Straight Talking by Jane Green Read Free Book Online Page A

pulled his chair up very close to mine and held my hand. “He loves you,” he said, “and he wouldn’t hurt you. I know what you’re thinking but it just isn’t Simon. He doesn’t look at other women when he’s with you. Trust me, he’s working. Maybe he had to go out to meet someone, maybe he went round to a journalist’s house. Whatever. He isn’t doing what you think he’s doing.
    “Do you want to stay here? You can, but I think Simon will be home very soon, and he’ll want to know where you are.”
    I finished my tea, took some deep breaths, and stood up feeling much better, trying to ignore those little niggly fears right at the bottom of my stomach. “Don’t tell him I was here. Please. I feel so stupid.” He wouldn’t, he said, unless of course Simon was already home, in which case he’d want to know where the hell was I.
    “Thank you, Adam,” I said as I reached up and hugged him very tightly. The sort of hug that says I’m in way too deep and I’m not sure I’m going to make it. The sort of hug that says please don’t let anything happen to me.
    Adam hugged me back, and I knew what he was saying. I knew those big warm circles he was making on my back with his hand meant everything’s going to be OK. Trust me. Everything’s going to be OK.
    But of course everything’s not going to be OK, is it, you know that as well as I do. When the seeds have been sown, it doesn’t take long for them to grow into a big, strong, vibrant affair. All you need is that one tiny seed, and so many of them are blowing around in the wind, you’d have to be bloody holy not to catch one, wouldn’t you? At least, if you’re a man. Bastards.
    I went home then, and as I took off Simon’s coat and pulled my trainers off, the front door opened and then Simon was in the doorway.
    “I’m so sorry, Fanny. What a nightmare,” he said, as he started unbuttoning his shirt.
    I wanted to shout, to scream, to lose control. What I should have said was, WHERE THE FUCK HAVE YOU BEEN? WHAT THE FUCK HAVE YOU BEEN DOING? But I didn’t. I said, “You could have called me, I was worried. I thought something had happened to you.”
    It came out sounding like a whine and it was not what I had meant to say at all. I don’t know whether this has ever happened to you but when I’m lucky enough to have found what I’m looking for, I’m terrified I’m going to lose it again.
    So instead of being Tasha the slasher, Tasha the strong fearsome woman, I’m Tasha the little girl, desperate for approval, frightened to fight, frightened to shout, just in case they don’t like me anymore.
    So when Simon turned round and said, “Don’t give me a hard time, Anastasia”—which is naturally what he called me when he was angry. Or guilty—I retreated back into my hole and started apologizing.
    “I’ve worked like a demon tonight, but we finished it, thank Christ,” he said, but he wasn’t looking at me. He couldn’t meet my eyes. “I’m never commissioning that pillock again. He can’t write to save his life.”
    I know what I should have said next, I should have asked him straight out, “Were you in the office?” but I didn’t want to trick him, I wanted to give him a chance to escape, to prove me wrong.
    “I called you and you didn’t pick up the phone. Why not?”
    “Jesus Christ, woman, it’s four A . M . and you’re quizzing me like I’m guilty of something, although heaven knows what. I heard the phone ringing but I didn’t pick it up because I was working to deadline. You of all people know what it’s like when you’re too busy to chat, and I knew it was you and it would just distract me.”
    Actually I don’t know what it’s like, because I’ve always thought that people make time for things they want to do. When someone says sorry I haven’t called, I’ve been too busy, it’s bollocks. Who hasn’t got time to pick up the phone and say a quick hello, a