Summer at Tiffany's (38 page)

‘Mmm, yeah, I know
technically
it was all above board, but . . .' Gem's eyes were steady upon her. ‘It just didn't look good.'

There was a heavy silence, Gem's stare protracted and weighty with accusation.

Cassie was taken aback. ‘Wow. So you're saying Luke and I aren't allowed to be friends?'

‘No, I'm not saying that, but to be honest, I can see where Amber was coming from. There are grey areas, aren't there? Sometimes you can feel something's a bit dangerous, even if it seems perfectly innocent . . .'

Cassie stared back at her, wondering exactly how much Gem knew about her and Luke's past. Had someone told her – Suzy? Arch? Henry? – or had she guessed? Was she guessing now?

‘Put it this way, I wouldn't have been pleased if I saw Laird like that with another girl, and I reckon Henry would've reacted exactly the same if he'd seen you.'

Cassie felt her hackles rise at the mention of Henry's name, at the assumption Gem knew Henry best, at the implied threat in her words. ‘Well, that's because you don't know Henry the way I do,' she replied coolly.

Gem straightened her spine a little and Cassie was reminded of a snake getting ready to strike. ‘I've known him all my life. He's more like a brother to me than a cousin. He tells me everything.'

‘He tells you nothing,' Cassie said sharply. She had had her fill of Gem's incipient possessiveness of Henry. ‘Even if he
was
your brother, which he's not, a brother's nothing to a lover. I know him intimately – his every thought, desire, dream . . . He shares them with me, not you. You're eight years younger, a hurt little girl he simply still feels protective of. He's incredibly fond of you, but you're as amusing to him as that puppy. That's it. So
I'll
tell
you
how he reacts, not the other way round, OK? Because you talk about grey areas, Gem, but you're in one yourself, right now, and I can “feel”' – she sarcastically made speech marks in the air with her fingers – ‘that you're not as innocent as you're making out to be either.'

Gem looked back at her, her face impassive but her eyes stony cold and Cassie could tell she wasn't used to losing. ‘Amber said—'

‘Amber can say what she likes. I'm not interested. Henry would never be so petty as to be threatened by something like that, but if Amber wants to “freak” at Luke about it, well, that's her business.'

And without another word, Cassie reached down and grabbed her purple trainer from the puppy's mouth. ‘And you'd better get your dog under control too.'

Cassie was lying on the sofa, one leg dangling idly over the arm, utterly determined this time to get to the end of Chapter Four, when Suzy walked in.

‘Oh. Hey.' Suzy flopped heavily into one of the wing chairs that would be so
au courant
if it was covered in a jazzy tartan, but instead looked tired and dated in a mossy velveteen fabric.

‘Hey. I thought everyone had gone out.'

‘Me too.'

Cassie's eyes fell to the glass of wine in Suzy's hand. ‘Gosh, it's a bit early, isn't it, Suze? It's not even lunchtime yet. I'm surprised you can even look at alcohol after last night.'

‘I
need
this.' Suzy stared at the wine glass like it was an elixir.

Cassie recognized the tone in her voice. ‘Oh God, what's she done now?' she asked with a sympathetic groan.

Suzy shot her a hateful stare, which, had it actually been intended for Cassie, would have made her turn to ash. ‘She's bloody snuck in with that dog and
left
him here, with a water bowl and a cardboard box.'

‘You are kidding!'

‘I wish I was.' Suzy took a deep glug of the wine. ‘He's in the boot room.'

‘Well, take him back again.'

‘Just tried that. She says it's only till Saturday, so that it's a surprise for the wedding. I mean, what's she gonna do? Have him jump out of the cake?'

Cassie tried not to laugh at the image this conjured in her mind. ‘Unbelievable.'

‘
Un
believable,' Suzy concurred, nodding as she stared into the wine glass again, a positively frightening look on her face.

‘Where's Velvet?'

Suzy blinked herself back into the present. ‘Huh? Oh, Arch has taken her for a walk along Greenaways.'

There was a pause. ‘Oh. Right.'

Suzy scowled again, her mood blacker than Cassie had appreciated. ‘What do you mean, “Oh. Right”?'

