Page 40 of To All the Men I’ve Killed Before

I give her a grateful smile. ‘Thank you so much,’ I say as she and her friends slip out of the booth, allowing Antoinette and I to take their place.

‘See?’ Antoinette says. ‘It’s so friendly here.’

‘Only because they’re drunk on craft cocktails.’

‘Drunk people in London would just try to start a fight.’

I laugh. ‘That’s not true. London is friendly.’

Antoinette raises an eyebrow. ‘So what are we drinking?’

I look at the menu, which is really cool – designed to look like an Old Hollywood gossip paper. The cocktails look amazing. They’re named after places in Hollywood like Whisky Go Go and The Roosevelt. There’s even a Chateau Marmont. I shudder.

‘Not alcohol,’ I say. ‘We need to be on our game.’ I’ve learned the hard way that being sloppy drunk leads to being a sloppy killer. No one likes a sloppy drunk. They like a sloppy killer even less.

‘Just a sparkling water then,’ she says and I order the drinks on my phone.

A server brings them over a little while later. As she’s placing them on our table I notice Antoinette’s eyes widen in shock.

‘What?’ I spin round, not sure what I’m expecting, but there’s nothing. Just people drinking, talking and laughing.

‘That guy, the one in the grey T-shirt,’ Antoinette says. ‘I’m sure I just saw him slip something in that girl’s drink.’

‘What?’ I say. ‘What was it?’

‘I don’t know, something in a little vial. He just poured it in while she was looking away!’

I stare at the guy. He doesn’t look shady. He’s wearing a vintage-looking T-shirt, old-style Levi’s and an earring in his right ear. There’s a thin gold chain around his neck. He has that carefully curated stubble that most of the men I’ve seen here are sporting. He’s laughing now, with the group of people he’s with. They look like they’re friends.

‘Are you sure?’ I ask Antoinette but she doesn’t answer because she’s jumped out of her seat and is making her way to the bar like she’s on a mission. I watch as she reaches the group and leans over the bar, trying to get the attention of a server. As she moves I see her hand slip out and knock over one of the drinks lined up on the bar. It goes everywhere, all down the side of the bar, on the floor, but mostly over the guy.

‘Oh my God, I am so sorry,’ Antoinette squeals, grabbing a handful of napkins and dabbing at his jeans. ‘I am so clumsy.’

‘Hey, don’t worry about it,’ says the guy, appeased by having Antoinette effectively paw him. ‘Accidents happen.’

‘I’ll replace the drink,’ Antoinette says but he waves her off.

‘Seriously, don’t worry about it, it’s fine.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘Of course, get back to your night.’

Antoinette gives the group a dazzling smile and shimmies back over to our booth.

‘She won’t be drinking that spiked drink now,’ she says to me, looking triumphant.

‘No,’ I say. ‘But you know he’s probably just going to spike someone else’s drink later.’

Antoinette gives me a wicked smile and holds out her fist, it’s curled around something. She unfurls her fingers and I see, in the palm of her hand, a little vial of clear liquid.

‘Swiped it when I was wiping him down,’ she says.

‘What? How?’

‘I learned how to pick pockets at boarding school,’ she says with a casual little shrug. ‘We used to practise when we went out on day trips. No one ever suspected a group of girls from an expensive school was going to steal from them. I’m quite good at it. My sleight of hand is unreal.’

‘So I see.’