Last Chance Saloon - Marian Keyes [190]
‘That’s Katherine with a K,’ Katherine emphasized slowly.
Lorcan repeated, with an indulgent grin, ‘That’s right, Katherine with a…’ Abruptly, he paused, the blood draining from his face. He’d just remembered who she was. Christ! Instantly he regretted having ever opened his mouth about semi-recognizing her. ‘You look different,’ he blurted.
‘It was a long time ago.’
‘Yeah, it was, wasn’t it? It must be, at least, let me see, seven years.’
‘Twelve and a half,’ she said, before she could stop herself. Then she really, really hated herself. How could she have been so transparent?
‘You’ve been keeping track.’ Lorcan laughed nervously. He was now very, very keen to leave, but as he started moving towards the door, he noticed the man sitting beside Katherine with a K. Holy Jesus, what was going on here? It was the pretty-boy exec who’d had him thrown off the butter ad. With sudden, heart-clenching paranoia, Lorcan wondered if this was a set-up. A type of court, or a roll-call of his life? His past finally running him to ground? Were there several more pissed-off women and disgruntled ex-colleagues lurking in the bedroom, ready to make an appearance? Then he told himself to stop being stupid. Coincidence. That’s all it was. ‘Hey,’ he tried to hide his anxiety with raucous, belittling laughter, ‘it’s Joe, Joe Roth.’
‘Lockery Liggery.’ Joe nodded with hostile politeness. ‘What a surprise.’
‘The name’s Lorcan.’
‘Isn’t that what I said?’ Joe’s innocent tone fooled no one.
A gleam appeared in Lorcan’s eye. He hadn’t forgotten the humiliation he’d suffered on the day of the ad, or the poverty he’d lived in since, or the career that had remained in the doldrums.
‘Are you two…?’ Lorcan slowly moved his finger between Katherine and Joe.
‘Are we two what?’ Joe asked.
‘Going out with each other?’
‘What’s it to you?’ Joe asked politely.
‘No, don’t tell me, you’re married’ Lorcan laughed.
‘We’re not married,’ Katherine said, her voice small and faraway.
‘Great!’ Lorcan said heartily. Then, to general alarm, he sat down on the other side of Katherine and, with slow deliberation, kissed her cheek. ‘Still hope for me, so.’
Amy made a tiny, anguished noise and Joe started angrily. ‘Just a –’
But, as everyone watched, stricken with disbelief, Katherine gave her shoulder to Joe and turned, like a flower reaching for the sun, towards Lorcan.
74
She’d never been able to resist him and she wasn’t about to start now.
She’d been almost nineteen, standing at a bar in Limerick, earnestly chatting to a lady she worked with, when Lorcan had first spotted her. He’d been feeling bored and irritable, like a cat without a bird, and suddenly the ennui lifted. ‘Look at that cute little girl there.’ He elbowed his friend, Jack.
‘She doesn’t look like your usual type,’ Jack said, in surprise.
‘She’s a girl,’ Lorcan pointed out. ‘That makes her my usual type. Cover me, I’m going in.’
When Delores, the woman she was with, went to get cigarettes, Katherine was surprised to hear a mellow, chocolatey voice behind her asking intimately, ‘Did it hurt?’
Startled, she turned. And found herself looking into the face of the most handsome man she’d ever seen in her – admittedly sheltered – life. He was lounging, elbow on the bar, smiling down at her, burning her face with his naked admiration. ‘Did what hurt?’
He paused and fixed his sherry-dark eyes on her intently. ‘When you fell from Heaven.’
She flushed, as she wondered if she was being ‘chatted-up’. If she was, it was a first. ‘I’m not from Heaven. I’m from Knockavoy.’ She’d always known she wasn’t very witty but, nevertheless, she was still bitterly disappointed with her answer.
But Lorcan laughed. ‘I love that. “I’m not from Heaven, I’m from Knockavoy.” That’s a good one.’
Some sort of nameless good feeling started to warm Katherine.
‘What’s your name?’ Lorcan asked, softly.
‘Katherine. That’s Katherine with a K,’ she added, with a solemnity that enchanted him.
‘And I’m Lorcan. Lorcan with an L.’
She giggled, entertained at the thought. ‘It’s hardly