“Sometimes attack is the best form of defence,” she said with a sharp nod.
“Mum? Lils?” a feminine voice called out.
“Sophie’s friend will look after you, don’t you worry,” Carmen said, not seeing that her words had quite the opposite effect, especially when my best friend and a strange man came walking around the corner.
A very good looking guy.
Fuck… I thought, immediately cataloguing the ways I was not ready for company. Hair like a rat’s nest, bleary eyed and hungover as fuck, with ratty PJs and no bra on.
“Oh hey,” Sophie said, walking over. “How’d you pull up? Need a couple of aspirins and a cheeky Maccas run to set you to rights?” She put her hands on my shoulders. “You’ll need it because whoever the fuck Logan is—”
“Aunt Sophie!” both Carmen and Evie exclaimed.
“Sorry, whoever the hell Logan is, he’s not afraid of playing hardball.” She grinned then, looking way too put together and perfect, so much so that it was scary. Or was that just the vulpine smile of hers? “Just the kind of ball I like to play. Now, this is Leo Rochester. He’s the guy from my firm that specialises in family law I was telling you about.”
“Nice to meet you, Lily, was it?”
He stepped forward, all perfectly pressed button down and knife pleat pants, gold cufflinks flashing as he offered me his hand. I set my plate down and rubbed my hands on my PJs before shaking it.
For a moment, he just smiled. With a thick wave of brown hair and a megawatt smile, he had a confident, competent look about him. But as the skin around his hazel eyes creased as his gaze locked with mine, I forgot to reply.
“So, Sophie’s given me the basics of the case, but it’d be good to go over everything in a little more detail. This is quite an unusual situation,” he said.
“Mum, when do I get to see my dad?”
Everyone turned around to see Evie sitting there, her utensils clasped too tight in her hands, like she was ready to deploy them in any fight that might come.
“That’s what Mr Leo is here to help sort out,” Carmen said smoothly. The lady was a damn kid whisperer, seeming to be able to pitch her voice at the perfect combination of concern, affection, and authority.
“Why?” Evie looked at Leo and seemed to evaluate his usefulness with narrowed eyes, before turning back to me, awaiting my response.
“Well, darling, we want you to be safe at all times. Adults use lawyers like Aunt Soph to hammer out agreements that everyone feels comfortable with. They’ll work out things like when and how long you see your dad for, and where you’ll see him.”
Evie blinked at that, and I watched her brain kick into gear, tossing around the implications of that. Still ruminating, she nodded slowly, and I let out a little sigh.
“I have to open the shop today,” I said apologetically to Leo. “I’m sorry, but Saturday is my best day for sales. It helps keep me afloat during the week.”
“We can talk there then,” he replied smoothly. “Normally I’d be willing to postpone things but…”
He had more things to say, I could tell, bad things, but when he turned around and looked at Evie, he had the wherewithal to stop himself. Thank god for that, I thought hurriedly. I had a big mouthful of my coffee, which only added to the party of acid, misery, and shitty decisions in my guts, before moving to get ready.
“Breakfast!” Carmen called out as I walked off.
“Maccas run on the way to work,” I promised before diving into my bedroom.
Chapter 13
Fake it till you make it, Sophie and I always told each other. Well, right now, I was faking my arse off. I was in a pair of jeans that did amazing things to said arse, along with a pair of boots that made me look taller and my legs longer. I had a fitted shirt left buttoned low and, if Leo’s surreptitious look was anything to go by, it made the girls look good. But as a sop to my own physical misery, I’d pulled on a long cardigan that was warm and soft, flaring wide around my legs like a medieval cloak.
“You’re going to make him eat his tongue,” Sophie hissed at me with a grin as we walked over to the cars.
Evie had enthusiastically endorsed Nana Carmen’s plans. She was going to get hopped up on way too much sugar, go shopping, and then see some ridiculous movie, so her acquiescence came as no shock. She’d demanded updates on the Ben situation though, making it clear that no matter what we bribed her with, the distraction tactic was only going to be a temporary measure. As we walked into the shop and I directed Sophie and Leo over to one of the reading nooks by the front door, I wondered what exactly we were going to be able to tell her.
But as I moved around the shop, turning the open sign around and setting up the till, a calm settled over me. In some ways, Evie and I were the same. She had her safe spaces, and so did I. And this was my favourite. The smell of books, old and new, shelves and shelves of them, lined up just so. Sophie liked to argue that I was a book dragon, sitting atop a pile of my beauties, but I was willing to part with them. I liked doing so. Finding someone the perfect book, sharing that pleasure of discovering something that captures your imagination, your soul… There was nothing else like it. So when Mrs Fiddler and her friends arrived, right on time, I had the tea poured and a selection already on the front desk for them.
“Oh, you’re a good girl,” she said, eyeing the giant stack of quite steamy romances.
She might be retired, but she wasn’t dead yet, she’d assured me many a time. She took the tea and the books over to her favourite table, leaving me to deal with her friends and find whatever they were looking for. I raced around the shop, pulling clean, small town, and, weirdly, hot mafia romances off the shelves, spreading the books across the counter and giving them a quick spiel on each one. Mrs Fiddler came and paid for the ones she’d decided to take and then her friends did the same, retiring to the little armchairs that formed a circle in her corner.