Playing James by Sarah Mason Read Free Book Online Page B

got it together one night when they were working late. I personally breathed a huge sigh of relief as the tension had been unbearable (lots of hot steamy looks over the photocopier) and I wasn't sure whether it was going to be like one of those novels where nothing turns out quite how you want it. For example,
The English Patient
. Couldn't she have survived the plane crash and just been camped out in the cave waiting for him when he got back? Like an Arab version of a Girl Guide, with her yashmak out on the line and humming 'Kum Ba Yah'? Anyway, I digress. Things between Lizzie and Alastair have definitely not stayed as they started out.
    Lizzie continues. 'So I went into town at lunchtime to console myself and guess who I met?'
    'Who?'
    'Bloody Teresa! And wouldn't you believe it – she took one look at my shopping bags and proceeded to tell me about how Jesus Christ gave the shirt off his back for his neighbour and would I do the same thing.'
    'No!'
    'And I know it's blasphemous but I told her obviously JC didn't have Jigsaw in his time and I was
sure
he would understand that my new little crossover top was very hard to come by and I wouldn't like to part with it. I know it was awful of me but I simply couldn't resist it.'
    I laugh at this which is probably blasphemous by default, but then, according to Teresa, Lizzie and I blew our chances with Him a long time ago. About the same time we discovered boys and alcohol.
    At school, Teresa was the most pious teenager you could ever meet. She never wore make-up or discussed clothes or wolf-whistled at boys. She read the Bible in break times and ran the local Christian Youth Group. She always dressed perfectly. Absolutely pristine. Even now she is the perfect M&S woman, complete with a little gold crucifix. Her hair is a dark, glossy chestnut, softly wavy and cut into a bob. She is actually a very pretty girl, but absolutely ruins any effect she could have with her very sour, squashed lemon facial expression. I don't think her holiness is a result of some entirely natural I-just-love-the-world-and-everyone-in-it viewpoint because, believe me, she is an absolute grade A bitch. There is some other, more complicated psyche at work which I can't even begin to fathom. Once, at school, she spread this really vicious rumour that I had been caught shagging my amour-du-jour, Matt, on a snooker table! Considering my only up-close-and-personal incidents with Matt at this stage in our relationship had usually taken place in a bus shelter with at least three layers of clothing between us, this was indeed a spectacular accusation. Especially since at that age I didn't have enough confidence to play snooker on a snooker table, let alone shag on one. Not very Christian of Teresa in my opinion.
    Lizzie sploshes some more wine into our glasses and curls her feet up under her.
    'So, what terrible fate has befallen Buntam lately?'

Chapter 4
    A t work the next morning, I reeive a message to call Robin urgently. I am connected to her extension by another charming member of the Bristol Constabulary.
    She answers.
    'Robin, it's Holly Colshannon from the
Bristol Gazette
. We met yesterday.'
    'Holly! I was just about to call you! Stop the press! Have I got news for you!'
    'Have you?' I blink in surprise.
    She is jabbering madly like a demented typewriter. 'It just came to me! It is a PR opportunity to die for! I don't know why I didn't think of it before! This is the one, Holly! It took a hell of a lot to persuade them, but they have actually agreed to do it. It's only for six weeks though.'
    'Who are they? What have they agreed?'
    Robin leaves a dramatic pause and then says, really slowly, 'I. Have. Got. You. Assigned. To. A. Detective!'
    She breathes heavily down the phone, presumably waiting for the applause to come. The problem is Miss Thickie here doesn't quite understand. I frown to myself.
    'To a detective? How do you mean?'
    'Hol-ly,' she says impatiently. 'Instead of using the usual channels