Sally was drinking Pernod and water, which was unbelievably disgusting but she’d been in need of Dutch courage and there hadn’t been anything else alcoholic in the flat. Talking things through with Lola would have helped but Lola was away for the night, being wined and dined at a publisher’s dinner being held in a hotel in Berkshire.

She had to do this on her own. Well, with the aid of Pernod.

‘Go on then,’ said Gabe. ‘Thrill me.’

Having psyched herself up to tell him, Sally abruptly lost her temper.

‘See? See? You’re still doing it!’ Her eyes narrowed and her voice rose as Gabe chucked his jacket over the back of the chair. ‘Even now! I’m trying to tell you something that you’ll want to hear and you’re being all distant and sarcastic.’

‘I’m sorry. Right, I’m listening. See?’ Gabe made his face, deliberately blank. ‘Not being sarcastic at all.’

And now he was treating her like a child. Her stomach in knots, Sally blurted out, ‘Well, don’t worry, soon you can be as sarky as you like because I won’t be here to see it. I’m moving out.’

A muscle was going in Gabe’s jaw For a couple of seconds he just stood there looking at her.

Then he turned away. ‘Right. Good for you.’

‘Is that it?’ Adrenaline was sloshing through her body. ‘Is that all you’re going to say?’

‘What else do you want me to say? OK, I’ve got something. Have you told Lola yet?’

‘What?’ Sally took a step back. ‘No, because she’s not here. I’ll tell her tomorrow when she gets back.’

Gabe raised an eyebrow. ‘And how do you think she’ll react?’

‘Oh, come on, it’s not that big a deal!’

‘Sure about that?’

‘We’re all adults!’

‘But you haven’t mentioned it before now, have you?’

‘Because I only decided tonight! My God, why are you being like this? I’m leaving.’ Pernod flew out of Sally’s glass as she flung her arms wide. ‘Isn’t that enough? I thought you’d be delighted to have me out of here. And what’s this about?’ Agitatedly jabbing a finger at his discarded jacket, she cried, ‘You spend your life nagging me but it’s OK for you to act like a slob. Would it kill you to hang that up?’

Slowly and deliberately, Gabe picked up the jacket. As he made his way past her he murmured,

‘Poor sod, does he know what he’s letting himself in for?’

Will you shut up? I’ve worked for him for the last two years, haven’t I? So I can’t be that unbearable!’

Gabe stopped dead. ‘Worked for who?’

‘Dr Willis!’

He gazed at her in utter disbelief. ‘You’re having an affair with Dr Willis?’

‘What?’ Sally let out a shriek. ‘For crying out loud, what are you on? How could you think I’m having an affair with Dr Willis?’

‘But ... but ..

‘He’s old.’ Sally wailed. ‘And he’s married.’

‘So who are you moving in with?’

‘Dr Willis. And his wife. But I won’t be living with them, not in the same house. It’s a self-contained annexe.’ Sally mimed self-containment with her hands. ‘When I wake up in the morning I’ll see sheep.’

Gabe was gazing at the almost empty glass of Pernod. ‘How many of those have you had?’

‘One. It’s vile. And can we please stop arguing now, because I’m not moving out tonight. I’m going to be here for another four weeks yet.’

He shook his head in confusion. ‘I don’t understand the bit about the sheep. At all.’

‘There’s loads of them, all over the hills.’

Gabe said evenly, ‘Where are these sheep? Where is this house?’

‘Near Skipton. In Yorkshire. That’s where I’m going to be living.’ As she said the words, Sally wondered if she really wanted to go. ‘Living and working. It’s a fresh start.’

‘Why?’

‘Why? Because I’m hoping it’s going to be nicer than living in London. My boss is moving to Yorkshire and he offered me a job in his new practice.You don’t want me here in this flat, you’ve made that perfectly obvious. Of course I’ll miss Lola, but it’s not going to stop me ...

