At five to twelve they downed tools and went to catch a bus to the nearby Kings Road, all dressed up in their Christmas finery. Antonia had already gone ahead in a cab, muttering something about an important meeting, but Bianca had overheard her in the corridor changing the time of her pedicure.
Someone had brought along a bottle of Jägermeister for the journey, but Lizzy just couldn’t get in a festive mood. Elliot kept asking if she was all right, but Lizzy could hardly tell him the truth and own up that she’d been through his private possessions.
To make matters even worse, she’d woken up that day really missing Nic. It just felt so
weird
that she wasn’t in Lizzy’s life. It was always there on the periphery of Lizzy’s vision, no matter what direction she looked in. The fact that it was Christmas made Nic’s absence even more apparent and horrible. Lizzy had bought her presents months ago: a gift voucher to the Go Ape theme park and the
Ragga Dancefloor Anthems 1992
album Lizzy had found on eBay. (Nic was stuck in a musical time warp.) The gifts were gathering dust on Lizzy’s sideboard at home, destined to never get opened.
Lizzy still had no idea what she’d done wrong. Sometimes friends just fell out, but there had been no bubbling tension under the surface, or a feeling of drifting apart. Not that Lizzy was aware of anyway, but then again, since when was she the best person to judge what was really going on with someone?
Oh Nic!
she thought miserably.
I need you.
Her friend had always been able to cut through the crap and see things for how they were.
The restaurant was at the unfashionable end of the Kings Road and was decked out like a retro alpine ski lodge with an eighties menu to match. The owner was a woman called Saskia, who looked like she weighed about the same amount as one of Antonia’s calves, and who was dressed entirely in maroon velvet. Judging from the rapturous welcome they’d received from Saskia and the calamitous shouting coming from the kitchen, Lizzy got the impression they weren’t used to a glut of customers. They were the only party there, which was lucky as the place was tiny.
Lizzy found herself between Bianca and the work-experience girl, who’d ended up getting a last-minute invite. The girl was scarily ambitious and by the time the first course had turned up – a choice of melon balls or a sickly-looking prawn cocktail – Lizzy had been asked twice about when she was thinking about moving on.
Antonia had turned up in a pair of flip-flops with newly pink toenails and a Heal’s bag full of Happy Halos, which she’d promptly handed round. ‘I want you all to go into at least five bars on the way home with these on and spread the Halo love,’ she had ordered. ‘Somebody has to get this bugger promoted.’ She had shot Lizzy a dirty look.
‘Have you thought about ringing round a few journalists and asking them to do a review on it?’ the workie suggested. ‘I’m sure they wouldn’t mind.’
Lizzy smiled through gritted teeth. ‘I’ll bear that in mind, thanks.’
The restaurant was BYO – Saskia had blithely mentioned something about a police raid and losing their alcohol licence, so everyone kept traipsing out to the nearest off-licence. By the time dessert came round, most people were absolutely trollied.
‘So why are you so happy at the moment?’ Antonia boomed at Lizzy. Her cheeks were even redder than normal. She’d been quite happy to sit there all afternoon and drink other people’s wine.
‘What do you mean?’ Lizzy gazed at the rather plastic-looking rum baba on her plate and had a disturbing flashback of
This Morning.
‘You’re walking round with a smile like the Cheshire cat at the moment. You’ve got a new fella, haven’t you?’
Lizzy glanced round. The rest of the table was playing a game of ‘I Have Never’.
‘I might have,’ she said cagily.
‘I
knew
it!’ Bianca declared. ‘It’s so obvs!’
‘Is it?’ Lizzy thought she had been playing it all discreet and knowingly, the way Frenchwomen always did in films when they were having a liaison with a rich and powerful man.
‘Totes!’ Bianca chortled. ‘You’ve been coming into work with your hair all mussed up at the back and you’re always ten minutes late these days.’
‘You filthy little shagger,’ Antonia said with relish.
‘Antonia!’
‘I’m not saying it like it’s a bad thing.’ She stuck a spoon into her tiramisu. ‘Somebody’s got to be having it these days.’
‘Spill the beans!’ Bianca said excitedly. ‘Who’s the hottie?’
‘It’s just this guy.’
‘Sweets, I need deets!’
‘She’s probably embarrassed about him,’ Antonia boomed. ‘Is he a litter-picker or something?’
‘No, actually,’ Lizzy said coldly.
