Page 112 of Read My Lips

Ouch.

“I—”

“I think we’re done here, don’t you? For all our sake, just keep out of the way.”

The hinges on the door squealed as he shoved it open, and I slumped back against the edge of the sink as it hushed closed behind him. The bathroom was empty again. I was on my own. Like it turned out I always had been.

I didn’t go back to the table. Out there, Luke would have another go picking me apart and I’d have to listen to Simon knitting everything into the perfect excuse, and Richard confessing all. I’d have to dodge journalists snapping shots they could slap that paperbagjob hashtag all over.

I stood still so long the automatic lights turned off. Then I sat on the closed toilet seat in the propped open end stall, as the hum of chatter from the restaurant got quieter and quieter.

The light flashed on again when the door hinged wide. Simon’s ombre-toed shoes marked a sharply defined path across the tiles, and stopped in the doorway of my hideout. “Luke’s leaving,” he said, a little too loudly. “We got away with it. You can come out now.”

I forced myself to stand up.

“You should have seen him.” The spark in Simon’s eyes was back. “He’s spitting tacks – we’ll have to brace for publication. But Richard’s got a feature booked in with Beau Monde to get his version down formally. That’ll eclipse Luke’s editorial temper tantrum if he does still go to press. We got away with it.”

Energised by the win, he didn’t notice I wasn’t smiling back. Normally his beaming grin would be enough to sweep me up too. Today, static buzzed in my ears from everything Simon had told Luke, and everything Richard told me.

“Why did you say all that, out there?”

“What?”

“To Luke. With the camera on. About me. About my family.”

Simon frowned. “Because it’s the truth. Are you feeling okay?”

He reached out, but I knocked his hand away before he touched me.

“It’s not though is it? None of this bloody is.” A knot of horribleness twisted deep down in my gut. “We didn’t say anything because it wasn’t us. Because this whole thing is a crock of shit, and you just – filmed yourself talking about things I’ve only ever told you to try to prove to the bloody internet it isn’t.”

“Ben…” Simon visibly stopped himself reaching for me, voice as calm as ever, because Simon Azie never shouted. “Look. You didn’t have an answer for him and⁠—”

“I didn’t need an answer, did I? With Richard right there with his grand coming-out gesture two weeks too fucking late, telling me he’s got everything sorted.”

“Please don’t shout.” His eyes were soft, but I didn’t believe them. I should have never believed them.

This was all on me. He’d warned me he had the advantage, only I hadn’t believed him. I was the only one who hadn’t thought I was disposable to him after all these years.

“I get it,” I spat. “I see now, how you’re so bloody wonderful at this job of yours. You use everything you’ve got to make life come across how you want it to be. So why shouldn’t I be just another bit of kit in your fucking armoury.”

Simon’s face hardened, all the kindness in him blanked off completely. He looked like a stranger. And I hated it.

“You have never been that.”

“Then what the hell was that?”

“I did my job.” If that wasn’t shouting, I didn’t know the definition of the word. “You’re the one who came up with this ridiculous plan. I’ve been doing everything I can to sell it. To make it stick, against all the odds. And that’s what it took to make that vulture back off!”

“I get it. Worst idea I’ve ever had in my life. No one in the universe believes you’d want to shag me!”

“That is not what I said. You’re the only one who thinks that. All I’ve been doing is making sure Mel buys the bloody video, or you’d be hauled over the coals right along with me.”

I scoffed. “She never bought it anyway. It’s one big joke to the lot of you.”

“She bought you. She sees what we’ve got.”

My laugh twisted up my throat, coiling like razor wire. “We don’t have anything. Remember? It’s convenient sex to make Richard look better. And he doesn’t even bloody well want that.”