Skipton’s a really friendly place, I’ll meet loads of new people, the views are—’

‘So what happened?You and Nick broke up? Or is he moving up there too?’

For a split second she couldn’t work out who he meant. ‘Nick who?’

Gabe gave her a look. ‘Come on. I know.’

Sally didn’t know what he knew, but she- felt herself flushing anyway. Great waves of heat and shame swept over her. If Gabe knew, that meant Nick must have told him. Except ... oh God ... it was far more likely that Nick would have told Lola who in turn had told Gabe, so basically they’d all been laughing at her behind her back.

‘OK, I get it.’ As her flush deepened Gabe said dismissively, ‘You’re moving up there together.’

‘What are you talking about?’ Sally stared at him; how could he even think this? ‘I’m not having an affair with Lola’s dad!’

‘You mean it’s over?’

‘I mean it never happened!’

‘No? Take a look in the mirror.’ Gabe’s tone was triumphant. ‘If it’s not true, tell me why you’ve gone redder than a traffic light.’

‘Oh, I’m sorry, are we in court?’ That was it; Sally lost the last vestige of control. ‘Are you the lawyer for the prosecution? Not that it’s any business of yours, but just to shut you up and get you off my back, the reason I’ve gone red is because, OK, I did have a bit of a crush on Lola’s dad a while back and I did make a complete idiot of myself one afternoon telling him I liked him. But he was very nice about it and turned me down really gently, and I don’t know what makes you think it ever went any further than that, but it definitely didn’t. And if you don’t mind, I’d really prefer it if Lola never found out.’ Unable to meet his gaze, she said, ‘Can we stop talking about this now? It’s humiliating.’

No reply. Sally carried on staring at the floor. Finally she heard Gabe say, ‘There’s nothing going on between you?’

Her hands clenched in frustration. ‘For God’s sake! Isn’t that what I just said?’

‘Sorry. Just checking. The afternoon you made a bit of an idiot of yourself ...’

‘An awful lot of an idiot of myself’ In fact, actually admitting it out loud felt quite cathartic.

‘OK, but was it a Sunday afternoon?’

Sally nodded and gritted her teeth, cringing at the memory. The ridiculous thing was, she no longer even thought about Lola’s dad. The crush had died as quickly as it had sprung up, almost as if subconsciously she’d always known it would never turn into anything more. ‘Yes, it was a Sunday. Lola was working. You were off out somewhere.’

‘And you and Nick were standing over there, by the window’ As he pointed, a glimmer of a smile appeared at the corners of Gabe’s mouth for the first time in what felt like months.

‘I suppose so. Yes.’ Admittedly she’d been slightly the worse for drink at the time but not so far gone that she couldn’t remember the way the winter sunlight had streamed through the window, lighting up the glints in Nick’s dark hair ... oh! The penny dropped. ‘You were outside the flat!’

Her mouth fell open. ‘You were watching me make a prat of myself!’

‘I didn’t know you were making a prat of yourself. He had his arms around you.’

‘He was keeping me upright. And I don’t know if I ever mentioned this, but I’ve had a bit of a bad leg.’ Sally couldn’t believe what she was witnessing; before her very eyes Gabe was metamorphosing from the tetchy grump of the past few weeks back into the old sparkly-eyed human Gabe she’d missed so desperately since the evil twin had taken his place.Chapter Chapter 51

’I thought you were shagging him.’ Gabe’s whole face had changed, cleared. He was smiling now with what appeared to be relief.

Glad the misunderstanding had been cleared up but mystified by the relief, Sally said, ‘Is that why you’ve been so stroppy and weird?’

He hesitated, then nodded. ‘You could say that.’

‘All because you thought I was having a thing with Nick? Would Lola really have hated it that much?’

There was that old familiar smile again, as if he knew something she didn’t. Shaking his hair out of his eyes, Gabe said, ‘No idea.’

‘But that’s why you were so iffy.’

A longer pause this time. Much longer. Finally he raked his hair back with his fingers.