‘Who is he then?’ she demanded. ‘I don’t know what the big secret is, it’s not like I’m going to have heard of him.’
Lizzy gazed at her boss across the table. Pink lipstick was smeared across Antonia’s horse-like front teeth.
Rise above it
, Lizzy told herself.
Rise above it and change the subject. Antonia doesn’t need to know anything about your private life.
‘Actually I think you might know him. Elliot Anderson?’
Antonia looked up from her pudding. ‘Elliot Anderson from the
FT
?
News at Ten
Elliot Anderson who was engaged to Amber de la Haye?’
‘Is he the guy who looks a bit like Eddie Redmayne?’ Bianca squealed. ‘He is totally hot!’
‘You?’ Antonia was looking incredulous. ‘And him?’
‘What’s so weird about that?’ Lizzy said defensively.
‘Nothing, except that I happened to have dinner with Tils last week at Highroad House and Elliot and Amber were at the table next to us.’
Lizzy went cold. ‘What?’
‘When was it now?’ Antonia gazed at the ceiling. ‘It must have been a Wednesday because I’d just been to see my kinesiology woman.’
Lizzy was frantically rewinding in her head.
Wednesday. Wednesday. Wednesday.
Elliot had told her he’d gone to meet a work contact!
‘They looked
very
cosy together,’ Antonia continued. ‘They had the table in the corner by the fireplace, the one you always ask for if you don’t want to be disturbed. I’m sure it was only because the place was pretty busy that night,’ she added innocently.
‘Sweets, are you OK?’ Bianca asked.
‘Oh,
Wednesday
! Sorry, I’d just got my dates mixed up,’ Lizzy told her boss, gulping back the panic. ‘I thought they were meeting Tuesday night.’
Antonia’s face fell. ‘You knew?’
‘Of course I did. It’s all totally cool. Amber and Elliot were together such a long time, they’re still really good friends.’
Bianca frowned. ‘I’m not sure I’d be happy about my boyfriend meeting up with his ex-beautiful-fashion-designer-fiancée.’
‘Really, it’s not like that.’ Lizzy stood up. ‘Would you excuse me? I must go to the loo.’
The Ladies were two nightclub-style cubicles that afforded no privacy, but luckily they were empty. Lizzy went into the furthest one and sank down on the seat. She felt like she’d been kicked in the stomach. Why hadn’t Elliot said anything? Was Antonia making it up? Lizzy stared at the plastic toilet door. Even her boss wasn’t that vindictive.
She got her phone out but there was no reception. Lizzy unlocked the cubicle and stood in front of the mirror, inhaling deep, juddering breaths to calm down.
There has to be an explanation. There has to be an explanation.
So why didn’t he tell you?
the Voice of Reason chimed in
. If it was just an innocent meetup, why didn’t Elliot tell you?
And then came the creeping thought:
You knew something wasn’t right.
The Kings Road was alive with Christmas action. Lizzy stood on the pavement in her dress clutching her handbag. Her coat was still in the restaurant along with her Secret Santa present, but there was no way she could go back in now. She’d just have to text an excuse to Bianca about feeling ill.
She dialled Poppet’s number, but it went straight to voicemail. Elliot had told her he was going for work drinks, but as Lizzy stood on that cold, noisy, brightly lit street, she instinctively knew it was a lie. She
knew
with that sixth sense a girl sometimes got, that gut-churning, throat-tightening
I’m-going-to-be-sick
feeling, that he was with Amber. She should have trusted her instinct from the start! Instead she’d shoved the niggling doubts to the back of her mind, because she didn’t want to ruin the perfect picture she’d created. Now the paranoia had been ignited with a vengeance and was spreading like wildfire through her body.
Lizzy walked right out into the middle of the road, narrowly avoiding a passing car. The cab behind it screeched to a halt.
‘Eagle Wharf please, on the Embankment,’ she told the driver.
The journey through the rush-hour traffic was the longest forty minutes of Lizzy’s life. Paying the driver the eye-watering fare, she started to zigzag her way down the myriad of streets towards the river. ‘You’ll catch your death dressed like that!’ a woman dog-walker called as she ran past, but Lizzy barely heard her.
The apartment block was mainly in darkness, the odd rectangle of light in amongst the black windows. Most people were probably out celebrating, just as Lizzy should have still been in the warm, rowdy restaurant with her work colleagues, instead of standing there by the freezing Thames in heels and a little party dress.
