The Other Woman's Shoes by Adele Parks Read Free Book Online Page A

missing out on a morning shag or facing the task of unearthing dog food in the filthy kitchen.
    Eliza showered and dressed and then warily ventured into the kitchen. It always looked and smelt even worse than she anticipated, hygiene not being a great concern of Greg’s. She hunted around for an unpolluted fork andthought despairingly about how depressing it was that one of the only washed items in the kitchen was Dog’s bowl and then only because it had been licked clean rather than felt the benefit of Fairy Liquid. Eliza scooped the foul-smelling dead horse into the bowl and gave it to Dog.
    ‘I shouldn’t have to do this, I’m a vegetarian,’ she yelled through to Greg who was, naturally, still in bed.
    ‘Since when?’
    ‘For ages, you just haven’t noticed.’
    ‘But you had a hotdog when we came out of that club the night before last.’
    Eliza was momentarily stumped. ‘There’s hardly any meat in those,’ she called back defiantly.
    ‘And you had fish and chips last night,’ argued Greg. He now stood in the doorway of the kitchen, stark bollock naked, sleepily rubbing his eyes and lighting a cigarette. A complicated fusion of pleasure and displeasure shone and shot through Eliza’s chest. She couldn’t deny it – he was an adorable, sexy mix of boy/man. She fancied the hell out of him.
    Literally.
    If the hell-raiser were out of him, he’d be her perfect man.
    Greg was tall and lean. He was in much better shape than he deserved to be, considering he existed entirely on a diet of takeaways, alcohol and tobacco. He wore his hair longer than was fashionable but somehow it suited him. He always needed a shave, even after he’d just had one.
    He was so fuckable.
    Although he did need a hair cut and their first-born would be called Child.
    ‘OK, I’m a pescarian then.’
    ‘I always thought you were Aquarius.’
    ‘Ha ha, very funny,’ commented Eliza. She reached for the previous evening’s Evening Standard and turned to the horoscopes. She was never sure if the day described was intended to be the same day the newspaper appeared, because that wouldn’t make much sense as everyone read the Evening Standard on their commute home from work, and by then there wasn’t much of the day left. Therefore the forecasts must be for the following day. To make sure, Eliza always read the newspaper on both days.
    This is a great day for working at relationships. If you have identified areas that you need to pay attention to with a certain person, there’s no time like the present for getting going. Clear communication will only be possible if you are entirely honest, particularly with yourself.
    The horoscope’s accuracy didn’t do much to cheer her up.
    ‘Look, I’m taking Dog for a run; you could make yourself useful by clearing away some of last night’s debris.’
    As usual, Greg’s flat was littered with empty cans and chip wrappers. There were breakfast pots that had been accumulating for at least the last four days. Eliza was trying to ignore them but she was aware that the odds were she’d break before Greg noticed them and soon she’d don her rubber gloves. Greg looked around the kitchen in a manner that confirmed to Eliza that he genuinely couldn’t see the towering piles of dirty pots,the overflowing black rubbish bag (there was no bin), the sticky gunk that decorated the lino or the grease on the hob. He did however see that the cereal box was empty.
    ‘Can you pick up some Crunchy Nut Corn Flakes whilst you’re out? No, get Coco Pops. No, get Frosted Shreddies. Oh God, I can’t decide. Which do you think?’
    Eliza let the door bang after her and didn’t bother to reply.

8
    Poor Dog. He’d rather fancied a brief trip to the nearest lamp-post or, at most, to the local corner shop to pick up the cereal, but Eliza had something altogether different in mind. She power-walked him through the streets, all the way along the bustling Uxbridge Road, dragged him past Shepherd’s Bush Green,