Sushi for Beginners - Marian Keyes [113]
‘I know. But be honest, is the pressure on you to bring them the head of Marcus Valentine?’
‘N-no;,’ she stuttered.
‘And they’re not leaning on you at work about it?’ he asked again.
‘No way.’ Ashling was adamant. ‘There’s been no mention of it, actually.’
‘Oh.’ After a spell of silence he added, ‘I see… I see.’
Looking out from under his eyelashes, he smiled slightly at her, and with a sudden warmth burring in her solar plexus, Ashling realized that she found him attractive. He must be the kind of person who grows on you. And he wasn’t really like his stage persona at all. Just as well – goofy gobshites weren’t exactly bedroom fodder.
Then he shifted, tilted his head against Ashling’s and said in a low, meaningful tone, ‘Would you like a bag of chips?’
‘No, thanks.’
‘So we’ve had a drink, you don’t want chips, all that remains on the agenda is…’ The rampant sex!
Though she’d lost count of the number of drinks she’d had, the idea filled her with sudden, inexplicable paralysis. Not exactly fear, but not exactly not fear either. She really liked him, she found him attractive, but…
‘Oh, would you mind… You see, I hadn’t planned to be out late tonight. Work in the morning and all that.’
‘0h right. Sure,’ he said evenly, but he wouldn’t look her properly in the eye. ‘We’d better get going then.’
He kissed her when he dropped her home, but somehow she wasn’t convinced by it.
33
Soft, pudgy hands stroking her face… Halfway between sleeping and waking, Clodagh dreamily savoured the heat of Molly’s hands touching the sensitive, yielding skin of her face. Lying on Clodagh’s chest, Molly breathed with earnest weight as she trailed her tender, sticky fingers along Clodagh’s chin, her cheeks, around her nose, her forehead and… OW! Ouch! Stars went off in her brain.
‘You punched me in the eye, Molly!’ Clodagh yelled, in shock from the violent awakening.
‘Mummy woke up,’ Molly said, in fake surprise.
‘Oh course Mummy woke up.’Clodagh cupped her hand over her blinded eye, which was sluicing water as though from a burst dam. ‘Getting a belt in the eye usually does that to a person.’
Shrugging Molly off her, she stumbled to the mirror to check the damage. She needed to look her best today because she had an appointment at an employment agency.
One side of her face was normal, the other was collapsed into tearful, bloodshot disaster. Damn. Then she noticed the pile of clothes on her chair, and went into her usual pre-Flor frenzy of tidying and hanging.
‘Get dressed, Craig,’ she called. ‘Molly, hurry, put your clothes on. Flor will be here.’
Thundering down the stairs, breakfast was the usual war-zone.
‘Don’t want the All-Bran,’ Craig screeched and bawled. ‘Want the Coco Pops.’
‘You can’t have the Coco Pops until the All-Bran is eaten,’ Clodagh said, pretending for a moment that she might be obeyed.
Her weekly shop included six-pack selection boxes of cereal, of which the Sugar-Puffs and Coco Pops always got scoffed immediately, while the boring ones like All-Bran mounted up in an abandoned slush-pile. Until they’d been consumed, she tried to resist being bullied into opening a new selection. And always caved in. Particularly today because time was of the essence. Tearing cellophane from a virgin six-pack, she thumped the Coco Pops in front of Craig. Then in her nightdress she hurried out to the car, retrieving several shopping bags from their hiding place in the boot. She often did that when she bought something new to wear. Even though Dylan never complained about her spending money on clothes, it didn’t stop her feeling guilty.
But this was different. While Dylan had been at work on the bank holiday, Clodagh had dumped the children with her arthritic mother and gone on a mini-spree. The bags that she hustled into the house contained young, funky party clothes, clothes that she wasn’t entirely confident how to wear. She’d also bought a suit in honour of her visit to the employment agency – about which Dylan knew nothing. She didn’t know why she hadn’t told him but she had a vague, free-floating suspicion that