Justine Elyot - Fast And Loose

‘Ba-doom-tish,’ I said, lifting my hand to his for a weary hi-five.

‘You’re not classing me as an incubus, though, are you?’ he said.

Dread knotted in my stomach. He was going to talk about That Night.

‘I mean,’ he continued, ‘you definitely weren’t asleep.’

‘Wasn’t I?’ I said guardedly. ‘Oh. My mistake.’

Damn. He moved an inch away from me and nursed his pint with a faint, sickly smile.

‘Right,’ he said. ‘Fair enough.’

Gah, now I felt like a bitch. It wasn’t on. He was the one who hadn’t called. Though…come to think of it…neither had I. A change of subject was definitely in order.

‘So, how are you going to review this place?’ I asked with an unconvincing display of casual interest.

He brightened a little.

‘I thought you could help me out,’ he said. ‘It can be a joint effort. I mean, this is probably much more your scene than mine, so my personal opinion might not be all that relevant.’

‘What is your personal opinion?’

He shrugged. ‘Bit dark. Can’t see anyone’s face. How do I know who to chat up?’

‘Right,’ I said, feeling that I’d asked for that one.

‘I mean, half the blokes are prettier than the girls. Speaking of which – eyeliner!’

He produced a stick of kohl from his inner pocket and presented it to me, point uppermost.

‘You really want me to do this?’ I asked, taking it from him.

‘Why not? I felt a bit naked up there at the bar. I need something to make my eyes flash villainously.’

‘They already do,’ I said, looking right into his heart of darkness. ‘OK. Hold still then.’

I started at the inner corner and began to draw a sweeping line across his eyelid, but his lashes flickered so madly that I had to keep giving up, laughing at his obvious panic.

‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘But God, that feels unnatural. I keep thinking you’re going to poke me in the eye.’

‘I won’t if you just keep still.’

‘Hold my face, then.’

The invitation sounded absurdly intimate. I held his chin and lower face in one hand, giving him no chance to jerk it back and away from my pencil, and started again. He was in my power, leaning down to me, his eyes half-closed and twitching. His skin was a little bit velvety, a soft growth of new stubble in my palm. He smelled of alluring spice. If I moved just an inch nearer, our lips would brush.

The memory of how they had done so before broke into my body, stealing inside with my breath. It wrapped my lungs, then my heart, then it flowered in my belly, its bloom descending between my legs. I lived and breathed desire for him. My hand faltered and the black line went beyond his eyelid, smudging the side of his eye.

‘Sorry,’ I muttered.

My sigh mixed with his. Lager and vodka and a trace of something sweeter. It felt luxuriously daring, to be so close to him, knowing the danger.

I wetted my thumb and rubbed at the smudge.

He caught my wrist, so quickly I almost screamed. He was wearing black leather gloves and his fingers felt cold and slick on my skin.

‘Did you just share a bodily fluid with me?’ he whispered.

I opened my mouth but the words had packed up and gone home.

‘Want to share some more?’

His mouth was getting closer, a lush-lipped omen of doom coming right for me.

What was I going to do? I knew you wouldn’t let me down . The words popped into my head at the critical moment, giving me the impetus I needed to escape from his glorious, wicked clutches.

‘Tom, can you work out a person’s physical location from their IP address?’

He halted in mid-smooch-approach and jerked his head backwards.

‘What?’

‘I mean…I’ve heard you’re good at a bit of cyber espionage. You worked out who that whistleblowing blogger was at the council, didn’t you? Would you be able to do something like that?’

‘Jesus, Ella,’ he said, looking almost fearful in his incomprehension. ‘Do you think this is really the moment?’

‘Sorry, but it’s been on my mind,’ I said. The implications of telling Tom about this had thrown themselves into the forefront of my mind, and they were messy. In fact, I didn’t want to think about them at all. But I’d said it now.

The kiss would probably have been the easier option, after all.

He shook his head and rubbed one eyelinered eye, making it look as if he’d been punched in the face.

‘What’s been on your mind? Are you being cyber-stalked? Ella? Is somebody hassling you?’

‘No. Actually. Forget I mentioned it. I don’t think you’d be able to help anyway. Oh, is that The Cure? Fancy a dance…oh.’ My foot on the table reminded me. ‘No. Scratch that too.’

Tom failed to erase the memory of my words from his expression and reset to his normal drinking-and-flirting-in-bar setting.

Instead, his stare lingered on and on and on until I wanted to hide under the table.

‘You look like I’ve given you a black eye,’ I said. ‘There’ll be rumours.’

‘Well, you have, haven’t you?’ he said. ‘Ella, talk to me. What’s this about? I have to admit, I was surprised when you accepted my invitation. You obviously want my help with something, though I was hoping it was just your desire for my body.’

‘Can you do it or can’t you?’ I said, seeing that he wasn’t going to let things drop. ‘The IP thing, I mean.’

‘No,’ he said. ‘Not unless I can convincingly pretend to be a police officer, which I’d rather not, to be honest. The council whistleblower was different. He had a particular style that I was able to identify just from familiarity.’

‘OK. Well. Thanks, anyway. It was worth asking.’

Would that be enough for him?

‘Oh, come on, El. Don’t leave it there. Why was it worth asking?’

‘I can’t tell you. Not without several more of those vodkas inside me, anyway.’

‘Oh, well, if that’s the key…’ He stood up, took my empty vodka glass and headed back to the bar.

Oh, God. Why had I even brought it up? Surely there had to be other ways to deflect the Crowley lips? Why had none of these suggested themselves to me at the crucial moment?

If I told him about Mia Culpa, then he would know that I read her blog, and if he knew that I read her blog, then he would know…argh! It couldn’t be done. Not if I didn’t want an eternity of Fifty Shades jokes in the office.

On the other hand, Crowley loved a good story, and this had the potential to be just that. If only I could take out the potentially embarrassing nature of the material…no. It couldn’t be done. I’d have to fob him off.

‘Come on then, Coxy,’ he said, handing me my second vodka. ‘Get it down you. I can’t have you holding out on me.’

‘Is this a double?’ I said, squinting at the clear, slightly effervescent liquid.

‘Might be. Who do you want to track down? An ex-lover? A potential future one? A long-lost family member? I’m intrigued – and you can’t intrigue Tom Crowley and expect him to leave it there. Sorry, but my professional pride won’t stand it.’

‘Professional pride,’ I snorted. ‘Professional sticky beak.’

‘Same thing. C’mon. Who’ve you been in a Twitter storm with? Who’s been viewing your Facebook profile?’

‘Shut up,’ I moaned. ‘Talk about something else. Who’s up for the deputy editor job? Have you heard anything?’

‘Nice try, but if you want me to shut up, you’ll have to shut me up.’

I took a deep breath, downed the vodka in one and turned back to him.

‘Ask me one more time and I’ll –’

‘I won’t stop badgering you all night. And you can’t even run away from me. So just give it up, girlfriend.’