“Just fiction,” he said. “That’s a fucking joke, isn’t it?”
I folded my arms, kept my chin high. “Sorry?”
He clicked away on his keyboard. “I quote: he’s uptight, and controlling, and difficult, and a workaholic. He’s an idiot, fuck him.”
My heart thumped in my chest. “I was drunk. Prosecco. And it’s a story.”
“Fuck him. That’s how you felt about swanning off and leaving me to pick up all your fucking slack, is it? Fuck him. Fuck Andy and all the work he put into our club. Fuck Andy, who invested thousands in a future for both of us, who took a risk by ploughing a shit ton of his own money into a dream you fucking came up with. Who invested in you, a twenty-four year old, hormonal, high-maintenance fucking nightmare with nothing but a bad credit rating and a string of weirdo ex-boyfriends in her back catalogue. Fuck him, right, Faye? Just fuck him.”
“Jesus, Andy. It’s only a couple of pages, don’t take it out of context.” I kept my nerve like a trooper, despite my elevated heartrate. “You weren’t there, it wasn’t like that. Anyway, you are uptight and controlling and difficult, and you’re definitely a workaholic.”
“And a fucking idiot?”
My mouth couldn’t help itself. “Yes. Yes, you are. Sometimes. Just like I may have sometimes been a hormonal, high-maintenance fucking nightmare. We’re not exactly pure as the driven snow, either of us. And you wanted to invest the money. You had the cash, I had the vision. Don’t try and make out it was some kind of mercy mission, we both did alright out of it.”
“You left me in the lurch, ditched every shred of commitment we had to each other and this business, and then you laughed about it. You laughed about it, and you let that piece of shit put it in a fucking book!”
“I wasn’t laughing.”
“Doesn’t seem like it from where I’m standing.”
“Maybe you’re standing in the wrong place, then. I was there, you weren’t.”
“And what about this...” My stomach churned as he resumed his scrolling. “A partner in every way but the one that really matters. What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”
I wished the ground would open up and swallow me whole. “It’s quite self-explanatory. You did actually bother to read the rest of the chapter, didn’t you?”
The corner of his mouth twitched, eyebrows pitted as he stared right through me. “You never told me you wanted more. Not so much as a fucking hint.”
I rolled my eyes. “I didn’t think I needed to, just like you didn’t need to say you didn’t. It was obvious. A thousand opportunities you never took. A thousand times when it was there, simmering, where we could’ve, but didn’t. Where you didn’t.”
“Business and pleasure don’t mix. I thought we were on the same page with that.” He took a seat, rested with his elbows on the table, staring so fiercely I could’ve burned up. “Lots of women flirt, Faye, it doesn’t always figure they want something more. If you wanted more, you should have used that smart fucking mouth and told me so.”
I smiled, shaking my head in disbelief. “Whatever, Andy. You knew. We both knew. Rewrite it all you want, but it was right there and you always chose the other road.”
“I’m telling you now, Faye, I had no idea. Yes, we had an intangible something. We also had a business. A business that needed us to work well together, without any messy shit in the way. It would have gone tits up in five seconds flat if we’d started fucking. I assumed you realised the same.”
I shrugged. “It’s all water under the bridge now. You’re reading a fictionalised snippet of a conversation I had three years ago. Nothing in that book matters anymore.”
“I think I’ll read it anyway.”
“Please don’t.” My stomach lurched at the prospect. “There’s nothing important in there, nothing else about you.”
“Nothing else?”
“Nothing.” I hoped I wasn’t lying, since I wasn’t planning on checking my facts anytime soon.
He let out a pissed off sigh. “Fucking hell, Faye. What are we doing here? We can’t work. This can’t work. You’ve rocked up with a whole fucking bag of chips on your shoulder, straight back into a club I’ve been running perfectly well on my own for three years, thank you very fucking much.” He ran his fingers through his hair, exasperation mingling with rage. “For someone that claims to have spent so much time wanting more and doing nothing about it, you made short work of inciting a full-on fucking pain session in the playroom. What the fuck was that all about?”