If Lily was completely honest, it did feel the tiniest bit odd seeing him holding Coral's hand, stroking her fingers and slowly rubbing the small of her back, but this was only because she wasn't used to witnessing such public displays of affection from someone who still felt to her like a stranger.
Then again, he wasn't a stranger to Coral. She'd finally found someone she liked, and that was all that counted. It was definitely a good thing to have happened to her.
‘Suspicious Minds' was playing on the music system as Trent brought their drinks back to the table, and a few of the regulars were joining in with the chorus.
‘Ah, Elvis Presley. Can't beat a bit of Elvis. Elvis the Pelvis,' said Trent, sitting down and taking a gulp of lager. He winked at Coral. ‘Love me tender. Can't help falling in love.' He reached for her hand once more and gave it a squeeze. ‘The wonder of you.'
Yikes, and now he was gazing dreamily into Coral's eyes. Was he about to burst into song and start serenading her? Lily exchanged a glance of alarm with Dan, who promptly leapt into the breach with ‘Speaking of pelvises … '
Oh God, now what was he about to say?
‘Sorry, what?' Coral was looking baffled too.
‘Remember Kyle, the boy we were at school with? The one who had that accident at Hestacombe Lake and broke his pelvis?'
‘Of course I do,' Coral exclaimed. ‘That poor boy, wasn't he in hospital for weeks? And the farmer put a bull in the field after that so the rest of you couldn't get down to the lake.'
Dan nodded. ‘Lily and I were wondering what happened to him after his family left the area. We wanted to look him up, but neither of us can remember his surname.'
‘McSomething. Or MacSomething,' said Lily. ‘I'm not sure I ever even knew his name, not properly. It was MacLanan or McLanahan, or McClannon … or MacAllen … ' She shrugged. ‘We tried googling, but it was hopeless.'
‘And I can't help you,' said Coral. ‘I never even met him. No clue, sorry. Oh-'
Her eyes had widened. For a split second, Lily thought Kyle's name had somehow come to her. The next moment, she realised it hadn't; Coral was staring straight past her across the pub.
Lily met Dan's dark eyes once more and saw the concern in them, coupled with a lack of surprise. That was when she knew who had just walked in and, in all probability, who had texted him ten minutes ago.
Well it had to happen at some stage. Patsy couldn't stay away forever and never come back.
Chapter 44
It was by the sheerest coincidence that the previous Elvis track had just faded away and been replaced by the opening chords of ‘Devil in Disguise'. Whooping with recognition, and oblivious to the awkwardness of the situation, the regulars cheerily greeted Patsy's arrival, then returned their attention to the impromptu singalong.
Lily looked at Patsy and Patsy looked back, her expression carefully masked as she slowly threaded her way between the tables.
‘How are you feeling?' Dan kept his voice low.
Lily shook her head. ‘I don't know.'
Across the table, Coral was explaining to Trent what was going on. Leaning sideways, Dan murmured, ‘Do you want me to kiss you again? Because I will. Right here in front of everyone.'
Lily couldn't move; his mouth was millimetres from her ear and her ear was fizzing like a firework, hyper-aware of his proximity. She whispered, ‘Shush, stop it.'
‘OK. But you never know, it might help.'
Of course it wouldn't help. But the awful thing was, she wanted it to happen. Not here, though, and not now. In private.
Oh God, stop thinking about it.
But she knew what Dan was doing and why he was doing it. Patsy was his big sister, his only living relative, and he wanted all this to be over. He hadn't asked her to forgive Patsy, but of course that was what he wanted.
And now Patsy was standing directly in front of her, swallowing with difficulty, her hands clasped and her fingers twisted together. You could see her knuckles whitening with the tension in her grip.
‘Lily, I'm sorry. I know, I know, I can keep on saying it and it's never going to be enough, but I don't know what else I can do.' Patsy's face was pale, and the violet shadows beneath her eyes betrayed how little sleep she'd been getting. ‘I just wish there was something-'
‘Don't.' Lily shook her head as she pushed back her chair and rose clumsily to her feet. She wrapped her arms around Patsy and hugged her hard. ‘It's all right, you don't have to do anything. You made a mistake, that's all. But I still love you.'
