Wiping her now wet eyes with her fingers, she hauled in her breath and climbed out of the taxi, yanking her overnight bag from the floor.
How was she going to spin it this time? she thought, looking up to the window of Poppy’s flat. Since she was a little girl, Poppy’s home had been hers too, the place and person she ran to when life kicked her to the kerb.
Poppy and Izzy, her oldest friends and the people who loved her best. They’d welcome her back as they always did and then they’d settle in, waiting for the story…because there was always a story. For once she just wished that she had the guts to drop her guard and tell it as it was. That she felt battered and bruised and emotionally flattened. Sad and so damn scared that she’d never find what she needed, what she was really looking for.
Petrified that she would soon be thirty, then forty, fifty and kept around for her charm, her entertainment value, her pretty face but still, under it all, unloved, unvalued and, worst of all, unneeded.
‘Seriously, she was riding him so fast that I thought that her wings were going to launch her off him…’
Tori was in her favourite chair in the eclectic, messy, colourful sitting room of the flat, her bare feet tucked up under her and a glass of red in her hand. Poppy was in the wingback chair opposite her and Izzy sat on the ottoman next to her. Both were doubled over, clutching their stomachs and laughing uproariously.
Yeah, good job, Tori, she thought wearily. You’ve pulled it off again.
‘Oh, God, Tori, stop.’ Izzy whimpered between snorts of laughter. ‘Your love life should be serialised as a soap opera, hon.’
‘And Mark? How did he act?’ Poppy asked, wiping her tears away.
‘He didn’t even bat an eye, just turned and said, “Get naked, join in, and What’s-Her-Skanky will show you what to do.”‘
Two mouths fell open, perfectly synchronised. ‘And you didn’t know about this?’
‘Hell, no!’ Tori made herself smile. ‘If I had, I would’ve had a say in who to pick as contestant number three. But really, God—her? She looked like a walking mattress. Besides, women just don’t do it for me.’
‘You did kiss Melissa Butler.’
‘I was thirteen, Poppy! And you dared me to!’ Tori stared up at the ceiling.
Poppy sat up, leaned forward and sent Tori a searching look. It was her Poppy patented, sneaky you-talk-a-good-game-but-I-know-you-are-full-of-BS look. ‘Are you really okay, Toz? You’re acting like you couldn’t give a damn but—’
Tori tossed her hair and dredged up a reassuring smile. ‘I’m fine, I promise. Mark is welcome to dip his ink into her radioactive well.’
‘Talking of, please tell me that he’s clean and so are you.’ Poppy—Dr Poppy now—asked, frowning. ‘Maybe you should come in for a check-up, let me run some tests. Do a complete physical.’
She was stupid emotionally but she wasn’t a complete idiot. ‘Relax, Pops. We always used condoms, Doctor. No exceptions, ever.’
‘Promise?’
‘Promise.’ Poppy let out a huge sigh of relief and Tori was grateful that she’d never, not once—despite Mark’s bitching—deviated from that rule. And Mark could bitch for days.
‘On another subject…I’m homeless and I need to move back in. Can I have my old room back?’
Poppy and Izzy exchanged a frantic, oh-no look that had her heart crashing to the floor. If she couldn’t move back in then she didn’t know that she could hold it together. The only place she could contemplate being was in this flat, with these people. Poppy looked agitated. ‘The problem is that Alex and Lara are in your room and I’ve rented Izzy’s room to Isaac—’
‘But isn’t he away?’
‘Yes, but—’
‘She can have the boxroom,’ Izzy interjected, ‘since I’ve moved in with Harry.’
Ick, the boxroom. Tiny, cramped, child-sized bed. Jeez, it wasn’t even big enough to swing a fly. No cupboard space, a tiny window and you could hear every noise from the bathroom and its old, rusty pipes.
On the plus side it didn’t have her despicable ex in it. Win.
‘I’ll take the boxroom.’ Tori sighed. ‘Though I think that, as my mates, either you or Alex should consider giving up your rooms because I’ve been traumatised for life. I’m considering bleaching my eyes and brain with acid.’
Poppy stood up, patted her shoulder and took her wine glass. ‘Yeah, you’d think that. Here’s an idea—while you’re suffering in the boxroom, think about choosing a man a couple of steps up the evolutionary scale from pond scum next time, okay?’
‘Yes, Mum,’ Tori grumbled.
‘Seriously, she was riding him so fast that I thought that her wings were going to launch her off him…’
Matt Cross held the front door to his new digs open and considered reversing back through it. He instantly recognised the tone and notes of girl talk and it wasn’t something he wanted to interrupt by walking into the lounge. He supposed that this was something that he’d have to put up with, together with scented rooms, lingerie and a slew of empty wine glasses scattered throughout the house.
It had been a long time since he’d shared a flat with anyone. Sharing a house with Poppy and Alex would take some adjusting to, but at least his clients didn’t know where he was and couldn’t rock up on his doorstop at all hours of the day looking for reassurance or company.
His eyebrows lifted at the drawling, low-pitched voice that sounded as if it belonged on the other side of a phone-sex conversation. Matt, not wanting to give his presence away, left the door open and peeked through the doorway to the lounge and saw the perfect profile of a streaky-haired woman with mile-long legs.
Whoah! Sexy.
Matt dragged his eyes away to look from Poppy, his landlord, to Izzy, whom he’d met before. The knockout must be—geez, what was her name? Laurie? Laura?—the third of the three original flatmates he had yet to meet. Izzy was bent double, wheezing with laughter, and Poppy was wiping her eyes.
Her smile was negated by the fact that she was clutching the stem of her wine glass so hard that he thought it might break at any minute. Mmm, she didn’t think her story was quite as funny as they did.
Now that was interesting.
Then she lifted her face and stared at the ceiling and he caught the sheen of tears in her eyes, her rapid blinking. Hello…she was seriously distressed. Matt’s instinct was to head straight for her, to gather her up and to tell her it was okay to let those tears fall.
Weird, slightly scary, since he didn’t even know the woman. He watched, fascinated as she rearranged her features so that she looked like any other carefree woman in her mid-to-late twenties with wide eyes and a wider smile.
Oh, she was an excellent faker.
‘He didn’t even bat an eye, just turned and said, “Get naked, join in and What’s-Her-Skanky will show you what to do.”’ She carried on with her story.
Now he had the urge to rearrange some clown’s face.
Matt turned and lifted his eyebrows when Alex, Poppy’s brother and another inhabitant of the flat, stepped into the spacious hallway behind him.
‘Women just don’t do it for me.’
‘You did kiss Melissa Butler.’
‘I was thirteen, Poppy!’ she howled. ‘And you dared me to!’
Alex lifted his eyebrow at Matt before looking through