Always You by Erin Kaye Read Free Book Online Page B

thought. ‘I am proud of what I’ve achieved,’ she said, referring to her successful transformation from stay-at-home mum to businesswoman. Seven years ago she’d updated her qualifications, brushed up her image and gone back out to work. She’d been promoted three times since then and hadn’t looked back.
    He took a hand out of his pocket and rubbed his chin, dark with stubble even though the night was yet young.
    ‘You know, I was going to look you up when I got here,’ he said.
    ‘Really?’ she said sourly, disbelieving him. And then she recalled the earlier conversation with Andy. ‘Why did you tell Andy we were just university acquaintances?’
    He held out his hands in supplication and smiled disarmingly. ‘What did you expect me to say? That we were lovers once?’
    She looked away, embarrassed. Not only had they been lovers, they had been in love, and the best sex she’d ever experienced had been with him …
    She opened her mouth to ask why he had wanted to look her up, when a voice shrieked, ‘Cahal!’ They both looked in the direction it was coming from. Jody teetered towards them. She was tall anyway and in heels she towered, like a caramel-coloured gazelle, over all the women and most of the men in the room. She hooked her arm around Cahal’s and, turning a cold, glassy eye on Sarah, she said, ‘Ah, here you are.’ Then she turned her laser-like attention on Cahal. ‘I wondered where you’d gotten to.’ She pouted girlishly into his face, lowered her gaze and pressed a forefinger into his chest. ‘Everyone’s looking for you.’
    Sarah looked away, annoyed by the interruption and faintly embarrassed by Jody’s physical intimacy with Cahal. Were they an item? She disapproved, she told herself, because Jody was young enough, almost, to be his daughter.
    Regarding Jody from under slightly hooded eyes, he said playfully, ‘You make me sound like a wanted man.’
    Heat rose to Sarah’s cheeks. He
was
flirting with Jody!
    Quick as a flash, Jody said, ‘Oh, you are.’ There was a long silence while she let all the possible meanings of this sink in, and Sarah’s emotions see-sawed between admiration at her boldness – and outrage. Once she’d recovered her equilibrium, she said, ‘Excuse me, I have to go,’ and she marched purposefully into the crowd.
    Eventually she stumbled across her work colleagues. Lizzy teetered towards her on three-inch heels, red-faced and clearly the worse for wear. Trevor wasn’t far behind, smiling goofily, his tie loosened. ‘Come on,’ said Lizzy. ‘They’ve called us through for dinner. I’m starving.’ She placed one hand on her stomach and grabbed Sarah’s arm with the other to prevent herself from toppling over. Sarah smiled indulgently – and tried to put the image of Jody pawing over Cahal out of her mind.

Chapter 4
    On the way home from work, Ian took the short detour to Lough View, the nursing home on Greenbank Road where his mother had lived for the past two years. He found the place depressing and the fact that he’d been unable to secure more salubrious surroundings for his mother’s final home filled him with guilt. It wasn’t for want of trying – or for lack of money. His father, who’d risen to the rank of chief superintendent in the police, had left Evelyn very comfortable. When Ian had set out on the quest to find a suitable nursing home, after the second stroke had left his mother partially paralysed on her right side, this was the best of an unimpressive bunch.As soon as the door opened he steeled himself for the smell that wafted out on stale, overheated air – overcooked vegetables and the unpleasant odour of cheap disinfectant, a game attempt to disguise the faint, sour smell of urine. Though lately confined to bed by yet another persistent chest infection, his mother was not incontinent – not yet – and for that he thanked God. He prayed she would be spared that indignity. ‘How is she today, Jolanta?’
    The care