“Kate, you’re not sounding like yourself,” he replied. “Maybe it’s time to give this vacation a rest and come home. You’ve been gone for over two weeks, you know that, right?”
I shook my head. “Yes,” I said, feeling more frustrated by the second. “But I’ve met someone here, who I really do like.”
Josh laughed. “Oh, him? The soccer player?”
I narrowed my eyes. “What’s so funny?”
He nodded, a smile easing its way onto his face. “I saw the article,” he said. He stretched and put his hands behind his head. “I know all about him.”
I frowned. “So what are you doing here if you knew I was with someone else? Aside from giving me news from the producers, that is.”
He laughed again. “Come on, Kate. Do you really think the biggest playboy in Manchester would wanna settle down with someone he’s only known for a couple of weeks?” He raised his eyebrows at me, like it was the most ludicrous possibility in the world. “I mean, you’re smarter than that.”
I looked away. I wasn’t sure what I thought was going on between me and Jay, but Josh was making me uncomfortable. “I don’t think you know what you’re talking about,” I said in a stiff voice. “I know Jay better than that.”
Josh pulled an envelope out of a backpack on the floor that I recognized as his. “Look at these,” he said, smirking. “Then tell me what you think.”
I didn’t want to believe anything bad about Jay, but my heart started to sink before Josh could even show me what was in the envelope. I pushed his hand away.
“I don’t want to see,” I said, shaking my head. “It’s probably some tabloid bullshit. You know his ex-girlfriend is a celebrity gossip columnist, right? And she has a real vendetta against him.”
Josh chuckled. “Well, no, I didn’t, but take a look at these, Kate. Your man is with another woman right now. Like literally as we speak.”
I winced as he emphasized the words ‘right now’, and hauling myself off the couch, I strolled into the kitchen and grabbed a pastry from the bag. I didn’t want to think about Jay doing anything that would upset me, and I knew Josh was just trying to rile me up.
“Come on, Kate,” Josh pleaded. He followed behind me, clutching the envelope and trying to hand it to me. Every time I shook my head, he wheedled further.
“Josh, leave me alone,” I said through a mouthful of croissant. “Please.”
“I’m not leaving until you look at these,” Josh replied in a firm voice. “It’s for your own good, Kate.”
Something about his voice made me stop eating and lower the rest of the croissant to the counter. “Fine,” I snapped. “Show me.”
Josh eased some photographs out of the envelope. My heart started to thud in my chest and the last bite of pastry in my mouth turned to ash as Josh flipped them over. There, in bright color, was Jay. He was sitting at a café with an unknown woman. She actually resembled me a little bit; she was a curvy brunette with delicate features. But that was where the similarities ended. In the photo, Jay was leaning over the table and kissing her. Her hands were tangled in his hair, and I could see the small Manchester United logo on the back of his jacket—the same jacket he’d been wearing when he left this morning. Untouched cups of coffee sat between them and the girl’s skirt was so short I could see the pink crotch of her panties, just waiting for Jay to tear them off.
I felt sick. “I don’t want to look at any more of these,” I said, abruptly pushing the photos back towards Josh. He caught my hand by the wrist and slipped another photo into my unwilling fingers.
“Kate, the timestamp of these is pretty recent,” he said slowly. “I mean, they were practically only just taken.”
He pointed to the right-hand corner of the photo where I unmistakably read today’s date and a time that showed the pictures were taken about an hour and a half ago. My stomach churned and knotted, and Josh looked at me again. “Are you sure you really know this guy, Kate? He ran out on you for some cheap tart.”
I ignored the question for the time being. “Where did you get these pictures?”
“A friend of mine lives here. He works in the media industry too. Anyway, I called him before I came here to Lizzy’s place to find you, and we caught up for an early breakfast and coffee. He asked why I was here, and I mentioned your name, and he recognized it and connected it with Jay Walsh, because of that article the other day.”
“And?”
“And he’d just received a bunch of pictures from a paparazzi friend of his. He wasn’t going to run them—pictures of Walsh having coffee with some woman aren’t exactly stellar news—so he gave them to me to show to you.”