‘Kate,’ I answer, filling the word with a boat load of get fucked and ignoring her hand.
Reduced to covert glances her way, she gazes at the stage with a sycophantic smile, the lock of hair back between her fingers. ‘You know, it never lasts with Kai.’
‘And you’d know from bitter experience?’ I don’t turn, just bark again.
She shrugs with indifference this time, the crowd around us laughing at something said from the podium. I can’t help feelI’mbeing laughed at. Just look at her, look at me. Standing beside her, paling into insignificance.
Kai shakes his head almost imperceptibly, his gaze fixed on mine. Is there supposed to be some meaning in that?Don’t talk to her? Don’t listen? I don’t know who the fuck she is?
‘He is a...tombeur, no? One woman is never enough, and he has needs you can’t understand.’ Her eyes flick over me again, this time almost apologetically. ‘I offer him something you can’t.’
Absurdly, the wordanalpops into my mind. I actually laugh myself as I turn to face her, despite jealousy and anger tightening my gut. ‘I hope it’s something other than vagaries and obscure references.’
‘He always comes back to me.’ She spits the words out, eyes turning to flint. ‘You don’t even live here, this is just some holiday romance.’
‘Wrong. I do live here. I live near the mall, you know the one’—my hand moves to one cocked hip—‘on the corner ofI don’t careandI don’t give a fuck?’
Then, for the first time in my life, I actually appreciate what spinning on your heel is all about. I do so, gratifyingly, ignoring curious glances and the ominous sound of my heels against the stone floor. I head in no particular direction before remembering the bar, so head indoors.
Vague bitch! Why couldn’t she have just said it: she fucks him? Or he fucks her.My heels click angrily, each step pounding in my skull.
‘Vodka tonic,’ I growl at the barman, adding, ‘please’ as an afterthought.‘No. Wait. Hold the tonic—vodka, straight up.’ Taking a leaf out of Matt’s book, I decide I’ll use it as a disinfectant: hard liquor to cleanse her clinging insinuations, to numb my brain. Elbows against the bar, I put my head in my hands.
‘You said you’d wait.’
Kai’s voice is relief and persecution all in one breath. I don’t turn around, just take the tumbler of vodka into my hand.
‘I haven’t left. Yet.’ My reply is as hard and sharp as shards of glass, the shards I’d like to poke him with. I don’t want to look at him, and not stab him, exactly. Maybe just punch his face.
Lifting my drink, I tilt the glass at the barman in silent salute.
‘It’s not what you think.’ Kai’s low-pitched words fall in a tumble, the heat of his body scorching me from behind.
‘No? Then what is there to tell?’ I use his earlier words, the same bland inflection. ‘Besides, I thought your talents didn’t extend to mind reading.’ I half turn, my grip on the glass like a vice, realising, after all, that I do want to chuck it at his head. At the wall.At something.
‘She wasn’t invited and I meant what I said.’
‘About her being an easy lay? Yeah, I got that, thanks.’
‘That we’re over.’
‘And Essam wants sloppy seconds?’
‘He isn’t to be trusted.’
‘Is that a family trait?’
‘Is that... straight vodka?’ His hand sears my wrist, but I refuse to turn fully, to acknowledge him.
‘It is. Today’s clusterfuck is brought to you by the letter V.’ I make the victory sign with my fingers against the glass, without the benefit of triumph.‘The cleaner of all thought.’
The glass slips from my hand in an instant. ‘Mixed drinks cause injudicious decisions.’ With a flick of his wrist, he empties it on a nearby potted palm. ‘You don’t need it but you do need to hear me out.’
‘Yeah? How about you don’t tell me what I need, especially after hearing whatyouneed from her.’ I twist back to the barman. ‘Another one please and he’s paying.’
‘No. No more. And this is a free bar. My tab. And for the record, she’s got nothing I need.’
And, of course, it’s a free bar. Have I not been humiliated enough?
