‘You’re a dark horse,’ Beth said, nodding when Kieran offered to buy her a drink. ‘How come you never mentioned before that you’re starting a fashion revolution?’
Kieran shrugged. ‘Hey, it’s early days. More like a fashion … minor uprising.’
Beth laughed, the sound soft and warm against the buzz of the pub. ‘Well, consider me on board. Sign me up for your beta thingy. I want to see if it tells me to bin half my manky aprons.’
‘Deal. But please don’t roast me in the feedback form.’
‘No promises,’ she said, eyes glinting. ‘Depends how good your app is.’
They sat together quietly and sipped their drinks. Kieran felt he should mention Lisa – or rather, her overdue departure – but the time wasn’t right. Instead, he soaked up the pub atmosphere. And the feeling ofrightnesswith Beth.
As if she sensed his thought, Beth stiffened. She gulped back the remains of her drink and stood up.
‘Do you have to go now?’ Kieran wanted her to stay. He wanted to spend hours with her, unravelling what made her tick. What made her happy or sad.
‘Sorry, the kitchen awaits. Night, Kieran. And for what it’s worth, you looked in your element there.’
‘I did?’
She smiled. ‘It suits you, if you’ll pardon the clothing pun.’ And she was gone.
Kieran finished his drink and wandered into the now-empty room. He looked around at the higgledy-piggledy chairs, the flickering fairy lights and the sign-up sheet, with Beth’s name scribbled halfway down.
He stood there, hands in his pockets, heart doing that annoying hopeful flutter. For the first time in a while, he didn’t just believe in the app.
He believed he might make this work, all of it. ClosetAura, Cranley, and whatever this was with Beth. Maybe, just maybe, his new beginning had materialised in a scruffy back room strung with fairy lights.
Chapter Forty-One
Beth had agreed to the Shadows of Auld Reekie escape room mostly because Diana had insisted it would be a laugh. Standing at the entrance to the vaults, though, with fog curling around her ankles and a faint wail of bagpipes echoing below, she was already questioning her life choices.
‘It’s all theatre,’ Diana said cheerfully, striding ahead with her torch like an intrepid explorer. ‘Burke and Hare, ghostly pipers, jump scares. It’s all part of the fun!’
Beth caught up and clung to her arm. ‘If it’s just theatre, why does itsmelllike something actually died down here?’
The narrow tunnel walls wept with damp; the lanterns flickered in a distinctly malevolent way. When a cold gust of air brushed her ear, Beth gave an undignified squeak and nearly bolted up the steps. Encountering a genie was one thing; this was something else entirely.
Diana, naturally, was having the time of her life. She solved the first puzzle in record time, pressed every suspicious-looking brick in the wall, and even flirted with the projected ‘ghost guide’. When a hidden door hissed open and a skeletal handdropped from the ceiling, Diana howled with laughter. Beth screamed so loudly that the next group applauded.
‘Never again!’ Back at Diana’s, Beth accepted a large glass of wine as they waited for a Chinese takeaway delivery.
‘Wuss,’ Diana teased, tipping prawn crackers into a bowl. ‘You choose next time, and you can pick something with fewer corpses. Maybe a trip to the cinema, to see a romcom with a torrid love triangle. Speaking of which…’
‘I’m not in a love triangle,’ Beth said quickly. ‘There’s no romance between me and Kieran, and as for Luke…’
She explained how Luke had turned up and she’d told him the truth – that he was chasing the woman she used to be, not the one standing in front of him now.
‘Good for you, hon.’ The doorbell chimed. ‘Hold that thought while I get the food.’
Minutes later, they were perched on opposite sofas with trays of steaming Singapore noodles, Szechuan spicy beef and fried rice between them.
‘Anyway,’ Beth said, chopsticks in hand, ‘Luke’s messaged a few times since, but I told him it’s over. And I mean it. No more what-ifs.’
‘Bravo,’ said Diana. ‘Now, on to the enigmatic Kieran. Because my love life is dead, I have to live vicariously through yours.’
Beth laughed. Diana, despite her endless admirers, was ruthless in disqualifying them. ‘It’s complicated.’
‘It’s only complicated if you make it so. Didn’t you say he was single after his girlfriend dumped him?’
