“You loved me?”
“Piss off, Faye, of course I fucking loved you, I loved you way before we got this pissing club. Nobody else would have convinced me to take this much of a gamble with my fucking money. Not a fucking chance in hell.”
“I didn’t know.”
“Clearly.” I sighed. “So, that’s my second dirty fucking secret. You ran, I ran after you. Then I came back with my sorry tail between my legs, and I took your name off the directorship because I was so mightily pissed. That doesn’t make it right, I know, but Jesus, Faye, have a bit of fucking tolerance, will you?”
A tear ran down her face but she brushed it away. “It’s not about that,” she said. “It’s that you didn’t tell me.”
“And when was I supposed to tell you exactly?”
“Before I was in your fucking bed might have been a good time.”
I threw my hands in the air. “Pissing hell, are you for fucking real?”
“You lied!” she hissed.
“We bothlie, Faye. We both hide things, we both kid ourselves, and knock heads, and think our hands are sparkling fucking clean.” I paced away from her, only to turn back again. “You’re so keen to know when I would have told you about that stupid fucking form, how about when you were going to tell me why you ran away from fucking Italy? From that fucking tosser?”
Her mouth dropped. “That’s different.”
“Is it? Is it really?”
“Totally!”
“So, you read my secret on a stupid piece of paper, I read yours on Vincent fucking Blackthorne’s website. What’s the fucking difference?”
“His website?”
“Yes on his poxy website. His disgustedfansdissing the cunt for selling his fuckingmagpie.”
“Oh God.”
“Youshould have fucking told me.”
“I was going to tell you!”
I laughed. “No, you fucking weren’t.”
She slammed her hands on top of the flogging bench. “I was embarrassed. Humiliated. Ashamed.”
“You could have told me, Faye, I would never have judged you.”
“Nowyoucan piss off,” she snapped. “You werealwaysfucking judging me! Always full of condemnation! I’ve hardly been able to do anything fucking right since I’ve been back.”
“That’s different.”
“Is it? Is it really, Andy?”
“Totally!”
And we’d gone full fucking circle.
I put my head in my hands, exhausted. “He sold you for sex, Faye, that’s a disgusting thing to have gone through.”
“Yeah, well, the whole thing was disgusting. You have no idea what filthy shit went down out there, Andy. No fucking idea. The line between where I wanted it and where I was being whored out is pretty fucking blurry. But he sold me, and that’s disgusting, and wrong, and an absolute betrayal. I don’t like betrayal, Andy.”
“Like anyone does, Faye, get off your moral fucking high horse.”