‘Well, is it OK for him to be walking alone with Velvet? What if he . . . if something happened again?'

‘I took his blood pressure this morning and it was fine. His colour's good, appetite healthy. He just wants to be treated normally again. Is that too much to ask?' Suzy snapped.

Cassie shook her head, even though she felt hurt by her friend's sharp tone. Suzy had so much on her plate – a toddler, a convalescing husband, a stressed mother, a wedding to sabotage and now a puppy to look after. Little wonder her patience and temper were stretched thin.

She stepped back onto safer ground. ‘God, Gem's got such a nerve dropping Rollo on your doorstep like that,' she tutted sympathetically. ‘You'd have thought she'd learned her lesson about not pushing too far this morning.'

Cassie recalled the short, tense journey back from the festival – the three of them hung-over and irritable, their bruised egos bristling against each other in Suzy's car. The glossy black Jeep hadn't been in the drive when they'd rolled past Snapdragons and Cassie had wondered whether Amber had insisted she and Luke leave immediately, after all.

Not that she asked anyone outright. She had gone straight back to bed – angry, frustrated, depressed all over again, as though the highs of the past few days had never happened – and when she awoke, it was in a marginally brighter mood, the spat with Gem merely a faint sour note in the background.

Suzy was staring at her.

‘What?' Cassie asked, bringing back her thoughts.

‘Nothing.'

‘No, you said something. What was it?'

‘I just said I thought she had a point.'

Cassie's mouth dropped open – had she misheard? – and she shuffled herself into a more upright position on her elbows. ‘Sorry?'

‘Gem. She had a point.'

Cassie was gobsmacked. ‘Are you seriously telling me you're on her side?
You?
'

‘Give me a break,' Suzy snorted.

‘So then what are you getting at?'

‘Just that I think you were wrong when you said Henry wouldn't have minded about you . . . wiggling about on Luke's shoulders. I think he'd have flipped, actually.'

‘I wasn't wiggling! I was dancing! It was a concert! He was helping me see the stage!' Cassie protested, scarcely able to believe they were having this conversation.

‘And he's your ex. Your very attractive, sexy ex whom you nearly got back together with in Paris.'

‘Yes. And the pertinent point here is . . . he's my
ex
. Added to which, as you've already, so kindly pointed out, he's completely over me.'

There was a fractional pause. ‘Yes, well, I've changed my mind about that.' Suzy blinked at her. ‘I don't think things have finished between you after all.'

‘
Seriously?
You're honestly telling me you think he and I are rekindling our lost lust because we got drunk and danced with fifty thousand other people at a concert? Jeez, give me a break!'

‘There's still unfinished business there.' Suzy presented the statement as irrefutable fact. ‘It isn't over.'

‘Right. Yeah. I get it. Totally,' Cassie said with impressive sarcasm. ‘Because I sat on his shoulders to get a better view, that means we can't keep our hands off each other. Meanwhile all the other times we've been together
without incident
don't count. And I suppose him skipping hand in hand through Rock with Amber is all a front too, is it?'

‘All I know is every time I look over at him, he's looking over at you,' Suzy replied with irritating calm that only served to wind up Cassie further. ‘And he looked like he'd been shot when he came in and saw you standing in that wedding dress.'

She'd seen it too, then.

‘It was Amber he was looking at, actually. They're not even engaged yet, remember? What bloke wants to see his girlfriend playing the bride when he hasn't even proposed?'

‘Well, I'd bet our house that until
you've
got a wedding ring on
your
finger, Amber won't be getting one on
hers
.' An anger came into Suzy's rich, dark eyes that Cassie had seen many times before – but never directed at her. ‘Henry's my brother, Cass. Do you really think I'm just going to let this happen right in front of me while he's away?'

The sudden playful wind that blew over the precipice – where Cassie had felt herself balancing all day – felt chilling now, and black.

‘I'm not even going to dignify that with a comment,' Cassie said angrily, picking up her book and pointedly looking at the page, ‘Chapter Four' swimming before her eyes. Her heart was pumping at double time, and her hands were tingling. ‘I have done
nothing
wrong.'

