Isaac, who’d been clearing plates, turned and headed for the bar. Lily, however, stepped fearlessly up to the man, only the bar counter between them. ‘I’m afraid I can’t serve you further alcohol this evening.’ She held his gaze for a moment, then turned away.
The man reached between the beer taps and grasped her arm. ‘Oy! Don’ you friggin’ walk away from me—’
Isaac was there in two strides but Lily had already broken the man’s grip. ‘You need to leave, sir,’ she snapped.
The man sneered. ‘I’ll leave when I’m good an’ ready.’
Lily seemed effortlessly composed. ‘My option is to call the police, sir. Two seconds to decide. One—’
‘Stop bein’ so up yourself.’ Red-faced man was looking decidedly ugly.
‘Two.’ Lily reached for the phone on the wall.
Standing behind the drunk and watching Lily handle it, Isaac saw the man’s friends pulling on their coats and scowling. ‘C’mon,’ one of them called. ‘Not worth it. Crappy little pub in the arse-end of nowhere. They’re welcome to it.’
Lily put the phone to her ear and her finger on the first button.
The red-faced guy shoved abruptly away from the bar. ‘Your beer’s piss anyway.’
The men clattered chairs over and harrumphed a few more insults but they did blunder out of the front door. In the silence left behind, Lily replaced the phone.
It was ten past ten and the bar was empty. Fantastic. At least the men had put plenty into the till before their behaviour cleared the place. ‘Vita, perhaps you could start collecting glasses?’ Isaac suggested, to give him a quiet moment with Lily. As Vita moved off, he turned to Lily, intending to check she was OK.
‘Sorry,’ she jumped in before he could speak. ‘I should have handled that without antagonising him. I let him get to me because I hate it when a woman turns down a date and the man says she must therefore be gay, especially when “gay” sounds like an insult.’ Her blue eyes were stormy. ‘It always touches me on the raw because Zinnia and I are from the kind of family with two mums and no dads. I thought I’d tell you because I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s easiest all round when people know.’ She tilted her head and waited for him to react.
It was obvious Lily was at least half-expecting something negative from him. Isaac wondered how many people had hurt her on this subject over the years. ‘The whiff of homophobia is always unacceptable and I can see why the awkward customer wound you up particularly.’ He smiled. What she’d outlined wasn’t precisely a situation he’d encountered before but he didn’t see why he should treat this differently to any other personal topic a member of staff had chosen to bring up. ‘Are you OK? I thought you dealt with the offensive customer well.’
She shrugged. ‘He was nothing compared to drunken stags in Barcelona. My ex-husband’s family ran a bar just off Las Ramblas. Bar Barcelona was a big place, firmly on the map so far as stags and hens were concerned. It got rowdy and I learned to ignore most bad behaviour … but tonight I let that guy get to me.’
‘He was offensive,’ he repeated. ‘Your husband was Spanish?’ It explained her surname of Cortez.
‘Yes. We met when he was in the UK gaining some experience of hotels because his family was thinking about opening one. He tried to live here and pined for Spain, so I tried to live there.’ She gave a tiny quirk to her eyebrows. ‘I think I could have lived in a different part of Spain, or in a different way. But I never settled into the family business.’
‘Because your main job’s as a …’ He paused, groping for the title she’d given him before but unable to get past ‘exhibitionist’, which was a distracting thought and definitely not what she’d told him.
‘An exhibition designer,’ she completed for him. ‘I design stands for things like trade shows – functionality of the space, branding, display, that kind of stuff. But that wasn’t seen as more important than working in Bar Barcelona. Sergio’s brother Nando and his wife seemed happy to muck in and my wanting to pursue my own career caused friction.’
Isaac stepped to one side to allow Vita through with a stack of glasses. ‘And here you are working in a village pub so I guess you like bar work.’
She hesitated, glancing around at the brass and beams and the winking Christmas decorations. ‘It’s more that it’s where I seem to end up.’ As if that reminded her that she was supposed to be working she gave him a brief smile and swung off to the dining area to collect salt and pepper cellars to refill.
Vita bustled past for more glasses and soon as many closing jobs had been accomplished as practicable without them actually closing. Isaac sighed at the sight of the empty bar. ‘It’s not going to take three of us to finish up. One of you can take an early night.’
‘Vita can,’ Lily said, looking up from sorting sauce sachets into caddies. ‘Her kids get up at the break of dawn.’
Vita couldn’t hide a flash of relief though she said fairly, ‘Or we could flip a coin.’
Lily waved the idea away. ‘We can even things up another time.’
The other woman needed no further cajoling. She vanished into the back and soon came the sound of the outside door closing. Isaac checked the time. Ten thirty. He could easily have sent Lily off as well but this wasn’t his pub and he wanted to improve his feel for things. ‘Is it often as quiet as this?’
‘Never in all the time I’ve worked here.’ Lily rolled her eyes. ‘It was that obnoxious guy and his obnoxious mates. We almost never have aggro in The Three Fishes and it sent everyone home.’
He puffed out his cheeks in relief. ‘Good. I’d hate Mr Tubb to think I’m running his business into the ground.’ Though he wasn’t serious, saying the words out loud made his stomach give an unexpected lurch.
She stepped closer, frowning. ‘We must have taken enough in the early part of the evening to make up for the last hour being quiet.’
‘“Quiet” like the Marie Celeste?’ But he grinned. ‘You’re right.’ He was just going to make another joke, this time about the novelty of ringing ‘last orders’ in an empty pub, when the front door opened and a woman strolled in. Wearing her forty-something years easily on her tall and willowy frame, streaked brown hair tossed artfully around her face, she was all but hauled towards the bar by a large Dalmatian dog whose tail became a blur when he spotted Isaac.
‘Doggo!’ Isaac heard himself say stupidly.
Doggo whined ecstatically, ears back, his doggy grin a mile wide as he bounced and danced, giving a loud bark, obviously frustrated by the restraining lead. Isaac strode around the bar and crouched to fuss the excited canine, choosing to focus on the dog he’d lost along with everything else, rather than on the woman watching with an indulgent smile.
Hayley.
In a long cream woollen coat and high-heeled black boots she looked as polished as fine china. What the hell was his ex doing here? And why did it have to be now, when there wasn’t a single customer in the place? Frigging typical, he thought bitterly. In her eyes, it would make him look more of a loser than ever.
‘He’s pining for you so I thought I’d bring him over as a surprise. See how you were settling in.’ Hayley sounded as composed as if they’d last met yesterday rather than two months ago, when he’d moved out of her flat in Peterborough, a forty-minute drive away, and into his sister’s spare room in nearby Bettsbrough until taking up residence in one of the seldom-occupied guest rooms upstairs a couple of weeks ago. Hayley glanced