bedroom and knocked.
‘Hey.’ Carli’s voice called from inside.
‘Hey.’ Niall opened the door and entered the room. Carli was lying on the bed, looking at her phone. Maybe texting Glen and telling him she missed him already or swooning over photos of him. ‘I bought you some stuff for camping.’ He placed the bag from the outdoors store on the floor by the bed, then stepped back.
‘Oh, that’s incredibly sweet, and you didn’t have to do that. Your mum said there’s camping gear here I can borrow.’
Niall shrugged, not sure he wanted to be sweet. Was Glen sweet? ‘No need to camp like it’s 2009 anymore, Cass. You should be comfy. There’s a mat and a warm sleeping bag in there, and a pillow.’
‘Oh, Niall. Thanks so much.’
He nodded. ‘No bother.’ Then he let slip what was on his mind. ‘How’s Glen?’
A shooting star of confusion flit across Carli’s face and she pulled herself up in the bed, eyes sparking with interest at this question. He stared at her boldly, acutely aware he had no right to ask anything about Glen, but needing to know all the same.
For a moment, Carli simply met his gaze, as if trying to read him. Or maybe she’d read him already, closed the book and was about to tell him what she thought of his story of jealousy and possessiveness.
‘Oh, he’s great,’ she said, somewhat too dreamily for Niall’s liking. ‘Missing me, of course. And me him.’
‘Uh-huh.’ Niall swallowed hard.
‘We’re both missing cuddle time,’ Carli added.
‘Cuddle time? Right.’ This was way more information than Niall needed. Why the hell had he come upstairs and forced himself to be privy to this? Asked her about some guy he wanted absolutely zero detail about. He did not want to envision Carli having ‘cuddle time’ with another man.
‘We never had cuddle time, did we?’ she said, appearing to consider it.
‘Um… what?’
‘You and me.’ Carli met his gaze. ‘I mean, we had cuddles, but we never called it cuddle time, which is a shame because it’s nice to have cuddle time, don’t you reckon?’
Niall shuffled his feet. He liked to cuddle women as much as the next guy, but he’d never got down to calling it cuddle time with anyone. And Carli had been the woman he was closest to of them all.
‘If cuddle time is what you’re into then I guess you have that thing,’ he said. ‘Glen sounds like he’s very… in touch with his emotions, so you guys, erm… Look, I’ve just remembered I have to be somewhere.’ Niall turned to walk out. Fuck this. He was getting way too attached way too soon, so this was a timely wake-up call.Go for a walk in the cold, stroll into the sea and let the cold water sort your head and your heart out.
‘Niall.’
He stopped. Turned back to Carli, still sitting on the bed, so naturally beautiful, bare-faced and lotus posed in her leggings and hoodie, glossy chocolate hair cascading over the front of her right shoulder in that way that made him want to stride right up to her, brush the stray tendrilsfrom her cheek, take her face in his hands and kiss her. Like Glen probably got to.
‘Aye?’
‘You know Glen is a Labrador, right?’
Niall bit so hard down on the inside of his lip, he cut into the skin.
Glen is a Labrador. He’s a dog. He’s a flipping dog. Jesus H, Niall, you absolute muppet. Okay, stand up straight, meet her dead in the eye and pretend you knew all along. Maintain a scrap of dignity. Just one tiny wee morsel, you absolute toolbag.
