Dirty Bad Strangers(71)

I couldn’t stop grinning. It turned to laughter, hysterical laugher, tears streaming down my face at the sheer heights of crazy the last twelve hours had scaled.

“I’m glad you think it’s funny,” Chelsea snapped. “Maybe some of us are actually worried about you.”

I tried to regain composure but I was way too wired, adrenaline, endorphins, lack of sleep. What a bloody jumble.

“I’ll get a shower,” I managed, finally.

“Make it a quick one,” Tessa said, scooting after me. “We’re going out, step one of Chelsea’s rehabilitation. Only down the road, to the Rifleman’s.”

I bloody hate the Rifleman’s. An old pub turned sports-dick hang-out, big screens and loud fucking assholes. “Please not there.”

Tessa put on her best be reasonable face. “It’s the furthest she’ll go.”

“To a sports bar? Like that will bloody help.”

“She won’t get a tube, won’t go out of the city. I’ve only just got her to agree to taking twenty-five paces down the street. Sports bar or not, that’s where we’re going. For Chelsea, ok?”

I rolled my eyes. “Fine. Give me half an hour.”







It turns out Chelsea needed a lot longer than I did, hardly a surprise. It was gone midday by the time we hit the pub, right in the middle of the weekend’s football recap. Bloody brilliant. Stupidly, I offered to go to the bar, ending up three fucking deep in drunken idiots. I stared blankly at the screen above, a massive flat screen thing in super HD that does nothing but slow the queue down. Why people fasten those things to 17th century beams is beyond me.

I cast a glance over my shoulder to find Tessa and Chelsea bagging a table. A small mercy, at least. I shrugged at them, gesturing to the queue, but they were already jabbering on about something or other. I was inching closer when the crowd in front erupted in a ridiculous chant, shoving me backwards without a fucking care.

Singers! Singers! Singers!

I was sick of the bloody Singers, holding them solely responsible for being in this cruddy queue in the first place. Well, the Singers and Chelsea’s own innate ability to be a bloody idiot.

Turns out they’d won 4-0 at Liverpool Wanderers away. Whoopy-fucking doo. The crowd erupted at every bloody goal highlight, and I lost my patience, using the opportunity to elbow my way through while they gawped up at the screen.

“Three vodka Coke’s,” I shouted, handing over a twenty. I hardly got much change, either, another bloody shitter about this place.

I balanced the drinks in my hands, sighing in relief as I made my way back towards Chelsea and Tessa.

Only then I stopped fucking dead.

Jason’s voice, in the fucking pub. I’d know it a mile away, ten miles away, ten million bloody miles away. My heart leapt, mouth dry. I looked for the man that could be him, scouting the place while Tessa and Chelsea stared over.

“It was always going to be a tough match, Wanderers at home at this stage in the season, but we played well, came out fighting. Guess the result speaks for itself.”

My eyes shot up to the screen, ears trained on the speakers.

No. Fucking. Way.

The presenter’s voice. “There’s rumours that you won’t be hanging up the boots next season, do you think you’ve got another Premier League battle in you?”

I stared at the man on screen as the reporter put a microphone in his face. He smiled, tossing his hair back. Wet hair, curling at the bottom. Brooding eyes sparkled at the question.

“Never say never,” he laughed. Jason’s laugh. “It’s been a strange season, anything can happen.”

The reporter shook his hand, and the subtitles switched back from the latest scores.

Jason Redfern, Kensington Captain.

The world turned way too quickly. Heartbeat in my temples, my breath stuck in my chest. I stumbled backwards, losing the drinks in the process, they tumbled to the floor in a spray of glass and ice cubes. A hundred eyes on me. Tessa and Chelsea’s amongst them.

“Gemma?!” They grabbed me by the arms, yanked me clear of the crowd. “What the hell’s the matter?”

Gemma? Gemma? Gemma talk to us. Are you ok?

Tessa was shaking me, hands tight on my shoulders.

My tongue felt like rubber, words tumbling and blathering without consciousness.

“It’s him, oh my God, it’s him!”

“It’s who? Where?”

“My Jason,” I gasped. “On the TV.”

Chelsea flicked her hair. “You mean my Jason? Jason Redfern.”

“It’s him,” I said, brain spinning. “Holy shit!”

It took a long moment for the situation to dawn on Chelsea, she laughed at first. I watched her expression change as she turned it over. “You mean that Jason is the guy you’ve been seeing? The crazy fucking weirdo who makes you wear a blindfold?”