For a moment, a sense of relief flows through me like when you climb into a warm bath. Well, that’s wonderful. I don’t fancy walking in my little boots that far anyway. It’ll wear them down and they’re already second hand. But then the gritty competitiveness teases into my blood system andhell noam I letting this man steal this victory.
“I’ll go with you!” I announce, matching his volume.
“Great!” Michael says with a clap just as James says, “You can go on your own then.”
“What!?” I step backwards. He’d let me go on my own? Out here? I might get lost. Or murdered. Or kidnapped. Of course, he wants me to go alone. Bastard.
“I think it would be wiser to go together. You’re a great team!” Michael adds jubilantly. We both give himare you kidding!? expressions but his smile doesn’t slip.
“Give me strength,” James mutters under his breath, before shrugging out of his jacket, despite the chilly breeze rolling off the nearby lake. “Come on then, Felicity. Let’s get this over and done with.”
Chapter Four
When I was sixteen, I went on a walking holiday with Dad and his then fiancée, Sasha. She was pretty but she was a bitch, and despite the walking part of the trip away beingheridea, she found an excuse at every opportunity to complain about it.
Despite this, I felt this deep need to show Dad how much I liked her. I’d made his life miserable enough up till then. If she made him happy, then I was happy.
So, I gritted my teeth, held my head high and forged on ahead despite her constant whinging.
Sometimes I do worry witnessing my parents’ failed relationship somehow set my own romantic life up for failure. They’ve hardly been good role models. It forces me to be extra focussed on my job because, what if that’s all I really have to show for myself? For my life? I’d better make it good.
And that’s why I am not going to let James, who is striding ahead of me on his long powerful legs, bother me. I’m pattering down the road behind him, my heels clinking on the tarmac, doing two strides for each one of his.
“Will you slow down?” I complain.
“You’re the one who insisted on coming. You can keep up.”
I groan audibly. “You know you can be a real arse sometimes. Actually no, you always are. You’re always an arse. A great big, dick of an arse.”
“That doesn’t make sense.”
“You don’t make sense.”
He laughs, bitter. “Burn.”
A thought occurs to me now we’re totally alone, the minivan no longer in sight. “What did Michael say on the jet?”
“None of your business.”
“Just tell me.”
“I don’t want to.”
I scoff. “Fine, whatever. Just surprised you supposedly spent the morning with him but seemingly have zero knowledge of what the hell is going on right now. Why are we in Scotland anyway? Why here? Why pull us away from our busy working days without any access to our emails at all for… for this! What is this!?”
“I know as much as you, Felicity.”
James keeps walking ahead as if he can somehow out-stride me. He could. Absolutely. In fact, if he started running now, I’m sure he’d disappear in moments. I wouldn’t stand a chance. Even if I had appropriate footwear, he’d escape me like a greyhound racing a guinea pig. Which is intriguing, because why isn’t he?
He’s only walking fast enough to make it slightly difficult for me. I reckon he could go faster if he wanted to.
James’ phone bleeps. He tugs it out of his pocket so fast you’d think it was burning a hole through his chinos. “Shit. Low battery.”
“How do you already have low battery?”
“There wasn’t a charger on the jet.”
“But you didn’t leave home with it charged?”