Silence crept like a stain between them. The air seemed solid – thick and unbreachable – changing their views of each other into something hazier and less defined. They never fought; their last fight must have been at school, it was so long ago, but there was a far more threatening undercurrent to this than whether or not Cassie had pinched Suzy's shoes or eaten the last of the bread.

Suzy got up from the chair finally. ‘What kind of sister would I be—'

‘What kind of friend are you
being
?' Cassie spat back.

‘One who calls it as she sees it. And Gem wasn't wrong in what she said this morning.'

Cassie looked back at her, tears stinging her eyes. ‘I can't believe you're on her side, after everything I've done for you.'

‘This isn't about sides! It's about Henry! He deserves better than this.'

‘Better than this? Or better than me?'

‘That isn't what I said and you know it.'

‘Do I? All I know is that I'm being punished for being precisely the person you all wanted me to be. You wanted me to be strong and independent and living life on my terms at last, but now all you and your mother and Henry go on about is setting a date and starting a family, as though the divorce and the betrayal and the lies never happened,' Cassie cried. ‘Well, newsflash! They happened to me! And the hurt and shock doesn't just go away because your brother gave me a ring. It doesn't work like that. You can't use a new engagement to get over an old marriage.'

‘Of course you can't, but neither can you stay in this limbo you've created for yourself. You're caught between lives, Cassie – you want to party like you're twenty-one, but frankly it's not a good look anymore. It's getting old. At some point, your life has to start moving forwards again.'

‘Oh, like Gil's is doing, you mean? Five days from now and it'll be the first day of the rest of his life.' She inhaled deeply. ‘Thanks for telling me, by the way.'

Suzy blinked, looking shocked. ‘I . . . I was going to tell you.'

‘When? When he was on honeymoon? Were you worried I might secretly try and reignite my relationship with him too?'

‘Don't be flippant, Cass.'

‘Why not? Isn't it a
good look
?' Every word was dripping with a sarcasm she barely recognized herself capable of.

‘I was trying to protect you . . . Who told you, anyway?'

‘Kelly. Because she
is
a good friend.'

‘When?'

‘A couple of weeks ago.'

‘So, about the same time you started freaking out on Henry, then?'

‘No. Because
I'm
not the one freaking out. He is. You are.'

‘You find out your ex-husband's getting remarried in the same month your fiancé pushes for commitment and your ex-lover suddenly appears out of the blue, and you're seriously trying to tell me you're not freaking out? Cass, your world's spinning so fast right now it's a wonder to me you can walk straight.'

‘Ha! Pot. Kettle. Black.'

‘What's that supposed to mean?'

‘That you're out-of-your-tree stressed and projecting all of it onto me. That wedding's going ahead on Saturday and nothing you have done has stopped it. She's got the dress, the vicar, the church,' Cassie said, counting on her fingers.

‘Yes! And you're doing the bloody catering. Between you and Henry and Arch and my mother and that bloody Germ, is it any wonder my life's a mess right now?' Suzy shouted, her voice splintering from the weight of the words. ‘There. I've said it. My life's a bloody mess.
Are you satisfied?
'

Cassie swallowed, instantly stricken with remorse as she saw two swollen tears slide silently and defiantly down Suzy's reddened cheeks. Suzy never cried. She was Boudicca, her warrior friend.

Suzy brushed the tears away angrily with the backs of her hands – as though she had let herself down – turning as she got to the door. ‘Well, I'll tell you this for nothing, Cassie. Maybe everything in my life is wrong at the moment, but I know as sure as an egg's an egg that I'm not wrong about you and him.' And she stormed out of the room, sucking the air out with her.

The lagoon lay slick and still, like an unblinking turquoise eye, as the sea frothed against the other side of the rocks that encircled it like a wall, the cold Atlantic Ocean several feet lower than the pool now, as the tide continued its race out towards the horizon. Their soft and pale bodies looked vulnerable against the scarred black rocks, which rose in a circle from the water, all of them leaning into the serpentine stone and trying not to scratch themselves against the thick encrustations of mussels and limpets.