‘Oh God.' Choking up, Patsy let out a sob like a honking goose. ‘Really? Really?'
‘Of course really.' And now Lily's eyes were brimming too. ‘You've been gone for two weeks. I've missed you so much.' It was true, it was so true. She'd wanted to punish Patsy, but in doing so she had only succeeded in punishing herself. The two of them had both been feeling terrible. Forgiving Patsy meant all the anger could melt away, the hurt and the resentment evaporate into thin air. Tightening her hold, she whispered, ‘I'm sorry too.'
‘Oh Lily, you haven't done anything to apologise for.'
Well she had, but it was nothing to do with Patsy.
Lily exhaled with relief. She looked across at Dan and saw him smile. Forgiving Patsy for having done wrong meant she could forgive herself for kissing Dan. Or, more to the point, kissing him and enjoying it so much she hadn't been able to stop thinking about it ever since.
Forgiving herself, it turned out, was easy. Now all she had to do was figure out how to erase the memory of That Kiss from her brain …
Then it was Coral's turn to embrace Patsy and say, ‘We've all missed you. Where have you been?'
An extra chair was pulled up at the table. Sean, working behind the bar, brought over a drink for Patsy and gave her shoulder a squeeze. ‘Welcome back.'
Patsy rested her hand on his for a moment and looked up at him with gratitude. ‘Thanks.'
At the other end of the pub, Elvis had given way to Queen and everyone was now belting out ‘Bohemian Rhapsody'. Patsy shook her head. ‘No one's taking any notice of me being here. I thought the place would fall silent and I'd be glared at. I expected to be public enemy number one.'
‘They don't know,' said Lily.
‘Really?' Patsy clutched her chest in relief. ‘You didn't tell them?'
‘No one else needed to know,' said Coral.
‘Oh God, thank you. Thank you so much. I was so scared. Where does everyone think I've been?'
‘We just said you'd gone up to London to help out in Rosa's salon because two of her senior stylists were off sick.'
Patsy nodded, because this was entirely feasible. ‘OK, right.'
‘And where were you really?' said Lily.
‘Dredging a canal in Norfolk.'
Double-take time. ‘You what?'
‘It's one of those voluntary projects to clear up the waterways. You spend all day every day scooping gloop and weeds and rusty bikes out of a stretch of canal, and in return they put you up in a caravan and give you three cooked meals a day.'
It was like hearing Patsy announce that she'd been working in a sewer or down a mine. Lily said, ‘You? Dredging a canal? But that's everything you hate in the world.'
‘I know. I think that's why I did it. Couldn't afford to go anywhere nice, so I decided to do something awful instead. It seemed like the right thing to do. I suppose I wanted to punish myself.'
‘Oh Patsy. And was it better than you thought? Did it turn out to be fun after all?'
‘No, it was revolting. Mud and rats and millions of mosquitoes. And the smell of it was just … eurgh.'
Grasping at straws, Lily said, ‘Were the other volunteers nice, though?'
‘God, no, they were awful too. I was sharing a mouldy two-berth caravan with an old hippy called Rain. You know how people always say nits prefer clean hair? Well that turns out to be a big lie, because Rain has a headful of nits and she hasn't washed her hair for the last twenty-three years.'
Lily tried not to shrink away. Patsy saw her flinch and they both burst out laughing. Oh, the joy of knowing all the bad stuff was behind them; everything was completely back to normal. The connection between them was as strong as it had ever been.
‘Where's Declan?' Patsy looked at Dan. ‘You said in your text he was staying at our place with you. I thought he'd be here tonight.'
‘He was going to be,' Lily explained. ‘But something came up this afternoon, some emergency with one of his properties, and he had to drive back to London to sort it out.' It had been so lovely having him down here all week; she'd been disappointed when he had called her earlier to tell her he was leaving and wouldn't be able to join them this evening. She hoped the problem wasn't too desperate; he'd sounded a bit subdued on the phone.