‘Actually, that wasn’t why I was ... iffy. I just didn’t think you should be seeing him.’

‘You didn’t approve? Because of the age difference?’ Sally hazarded. Blimey, who’d have thought it? ‘But he’s only twelve years older than me.’

Gabe grinned, shook his head and looked ... well, to be honest she wasn’t absolutely sure how he looked. If it had been anyone else she might have said embarrassed.

Finally he took a deep breath. ‘OK, I can’t quite believe I’m standing here saying this, but the reason I wasn’t happy about it—’

‘Not happy about it? Ha, that’s an understatement!’

‘Don’t interrupt,’ Gabe ordered. ‘Let me get this out before I lose my nerve. The reason I was bloody furious about it was because I was . I was ...’

Encouragingly Sally said, ‘Spit it out.’

‘Oh, for crying out loud, it was because I was jealous.’ He threw both hands up in the air. ‘There.

Said it. Now you know.’ Sally stopped dead in her tracks. Surely not, surely not .. . Gabe shrugged. ‘Sorry.’

‘Oh my God. Gabe! That explains so much,’ Sally blurted out. ‘I even guessed! I asked Lola and she said I was wrong, but I knew, right from the word go!’

‘You did?’ It was Gabe’s turn to look stunned.

‘I knew before I even met you.’

‘What?’

‘The whole tidiness thing.’ She was triumphant. ‘Dead giveaway. Keeping everything neat and always nagging me to clear up my stuff. All that hassle about not leaving my plates on the carpet. Forever complaining when I forget to hang up the towels in the bathroom. It’s so obvious.’

‘You really think I’m gay?’

Flummoxed, Sally said, ‘Isn’t that what you’re telling me?’

‘No’ Gabe clutched his head, looking as if he was on the brink of tearing his hair out. His eyes, wide with disbelief, fixed on hers. The next moment he reached out and grabbed her.

Before Sally knew what was happening, she was being kissed. His warm mouth covered hers, her whole body was pressed against Gabe’s, her skin was zinging like sherbet and ... cut.

Just as abruptly as it had begun, the kiss ended. Gabe let her go and she was left standing there like a cartoon character, dazed and panting and with confusion in the form of giant question marks exploding out of her head.

‘I can’t believe you thought I was gay.’ Gabe was breathing, heavily too.

‘But ...’

‘Oh shit, this is all going wrong. I thought I could do it but I can’t.’

Before she could react, he was gone. The door of the flat slammed shut behind him and Sally heard his footsteps clattering down the staircase. She sank down onto the sofa and clutched her hands tightly together to stop them trembling. Her palms were damp too; desperate though she was for a glug of Pernod she knew the glass would slip through her fingers and crash to the floor.

OK, concentrate. Gabe had jumped to the wrong conclusion. And so had she. He wasn’t gay, she was certainly convinced of that now And if he wasn’t jealous at the thought of Nick being involved with someone else, then it stood to reason that he had to be jealous at the thought of her seeing another man...

Shaking now, Sally replayed the incredible thought in her mind. But how could this be happening, exploding like a bomb in front of her with no warning at all?

And why was she feeling, amongst all the confusion and disbelief, as if it was something she’d been longing to happen for months?

But so secretly that she’d barely even acknowledged it, because it was simply the most unlikely scenario on the planet.

Sally wrapped her arms around her waist, rocking back and forth in order to think more clearly.

Had she, deep down, been seriously attracted to Gabe since the first time she’d clapped eyes on him?

Yes.

Had she ever considered doing anything about it? No.

Never.

Because it was like fancying George Clooney from afar. Millions of women did, it was an absolutely harmless pastime. But they also knew that if they happened to bump into George Clooney, the chances were that he probably wouldn’t fancy the pants off them in return and pester them for a date.

And that was pretty much how it felt, inwardly acknowledging that Gabe was gorgeous and funny and pretty damn fanciable – if a bit over-zealous in the tidiness department.