She stood in front of the building and tried to work out which one was Elliot’s apartment. Lizzy counted up the floors and found his living-room window. There were no lights on. No one was home.
Lizzy took a long, grounding breath. She was going out of her mind! She’d just hared across London on a ridiculously paranoid whim. Although it still didn’t answer why Elliot had lied about going for dinner with his ex-fiancée …
There will be a reason
, she told herself.
There’s always a reason. Elliot’s a good guy. He wouldn’t do that to me. I bet Antonia did get it wrong.
At that moment a light suddenly came on. Lizzy’s heart leapt into her mouth. At the same time, a figure hurried round the back of the apartments, the same way Lizzy had come. He or she was wearing a long trench coat and a black beanie hat, but as the figure hurried up the front steps and went inside, Lizzy caught a glimpse of the beautiful face. A chill went through her that had nothing to do with the weather.
It was Amber.
The next moment the blinds came down in Elliot’s living-room window and Lizzy was left standing alone in the cold.
Lizzy finally made it into the office the next day at 11 a.m. Bianca was slouched at her desk, studying her eyebrows in a magnifying mirror. She glanced up and did a double-take. ‘Sweets, you look awful!’
Lizzy took her coat off and sat down at her desk.
‘How weird only you got food poisoning and the rest of us were OK.’ Bianca leant across her desk. ‘OMG, things totally kicked off after you’d gone!’
‘Did they?’ Lizzy said listlessly.
‘Antonia ended up having a massive row with Jocasta and she’s lost the Zen Ten account!’
Lizzy looked at her colleague. Words were coming out of Bianca’s mouth but they were making no sense.
‘Jocasta phoned when we were still at the table and started kicking off about something. Antonia was pretty pissed by then and said she was fed up with being Jocasta’s emotional punchbag, to which Jocasta apparently said that that was
exactly
what Antonia was there for, and while she was on the subject, Antonia was pretty shit at it. She fired Antonia on the spot!’ Bianca paused for breath. ‘There was lots of shouting about boundaries and invasion issues.’
Lizzy looked over at the conference room. Antonia was wildly gesticulating on the phone to someone.
‘She was in there when I came in,’ Bianca whispered. ‘I heard her going mental about something to do with Karen Jones as well. What’s that about?’
Lizzy didn’t even bother turning her computer on. A few minutes later the door to the conference room opened.
‘A word, Lizzy,’ Antonia said coldly.
Both company laptops were open and the table was littered with files and invoices. Antonia sat back down in her chair.
‘Would you like to explain why Karen Jones is still only paying fifty per cent of her monthly retainer?’
‘I lied to you,’ Lizzy said dully. ‘She was having money worries, so I gave her a reduced rate. I thought she’d be able to pay the money back.’
Antonia’s nostrils flared. ‘And you didn’t think to consult me about this?’
‘I knew you’d say no.’
‘Of course I would have said no!’ Antonia shouted. ‘We’re running a business here, not a fucking charity!’
Lizzy looked at the floor. There was a bit of gold foil scrunched up by her feet: the telltale evidence of someone’s illicit chocolate snack.
‘Well?’ Antonia demanded. ‘Aren’t you even going to defend yourself?’
‘There’s nothing to defend.’
‘I’m suspending you with immediate effect.’ Antonia gave Lizzy a long hard stare. ‘It goes without saying how shocked and disappointed I am. You’re meant to be a trusted senior member of staff.’ She shuffled some papers. ‘We’ll be in touch on how to proceed with your disciplinary, but it goes without saying that your future looks
extremely
bleak at Haven PR.’
Lizzy gazed at the woman she’d worked her arse off for for the last two years. ‘You don’t have to suspend me.’
‘I don’t think you’re in any position to tell me what to do,’ Antonia said loftily.
‘Yes I am, because I quit.’ Lizzy turned and walked out, leaving her boss open-mouthed at the table.
Lizzy emerged into bright sunlight outside the Haven office. Everything looked the same, but Lizzy had the strangest sensation that she was on a stage and that the familiar landmarks were props and the Christmas shoppers scurrying past with bags were actors, all taking part in the production. Nothing felt real. She was in free fall and there was nobody to put their hand out and catch her.
What do I do now? Where do I go
? She was in a horrible dream that she had no way of waking up from.